On the Trophosphere, thought experiments and my unreliability…

So much for keeping up this little blog I have going here. I can safely say that’s failed miserbaly, although now I’m here I’ll post a little review of my favourite book of the year ‘The End of My Y’ by Scarlett Thomas.

Hailed as the ‘best author you’ve never heard of” by interviewers and reviewers, Thomas attempts to break the literary mould, to write storyless stories in the style of Zen koans and to write based on those things that interest her at the time. Whil Popco focuses on, amongst other things, cryptology, pirates, capitalism and toy-making. Mr Y takes this a little further.

The heroine, Ariel Manto (mysteriously an anagram of I Am Not Real), is in her late twenties, involved in a sordid affair with a married man, and writing a thesis on thought experiments. Finding a rare book that’s been missing for hundreds of years, she’s thrown into a world of minds, ‘The Trophosphere, where you can read minds, jump into minds, manipulate minds in a way that no one would have thought possible.

Just thinking about the plot makes my brain want to implode, and the whole novel is a whirlwind ride through science and thought ending in the most fulfilling ending that I’ve ever read in a novel. The undercurrent of religion is particularly interesting, especially in a book that seems rooted firmly in scientific foundations. Ariel is a character that we can relate to. She’s not some glossy image in a chick lit novel who has problems and resolves them. Ariel struggles with self-harming tendencies which manifest in her, not so innocent, sex life and she suffers from the problems that young people are faced with, living on beans and rice in a tiny flat infested with mice.

I’m rambling. Basically, The End of Mr Y is magical, breath-taking, and one of the most interesting books I have ever read. So read it!

A day at the cinema (containing the good, the bad and the ugly of what cinemas are showing at the moment)

Yesterday, being unable to keep away from work for long periods of time, I spent the best part of 10 hours in the cinema, arriving at 10:30am and departing at approximately 8:30pm. During that time I managed to watch 4 of the new (or nearly new) releases that are gracing our cinema screens at the moment.

First, and surprisingly not the worst, film of the day was ‘Tinkerbell and the Great Fairy Rescue’. I would like to point out that I was originally seeing this film with my boyfriend’s seven year old sister, who decided she’d rather see Toy Story 3 with her friends instead. Indeed, this had hardly the challenging, thought-provoking plot that other recent releases such as ‘Toy Story 3′ and ‘Shrek Forever After’ presented us with, and the characters were sadly not forced to make moral decisions and fight evil stuffed bears. Nonetheless, considering this film from the ‘Disney Fairies’ franchise made its way straight into the smallest screen at the cinema (a feat which is only saved for the truly terrible films) I was somewhat impressed. The animation was bright, colourful and generally aesthetically pleasing. The lead character of ‘Lizzie’ seemed to have the most disasterously fake English accent, which I attributed to the fact she must have been voiced by an American girl. However, it would appear I was incorrect and she is indeed English, though where she gained the ‘fake’-ness is beyond me. Without delving too deep into the artistic qualities of a film thats sole intention was to prove to small girls that fairies do exist, it wasn’t too much of a disappointment.

Next, I chose to watch ‘The Last Airbender: Book One: Water’, much to my boyfriend’s disgust. I can safely say my experience with the ‘Avatar’ (not to be confused with James Cameron’s Avatar) series is limited, having only watched a small part of the ‘Book Three: Fire’ though mostly liking what I’d seen. From what I could gather from previous research, the film tries to keep the essence of the cartoon series, with a few fundamental changes, such as the pronunciation of names and the ability of the firebenders to create fire out of nothing. Even though I am not particularly familiar with the story, the film seemed, even to me, to follow very little plot. The scenes were merely snapshots, all pieced together without a recurring theme to draw them into any kind of coherency. While the effects were well executed and believable, the same could not be said for the acting. As Dev Patel’s biggest piece of work since Slumdog Millionaire, it can certainly be said that this one won’t be winning as many Oscars, or indeed any. Jackson Rathbone, most notable to teens worldwide as ‘Jasper’ in the ‘Twilight Saga’, played the same sort of character as usual, with the weird facial expressions that just don’t really fit…anywhere. The only performance which stood out for me was that of the lead, Aang, played by Noah Ringer. This boy was cast after sending a video over the internet of him doing martial arts in his basement. Having had no previous experience in film, it does not shine a good light on those more experienced actors who were outshone by this 13 year old boy. Overall, I left feeling, not cheated, but a little disappointed that the climax to the film hadn’t been more impressive.

