The Ghost

There are some authors whose books you take to straight away – for me those authors include Jilly Cooper and John Grisham. There are others that can take a little more time to get used to. It took me a while to get into Ian Rankin, now I count him as one of my favourite crime writers so I generally find it worth persisting….

The Ides of March

2011’s star of the year has to be Ryan Gosling. All of a sudden he’s everywhere and getting lots of attention and love. Not least from a number of movie bloggers and guys I speak to on Twitter. I must admit though that I don’t feel the Gosling love as much as some others do. I like him…

Ides of March Trailer

The Venice International Film Festival opened this week with a showing of George Clooney’s fourth film in the director’s chair – The Ides of March. Feedback so far has been very positive, particularly about Ryan Gosling’s performance. The cast is strong with Clooney, Gosling and the always impressive Philip Seymour Hoffman. The trailer promises a slick political thriller and it’s definitely one of my must-sees for what looks like a very impressive autumn at the cinema. What upcoming releases have caught your eye?

Green Zone

No director has yet managed to produce a great film set during the Iraq War. I know Kathryn Bigelow won the Best Director Oscar for The Hurt Locker but that was pretty dull ….

Russell Crowe joins Mark Wahlberg’s Broken

Cheery chappie Russell Crowe has joined the cast of Mark Wahlberg’s political thriller Broken. Crowe will play a Mayor who hires a private detective to uncover evidence of his wife’s cheating which leads to murder and financial scandal. Sounds very worthy and really rather dull. Can real estate shenanigans make for a decent film?