Nina, schizo ballerina

A belated Happy New Year, everybody. I'm back!

Boy, am I finding this month hard to get through financially. I'm willing to bet a lot of you are in exactly the same situation. Xmas shopping did drain the old cofffers although not as much as I thought it would; nevertheless it's still been a bit tight until pay day. Ho hum. Not as bad as all that. I guess the brand new car I purchased just before Crimbo might have had something to do with it...I figured it was time I traded in my old model for a new one and it was money well spent (I sold my Ford Focus and bought a Ford Fiesta Zetec, in case you're wondering....it's in hot magenta and has ambient lighting!! Ooer. I love it).

Anyhow, even though spending has had to be reigned in, I managed to go to the pictures last night to see "Black Swan". I wanted to see what all the hype was about.

Very good and very creepy would be my summation. Admittedly it does take a while to get going and the real "horror" aspect doesn't kick in until about 2/3 of the way through....but worth seeing. For those of you not in the know, the movie concerns a production of "Swan Lake" by New York City ballet company. The production requires a ballerina to play both the innocent White Swan and the sensual Black Swan. One dancer, Nina (Portman), is a perfect fit for the White Swan, while Lily (Mila Kunis) has a personality that matches the Black Swan. When the two compete for the parts, Nina finds a dark side to herself and starts to experience elaborate hallucinations and delusions about other people and their behaviour. From thereon, things spiral drastically downwards...

Natalie Portman was excellent as Nina, doing the whole "driven but repressed ballet dancer" bit convincingly, hardly surprising, given the presence of her overbearing and controlling mother, played by Barbara Hershey (an actress you don't see much of these days but who I used to love in films like "Hannah and Her Sisters". Good to see her back, but what has she done to her teeth? Huge overbite or what...) Kunis, an actress I haven't seen in anything else, made a good foil for Portman's uptight Nina as her sassy ballet dancing colleague and the scenes where she takes her out to get her p*ssed, then drugs her drink, are entertaining (and then there's the raunchy shenanigans that follow...)

The horror aspect was well conveyed with several genuinely disturbing and unsettling moments e.g. the part when Nina's mothers' paintings all start talking to and mocking her and her eyes turn swan red. Not to mention the strange barbed black things that start poking up out of Nina's skin. Ugggh! I won't say any more otherwise there won't be any surprising nasty bits left, for those of you that are planning on seeing it. The psychological angle - are all of these things genuinely happening or are they in Nina's mind? - made the film gripping for me, and put me in mind of old movies like "Repulsion", "Rosemary's Baby" and "The Stepford Wives", even if the final revelation was kind of obvious.

My criticisms would be that the film has a rather unrelentingly "dour" feel about it and there's not much humour in evidence. The muted visuals/cinematography (there's little colour in there) reinforce this atmosphere but that's kind of deliberate I think - emphasising the harshness and claustrophobia of Nina's world. Every now and then colour breaks through e.g. the scene when a drugged-up/p*ssed Nina goes to the club and is bathed in red whilst a strobed light flashes - all very symbolic.

The dance sequences, in particular the final realisation of "Swan Lake" at the end - are pretty amazing and it's clear that Portman can do ballet (although apparently she's replaced in some long shots - still not as bad as Jennifer Beales in "Flashdance" who didn't dance properly atall. Pah!).

It really creeped me out and I want to see it again!

And it's made me want to go out and buy the soundtrack to the real "Swan Lake". Truly moving and beautiful music. Erm...oh yeah. When I've got some money.

4 out of 5.

No more champagne....

Well actually, I expect there'll be more than a few bottles of champers being uncorked tonight as I write this ... it is still a few hours from midnight, after all....

But Agnetha says it best ... (thanks Alan for letting me nick this from your blog!!) (And I've always dug ABBA's pronunciation of "champagne"....)

So on that note, I'd like to wish all of you dear people a DELIRIOUS, DELIGHTFUL AND DELOVELY NEW YEAR!!



I WILL be back next year...

New Year's Salutations

Hey everyone

Time for a quick update which is LONG overdue....you probably thought I'd fallen off the planet again. I'm back from Brazil now and suffice to say, had a fabulous time. Sadly I didn't really get the time to do any more blogging updates as internet access became kind of tricky once we left Uberaba... Xmas in the sun comes highly recommended though! The resort we stayed in over Xmas and New Year, Porto Seguro, was lovely and the temperature was in the region 30-35 oC - amazing! Sitting on the beach, taking a dip in the sea and sipping a cocktail on Dec 25th was quite an experience, I can tell you and on several occasions I couldn't help thinking about the freezing cold conditions you were all enduring back home...heh heh heh. In fact, Brazilians actually celebrate Xmas officially on Dec 24th, so on the evening of Xmas Eve we had drinkies, gave and received presents and had a big slap-up meal (the latter happened at midnight! Weird, I bet you're thinking....) The next day mainly involved recovering from one's hangover.

