Magic In The Moonlight, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Cast: Colin Firth, Emma Stone, Simon McBurney, Dame Eileen Atkins, Hamish Linklater, Jeremy Shamos, Ute Lemper, Antonia Clarke, Natasha Andrews, Valérie Beaulieu, Peter Wollasch, Jürgen Zwingel, Wolfgang Pissors, Sébastien Siroux, Catherine McCormack, Erica Leerhsen, Didier Muller, Marcia Gay Harden, Jackie Weaver, Ronald Alphonse, Ronald Baker, Kelly Keto, Olivier Marchevet, Geroges Edouard Nouel, Mark Sims, Paul Bandey, Rudolf Krause, Patrick Zard, Pedro Chomnalez,  Jessica Forde, Lionel Abelanski.

 

Magic In The Moonlight, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T, Liverpool. full post

(541 words, estimated 2:10 mins reading time)

Doctor Who: Engines Of War. Book Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

It was perhaps arguably one of the greatest twists in the long history of the much loved television series Doctor Who, the appearance of John Hurt as The Doctor who went to war. The Time War, talked about since the return of the man from Gallifrey, perhaps a throw-away line to get round why the programme had been shamefully off air in its original format, one film aside, since 1989. An off the cuff comment which came to be the dystopian nadir in which tantalised the show’s legion of fans like a hungry wolf being offered a free slap up meal with a herd of caribou and then getting to have the dinner guests for deserts.

Doctor Who: Engines Of War. Book Review. full post

(521 words, estimated 2:05 mins reading time)

Murasaki Baby, Game Review. PS Vita.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Murasaki Baby is a side scrolling platform adventure game available for download from the PlayStation Store for the PS Vita. The game was announced at GamesCom 2013 to much acclaim and anticipation, so the ultimate question entering the release must be; can the final build of the game stand up to the hype?

The story of Murasaki Baby sees the lead character that is abstractly referred to as Baby rather than a distinctive name being lost a nightmarish world full of her worst fears as she explores various moods in an attempt to find a way back into the safety of her mother.

Murasaki Baby, Game Review. PS Vita. full post

(1354 words, estimated 5:25 mins reading time)

Now You’re 64.

Now that I’m older, still dying my hair

With many fears about why and how.

Will you still be sending me books on crime

Poirot, Marple, even Harry Lime?

If I’d not phoned till quarter to three

Would you have a search party at my door?

Will you still need me, no need to feed me

Now your 64?

 

I am older too

And because you brought me into the world

I will forever love you.

 

I was never that handy mending your clothes

Now You’re 64. full post

(251 words, estimated 1:00 mins reading time)

April In Paris, Theatre Review. Floral Pavilion, New Brighton.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Shobna Gulati, Joe McGann.

Paris is the city of many dreams, it whispers across the Channel and throughout Europe like a tempting lover, slowly cocking its finger, begging that you come armed with flowers and an open mind. Together with knowing full well that the first time you lay eyes on sights such as Sacre Coeur, the Moulin Rouge, the magnificence of the Eiffel Tower and the haunting gothic nature of Notre-Dame, Paris will capture the heart and have you professing love, even if the word is an alien as the thought of not having the stomach to try the gastronomic delights on offer in April in Paris.

April In Paris, Theatre Review. Floral Pavilion, New Brighton. full post

(480 words, estimated 1:55 mins reading time)

Kobra And The Lotus, Gig Review. o2 Academy, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

It’s not every day you find a cobra on stage entertaining a crowd so completely but the difference is that this particular Kobra has got bite. A tempting creature who, had she been placed somewhere on hand in the Garden of Eden wouldn’t have had any trouble in tempting the guardians of the Tree of Knowledge into sacrificing their cushy life and no doubt which ever deity happened to be wandering past at the time, then this Kobra would have happily taken them down the path to true Metal redemption also.

Kobra And The Lotus, Gig Review. o2 Academy, Liverpool. full post

(520 words, estimated 2:05 mins reading time)

Scare Tactics, Gig Review. 02 Academy, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

It doesn’t quite matter when, for timing is unimportant in such matters, but at some point when watching Scare Tactics inside the 02 Academy as they support America’s Metal sensation Kobra and the Lotus, you will feel the floor buzz as if you have somehow placed your feet on a carpet of the biggest, meanest and understandably angry bees going. The buzz turns to a loud hum and in time becomes the type of noise in which images of 747 jet plane, perhaps being piloted by the largest bee ever seen and who woke up with a hangover the size of The Empire State Building, comes across in waves. It is palpable, it is magnificent and the beat is relentless.

Scare Tactics, Gig Review. 02 Academy, Liverpool. full post

(460 words, estimated 1:50 mins reading time)

Black Diamond, Gig Review. 02 Academy, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

It is a responsibility that must be faced with strength and humility that if you find a young group of musicians who have blown you away the very first time you see them, you have to go and find them again, give them another listen to just make sure that what you heard was a musical truth and not the first signs of sentimental middle age. You owe it to yourself to go along with a view of dispassionate attention and steel yourself to find that age has tempered your thinking.

Black Diamond, Gig Review. 02 Academy, Liverpool. full post

(599 words, estimated 2:24 mins reading time)

Rose Of June, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Iain Hopkins, Gemma Banks, Christopher Rae.

Nobody has the monopoly on grief, nobody feels the dejection in the same way as anybody else and nobody should ever dictate to another human being just how long grief should ever take to get through the system. When a person loses someone either close to them or someone they may have only known through the public eye of the media, what they feel upon that person’s departure is real to them and in the end it takes a friend just sit and listen and occasionally talk in which the inconsolable and heartbroken can work through the five stages of grief.

Rose Of June, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(484 words, estimated 1:56 mins reading time)

New Tricks: Roman’s Ruined. Television Review. B.B.C.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Tamzin Outhwaite, Dennis Waterman, Nicholas Lyndhurst, Denis Lawson, Tracy-Ann Oberman, Liz White, Louis Emerick, Storme Toolis, Carol Starks, Hermione Gulliford, Gary Oliver, Alix Wilston Regan, Elliot Levey.

What did the Romans ever do for us? It might have been possible to hear John Cleese remonstrate with the three life-hardened detectives in New Tricks’ latest episode Romans Ruined but far from the nice simple case that perhaps Gerry Standing was expecting, what they find at the end of the investigation is a crime that, at least in the team’s hearts, is not the ending they would have liked to pursue.

New Tricks: Roman’s Ruined. Television Review. B.B.C. full post

(515 words, estimated 2:04 mins reading time)