TV

Castle
8x16 Heartbreaker

Vera
8x03 Home
[Watch it (again) on the ITV Hub.]

Films

Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters (2017)
[#13 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

this week on 100 Films

4 brand-new reviews were published to 100 Films in a Year this week, and they were...


The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists! (2012)

Naturally it’s a tale not so much of derring-do as of humorous shenanigans, though in truth it’s not the studio’s most hysterical offering, ticking along with a level of gentle amusement rather than outright hilarity... Plus it’s all carried off with the ineffable charm of Aardman’s hand-crafted puppetry

Read more here.


Public Access (1993)

What secrets lurk beneath the surface of this pretty little town? Who is this stranger and what are his motives? How will the community react to the previously-secret complaints and possible revelations? Unfortunately, Public Access does very little to explore any of those possibilities.

Read more here.


Saludos Amigos (1942)

The sixth film in Disney’s official animated canon was the first in a run of cheap “package films” that span the gap from 1942’s Bambi to 1950’s Cinderella. Frankly, if Disney hadn’t decided to make it part of their animated canon whenever that list was first settled upon, I very much doubt it would be remembered today.

Read more here.


The Straight Story (1999)

Such a simple, straightforward, grounded narrative seems so very un-Lynch-like at first, but its tale of quirky Americana, peopled by a ragtag selection of endearing oddballs, isn’t so far outside his wheelhouse.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

Murder on the Blackpool Express

Would I Lie To You?
11x10 The Unseen Bits [season finale]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

The Boss Baby 3D (2017)
[#12 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

One new DVD-to-BD upgrade this week, which otherwise makes no changes whatsoever. Ho hum.

Number of titles in collection: 2,076 [no change]
Of which DVDs: 1,165 [down 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 911 [up 1]

Number of discs in collection: 5,327 [no change]
Number of films: 2,315 [no change]
Number of TV episodes: 8,005 [no change]
Number of short films: 599 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Celebrity Mastermind
2017/2018 Episode 7 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Vera
8x02 Black Ice
[Watch it (again) on the ITV Hub.]

TV

The Great British Bake Off
The Great Festive Bake Off [2018 special]
[Watch it (again) on All 4.]

Would I Lie To You?
11x09 Episode 8
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Death in Paradise
7x03 Written in Murder
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Zatoichi on the Road (1963)
[#11 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

TV

Celebrity Mastermind
2017/2018 Episode 6 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Would I Lie To You?
11x08 Episode 7
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

La La Land (2016)
[#10 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

this week on 100 Films

It's that time of the month over at 100 Films in a Year: the TV review...





Plus there were 4 brand-new film reviews too...


Black Swan (2010)

Described by director Darren Aronofsky as “a psychological thriller horror film”, Black Swan straddles the divide between classy Cinema and genre Movies as artfully as, say, a Hitchcock thriller. [...] Shot handheld on a mix of 16mm and video-capable HD DSLRs,it has a documentary look, often emphasised by its editing — at times it could almost pass for a fly-on-the-wall look behind the scenes of a ballet company. [This] serves to make the film’s unsettling parts all the more effective

Read more here.


Bright (2017)

Bright is a long way from perfect, but it’s also pretty far from being the disaster of epic proportions that critical and social media reaction seems suspiciously keen to paint it as (the Cannes-like “Netflix make TV not movies” sentiment is strong in some quarters). It’s a middle-of-the-road blockbuster movie, with some very solid plus points that are let down by some irritating negatives.

Read more here.


The Man from Earth: Holocene (2017)

has some very good ideas that could’ve made for a worthy continuation of the original film. Chief among them is the mystery of John’s relatively sudden ageing. Is he dying? Is he just entering a new phase of his existence? Either way: why? The film asks these questions, makes nods towards possible explanations, but otherwise doesn’t seek to explore it too much.

Read more here.


