Ulysses

 I am 70 yar old and 71 yar ago the Ulysses film came out starring Kirk Douglas. It made an impression when I first watched it as a 10 yar old. Now as it happens there is a picture theatre right across the road from where we are staying here. So we booked a ticket for the afternoon session and relived the Essendon days by having sliders at Grill'd. The new film is long and loud and has less emphasis on Gods than its predecesor. I can remember a lot of that first film but would be interesting to find a copy to watch again somewhere. We tried the rooftop pool for an hour or so before retreating.

Largercrantz

Haven't done much reading except for the last week when I went away, I quickly grabbed a book to take. However I took one I had read last year.  My marking of the pages must have been forgotten but I reread it anyway even though you get that deja vu feeling.  There are five of the Lisbeth Salander saga so far and an Eye for an Eye has some stock market manipulation going on at the end, so there is another book in the series.  It was the Spider's Web that I had not read but it turned up on TV the night before we left. After watching that film, other characters that had been mentioned started dropping into place. It is better to read these things in order.  PS There are a few Lisbeth Salander actors getting around which makes it more confusing. 

Queen The Movie

This is a good show.  I have seen just about everything to do with Queen except Freddie live.  Rami Malek must have studied Freddie for hours to get those moves just so.  This is the most people I have seen in a picture theatre for years and at the end we were all clapping.  We have found a sneaky car park about three hundred metres from the Village Cinema in Geelong. It is the first time I have been in there since a 43° day about 15 yar ago and I managed to sit thru the whole show without needing to go, which was better than about 50 other people.

Legends

Solo

Managed to get to the flicks even if we have to drive a bit further these days but we did get back to our old Waurn Ponds favourite Readings.  It's further than Geelong but parking is free except the shopping centre has tripled in size since we last bothered to notice so parking seemed tight on a Sunday afternoon.  The Solo show continues the side bar method of joining some more Star Wars dots together. They brought in the A Team acting cast for this one.  Chewie seems to be the one unstoppable character in the whole saga. 

Khaleesi

The Greatest Show

I can't remember if I have ever been to the pictures twice in a week. As musicals go this one was much better than LaLa Land.  There was plenty of poetic licence used but the show must go on.  Not sure what happened to Bailey. 

These guys don't look like they strut

Three Billboards

This film has a hard edge with a few funny moments.  I am always playing a game around spotting the "Game of Thrones" actors in other films.  However there is one actor you can never miss being a bit short on stature.  Films based in the south of the US always have their rednecks and there are plenty in this film.  There is a classic speech where a priest is accused of being in a religious gang and if one of those gang members is culpable then they all are.

Female Redneck

Last Jedai

This was an improvement on Disney's first effort being Episode VII. I think Rogue One was their best effort so far.  It seems to me there is no body left to fight the bad guys now.  And another thing, how do they get so many bad guys?  We spent $97 for two of us, $39 on some sliders and $51 for two IMAX seats and $7 for one choc top.  You couldn't do that every day.

They come in threes

We watched a rerun of the War of the Worlds where Tom Cruise does a lot of running from the bad guys.  Then during my daily ripping of the old record pile I plucked out the War of the Worlds music version by Jeff Wayne.  I can't even remember buying this and it's a double album.  It is music song and a narrative by Richard Burton and this time it is set in England.  I remember listening to this story numerous times from one end to the other and you need at least 100 minutes for the whole thing.  I must have had plenty of spare time once.  Finally, the mail came and inside was a copy of Red Mars filling another gap in my Hugo  List.  The Martians are invading this address at least.

Fahrenheit 451

This is the second book in the Hugo list. Would you give a book an award when its theme is about burning other books?  The theme is really about censorship and what you can and can't read. This book written in 1953, is not that long after the Germans were burning books in the 1930s. We visited Bebelplatz in Berlin in 2015 where books met their demise.  Mel Gibson was going to do a remake of the film but now HBO are doing it.

451℉ is the optimum temperature for burning books

HCW-580

My old video camera was starting to show some ragged edges at the end of every scene.  You could edit this out but didn't seem like a good idea with a tour of Europe coming up.  It did the job for 5 years.  There aren't as many of these types of cameras around any more. Videos via smart phones seem to be all the rage but you can't fool me.  I did find one which is a HC-W580M.  They don't come with hard drives any more either so this one is much lighter. It also has a second lens which can be rotated thru 180°.  Not sure how this is going to work but picture in picture is what it says in the manual. The batteries are always an issue. I have three perfectly good batteries from the previous model that match perfectly except for a deliberate design effort to force you to buy new batteries. If I could be bothered there is a lug which if I filed off would make the old batteries compatible with the new camera.

