Issue 596

Savage Grace - interview with Julianne Moore

Glasgow Film Festival

14 Feb 2008

Since coming to the public’s attention in Robert Altman’s 1993 film Short Cuts, Julianne Moore has built a career on playing roles other starlets would run a mile from. Who else would have the guts to go from playing a porn star in Boogie Nights (a role…

Zurich

14 Feb 2008

On my first visit to Zurich, my Swiss boyfriend dragged me along to the city’s annual Street Parade. I went along expecting a paler version of Berlin’s famous Love Parade and was bowled over by some 800,000 people partying frantically through the city…

Hot Chip

14 Feb 2008

ELECTRO-POP Barrowland, Glasgow, Tue 26 Feb ‘I guess we’ve always been outsiders,’ says Felix Martin, one fifth of geeky electro-pop outfit Hot Chip. ‘I think that comes across in our music. We seem to be unique, we’ve never felt closely related to…

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde - interview with Alan Grant and Cam Kennedy

14 Feb 2008

Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde has spawned countless adaptations since its publication in 1885. The stage play ran for 20 years and there have been numerous film versions, with stars as diverse as Fredric March, Spencer Tracy and…

Woody Allen - Cassandra's Dream

Glasgow Film Festival

14 Feb 2008

With those thick-rimmed glasses, that wisp of brown hair and the deeply cut grooves in his forehead, Woody Allen owns one of the most iconic faces in American cinema. These days, at 72, it’s a little more wizened and walnut-like – presumably from all…

Restaurants in Edinburgh’s Old Town

14 Feb 2008

There have always been bars with ideas above their station when it comes to food, and there have always been restaurants with the notion that their bar area can be both a bit on the side and the hippest hangout in town. It’s not often that both are…

Dillinger Escape Plan

14 Feb 2008

Most bands have their share of bad luck. Dillinger Escape Plan have their share and others’ too. The New Jersey noisecore troupe’s misfortunes include: five years between debut and sophomore albums, approximately seven line-up changes (songwriter and…

Daniel Jackson

14 Feb 2008

The smell of burnt toast and old carpet, the familiar Sunday re-runs of popular television shows glinting from the screen in the corner, the dreich weather outside... there’s something about the home people shared with parents in the earliest years of…

Fairtrade Fortnight

14 Feb 2008

Hey! You there! Traipsing about in your fashionable budget high street coat, sipping at your chainstore coffee! This is your conscience calling! Since 1996, the ever-expanding, UK-wide Fairtrade Fortnight has been nagging Scotland’s consumers to put…

There Will be Blood

14 Feb 2008

EPIC/DRAMA (15) 158min As the American industrialist Jean Paul Getty noted, ‘Oil is like a wild animal. Whoever finds it keeps it.’ It’s a notion that lone silver prospector Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day Lewis) soon discovers when he finds black gold…

Star Gazers

14 Feb 2008

Blow the budget Celeb spotting? How very 90s. For seriously cool star-gazing, you need to head south, to the Pic Du Midi. This mountain in the Pyrenees is famous for its observatory; among its collection of telescopes is a 106-cm whopper which was…

Crazy Love - interview with Don Klores

Glasgow Film Festival

14 Feb 2008

Crazy Love isn’t your everyday romantic comedy: boy meets girl, boy loses girl and arranges for hoods to throw acid in her face, boy goes to jail, then re-emerges to marry the very same girl. Arguably the darkest date movie ever, Dan Klores’ new film…

DJ Format

14 Feb 2008

Three years since the last album and having apparently denounced hip hop while throwing himself headlong into DJing and re-editing duties you might be surprised to find that DJ Format, aka Southampton-born Brightonian Matt Ford, has been quietly…

Mark Millar

14 Feb 2008

Despite being one of the most successful writers of comics ever, Mark Millar still resides in Coatbridge. Like most UK writers he earned his stripes on 2000AD. ‘The older guys like Grant Morrison, Pete Milligan, Alan Grant and John Wagner had all…

Chinese New Year

14 Feb 2008

It’s the Year of the Rat, and Scotland is celebrating. See page 9 for other events in the nationwide China Now project, or just mosey on down to Kelvingrove Museum for a day of music dance and craft. Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum, Glasgow, Tue 19…

