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   SpringBoard UK Film and music reviews area

               

Slither (2006) James Gunn (writer & director) knows what makes horror fans scream. both in pleased disgust and, just as important (with the audience for this type of movie) devoted genre glee that only comes when the director in question clearly loves nudging the collective gag reflex just as much as gore hounds dig the real deal, squishy, brain-bursting, outer-space slugs and all .... Full review here

Cream - Disraeli Gears Focus is made on Eric Clapton of course - he was 'the star', or at least, would later become so. But little in Eric Clapton's subsequent solo career could prepare you for this, Cream's classic work of blues psychadelia. Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker both make important contributions .... Full review here

 

Mission Impossible III (2006) Nonsense is the essence of the super spy genre, and J.J. Abrams, the third director to helm this action franchise (after Brian DePalma and John Woo), both acknowledges that fact and exploits it for all it's worth .... Full review here

Waterloo To Anywhere - Dirty Pretty Things Is it any wonder or surprise that Babyshambles nor Dirty Pretty Things match upto the thrills provided by The Libertines? Two songwriters to fill an album, now we've one. I won't carry on .... Full review here

 

Don't come knocking (2006) In reverse of traditional westerns, where the hero rides into town, Don't Come Knocking begins with the protagonist riding out of one, in the instance, a movie location set. Here lies a man whose personal and public identity has long been synonymous with his screen counterpart. Played by Sam Shepard (who also penned the screenplay) Howard Spence is a faded actor of westerns .... Full review here

U2 - How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb U2 seem to make albums in groups of three. If you are fairly familiar with the back catalogue of U2, the following groupings will make sense to you. Boy, October, War. Unforgettable Fire, Joshua Tree, Rattle And Hum. Achtung Baby, Zooropa, Pop. All That They Can't Leave Behind, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb... Full review here

 

Silent Hill (2006) Oh dear, more mainstream substandard regurgitated tripe to get the multitude into the cinemas and to switch off their brains. Where do you start with a critical analysis of something like this? ' Let's first look at the script which has the character of Dahlia Gillespie .... Full review here

Bloc Party - Silent Alarm Another new British guitar band. Isn't there one along every week, at the moment? Bloc Party distinguish .... Full review here

 

16 Blocks (2006) I must admit that I was not optimistic for this movie. Bruce Willis (who is one of my least favourite 'high profile' actors) portrays a NYPD office .... Full review here

Prince - Diamonds and Pearls Prince gets himself a new band, which is all very good as 'Diamonds And Pearls' sounds like a natural, organic product as a result .... Full review here

 

Ice Age 2 - The Meltdown (2006) In 'Ice Age: The Meltdown' all the major characters are back, and Scrat is given a lot more screen time as he ingeniously tries to nail that elusive nut .... Full review here

James Blunt - Back To Bedlam Marketing at major labels works in predictable ways. James Blunt is an excellent example of this, his history at a soldier .... Full review here

 

Enron - The Smartest guys In The Room (2006) Alex Gibney presents a tale of greed, deception and corruption in this epic documentary on the Enron scandal that destroyed the corporation and put thousands out of work .... Full review here

Mystery Jets - Making Dens I'll get the two most often commented upon facts concerning Mystery Jets out of the way first of all, so we can concentrate on the music .... Full review here

 

Transamerica (2006) Transamerica focuses on a pre-operative, male-to-female transsexual who was born and raised as Stanley, but is now in her female adulthood as Bree. Bree holds down two jobs and saves every penny so she can pay for one last operation to make her a woman at last .... Full review here

Journey South - Journey South There's a guy in this years American Idol who rearranges the likes of 'I Walk The Line' by Johnny Cash into genuinely different rock mode. Here in the UK we had Journey South, two brothers both .... Full review here

 

The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (2006) The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada is a stunning success and fully deserved its two awards that it collected at Cannes, one for best actor (Tommy Lee Jones) and the other for best screenplay (Guillermo Arriaga) .... Full review here

