Flavours of the Month: July & August 2026...

The sardonic arm of the law, foul-mouthed kitty-cats, and baloney in a galaxy far far away is just some of what's been setting the tone of my July/August 2026...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: July & August 2025...

In space no one can hear you being stupid, hunting drug lords, and post-apocalyptic gear-crunching is just some of what's been setting the tone of my July and August 2025...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: July & August 2024...

Seventies sauce, humorous horror, and seeing how far the rabbit hole goes is just some of what's been setting the tone of my July & August 2024...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Months: July/August 2023...

Tomes of Terror, a menagerie of monsters, and some rubber-burning donuts is just some of what's been setting the tone of my July and August 2023...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August/September 2022...

Climactic stories, grotesque humour, and some monstrous sights are just some of what's been setting the tone of my August/September 2022...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August/September 2021...

Crazy island-based goings on, returning to E-Corp, and Maurizio Merli's flyin' fists are just some of what's been setting the tone of my August/September 2021...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August & September 2020

We fight on through the harshness brought about by a family health emergency that has turned things upside down - and all against the continuing wretchedness of the pandemic that makes a hard situation all the harder. Nevertheless, bloody vengeance, Agent 47, and documentaries galore are just some of the flavours of my August & September 2020...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August 2019...

Deadly psychology, the end of an undead era, and micromanaging through a nuclear apocalypse are just some of what's been setting the tone of my August 2019...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August 2018...

Complicated comics, all-out action in middle America, and an elf named Elfo are just a few examples of what's been setting the tone of my August 2018...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August 2017...

A gobby gun-for-hire, saucy space adventures, and Mr Cooper(s) - just some of what's been flavouring my August 2017...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August 2016...

West Country slackers, brooding heroes, a coven of witches, and a Gonzo journalist - just some of what has been setting the tone of my August 2016...

Click "READ MORE" below for this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August 2015...

Brooding detectives, super soldiers, underground spookiness, and more such things have been summing up my August 2015...

Click "READ MORE" below for this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August 2014...

Dark conspiracies, comedic priests, talking dogs, sardonic comedians, hard-boiled cops, and underground zombies ... just a few of the things that have been flavouring my August 2014 ... read on to see what else.

Click "READ MORE" below for the looks, sounds, vibes & flavours of the past four weeks...

Flavours of the Month: August 2013...

LOOKS:

The Kevin Pollak Chat Show - it's a little rough around the edges, and Sam Levine's semi-off-camera interjections don't float my boat, but there's some good and lengthy interviews to see on YouTube. Some I've dug into this month have been Ed O'Neil, Lisa Kudrow, Matthew Perry, and a massively entertaining sit-down with the reliably verbose John Landis who has a veritable shedload of fascinating and entertaining stories from his decades in the movie industry to share. The shows are good because it's just two people having a relaxed and varied chat - although Pollak could ask his questions faster and more succinctly.

Click "READ MORE" below for more looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Flavours of the Month: August 2012...

LOOKS:

Napoleon Dynamite - we watched this movie so many times in the final semester of uni, to the point that we could practically recite all of it, but I haven't seen it since, until now that is. It still evades a summary as to why it's so unique and enjoyable.

Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan - the first time I saw it I wasn't at all keen on it. A few years later and I grew to like it a lot more, despite its flaws, and seeing as Sky Movies haven't shown it (despite frequently showing Friday the 13th one-through-seven routinely), I fancied another dip into it. Yes, there are some problems, but I've come to really enjoy the flick.

Breaking Bad: Season 3 & 4 - the catch-up with Vince Gilligan's excellent drama (with pitch dark black comedy) continues apace. That moment from the final episode of season four was so good I had to watch it several times. Roll on season five!

Beaver Falls: Series 2 - not overly serious, but not overly silly, and a great antidote to the self-involved and totally unrealistic nonsense that is Skins. You've gotta love Barry too - what a state, but he gets all the best lines.

Click "READ MORE" below for sounds, vibes, and an in-depth look at the Pros and Cons of Assassin's Creed: Revelations...

Flavours of the Month: August 2011...

LOOKS:

Hobo With A Shotgun (Blu-Ray) - my favourite movie of 2011 finally hits UK shores on home video. Check out my review from earlier this month.