Retro technology

14 Feb 2008

In some ways Jack Black and Mos Def’s new film Be Kind Rewind (see our review on page 46) highlights the end of an era for old technology such as the VHS. Today it’s hard to imagine DVD disappearing completely and being replaced by Blu-Ray and HD DVDs…

Nick Evans and Tony Swain

14 Feb 2008

It seems Paul Nesbit can do no wrong at Inverleith House in the Botanic Gardens. The curator has a back catalogue of excellent exhibitions under his belt, having shown work by some of the most respected national and international artists. Following a…

Taste Test - Hot breakfast sarnies

14 Feb 2008

Sausage & egg sandwich, £4 Always Sunday, 170 High Street, Edinburgh, 0131 622 0667 While Always Sunday’s statuesque, custom-made breakfast sandwich is evidently quality produce, the £4 price tag, and impracticality when it comes to trying to keep…

Baby Bible Bashers

14 Feb 2008

DOCUMENTARY Channel 4, Thu 14 Feb, 9pm; repeated Tue 19 Feb, 11.05pm It never fails to chill the blood to see people who claim to be working on behalf of the little baby Jesus with banners denouncing everyone from liars to homosexuals and adulterers…

Burlescapades! Valentine Venetian Masked Ball

14 Feb 2008

BURLESQUE The Voodoo Rooms, Edinburgh, Fri 15 Feb ‘Some of the acts will have a Valentine’s theme, some a Venetian, and others a bit of both. We even have a pillow fight,’ laughs burlesque performer and Burlescapades! organiser Lily White. ‘It’s not…

Retro websites

14 Feb 2008

www.aquarterof.com From Anglo Bubbly and Wham! bars to foiled chocolate cups and Space Dust, this website is a joy to behold for those of us nostalgic for long-forgotten treats. Oh, to return to the days when a two pence Highland toffee was the size…

Jo Caulfield

14 Feb 2008

STAND-UP The Stand, Glasgow, Thu 14–Sat 16 Feb Jo Caulfield knows that it’s good to let off some steam now and again. On her website, she allows her fans to rant on her Angry and Annoyed page. Among the more recent complaints was the woman who gets…

Camilla Low: Straight Letters

14 Feb 2008

SCULPTURE DCA, Dundee, until Sun 30 Mar Despite receiving her education at Glasgow School of Art, this is the first major solo exhibition in the UK by Norwegian sculptor Camilla Low. With this in mind it’s fortunate that a venue the size of the DCA is…

Glasgow Film Festival - LGBT

14 Feb 2008

LGBT CINEMA Various venues and times, Thu 14–Sun 24 Feb From early, openly queer flicks such as Victim, through the work of landmark filmmakers Derek Jarman, Todd Haynes and Gus Van Sant, to the recent mainstream success of Ang Lee’s Brokeback…

Food For Thought

14 Feb 2008

I love to start the day with a breakfast of a greasy fry-up from a local café in Holloway where I live. I’m spending a lot of time on the road just now, so lunch is usually a cheeseburger from McDonalds. I’d love to say I eat healthy sandwiches with…

5 Things you might not know about - Des Clarke

14 Feb 2008

1 In 2000 at the tender age of 19, Des Clarke was runner-up in the prestigious So You Think You’re Funny awards. The victor was one Drew Rokos. He’s Australian. That’s all we know about him. 2 His first major TV exposure was on ITV’s Saturday…

Speed climbing!

14 Feb 2008

Ever fancied finding love at 100ft? Boldly going where almost certainly no one else has gone before and combining popular 00s social activities speed dating and rock climbing, this post-Valentine’s Day event for lovelorn cliff face enthusiasts begins…

Side Dishes

14 Feb 2008

Despite raised expectations, no new Michelin stars have been awarded to restaurants in Glasgow and Edinburgh, though there’s one for West Lothian with the unexpected elevation of the Champany Inn near Linlithgow. Places awarded a Bib Gourmand (good food…

Ansel Adams: Celebration of Genius

14 Feb 2008

Inspired by the centenary of his birth in 2002, this exhibition is the most comprehensive overview of Adams’ career ever exhibited in the UK. Adams was one of the most influential photographers of the 20th century, best known for his visionary…

