Movie Binge December

I've been watching a lot of movies recently so I thought I'd do a review post. I should point out that I saw none of these films in 3D (which may or may not explain some of my views).

HUGO ~ Very poor visuals (perhaps they're more impressive in 3D) with very obvious fake backgrounds and way too much CGI endlessly weaving between passengers on train platforms. A sweet message about the love of imagination, but quite a long, drawn out narrative structure with lots of Tell me/It's a secret/ But you must/No, I can't/Oh, go on/No, really, I can't... And quite a few plot holes too, where stuff that's important one minute is totally forgotten the next.

TINTIN ~ Visually very impressive, really used the freedom of the CGI world to get the camera to do things you couldn't do in real life. Action set pieces were very good, although the story itself suffers from the same problems as the source material (Tintin tends to solve cases through luck and coincidence), although fortunately they toned down the casual racism in the books. Still prefer Asterix and Obelisk, myself.

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Bunch of Cults No.6: 1Q84

This is part of an ongoing series of weird and wonderful stories from off the beaten path. Others in the series can be found here.

This post is in two parts. Firstly a look at the latest book from Haruki Murakami, probably the bestselling ‘cult’ author in the world. And secondly a few thoughts on the power of story over technique. If you’re telling an engrossing tale, does it really matter how you go about it?

1Q84 by Haruki Murakami is a science-fiction story. Sort of. It’s set in a parallel 1984, that is more or less identical to the real 1984. Except for the two moons in the sky (that only a few people notice). It is about two people, a lonely young woman, and an aspiring novelist. And it is about a fantastical group of Little People who are trying to control the balance of good and evil in the world. 

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Chapter One: Harry Potter

This dissection is specifically looking at how best to construct an opening chapter of a novel, in this case for children. I should say first that I am not a big reader of middle grade books and will be approaching this first chapter the same as any other in the series (other books I’ve analysed can be found here: Chapter One Analyses), with a view to taking it apart to see what works, what doesn’t (and how she got round that), which conventions are used well, and which are broken to good effect.

Clearly this is one of the most famous and most revered books in children’s literature but I have attempted to approach it objectively, aided by the fact that I have never read any of the books in the series. It should also be remembered that chapter one in a published book as written may not have been chapter one in the original manuscript, or may have gone through many edits.

The original Harry Potter book was published in 1997 after being rejected by numerous publishers. The first chapter, thirteen pages, is a little different to the rest of the book, being in omniscient POV, very much in the narrator’s voice. The following chapters appear to switch to a more conventional third person POV from Harry’s perspective (although I don’t know if this remains so for the rest of the book).

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Bunch of Cults

I hope to make this an ongoing series looking at books and movies that I have been meaning to read/watch and have now got round to. What makes these stories special is that they have a non-mainstream sensibility and may not be overtly commercial, but have managed to find a place within the collective consciousness.

The first book I want to look at is Room by Emma Donoghue. A prize-winning novel about a woman and her young son trapped in a room and occasionally visited by their captor.

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