Beaver Falls - showing on E4, this show about three Brits who spend their summer as camp counsellors at an American summer camp is pretty good fun. It's much better than Glory Daze which also showed on E4 earlier this year, but a mere six episodes in length feels a bit too brief.

Wilfred - a sitcom about Elijah Wood and a guy dressed as a dog (but is actually a dog to everyone else). Nuff said. Good fun.

SOUNDS:

Nirvana - I've been touring through their back catalogue, from "Bleach" to "Unplugged In New York".

Rage Against The Machine "Maggie's Farm" - as heard at the end of The Other Guys.

VIBES & FLAVOURS:

Alan Wake - I've been meaning to replay Remedy's excellent 'psychological action thriller', but there had always been something else to fill my designated 'videogame time' - however I finally got around to giving it a second run through, and once again I loved every second of it. It deserved to sell many more units than it did (it clashed with the excellent Red Dead Redemption, after numerous delays), and while it has some flaws, it's just so involving and atmospheric and has that unique Remedy vibe.

Scotland - I was off on holiday to Scotland again this year to catch a bit of the festival and do some of the tourist spots. The Royal Yacht Britannia, Best of the Fest, Ed Byrne at the EICC, The Real Mary King's Close, and Stirling Castle were some of the highlights - and I even spotted comedian Mark Watson walking past the BBC Three compound.

Frank Miller "Sin City: The Hard Goodbye" - I loved the movie, but I haven't gotten around to reading the graphic novels, however I finally gave this one a read (included with the Recut & Extended Region 1 DVD that I got damn near six years ago) and so I think I must give the un-filmed books a look-see.

Scotland holiday 2010...

I recently had my first holiday in years, and so I returned to my motherland of Scotland.

I took the train up (a five hour journey), and while I'm not prone to claustrophobia, after five hours on a sodding train I was desperate to get off it. I passed the time with podcasts on my MP3 player, but there are still things that irritate even when you're zoning out with a series of podcasts.

I specifically got my tickets in the "quiet zone" coach, but unsurprisingly plenty of people (a number who didn't have reserved seats either) were busy on their phones - ring tones and conversations of an equally inane nature were indulged in. The entire point of the quiet coach is that you're not supposed to be on the ruddy phone - who wants to listen to your stupid, boring conversation anyway? Especially when you're speaking so loud I can hear you over SModcast in my earphones (I made sure I could still hear the train, so as not to disturb anyone else with my music and podcasts). What's more - don't bring children into the "quiet zone" - please, just don't.

Then you've got people who eat smelly food, refuse to stay in their seats (so they can have a conversation with someone elsewhere, thus shoving their arse in some other passenger's face), and generally fail to adhere to the rule of not irritating me (and others) senseless. It might sound harsh, but I seek to not irritate others, so why shouldn't everyone else seek to be more considerate of those around them - and in the "quiet zone" coach of all places! However, being that we're all British, nobody complained out loud.

What's more, if you're going to get a window seat - look out the flippin' window - don't sit there reading a book. I was stuck with aisle seats and would have rather liked to have spent five hours staring out at the country passing by, rather than being stuck looking at everyone else, getting bashed with baggage, and having arses come entirely too close to my person. If you have a window seat, you should be looking out the window, not reading a book.

Moving on from the torturous boredom and irritation that is modern day train travel, the holiday itself was great fun. Aside from a smidge of drizzle on Saturday night, it was pretty much blue skies and sun the whole time - a perfect way to experience Scotland, and particularly Edinburgh during the closing days of the festival.

I saw Jason Byrne at the Assembly Hall (excellent), a couple of fringe acts on the streets, the final Best of the Fest show in the gardens (hosted by Carl Donnelly, and featuring a singing act - I forget the name - comedian Simon Evans, comedian/card trickster The Card Ninja, and improv musical comedy group Baby Wants Candy - it was properly good fun) ... then it was a bus tour of the city, a tour around the gardens and Rhod Gilbert at the rather swish EICC (also excellent).

We also checked out the seaside town of North Berwick, which I'd visited numerous times throughout my life and hadn't been to for years. We toured the beaches, harbour, Seabird Centre, and the town itself and it was a brilliant day for it too. Ideal weather for a nostalgic time.

Naturally we also did the Edinburgh Castle, and you really need the whole afternoon to do it - such as we did - it's just so chock full of stuff to see, and the views over the city are worth the admission price alone. We even had a look into Saint Giles Cathedral on the way back.

