Another Fantastic Year of singing arrived last night as The Eurovision Song Contest took place in MalmöSweden. Sweden won the contest last year with their successful win with Loreen singing Euphoria. In a remarkable change this year though, the winning song was not shown at the beginning of the show. Instead, a new anthem for the contest was shown with a flag ceremony for the show’s acts which reminded me of the chariots scene from The Hunger Games. The song Euphoria was eventually played as the climax of a series of songs sung together by last year’s winner Loreen.
The presentation of the event was one of the strongest in the show’s history with the show being presented by native comedian Petra Mede. It made a nice change from the standard format of two presenters, one male the other female. It also meant that she was not being held down by the male presenter and could make the job her own, she even conducted the halftime show with a song and dance routine and even included little bits of comedy every now and again. In my opinion I think there should be more of those flash dances that Norway did in 2010.
The competition as a whole had a nice variety of Acts. Armenia had an interesting entry, interesting as the song was composed by Black Sabbath Guitarist Tony Iommi. The song’s overall started off quite well with a nice introduction from France. The song’s continued with some other Good entries from Belarus and Germany (which did sound a bit like Euphoria). But when it came to my Vote as in the county I decided to vote for, I chose the entry from Norway. I liked its heavy style and in some case did remind me of The Prodigy. Throughout the judging of the songs I was constantly willing it on to win. In the end it finished with a respectable 4th place.
The United Kingdom did better this year than last, 3 more countries voted for it than last year’s four and finishing with 23 points overall (11 more than last year) and placed 19th; which is not to bad for the UK considering the recent history. The voting this year was a close one, to begin with many songs were climbing for the top spot continuously but when Denmark (Only Teardrops by Emmelie de Forest) got the foothold it pretty much held it until it won the contest, however Azerbaijan (the previous year’s host) for a long time were in a position to overthrow it. But with 4 countries left to vote, Denmark had already Won. Bizzarely though, unlike previous years Denmark were announced as the winner with countries still left to vote, it was only after the announcement that the voting continued, but this was probably for the benefit of getting the winner out and ready quickly. The vote was close overall with the winning song not getting a record score and instead winning with 281 points; 11 points off from Finland’s Victory in 2006. It was another Great year for Eurovision, the winning song was actually quite nice and it was Good to at least see that the Favourite won so there won’t be all this political voting nonsense ruining the entire show. Eurovsion remains one of the Best music events of the year and one of my Favourite events of the year. In 12 months time the show will return, so lets now enjoy all the Great Music from this year and Celebrate Denmark’s third victory in the contest.
GENEPOOL (Denmark did quite well in 2010 coming fifth with one of my favourite songs from that year).
This past friday was almost like any day for someone who attends University in Preston while living in Lancaster. I went to Lancaster train station to get my train to Preston and was once again hoping to get a seat for two reasons. Firstly it is nice to sit down, and secondly; I prefer to read sitting down, that way I can read some more of The Spook’s Curse. However it was a First TransPennine Express train which meant that there was only a vague chance of getting a seat. In the end I did not get one and had to stand up all the way, which brought up a very interesting question; if FirstGroup can afford to bid for the West Coast Main Line, why can’t they afford to put an extra carriage on their Manchester Airport trains? It’s a popular service and everyone has to stand so surely they could do the decent thing and add some more seats for the comfort of their passengers.
Anyway later in the day, on my way home, things got a lot worse. After getting my lunch from McDonalds I went to Preston Train Station and arrived just after 4:10pm, and as usual, there are millions of trains going south but hardly any going North. I think there must be some kind of portal that links London and Glasgow/Edinburgh so that once a train has arrived at Euston Train Station, it goes straight forward into the portal and immediately arrives in Glasgow/Edinburgh. Anyway because of the lack of trains going North I had to wait about half an hour for a train. So I ate my McDonald’s and did something that I enjoy while waiting for a train at Preston Train Station, head to the end of the platform that points towards London and watch the trains come in, it’s both relaxing and fun.
