Amidst the confusion and calamity of COVID-19, America manages to throw itself even further into turmoil with thousands of people taking to the streets in protest of the brutal murder of George Floyd, a 46 year old black man who died in police custody in May. Poor Floyd can clearly be seen in a viral Youtube video being suffocated to death by a police officer who has his knee forced into Floyd's throat as he gasps and pleads 'I can't breathe' - but they do not show any mercy, and he dies because of a cruel and corrupt American authority system that feels entitled to use inhumane force and reckless violence against its citizens. 
As the world watched in horror, the American public completely broke over this latest demonstration of societal inequality and they rose up in anger. Some chose to peacefully demonstrate, others used more force and in some cases stores were looted and protesters were brutally attacked in scenes that felt more like they belonged in a post-apocalyptic movie rather than on the streets of a first world country. 
And although it would appear that this is all due to George Floyd death, in reality although clearly awful, Floyd's death was merely the straw the broke the very overburdened backs of the American people. George Floyd was a spark in a powder keg of disgruntled, beaten down and fed up citizens that had finally had enough of the oppression and sheer disregard of their welfare by the leaders and law enforcement of their country, the very people who are supposed to be serving and protecting them. Between the coronavirus, the record levels of unemployment and the years and years of African American deaths and criminal frame ups from the police, this mass protest was well overdue. 
So Trump has truly made his bed, his very ugly bed and now he must lie down in it. Do I feel sorry for him? Of course I don't, and even though I would never advocate anarchy in the streets I cannot help but feel like this latest outpouring of anger and demonstration from the people of America is more than warranted and seriously overdue. The dragging down, the corruption and the maldistribution of support and care in that country simply has to stop, and if that means taking it to the streets and getting loud about it, well so be it I say.
I just hope that they will take this fervent energy with them to the polling booths at the next election and start to show more care for who they elect to speak for them in the future because there is only way that any of this is going to change and that's by cutting the head off the beast itself. Donald Trump has proven himself to be nothing short of psychopathic since the whole COVID-19 pandemic began, and when he isn't advising his people to go out and drink bleach as a Coronavirus preventative, he is generally otherwise busy inciting fear, promoting corruption and generally acting like a bible swinging lunatic. If this doesn't get the Americans rallied together to vote him out, then nothing will now. 
This latest uprising around George Floyd, I believe is just the beginning. In 1967 Dr Martin Luther King, Jr. called for a 'revolution of values' because of the continuous cycle of social inequity and police brutality that the African Americans were enduring, and this form of civil rights movement is beginning to come into play again today. Fairness and justice are worth fighting for and now that the American people have gained some momentum and worldwide attention and support they will not be going quietly into the night with this, they are going to keep this momentum going and they are going to make changes.
A time of revolution is most definitely upon us, not just upon the Americans, but upon us all. What we are all witnessing right now is an extremely significant and important time in history, a time that you will talk about with your families for years to come, a time when all of the oppressors will be held accountable for their choices and democracy shall prevail. It's the start of something big and extremely overdue, so bring on the revolution I say, you have my full support. No-one in this world should have to fight for equitable treatment, it should just occur and I look forward to the abolition of all of these barbaric, archaic and unwanted behaviours, let's make the assholes accountable! Viva La Revolution! Power to the People! But most of all, watch this space because things are going to change and it will be wonderful to see the people win and the bad guys all finally get their comeuppances. 

The 92nd Academy Awards aired on Monday and of course I was glued to the television for the duration. I love all of the glitz and glamour and particularly enjoyed the brilliant opening routine which gave homage to some of the excellent movies of 2019 that didn't make the final nomination cut like Us, Midsommar, Queen and Slim and Dolemite is My Name. 
I cannot express my joy at seeing the floral 'Midsommar' dress on Janelle Monae as she declared "Tonight, we celebrate all the amazing talent in this room. We celebrate all of the women who directed phenomenal films and I'm so proud to stand here as a black queer artist, telling stories. Happy Black History Month." 
And what a wonderful night it was all around with Parasite smashing it out of the park with four Oscar wins, including Best Picture, Director, Original Screenplay and Best International Feature Film. Turns out that when the South Koreans arrive at the Academy Awards, they mop the floors with their opponents. And good for them, Parasite was easily one of the best movies of 2019, and I for one have been advocating for more foreign film appreciation for decades, so it's about time really.
