Battle: Los Angeles and How To Lose Friends & Alienate People

Over the last couple of nights I've been flexing my blu-ray muscles and have rented a couple of films I quite wanted to see ion the cinema but me 'n' the wife (got used to saying that now, it just kinda rolls off!) never got round too it.

Thanks to a few (rapidly expiring) blockbuster vouchers we have from when we bought the player we went down and picked up, Battle: Los Angeles and How To Lose Friends & Alienate People, two slightly different films no doubt.

Well first up was Battle: Los Angeles.

I quite like my alien invasion sci-fi films (shocking I know), Independence Day is overly cheesy but remains a favourite to this day, I even quite liked the Tom Cruise War of the Worlds... sorry. I was expecting a cliché ridden, over the top, 'Go America!' film, with minimal character development and stuff blowing up all over the place, ending with a initial victory for mankind but looked like it would result in overall glory.

Got what I was expecting.

It's by no means a bad film, the predictable plot and the flag waving patriotism are hallmarks of a bad film no doubt, but I didn't go in thinking it was going to get many screenwriters guild nominations. After a bit of a slow start, which set up many of the clichés from the outset (1 guy close to retiring, 1 guy's wife having a baby so fighting to protect it etc) it is action packed, the constant action to action movement with the narrative done in the lulls was very video game in it's style, shame then the game of the film, as with so many film tie ins, sucked ass.

The acting was very standard for the genre, I'm pretty sure Aaron Eckhart's jaw has never been so square for so long ever before, and (unless there's a sequel of course) wont be ever again. But overall I think the film worked on most of the levels it went after, stuff blew up, mankind started to win, a good time was had by all. I've made it sound like a very by-the-numbers 3 star film, and yes I think that's fair enough and sometimes that's all you want from a film.

Second, and on the following night, was a British film, ropey territory for a start, set in America How To Lose Friends & Alienate People.

For which I didn't really know what my expectations were. I'd wanted to see it purely as Simon Pegg was the lead and he's usually pretty good, but had never got round to it. From the box office (quite a heavy loss) I wasn't the only one.

Turn out this film was pretty good. I wasn't aware of the support cast, but to be fair once they were on screen they were mostly good, Megan Fox (who was awful, but it suited this part), Kirstin Dunst, Jeff Bridges, Gillian Anderson, Danny Huston, Bill Patterson, even 2 of the 3 leads from the IT Crowd, Miriam Margoyle and James Cordon were in it.

It was mildly funny where necessary, I didn't think all the slapstick was really required, but it kept the film moving along. It got quite predictable towards the end when it was always easy to see who would end up as the love interest, but it was a good watch. Pegg was very good, Dunst was good as she tends to be in a more supporting role (E.g. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) and Bridges was a little subdued but was funny on a number of occasions.

Bonus - no game to slate, it'd be awful anyway, just assume.

Battle: Los Angeles took better advantage of the blu-ray looking better, but then it's an sci-fi slash action film not a comedy, it would!

Of the two, it's hard to compare, but if it came down to watching one or the other again, I'd go for How to Lose Friends. It just worked better as a story, as it actually had a concrete not 100% predictable one. Go watch, if enough people do, it may one day break even!

Dara O'Briain

...or at least I think that's how you spell it!

I've got a very odd sense of humour, and as a result of this, there are very very many mainstream type comics that do nothing for me. MacIntyre? Annoying. Brigstoke? Blah. Addison? Meh? Djalli? Murray? Sorry, not for me, etc.

However, I do like a rather odd selection of 'funnymen', Jasper Carrott has always made me laugh, Daniel Kitson was the funniest Stand up show I've ever seen and of late Dara O'Briain has become quite popular!

I've always known Dara from stuff like Mock the Week, QI, Have I got News for You, all programs that can be very hit and miss but generally are worth the effort of watching. He's always come across as funny, quite intelligent and generally quite interesting. Something vital on these type of panel shows as unless you stand out, whether acting as presenter or panel show member, you do tend to just blend in and end up leaving no real impression (Unless you're Ian Hislop, then I just think you're a cock).

He was one of the first people I 'followed' (not a fan of the phrase...) on twitter and generally on there he's equally as witty and interesting, all boded well!

A few years of consistent merriment and I decided to acquire his DVD, This is the Show, after all who doesn't love Tits. I can't say I paid for it, it was Christmas time and the always lovely wife (almost!) provided me a copy in shiny wrapping paper, we watched it and I was impressed by both his levels of geek (also very present on twitter) and of course the routine. It remains one of my favourite comedy DVDs to this day (that's not a particularly huge thing, I've only had if for like 6 or 7 months... but it's still good)

Although I had realised I liked the guy, I didn't really consider myself a fan still, even though I was. I was in some kind of Dara denial. It only came into sharp focus when I was on my way to Tenerife for my mates stag do a few weeks ago. I popped into the WH Smith in Bristol airport to get some reading material for the plane and the clearly relaxing(!) weekend which was to follow, I'd been hankering for Nerd Do Well by Simon Pegg for some time, after all he's nerd royalty and he's motherfunking Scotty! Now the paperback had been issued, I marched in with my £7.99 in my (metaphorical) hand.

I picked it up and noticed the book was in a buy 1 get 1 half price offer.... ooooh the possibilities. I scanned round and noticed Tickling the English, a book I was unaware of the existence of before. So I got it and easyjet whipped me 4 hours to the Moroccan coast. I intended on reading the Pegg book, with the expectation I had for it and in the unlikely event I finished it, Dara would step in.

I looked at both and found myself drawn to the Dara book. I then proceeded to read his book over the holiday and finished it when I got back, not giving a second thought to the Pegg book. The book was excellent, I think there would have been something extra too it if I had been English (I'm Welsh...) as there would have been more to relate too etc, but it was good from the perspective of watching one Celt dissect the next door neighbours, of whom I do of course have my own thoughts, hates, preconceptions, for the pleasure of another.

After this I am fully converted! The final piece is to see the guy on tour, so I'm sat waiting patiently for some dates.... anytime your ready Dara... and play Cardiff or Swansea or both, can't be arsed trekking to Bristol thank you very much.

But he does have an excessively large head...

iTunes library

I've become officially bored with the music on my phone. There were 1100 songs on there, but due to me putting on whole albums, much of that was faff and below standard album tracks, so got skipped, with increasing frequency.

So last night, I took an hour, which turned into 3 and redid the entire library. Many of the same songs remained but there was a vast majority of stuff I've forgotten about, all in all it seems far more listenable (is it a word??) too. Sadly there was some casualty's in that some songs are forever trapped on my dead pc (working on getting it back to life), I need my Best. Concert. Ever (Jonathan Coulton), my Dr Horrible albums, my  Elbow album, even my solitary Glee song, but for now they're gone... (any donations to allow me to procure them via iTunes, my paypal is... JOKING)

Anyway, with some tinkering this playlist should be ok to take with me to Tenerife at the end of the week for my mates Stag Do. I'm also thinking of acquiring myself Nerd Do Well by Simon Pegg as reading material, books 2 for £7 in ASDA, very affordable even middle of the month. Only downside was, there was nothing else in the paperback section I really wanted. Any recommendations, there's a comment box below, hit me up!

Anyway lunch time over, back to work.