The Mummy (2017)

It’s a tonal mishmash. It’s not exciting enough to satisfy as an action movie, but not scary enough to qualify as a horror. There’s humour, but it’s poorly integrated, feeling at odds with the dark tone. This is a PG-13 movie that kinda wants to be an R, but not so much that it’ll really commit to sitting on that PG-13/R line.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

Theatre

Aladdin

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

Number of titles in collection: 2,076 [up 1]
Of which DVDs: 1,166 [no change]
Of which Blu-rays: 910 [up 1]

Number of discs in collection: 5,327 [up 2]
Number of films: 2,315 [up 1]
Number of TV episodes: 8,005 [no change]
Number of short films: 599 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

QI
15x12 Occult
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

The Man from Earth: Holocene (2017)
[#9 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

Films

The Man from Earth (2007)
[2nd watch]

Rewatchathon 2018 #3

+ one of the two audio commentaries, featuring director Richard Schenkman and actor John Billingsley

Films

The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists! (2012)
[#8 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

Films

Die Hard (1988)
[4th watch]

Rewatchathon 2018 #2. It's been almost ten years since I last watched Die Hard. Where does time go?!

TV

Celebrity Mastermind
2017/2018 Episode 5 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Would I Lie To You?
11x07 Episode 6
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

The Love Punch (2013)
[#7 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
[#6 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

this week on 100 Films

5 brand-new reviews were published to 100 Films in a Year this week, and they were...


District 9 (2009)

The first half is excitingly original and interestingly ideas-driven, with allegory that is powerful if perhaps a little heavy-handed (I suppose that’s kind of unavoidable when you make a movie about segregation and set it in South Africa). The second half is just a shoot-em-up.

Read more here.


Forbidden Planet (1956)

Once it gets past everyone’s lustfulness (it feels uncomfortably like watching the filmmakers play out some personal fantasies), there are proper big sci-fi ideas driving Forbidden Planet. There are also some gloriously pulpy action sequences, like a fight against an invisible monster. It’s backed up by great special effects.

Read more here.


Get Out (2017)

Get Out unfurls with a slow-burn tension, where you can’t be sure that Chris isn’t just being paranoid. Well, we can be sure, because we know we’re watching a horror movie. In terms of that genre, it’s effectively creepy without indulging in many outright scares — it foregrounds an encroaching sense of unease rather than pure terror.

Read more here.


Her (2013)

People often refer to the template of Black Mirror as “what if technology but MORE”, and Her definitely fulfils that brief: “what if Siri was genuinely intelligent and someone fell in love with her?” Also like an episode of Black Mirror, it’s as much about what this reveals about humanity as it is about the crazy sci-fi concept

Read more here.


Moon (2009)

Like so much good sci-fi, it uses its imagined situation as impetus to explore the effect on its characters (or, in this case, character) and what the human reaction would be in such a situation. Maybe this is becoming a cliché already, but it’s quite like an episode of Black Mirror in that regard.

Read more here.


I also selected the 22 films I must watch during 2018 for my Blindspot and "What Do You Mean You Haven't Seen" challenges. Read about those at these two links:







More next Sunday.

TV

Upstart Crow
2x07 A Christmas Crow [Christmas special; 2nd watch]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Vera
8x01 Blood and Bone
[Watch it (again) on the ITV Hub.]

Films

The Purge (2013)
[#5 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

After all the new stuff and yearly stats last week, this week there's absolutely nothing to report. Not a sausage.

Number of titles in collection: 2,075 [no change]
Of which DVDs: 1,166 [no change]
Of which Blu-rays: 909 [no change]

Number of discs in collection: 5,325 [no change]
Number of films: 2,314 [no change]
Number of TV episodes: 8,005 [no change]
Number of short films: 599 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader, when there will be some additions, I promise.

TV

Blue Planet II
Episode 6 Coasts
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Death in Paradise
7x02 The Stakes are High
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Would I Lie To You?
11x06 Episode 5
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

The 400 Blows (1959)
[#4 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

Blindspot 2018 #1

TV

Blue Planet II
Episode 5 Green Seas
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Great British Bake Off
The Great Christmas Bake Off [2017 special]
[Watch it (again) on All 4.]

Films

My Life as a Courgette (2016)
[#3 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

TV

Blue Planet II
Episode 4 Big Blue
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Celebrity Mastermind
2017/2018 Episode 4 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Our Friend Victoria
1x07 Christmas [special]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

The Narrow Margin (1952)
[#2 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]

TV

Blue Planet II
Episode 3 Coral Reefs
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Celebrity Mastermind
2017/2018 Episode 3 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Insert Name Here
3x05 Christmas
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

DVD Extras

Dunkirk Special Features
The three featurettes under "Land", about how they staged the beach scenes, and the two under "Air", about how they achieved the aerial sequences. The latter was particularly interesting, because they basically invented a load of new techniques -- as well as reviving some very old ones -- to do things that have never been done before. Quite incredible.