Now we just need another female to win a Best Director Oscar because that hasn't happened since Kathryn Bigelow broke the mould and won one in 2010 for The Hurt Locker, and it's been a mighty dry category for females ever since as well; here's hoping 2020 will change all that again. 
However, enough of my own agenda, let's just get onto the very worthy Oscar winners for 2019, my congratulations and sincere appreciation to you all!
Best Picture:
“Parasite”
Lead Actor:
Joaquin Phoenix, “Joker”
Lead Actress:
Renee Zellweger, “Judy”
Supporting Actor:
Brad Pitt, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”
Supporting Actress:
Laura Dern, “Marriage Story”
Director:
Bong Joon Ho, “Parasite”
Animated Feature:
“Toy Story 4,”  Josh Cooley
Animated Short:
“Hair Love,” Matthew A. Cherry
Adapted Screenplay:
“Jojo Rabbit,” Taika Waititi
Original Screenplay:
“Parasite,” Bong Joon-ho, Jin Won Han
Cinematography:
“1917,” Roger Deakins
Best Documentary Feature:
“American Factory,” Julia Riechert, Steven Bognar
Best Documentary Short Subject:
“Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone,” Carol Dysinger
Best Live Action Short Film:
“The Neighbors’ Window,” Marshall Curry
Best International Feature Film:
“Parasite,” Bong Joon Ho
Film Editing:
“Ford v Ferrari,” Michael McCusker, Andrew Buckland
Sound Editing:
“Ford v Ferrari,” Don Sylvester
Sound Mixing:
“1917” Stuart Wilson
Production Design:
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Barbara Ling and Nancy Haigh
Original Score:
“Joker,” Hildur Guðnadóttir
Original Song:
“I’m Gonna Love Me Again,” “Rocketman”
Makeup and Hair:
“Bombshell” Kazuhiro Tsuji
Costume Design:
“Little Women,” Jacqueline Durran
Visual Effects:
“1917” Guillaume Rocheron, Dominic Tuchy, Greg Butler.

The Academy Awards (or Oscars) are officially Hollywood's biggest awards 'night of nights.' They serve to award movie makers, directors and actors who have reached a pinnacle of excellence in their careers. To even receive an Oscar nomination is huge deal in Hollywood, and unlike the Golden Globes that celebrate television and film excellence, the Academy Awards are solely focused on recognising achievements of excellence in film.
The categories at the Oscars span much further than acting and directing, and also offer recognition for all of the creative and technical work that goes on behind the scenes when movies are made. From costuming, sound, cinematography, visual effects and cinema shorts, the Academy Awards are the most prestigious and coveted of all of the Hollywood award events, and even though I never miss the Golden Globes, the Screen Actors Guild Awards or the Critics Choice Awards, the Oscars are easily my favourite awards ceremony to watch every year. 
If you should wish to see the Academy Awards ceremony yourself this year, it will be broadcasting live on Channel Seven from 12pm on Monday 10th February, with an encore airing at 7.30pm for those of you who, like myself, will be at work during the day of the ceremony. 
