Bite this

EW's best TV sound bites of '07. Hilarious

Going for Gold

IMDb has launched its 'Road to the Oscars'. Pretty good summation of the favourites and longshots so far.

The Last Word column from today's Day and Night in the Irish Independent

If memory serves, I didn't make any New Year resolutions last year (the fact that I can't remember is surely evidence enough). In fact, I think I argued on these very pages that they are a big waste of time, seeing as nearly all resolutions made at New Year are violated faster than those passed by the UN Security Council.

This year, however, I've decided to change my attitude somewhat. I'm determined to make some changes in 2008, and see them through to the end* (*Terms and conditions apply). But I hasten to classify any of these plans as resolutions per se. Considering I've contemplated most of these things before, or have already attempted them and given up, I think it more accurate to call them New Year "resurrections".

So here are my resurrections, in no particular order either of importance, or of my level of commitment to stick with them:
Negative thinking: The one and only thing I'm definitely ditching in '08 is negative thinking, a dysfunctional form of mental hard-wiring that's kind of like smoking: a filthy, disgusting habit that poisons you from the inside. And I'm a chain-smoker (so to speak).

So from January 1, I'm going to slap on my Neg-atine patches, and think happy thoughts. Now, if I understand the gurus on daytime talk shows correctly, thinking positively will kick the universe in its big vindictive ass, and allow all the good things I know I deserve – well, want anyway – to come into my life. All of which should come in handy as I tackle my three resurrected projects, which are:

The gym: 'Oh how predictable', you cry! But wait! See, I'm already a member of a gym - quite a swanky one at that - so I'm pledging to resurrect that initial enthusiasm I demonstrated for fitness when I first joined, which incidentally lasted about 45 minutes (or however long that episode of Shortland Street was that I watched while listlessly gliding on the cross trainer).

This one is important as the gym is my only option to keep in shape, because the Lord herself knows I love food too much. Diets definitely are not for me, though I hear that several weight watchers are fans of a “regime” where they substitute lettuce for bread in their sandwiches, and replace one meal a day with a helping of cotton wool dipped in orange juice. Which serves as an unappetising segue to my plan to enrol in:

Cooking classes: Yes, I can microwave instant rice and slave over a hot take-out menu like the best of them, but 2008 is the year where I will master the foodie basics and a lot more besides. By the end of my cooking course, I plan to be the MacGyver of food, able to whip up delectable, Michelin star- cuisine with just Quorn, pasta, a duck egg, some string, and a copy of Irish country queen Susan McCann's 1991 album, Diamonds and Dreams.

Finally, learn a new language: I could be practical and make the effort to learn our second national language – you know, Polish – but I've been threatening to learn Spanish for years now, and I reckon it's time I got off my culo and did something about it. The idea is that once I master the language, a whole new world will open up to me, one rich in culture, literature, history (Okay, I want to chat up Hispanic guys in their own language, are you happy?)

Of course, despite my good intentions (is that the road to hell I see before me?), it's possible I might just pack all these in after two weeks because I just couldn't be bothered. Sorry, that’s negative right? I’ll pack them in because I positively couldn't be bothered. See, it’s working already.

Screen Actors Guild

Nominations for the 2008 Screen Actors Guild Awards are out. Always important ones to watch, as they're voted for entirely by actors, who make up the largest voting block in the Academy Awards. See full list of nominations here

Biggest surprises:

The strong showing of Into the Wild, which was shut out by the Golden Globes. Sean Penn's movie picked up 4 nods for Emile Hirsch, Catherine Keener and the brilliant Hol Holbrook, who I think will emerge as the sentimental favourite to win Supporting Actor, just shading heavy fave Javier Bardem (No Country For Old Men).

Atonement was completely ignored - this does not auger well.

Ryan Gosling makes the cut for the bizarre Lars and the Real Girl. The actors clearly love him. He could make the Oscar race.

Ellen Page nominated as Best Actress for Juno - the girl is going to go far. Perhaps even an underdog winner? Strange that the cast failed to pick up an Ensemble nod though.

No love for The Savages, and its stars Laura Linney and, shockingly, Philip Seymour Hoffman, who has 3 award worthy performances this year.

Charlie Wilson's War looks finished already.

With cheese...please!

