TV

FlashForward
1x21 Countdown
It's quite hard to feel any sympathy for the breakdown of Dem & Zoe's engagement, considering she's been an unlikeable pussy-whipping bitch throughout. Good riddance to her, in fact. Indeed, FlashForward routinely fails on all emotional fronts -- the supposedly moving scene between Mark and Charlie was a particularly weak and over-sentimental example in my opinion.
Still, only one more ep to go, and then we'll have all the answers we're ever going to have.
[Watch it (again) on Demand Five.]

You Have Been Watching
2x06 (20/5/10 edition)
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

Films

Insomnia (1997)
[#52 in 100 Films in a Year 2010]
Swedish original of the Al Pacino/Robin Williams/Chris Nolan film, which I watched almost exactly a year ago. Slightly weird coincidence there then.

TV

Outnumbered
3x06 Programme 6 [season finale]
A more low-key series-closer than Outnumbered usually does, I thought. Good news that they show no signs of stopping though -- I miss it already.
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Wallander [Swedish]
2x05 Cellisten (aka The Cellist)
One of the more interesting things about Wallander is how it can do an episode about the Russian mafia, featuring car bombs and multiple murders, and still feel resolutely low-key. It has a knack for making the improbable feel almost real.

Music

Mind Heist by Zack Hemsey

The lovely music from the third Inception trailer, written especially for it. Beautifully Dark Knight-y. One 'review' of the trailer described this track thusly:

and the music...the way it grates into your head, into your nerves, it puts you on edge while simultaneously making you feel that this is the most important movie of the year and that the stakes are so high in this, how can you not go see it?

Yup.

You can listen to it streamed here. It's available to buy once the film's out, but if you're A Bit Naughty you can actually download that stream. But you didn't hear that from me.

Articles

Cannes 2010. End of the Line: Outrage (Takeshi Kitano, Japan) by Daniel Kasman
(from Mubi)
Interesting review of Kitano's latest, offering a different perspective to most.

Towel Day 2010: Take some time to enjoy the genius of Douglas Adams by Shane Richmond (from Telegraph.co.uk)
and
Towel day: Douglas Adams remembered across the globe by Michelle Pauli (from guardian.co.uk)
RIP Douglas.

On a related note...

How to Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the Internet by Douglas Adams
(from DouglasAdams.com)
As mentioned in the Telegraph article. It's 11 years old, but it's still largely relevant.

TV

FlashForward
1x20 The Negotiation
[Watch it (again) on Demand Five.]

The Mentalist
2x14 Blood In, Blood Out
[Watch it (again) on Demand Five.

Articles

Shrek Shrinks with Fourth Movie by Brandon Gray
(from Box Office Mojo)

Shrek Forever After debuted far, far below the mighty starts of some of its predecessors, grossing an estimated $71.3 million on approximately 9,500 screens, the broadest launch ever for an animated movie.
Shrek the Third still holds the record for highest-grossing animated opening with $121.6 million, followed by Shrek 2 and The Simpsons Movie. Shrek Forever After ranks fourth on that list, although, in terms of estimated attendance, it would barely make the Top 20... opening 41 percent lower than last movie despite the 3D ticket price boost was alarmingly severe. In terms of attendance, the slip was even more extreme: down 59 percent.

More details and analysis at the link. I like that 3D may be to blame.

TV

An Audience with Michael Bublé
[Watch it (again) on ITV Player.]

Doctor Who
31x08 The Hungry Earth
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

House
6x22 Help Me [season finale]
Brilliant episode, what a great way to end the season. And, as usual, can't wait for the next.

Articles

50 Beautiful Movie Posters by Alessandro Cattaneo
(from Smashing Magazine)
An interesting gallery of lovely posters, some obvious, some less so. And it's not at all as pretentious as you might expect.

this week on 100 Films

3 new reviews were posted to 100 Films in a Year this week, and they were...

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008)

action sequences are frequent and fantastic throughout. The raid on the castle is tense, exciting and ultimately devastating — the troops left behind to certain slaughter is an incredibly dark moment in a PG-rated kids’ film.

Righteous Kill (2008)

it’s dull. Properly dull — not slow, not measured, not leisurely — just dull. Director Jon Avnet tries to spice things up occasionally with some swishy camerawork or editing, apparently forgetting he’s lensing a procedural thriller about a pair of 60-something cops and not Miami Vice 2.

Waitress (2007)

Some have criticised it for putting so much levity near such tragic topics; I can only assume they live in a different world to our’s, presumably one where either everything is punctuated by a laughter track or one where everything is underscored by Coldplay.

More next Sunday.

