TV

Elementary
4x01 The Past is Parent

TV

Castle
5x22 Still

Live at the Apollo
11x05 Episode 5
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Arrow
4x07 Brotherhood

Films

Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015)
[#184 in 100 Films in a Year 2015]

TV

Castle
5x21 The Squab and the Quail

The Flash
2x07 Gorilla Warfare

Articles

Ranking all 9 series of Doctor Who (and the specials) from 2005 to 2015
by Morgan Jeffery (from Digital Spy)

This starts off with an act of pure stupidity (no way series one is the worst), but then pretty quickly gets pretty accurate. Not necessarily the exact order I'd put them in, but not bad.

TV

Castle
5x20 The Fast and the Furriest

Detectorists
2x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Doctor Who
35x12 Hell Bent [season finale]
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Jessica Jones
1x10 AKA 1,000 Cuts
1x11 AKA I've Got the Blues

this week on 100 Films

Lots to cover on 100 Films in a Year this week!

Firstly, it's a new month, so here's a look back at the old one:




Then, my 2015 advent calendar kicked off. Read all about that here:




As you'll learn if you read that, my plan is to post two reviews a day throughout advent. So that means, this week, 12 new reviews were posted(!) They were:


Ant-Man (2015)

Marvel are currently fond of mixing “superhero” with “another genre” to produce their movies — which makes sense, given the standard two-or-three superhero narratives were already becoming played out by the time Iron Man came along, never mind in the raft of movies Marvel Studios have released since. Here, “superhero” is mixed with “heist movie”; more specifically, “heist comedy”. It’s superheroes by way of Ocean’s Eleven, basically.

Read more here.


L'Atalante (1934)

my view hews closer to the original reception. Reportedly a French distributor called it “a confused, incoherent, wilfully absurd, long, dull, commercially worthless film,” while critics called it “amateurish, self-indulgent and morbid.” OK, maybe it’s not that bad, but there are nuggets of truth in there.

Read more here.


Beverly Hills Cop (1984)

I didn’t expect to care for this all that much… but I actually thought it was really fun. It’s not the funniest movie ever, nor does it have the most thrilling action, or the most engrossing or surprising plot, but it does all those things — well, the first two — well, maybe just the first one — well enough. It’s sort of incessantly likeable.

Read more here.


Brazil (1985)

It’s clever, it’s funny, it’s massively imaginative in both its visuals and its storytelling, and its influences on the 30 years of dystopian fiction that have followed is… well, fairly clear, because it also has influences of its own, so whether future works are influenced by the original influence or whether the influencee has become the influencer is an over-complex matter for over-complex people to discuss ad infinitum.

Read more here.


End of Watch (2012)

Ah, found footage. Some despise it. I’m not sure anyone loves it. I don’t mind it, so long as it’s used appropriately. Here, the found footage aspect is abandoned literally as soon as it’s introduced, rendering it absolutely pointless.

Read more here.


Europa Report (2013)

Astronauts head to a Saturnian moon to examine its water in this scientifically-accurate drama. The voluminous “special thanks” to space-related organisations shows how seriously the filmmakers took that accuracy, and it pays off in the exploration of some neat ideas.

Read more here.


The Fifth Estate (2013)

It’s The Julian Assange Movie, in which Benedict Cumberbatch dons a lanky white wig and an Australian accent to portray one of the most significant figures of our times, whether you like it or not.

Read more here.


Force Majeure (2014)

At its best, writer-director Ruben Östlund’s YouTube-inspired film is a droll dark comedy. Told in wisely-deployed long takes that benefit the cast, there’s also gorgeous photography and a dramatic score

Read more here.


Go (1999)

When people call 1999’s Fight Club “the first film of the 21st Century”, it sounds a bit clever-clever. When you watch 1999’s Go, you see what they mean. Fincher forged forward; Liman encapsulated “just been” — indeed, it’s been called the most ’90s movie ever made.

Read more here.


Life Itself (2014)

Roger Ebert was an influential, respected, beloved critic for decades, and one with an interesting life: he began in old-school newspaper journalism, defined TV movie criticism, and eventually spearheaded the profession’s move online. So it merits recounting in this documentary

Read more here.


The Swimmer (1968)

A strange air means this quickly begins to feel like a Twilight Zone-esque mystery, but it’s actually something else entirely… though to reveal too many secrets would spoil it.

Read more here.