Elvis Presley - Greatest hits There may well have been rock albums before this one, I'm not sure and to be honest, don't especially care. This album was a rock album without a single hit song on it .... Full review here

 

Inside Man (2006) I had seen the trailers for this Spike Lee film a while back and thought hello, this could be interesting. The trailer paints the possibility of an intelligent thriller that does a rethink on the classic bank robber movie .... Full review here

Strokes - First Impressions of the earth The Strokes return early 2006 with a new album that has the no small task of saving the groups reputation .... Full review here

 

Grizzly Man (2006) Werner Herzog has used for this magnificent documentary some of the some of the hundreds of hours of footage that Timothy Treadwell shot of himself with grizzly bears in their natural habitat .... Full review here

Graffiti Bridge - Prince A slightly strange release from the diminutive purple one in that he himself only sings on just over half the tracks. 'Graffiti Bridge' has generally got a bad rap over the years, as a soundtrack movie to a film that flopped big-style .... Full review here

 

Big Momma's House 2 (2006) The premise of this movie puts Big Momma (FBI agent Malcolm Turner (Martin Lawrence) and now an expectant father married to Sherry Pierce (Nia Long) from the first film) as an undercover nanny in the Orange County home of a suspicious computer-worm creator .... Full review here

Ringleaders of the Tormentors - Morrisey Ringleader Of The Tormentors follows Morrissey's wholly successful comeback set 'You Are The Quarry'. 'You Are The Quarry' spawned three UK top ten singles, the most success Morrissey has ever had, in fact. 'Ringleader' is very much a follow-up .... Full review here

 

The proposition (2006) In the anarchic 1880 Australian Outback, Captain Stanley (Ray Winstone) captures, after a violent gunfight that occupiers the first five minutes of the film, renegade Irish criminals Charlie (Guy Pearce) and Mike (Richard Wilson), two-thirds of the infamous Burns Gang that are guilty for the .... Full review here

Aerial - Kate Bush Kate took several years off, had a baby and built a new studio following 1993's The Red Shoes. It's been a long time coming but the 2cd album set Aerial proves to be worth the wait. From the slightly misleading opener 'King Of The Mountain Cometh' .... Full review here

 

Capote (2006) On November 15, 1959, a thriving Kansas farmer, Herb Clutter, his wife Bonnie, his sixteen year old daughter Nancy, and his fifteen year old son Kenyon, were bound and gagged, robbed, and executed. New York writer Truman Capote saw the news story ..... Full review here

The Buzzcocks - Flat Pack Philosophy The Buzzcocks have now released more albums since their reformation in the late eighties than they did originally. I always thought it something of a shame they split up when they did, they were such a great group at the time .... Full review here

 

Good Night And Good Luck (2006) George Clooney strikes just the right mood in this factual film of TV reporter Egbert Roscoe Murrow, known better as Edward R. Murrow, and his gutsy battle in the Fifties against the Commie-baiting Senator Joseph McCarthy .... Full review here

The Darkness - One way ticket to hell & back When The Darkness first appeared on the scene, a friend of mine bravely stated they were going to .... Full review here

   

Chicken Little (2006) As Walt Disney's first home-grown computer animated motion picture (all the previous releases were produced by Pixar studios) Chicken Little is arguably one of the most important movies in Hollywood at this time .... Full review here

Hypnotise - System of a Down Second new album of 2005 from System Of A Down, a band who survived the fall-out from the briefly .... Full review here

 

Walk the Line (2006) 'You build on failure. You use it as a stepping-stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.' - Johnny Cash Full review here

Deep Purple - Rapture of the Deep A new Deep Purple album should be something of an event, but it's a reflection of the status of the group this once legendary band are struggling commercially. Too many line-up changes throughout the years hardly .... Full review here

 

Jarhead (2006) 'Jarhead' is a factual story that has been adapted from an autobiographical book of the same name written by disgruntled Gulf War veteran Anthony Swofford. That sadly, however, does not stop it, for the first hour of its two-hour running time at least, from feeling like a 'Full Metal Jacket' remake to being a Gulf War version of 'Platoon' .... Full review here

