Archive for the ‘Cultural issues’ Category
Word of the day: quarantine
April 22nd, 2020 by Roger Darlington
The current coronaviris crisis is highlighting certain words. My last word of the day was ‘furlough’. Today I want to look at the word ‘quarantine”. The word comes from the Italian word for 40: quaranta. Originally, when a ship was suspected of being infected with some contagious disorder, it was obliged to lie off port […]
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A review of the 2014 film”Effie Gray”
April 17th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
In 1848, Euphemia ‘Effie’ Gray (portrayed here by Dakota Fanning) was 19 when she married the famous critic John Ruskin (Greg Wise), but he was a terrible husband and the marriage was never consummated, a further complication being her attraction to the Pre-Raphaelite painter John Everett Millais (Tom Sturridge). This famous Victorian love triangle is […]
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Word of the day: furlough
April 10th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
Until a couple of weeks ago, most people had never heard the word furlough. Now it is everywhere. But what does it mean? And where did it come from? As a noun, it has three meanings: a vacation or leave of absence granted to an enlisted person a temporary leave of absence authorised for a prisoner from a penitentiary a usually temporary layoff from work Clearly, in current circumstances of the coronavirus crisis, it is the last meaning that is relevant. […]
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“I’m still standing”
March 20th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
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What was the greatest film ever made? Let me make a nomination.
March 17th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
Readers of this blog will know of my love for the cinema. At the weekend, I ‘braved’ the coronavirus to go to the British Film Instiute and see my all-time favourite film on the big screen. Since it was first released in 1962, over a period of almost six decades, I’ve viewed “Lawrence Of Arabia” […]
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“Parasite” becomes highest earning subtitled film
March 14th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
The Oscar-winning horror-thriller “Parasite” has become the highest earning foreign language film at the UK box office, overtaking the 2004 Mel Gibson-directed film “The Passion of the Christ”. Curzon, the South Korean film’s UK distributors, has reported that “Parasite” has passed “Passion”’s cumulative total of £11,078,861 on 6 March. “Parasite” was released on 7 February […]
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A review of the new French arthouse film “Portrait Of A Lady On Fire”
March 6th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
This wonderful French-language arthouse film is a rarity in the world of cinema: a work written and directed by a woman (Céline Sciamma) with cinematography by a woman (Claire Mathon) and a cast list – headed by Noémie Merlant and Adèle Haenel – in which men barely feature. Set around 1770, it is located on […]
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A review of the utterly over-the-top movie “Birds Of Prey”
February 23rd, 2020 by Roger Darlington
Thought that films about comic book characters were all man-made? Well, here in the DC comic universe, we have a movie with women as producer (Margot Robbie), writer (Christina Hodson) and director (Cathy Yan) in which the girls also fill the main role of Harley Quinn (Robbie again) and the three eponymous birds (Mary Elizabeth […]
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Thank you and farewell “Madam Secretary”
February 15th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
I suppose all good things have to come to an end and I’ve just watched the last episode of the American television series “Madam Secretary”. The series began in 2014 and seasons 1-5 each had between 20-23 episodes. The sixth and last season has concluded with just 10 episodes, making 120 episodes in all. I’ve […]
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A review of the important new movie “Queen & Slim”
February 14th, 2020 by Roger Darlington
How many American films have a black woman as both writer and director and black actors in both the lead roles and in most of the support roles? But this is how it should be for a work that reflects the Black Lives Matter agenda and it is a genre-blending triumph, part thriller-cum-social commentary, part […]
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