Moving on ... many years ago when I was in primary school, we almost did the York Dungeon on a school trip - but it was deemed too scary for us kids - and so I've always wanted to check one of these out, and so we did the Edinburgh Dungeon. It was tip-top, I really enjoyed it - even if it did freak me out a couple of times (the parts where all the lights go out and the surround sound kicks in are just perfect) - and I even went on the Extremis: Drop Ride to Doom at the end ... which for me, being that I'm terrified of heights, was a real thrill but one I felt safe enough in doing. The actors portraying various parts throughout the tour were all tip-top too, and it was all a really good time - a mixture of gross-out and suspenseful horror. Highly recommended - the Sawney Bean, Burke & Hare, and Mary King sections being particular highlights.

Finally we tackled the Edinburgh Zoo - where seemingly everywhere you go is up a steep hill - but we got to see plenty of animals after some initially shy exhibits. Highlights included - a bunch of chimps going batshit crazy at each other over some faux-pas on the Budongo Trail, two Sumatran Tigers (one of which was lording it over us stood in a tree), a Leopard that was chilling out right by the glass, two highly energetic and playful Indian One-Horned Rhinos, the affable colony of Penguins, and the monkey house where Capuchins were having a great old time.

It was certainly a jam packed schedule, and I've rarely (if ever) done so much walking about in all my life (no wonder I dropped 4 lbs over the week) ... then it was the train home, and well, you know what that was like ... but an absolutely gorgeous cheese-and-meatball panini at a service station relieved my travel stress in an instant.

Oh and I even got to see a couple of movies - Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, and Dinner For Schmucks - which I'll blog about later.

Where have I been?

In Scotland on my first proper holiday in years, that's where.


I'll blog about it in-full later on, but there's a picture of me sat atop Edinburgh Castle looking out over the city and beyond.

Flavours of the Month: August 2010...

A bit earlier this month, and I'm trying out a new style of doing this monthly blog post.

LOOKS:

Blade Runner - finishing off that 5-disc DVD box set.

Everybody Loves Raymond - repeats during lunch time.

Creature Comforts - repeats recorded from late night ITV2.

Friday 13th: Parts 2, 3 and 4 - what with it being a Friday 13th, they showed several of the films from the franchise. I'd forgotten how relatively tame the second movie was, with its really brief moments of violence, I finally got to see the third movie in its full 2.35:1 original aspect ratio (rather than the grainy Pan & Scan 4:3 VHS I've been used to), and to round things off I got to see the uncut version of the fourth movie.

SOUNDS:

Alan Wake OST by Petri Alanko - the perfect compliment to thinking about the game a lot (and giving the prequel short film Bright Falls another viewing).

The Black Angels "Passover" - linked to Alan Wake with the opening track "Young Men Dead", I've really gotten into this 'rock dirge' album.

VIBES & FLAVOURS:

I finally got around to, and finished, reading "Driven to Distraction" by Jeremy Clarkson. As is customary at Christmas, any self-respecting Top Gear fanatic will end up with one or more books written by one or more of the presenters. "Distraction" was an epic tome; a weighty hardback too large for comfortable reading ... but once I got back into the style of Clarkson's aritcles I enjoyed it as I always do.

I've been getting some good prep work done on "Allen Bridge" - my next script - but there's plenty left to think about. Speaking of scripts, "Summer Road" was finished off and posted off to the BBC Writersroom.

Finally there's been a lot of summer time painting and decorating going on (a task I'm good at, but find utterly mind-numbing), as well as some rather late (or rather early) spring cleaning - I've been digging through my chock-full cupboard, weeding out junk for recycling and items for charity shops. On top of all that my entertainment centre in the corner of my room has changed significantly. My trusty 21 inch Samsung CRT has been replaced with a 24 inch Goodmans HDTV ... my Naiko VHS player has been swapped-out for a 12 year old Sony monster chock-full of bells and whistles ... and to cap it all off the hand-me-down DVD player that had been gradually going on the fritz has been replaced by a Samsung Blu-Ray player. I've even got a new cable for my Xbox360 so I can game in HD.