Eminem - Curtain Call, Greatest Hits Another great album from the artist Eminem, a bit disappointed that there is only 3 new song, and it almost seem that he has not put much effort to promote the album in this i mean the advert has pieces of work from his previous portfolio, so didn't have much work 'himself' to do, but nevertheles ... Full review here

 

Brokeback mountain (2006) There is something very watch-able about an Ang Lee film. Not only the cinematography but his ability to direct a film that does reflective, passion, intimacy, and drama mixed with unspoken desire extremely well .... Full review here

Artic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am I believe almost everybody on the planet has heard the story of Arctic Monkeys by now. Reaching number one in the UK with their debut single release, largely because of internet promotion rather than regular routes, such as airplay. Then of course, the NME get on the bandwagon, hyping Arctic Monkeys to such previously ....... Full review here

 

Match Point (2006) If you want to bring elegance to the peddling of adulterous characters, you go to the UK. Then, if you want those characters to grapple with the moralities of such infidelities with a ripple of intellectual competence, you go to Woody Allen, and he is ...... Full review here

Status Quo - Dog Of Two Head Status Quo still weren't selling albums, so Pye records dropped them. Of course, much to Pye records dismay, the Quo became one of the biggest selling rock acts of the 70s shortly afterwards. Nice work there ..... Full review here

 

On The waterfront (1954) 'I coulda' had class. I coulda' been a contender. I coulda' been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am'. Marlon Brando's famous, career-making speech in 'On the Waterfront' is undeniably one of the most memorable pieces of .... Full review here

The Life Pursuit - Belle and Sebastian Upon initial listening, which is what this particular section of my site is all about, 'The Life Pursuit' is immensely disappointing. After 'Dear Catastrophe Waitress' seemed to encompass all aspects of the group better than perhaps any other .... Full review here

 

The Producers (2006) After converting his first motion picture into a hit Broadway musical, Mel Brooks transports the story of two theatrical entrepreneurs back to the big screen in this musical comedy. So while this is another in a far too long a line of remakes, this sets itself apart in that .... Full review here

Richard Ashcroft - Keys to the World (2006) An appearance at Live8 and suddenly the former Verve front man is, according to NME, 'God' again. He's not been 'God' since the second Verve album, says me. Anyway, after the frankly terrible 'Human Conditions', is 'Keys To The World'  .... Full review here

 

Cheaper by the Dozen 2 (2006) Mr. & Mrs. Baker along with their twelve children are back.   Father and Husband .... Full review here

ZZ Top -  - Greatest hits (2005) This reviewer got somewhat criticized for his lukewarm reception to the last Korn album .... Full review here

 

The Good, The Bad & The Ugly (1966) In 1966 Sergio Leone's & Clint Eastwood’s classic ‘Man With No Name’ trilogy came to a close .... Full review here

Korn - See You on the Other Side This reviewer got somewhat criticized for his lukewarm reception to the last Korn album .... Full review here

 

King Kong (2005) So Academy Award-winning director Peter Jackson finally got the green light (and an estimated budget of $207,000,000) to remake the film he .... Full review here

Madonna - Confessions on a Dancefloor Madonna continues to survive, shrugging off the occasionally badly received album to .... Full review here

 

Harry Potter - Goblet of Fire (2005) It’s inevitable that Harry, Hermione and Ron have to grow up and face the monsters of adolescence .... Full review here

Cold Play - X & Y Such was the perceived importance of the third Coldplay release. Chris Martin sensibly knew .... Full review here

 

Just Like Heaven (2005) 'Just Like Heaven' presents yet another Reese Witherspoon romantic comedy made by a studio committee .... Full review here

 

The Stepford Wives (2004) This is a story about a town where good wives aren't born but made .... Full review here

 

The Chronicles of Narnia (2005) The Chronicles of Narnia. It is a pretty good movie with great effects, good acting I little dry in places .... Full review here