And this year, the Academy Award nominees are as follows:
Best Picture:
“Ford v Ferrari”
“The Irishman”
“Jojo Rabbit”
“Joker”
“Little Women”
“Marriage Story”
“1917”
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”
“Parasite”
Lead Actor:
Antonio Banderas, “Pain and Glory”
Leonardo DiCaprio, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”
Adam Driver, “Marriage Story”
Joaquin Phoenix, “Joker”
Jonathan Pryce, “The Two Popes”
Lead Actress:
Cynthia Erivo, “Harriet”
Scarlett Johansson, “Marriage Story”
Saoirse Ronan, “Little Women”
Charlize Theron, “Bombshell”
Renee Zellweger, “Judy”
Supporting Actor:
Tom Hanks, “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood”
Anthony Hopkins, “The Two Popes”
Al Pacino, “The Irishman”
Joe Pesci, “The Irishman”
Brad Pitt, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”
Supporting Actress:
Kathy Bates, “Richard Jewell”
Laura Dern, “Marriage Story”
Scarlett Johansson, “Jojo Rabbit”
Florence Pugh, “Little Women”
Margot Robbie, “Bombshell”
Director:
Martin Scorsese, “The Irishman”
Todd Phillips, “Joker”
Sam Mendes, “1917”
Quentin Tarantino, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”
Bong Joon Ho, “Parasite”
Animated Feature:
“How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World,” Dean DeBlois
“I Lost My Body,” Jeremy Clapin
“Klaus,” Sergio Pablos
“Missing Link,” Chris Butler
“Toy Story 4,”  Josh Cooley
Animated Short:
“Dcera,” Daria Kashcheeva
“Hair Love,” Matthew A. Cherry
“Kitbull,” Rosana Sullivan
“Memorable,” Bruno Collet
“Sister,” Siqi Song
Adapted Screenplay:
“The Irishman,” Steven Zaillian
“Jojo Rabbit,” Taika Waititi
“Joker,” Todd Phillips, Scott Silver
“Little Women,” Greta Gerwig
“The Two Popes,” Anthony McCarten
Original Screenplay:
“Knives Out,” Rian Johnson
“Marriage Story,” Noah Baumbach
“1917,” Sam Mendes and Krysty Wilson-Cairns
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Quentin Tarantino
“Parasite,” Bong Joon-ho, Jin Won Han
Cinematography:
“The Irishman,” Rodrigo Prieto
“Joker,” Lawrence Sher
“The Lighthouse,” Jarin Blaschke
“1917,” Roger Deakins
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Robert Richardson
Best Documentary Feature:
“American Factory,” Julia Rieichert, Steven Bognar
“The Cave,” Feras Fayyad
“The Edge of Democracy,” Petra Costa
“For Sama,” Waad Al-Kateab, Edward Watts
“Honeyland,” Tamara Kotevska, Ljubo Stefanov
Best Documentary Short Subject:
“In the Absence,” Yi Seung-Jun and Gary Byung-Seok Kam
“Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone,” Carol Dysinger
“Life Overtakes Me,” Kristine Samuelson and John Haptas
“St. Louis Superman,” Smriti Mundhra and Sami Khan
“Walk Run Cha-Cha,” Laura Nix
Best Live Action Short Film:
“Brotherhood,” Meryam Joobeur
“Nefta Football Club,” Yves Piat
“The Neighbors’ Window,” Marshall Curry
“Saria,” Bryan Buckley
“A Sister,” Delphine Girard
Best International Feature Film:
“Corpus Christi,” Jan Komasa
“Honeyland,” Tamara Kotevska, Ljubo Stefanov
“Les Miserables,” Ladj Ly
“Pain and Glory,” Pedro Almodovar
“Parasite,” Bong Joon Ho
Film Editing:
“Ford v Ferrari,” Michael McCusker, Andrew Buckland
“The Irishman,” Thelma Schoonmaker
“Jojo Rabbit,” Tom Eagles
“Joker,” Jeff Groth
“Parasite,” Jinmo Yang
Sound Editing:
“Ford v Ferrari,” Don Sylvester
“Joker,” Alan Robert Murray
“1917,” Oliver Tarney, Rachel Tate
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Wylie Stateman
“Star Wars: The Rise of SkyWalker,” Matthew Wood, David Acord
Sound Mixing:
“Ad Astra”
“Ford v Ferrari”
“Joker”
“1917”
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”
Production Design:
“The Irishman,” Bob Shaw and Regina Graves
“Jojo Rabbit,” Ra Vincent and Nora Sopkova
“1917,” Dennis Gassner and Lee Sandales
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Barbara Ling and Nancy Haigh
“Parasite,” Lee Ha-Jun and Cho Won Woo, Han Ga Ram, and Cho Hee
Original Score:
“Joker,” Hildur Guðnadóttir
“Little Women,” Alexandre Desplat
“Marriage Story,” Randy Newman
“1917,” Thomas Newman
“Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker,” John Williams
Original Song:
“I Can’t Let You Throw Yourself Away,” “Toy Story 4”
“I’m Gonna Love Me Again,” “Rocketman”
“I’m Standing With You,” “Breakthrough”
“Into the Unknown,” “Frozen 2”
“Stand Up,” “Harriet”
Makeup and Hair:
“Bombshell”
“Joker”
“Judy”
“Maleficent: Mistress of Evil”
“1917”
Costume Design:
”The Irishman,” Sandy Powell, Christopher Peterson
“Jojo Rabbit,” Mayes C. Rubeo
“Joker,” Mark Bridges
“Little Women,” Jacqueline Durran
“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Arianne Phillips
Visual Effects:
“Avengers Endgame”
“The Irishman”
“1917”
“The Lion King”
“Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker”

Here's a shout out to all of the directors that have given me a memorable viewing experience at some point in my lifetime. This list is designed to give credit to my favourite director's work and offer homage to their incredible efforts. I have also cited my favourite movie offering from each director as well, just in case you wanted to know where I thought that they had put down their best work thus far. 