TV

Blue Planet II
Episode 2 The Deep
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Celebrity Mastermind
2017/2018 Episode 2 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Doctor Who
37x00 Twice Upon a Time [Christmas special; 2nd watch]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Blue Planet II
Episode 1 One Ocean
Finally watching this in UHD via iPlayer (only available via certain devices). It looks absolutely stunning.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Celebrity Mastermind
2017/2018 Episode 1 (of 10)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

A Christmas Carol Goes Wrong
[2nd watch]
Enjoyed this more a second time, actually.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Not Going Out
9x00 The True Meaning of Christmas [Christmas special]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Tim Vine Travels Through Time
Christmas Special [2nd watch]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

this week on 100 Films

With the new year only just underway, the past week over at 100 Films in a Year has been entirely concerned with looking back at 2017.

It started with the monthly progress report for December...





And continued with these four posts looking over the year in its entirety...


My Top 5 Most-Read New Posts in 2017

This year, all five of my most-read posts are from my TV review column... But this is a film blog (it’s in the title), so this year I’m doing two top fives: the genuine top 5 most-read new posts in 2017, which is also the top 5 most-read new TV-related posts, and then the top 5 most-read new film-related posts.

Read more here.


2017: The Full List

2017 — the 11th year I’ve been doing this 100 films challenge, and the fifth consecutive year I’ve surpassed that goal. Below is the full list of new films I watched this year, all linked up to reviews and that.

Read more here.


2017 Statistics

In today’s post we do the fun stuff: look at all sorts of statistics about 2017's viewing. Hurrah!

Read more here.


The Best & Worst of 2017

Having listed all I watched in 2017 and analysed it thoroughly, it’s time for the finale: what I thought were the best films I saw last year.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

Death in Paradise
7x01 Murder from Above
I once complained that Death in Paradise should have episode titles. According to Wikipedia, it's had them all along. Hm. Anyway, henceforth I'll be using those, wherever they derive from.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Would I Lie To You?
11x05 At Christmas
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

I was unable to do an accurate year-on-year increases post last time because I was away from home. Although we're now nearly a week into 2018, I've not purchased or received anything new since December 31st, so this post will serve just as well.

Number of titles in collection: 2,075 [up 3 this week; up 154 in 2017]
Of which DVDs: 1,166 [no change this week; down 27 in 2017]
Of which Blu-rays: 909 [up 3 this week; up 181 in 2017]

That's my highest number of new titles in a year since records began (i.e. 2013). And I was meant to be trying to buy less!

Number of discs in collection: 5,325 [up 11 this week; up 374 in 2017]
Number of films: 2,314 [up 7 this week; up 193 in 2017]
Number of TV episodes: 8,005 [no change this week; up 426 in 2017]
Number of short films: 599 [no change this week; up 91 in 2017]

Not quite sure how I acquired so many short films. As far as I'm aware that's all made up of odd ones here and there included with feature films.

Total running time of collection (approx.):
393 days, 17 hours, and 40 minutes.
(Up 1 day, 12 hours, and 18 minutes from last month.)
(Up 27 days, 7 hours, and 3 minutes from last year.)

Despite that whopping number of new titles, that's not the highest yearly running time increase (that belongs to 2015, probably because I acquired nearly 50% more TV episodes that year).

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 The Grand Final
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

DVD Extras

Dunkirk Special Features
The four featurettes under the heading "Creation". I intend to watch the remaining 12, just not all in one go (altogether they add up to just under 2 hours -- slightly longer than the film itself).

TV

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 Semi-Final 2
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Bright (2017)
[#1 in 100 Films in a Year 2018]
It begins again...

Dunkirk (2017)
[2nd watch]
Rewatchathon 2018 #1. This, too, begins again...