Remote Control

14 Feb 2008

The internet is a wonderful, wonderful place. Where else can you tap a few buttons and see men lip-synching to Romanian hit songs or witness dogs interfering with cats or watch a yardful of hardnut prisoners do the ‘Thriller’ dance or gasp in amazement…

Rambo

14 Feb 2008

ACTION/THRILLER (18) 90min Last year Sylvester Stallone successfully revitalised the Rocky franchise with Rocky Balboa. After a number of dud sequels, Stallone breathed life back into the pugilist by revisiting him in his decrepitude to winning…

X Factor Dance Company

14 Feb 2008

SITE-SPECIFIC PERFORMANCE Freemason’s Hall, Edinburgh, Tue 19 Feb–Sat 1 Mar Eighteen years after its first performance, X Factor Dance Company is coming of age. And, like most new recruits to adulthood, is striking out into uncharted territory. For…

The Bucket List

14 Feb 2008

COMEDY/ADVENTURE (12A) 96min After four decades as one of cinema’s most personable superstars, Jack Nicholson deserves the extended curtain call he gets in The Bucket List, even if it is sentimental, mawkish and manipulative. Ideally cast as filthy…

All The Boys Love Mandy Lane

14 Feb 2008

HORROR (18) 90min Here’s a welcome example of that all too rare thing in American horror movies: a teen slasher that’s actually very good. The simple answer to that conundrum is that appearances can be deceptive: Mandy Lane isn’t simply a teen slasher…

Heelie-Go-Leerie

14 Feb 2008

CHILDREN’S THEATRE Brunton Theatre, Musselburgh, Wed 20–Sat 23 Feb, then touring When Virginia Radcliffe decided to write a show about play, she knew her imagination would only take her so far. That if she wanted to capture the fantastical worlds…

The Visible Men

14 Feb 2008

NEW WORK Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, Sat 16 Feb Contemporary dance and comedy double act are two concepts that aren’t usually found in the same sentence. The two genres appear to attract such widely different types of audiences, and philosophies that…

Scottish Dance Theatre

14 Feb 2008

CONTEMPORARY DANCE Dundee Rep, Thu 21–Sat 23 Feb, then touring. When dance and music come together, it’s usually a fusion of creative sources – a symbiotic partnership of composer and choreographer. But when artistic director, Janet Smith commissioned…

Inglorious Bastards

14 Feb 2008

WAR (15) 87min (Optimum DVD rental/retail) ‘War’ as the French statesman, physician and journalist Georges Clemenceau remarked ‘is too serious a matter to entrust to military men.’ But then again he never met this raggle-taggle bunch of escaped…

The Cool Kids

14 Feb 2008

HIP HOP Ego, Edinburgh, Sun 17 Feb For the past few years hip hop in the states has been suffering. In 2007 album sales nose-dived and the ‘hip hop tycoon’ icon with clothing labels, butlers and perfumes finally crumbled under street level scrutiny.

Gallows

14 Feb 2008

HARDCORE PUNK ABC, Glasgow, Sat 23 Feb If you’re under the misapprehension British rock was in trouble you obviously haven’t heard Gallows, the most exciting band Britain has to offer at the moment, a snarling feral injection of true hardcore and raw…

Baillie and the Fault

14 Feb 2008

INDIE Barfly, Glasgow, Tue 29 Jan Can Gary Lightbody have fooled everyone on the Glasgow scene into thinking that being just the right side of average is something to aspire to? Baillie and the Fault’s Mike Baillie – a man who has served his time on…

Six Characters in Search of an Author - interview with cast and crew

14 Feb 2008

Trying to get to the nub of Luigi Pirandello’s 1921 absurdist classic Six Characters In Search of An Author is an infuriating, intellectually taxing, challenging and rewarding process. Essentially, six characters – fictional characters, but somehow…

Gamerz

14 Feb 2008

‘The elevator pitch for Gamerz is that’s it’s a bittersweet love-triangle set in Glasgow University’s Dungeons and Dragons society,’ says one-time role-playing geek and now film actor, writer and director Robbie Fraser (pictured, right). His low-budget…