EW's latest list: Ultimate cheesy ballads - class!

Obama: "The bridge to the 21st century"

Yes, it's Wednesday but I'm just getting around to reading the Sunday papers now. Andrew Sullivan had an extraordinary piece in the Sunday Times, in which he laid out the most eloquent argument yet as to why the only person for the job of US president post-Bush is Barack Obama. I don't need any convincing (not that it matters since I won't be voting!), but if you're one of the doubters, read on...

"Last week was a horrible one for Hillary Clinton. Her husband had thrown a wrench into her campaign to become president of the United States by declaring that he’d been against the Iraq war from the beginning - a transparent fib that reminded many Democrats of the pathological lying of the 1990s." continue

Write sentiment

AFI movies of the year

The top ten movies of 2007 according to the American Film Institute (alphabetically):

- Before The Devil Knows You're Dead
- The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
- Into the Wild
- Juno
- Knocked Up
- Michael Clayton
- No Country For Old Men
- Ratatouille
- The Savages
- There Will Be Blood

Best TV 2007

EW.com has a great feature on the top TV moments of 2007 here. My personal faves were the shattering flash-forward twist ending to Lost, the Pam/Jim resolution in The Office and every moment of 30 rock.

Leon takes X Factor

Genuinely shocked. Yet kind of hard to deprive him too, right?

Path-ological disorder

Sideline from today's Irish Independent

Rage is all the rage these days. We’ve all heard of road rage and air rage, and this week, Martina Devlin wrote about gift-buying rage on these very pages. Well, I've recently started to believe that I may have path rage. One might even go so far as to call me a "psycho-path".

This blood-boiling condition of extreme frustration and anger is a year-round affliction, though it's known to be exacerbated at key points in the year - mainly summer and Christmas time, and other such periods that draw huge numbers of people and tourists onto our capital's already bursting-at-the-seams footpaths.

Those of us susceptible to path rage are fast walkers, and like to be able to get about our business quickly by manoeuvring our way through Dublin's streets and sidewalks without interruption or obstacle. How and ever, at present such ease of passage is nigh-on impossible unless one becomes an expert in the French athletic art of Parkour, as demonstrated in the movies Die Hard 4.0 and Casino Royale, where the practitioner agilely leaps over all public encumbrances with gravity-defying ease.

Oh just imagine being able to deftly avoid all the caravan-size buggies and prams, the joined-at-the-hip couples, the snail-pace, lolly-gagging tourists, the bewildered shoppers that occupy over twice their body space with bags, the gangs of school kids stopped mid-path to agonise over their latest teen angst drama, and the inconsiderate Nu-Yuppies who think a phone call is reason enough to halt mid-step, set up shop right in the middle of a narrow thoroughfare, and bray on their mobile with ne'er a thought for all of us suddenly piling up behind them. Nassau Street in Dublin, I'm thinking of you in particular as I write this.

But since that acrobatic solution isn't realistic for most of us, I think Dublin's city overlords should look to New York City and London, where the idea of slow and fast lanes for pathways and sidewalks is being seriously considered. I can't think of any other way for speed-walkers and strollers to live peacefully side-by-side. We don’t expect cyclists to have to share the same path space with walkers, so why should we speedy steppers have to suffer alongside slow coaches? I don’t like having this rage in me. I’m just looking for a simple, speedy way to take the path of least resistance.

Knight Fever

End of the road, Hillary?

Grim reading for Hillary. Here and here

Has The X Factor devalued the Xmas No 1?

From the Independent. Here.

Season of good film?

The London Independent critics' pick of classic Christmas movies. read here

Global domination

Yesterday's Golden Globe nominations were spread quite richly amongst many deserving nominees. The Globes may be the cinematic film prize equivalent of a McDonald's meal, but they're an important publicity tool at this stage of the race. See full list of nominations here.

Yay!

Carlow girl Saoirse Ronan (13) getting a nod for her astonishing performance in Atonement.

Philip Seymour Hoffman's double whammy in Lead and Supporting. He could also have picked up a nod for Before The Devil Knows You're Dead

Casey Affleck.

30 Rock gets several nods. Best comedy on TV

James McAvoy - the boy is gonna be huge

Ellen Page's and writer Diablo Cody's nods for Juno. Cannot wait to see this

Julian Schnabal's Directing nomination. He did incredible work on Diving Bell

Aaron Sorkin - from the biggest West Wing fan on earth.