TV

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 Brunel University v Reading University
Christmas 2017 Semi-Final 1
[Watch Brunel v Reading and Semi-Final 1 (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Michael McIntyre: Happy & Glorious
Thought I'd seen this -- I recognised the start -- but it's not in my records and there were bits I didn't remember, so...
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Mrs Brown's Boys
CSI: Mammy [New Year special]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 Queen Mary College, London v Cardiff University
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

The Graham Norton Show
22x13 New Year's Eve Show
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Little Women
Part 2 (of 3)
Part 3 (of 3)
[Watch parts two and three (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Airplane! (1980)
[2nd watch]

Rewatchathon 2017 #52

this week on 100 Films

As it's the new year tomorrow, this week over at 100 Films in a Year has ended with a review of 2017's Christmas TV...





Aside from that, there were 8 brand-new film reviews...


The 39 Steps (1935)

This adaptation of John Buchan’s adventure novel is one of the best-known among director Alfred Hitchcock’s early works, and for good reason. Galloping briskly along with a running time under 90 minutes, it’s a film where mood, tone, and the wonderful execution of individual sequences are all allowed to trump plot, which is somewhere on the spectrum from unexplained to nonsensical.

Read more here.


Dances with Wolves Special Edition (1990/1991)

the near-four-hour extended one certainly feels its length. That’s not necessarily a bad thing — this is an epic in the truest sense of the word, with a large story to tell on a grand canvass; although it’s concurrently a drama about just a couple of people from different cultures coming to interact.

Read more here.


Gran Torino (2008)

I imagine it would play very nicely as a companion piece and/or counterpoint to his earlier Oscar-winner, Unforgiven — both are stories about old men in one final fight, essentially. Here, that comes with a subtext about the price that’s paid for standing up for yourself. It may be the right thing to do, and maybe it ends up with the right result, but the good guys really suffer to get to that point.

Read more here.


Jackie Brown (1997)

Some people argue that Jackie Brown is secretly Tarantino’s best movie. I add “secretly” there because it gets a lot less attention than the aforementioned movies that came either side of it. That’s not a bandwagon I’m prepared to jump on. To me, it feels a little like QT was trying to emulate what worked about Pulp Fiction without just making a rip-off of his own movie, and therefore it’s a bit of an inferior copy.

Read more here.


A Matter of Life and Death (1946)

It’s a grandly romantic film — it is all about the triumph of love over everything else, after all — but with a particular fantastical bent that I think remains unique. It has the wit to present a mildly irreverent stance on the afterlife, not taking the whole “life and death” thing too seriously.

Read more here.


Nashville (1975)

Robert Altman’s low-key epic about 24 characters and how their stories interact, overlap, and collide across five days in the city of Nashville, Tennessee. The sheer scope of that makes it a tricky film to interpret. There’s a lot going on, much of it in snatched conversations and moments that leave it up to the audience to piece together what matters and why.

Read more here.


Planet of the Apes (1968)

Coming to Planet of the Apes for the first time almost 50 years after its release, there’s an unavoidable quaintness to some of it, mainly the monkey makeup. It was for a long time iconic, but it’s been abandoned in favour of hyper-realistic CGI in the new movies and therefore shows its age.

Read more here.


Silver Linings Playbook (2012)

Screenplay (first two acts) — 3/5
Screenplay (bit where it suddenly gets plot-heavy and all exposition-y to set up the third act) — 1/5
Screenplay (third act that seems to be from a completely different, much more conventional movie) — 2/5

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

A Christmas Carol Goes Wrong
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Little Women
Part 1 (of 3)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

A Few Good Men (1992)
Stumbled across this on TV and watched chunks from the second half, including the famous climax. Not something I'd do normally, but when having Christmas at other people's houses... It's not like my viewing of it first time round was perfect, having to wait over two months between most of the film and the final half-hour. I really ought to re-watch it properly.

Scrooged (1988)
[#174 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

Technically the monthly running time update isn't due until next week, but this is the last update of 2017 so I thought it would be better to bring it forward a week and do all my past-year increases... but I'm away from home at the minute, and home is where my full records are, so it'll have to wait after all. On the bright side, I'm not expecting any new additions in the next week that aren't technically already here (they're waiting for me when I get home), so it'll still be accurate for my 2017 increases.

Aaaanyway! On with the stats for what I got for Christmas...