Glasgow Film Festival highlights

Glasgow Film Festival

14 Feb 2008

Honeydripper John Sayles’ first film as director since 2004’s Silver City is a multilayered 1950s Alabama-set music business melodrama starring Danny Glover. GFT, Sat 16 Feb, 8pm; Cineworld Renfrew Street, Sun 17 Feb, 6.15pm. Zam Salim…

Mister Lonely - on-set feature

Glasgow Film Festival

14 Feb 2008

When news broke that Harmony Korine had cast Y tu mamá también star Diego Luna as a Michael Jackson impersonator it seemed a typical act of provocation from the Gummo and Julien Donkey Boy director. How many other directors would be brave enough to cast…

Lars and the Real Doll - interview with Emily Mortimer

Glasgow Film Festival

14 Feb 2008

Emily Mortimer is laughing. ‘Bianca’s a very subtle actress and incredibly modest. She sits quietly, she waits. She doesn’t pace around, throw hissy fits or demand things. And her performance is incredibly low key.’ Bianca is Mortimer’s Danish/Brazilian…

All glimmers in limbo: Tramway

14 Feb 2008

Glasgow’s Tramway has a rich, varied history that closely mirrors the city’s development from a noisy industrial town to a centre of arts and culture. The building began life as a tram terminus (the clue’s in the name), housed the Museum of Transport…

DVD Round-Up

14 Feb 2008

It’s that time of year when everything goes a little bit box set crazy. If you go on the right website (I suggest www.moviemail-online.co.uk) you can pick up newly released The Complete Coen Collection 1984-2004 (Spirit ••••) for around the £50. With…

Great Expectations

14 Feb 2008

ADAPTATION Brunton Theatre, Musselburgh, Fri 15 & Sat 16 Feb; Paisley Arts Centre, Thu 21 Feb; MacRobert, Stirling, Tue 26 Feb Much of Charles Dickens’ most successful work draws on his own life experiences. Strange, then, that perhaps his most…

Afghan film festival

14 Feb 2008

FESTIVAL For exasperated introductions to the complexities of Afghanistan’s political situation it is difficult to beat Atiq Rahini’s (A)fghanistan: An Impossible State. Rahini simply allows the attending members of a loya jirga (political gathering…

Be Kind Rewind

14 Feb 2008

COMEDY (12A) 100min Michel Gondry’s freewheeling satire on copyright law features a frustrated filmmaker Mike (Mos Def), who works in a VHS-only video store in an apartment block due for demolition. When his dad (Danny Glover) is out of town finding…

Singles & Downloads

14 Feb 2008

The trouble with being trendy and much touted is that, at some point, you’ve got to produce the goods. Indie ugly mugs The Cribs singularly fail to do so with ‘I’m a Realist’ (Wichita) •, a tuneless, insipid, po-faced sub-Razorlight jangle. Ditto for…

Bailegangaire

14 Feb 2008

Few oral traditions could be as vital in a modern day society as that of Ireland. Storytelling is part of its culture, and, if the work of such writers as Conor MacPherson and Tom Murphy are anything to judge by, very much part of its theatre. In…

Interview - Arek Kozak

14 Feb 2008

Rosie Lesso talks to Arek Kozak about bringing Poland to Scotland at the Collective Rosie Lesso The exhibition, Polish-Scottish Cultural Stimulation, makes cultural comparisons in response to the rising number of Polish inhabitants in Edinburgh. As…

Glasgow International Festival of Contemporary Visual Art unveils plans for 2008

14 Feb 2008

The private home of Scottish artist Douglas Gordon will be open to the public as part of this year’s Glasgow International Festival of Contemporary Visual Art (Gi), which takes place in April. The award-winning artist will give his residence over to…

Palmstar Poppy

14 Feb 2008

MUSIC THEATRE Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, Thu 14-Sat 16 Feb Why do we turn to songs to explore our feelings, particularly when we speak of love? Love songs often seem more able to translate our emotional experiences into words better than prose, and…

RNSO – Wagner’s The Ring, an Orchestral Adventure

14 Feb 2008

CLASSICAL Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Sat 23 Feb; Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, Sun 24 Feb When, in the early 1980s, conductor Neeme Järvi left his Estonian homeland to work in the west, it didn’t go down too well with the powers that be. His name was…

Hello, Dolly!

