Pirates Of The Caribbean: Salazar’s Revenge, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T.,Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Johnny Depp, Javier Bardem, Geoffrey Rush, Brenton Thwaites, Kaya Scoderlario, Kevin McNally, Golsifteh Farahani, David Wenham, Stephen Graham, Martin Klebba, Angus Barnett, Adam Browne, Giles New, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley, Paul McCartney, Bruce Spence.

 

Every tale has an ending, the circle completed and the finale one that can be passed down as being just as riveting or exciting as the original, the one that started the quest in the first place; if not then dead men and bored but faithful audiences tell no tales, for nobody likes a sequel to be a failure.

Pirates Of The Caribbean: Salazar’s Revenge, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T.,Liverpool. full post

(538 words, estimated 2:09 mins reading time)

Snatched. Film Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * *

Cast: Amy Schumer, Goldie Hawn, Ike Barinholtz, Wanda Sykes, Joan Cusack, Tom Bateman, Bashir Salahuddin, Christopher Meloni, Óscar Jaenada.

 

Mixed: a sense of neither engaging, being fun enough to overlook the obvious, or unresponsive enough to find certain aspects of the film entertaining; for Snatched, it might go down on its epitaph that this particular film is neither here nor there. Its ideas are laudable but not sincere, that it brings one of the greats of her time in Goldie Hawn back to the screen but then doesn’t relish the part that she plays as the once gregarious girl of the film’s past nor as the woman who made films such as Death Becomes Her and Private Benjamin such sublime pieces of art.

Snatched. Film Review. full post

(449 words, estimated 1:48 mins reading time)

It’s Not You.

It’s not you…

I look in the mirror

each time I feel this darkness

descend, I know it’s not you

but the mirror

sneers and lies to me,

my reflection

haunted, incapable of compassion,

scorns and sniggers

whilst all the time never letting me go,

the mirror it seems

is the victor

in this battle, it knows

how to bring me down,

cashing in on the fact

that I must stare into the abyss

again and again, to lose sight of the dead and the forgotten

It’s Not You. full post

(205 words, estimated 49 secs reading time)

Chris Stapleton, From A Room. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

We all sit at times in our rooms, the décor may change, the furniture may find its way to the local dump after many years of being held together with Blue-tac, elbow grease and luck but in the end we find ourselves where we are comfortable, our nest, the sense of relaxation or protection, our safety net…whichever way you hold it up to scrutiny, From A Room is where we learn to sing.

Chris Stapleton, From A Room. Album Review. full post

(427 words, 1 image, estimated 1:42 mins reading time)

Only Child, Working Class. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Rue the day you ever ignore the sound of the angry, of those that a Government decides to dismiss as unworthy or lacking in substance to be anything but a nuisance in their corpulent hides, rue that day you forget what makes a country work, what makes it truly a place in which people look out for each other and not descend into the realms of distance and dispensed with compassion; for in that day the anger, if history has taught us anything is the day when those oppressed, those overlooked and rejected will fight back and see an edifice crumble.

Only Child, Working Class. E.P. Review. full post

(501 words, estimated 2:00 mins reading time)

John Jenkins, Postcards From Mabelthorpe. Single Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

For many the seaside was not just a place of fun, of rest from the daily grind and the knowledge that for a week or two there would be something other than the feeling of oppression in the factory air, it was a home, it was the place where you could be yourself and see the world with fresh eyes and a clean soul. For the British before the advent of package holidays and the young spending their money on the excitement of going abroad, this was also the time when the family got together, where perhaps the differences between the generations were slowly eroded away and in between bouts of boredom, something magical may happen, something that always ended with the words Wish You Were Here on the back of a set of Postcards from Mabelthorpe.

John Jenkins, Postcards From Mabelthorpe. Single Review. full post

(510 words, estimated 2:02 mins reading time)

My Uncle Charlie.

Was there anything you couldn’t do,

a second dad to me,

my father’s best friend

then

and now and for as long

as I breath

you are a hero,

decked out in Bournemouth

red and black, yet

we attended Southampton games together,

football of any colour,

our finest moment

off the field

was to sit together at Old Trafford,

your first visit, my first victory in Blue;

on the back of the Daily Mirror

when Monday came.

You stopped at our house on Manilla Road

My Uncle Charlie. full post

(181 words, estimated 43 secs reading time)

Avatarium, Hurricanes And Halos. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Beauty without arrogance must be allowed room to be savoured, the sense of the silence at the heart of the tornado, the whisper of love between two angels and a well thought of demon, beauty must be seen but not worshipped, it must be cared for but not taken for granted and once it has the attention of all who see it for the natural state it is, then no matter what, no matter the demon and the angel involved, what you have is Hurricanes And Halos and both are as attractive as each other and both startle when confronted for the first time.

Avatarium, Hurricanes And Halos. Album Review. full post

(379 words, 1 image, estimated 1:31 mins reading time)

Jenny Lascelles, Backbone. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The sound of the sweet can be the most heavenly, there is a sense of innocent wonder that reflects in the voice of such an artist, the listener entranced by the thoughtful phrase, the word of the charming and considerate; yet along knowing that inside the sweet is lioness, a roar from the jungle which whilst might not heard at close hand, still echoes far and wide and shows the other animals in the domain not to mess with the queen.

Jenny Lascelles, Backbone. Album Review. full post

(401 words, estimated 1:36 mins reading time)

Inspector George Gently: Gently Liberated. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Martin Shaw, Lee Ingleby, Heather Carroll, Lisa McGrillis, Lorcan Cranitch, Steven Elder, Don Gallagher, Simon Hubbard, Emma Rigby, Victoria Bewick, Anamaria Marinca, Maria Stockley, Robert Lonsdale, Derek Hutchinson, Paul Warriner, Rachel Teate, Christopher Tembey.

 

A television series can too often outlive its life expectancy, the natural story that drew the viewer in coming to a stuttering halt and becoming less than the perfect ideal viewing it once was proudly claimed to be. In some cases though what might have been perceived as the final adventures of a much loved character might not be enough, the finale of a person’s life left hanging, stuck in the rounds of congratulations and non-committal farewells. Such was the fate of Martin Shaw’s Inspector George Gently, left dangling after a successful case cracked, there really was a couple of more hurrahs left in the soul but none seemed forth coming.

Inspector George Gently: Gently Liberated. Television Review. full post

(475 words, estimated 1:54 mins reading time)