Archive for the ‘Cultural issues’ Category
A review of the new film “The Father”
June 21st, 2021 by Roger Darlington
Many of the patients I visit in my hospital volunteering role have some form of cognitive loss and my mother had vascular dementia, so I’m not unfamiliar with the illness. Also films like “Iris” and “Still Alice” have previously addressed the issue of dementia, so this is not a new topic for the cinema. But […]
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Looking for thrills? Try “A Quiet Place”
June 20th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
“A Quiet Place” Horror is not a movie genre that generally appeals to me, but this movie received good reviews and it stars one of my favourite actors, the British Emily Blunt. So I took the opportunity of a pandemic lockdown to catch it on television. In fact, the film is something of a family […]
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A review of the 2016 film “20th Century Women”
June 15th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
This 2016 movie didn’t register on my radar at all on its release but, five years later, I caught it on television during the global pandemic. It will not be to everyone’s taste because it is totally character-driven with no set action pieces – but I loved it. It is written and directed by Mike […]
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The evolution of storytelling: have stories become more complex?
June 15th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
I recently had a discussion on the evolution of storytelling – as you do – with a Canadian friend who is an English teacher in an American school. I suggested that storytelling has become more opaque but she rather contested that. She pointed out that the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey” – both, of course, very […]
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A review of the novel “The Beekeeper Of Aleppo” by Christy Lefteri
June 11th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
There is a certain fashion for novels to have a title in the format “The [common noun of an occupation] Of [proper noun of a place of peril]” – think “The Bookseller Of Kabul”, “The Tatooist Of Auschwitz” and “The Cellist Of Sarajevo”. I was particularly attracted to this particular work because I spent a […]
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Word of the day: weathering
June 6th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
Of course, you know this word in relation to the physical effect of weather on materials like wood or metal. But do you know the use of the word in relation to people, especially ethnic minorities, to describe the health effects of sustained discrimination? This use of the word was first proposed by. Arline Geronimus, […]
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A review of the 2016 rom-com “Mother’s Day”
June 4th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
Who doesn’t love a good rom-com and these days the genre usually manages to include a bit of social commentary. This movie is an attempt by director Garry Marshall – who had such a huge success with “Pretty Woman” in 1990 – to follow up on the formula developed for his rom-coms “Valentine’s Day” (2010) […]
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A review of the new movie “Godzilla vs Kong”
June 1st, 2021 by Roger Darlington
Over the years, I’ve seen the two American versions of Godzilla and the three versions of Kong, so I was up for a movie pairing these two mega-monsters – and there were some extra factors. It was the end of the third British lockdown of the global pandemic and I was desperate for some cinematic […]
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A review of the new film “Sound Of Metal”
May 27th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
Ruben (British Pakistani actor Riz Ahmed) is a drummer and Lou (Olivia Cooke) is the guitarist and singer in a punk-metal duo called Blackgammon. Both are recovering addicts in a loving but complicated co-dependent relationship. They seem to be on the cusp of some professional success when Ruben suffers a sudden and catastrophic loss of […]
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There are so many ways to die – linguistically, that is
May 24th, 2021 by Roger Darlington
Check out this list. I rather like the expression “to kick the bucket” – but there is no certainty around the explanation of the origin of this expression.
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