14 Feb 2008

MUSICAL Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, Tue 26 Feb–Sat 1 Mar If light entertainment is your bag, then you can’t beat a tried and tested classic. Hello, Dolly!, first performed in 1964, is the kind of bright and breezy musical that doesn’t take itself too…

Scottish music festivals announce 208 line-ups

14 Feb 2008

Some of Scotland’s most popular music festivals are announcing line-ups over the coming weeks with the likes of Rock Ness already unveiling acts Roisin Murphy and Fatboy Slim for a spring and summer of collected aural pleasures. Live at Loch Lomond…

Introducing . . . Back Tae Mine

14 Feb 2008

The best new nights in town. This month: Back Tae Mine Residents Gavin Dunbar (of Camera Obscura), Ally Cook and Nal Townley, the men behind the Woodside Social Club’s now-departed Winchester Club. Guests Regular, and generally as steeped in the…

Scottish music festivals announce 208 line-ups

14 Feb 2008

Some of Scotland’s most popular music festivals are announcing line-ups over the coming weeks with the likes of Rock Ness already unveiling acts Roisin Murphy and Fatboy Slim for a spring and summer of collected aural pleasures. Live at Loch Lomond…

Portico Quartet and Basquiat Strings

14 Feb 2008

JAZZ Voodoo Lounge, Edinburgh, Tue 19 Feb The Portico Quartet have been grabbing a lot of attention since the release of their debut album last year. Part of the buzz has definitely centred on the unusual instrument at the heart of their distinctive…

Playlist

14 Feb 2008

The huge, mildly nauseating US box office returns of the new Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus 3D concert film put PlayList in mind of some of cinema’s greatest ersatz bands and non-existent singers. So, let this faux guide help you differentiate between your…

Eastern European films at the Glasgow Film Festival

14 Feb 2008

Taking its lead from both the rise in Polish immigration into Scotland and the critical euphoria which has greeted recent Romanian films including Cristian Mungiu’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, this year the GFF throws the spotlight on Eastern European…

Resurrection

14 Feb 2008

ADAPTATION Oran Mor, Glasgow, Mon 11–Sat 16 Feb Whether it’s your carbon footprint or choice of chicken, it seems the individual’s responsibility for the choices they make are under more scrutiny now than ever. But Resurrection, playwright Nicola…

Kaput!

14 Feb 2008

ECLECTIC The Hold, Glasgow, Sat 23 Feb ‘The thing about indie kids is that sometimes they just don’t have the stamina to dance to the end,’ muses Colin Bailey aka Kaput!’s Kid Twist. ‘I play rock’n’roll at Kaput!, but it’s all about dancing and…

Live Undead

14 Feb 2008

PAINTING Transmission Gallery, Glasgow, until Sat 23 Feb This ambitious show, curated by Michael Hill Johnston, brings together a century of paintings on the subject of portraiture from both Scottish and international artists. Live Undead boasts…

Tony Parsons - My Favourite Wife

14 Feb 2008

RELATIONSHIP DRAMA (HarperCollins) The question of whether it’s possible to truly love more than one person is perhaps the most enduring theme in world literature. Writers as diverse as Emily Brontë, Charles Dickens, DH Lawrence and Vladimir Nabokov…

6 Reasons To Go See - Instal

14 Feb 2008

This three-day festival of left-field sound has consistently revisited ideas explored by the avant-garde half a century ago. This year Instal focuses particularly on attempted subversions of bog-standard us’n’them gig protocol in a multitude of…

The Italian

14 Feb 2008

DRAMA (12A) 99min It’s 2002 in a rundown orphanage in a remote, god forsaken corner of Russia. The boys live in hope of being picked out by one of few visiting couples keen on adoption. Sweet six-year-old Vanya (Kolya Spiridonov) is one day lucky…

Lotte Gertz

14 Feb 2008

PRINTING, PAINTING AND DRAWING Mary Mary, Glasgow, until Sat 1 Mar Narrative of sorts emerges through the manipulation of formal elements in the printed, painted, drawn and collaged works of Lotte Gertz. In this, her first exhibition at Mary Mary, the…