Number of titles in collection: 2,072 [up 2]
Of which DVDs: 1,166 [down 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 906 [up 3]

Number of discs in collection: 5,314 [up 3]
Number of films: 2,307 [up 2]
Number of TV episodes: 8,005 [no change]
Number of short films: 599 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

The Late Late Show Carpool Karaoke Primetime Special
Mistook this for a Christmas special in Sky One's listings, but it's actually from the summer. Despite the title, it's really just a Late Late Show special -- presumably they put Carpool Karaoke in the title because it's famous and therefore a draw.

Live at the Apollo
13x07 Christmas Special
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

QI
15x09 O Christmas (XL edition)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Tim Vine Travels Through Time
Christmas Special
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 St John's College, Cambridge v St Edmund Hall, Oxford
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon (1942)
[2nd watch]

Rewatchathon 2017 #51, although this time I watched the colourised version, just out of curiosity. It wasn't bad, but it doesn't look quite real -- everything's too washed out, too pastel-y, without enough nuance in the shades and range of colours, despite their best efforts. It's not distracting, at least, but it's ultimately pointless.

TV

Michael McIntyre's Big Show
3x06 Christmas Special [season finale]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Miranda Does Christmas
On the same set from those Christmas specials Ruth Jones used to do, I swear.
[Watch it (again) on All 4.]

Romesh Ranganathan: Irrational Live
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 University of Leicester v UCL
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Upstart Crow
2x07 A Christmas Crow [Christmas special]
Followed by scouring through Love Actually for the scenes being referenced.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

The Big Fat Quiz of the Year 2017
[Watch it (again) on All 4.]

The Miniaturist
Part 2 (of 2)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 University of York v University of Southampton
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

The Miniaturist
Part 1 (of 2)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Snow Bears
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Travel Man
6x00 48 Hours in Hong Kong [Christmas special]
with John Hamm.
[Watch it (again) on All 4.]

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 Selwyn College, Cambridge v St Andrews University
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

As usual, it was a busy Christmas Day in front of the telly...

300 Years of French and Saunders
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Doctor Who
37x00 Twice Upon a Time [Christmas special]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Dresser
Finally got round to watching this 2015 re-adaptation of Ronald Harwood's play. With its Oscar-calibre cast and feature-length running time, it's the kind of thing that's perfectly positioned to fall between stools in the "what's film and what's TV?" debate.

Have I Got News For You
54x11 Have I Got a Bit More 2017 News for You
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Highway Rat
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Mrs Brown's Boys
Mammy's Mummy [Christmas special]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

University Challenge
Christmas 2017 Durham University v Keble College, Oxford
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Gogglebox
10x16 The Best of 2017
[Watch it (again) on All 4.]

Joanna & Jennifer: Absolutely Champers
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Elf (2003)
[#173 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

this week on 100 Films

4 brand-new reviews were published to 100 Films in a Year this week, and they were...


Hidden Figures (2016)

Based on a true story, Hidden Figures is about three black women working at NASA in the early ’60s, a time when segregation was still in force in the US. It’s a double whammy of timely issues, then: they struggle to prove they’re clever and have scientific know-how because they’re women, and they struggle to prove they’re worth treating with respect because they’re black. How depressing that these things are still relevant over 50 years later.

Read more here.


John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017)

For anyone who particularly liked the snippets of this world’s mythology from the first movie, Chapter 2 delivers what they’re after in spades... Of course, it’s all still in service of people shooting and stabbing and punching and whatever-else-ing each other. Maybe that’s doing it a disservice. Nonetheless, there’s lots of intricately choreographed, cleanly staged action — and what more do you want from a film like this?

Read more here.


The LEGO Batman Movie (2017)

You might think the story is almost by the by, because the real point is the gags — and fortunately the movie is indeed consistently funny, with a Flash-like pace to keep things moving... But don’t disregard the narrative offhand, because it also summons up surprisingly effective character arcs. Who expected that, right?

Read more here.


Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017)

I’ve felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if a small but vocal group of fanboys suddenly cried out in terror and were unfortunately not silenced because on the internet such complaining goes on forever. Yes, something terrible has happened: a new Star Wars movie has come out and, rather than go the Force Awakens route of appealing to nostalgia and familiarity, it’s attempted to boldly go where no Star Wars movie has gone before. Well, it’s maybe not quite that innovative, but writer and director Rian Johnson has given us an Episode VIII that eschews rehashing former glories for an attempt to push the franchise forward in interesting new ways. It’s not an unmitigated success, but it is considerably more than just “a good effort”.

Read more here.


I also wrote a piece about my continuing experience with 4K UHD...





More next Sunday.

TV

Peter Pan Goes Wrong
[2nd watch]
My parents had this recorded from last year. It's still hilarious on a second viewing. Sadly it's not being repeated for the sake of anyone who missed it.

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

Although it's nearly Christmas, and so by rights things should quieten down until after the big day, I haven't played by the rules: there are six additions this week.

Number of titles in collection: 2,070 [up 6]
Of which DVDs: 1,167 [no change]
Of which Blu-rays: 903 [up 6]

Number of discs in collection: 5,311 [up 12]
Number of films: 2,305 [up 6]
Number of TV episodes: 8,005 [no change]
Number of short films: 599 [up 4]

I don't know what I'm getting for Christmas, obviously, but I have a sneaking suspicion next week's update will actually be smaller. We'll see in seven days' time, faithful reader.

TV

The Graham Norton Show
22x12 (22/12/17 edition)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar's Revenge (2017)
[2nd watch]

Rewatchathon 2017 #50

TV

Black Mirror
2x04 White Christmas
While a lot of people seem to go on about how much they love season three's San Junipero, this 2014 Christmas special (the last episode broadcast on Channel 4) is still the highest-rated episode of Black Mirror on IMDb by a solid margin. I'm not sure it is the show's best episode (season one's The Entire History of You takes some beating), but it was very good.

And BBC Four had a Star Wars night...

The Galaxy Britain Built
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Hollywood's Master of Myth: Joseph Campbell - The Force Behind Star Wars
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

John Williams Film Prom
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

The League of Gentlemen
4x03 Royston Vasey Mon Amour [season finale]
Revivals of once-great comedies can be a mistake -- they're often little more than an exercise in nostalgia -- but this has been really rather good, and gone down very well too. Officially it's a set of 20th anniversary specials rather than a fourth series, but might we see more? I think it would be welcomed.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Forbidden Planet (1956)
[#172 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]
Blindspot 2017 #12. And that completes Blindspot for 2017.

Home Alone (1990)
[2nd or so watch]
Rewatchathon 2017 #49. Haven't seen this since I was a kid. I may well have seen it more than once back then, but I wouldn't swear to it.

TV

The League of Gentlemen
4x02 Save Royston Vasey
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
[#171 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

TV

The League of Gentlemen
4x01 Return to Royston Vasey
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Hidden Figures (2016)
[#170 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

this week on 100 Films

It was time for a TV review this week on 100 Films in a Year...





Plus there were 4 brand-new film reviews...


The Darjeeling Limited (2007)

As someone who still feels new to Wes Anderson’s world and is working through his oeuvre in a roundabout fashion, I don’t necessarily disagree with the sentiment that it's a lesser work on Anderson’s CV. If you want to find out what’s so great about Anderson, there are certainly other places to start.

Read more here.


Hotel Chevalier (2007)

a kind-of-prequel, kind-of-Part-One to The Darjeeling Limited. It’s probably best remembered for... Natalie Portman’s ass... because oh my God you get to see Natalie Portman’s ass... I don’t know how much it has to offer outside of setting up part of The Darjeeling Limited. Unless you just want to see Natalie Portman’s ass, of course.

Read more here.


The Terminator (1984)

The more mediocre movies you see, or even just “quite good” ones, the more you realise how perfect the great ones are — and The Terminator is a great movie. It’s full of superb sci-fi ideas, well-directed action sequences, quotable dialogue, and memorable characters — not least the instantly iconic title role.

Read more here.