Unfortunately after the journey home proved to be a bit of a nightmare. One of our connecting flights was cancelled at very short notice, which led to a domino-type effect that meant we arrived home about a day and a half late. If there's one thing I can't stand, it's waiting around at airports and not knowing if you're going to get onto the next flight or not is even worse. We did manage to have a quick look around Lisbon (Portugal) in the process (well the Vasco De Gama shopping centre to be exact) so that was kind of a bonus. But I just couldn't wait to get home and to my bed. I don't sleep well on planes either and one of the flights we were on had the worst reclining seats ever... By the time me and Gustavo got back we were totally knackered and worn out. To add to that, on getting home I then proceeded to pick up an ear infection and stinking cold/cough!! Was this God's way of telling me that I should have remained in Braaaaazil? Or punishing me for being nasty about all the freezing millions of people back home?? Could be! Fortunately I'm feeling better now, but it's been a shock being back in this v. chilly climate as you can imagine...horrid, in fact. Ho hum. Back to life, back to reality, as Caron Wheeler once said.

I've since managed to catch the two-part Dr Who finale, courtesy of my very nice Mum recording and posting it to me. Enjoyed it on the whole: David T was on great form and enjoyed an excellent rapport with Bernard Cribbins, John S was (relatively) more reigned-in than his previously OTT performance and actually had some good Masterly-moments, I loved the revisiting the past companions bit in the last 20 minutes or so too (even if was a bit hard to stomach that the Doc could "hold off" his regeneration for so long) and Matt Smith looks engagingly zany, but also kind of sweet, from his initial introduction. Less satisfying was all that stuff with the Time Lords - well, Timothy Dalton was very imposing and impressive but I just didn't get the whole storyline with them - found it too hard to follow - am I being thick? I would have liked to have seen better interaction between the Time Lords and the Doc/Earth people too - all they really did was stand in the Eternity gate thing and spout some dialogue.

Well I best go but I will try and put up some pics of my Brazilian experience soon and come back with some other posts...

And before I forget, I hope you all had a totally excellent Xmas and a Happy New Year to all of you!!

OC xx

I´m in Braaaaaaaaazil!!

Bon dia,

I may just have forgotten to mention that, this Xmas, I am vacationing in Brazil! And, in fact I am here already.... hoorah! Yep, I started my hols last Friday (I have 3 week´s break, which is definitely one of the positives abou my job). I´m writing to you from the lounge of Gustavo´s parents´s house in Uberaba, Minas Gerais, where we are currently staying and it´s very good to be here ... Being a holiday I´m planning on doing as little work as possible so may well have a lot of time on my hands, hence can update this blog a bit more! I will try to upload some pics in the next couple of weeks so you can see what I´ve been up to ... yes this is my first ever Xmas in South America and I´m not sorry one little bit to be missing it in old Blighty ... sorry to rub it in folks!!

We´re in Uberaba for the next week or so, then after that we will be travelling further north to the state of Bahia, to a place called Porto Seguro, which is meant to be a bit of a tropical paradise. Gustavo, me and some of his family have hired a big house with a pool there (mmm mmm mmm) and will be staying there from about 23rd Dec through to 3rd Jan i.e. over the Xmas and New Year period!! It´s going to be really interesting and different spending the festive season here, not least being in a 30-40 degree climate!! Yaaaay!! Having said that, it´s raining here at the moment, which is a bit ironic ... there better be lots of tan-inducing sunshine before I come back or else!

A few other things:

- Yesterday Gustavo´s parents had lots of family and friends en cassa for a Sunday barbecue. This is a bit of a tradition over here. They have a back yard where we all sat whilst the (real?) men cooked lots of delicious meats on the barbie (and I´m telling you, the meat here tastes so much better than in old Blighty). Much beer and food was consumed and lots of chat and laughter took place ... trouble is I can´t speak Portuguese very well but still managed to have a great time! The barbies here last much longer than they might at home - people start coming over at lunch time, drop by during the day and the whole thing doesn´t tend to finish til the early morning hours ... a very social affair!

- As you might have figured, I will be missing Dr Who over Xmas - oh nooooooooo!! However am planning on getting my Mum to record it for me, so don´t forget Mother if you´re reading this! I guess the recompense of being in Brazil just about makes up for it.

- I´ve already caught the latest telenovella being broadcast in Brazil, Caras & Bocas, (Faces & Mouths - great title!) - Brazilians really go in for their melodramatic soaps and this one seems to be no exception. Last time I was here there was one on called Paraiso Tropical. The difference between Brazilian and English soaps is that these ones only tend to run for about 9 months, after which they finish and a brand new one starts up. Somehow I don´t think they could cope with the longevity of Eastenders and Coronation Steet. And you don´t always have to understand the language to pick up on the OTT acting and situations - in one episode I saw the other day, somebody sabotaged a wedding by releasing a load of spiders into an air vent which then proceeded to overrun the wedding venue and frighten all the guests - like you do. The spiders looked suspiciously CGI to me ...

- On a much more serious note, Steve, I was very sorry to hear about you losing your grandfather. He sounded like a real battler and that he had a good innings. Hope you´re bearing up and have a good Xmas in spite of your loss.

Well that´s about it for now, but will write again soon. Ciaou for now!

OC xx