What made me really happy when I was compiling this list was just how varied, vast and interesting the styles of direction are that I have been fortunate enough to experience, but what made me really sad was the lack of female directors that made this list. Clearly, the role of director is still a very male dominated field in Hollywood. I did happen to notice that all of the best movie nominations at the Golden Globes this year were all for male directors. And the saddest thing of all about this is, that it is not at all indicative of female directorial ability or talent in any way, shape or form, what it is indicative of is the lack of opportunities for upcoming female directors, and that is something that really needs to change.
Some of the best movies and television programs that I have seen over the last few years were both written and directed by women. Women have incredible and engaging stories to tell both in front of and behind the camera, and I for one would like to see more of them in the future. So, please make sure that you too are making an effort to see more movies that have been directed women in a show of support for all of the female directing pioneers that are out there telling their stories and sharing their visions in a very male dominated industry. 
So without any further ado, here are my favourite movie directors (in no particular order other than my recall ability) and my favourite movies that they have brought to life on screen. 
David Lynch - A true visionary in every sense, he's the man behind Twin Peaks, Blue Velvet, The Elephant Man and Eraserhead. Lynch is known for his surrealist cinema stylings and deeply original point of view.
BEST MOVIE: Mulholland Drive
Wes Anderson - The king of quirk with a distinct visual style and amusing narrative. He's delivered gems like The Royal Tenenbaums, Moonrise Kingdom and The Grand Budapest Hotel and has produced two incredible stop motion children's animations as well, one of which is on my Hall of Fame.
BEST MOVIE: Fantastic Mr Fox
Lars von Trier- A Danish director and scriptwriter that has had a long and controversial career. Basically he seems to enjoy destroying beautiful things in all of his films, which are gritty and damning. He's responsible for Nymphomaniac, Antichrist, Dancer in the Dark and Dogville, which all left a mark on me. 
BEST MOVIE: Melancholia
Jason Reitman - Reitman seems to 'get' women and understand difficult relationship dynamics, and his films certainly portray that knowledge. He brought us Juno, Up in the Air, Tully and Young Adult which were all exceptionally good. 
BEST MOVIE: Labor Day 
Taika Waititi - A clever New Zealand comedy filmmaker who always seems to get the right balance between poignancy and laughs in his films. He's the funny guy behind Moana (he wrote the first screenplay), What We Do in the Shadows, Eagle vs Shark, Boy and most recently Jojo Rabbit. 
BEST MOVIE: Hunt for the Wilderpeople
Peter Jackson - Jackson is responsible for all of the journeys that I took in darkened cinemas to Middle Earth, I bloody love ya Peter! Besides the all of the LOTR's and The Hobbits, he is also the man behind King Kong, The Lovely Bones and the incredible documentary They Shall Not Grow Old. 
BEST MOVIE: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
John Hughes - Hughes pretty much dictated everything that I became obsessed with in my teens. From bad boys to '80's fashion Hughes could do no wrong. I have rewatched Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Sixteen Candles and Weird Science countless times, they're absolute classics. 
BEST MOVIE: The Breakfast Club
Stanley Kubrick  - Probably one of the most influential filmmakers of all time, Kubrick has crossed so many genres that his body of work is dizzying! He gave us giants like 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket, Spartacus and A Clockwork Orange. 
BEST MOVIE: Eyes Wide Shut
Alejandro González Iñárritu - With a flair for telling the most compelling international stories about the human condition, this highly acclaimed Mexican director gave us some unforgettable cinematic experiences like Birdman, Amores Perros, 21 Grams and The Revenant. 
