January28th
My film was recently featured on Guide2Dublin. I’m so excited about this because I am so passionate about the message my film contains and I would love for it to be seen by people. I hope it might help somebody make the decision to stop hating their body once and for all.
For those of you who may have missed it, here it is:
I would really appreciate it if you could watch the film and share it with your friends.
January19th
A while back, I spoke about the short film I had to make for college and I promised I would show it to you when it was done.
Well, here we are. It’s called The Beat of Her Own Drum and it looks at the effects of bellydance on the self image of a small group of women in Dublin, including my good friend Hannah.
I hope you enjoy this video and if you do, could I ask you to share it? I really believe in the message put forward in this film and would love for it to reach as many people as possible.
July16th
I love this film. You can tell, even if you didn’t know who director Tom Ford is, that it is a film preoccupied with style and aesthetic. There’s Colin Firth’s brogues and Wayfarers, to Julianne Moore’s shift dress and iconic eyeliner, and of course all the secondary roles played by beautiful, chiselled models.
The film is just a truly beautiful thing to behold, setting a wistful tone which perfectly blankets the plot, accentuated by Firth and Moore’s exquisite acting.
February4th
I don’t know how I feel about Valentine’s Day. At the mention of it, the cynic in me goes, “Pshaw. Yet another useless holiday thought up by greeting card companies to make you part with your hard earned cash if you’re with somebody and feel like absolute poo on a plate if you’re not.” And yet, another part of me kind of likes the idea of having one day a year dedicated to love. The romantic in me wants to spend just one day a year doing romance and flowers and wine. I have to admit, there’s a part of me that’s excited about the presents. It’s not right but it’s true.
My feelings about Valentine’s Day are almost identical to my feelings about love movies. You know the ones: those soppy, clichéd films which try their utmost to pull at your heart strings and make you cry. Thing is, I rarely have time to sit and watch a whole film (which is why I favour TV shows – shorter episodes) so when I do, I want it to be something brilliant, challenging and engaging, which will fuck with my head and make me rethink life.
Thing is, though, sometimes that isn’t what you need. Sometimes, all you need is a good old weepie movie, a glass of wine and a bag of popcorn. Bonus points if your girlfriends watch it with you. Have a good old cry, fantasise about the perfect love affair. You’ll feel good afterwards!
What are your favourite love movies? Here are mine:
November17th
Here’s a clip from one of my favourite movies, Shortbus. It’s DEFINITELY not for everybody. It’s one of the most sexually explicit films I’ve ever seen. It’s also one of the most emotionally explicit films I’ve seen, and for that I love it.
In the end
We all bear the scars
Yeah, we all feign a laugh
We all cry in the dark
Get cut off before we start
And as your first act begins
You realise they’re all waiting
For a fall, for a flaw, for the end
And there’s a path stained with tears
Could you talk to quiet my fears
Could you pull me aside
Just to acknowledge that I’ve tried
As your last breath begins
Contently take it in
Cause we all get it in
The end
And as your last breath begins
You find your demon’s your best friend
And we all get it in
The end.
Also, Justin Bond is absolutely and exquisitely beautiful:
September24th
I missed it ! I missed TILT yesterday, just like I did last Thursday. I hope you guys don’t mind me doing TILF instead (that’s Things I Love Friday) to make up for it. I’ve had a busy week, busy but good, and here’s what’s been great about it.
Gozo
Last Tuesday we celebrated Independence Day, which means I had an extra long weekend which Andrew and I spent in Gozo. Malta’s sister island is really peaceful and has retained most of its rural character. We spend a few weekends a year there when we can and always come back feeling energised. It’s a pity it was already to cold to go swimming, but that’s okay. We had good food and wine, good books, a couple of DVDs and even more good food, like Hobz biz-zejt. Mmmm. Also, don’t you love these photos of Gozo which I found on Flickr? Clicking them will take you to the photographer’s page.
Mooncake
I am not the most adventurous eater in the world. I’m nothing like the magnificent Andrew Zimmern, who munches away happily on bugs and beaks. Yesterday, however, I had the opportunity to taste mooncake for the very first time, so I did. Mooncakes are Chinese semi-sweet pastries eaten during the Mid-Autumn Festival. They’re usually filled with lotus seed paste and have egg yolk in the middle to symbolise the moon. My verdict: I wasn’t crazy about the taste, but it’s certainly interesting. They are absolutely beautiful to look at, though. Have a look at the above Flickr photos.
