Petra in Jordan is one of my top bucket list destinations in the world. So while I can’t go there in real life, it was pretty exciting to discover it as the backdrop to one of Dame Agatha’s murder mysteries.
I felt like something different, and this deeply strange and haunting 1972 film by Werner Herzog about the doomed 16th-century expedition into the Peruvian rain forest definitely hit the spot. It’s the kind of film that you’re never sure you liked in the conventional sense, but one that gets under your skin.
I put off reading this book forever, mostly because I was intimidated by its sheer doorstop size. In the end, this requiem for the Soviet era proved to be both an easy and hard read. While perhaps not the pick if you’re looking to lift your spirits in the time of a global pandemic, it’s a book that fully deserves the term “masterpiece”.
What to do when you’ve got an NBN outage and can’t stream? Go back to your DVD collection of course. I thought I’d re-watch one of my all-time favourite movies, this witty and brilliantly acted period drama that starts as deliciously wicked and ends as a tragedy.
I’ve been watching a lot of crime drama/comedy recently for some reason. In addition to Hot Fuzz and Leon: The Professional, plus re-visiting Godfather I & II and all five seasons of Breaking Bad, I’ve now watched Martin McDonagh’s 2008 black comedy caper. And yes it made me want to go to Bruges.
Frustratingly superficial but endearing biopic of the 1950s pin-up queen, mostly worth a look for Gretchen Mol’s irresistible and exuberant performance.
I confess that most of my knowledge about A Streetcar Named Desire came from a classic Simpsons episode. But now I finally unwrapped the 1951 adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ stage play, after the DVD sat on my shelves for years.
This is only the second Christie novel in my re-readathon that I genuinely don’t remember ever reading before. I had the right instinct about who dunnit all along, but this Poirot mystery still boasts plenty of surprises and twists.
Somehow I spent the last fifteen years without ever once seeing this high school comedy classic, while still knowing its catchphrases (Stop trying to make Fetch happen). Watching it for the first time now, it still feels fresh and as deceptively effortless as a perfect pop song.
