Black Swan

I was going to save this review to bulk out the small amount of pre-prepared material I have for the next couple of weeks while I take some time out from film reviewing to work on the novel; however, I figured it would be better to post it now, ahead of the Oscar brouhaha.Early in Darren Aronofsky’s stone-cold modern classic ‘Black Swan’, impresario Tomas Leroy (Vincent Cassel) offers a 72-word synopsis of Tchaikovsky’s eternally popular ballet ‘Swan...

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GIALLO SUNDAY: Death Walks on High Heels

I just love the title. ‘Death Walks on High Heels’. It gives me a mental image that’s half ‘Seventh Seal’, half ‘Priscilla, Queen of the Desert’.The film itself is similarly schizophrenic: it starts off like a Hitchcock movie in the chic, playful stage of his career (think ‘North by Northwest’ or ‘To Catch a Thief’, but with more in the way of striptease routines and straight razors), then catches a flight to England and holes up in a rural backwater...

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The Social Network 2, anyone?

"I was egomaniacal and complacent.""And blogging.""And bloggin...

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Mini reviews

In addition to putting the call out for guest articles to augment the fortnight’s worth of material I’ve got prepared for the blog – the aim being to free up a month’s worth of evenings and weekends to really make headway with my embryonic novel while at the same time maintaining semi-regular content on these pages – it has to be said that the last couple of films I’ve watched fell outwith the remit of The Agitation of the Mind: ie. celebrating what’s great about cinema rather than picking over the carcass of its failures.Where do ‘Frailty’ and...

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The Agitation of the Mind needs YOU!

Between the necessary evil of holding down the day job, the unalloyed pleasure of watching movies and blogging about them, and a deep and abiding love for real ale ... ... I have neglected what ought to be my overriding ambition: work on the novel. My rationale has always been that in the time it would take me to progress a work of fiction 400 or 500 words, with the probability of the thing not finding a publisher at the end of the day, I can write...

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Emily Blunt

Didn’t I do this last year?Who cares if I did – Emily Blunt is one of Britain’s most talented actresses (Anthony Hopkins ranked her alongside Jodie Foster in a recent Empire interview). It’s her 28th birthday today and a large glass of chenin blanc is being raised here at chez Agitation....

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FINAL GIRL FILM CLUB: Frozen

My contribution to this month’s Final Girl Film Club.Fifteen minutes into ‘Frozen’ and I was mentally preparing my review. I was going to refer to it by what must surely have been its working title – ‘Three Douchebags on a Chairlift’ – and post this screengrab … … just so I could sarcastically conjecture that the rest of the sign read “… from watching this movie”. Then, round about the halfway mark, Adam Green’s admittedly (and it’s something I admit...

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When you side with a man, you stay with him …

If there’s a candidate for patron saint on this blog, it’s surely Sam Peckinpah.The man would have been 86 today.Compadre, I’m in Nottingham not Old Mexico, I’m raising a glass of beer not a shot of tequila, but I’m drinking to your eternal memory all the same.“I want to enter my house justified” – ‘Ride the High Country’...

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GIALLO SUNDAY: Torso

Although not as well-represented in gialli as black gloves, wickedly glinting knives, spiral staircases or bottles of J&B, the image of a broken or ritually dismembered doll is one of the most provocative images the genre has given us.One pops up during the opening credits of Sergio Martino’s sleazy, brutal and red-herring ridden opus ‘Torso’. The doll is placed in a sexualized context. A whisper of chiffon is pulled from the curvaceous body...

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New blog on the block

I just wanted to give a shout to the recently established film blog The Silver Screen. It’s the home of Brent, a New Zealander with a genuine love of cinema who’s open to all kinds of movies.In his first month of blogging, Brent has reviewed a diverse range of films, from recent releases ‘True Grit’, ‘Black Swan’ and ‘Tangled’ to foreign fare such as ‘The White Ribbon’ and ‘The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest’ by way of ‘Bitch Slap’, ‘Two Mules for Sister Sara’ and ’21 Grams’.His reviews are succinct, conversational and feature links to various...

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SOMETHING FOR THE WEEKEND: Tina Aumont in Torso

I'm kind of giving away tomorrow's Giallo Sunday choice here, but what the hell? I figured it was high time the doe-eyed and meltingly lovely Tina Aumont took her rightful place in the SFTW gallery....

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Knowing

NOTE: proliferation of SPOILERS in this review.With ‘Dark City’, ‘The Crow’ and (to a lesser degree) ‘I, Robot’, Alex Proyas demonstrated a noirish sensibility with a touch of the gothic. These films are dystopias, characterized by an appropriately brooding atmosphere. ‘Dark City’ and ‘The Crow’ demonstrate the kind of visuals that Fritz Lang, Bob Kane and Hieronymus Bosch would all be proud of. Even the toned-down mainstream approach of ‘I, Robot’...

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Women in horror: six great horror heroines

Celebrating Day of the Woman’s “Women in Horror Month” with half a dozen feisty final girls, resilient heroines and one sexy sheriff who looks good packing a shotgun.Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie in ‘Halloween’ Melissa George as Jess in ‘Triangle’Signourey Weaver as Ripley in ‘Alien’Jessica Harper as Suzy in ‘Suspiria’ Adrienne Barbeau as Stevie in ‘The Fog’Kari Wuhrer as Sheriff Parker in ‘Eight Legged Freaks’(Don’t forget to visit Day of the Woman...

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Women in horror: more deadly than the male

Celebrating Day of the Woman’s “Women in Horror Month” with half a dozen female horror icons whose pint you definitely wouldn’t spill.Robin McLeavy as Lola in ‘The Loved Ones’ Linda Hayden as Angel in ‘Blood on Satan’s Claw’ Ingrid Pitt as Countess Elisabeth in ‘Countess Dracula’ Rie Ino’o as Sadako in ‘The Ring’ Katharine Isabelle as Ginger in ‘Ginger Snaps’Amelia Kinkade as Angela in ‘Night of the Demon’(Don’t forget to visit Day of the Woman...

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Women in horror: the best of the bloggers

Brittney-Jade Colangelo has declared February “Women in Horror Month” at her intelligent, witty and highly readable blog Day of the Woman. If Brittney-Jade isn’t on your sidebar already, rectify that oversight now.In honour of her blog-a-thon and in celebration of the all the accomplished female horror bloggers out there, The Agitation of the Mind would like to take this opportunity to give a big round of applause to half a dozen of his favourite...

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