BEST MOVIE: Babel
Oliver Stone - A controversial director that has been accused of being a conspiracy theorist. He actually wrote the script for Scarface (which was directed by Brian De Palma) and also gave us Platoon, The Doors, Born on the Fourth of July and Wall Street. 
BEST MOVIE: Natural Born Killers
Michel Gondry - A French director that uses strong visual themes and compositions (often called Mise-en-scene)  to tell a story. Because of this, Gondry's movies are visually striking and are often considered to be art house or avante-garde. He gave us The Science of Sleep, Be Kind Rewind and most recently the brilliant  television series Kidding. 
BEST MOVIE: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Guillermo del Toro - A visionary fantasy director from Mexico who creatively brings monsters and mythical creatures to life in his films. Generally science fiction, horror or fantasy based, del Toro gave us some amazing otherworldly journeys through The Shape of Water, Hellboy and Crimson Peak.
BEST MOVIE: Pan's Labyrinth
Danny Boyle - This British director delivers equal measures of intense action and sincere emotion into everything that he does.  He's tried his hand at many genres and kept us gripped with Trainspotting, 28 Days Later, Sunshine, The Beach and more recently, Yesterday.
BEST MOVIE: Slumdog Millionaire
Sam Mendes - The buzz around this director has been huge this year, given the success of 1917. However, let's not forget all of his other epic offerings like American Beauty, Skyfall and Revolutionary Road.
BEST MOVIE: 1917 
James Wan  - An Australian-Malaysian director who rose to prominence after he co-created the Saw film franchise. Since then he has been scaring the pants off people with memorable horror films like The Conjuring, Insidious and Annabelle films.
BEST MOVIE: The Conjuring 2: The Enfield Case
Greta Gerwig - Actress and filmmaker, Gerwig collaborated with her partner (who is also a director) Noah Baumbach on several films before she kicked off her solo directing career in 2017 with Lady Bird. Since then, Gerwig has become a respected and predominant modern Hollywood director. 
BEST MOVIE: Little Women
Ridley Scott - I feel like I grew up watching Ridley Scott action and science fiction films. He's been entertaining me for decades and he's had some mind blowingly great movies like Alien, Blade Runner, Gladiator, Black Hawk Down and American Gangster. 
BEST MOVIE: The Martian
Michael Moore - A controversial American documentary filmmaker that gets up in everyone's face; love him or hate him, Michael Moore is hard to ignore. He's hit some very high notes with Fahrenheit 9/11, Sicko and Where to Invade Next. 
BEST MOVIE: Bowling for Columbine
Guy Ritchie - Before he married Madonna, Ritchie was making heaps of kick arse British gangster movies that were really funny and very entertaining.  He has just recently gone back to doing that again with The Gentlemen, but let's not forget that he also did Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, RocknRolla and believe it or not, the 2019 live action version of Aladdin. 
BEST MOVIE: Snatch
Jim Jarmusch - The patron saint of independent cinema since the '80's, Jarmusch's films are really arty, really cool, very edgy and hypnotically contemplative. He gave us Paterson, Deadman and Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai. 
BEST MOVIE: Only Lovers Left Alive
Steven Soderbergh - When Soderbergh made Unsane in 2018 and filmed it all on his iphone he made us feel like we were wasting our lives! He's a pioneer of independent cinema and his body of work is incredibly impressive; he gave us Contagion, Erin Brockovich and the Ocean's franchise. 
BEST MOVIE: Logan Lucky 
Christopher Nolan - He probably got a bit pigeon-holed for a while due to his Batman trilogy efforts (which I also loved) but let's not forget that he also gave us other memorable epics like Inception, Dunkirk and Memento. 
BEST MOVIE: Interstellar
Sam Raimi - Raimi terrified audiences in the 80's with The Evil Dead and then enchanted them in the early 2000's with Spiderman so it would be fair to say that his work is varied and vast. He also gave us some very noteworthy cult horror movies like Army of Darkness, Drag Me to Hell and Don't Breathe.
