Dark Shadows-Not As Bad As I Expected

I can’t remember the last really good Johnny Depp/Time Burton movie I saw, but it must have been Ed Wood.  That was about twenty years ago.  But Depp and Burton are still golden for some reason and will likely keep cranking out movies until one of them dies. Dark Shadows is another one of those movies that looked great in the coming attractions trailer, but fell a little short in the actual film.  The details were very good, the costumes, music, and sets were bang on. Johnny Depp actually made a pretty good Barnabas Collins and the special effects, especially…

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Toast on the BBC

I read Nigel Slater’s toast a couple of years back and really loved it.  A wonderfully odd little book about food, sex, and the glories of an Aga Range. The BBC film is a little glimpse into those bygone days of the 1960s.  We see what it’s like to be a foodie in a house where cooking consists of putting unopened tins into a pot of boiling water and letting them rattle around for a bit before opening them. This was our nine year old hero’s Mum who couldn’t cook, but could do a bit of baking-and she did a…

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The King’s Speech

The King’s Speech has received various awards and nominations, including twelve Academy Award nominations (the highest number of nominations in 2011), seven Golden Globe nominations, fourteen BAFTA nominations and wins from various critics’ circles.  –Wikipedia I was expecting The King’s Speech to be a good movie, and I am often disappointed by movies I think will be good.  Not this time.  The King’s Speech was great.  It’s an almost literal fairy tale of a Price who becomes a King through no real desire or action of his own.  First his father, played by Sir Michael-Dumbledore-Gambon, goes a bit mad and…

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