Notte Bianca
I’ll be taking part in Notte Bianca tomorrow. I’m singing a set with Renzo Spiteri on drums, Jes Psaila on guitar and Juan Camilleri on bass, at Europe House, St Paul’s Street, Valletta from 8 p.m.
Hutch and me
Me and Andrew
Me and Rachel
Sam, Danjel and Hutch
Platinum Love launch party
The party was great and the first print issue of the magazine is AMAZING. You have to get your hands on a copy of it!
The Guardian’s film challenge
The animation on this is incredible and it’s so fun to try and figure out what movies are being referenced. There are 26 in total; I’ve got 19 so far. What about you?
Glee
Glee is back on TV! YAY! I am loving the new characters, especially Sunshine Corazon, who is so adorable. Rachel has a great recap (GLEECAP!) of season 2 episode one on her blog, here.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
I really wish I had read this book back when I was 15. It’s just such a good snapshot of what goes on in your head when you’re 15. I know I’m not the only person here who can relate to Charlie. I loved his description of the first time he read The Catcher in the Rye (I remember my first time too, and it’s still one of my absolute favourite books). Also, the drama, the intense hormones, friends, feeling ‘infinite’… do yourself a favour and read it if you haven’t. And if you know any teenagers, do them a favour and buy it for them.
June7th
When I was 15, I met a boy on the internet called Damon. He was from South Dakota and our time zones were all wrong. But sometimes Damon and I would meet online – I would stay up late and he would be up early and we would talk. One time he even stayed online with me for hours because I’d said I’d never watched the sun rise.
He and I never met in real life. We had set a date, to meet on July 25, 2008, under Big Ben. That never happened. We still talk online sometimes and you can tell we’ve both grown up. I share a house with my wonderful boyfriend, and he has a beautiful girlfriend who he always talks highly of.
But something I will always be thankful for is that time Damon recommended all those films. I spent a summer, when I was 15, watching films Damon recommended. Films whose blurbs I had never even bothered to read at the video rental shop before. Over one summer I watched films like Pulp Fiction, A Clockwork Orange, Pi, Requiem for a Dream, The Deer Hunter, 2001: A Space Odyssey, City of God, Fight Club, Donnie Darko, Trainspotting and Se7en.
These films remain some of my favourite even today, and watching them at such a young age, essentially forfeiting the teenage films other kids my age were watching, meant the bar was raised pretty high for any other films I would watch as an adult.
I still love films, but very few move me in the way that those films did. There’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Shortbus, Paris Je t’Aime, 10 Things I Hate About You, American Beauty, Ghost World, The Big Lebowski, Juno, Garden State, Moulin Rouge! and a few others. Still, it’s rare that I watch a film which really speaks to me, which is disappointing after a summer of nothing but good films all those years ago.
Just now, however, Andrew and I watched 500 Days of Summer. Good films always take me back to that summer, eight years ago, in my parents’ basement. When I would get online and report back to Damon that I loved what I’d just watched and ask whether he could please recommend another one.
Putting aside the fact that I adore both Joseph Gordon Levitt and Zooey Deschanel (I want to be her), the film was something special. It has a magnificent soundtrack – The Smiths, Regina Spektor, Feist, Simon and Garfunkel. The basic premise of the film is this: Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love; girl doesn’t. How simple and how intricate.
It’s got such a great script and beautiful photography. The director is, and rightly so, fascinated by the way that Zooey’s eyes reflect the light at sunrise, at sunset, at noon. By the lines in Joseph’s face and how his eyes crinkle when he smiles.
I love the way it’s presented – I love that it isn’t chronological. I like the way the ending isn’t happy – it’s just life. It’s what happens. The Break Up tried to do this in a very Hollywood way. But this film is not Hollywoodised and this is what I love about it.
I like films like this one, like Juno, like Garden State, that make me happy to be just a little different. To be programmed just a little bit differently to the majority of people. To prefer The Smiths to Lady Gaga.
I don’t know why but before I met Andrew, films about love didn’t really do much for me. I guess I was cynical. Don’t get me wrong, this film didn’t make me gush or anything like that. But I love the way it presented love and the way it’s so similar to what I see in my head when I picture my life with Andrew – embraces, Moleskine notebooks and indie songs.