BEST MOVIE: The Evil Dead
Clint Eastwood - He blew everyone away when he started directing and acting in a string of extremely good and Oscar worthy movies, which he is still doing to this day. The man's got some serious talent and gave us gems like  Gran Torino, Million Dollar Baby and Mystic River.
BEST MOVIE: Unforgiven
Tim Burton - No-one does eccentric gothic horror and fantasy films better than Burton, he is the master! He has a style that is all his own, and with a lot of help from wife Helena Bonham Carter and actor Johnny Depp he's given us fantastical romps into magical fantasy worlds that have included Charlie and the Chocolate factory, Beetlejuice, Big Fish, Edward Scissorhands and Alice in Wonderland. 
BEST MOVIE: Sweeney Todd
Ang Lee - A visionary and a genuinely beautiful storyteller. It's rare for me not to get choked up when I watch an Ang Lee movie, they are just so deeply affecting. He gave us the gorgeous Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Life of Pi and The Ice Storm. 
BEST MOVIE: Brokeback Mountain
Sofia Coppola - Daughter of Francis Ford Coppola, Sofia has proven her worth as a director in her own right by delivering thoughtful explorations of female relationships and genuine, modern impressions of the human experience. She was responsible for The Virgin Suicides, Marie Antoinette and The Beguiled. 
BEST MOVIE: Lost in Translation
Judd Apatow -An American comedy director that started out producing and developing the television show Freaks and Geeks in the late 90's. He went on to direct Trainwreck, The 40-year-old Virgin and Knocked Up and also write some of the funniest movies that I have ever seen. 
​BEST MOVIE: Superbad
Alfred Hitchcock - The most influential and extensively studied filmmaker in the history of cinema, how could I possibly leave Hitchcock off my list? He's been giving audiences thrills and chills for years, and he still is with his extensive repertoire of thriller classics like North by Northwest, The Birds, Rear Window and Vertigo.
BEST MOVIE: Psycho
David Fincher - Ever since I saw The Game in 1997 I became interested in seeing more of Fincher's work. He's delivered a strong, controversial and impactful body of work and was responsible for Seven, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Social Network and Gone Girl.
BEST MOVIE: Fight Club
Paolo Sorrentino - An Italian director with an eye for truly beautiful and meaningful cinema. His films are absolute masterpieces and offer viewers moments of contemplation and glimpses of magic - I am obsessed with his work. He's responsible for Youth and This Must Be the Place. 
BEST MOVIE: The Great Beauty.
Joel and Ethan Coen - Genius brothers who bring something fresh, quirky and unique to the screen every time.  Their repertoire is so vast and so excellent that I really struggled to pick my favourite because they delivered The Big Lebowski, Blood Simple, O Brother Where Art Thou?, Fargo, Raising Arizona, Burn After Reading and True Grit, all of which were exceptionally great.
BEST MOVIE: No Country For Old Men
Alfonso Cuaron - A critically acclaimed Mexican director with an impeccable body of high quality work that crosses just about every genre of cinema including thriller, fantasy, science fiction and drama. Thanks Cuaron for giving us truly unforgettable moments like Y Tu Mama Tambien, Gravity and Children of Men.
BEST MOVIE: Roma
Francis Ford Coppola - Widely considered to be one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, Coppola practically had an all out nervous breakdown whilst filming Apocalypse Now in 1979. His commitment to 'getting the film right' has led people to see him a visionary of cinema. He gave us such giants as The Godfather trilogy, Bram Stoker's Dracula and The Outsiders. 
BEST MOVIE: Apocalypse Now
Quentin Tarantino - Known for his uber violent, non-linear storylines that contain extended dialogue, huge ensemble casts and loads of Pop Culture references, Tarantino has a style that is all his own. Many of his films pay homage to all of his own cinematic loves, especially Japanese martial arts, kung fu movies, spaghetti westerns and Italian horror. He's the man behind the following cinematic  juggernauts - Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Django Unchained, Kill Bill Vol 1 and 2, Death Proof and The Hateful Eight.
BEST MOVIE: Inglourious Basterds
Martin McDonagh - Considered to be the most acclaimed living Irish- British playwright, McDonagh caught my attentions when he made In Bruge, and then delivered again with Seven Psychopaths in 2012. But we all know him best for his amazing 2017 offering that made my Hall of Fame.