Boo-urns!

No Once in Best Musical/Comedy, or even in the Song and Score categories? But don't worry,Shakira got nominated...

Where is Laura Linney's nod for The Savages? Many critics have her down as a potential Best Actress winner, never mind nominee

No love for Waitress, and its stars Keri Russell and Andy Griffith

No Supporting nods for veterans Hal Holbrook and Max Von Sydow for two heart-breaking performances in Into the Wild and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly respectively.

On the Fence:

Michael Clayton's success. Clooney is great in it, and Tilda Swinton is a great unnerving presence, but I felt the movie itself was a bit flat and dramatically inert. Just me?

American Gangster for Best Drama? Really?? Expect this, Eastern Promises and The Great Debaters to be filtered out from main categories by Oscar time

Anging with Lee

Interview with Ang Lee in today's Day and Night magazine

(Can be viewed at independent.ie here)

Any new work from Taiwanese director Ang Lee is now treated as a cinematic ‘event’. His proven track record, and intriguing versatility, builds a fervent degree of excitement and anticipation around his movies.

Indeed, Lee’s latest movie, the intensely erotic WWII espionage thriller Lust/Caution, was amongst the main talking points of the Venice Film Festival last September, though not for wholly positive reasons. Lee’s movie won the festival’s highest accolade, the Golden Lion (the second time he claimed that gong in the past three years), a decision that perplexed many Western critics, who were sharply divided over the movie.

In person, Ang Lee is famously soft-spoken. In fact, he’s too soft-spoken. On the day I meet him in London’s Soho Hotel, he communicates in such a polite, but barely audible way that I’m afraid my tape recorder won’t pick up his voice. He’s dressed in a neat shirt and cargo pants, kind of like a kindly university tutor (an apt description seeing as his father wanted him to be a teacher).

But though he may have a speaking voice that carries all the bombast of an angel skipping on a fluffy cloud wearing cotton wool shoes, Lee is not short of anything to say, particularly about his latest project. Set in Japanese-occupied Shanghai at the height of the Second World War, Lust/Caution focuses on a young college student, Wong Chia Chi (played by newcomer Tang Wei in a startlingly assured debut), who joins a patriotic drama group, and slowly becomes involved in a radical covert plot to assassinate a top Japanese collaborator, Mr Yee (Tony Leung). Wong is chosen to befriend Yee’s wife (Joan Chen) and lure him into an affair, setting in motion a complex game of deception, lust and murder.

Lust/Caution is Lee’s first movie since winning an Oscar (and 19 other prizes) for Best Director for his ‘gay shepherd’ love story, Brokeback Mountain in early 2006. Following the phenomenal success of that cultural landmark of a movie, every film script in the world must have landed on Lee’s desk. So what drew him to return to a non-English language project for the first time since his breathtaking martial arts epic, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2001)?

“I’ve wanted to do this movie for a while, but I was afraid to do it,” Lee explains in his charmingly hesitant English. “I think I’m on a run of impossible romances for these couple of movies! But it’s very natural for me to do this after Brokeback, because in my mind, they’re both connected. Brokeback is like heaven or paradise, an idea of love that’s whimsical and pure, while Lust/Caution is like hell. You don’t want to go down there, and if you do, you can only hope to come out alive.

“I think winning the Oscar helped me to get this made, especially because it’s almost impossible to get a permit to film in China. They allowed me to do it, without, of course, knowing what I’d do with the sex scenes, but I had a lot of support.”

Be that as it may, Lee still had to cut 9 minutes from the movie for its release in mainland China, but that’s censorship he can live with. “Everyone talked about how much the Chinese authorities cut from the movie, but didn’t talk about how miraculous it was that this got made there in the first place,” Lee says graciously.

The movie has attracted most of its pre-release attention for the aforementioned sex scenes, which resulted in Lust/Caution being stamped with a dreaded R rating in the United States. The love scenes are indeed very graphic, naturalistic and prolonged, a narrative move that at first seems at odds with the themes of sexual and emotional repression that permeate Lee movies such as the Jane Austen adaptation Sense and Sensibility (1995) and 1997’s The Ice Storm, his sharp and insightful dissection of suburban America that prefigured many of the themes of the later, and more successful, American Beauty (1999).