TV

Ashes to Ashes
3x08 Episode 8 [series finale]
And so that's that. Intriguing and not-unguessable, which is probably a good thing, especially as some of the questions/possibilities left dangling allow us to fill in some bits how we choose to.
But nonetheless, you can read some interesting/revealing post-finale interviews with the series' co-creator here.
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Have I Got News For You
39x07 (20/5/10; extended repeat)
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Over the Rainbow
Show 10
Show 10: Results
aka, The Final.
[Watch Show 10 and the results (again) on iPlayer.]

Films

Tu£sday (2008)
[#51 in 100 Films in a Year 2010]
An '80s-set crime movie starring Philip Glenister and John Simm? Appropriate, considering this weekend's big TV.

Articles

Ashes Exclusive by Nick Setchfield (from SFX)
and
Ashes to Ashes: co-creator Matthew Graham says goodbye to Gene Hunt by Ian Wylie (from guardian.co.uk)

Two 'exclusive' interviews with Ashes to Ashes co-creator/finale writer Matthew Graham, published last night after the final episode. Still have some questions needing answers? He has them. (Though there's some repetition, each piece also has new info / a different spin.)

TV

Derren Brown Investigates
1x02 The Men with X-Ray Eyes
Verdict: fake. And actually quite exploitative. Nasty Russians.
[Watch it (again) on 4oD.]

FlashForward
1x19 Course Correction
Spoke too soon...
[Watch it (again) on Demand Five.]

Articles

How to Gain from Dragon by Brandon Gray
(from Box Office Mojo)
Why How to Train Your Dragon has been a surprise box office hit, and that rarest of things, a consistent one.

Collection Count

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

All new-release Blu-rays this week, one replacing a DVD. Exciting.

Number of titles in collection: 1,173 [up 2]
Of which DVDs: 1,086 [down 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 87 [up 3]

Number of discs in collection: 2,844 [up 3]
Number of films in collection: 1,239 [up 2]
Number of TV episodes in collection: 3,916 [no change]

Statistic of the week:

Titles I've upgraded to Blu-ray:
26
(29.9% of Blu-rays. 2.3% of DVDs upgraded.)

Specifically, these are things I used to own on DVD that I've now replaced with Blu-rays... which I guess is what the name says. Though it also includes three where, for various reasons, I've still kept the DVD.

I have no immediate intention to attempt an upgrade of my remaining 1,086 DVDs. In most cases it wouldn't even be possible, in others of minimal benefit, and it would of course cost a bloody fortune. Most of my BD purchases are new films or things I missed on DVD for whatever reason -- 70.1%, to be precise -- and this is how I intend to continue forward. But a few more titles may well warrant the upgrade in the future, particularly as prices continue to fall.

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

FlashForward
1x18 Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
More flashback-driven twists! Intrigue-tastic.
I'm almost beginning to like FlashForward now, which is sod's law considering it's been cancelled. Alternatively, maybe it's because I know it's All Over in just four more episodes that I don't mind so much.
[Watch it (again) on Demand Five.]

The Graham Norton Show
7x06 (17/5/10 edition)
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Russell Howard's Good News
2x08 Best Bits (extended repeat) [season finale]
Mostly hilarious, though the extended repeat's stand-up was a single routine, one so bad I'd actually wiped it from my memory (but I had seen it before -- I eventually remembered).
Also included in the extended version were some new bits cut from the series, including a selection of particularly funny montages. I would've linked directly to them on iPlayer, but for no known reason the BBC still insist on not putting the extended show up. Bastards.
[Watch the whole episode (shorter version only) on iPlayer.]

Films

Sword of Sherwood Forest (1960)
[#50 in 100 Films in a Year 2010]
Halfway through, and it's still May -- hurrah!

Articles

Death to the spoiler police by Mary Elizabeth Williams
(from Salon.com)
I dislike spoilers as much as the next discerning viewer, and I don't want to go round spoiling things for others -- well, except maybe fans of something like Twilight -- but this article has several good points about spoilers and the way we behave around them.
Be warned, it spoils Citizen Kane, The Sixth Sense, Les Diaboliquse, Soylent Green, The Empire Strike Back, and some US reality series.

New Social Networking Site Changing The Way Oh, Christ, Forget It
(from The Onion)

While millions of young, tech-savvy professionals already use services like Facebook and Twitter to keep in constant touch with friends, a new social networking platform called Foursquare has recently taken the oh, fucking hell, can't some other desperate news outlet cover this crap instead?

TV

Ashes to Ashes
3x07 Episode 7
Nearly over... very exciting...
[Watch it (again) in HD on iPlayer.]

Wallander [Swedish]
2x04 Tjuven (aka The Thief)