Heartofice

Noho Hank from Barry is maybe the best character on any tv show ever! What a star!

I think I already like season 3 more than season 2, but I'm keeping an open mind. Season 2 really fell into the schmaltz trap and was far too often just a lazy rom com show that barely felt like it was trying. I get the sense that this season might just be a bit tighter and maybe actually try and tell a story outside of a number of worn out cliches. I am interested to see where they go with Nate. In reality a former kitman would be given about 3 games before being sacked if he didn't win every single game. The narrative there is just too clear. The fans would turn on him immediately, he's not even a West Ham hero, or Lampard! But he is one of the more interesting characters on the show so I want him to go full villain!

The trailer definitely pushed the movie as a comedy, and I think I would like the movie a lot more if the comedy elements really came off. There is something about the script that is bordering on hilarious and it was really close to being a surrealist classic of the comedy genre. But I don't think there was quite enough bite to the lines or enough memorable conversations to stick with me. In comparison to something like The Guard which just has so many classic lines and back and forth, or In Bruges, there just wasn't enough there.

It had a donkey in it. That is enough to create humour by itself.

I started to watch Barry. I can't remember the last time a show made me want to jump into the next episode and just binge the whole thing so completely. Hader is so fun to watch. I wasn't sure this show would work for me, but I'm loving it.

I reckon I will watch EEAAO pretty regularly, it's just too much fun not to, even if its just jumping into certain scenes. However, I don't know why anyone would think 'Oh I'd love to watch The Shape of Water again'' or 'Birdman, that was so enjoyable, lets sit and watch it again!'

I've always wondered why the UK has such extortionate nursery costs compared to the rest of the world. I did assume that there must be issues around the insanities of the UK housing market which pushes up those costs, but it can't explain all of it. What I did learn today is that the UK has one of the strictest, if not the strictest rules around child to carer ratios around. So we need more child care workers in every nursery compared to pretty much everyone else. On the face of it that seems good, but it also makes child care costs higher. Any attempt to change these rules usually gets met with howls of outrage, even if it just aligns us with countries like those in Scandinavia. I'm sure there are plenty of other reasons like that just get hidden under the bonnet.

Yeah of all the awards the movie got the JLC one is a bit of a head-scratcher. She is basically doing a comedy sketch bit during her scenes, a bit of fun, hardly acting at all. It's more like getting an award for being on SNL. It didn't seem like a particularly strong category this year anyway. Possibly I would have given it to Kerry Condon but that just felt like a pretty solid performance more than anything. I don't think Bassett can expect to be winning Oscars for chewing the scenery in an MCU movie either.

Personally it’s the ‘ I don’t give a shit’ nature of the movie that really appealed to me, it’s a movie that just delighted in creating ideas and scenes that were just intended to instil joy in the viewer. The whole movie is telling you to just fucking enjoy yourself and stop over thinking everything. It’s ironic that the people who seem to viscerally hate it are big over thinkers

I'm very happy for EEOAO sweeping the board, I absolutely loved the movie and think it thoroughly deserves pretty much every award it got (ok maybe Jamie Lee is a bit of an odd pick but whatever) I'm seeing a narrative going around that this is a movie that people will be scratching their heads about how it won awards in a few years time. I have to totally disagree, this might be one of the few movies that might in fact be seen as a deserved winner. Who even remembers Green Book?! The Kings Speech?! Argo?

There was a point in time where I considered Aronofsky to be the most exciting and interesting director out there. I still love The Fountain as I think it sort of justifies its pretentious style with Jackmans amazing performance. But it’s been so long since I’ve been anything other than underwhelmed by his movies that I’m starting to think he’s someone more in the ‘pretentious hack’ category with M Night. Not that bad yet but it would be easy to re-examine his work and think he’s not actually very good.

I’m hoping they just put the old BBC test card up for an hour instead https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test_Card_F

Turns out the Attenborough thing is completely wrong:

Of course the safety narrative completely falls apart when you realise that they are being constantly papped in California, and that Meghan has sued numerous media agencies for using drones to invade their privacy, both in Canada and the US. https://www.insider.com/paparazzi-agency-x17-apologize-prince-harry-meghan-markle-archie-photos-2020-10 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/12/18/meghan-archie-settle-claim-against-photo-agency-canada-park/ And just look at this list of times they are being photographed in California. The idea that they are just being left alone is pure fiction. https://www.newsweek.com/prince-harry-meghan-markle-paparazzi-california-1567634 The irony is that the press in the UK is under far stricter controls due to its relationship with the royals, the Queen years ago set a very hard line on royals being photographed in public settings, saying she would sue if it happened. That combined with the Royal Rota system meant that access to the royals was controlled. Basically H&M wanted to leave that system so that they could more tightly control their press, but they were protected from it before.

California has better parties and more opportunities to advance Meghan's career. So of course they want to live there. Not sure why anyone would be gullible enough to buy their line about 'safety'.