No longer three lugs on top and bottom

More Aliens

Covenant means agreement. I can't see how there is anything much agreeable in Alien films.  There never seems to be much hope.  They are literally hopeless in that no matter how someone fights to survive against the nasty creatures they always end up dead.  There is a pattern to these films. Heroines beat off the bad guy and make it to the end of the film only to be killed off before they even get into the next film.

And another thing: Androids seem to be more trouble than they are worth

Hidden Figures

This film reminded me of when I was learning Fortran. It was on a Cyber that took up a whole building and you had to wait in a queue for the punch card machine then you waited in another queue to get your card deck submitted for input.  In this film there was a magic 20 or so cards that produced a whole set of rocket trajectories. Poetic license at its best.

Those were the days

Collendina Report No 983

We have used the Hoyts Kiosk for three days.  The Girl on the Train is a whodunit with the usual little tricks to throw you off the scent. Morgan is a SciFi thriller from Ridley Scott but I wouldn't pay too much to see it. Its been done before. Test Tube baby grows up and runs amok.  The last one was Light between Oceans. This is an Aussie film based on a book which I know I've read but I can't find any mention of in this blog. So I'm wondering if I read it in 2012 when it came out.  The whose who of old aussie actors are in this one.

A Chick Flick

I found the Stedman book on the shelf and it had flight tickets to Lord Howe Island inside. I new I had read it recently.

LALALand

You would have to be in lalaland to give this film 10 out of 10. If you are going to have a musical then get singers to fill the main parts rather than actors who can't sing.  Moulin Rouge had actors who couldn't sing but they did a better job than these two.  You would have to go back to Grease for the last great musical.  Went over to the Skyways for a meal.  This place was busy and the food was much better than First&Last. Why do they call it First&Last because the first time you go in there is also your last.

Over Rated

Daily DVD

We have seen a DVD each day thanks to the two Hoyts vendors at the supermarket.  It's a bit like a 15 hour flight, by the time you have finished you can't remember which films you have just seen.  For the record they were Jason Bourne, Central Intelligence,The BFG, Mechanic Resurrection, The Duel, Ghostbusters, Marauders, Finding Dory, Hollow Point, The State of Jones, Your Kind of  Traitor, Huntsman Winter War and I.T.  Some of these were B grade including the I.T. film with Pierce Brosnan. This one had some up to date gadgets but it still had that B feel to it.  But for $4 its cheaper than streaming.

Rogue One

It has taken me two weeks to get to see this film. I think it is much stronger than the previous offering from Disney since they took over.  Knowing the timeline is required. I think this one is around Star Wars 3.5 and does not follow on from Star Wars 7. The scenes and action are much improved. Readings let us in for $10 each which seems better than Hoyts.  The road to Waurn Ponds has changed with numerous new subdivisions.

Star Wars go to the beach

Macbeth Revisited

I saw last years film version of Macbeth.  I have often bemoaned how films can stray too far away from the book. It seems that not even Shakespeare is immune from the screenwriter's licence.  They had rewritten chunks in Ye Olde Speake which is hard enough but at least the story was essentially being maintained.  I was patiently waiting for the conversation between Banquo and Fleance about the concealment of night.  Not only did Fleance miss out on that line, he does not utter a single word during the whole film and yet mysteriously arrives in the final scene to take Macbeth's sword away. And Macbeth doesn't even lose his head in this version, although he does get stabbed to death for his sins.  The Scottish scenery in the film is worth it. The aussie actress Debicki has a burning role in this film.

King Duncan

Accountants and other killers

My real accountant just told me the Tax return money I was getting back is a mistake. I should sic Ben Affleck onto him. When he finds a mistake then payback is made with bullets. As far as the film goes, I've seen it all before, either Matt Damon or Arnie Schwarzenegger or Bruce Willis go after the bad guys knocking them all off against the odds.  I'd wait for the TV version.

never heard of a computer

Inferno revisited

Saw the Inferno film last night. Always interesting to see places in film where you have been yourself.  I wish I had known beforehand that there was a door behind Armenia in the map room of Palazzo Vecchio. This must be the most changed film of all time when compared to the book. Characters missing, others promoted and the ending is completely changed compared to what Dan Brown put in there.

Why are secret doors not locked?

Tourists, Dwarfs and other miscreants

"In Bruges" would be more interesting if you have been to Bruges. This is a crazy film about honour among thieves. There are a few lines in the film stating they are crazy.  This is OK to while away two hours in a plane but don't go out of your way to see it.  Dwarfs have come along way since Game of Thrones but I think this film is belittling them again. HaHa.

Killer tourists