But, as Lee explains, there was a very deliberate styling to the three main sex scenes that made them crucial markers in the story’s bleak progression.
“Each scene had its purpose,” Lee says. “The first appears to be violent, because it’s all about the agony of lost innocence, and of how the male character, Yee, is losing his control and how the girl, Wong, is usurping it. That leads to the second scene, which for me is about scrutiny, digging for truth. He insists on looking at her. When Wong’s in bed, she’s doing the ultimate performance as her character and as an actress, because she has to withstand the scrutiny of the interrogator to gain his trust. As for the third scene, they’re in hell. They don’t know where they are at that point because they are lost to distrust and fear.”

The movie also gave the 53-year-old Lee the opportunity to delve into China and Taiwan’s, how can I put it, complicated history. “That period in Shanghai is not discussed,” Lee explains. “All sides, nationalist and communist, in Taiwan and China prohibit the teaching about that puppet wartime government which they both think is a national disgrace. So it’s good to fill that gap, to make some remark on it to pass onto history.

“The thing that fascinated me about that period in Shanghai was the collision of world cultures in the city. It was the Paris of Asia in terms of fashion, food, literature and language. Shanghai was developed by foreigners, and because the city was safe, four million people crowded into it. It was almost sickly over-prosperous. It was a very strange time.”

As for the modern resonances in the story – violent resistance against a foreign occupation: sound familiar? - Lee says: “I didn’t do it for that reason, but it’s hard not to make the connection that things have not changed that much. It’s quite sad.”

Lee’s next project will be in English, a relationship comedy-drama called A Little Game, the details of which are still secret. But having reached the top of his profession, and amassed critical and audience respect the world over, I ask Lee what have been the biggest disappointments in his career so far.

He pauses for a moment, before replying: “I don’t think there have been disappointments, not on my part anyway. When I make a movie I always do my best. In that regard, once it’s done, I’m proud of my effort, proud that I managed a crew and made a film.

“I’ve been surprised by things I did not see coming. I have no idea why people just did not go see Ride with the Devil [his 1999 western starring Tobey Maguire]. Also with Hulk [the panned 2003 comic book adaptation, a remake of which is currently in the works with a new director and cast]: why did people have a problem with it? If I knew I’d have probably corrected it. There’s just no telling how people will react. Why did Chinese audiences think twice about Crouching Tiger? That beats me, I don’t know why they’re so cynical towards that movie.”

What about the fact that Brokeback Mountain was beaten at the last minute to the Best Picture Oscar by melting-pot drama, Crash, in one of the biggest upsets in the awards’ history? Lee smiles. “I was pissed for one night,” he says. “We’d won everything before that, so it was a shocker. I congratulated the Crash team the next day.” He laughs: “That might be the closest I came to ‘disappointment!’”

Duvet Day, hurray!

The Last Word column from Day and Night magazine in today's Irish Independent

’Tis the season to be sickly, what with cold, flu, chilblains, everything-itis, and, of course, raging, Herculean, psychopathic hangovers due to Christmas party mania. The mornings are dark, cold and wet. All modes of public transport are packed to the gills, and are even more intolerable than usual due to mercurial heating systems that infuse the vehicles with either Arctic chills, or doze-inducing heat. I think you’ll agree that in the face of such woes, sometimes your only bet is to chuck an old-fashioned, restorative sickie.

Like many people, I'm always wracked with massive guilt when I ring in sick (er, which I never do) — even when I genuinely am sick (er, which I always am). I just never feel like bosses believe you. You could look something like Gollum from Lord of the Rings, retching your guts up, barely able to move — and still be made feel bad about the fact that your blood, sweat and tears will not be able to oil the wheels of the great, heartless capitalist machine for one measly day.

Of course, the first task in the great sickie game of subterfuge is calling in sick — should you do it yourself, or have someone do it on your behalf? I personally feel phoning yourself is the best option, even if it does necessitate that you dig deep down to bring out your inner Meryl Streep, conjuring a voice that suggests you've been up all night curled around the toilet. I find that adding a tonal shift towards the end of the call that implies it's breaking your heart not to be able to make it in today is a nice, almost subversive touch.