Your Name. (2016)

If you’ve not heard about Your Name then… well, where have you been for the past year? It was a colossal hit in its native Japan during the back end of 2016, spending 12 weeks at #1 to become the fourth highest-grossing film of all time there... Critical acclaim has followed as it’s been released around the rest of the world too, hailing writer-director Makoto Shinkai as the new Miyazaki. It’s hard to imagination higher praise for an animator... So when I finally sat down to watch it this week it had a bit of weight on its shoulders — at this point it runs the risk of being a victim of its own hype.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

The Graham Norton Show
22x11 (15/12/17 edition)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017)
[#169 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

Four new acquisitions this week, including a BD-to-BD upgrade. It would've been double that, but the post seems to be slow right now. Wonder why...

Note how the numbers of discs and films are both sitting on the cusp of nice round figures. They won't land there though, because next week all those other titles will turn up and storm past it. Hey-ho.

Number of titles in collection: 2,064 [up 3]
Of which DVDs: 1,167 [no change]
Of which Blu-rays: 897 [up 3]

Number of discs in collection: 5,299 [up 9]
Number of films: 2,299 [up 2]
Number of TV episodes: 8,005 [up 7]
Number of short films: 595 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

Films

Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)
[2nd watch]

Rewatchathon 2017 #48

The Last Jedi tomorrow!

TV

Arrow
6x06 Promises Kept

Detectorists
3x06 Episode 6 [series finale]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Castle
8x15 Fidelis Ad Mortem

The Good Place
1x13 Michael's Gambit [season finale]

TV

Detectorists
3x05 Episode 5
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Flash
4x06 When Harry Met Harry...

Insert Name Here
3x04 Paul
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Would I Lie To You?
11x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Your Name. (2016)
[#168 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

TV

The Good Place
1x12 Mindy St. Claire

Paul O'Grady: For the Love of Dogs
6x05 Episode 5
[Watch it (again) on the ITV Hub.]

TV

Arrow
6x05 Deathstroke Returns

Detectorists
3x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

For a Few Dollars More (1965)
[2nd watch]

Rewatchathon 2017 #47

This was included in my 100 Favourites series, which you can read about here.

this week on 100 Films

There were 7 brand-new reviews on 100 Films in a Year this week, with 4 of them bundled into a...


Comedy Review Roundup

Let’s have a laugh (or, perhaps, not) with… Police Academy, Black Dynamite, Four Lions, and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.

Read more here.


Life (2017)

Playing like a cross between Gravity (a near-future thriller where space technology is almost identical to our present capabilities) and Alien (a violent alien lifeform attacks the crew of a space vessel), Life clearly aspires to be little more than a straight-up sci-fi/horror thrill ride, and on that score it’s a pretty effective piece of entertainment.

Read more here.


Rurouni Kenshin: The Legend Ends (2014)

As is a common fate among so many trilogy-closers, I thought Rurouni Kenshin 3 was sadly the series’ weak link. That said, it’s not a bad action movie — if you’re only in it for the swordplay then it satisfies with bells on; it’s the storyline around that is disappointing.

Read more here.


Twin Peaks: The Return (2017)

Film Twitter has been getting itself in a bit of a tizzy over the past couple of days about David Lynch’s return to TV [after] respected British film magazine Sight & Sound went and named Twin Peaks: The Return as the second best film of 2017... Personally, I’m not really sure where I come down on the issue. I mean, it’s definitely a TV series, isn’t it? But it’s also virtually an 18-hour movie, isn’t it? Can it be both? Why can’t it be both?

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

As promised last week, there's a whole load of stuff here -- eight additions, to be exact, with just one being a DVD-to-BD upgrade. That all makes its presence felt in the monthly running time update, too.

Number of titles in collection: 2,061 [up 7]
Of which DVDs: 1,167 [down 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 894 [up 8]

Number of discs in collection: 5,290 [up 18]
Number of films: 2,297 [up 9]
Number of TV episodes: 7,998 [up 18]
Number of short films: 595 [up 1]

Total running time of collection (approx.):
392 days, 5 hours, and 22 minutes.
(Up 2 days, 9 hours, and 24 minutes from last month.)

That's the biggest running time increase since there were silly numbers in July.

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Castle
8x14 G.D.S.

The Flash
4x05 Girls Night Out
This is by far the lowest-rated episode of The Flash on IMDb, not just this season but ever. I didn't think it was very good, but it's not that much worse than the show's usual standard.