BEST MOVIE: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Kathryn Bigelow - Spreading herself across a wide range of genres, Bigelow is not afraid to grapple the big topics. She is forging the way for future female directors with her stellar repertoire which includes Zero Dark Thirty, Near Dark and Point Break.
BEST MOVIE: The Hurt Locker
Darren Aronofsky - A director with a flair for delivering surreal, melodramatic and often disturbing content in his movies. Audiences often seem divided on Aronofsky's material, but I think that he is one of the most talented filmmakers of his generation. He brought us Black Swan, Requiem for a Dream, Pi, The Fountain and Mother!
BEST MOVIE: The Wrestler
Steven Spielberg - Okay, I know that he can be cheesy as hell, but when he gets it right - he really gets it right. There's a reason that Spielberg is still filling cinemas, the man knows how to make a movie. Besides I was virtually raised on Spielberg's material. He gave us E.T., Saving Private Ryan, Jurassic Park, Ready Player One, Schindler's List, Raiders of the Lost Ark, War of the Worlds and Jaws. 
BEST MOVIE: A.I. 
Tarsem Singh - An Indian director that creates films that are a complete immersion and a true feast for the senses. Stunning and absolutely unforgettable, I love his vision and wish that he would make more movies. Singh gave us Immortals, The Cell and Mirror Mirror.
BEST MOVIE: The Fall
Paul Thomas Anderson - Contemplative and filled with flawed and desperate characters, Anderson's movies explore dysfunctional families, alienation and loneliness and they are deeply affecting. He delivered some of my favourite cinematic experiences like Magnolia, Boogie Nights and Punch Drunk Love.
BEST MOVIE: There Will Be Blood.
Martin Scorsese - An American director best known for his gangster and crime movies, he is widely considered to be one of the most influential directors of the New Hollywood era. He tends to cast the same actors in many of his movies, and he has a long professional relationship with Robert De Niro. Scorsese gave us Goodfellas, Taxi Driver, The Departed, Raging Bull and most recently The Irishman. 
BEST MOVIE: Casino
David Cronenberg - Sometimes called the 'Baron of Blood' due to his visceral body horror movies. Cronenberg has made films that people never forget that they have seen, because they are so grotesque! It's really no surprise that I love his work! He gave us The Fly, Videodrome and  Scanners.
BEST MOVIE: eXistenZ
Alexander Payne -  One of the best filmmakers of all time, Payne's movies are full of dark humour and satirical depictions of a dysfunctional modern America. He's the man behind Sideways, About Schmidt and Nebraska.
BEST MOVIE: The Descendants
Jennifer Kent - Kent made her directorial debut in 2014 with the haunting film The Babadook. She is an Australian director that is willing to handle sensitive and disturbing material. Her 2018 movie The Nightingale caused waves due to it's graphic content, but I thought that it was one of the best film of that year. 
BEST MOVIE: The Nightingale
Roman Polanski - I wish that someone that wasn't a pedophile had directed Rosemary's Baby because it's definitely one of my favourite movies of all time. But the love ends there Roman because you're just not a good guy. 
BEST MOVIE: Rosemary's Baby 
HONOURABLE MENTIONS: aka 'I still love ya'

• Terrence Malick - The Thin Red Line and The Tree of Life, total game changers.
• Brian de Palma - Carrie and Scarface, enough said. 
• Dario Argento - 1977 Suspiria, nothing has come close to matching it in crazy colour design and stylised macabre.
• Neill Blomkamp - District 9 was next level genius, can we get more of that please? 
• Baz Luhrmann - Absolutely loved the Red Curtain Trilogy, and let's not forget The Great Gatsby or Australia. 
• Duncan Jones - you had me at Moon.
• Kenneth Lonergan - Manchester by the Sea, one of the most affecting movies I've ever seen.
• Woody Allen - actually I really don't love ya - NOT at all, you're a weirdo and you're a creep! However, I cannot deny that Blue Jasmine, Annie Hall, Mighty Aphrodite and Vicky Cristina Barcelona were all worthy watches. 