It was the announcement - after three years of waiting - of the home video release of the theatrical version of Grindhouse that pushed me over the edge. The 2-disc DVD has no new extras, whereas the Blu-Ray has all the existing ones and a whole shedload of new content ... and as a huge Grindhouse fan, it was the straw that broke the camel's back - I had gotten utterly fed up of home video releases of movies I was most looking forward to buying getting shafted on DVD in favour of Blu-Ray. Some other examples would be Cop Out, Kick Ass, and Iron Man 2. I'm an extra features whore (especially for making ofs, particularly if they're feature length), and so that Grindhouse announcement was the last straw and more than three hundred quid later, here I am!

Pentuple Bill Mini Musings: August 2010...

Westworld:
I'd only seen this once before - when I was about 12 - and while it has aged, horribly so at times, it's still an interesting concept. I couldn't help but think as I watched it "I wonder what a modern day remake of this would be like" as there's a lot of ideas that could be wrestled with in an even more in depth manner, with modern techniques, that are somewhat skimmed over or technically limited in the original movie.

The third act is a bit weak, it doesn't strive to fully investigate the subject matter, and it hasn't aged spectacularly well, but I still dig it for what it's worth. However, an intelligent remake that delivered heavily on the ideas as much as technically impressive action, would be something worthwhile. I guess we'll possibly find out in 2012.

Good Will Hunting:
It's another one of those movies where you don't see it until years later (13 years later in this instance), but you're all-too-aware of the numerous parodies and famous lines ("How do you like them apples?"). It was on TV the other day and I figured why not? The script is impressively researched, the 'Boston feel' is convincing, and the characters are interesting and complex ... no wonder it got so much praise.

Final Destination 3:
The first movie was quite good and memorable to boot, even if it did come out in the wake of Scream when horror had become a bit of a smart arse instead of a convincing genre. The second movie upped the ante on deliciously intricate death sequences, and that's really what the whole series is about. However in 2006 when 'Final Destination ... on a roller coaster' presented itself I wasn't interested, but four years later here we are. The deaths aren't intricate or as inventive as the previous movies, and the ending makes you wonder "was there any point in bothering?" but it has some moments.

The fourth movie is on Sky Movies soon so I'll check that out, but I'm not holding out much hope for the franchise now, especially with the abysmal titling of the fifth movie - "5inal Destination" ... so, what, "Five-in-al Destination"? Hmmm...

Revenge of the Nerds:
Old school 80s comedy - with Ted McGinley (who I know from Married With Children) and James Cromwell in it no less. Relatively tame and slow paced by today's standards, and not especially 'jam-packed' with ideas, it does speak of its time and no doubt if I was of the right age when it was new I would have absolutely loved it, but I'm just a bit too young to really see the attraction in this movie - not that I particularly disliked it, I was just a decade late to the party.

Still, I now 'get' the references to it in shows such as Family Guy and Robot Chicken.

Colin:
Much has been made of this being "the £45 zombie film" ... perhaps, but with an awful lot of favours, people, contacts and free work thrown into the mix. It could do with being about 20 minutes shorter and a little more focused and organised in its plotting, but overall I was quite impressed by it.

The film is, it has to be said, let down by the visual presentation - but then again that was part of the charm of it that so enraptured the slow-to-pay-attention mainstream media - but its real strength comes in numerous scenes that are well observed and/or pack an emotional punch. There is a subtlety to the film in the way big emotional situations are played out with little-or-no dialogue and instead with merely looks, careful framing, and an eye for explosive detail - the little visual cues that convey an essay's worth in a moment.

Certain sequences go on too long (such as a battle in a house with a hoard of the undead, and the dangers of someone's cellar), and the camerawork can be annoyingly shaky and dark at times ... but for every niggle or slight downside, there's a fantastic little idea thrown into the mix.

Working well with its low budget station, the zombie apocalypse playing out frequently as nothing but gunshots in the distance and a few newspaper headlines is a great way to sell a lot with very little. The film's full of these things and that makes it stand out. It's a great indie zombie flick, which really takes the subject matter seriously and deals with it in a mostly subtle manner - and what's more, on a few occasions it successfully struck an emotional wallop.

In a way it's a shame that so much attention has been given to the "£45" angle - although I can fully understand it, and condone it, as a marketing and attention-acquiring gimmick - but it does hide the real quality going on beneath the very low budget outer shell. It'll be interesting and exciting, to say the least, to see what the Director can do with a bit of money at his disposal.