If you're smart, you should pick a mid-week day for your sickie scam. Sciving off on a Monday or Friday is just asking, practically begging, to be caught out, the duvet day equivalent of OJ Simpson writing that If I Did It theoretical murder book.

But once the awkward, Oscar-worthy phone call is sorted, the day is your own. That sneaky, hard-earned sleep-in on your duvet day is amongst the most relaxing naps you'll ever have. Naturally, you can't go outdoors because you're too ill to get up and/or you can't be seen, so the only option is to then take to the couch. And as we all know, your duvet is always more comfortable on the sofa than it is on your bed, kind of like how crisps are always nicer when you're taking them from someone else's bag.

At this point it's time to build your comfy sickie fort, replete with all the resources you'll need for an afternoon of lounging. Once you have Neurofen, DVDs, soup, tea and various selections of biscuits within arm's reach, there's very little need or, indeed, incentive to move, save for wholly inconvenient bathroom breaks (at least until those adult nappies become mainstream and/or socially acceptable).

Then, as the Americans are wont to say, it's time to let the healing begin. It's amazing what a visual diet of Oprah, Aussie soaps, Blathnaid/Sheena/Joe-ige and endless Friends' repeats can do for the system. By the time your housemate(s) or partner arrives home from work, soaked through and half-dead on their feet, you'll be just slowly scraping yourself off the sofa, and probably on the verge of screaming if you hear, "So no-one told you life was gonna be this way..." emanating from your telly one more time — surely the ultimate sign that you're ready to go back to work the next day.

So go on. Don't you deserve just one day? You know you want to. Just don't all do it at once, please. After all, someone's lowly worker-monkey blood has to keep the capitalist wheels greased while you're dossing.

Is Anyone Electable?

Pretty depressing overview of the 2008 US Election from Slate

Mad Christmas

No second acts in American lives?

San Fran critics

2007 San Francisco Film Critics Prizes:

Best Picture: The Assassination of Jesse James

Director: Ethan and Joel Coen, No Country For Old Men

Actor: George Clooney, Michael Clayton

Actress: Julie Christie, Away From Her

Foreign Language Film: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Documentary: No End in Sight

Original Screenplay: The Savages

Adapted Screenplay: Away From Her

Supporting Actress: Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone

Supporting Actor: Casey Affleck, The Assassination of Jesse James

Love stinks

Whatever next? Read here

Hillary sacks Celine

The US presidential race is already the longest-running in history, so it's not surprising that the leading contenders are feeling the strain. Last week we got news of the first major shake-up in Senator Hillary Clinton's campaign, and what was it the former First Lady decided to do? Bring on a new campaign manager? Send Bill to outer Mongolia so he wouldn't keep outshining her? Get rid of that bone-chilling laugh of hers?

No, no and if only. Instead, Hillary has dumped Celine Dion's track 'You and I' as her official campaign song. In the Canadian chanteuse's place is Big Head Todd and the Monsters with their soft-rock ditty Blue Sky, which was originally written as a tribute to America's space programme.

Now, just why any politician — particularly one as savvy as Hillary —would ever think that Celine Dion was going to be the tune to win over the masses on the hustings is anyone's guess. Her only defence is that this disastrous and regrettable song choice was made by popular vote —surely an ominous metaphor for any political campaign.

And although Hillary 08's replacement tune is safely inspirational, I think Hillary botched this chance to musically communicate her message to voters. She only had to look to the rest of Ms Dion's hits to find a wealth of suitable tracks to sum up her bid for the presidency. How about Celine's 'I Want You To Need Me' or 'Show Some Emotion'?

There were also the eerily apt 'I Hate You Then I Love You' and 'Everybody'sTalking My Baby Down'. Wasted chance Hill.

Of course, her husband Bill famously used Fleetwood Mac's 'Don't Stop(Thinking About Tomorrow)' as the backdrop music for his first campaign in 1992, and keeping with those legendarily tempestuous lovers/business partners (the Mac, not the Clintons), couldn't Hillary have opted for the band's classic 'What Makes You Think You're The One?' as her official song?

Alternatively, Hillary had the choice of the Mac's 'Over My Head', or'No Questions Asked'. Also how could she not be tempted to use the songs 'Little Lies', 'As Long as You Follow' or 'Second Hand News'?