‘The A-Team’ was the next film I was to experience, and this impressed me. I’ve never seen the original television series, but I followed the story easily and warmed to the characters which were, although a little underdeveloped, endearing and belieavable. The plot was well thought out, without a doubt the undetermined ‘bad guy’ throughout the film kept interest and led to an interesting conclusion. As my boyfriend pointed out, some of the stunts were unrealistic (‘COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE’ as he shouted at the helicopter stunts) but seemed in-keeping with the film as a whole. Other than that, there can’t be much to say about it, other than that I enjoyed it, and it made a nice change after ‘The Last Airbender’.

And finally, (and the adage ‘saving the best ’till last definitely applied here’) I had the pleasure of watching Disney’s ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’. This film, for me, had everything a good family film should have. The plot was simple (Nicholas Cage has to find boy to save the world before evil sorceress destroys it) yet effective in its simplicity, and the characters were believable (or as believable as all this magic lark can be) More than anything else, this film was entertaining. The odd slapstick joke lightened the mood, the romance between geeky Dave and ‘it’ girl Becky made the plot realistic, the longing of Balthazar for his lost girlfriend added depth (as far as Disney can be deep) and it concluded in a nearly-not-happy-but-then-happy ending in a similar way to Pirates of the Caribbean did and National Treasure. This isn’t the sort of film to challenge your mind, and certainly wouldn’t impress the adult couple looking for a film to provoke thought (see Tinkerbell) but nonetheless this family action film certainly does ‘what it says on the tin’. Besides, surely any film with mops (and other cleaning implements) dancing to classical music by Paul Dukas has got to be a hit?!

LiterallyHarley

The Picture of Dorian Gray (with reference to that disasterous film released in 2009)

Consider being faced with the A Level English topic of Love through the Ages, a topic spanning, as the title would suggest, an age of literature of which we are supposed to accurately select titles which will be of most use in the coursework and exam that will follow.

Thus, having had the best part of three weeks completely devoid of anything except part time work in a local cinema, I have begun my journey (excuse the cheese) ‘through the ages’ with the supposedly controversial ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ by Oscar Wilde. I was warned that the edition I was reading (a certain ‘wordsworth classics’ edition if I remember rightly) did not contain the original text but rather the revised edition that is full of homosexual innuendos and otherwise unsavoury business.

Let me note at this point that prior to reading this novel I had the pleasure, if it can be called such, to watch the 2009 film Dorian Gray, an adaptation of this ever controversial novel. While the casting of Ben Barnes of Disney’s Prince Caspian fame, seemed quite an accurate picture of the innocence of Dorian Gray, and the presence of Colin Firth as his mentor offered some sort of promise for a vaguely interesting film, I was, to put it bluntly, insanely disappointed. The plot was weak, the acting poor, and the scenes that ensued were very little more sophisticated than some sort of Victorian fetish film. The relationship between Dorian and the rest of the cast was tenuous and based on innuendo alone. I left the film having been thoroughly disappointed.

If we now fast-forward to last month, when I picked up my as yet un-touched copy of The Picture of Dorian Gray, I, inevitably after my film experience, awaited the chapter that would present me with the large-scale hetero- and homosexual orgies that I feared the book may have been filled with. Imagine, therefore, my surprise, when the novel contained nothing absurdly sexual other than a few passing references. Indeed, the relationships that were presented in the novel were strangely innocent, the most distressing of those being the narcissistic relationship that Dorian entertains with himself.

Apart from skipping a utterly uninteresting chapter on the frivolities that Dorian indulges in, such as jewels and embroidery, I truly enjoyed the book as a piece of literature which deals with morality, as well as life and death in a most coherent manner without the need for sexual innuendos. Indeed, if I was to point out anything vaguely homosexual it would be Basil’s admiration for Dorian in the opening chapters. Nonetheless, this, to me, seems like the love of an artist of his muse, not love between two lovers.

Essentially, I feel the relationship between film and book is a somewhat tenuous link. The book is philosophical, dignified and utterly enchanting. The film is sordid and unnecessarily filthy, perhaps in the hope of interesting the young people of today in Oscar Wilde. Sadly, it failed.

LiterallyHarley

And so it begins..

It would seem to be a popular thing amongst young people to begin a blog, a sort of way for us to voice our opinions without being deemed hooligans or otherwise an unsavoury character. So, always wanting to be in keeping with tradition, I am here to voice my opinions on, most specifically, the arts, the ins and outs of what’s hot and what’s not in music, theatre, film and books.

So, ladies and gentleman, a welcome to my blog, and I hope you find something here that will make you want to continue reading!

LiterallyHarley