U23D

14 Feb 2008

DOCUMENTARY/MUSIC (U) 84min The distributors of U23D may have missed a marketing trick by handing out bog standard 3D glasses for this film instead of ones in the style of the classic Bono wraparound. Indeed, despite the 3D visuals, there is nothing…

Waz

14 Feb 2008

THRILLER/HORROR (18) 104min Marketed as a member of the Se7en school of psychological thriller, the gory realities of WAZ’s serial killer chase premise put it closer to the iniquitous barbarism presented by James Wan and Leigh Whannell’s Saw…

Black Water

14 Feb 2008

THRILLER/HORROR (15) 90min This low budget Australian creature feature is probably inspired by the true story of a saltwater crocodile attack in the Northern Territory. Written and directed by newcomers David Nerlich and Andrew Traucki, Black Water…

Toumani Diabate - The Mandé Variations

14 Feb 2008

WORLD (World Circuit) Toumani Diabate is one of those great Malian musicians that cannot be knocked. The album Kaira was his first: a beautifully melodic 40-minute kora solo, released in 1989. Since then he has been a collaborators dream, working with…

My Blueberry Nights

14 Feb 2008

DRAMA/ROMANCE (12A) 95min Wong Kar-wai’s compelling 1997 Buenos Aries-set Happy Together demonstrated that he can successfully transplant his inimitable style away from Asia, but here the director of Chungking Express and In The Mood for Love has made…

Masters of Horror Series 2: Volume 2

14 Feb 2008

HORROR (18) 360min (Anchor Bay DVD rental/retail) It’s a concept that should have horror fans rubbing their hands with fiendish glee. Masters of Horror gathers iconic horror directors from through the years (previous instalments have included John…

Also Released - Music: Records

14 Feb 2008

Janet Jackson - Discipline (Mercury) The youngest of the Jackson brood is back with über-slick R&B pop. She’s already stated she’s covering no new ground, which will save us expecting some kind of jazz metal style reinvention then, eh? Pete and the…

Adele

14 Feb 2008

REVIEW SOUL Classic Grand, Glasgow, Fri 1 Feb Dovetailing two phenomena, namely the fast track route to fame via MySpace and the new crop of ‘60s-style female singers triggered by the combined forces of Mark Ronson and Amy Winehouse, Adele is most…

The Apple Scruffs

14 Feb 2008

REVIEW ROCK 13th Note, Glasgow, Fri 1 Feb The original Apple scruffs used to hang around waiting to meet The Beatles, and tonight the devotion was so intense that you could have been forgiven for thinking that the door to the 13th Note was a portal to…

Also Released - Film

14 Feb 2008

Jumper (12A) 88min ••• Mildly interesting adaptation of Steven Gould’s hit sci-fi books about people called ‘jumpers’ who can transport themselves through time and space. Doug Liman (Mr and Mrs Smith, Swingers) directs with his usual admirable energy.

New Territories

14 Feb 2008

PHYSICALTHEATRE Tramway, Glasgow, until Mon 8 Mar Scotland’s annual international festival of Live Art, which returns this month features a series of standalone pieces that fall somewhere between dance, installation and contemporary…

Take Three: Good pub grub

14 Feb 2008

The Butterfly and the Pig 153 Bath Street, Glasgow 0141 221 7711, www.thebutterflyandthepig.com Unique and a little zany, this flighty butterfly and dashing pig have made a rather refreshing splash across the Glasgow pub food scene. The retro décor…

Fantastic Four: Rise of The Silver Surfer

14 Feb 2008

DVD (PG) 88min (20th Century Fox) There are tons of big budget comics-based movies (most notably Iron Man, Wanted and The Dark Knight) on the horizon this year so it’s worth reminding ourselves of the last superhero blockbuster to hit the screens. Or…

Lisa Appignanesi - Mad, Bad and Sad

14 Feb 2008

CULTURAL HISTORY (Virago) Possession, love, sex (too much or too little), religion, abuse, grief and heredity are some of the myriad causes of women’s madness, according to this book, which is subtitled ‘A History of Women and the Mind Doctors from…