And while Republicans would pick the Mac's 'Never Going Back Again' for Hillary, there's no doubt she thinks — well, hopes anyway — that'Landslide' will ultimately be the Mac tune she hears when votes arecounted/sabotaged on November 4 next.

Washington DC Critics

BEST PICTURE:
No Country for Old Men

BEST DIRECTOR:
Ethan and Joel Coen (No Country for Old Men)

BEST ACTOR:
George Clooney (Michael Clayton)

BEST ACTRESS: Julie Christie (Away from Her)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR:
Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESSWinner: Amy Ryan (Gone Baby Gone and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead)

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY:
Diablo Cody (Juno)

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY:

Aaron Sorkin (Charlie Wilson's War)

BEST ENSEMBLE: No Country for Old Men

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM:
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

BEST ANIMATED FILM:
Ratatouille

BEST DOCUMENTARY FILM: Sicko

BEST ART DIRECTION:
Sweeney Todd

BEST BREAKTHROUGH PERFORMANCE: Ellen Page (Juno)

Prize Day for Daniel

The New York Film Critics...

I saw Diving Bell and the Butterfly at the weekend on a BAFTA screener DVD. It's an incredible film. I cried my eyes out. Exquisite direction and cinematography (definite Oscar noms for both surely), with a riveting central performance from Mathieu Amalric, and a truly heartbreaking cameo from Max Von Sydow as his father. My vote for film of this award year so far.

Best Picture: (tie)
There Will Be Blood & The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Best Actor
Daniel Day Lewis for There Will Be Blood

Best Actress:
Julie Christie for Away from Her

Director
PT Anderson for There Will Be Blood

Supporting actress:
Cate Blanchett for I'm Not There

Supporting Actor:
Javier Bardem for No Country for Old Men

Breakthrough Performance:
Ellen Page for Juno

Debut Director:
Sarah Polley for Away from Her

Ensemble Cast:
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

Screenplay:
Wes Anderson, Jason Schwartzman, Roman Coppola for The Darjeeling Limited

Documentary:
Sicko

Foreign Language: (tie)
The Lives of Others & Persepolis

Animated:
Persepolis

Cinematography:
Robert Elswit for There Will Be Blood

Film Music:
Jonny Greenwood for There Will Be Blood

Top Ten Films:
1 Atonement
2 Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
3 The Darjeeling Limited
4 The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
5 I'm Not There
6 Juno
7 Michael Clayton
8 No Country for Old Men
9 Persepolis
10 Sweeney Todd/There Will Be Blood

Bloody victory

The Los Angeles Film Critics prizes...

BEST PICTURE: There Will Be Blood
Runner-Up: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

BEST DIRECTOR: Paul Thomas Anderson (There Will Be Blood)
Runner-Up: Julian Schnabel (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly)

BEST ACTOR:
Daniel Day-Lewis (There Will Be Blood)
Runner-Up: Frank Langella (Starting Out in the Evening)

BEST ACTRESS: Marion Cotillard (La Vie En Rose)
Runner-Up: Anamaria Marinca (4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR:
Vlad Ivanov (4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days)
Runner-Up: Hal Holbrook (Into the Wild)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Amy Ryan (Gone Baby Gone and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead)
Runner-Up: Cate Blanchett (I'm Not There)

Continue reading here.

Men are made gay by the child within

Er, okay. From The Sunday Times.

The Accused

Andrew Gumbel on Jodie Foster's (apparent) coming-out last week - and why the reaction to the news vindicates the actress' decision to keep it private for so long. Read here

Potty politics

Guest Column from today's Weekend magazine in the Irish Independent

Lately my parents have started to say there's no such thing as children anymore. By that, they mean that kids seem to be born "wise" these days, and are able to buy and sell you whilst you're still consulting the parenting manual to figure out how to fasten their nappy.

They base most of these assumptions on their dealings – an appropriately business-like term – with their seven grandchildren, my nephews and nieces, who range in age from 12 down to just two months. You've heard of Generations X and Y? Well, post-millenium kids should be called Generation ABC: they're toddlers, but ones who nevertheless deserve a socio-economic tag due to their all round savviness...

