Saturday, May 22, 2010

Following

Last night I was listening to another radio adaptation of a 1959 episode of The Twilight Zone called "Time Enough at Last", in which a bank clerk never has enough time to do his reading until a new type of H-bomb is detonated in his city, while he is taking his lunch break in the bank's vault, and soon finds himself with enough time to do all the reading he wants. It was probably one of the best known episodes of the TV series. I also listened to an episode of Classic Tales of Horror called "My Own True Ghost Story" by Rudyard Kipling about an Englishman who spends a terrifying night in a haunted bungalow in India.

Later on last night I watched the 1998 film Following, directed by Christopher Nolan. The film is a really low budget, black and white thriller set in London about an unemployed would-be writer (Jeremy Theobald) whose main interest in life is following random people around without their knowledge. Until one day he meets a charismatic burglar (Alex Haw) who plays psychological games with his victims, and finds himself drawn into a dark and dangerous world. The movie was shot in London over the weekends and is probably best known as the debut of Christopher Nolan, who has since gone on to be a major Hollywood director (with films such as Memento, Insomnia, Batman Begins, The Prestige, The Dark Knight and the up coming Inception). The movie has a very complex flashback structure and is kind of too tricksy for it's own good at times and a lot of the acting is enthusiastic to put it mildly, but it is still worth watching.

Today I went out to the city centre and got some wrapping paper for my dad's birthday present (it's his birthday on Tuesday) and I got the second season of True Blood on DVD and a book called Human Is? by Philip K. Dick, it's a selection of his short fiction and includes the stories that inspired the films Total Recall, Screamers, Paycheck and the up coming film The Adjustment Bureau.

Labels: , , , , , , ,