The Good Place
1x11 What's My Motivation

Films

Men in Black 3 (2012)
[#167 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

TV

Arrow
6x04 Reversal

Castle
8x13 And Justice for All

Detectorists
3x03 Episode 3
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Good Place
1x10 Chidi's Choice

Would I Lie To You?
11x03 Episode 3
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

The Terminator (1984)
[2nd watch]

Rewatchathon 2017 #46

TV

The Flash
4x04 Elongated Journey Into Night

Insert Name Here
3x03 Anne
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Atomic Blonde (2017)
[#166 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

Films

Her (2013)
[#165 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

What Do You Mean You Haven't Seen...? 2017 #10

And that completes WDYMYHS for 2017.

TV

The Graham Norton Show
22x09 (1/12/17 edition)
I only really watch this nowadays when I'm at my parents' and they bung it on.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Michael McIntyre's Big Show
3x01 (18/11/17 edition)
Same as above for this (as well as a few other random shows that I didn't really pay attention to).
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Murder on the Orient Express (2017)
[#164 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

Despite the mixed-to-poor reviews, I rather enjoyed this. It's also now made over $210 million worldwide, nearly quadruple its budget, so I guess we'll be getting the rumoured sequel.

this week on 100 Films

I'm sure you can't have failed to notice that it's now December (nearly Christmas!), which means it was time to look back at November on 100 Films in a Year...





There were also 4 brand-new reviews published in the last week...


Rurouni Kenshin (2012)

As promised, the action sequences are excitingly staged, full of quick choreography and slick stunts. Couple their impressiveness with the large cast and varied period locations, and it gives the whole thing a glossy, big-budget feel.

Read more here.


Rurouni Kenshin: Kyoto Inferno (2014)

one of those sequels that benefits from the its predecessor establishing the world of the story and the characters that inhabit it, meaning it can launch off on its own grander scale. Partly we see this in a material sense: it looks even more expensive than the first one... but it’s also in the scope of the story and the way it stretches the characters, both old and new.

Read more here.


Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017)

It’s probably a bit too barmy — a bit too European, even — for mainstream US tastes, but there’s a lot to like here for those who are so inclined. The main selling point is the imagery. Simply put, it’s incredible. There’s so much going on, all the time. There’s background detail galore. It whizzes through worlds that could be the entire setting for some other story. There are dozens, probably hundreds, of alien species thrown around. It’s so casually inventive, as if it’s got imagination to spare. And it’s mostly vibrantly colourful too

Read more here.


Zatoichi the Fugitive (1963)

the best part of the film is the final 20 minutes, a tour de force of emotion and action that sees Ichi surrounded and, enraged into action, taking down an army that stands between him and vengeance. Said vengeance comes in the form of a one-on-one sword duel, of course. Obviously we know our hero will triumph, but it’s still a tense scene, especially as it seems to be a rare occasion when Ichi’s been out-fought. This third act elevates the whole movie

Read more here.


The third and final (so far) Rurouni Kenshin will be reviewed tomorrow, and therefore feature in next Sunday's roundup.

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

Just one new-release addition this week. A whole load of stuff is out on Monday, but that's all still in the post.

Number of titles in collection: 2,054 [up 1]
Of which DVDs: 1,168 [no change]
Of which Blu-rays: 886 [up 1]

Number of discs in collection: 5,272 [up 2]
Number of films: 2,288 [up 1]
Number of TV episodes: 7,980 [no change]
Number of short films: 594 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Armchair Detectives
1x01 Watercolour Crime
I like the general concept behind this show (three contestants attempt to solve a TV-drama-style murder mystery), but being a daytime quiz show the 'drama' bits leave something to be desired. I might give it a few more episodes to see.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Bounty Hunters
1x06 Episode 6 [season finale]
I was wondering how there could be a second season of this. Turns out "by not exactly wrapping everything up" was the answer. Cheats.

The Good Place
1x09 ...Someone Like Me as a Member

TV

Castle
8x12 The Blame Game

Insert Name Here
3x02 Lou
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

The Punisher
1x13 Memento Mori [season finale]

Films

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
[#163 in 100 Films in a Year 2017]

Blindspot 2017 #11

+ some of the Blu-ray's special features, including visual essay You Must Become Caligari. I need to watch/read more before I attempt to review this...