Tank Girl (1995)

Critically derided, this anarchic adaptation of the rebellious comic has become a cult fave. You can see why: a ramshackle plot allows for plenty of outré zaniness, including a big musical number to a punky Cole Porter cover, and surely no one predicted the bizarre truth about the Rippers!

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

Films

Shaun the Sheep Movie (2015)
[#183 in 100 Films in a Year 2015]

Collection Count

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

After last week's madness, just one addition... of a ten-film box set.

Number of titles in collection: 1,821 [up 1]
Of which DVDs: 1,211 [no change]
Of which Blu-rays: 610 [up 1]

Number of discs in collection: 4,657 [up 12]
Number of films in collection: 1,990 [up 10]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 7,051 [no change]
Number of short films in collection: 465 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Castle
5x19 The Lives of Others

Have I Got News For You
50x08 (27/11/2015 edition; extended repeat)
[Watch the extended version (again) on iPlayer.]

Jessica Jones
1x08 AKA WWJD?
1x09 AKA Sin Bin

TV

Arrow
4x06 Lost Souls

Live at the Apollo
11x04 Episode 4
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Castle
5x18 The Wild Rover

Detectorists
2x03 Episode 3
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Jessica Jones
1x06 AKA You're a Winner!
1x07 AKA Top Shelf Perverts

TV

Castle
5x17 Scared to Death

The Flash
2x06 Enter Zoom

Films

Ant-Man (2015)
[#181 in 100 Films in a Year 2015]

Paddington (2014)
[#182 in 100 Films in a Year 2015]

TV

Doctor Who
35x11 Heaven Sent
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

this week on 100 Films

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


An inside out pair of shorts

Pixar’s latest opus, Inside Out, was naturally accompanied by a short film in cinemas. On Blu-ray, it’s accompanied by two. These are they -- Lava and Riley's First Date? -- reviewed in nice quick drabbles.

Read more here.


Jupiter Ascending (2015)

best known (as far as I’m aware) for provoking speculation it would cost Eddie Redmayne the Oscar for Theory of Everything because it came out during voting season and he was so gosh darn bad in it. And it’s also known for being just generally dreadful and universally disdained. [But] the universal disdain wasn’t actually universal — I have actually seen some people praise this film. I know, right? Sadly, I still thought it was awful.

Read more here.


Murder by Death (1976)

A gaggle of famed detectives are summoned to a remote mansion to solve a murder in this detective spoof by playwright Neil Simon. The twist is, all the characters are spoofs of famous literary/film/TV ‘tecs. Also, that the murder hasn’t happened yet. And also, that the person inviting them is Truman Capote. Not “someone playing Truman Capote”, but “Truman Capote playing someone”.

Read more here.


Plus, it's the last-ever archive reposts!


2010: The Full List

I did it! After last year’s slight shortfall, that’s the big news this year... So, here’s the list of all I saw. Slight change this year: the list is in numerical order, aka order viewed... [And] after the lists comes the usual array of fascinating statistics.

Read more here.


2010 In Retrospect

This final look back has my usual mix of features: a ‘Bottom Five’, a ‘Top Ten’, some ‘Also Ran’s, and ‘Didn’t Run’s too.

Read more here.


More -- though only new posts (hurrah!) -- next Sunday.

Films

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (Extended Edition) (2014/2015)
[#180a in 100 Films in a Year 2015]

Was this really only out last Monday? Feels like it's been sat on my shelf for weeks! Anyway, it's my third Hobbit film this year (after Part 2 Extended and Part 3 Theatrical back in March).

Collection Count

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

A delayed update this week, because not only was there loads to add, but it all arrived on Saturday afternoon. I thought most of it would arrive next week, but here it is just in time for the last running time update before the post-Christmas end-of-the-year one. That would've been an utter monster if this lot had been there too! As it is, I think it'll now really struggle to beat this... or even come close...

Number of titles in collection: 1,820 [up 5]
Of which DVDs: 1,211 [down 2]
Of which Blu-rays: 609 [up 7]

Number of discs in collection: 4,645 [up 78]
Number of films in collection: 1,980 [up 9]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 7,051 [up 246]
Number of short films in collection: 465 [up 3]

Yes, 246 episodes of TV. I imagine that'll make quite a difference to the...

Total running time of collection (approx.):
339 days, 1 hour, and 43 minutes.
(Up 10 days, 22 hours, and 18 minutes from last month.)

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Jessica Jones
1x05 AKA The Sandwich Saved Me