Also Published - 5 Paperback debut novels

14 Feb 2008

Priya Basil - Ishq and Mushq A generational novel about a Sikh mother whose secret past corrodes her life with tragic consequences for all. Black Swan. Catherine Hanrahan - Lost Girls and Love Hotels By day Margaret is training to be an air…

Various - Rough Trade Counter Culture 07

14 Feb 2008

EVERYTHING (Rough Trade) If anything can be gleaned from these expansive, annual compilations its this: try as you might you can’t keep up with all the fine new music around unless you actually run a record store. And while you might have…

Glyn Maxwell - The Girl Who was Going to Die

14 Feb 2008

MODERN SATIRE (Jonathan Cape) It’s no fun being told that you are soon to pop your clogs, as this compelling novel’s main protagonist Susan Mantle finds out following a visit to a mysterious fortune teller. The news triggers a bizarre chain of events…

KM31

14 Feb 2008

HORROR (15) 102min (Yume DVD retail/rental) Some critics were quick to liken this assured Spanish language chiller to Japanese horror films such as Ju-on: The Grudge. Young Mexican writer-director Rigoberto Castaneda’s debut does share the creepy…

The Singer

14 Feb 2008

ROMANCE (12) 110min (Artificial Eye DVD retail/rental) Forget all the ‘merde’ that Gérard Depardieu’s done in recent years — his performance in this exquisite film makes up for everything. He plays Alain Moreau, a middle-aged, overweight crooner who…

Defence of The Realm

14 Feb 2008

POLITICAL THRILLER (PG) 96min (Network DVD rental/retail) Not much has changed in the 24 years since this grim-faced, pessimistic and remorseless British thriller was released, save the end of the Cold War. In it, a reporter on a sleazy right wing…

The Sound of new Scotland

14 Feb 2008

REVIEW CELTIC CONNECTIONS Classic Grand, Glasgow, Thu 24 Jan The title of this show was a bold one, but proved Scottish music is nothing if not diverse. Trio Zoey Van Goey traded instruments more frequently than a Govan pawnshop while spinning their…

Played

14 Feb 2008

GANGSTER/THRILLER (15) 84min (High Fliers DVD rental) We love, love, love filmmakers who sod the restrictions imposed by low budgets by using every opportunity they can lay their hands on, including mates’ mates who happen to be famous actors. That’s…

Allan Guthrie - Savage Night

14 Feb 2008

CRIME THRILLER (Polygon) As the winner of last year’s Theakston’s Old Peculiar Crime Novel of the Year, Edinburgh’s Allan Guthrie is right at the forefront of the expanding sub-genre known as Tartan Noir. That Ian Rankin, the godfather of the style…

Omagh

14 Feb 2008

DRAMA (15) 102min (Optimum DVD retail/rental) On August 15 1998 a peaceful small town was blown apart both literally and figuratively by a bomb blast that killed and wounded many of its citizens. Written by Paul United 93 Greengrass but directed by…

Shed Simove - Ideas Man

14 Feb 2008

BUSINESS ADVENTURES (Bantam) Thanks to his career in TV production for shows like The Big Breakfast and Big Brother, fun-loving nerd Shed Simove has developed a real knack for churning out daft ideas. But on the side, he has slavishly dedicated years…

Witchblade Volume 1

14 Feb 2008

DVD (15) 100min (MVM Entertainment) The Witchblade is a mysterious ancient artefact, a weapon of immense destructive power that binds itself to the flesh of a living female host. Here the Top Cow comics series is given the anime treatment as the…

Judith Weir - The Welcome Arrival of Rain

14 Feb 2008

CONTEMPORARY (NMC Records) Scottish composer Judith Weir has enjoyed a prominent profile recently, with the world premiere of a new work from the SCO in December, and a whole weekend devoted to her music at the Barbican last month, much of it…

Opera Jawa

14 Feb 2008

MUSICAL (12) 120min (Yume Pictures DVD retail/rental) One of a handful of films commissioned to celebrate the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birth, this generally hugely successful project (other films in the series have included Syndromes and a…

The Black Cat

14 Feb 2008

HORROR (18) 92min (Shameless Screen Entertainment DVD retail) Patrick Magee leads as lugubrious medium (shaped more like a large) living in an English village, engaged in some occult jiggery pokery, the purpose of which never becomes clear. It’s a…