Continue reading here

Party favours

This Life column from Day and Night magazine in today's Irish Independent

Good news folks (well, for me anyway). After spending last weekend rummaging about — and eating my way through — the Christmas markets in Manchester, I can report that I'm now officially after getting into the Christmas spirit. Or should I say spirits?

Yes, all it took was a full Saturday afternoon faffing around in seasonably chilly weather, getting increasingly buzzed on gallons of mulled wine and specialist German beers, all while munching on plates of bratwurst, fresh giant macaroons and mini pancakes to fully awaken the festive beast in me.

And for the next three weeks, that beast will call the shots (sometimes literally). The party season is now in full swing, and who are we to fight it? After all, one of mankind’s oldest Christmas jingles practically insists on us donning now our gay apparel and spending the entire season in a jolly state. To do otherwise would be like affront to Santa (or something), and what monster would want to upset Santa?

Every year, it never ceases to amaze me just how many Christmas parties you can pack into one month. Then there are the endless house parties, liquid lunches, sneaky afternoon tipples, after work sessions, Kris Kindle parties – the whole period really is just a merry old assault on the senses (not to mention the liver).

Naturally, the flagship event is the official Christmas party, that great levelling institution that unites CEOs, managers and their lowly worker monkeys on the one even plane for a night of good-natured, festive fun. There are no barriers that night, no distinctions of superiority and inferiority. On that one night, they are all buddies, they are all equals, and all your actions are inconsequential, covered as they are by gentleman’s agreement that what happens at the party, stays at the party.

Of course, only an idiot believes those last few statements to be true, and that’s usually the same idiot who will end up insulting the boss and/or their loved ones, or walloping said employer after getting a bit too rambunctious as he/she animatedly sings along to Fairytale of New York, or who gets the bright idea to jump on the table for an impromptu performance – with corresponding dance routine – of You Can Leave Your Hat On.

For no matter how cool and “call me by my first name” trendy the higher powers are, you can never, ever forget that they are ultimately the hire powers. The Christmas beast I mentioned earlier will want you to disregard all your usual corporate caution in order to feed its insatiable appetite for seasonal mischief. You must learn to resist it and drown it out, perhaps by way of a simple censorious statement that you can say aloud to cancel out the wicked thoughts it’s putting in your mind.

So, for instance, you’re at the party and in the middle of a chat with the managing director when the beast stirs up and demands that you suddenly reach out and toss their hair and/or challenge them to a drunken pantsless dance-off. “Yes Bob, it is great news that the weekly estimated net user systems have been statistically…NO! DOWN BEAST! DOWN!... stronger that last year.” True, you may come across like you have some kind of Tourette’s, but just consider the alternative.

With some careful management though, the beast should ensure that you have a fun few weeks ahead. And, as I say every year, take full advantage. The party season may be exhausting and potentially ruinous, but it will be January soon enough - the dark, miserable hangover of months - where you’ll have more than enough time to recover mind and body, and where you’ll be only too glad to have a few merry (or, at the very least, fuzzy) memories to shore you up.

On the Run

Scary story about the two young Afghan actors who starin the forthcoming movie adaptation of The Kite Runner.

An award season for Old Men?

The Coen Brothers' No Country For Old Men has been named the Best Film of 2007 by the National Board of Review. Award season is in full swing, with the Golden Globe nominations out next Thursday.

Other winners include George Clooney and Julie Christie, who won Best Actor and Actress for Michael Clayton (which got mainly sniffy reviews over here) and Away From Her, respectively. Good to see Casey Affleck getting recognised for his astonishing performance in The Assassination of Jesse James. See all the winners, and the NBR's Top 10 movies of the year, here.

Couldn't you give us a few more careless whispers?

From today's Irish Independent

By Declan Cashin

Thursday

December 06 2007

Last August I was one of thousands who packed into the Point Theatre in Dublin to see George Michael perform as part of his 25th anniversary tour. That night, my friends and I -- who were all in nappies when George himself was strutting around in open Hawaiian shirts in the Club Tropicana video -- sang along to every lyric alongside die-hard thirty-- and forty-- somethings reliving their not-- so--distant youths. George was on brilliant form, uniting us all across the pop generation divide. Continue reading here.

The sister is watching that brother...

Who's afraid of Barack Obama?

Great piece about Obama in New York Times. Momentum is building baby.