Space Beasties & Psycho Killers

The Hidden is a scifi potboiler about an amusingly murderous body-hopping alien hunted by an expressionless Kyle McLachlan and despite the cliche-ridden script and cheesy acting it was quite good fun. It is 80's tastic though so get ready for some terrible suits, fast cars and rock music among the gunfire, mayhem and nonsense.


Shuttle is nasty thriller about some girls who accept a ride back from the airport in some nutter's minibus. Most of the cast are studio-bots except the driver who plays a rather convincing psycho - turns out the actor is Scottish so that explains that I suppose - but anyways as the journey spirals into more and more preposterous situations I guess the quality of acting doesn't really matter much as the blood letting comes to the fore.

Scientific Scintillates

Fricking mind boggling spiderish nanobots, from ScienceDaily

Jupiter's lost it's southern belt though apparently it's not the first time.

Those gravity lows might just be some ancient tectonic plates sinking into the mantle.

Rise & hopefully imminent fall of the Libservatives

Urgh, just 24hrs from the merest glimpse of a radical shift towards a progressive majority it's all gone & now we have the madness of a Lib-Con coalition. I reckon we'll have another election in 18 months max - the chances of Clegg and Cameron keeping their parties in line longer than that I think is highly unlikely, especially once the Libs see the damage they've just inflicted on themselves and the Cons grow tired of having their hands tied. I'm not alone in my scepticism - Heffer in Torygraph and one of Sullivan's colleagues on the Atlantic.

'72, '73 & '68

Endless Night is a 1970's adaptation of an Agatha Christie novel, apparently she wasn't so keen on it but I certainly enjoyed this Hitchcockian mystery despite it's amusingly dated 70's feel. A young drifter is enchanted by a cursed property, Gypsy's Acre, but when he marries and finally builds his dream home things start to go badly wrong. Maybe I was having a slow day but I got the surprise ending quite wrong.



Another little British gem is The Asphyx, a strange scifi/horror about a Victorian scientist who manages to photograph a mysterious entity that appears at the time of death, his researches continue and he uncovers that the Asphyx holds the key to immortality and his obsession takes a rather demented turn. With some competent acting, lush period detail and a cracking fortean plot this is a excellent 90 mins and I'm not surprised it's up for a remake.

2001 A Space Odyssey is probably the most important scifi film of the 20th Century and one of my childhood faves and it's recently had a magnificent transfer onto Bluray. Despite it being 42 years old this film looks amazing and is still the high benchmark for serious scifi film making. Well worth the £6.

Still Hungover

Kudos to Wonkette for posting this little gem bout pouting Davo's first encounter with Queenie while dressed as a rabbit - nice timing from the Mail, maybe it was Liam Fox ?

Andrew Sullivan lifts my spirits about the hopes of decimating the rapacious Tories from the country by the neat trick of making the country more democratic - such things dreams are made from.

Though Sullivan is aghast at the possibility of a more realistic representation of country's innate liberalism he's taking the situation better than fat faced Murdoch whore Adam Boulton, whose middle Engerland shtick has chafed at me for a while now so it's a joy to see he's creaking under the pressure while on two tv spots in 24hrs

Sun Dogs

Another great post from io9 explaining the phenomenon of parhelia. Hexagons is the short version.

Boar Blast & Shaky-Iraq

Razorback is a cult treat, sure the acting is ropey and the fx are a bit rubbish but look beyond that and you've got a stylishly shot monster romp. A gigantic Boar is terrorising some Outback town and it's local drongos so a few of the bereaved become determined to hunt the beast down once and for all. There's plenty of laughs - intended and otherwise - some nice action bits and it all rolls along at a decent pace making this an entertaining if shlocky 90 mins.

Green Zone is the latest effort from Greengrass & Damon and is another twitchy, shaky cam action thriller. Set during the Iraq conflict, Damon is tasked with hunting down WMD's and soon begins to suspect there's been a little subterfuge going on as he keeps coming up empty handed. The climax is a little weak, relying on a ridonkulous meeting of characters to tie things up and a lengthy section of uber-shaky-cam but overall it's a decent film with good performances and a strong script.

Romero improves & Hill blasts away

Survival of the Dead isn't Romero's best zombie munch movie but it's a definite improvement on Diary of the Dead. The action starts on some backwards coastal island as the locals fight over cleaning out the infected with hot lead or trying to find an alternative food source. A squad of soldiers struggling to stay alive on the mainland decide that the island is a safer bet and end up regretting it. Though there's plenty of head popping and some decent chew-downs the film just isn't scary, there's a few jump-scares sure but there's no tension, no dread. Maybe if they made the island and it's peeps a little more believable and less hokey-frontier styled it might have given a base to build the gore and gags on.



Extreme Prejudice is a slice of 80's action courtesy of Walter Hill. With Texas Ranger Nick Nolte facing off against greasy Kingpin Powers Boothe this is a sweaty border crossing Peckinpah rip off and it's a competent if unremarkable action thriller. The script is terrible, cliches abound and Nolte's stoney faced delivery doesn't help either but the action is handled well and there's certainly plenty of it. Shame they didn't stitch the bad A-Team subplot in tighter though as it just flaps around until almost the very end.