Eventually I saw the Pendolino arrive and boarded the train (through the first class section). Usually the Glasgow Central trains usually wait some time before leaving, but this one waited a while. After about 10 minutes or so, an intercom came on stating that the train was going to be delayed for about 15 minutes. So I get off and wait on the opposite platform for another train, which came while being about 1 minute delayed. I boarded the train (this time a VirginSuper Voyager) and got a seat, hurray. I had a little sleep before waking up and realised that the train was still in the station, Preston Train Station. There was an announcement stating that there was a train heading North towards Lancaster on another platform; but I was comfortable and so I stayed where I was. Then the announcement came the train was going to be 20 minutes delayed. So I got off and went to the other train, the one from earlier, which was still in the station and decided to wait for further information because the trains did not show a departure time, instead they just showed the word “DELAYED”.
Eventually I ran into my University friend Daniel who was having similar train problems as he too was wanting to go to Lancaster. Eventually, without word from the station, the first delayed train left Preston, without neither Me or Daniel on it. Now that is just unfair, several people were needing to go home and the station did not tell us when the train was leaving. So in response to this, we both boarded the second delayed train and waited, standing up for about 20 minutes plus, the reason behind the delay was apparently the train had no driver, which raises the question, how did it get to Preston in the first place?
So after 20 minutes or so and after the corridor had become packed with several people, another train going in the direction of Lancaster arrived and we did consider going on it, but in the end we stayed on the train that we were currently on which was now 1 hour and 10 minutes delayed. And then at about 6:00pm, the train moved and left Preston; HURRAY. After about 15 minutes of travel we finally arrived in Lancaster at about 6:15pm; 2 Hours and 5 Minutes after arriving at Preston Train Station in the first place. So home at last after a long (ANNOYING) journey. Then I walked home and on the way some bloke walked up to me and asked if I had any weed, to which my answer was “NO”.
Yesterday I watched the first episode of Jim & Yahtzee’s Rhymedown Spectacular by The Escapist I felt inspired to write some poetry. So that’s what I did. I wondered if it was possible to write poetry on twitter with in the character limit, and it was. So here is a series of Haiku’s I wrote on my Twitter page less than an hour ago about the Jaws Film Series, Enjoy.
“I have changed my job,
Oh dear look, another shark,
It’s following me”.
There you go, I hope you enjoyed this quick thing of Poetry, I may do some more in the future. I hope you enjoyed it, please fell free to leave comments, Thank You.
A few weeks ago I was engaged in a long discussion through my comments with my friend Matt. It was here that I came up with an idea. So as you can see by the title I am launching a new series of Blog Posts that will take place here every three months which will give readers a more in-depth knowledge of films. How does this work, well it’s simple really. Every 3 months I will set a film for whoever wants to join in to watch. After three months passes I will give participants some questions about the film to answer (I will give some questions on the reveal post to just to get you thinking) and there are 3 ways in which to answer them; Blog Post, Video Post or simply through the comments at the bottom of the post. That post will also show the details of the next film that will be studied.
When it comes down to the method in which participants may take part, it is entirely up to them. If the participants have a Blog or something along those lines, they may want to use the format to take part in this. If participants are not ones for writing much but would like to be involved they could make a video. Or if they prefer too they could just leave their feedback to the questions asked by simply leaving a comment. Whichever way you decide to take part, I only ask that you leave a link be it a video or blog post in the comments section just so I can have a read/watch for myself, as well as leave a link to the original post so their readers know what you are talking about and why you are doing it. Don’t forget that it is not compulsory to answer all/any of the questions but they do give you some ideas of what to think about when you are producing and presenting your response. So, now that all the major writing is out of the way, lets move on to the subject of the very first movie study; and it is pretty easy to guess what it is from reading the title. The film in question is of course the critically successful and cult classic Japanese Film BATTLE ROYALE.
Based on the novel of the same name by Japanese Author Koushun Takami. Described as Lord of the Flies for the 21st Century as well as being known as the most controversial book of the 20th Century, the story of the film revolves around a group of captured high school children placed on an island and forced to kill each other. While this may sound similar to many of you as The Hunger Games, do remember that Battle Royale (both book and film) were released before The Hunger Games was first published. The film was directed by Kinji Fukasaku and was released in 2000 and was met both with critical acclaim and controversy over its ideas. To date the film holds an 86% rating on Rotten Tomatoes as well as an 89% audience rating.
