<b>B-movie of the week:</b> The test of the success of a movie such as <i>Eight-Legged Freaks</i> is in how convincing and scary the monsters are. In this case, they are both, writes Shaun de Waal.
<b>Movie of the week:</b> <i>The Believer</i> is one of those rare movies that can modulate from the shocking to the moving, writes Shaun de Waal.
The garb of educated commentary offered by Jason Lott ("We need more reasoned public debate over GM food", August 8) is vacuous and appalling given his credentials as an ethicist.
<b>Not the movie of the week:</b> I walked out of Austin Powers in <i>Goldmember</i> thinking: These movies make money? wites Shaun de Waal.
<b>Movie of the week:</b> <i>Birthday Girl</i> does not stun one into submission like <i>Moulin Rouge</i>, and it does not bring one to the edge of one’s seat like <i>The Others</i>, but it does entertain, writes Shaun de Waal.
Retro Fresh puts the sounds of South African pop and rock of years gone by back on the shelves. Shaun de Waal spoke to Fresh’s Benjy Mudie.
It’s rather odd to be interviewing one’s former boss. Anton Harber was one of the founding co-editors of this newspaper, then The Weekly Mail, in 1985. (I joined the paper in 1989.) Seventeen years later, he is heading up the journalism programme at the University of the Witwatersrand’s Graduate School for the Humanities and Social Sciences. I spoke to him and to Lesley Cowling, also a onetime colleague; among other things, she ran the training programme at the Mail & Guardian for several years. She is now academic coordinator of the Wits journalism programme.
A lucky Friday reader can win the full set of the 14 Retro Fresh releases so far. Another six readers will each receive the consolation prize of a copy of Rocking Against the Machine.
<b>Movie of the week:</b> There is not a lot to
say about John Dahl’s thriller <i>Joy Ride</i>, except that it is a good movie of its kind, writes Shaun de Waal.
A ‘hit parade’ of Africa’s best books has been selected. Shaun de Waal reports.
<b>Not the movie of the week:</b> Barbet Schroeder has made some interesting films, but <i>Murder by Numbers</i> is not one of them, writes Shaun de Waal.
Shaun de Waal reviews David Bowie: <i>Heathen</i>
We see a lot of sex in the cinema. It is one of the movies’ perennial subjects, perhaps the subject. Even when it is disguised as romance, allowing a large amount of genteel pussyfooting around the issue, we know that it’s really all about sex. Like Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman’s long, long kiss in Notorious, from the days of serious censorship, we understand that this is about the meeting of more than lips.
40 Days and 40 Nights. The humour here is derived from the voluntary (and only temporary) termination of an unrealistically boisterous sex-life by a good-looking young man (Josh Hartnett) who knows — intimately — a large number of equally good-looking young women. After a nasty break-up, Matt reconsiders his randy ways, choosing to consult his brother — a priest — for advice about women and sex. The result is a decision to avoid having sex for Lent in order to develop a more mature attitude towards relationships. Pretty people. No depth. A few laughs. — Bruce Dennill
There have been some 20 versions of The Count of Monte Cristo, going back to 1908 and including Soviet and Egyptian takes on the famous tale. Alexandre Dumas’s story seems to have enduring life, as do his other classics — The Three Musketeers and The Man in the Iron Mask. Given how many remakes there have been of these three works, Dumas must be one of the most-filmed authors ever.
101 Reykjavik. Icelandic comedy about the party scene. An amiable comedy.
Time magazine recently hailed the huge opening weekend of Spider-Man as the herald of a new unity for the nation — before its opening, it said, "America was a splintered nation". What the magazine meant thereby was that different people were going to different movies. When Spider-Man opened, however, crowed Time, suddenly everyone was going to the same movie, and this "mass event" gave rise to a new "national conversation".
<b>Not quite the movie of the week:</b> For a movie that gestures towards <i>film noir</i>, <i>Mulholland Drive</i> would have been infinitely better had it been a tense thriller of an hour and a half, instead of two and a half hours that amble by at the pace of a bad art movie, writes Shaun de Waal.
<b>REVIEWS:</b>
<i>Christ: a Crisis in the Life of God</i> by Jack Miles (Heinemann)
<i>It Ain’t Necessarily So: Investigating the Truth of the Biblical Past</i> by Matthew Sturges (Headline)
<i>Doubts and Loves: What is Left of Christianity</i> by Richard Holloway (Century)<P>
Soundtrack: <i>The Lord of the Rings</i>
<b>Movie of the week:</b> Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s film <i>Amélie</i> has been a huge hit in its native France, and has replicated that success around the world, writes Shaun de Waal.
<b>MOVIE OF THE WEEK</b> One begins to wonder, after <i>The Curse of the Jade Scorpion</i>, who the ageing Allen could cast in the Woody Allen role in his next movie, writes Shaun de Waal.
<b>Not quite movie of the week:</b> <i>Storytelling</i> feels as though it has a masterful first act, an overlong second act and no third act at all, writes Shaun de Waal.
<b>Movie of the week:</b> Skilfully and without mercy, <i>A Beautiful Mind</i> coerces one into feeling good, writes Shaun de Waal.
<b>Thriller of the week:</b> I found <i>The Deep End</i> a seriously provocative movie, one that left me with a persistent sense of unease, despite (or emphasised by) the beauty of its images, writes Shaun de Waal.
Various literary and book-related events are lined up for readers and book-lovers around the country over the coming months, writes Shaun de Waal.
<b>REVIEW:</b> <i>Robert Mugabe: Power, Plunder and Tyranny in Zimbabwe</i> by Martin Meredith (Jonathan Ball).
No image available
/ 27 February 2002
In South Africa to promote her new novel, author Gillian Slovo speaks to Shaun de Waal.
No image available
/ 1 February 2002
<b>MOVIE OF THE WEEK</b><p> While we should really all be getting a bit stern about the idea of glorifying crime, it’s hard not to like all the criminal characters — and <i>Ocean’s Eleven</i> — very much, writes Shaun de Waal.
No image available
/ 25 January 2002
<b>NOT THE MOVIE OF THE WEEK:</b> <i>Vanilla Sky</i> is one of those films that diminish in retrospect, writes Shaun de Waal.