http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett I reserve the right to be wrong. Tue, 24 Jun 2008 10:03:49 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Here's a set of simple, affecting songs, beautifully sung and sympathetically arranged. The overall theme is Love Gone Wrong, the traditional singer-songwriter preoccupation. But Anna Coddington turns it into something that sounds great -- "beauty exploding from despair", to use one of her own lines. I was looking forward to buying ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2008/06/24/the-lake-anna-coddington/ I had a great time at this big, fun and loud film about a big, fun and loud elephant. The story of Horton and the Whos is one of my 2-year-old son's favourite stories, so this was a good choice as his first ever cinema experience. He enjoyed it, and ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2008/06/02/horton-hears-a-who/ I was listening to one of the tracks from the new Alec Empire album "The Golden Foretaste of Heaven" the other day. I was loving it but it seemed a bit familiar. The relentless pounding beat; the hypnotic, discordant basslines; the snarled vocals; the overall claustrophobic intensity of the thing. ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2008/05/09/alec-empire-and-nitzer-ebb/ Organised religion is a pernicious anachronism that should be abolished, according to Christopher Hitchens. His book is subtitled "How religion poisons everything" in case there was any doubt about his position. Organised religions are pretty much indefensible anyway, but his arguments are still worth reading -- I learned a few ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2008/04/08/god-is-not-great-christopher-hitchens/ Ben Kemp looks like a rugby player, but he has the most delicate falsetto voice and a rather poetic songwriting touch. His band, Uminari, are tight and very cool in a quirky Japanese way, especially the drummer who is so cool he doesn't need drumsticks. We saw these guys at ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2008/03/06/ben-kemp-uminari-anna-coddington/ Politics, cyberpunk (pseudo)science, philosophy, big explosions and scantily-clad nubile young women. Sure it's only a comic, but it still left me as breathless as a frenetic action film. This chunky book looks to be a compilation of several episodes of a series. The great thing is that they have translated only ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2007/11/30/the-ghost-in-the-shell/ Rainbows make me smile. Joanne has designed the beautiful "Smilebow" T-shirt, and if enough people vote for it at threadless.com then they just might pick it up and manufacture a print run. Then we'll be able to wear a Smilebow every day! Just click the Smilebow picture to go to the ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2007/10/05/smilebow-t-shirt/ This French comedy, about a man who doesn't want to get married (don't read any further if you don't want to find out what happens) but does anyway, was really quite good. It had a happy ending; it was hilarious, warm, and… French. And we saw it at the Lido cinema ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2007/10/02/i-do-prete-moi-ta-main/ Now this was an excellent adaptation of an unusual novel. Very cinematic and dark and not at all blockbustery. It was about 6 years ago that I read Patrick Suskind's novel, but I still remember it quite well and the film captured its tone nicely. I saw the film with Joanne ... http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2007/09/27/perfume/ "The Matsugane Potshot Affair" is your classic Festival film: amusing, but also with many uneasy moments. Weird. A bit pervy. Very non-mainstream; even more so than its very different predecessor "Linda Linda Linda" (directed by the same gentleman). http://www.thunderguy.com/bennett/2007/07/29/the-matsugane-potshot-affair/