Because the film is an interesting topic I decided it was possibly the Best Film to start the series on. So, for those who wish to participate, you have 3 months to watch Battle Royale. I will give you some questions to think about now and I will give you all the questions in 3 months time (July). Then in 3 months time I will also tell you which film will be looked at next along with some more questions.
Here are some taster questions for you:
1. Throughout the film there are 2 major riddles/questions being asked and don’t get answered until the end. Are these particularly questions necessary? If yes, why yes and if not, why not?
2. Do the weapons provided to the students/competitors reveal anything about who they are as a person?
3. What assets does the Battle Royale Program use to make the students kill each other?
4. Why do you think that the Battle Royal Program was set up in the way it is depicted (Format)?
5. If you were made to compete in Battle Royale, how would you react and what would your tactic to survive be?
I am already anticipating and looking forward to reading/watching any responses you make towards this. I may even attempt to answer some of the questions myself, but maybe not at first as this is not really about me, it is about you and your opinions.
GENEPOOL (Don’t forget to check back in June as I will be posting up a film review of Battle Royale).
It is no big secret that I like cars, I like all sorts of cars but my Favorite genre/type of cars are Super Cars. While I do like Big Four by Fours as well as classic cars and even some family type cars, I do prefer supercars to most other types. If I was to give you a list of my top 5/top 10 Favourite cars it would be highly likely that most of the list will be filled with Supercars.
But more recently I have been ignoring one car in particular. A car that if you were to look at it you would think I would like it, but to me it has been causing some irritating headaches.
This is the car in question, the Pagani Huayra (Don’t ask me how to pronounce to it). I have known about the existence of this car for a few years. When it was first announced I looked around for some pictures of it with no luck. Every so often I would try and look it up. But most of the time I did not want to think about it. It was not until a recent episode of Top Gear that I gave it a proper look. And I liked what I saw; it has a Good shape and gives out a lot of Power and noise, all key components of a Supercar. It also had lots of nice extras including the interesting Gear Stick. However, even after the impressive demonstration and Lap Time to me, it is still a bit irritating. Why? Well, this is why?
This is the Pagani Zonda. Produced by the same company that builds the Huayra, launched in 2000, the Zonda has had various different versions over the years including the C12, R, S, Cinque, Tricolore and F. The Zonda (Zonda F to be exact) is also my Favourite Car. The first time I saw it was on an episode of Top Gear (The Milau Bridge Episode, one of the Best Episodes), but it was not until the F made an appearance that it became my Favourite Car, and has been that way since. It’s body shape, it’s style, it’s noise and it’s speed alone make it a Fantastic Car, but to me the thing that makes it the best is that it is the true definition of a Supercar. It’s futuristic as well as mad, its name too, ZONDA, what a Fantastic name for a car. Supercars are dream cars for many and the Zonda represents this spectacularly as being a car that once existed in the minds of motoring fans, almost an impossibility before arriving on the scene and not just being a one-off car, it became a Legend of Motoring.
So why would I be ignoring a car that is being promoted as the Successor to the Zonda. Well that’s it; I don’t want the Zonda to disappear. The Zonda is an incredible car and as far as I can see it cannot be replaced and should not be replaced. Sure, the company needs to progress and build new cars to continue, but why not make the Zonda alongside the Huayra. While the Zonda and the Huayra share similar looks and in that sense you could say that they are basically the same car, I still prefer the Zonda to the Huayra The time leading up to the end of the Zonda was sad for me. While it did went out on a bang with the R and Tricolore, it was still the end of my Favourite car.
It may be the end of the Zonda as the main car produced by Pagani but I do not think of this as the real end of the Zonda. I am sure Pagani have their plans for the car that made them what they are, but for now the Huayra is their main project. So perhaps that is what is meant as the successor to the Zonda, it is the new Project as the Zonda is now complete.
GENEPOOL (My more regular readers may remember that I have done some car related posts in the past along with a look at the Ford Edsel and the Dodge Charger)
