At times the film stuff threatens to take over this blog so I’ve decided to start a separate blog site just for that. From now on I’ll put any movie-related entries including review at ‘Film Van’. There’s not much there yet (just a review of the latest Sherlock Holmes film) but in the next few weeks I hope to post entries about all the new films I see, plus all the films, new and old, I’ve EVER seen. If you have any particular favourites you’d like to see done first, please let me know; otherwise I’ll just do them randomly in order of most recent or of any films I’ve especially loved (or loathed) over the years. So I’d love it if you’d click on the link below and see what you think (please subscribe/follow too so I know if there’s any interest at there). It’s VERY early days yet but watch out for lots of new film stuff er… COMING SOON as they  say.

http://filmvan.wordpress.com/

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 40,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 15 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Please vote for the logo (above) that I designed (if you like it!). It’s  for P.O.D. (a band called Payable On Death). If you follow the link I’m about to post you can click to vote for me (you know it makes sense!). Voting opened today Jan 4 2011. OK, so the link is…

http://www.talenthouse.com/creativeinvites/preview/aa80a42d7f61a1092c75af0e4d6237a0/391

I’m going to see the new Sherlock Holmes film on Thursday so, as I hadn’t seen the first one, I bought it from Blockbuster for £3. It’s going to be a bit of a Sherlock Holmes OD week this week because I also watched the first episode of the new run of Sherlock on BBC1 on Sunday. I need all this film and TV viewing at the moment because here in England the year has entered its grim, cold, post-Christmas phase so it’s much better not to be outside.

The Guy Ritchie film (2009) was pretty good; very few dull parts, reasonable script and good performances from all of the cast especially Robert Downey Junior who became Holmes in the same way as he became Chaplin all those years ago. I liked the fact that the city of London, in a way, became another character of the film; this is an advantage that the movie has over the BBC version which could almost be set in any European city. Of course, the film evidently has a much bigger budget than the TV series so they can afford to put it all on show. Which they certainly do; the whole Victorian London thing looks breathtaking especially the under-construction Tower Bridge where the finale takes place.

Overall, it’s a good, entertaining film which ticks most of the relevant boxes. My minor niggles would include the violence; I’m not against showing violence but I hated the stylised, slo-mo, ninja-esque, trendy way it was done (why does Guy Ritchie have to spoil films by always putting this in?!). I also prefer my heroes to use violence reluctantly rather than rush into it like a couple of Transformers on a bad hair day.

As I said, the TV episode I also saw this week clearly didn’t have so much dosh to splash out on visuals. It made up for this, though, in inventiveness, cleverness, wittiness, suspense, characterisation and probably a few more fronts too. A lot of this was down to Stephen Moffat‘s script (does he ever do average ones?) but not all; the direction was great even without the CGI and all the cast was superb. I can’t choose between Robert Downey and Benedict Cumberbatch for who does the best Holmes; they both do it so differently but it works well both ways. If I was really really really forced I would probably say Downey because he has a tiny bit more heart but Cumberbatch gets the better words to say.

I’m only halfway through this Holmes Fest; am seeing the new film tomorrow and then there’s episode 2 on TV on Sunday. Maybe I’ll get myself a magnifying glass. I’ve been advised to do that before. That was in very different circumstances and it was even colder than today.

Please vote for the logo (above) that I designed (if you like it!). It’s  for P.O.D. (a band called Payable On Death). If you follow the link I’m about to post you can click to vote for me (you know it makes sense!). One other thing though, you won’t be able to vote until after January 4th 2012 but I thought I’d give you advance warning so you can iron your voting trousers.Many thanks if you decide to support my work. OK, so the link is…

http://www.talenthouse.com/creativeinvites/preview/aa80a42d7f61a1092c75af0e4d6237a0/391

Maybe I’m going for the ratings-grabbing, sensationalised headline there… I’m almost at 50,000 hits so maybe I just want to hurry up and get there before the end of 2011. Maybe the real story was that we went out in the orange Polo for a post Christmas walk along the North Wales coast and there was a few seagulls.

Here in the North West of England we got the first snow of the season today so I took a few pics. It’s night now and the snow has stopped but I can hear cars crunching on the road outside the front window so I reckon it must have frozen. I love snow but I don’t like the cold. I was meant to be living and working in the Bahamas but there was a terrible mix-up!

WHAT’S IT LIKE WHERE YOU ARE?

I took these photos on my way home from work today. I must cross the Runcorn/Widnes bridge five or six times every day of my life. As a kid I used to think cars crossed it by driving over the actual arched bit and I remember the disappointment when I realised it was just a straight road suspended below. Me and Eddie from work have talked about doing a para glide from the bridge for charity and I think that might still happen at some point.

The main arch is 1,082 feet (330 m) long and each side arch measures 250 feet (76 m). Its height over the river bed is 285 feet (87 m) and the headroom over the ship canal is 80 feet (24 m).  The Silver Jubilee Bridge as it’s now known requires constant repainting and for this one coat uses 6,000 imperial gallons (27,277 l) of paint.  At the time of its construction it had the third longest steel arch span in the world. It had the longest vehicular span in the country, but this record was held for only a few weeks until the Tamar Bridge was completed. By 2001 it was the 10th longest steel arch bridge and at that time was just 20 centimetres (8 in) short of having Europe‘s largest span.

The bridge was built by Dorman Long who also built the Sydney Harbour Bridge and is the 23rd largest arched span bridge in the world. On a more gruesome note, unhappy people round here often try to end it all by jumping off it!