The Golden Globes Awards happened on Monday at midday and I was lucky enough to watch them in real time from the comfort of my couch. However, it is extremely hard to really enjoy any type of celebration or merriment wholeheartedly at the moment without feeling extremely guilty. Especially when you are surrounded by a very ominous, dark, smokey haze that has drifted over from the devastating bushfires that are ravaging our country at the moment. To call the state of affairs in Australia grim at the moment would be a serious understatement, they are truly troubling and frightening real. 
Gone are the days of a laid back and relaxed Aussie Summer, the reality of our warmer season now is  an endurance of long dry days, hypervigilance and dire concern as year after year we watch in despair as our country turns to ash. And I am well aware that our climate makes us more susceptible to bushfire, but the frequency, ferocity and duration of this year's blazes has been unprecedented. Nowhere in Australia is safe from the threat of fire anymore and when you already live in a high fire risk area as I do, you can't help but be very, very concerned. 
Many of the actors that took to the stage on Monday extended their thoughts and solidarity towards Australia during our country's fire crisis, but goodwill and thoughts, although kind, aren't exactly going to extinguish the roaring blazes or save family homes. So, what can anyone really do to help? At this point in the crisis what we really need is more money, money to replace homes and support devastated communities to get back onto their feet and to help care for injured wildlife and fund koala hospitals. These donations can be made through The Red Cross, the CFA, Wildlife Victoria and also directly to The Victorian Bushfire Appeal, all of whom can easily be reached online if you feel compelled to offer financial support. 
In the long run however, it is up to us as a nation to not only be stronger in our fire awareness and prevention but to be far more mindful about where we place our votes for our country's leadership in the future. Without a leader in this country that is willing to make serious and realistic moves towards our climate change issues nothing is going to improve. Australia desperately needs a national climate and energy policy review, and most of all a leader that is willing to undertake that work. That is never going to happen if we don't make it happen, so please, I implore you to not waste your next vote but to thoughtfully consider what the future of our country will look like for our children and children's children and to have that at the forefront of your thinking when you vote next. Come on Australia - we can make big changes for the better by just casting our vote to where it is needed. 
​But enough about politics, let's lighten the mood and announce the Golden Globe recipients for 2020 - a most worthy and deserving bunch for sure:

Words are flowing out
Like endless rain into a paper cup
They slither while they pass
They slip away across the universe
Pools of sorrow, waves of joy
After drifting through my opened mind
Possessing and caressing me
Jai Guru Deva, Om
Nothing's gonna change my world...

Beautiful words from John Lennon and the lyrics from the incredible song Across the Universe by The Beatles.  
And why have I written them here? Well, sometimes I find that words are not always enough to express a feeling, but song lyrics - like poetry, seem to fill that void for me. In fact, I often seek the mellow embrace of a song when I really need to let it all out and there are many songs that evoke deep emotional responses within me, but for some unknown reason Across the Universe is one that I find myself turning to when my emotions get a bit jammed up or muddled. 
Apparently, The Beatles stated that the song was heavily influenced by their interest in Transcendental Meditation during the late 1960's. The mantra "Jai Guru Dev, Om" that features in the song is actually a Sanskrit phrase whose words can have many meanings. In translation it approximates as "glory to the shining remover of darkness" and it can also be paraphrased as "Victory of God divine", "hail to the divine guru," or the phrase commonly invoked by the late Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in referring to his spiritual teacher, "All glory to Guru Dev."
Whatever the interpretation, the lyrics are highly image-based with abstract concepts and in a 1970 interview with Rolling Stone magazine, John Lennon referred to the lyrics of Across the Universe as "one of the best lyrics that I've written. In fact, it could be the best. It's good poetry, or whatever you call it, without chewin' it." And he is right, it is an incredibly well written piece of music and I always feel emotional when I listen to it. 
I suppose everyone has their favourite songs that they turn to when they want to cry a little or release something or just feel a connection. Here is a list of my top 25 favourite "get your feels out" songs that help me to release my pent up emotions. These songs really get me right in the heart every damn time that I listen to them. 

1. Across the Universe - I love The Beatles version, but recently Aurora did a version on Triple J's Like a Version and it is pretty much perfect in every way. 
2. This Woman's Work - Kate Bush 
3. Thirty-Three - The Smashing Pumpkins 
4. Morning Theft or Hallelujah - Jeff Buckley
5. Breathe Me - Sia 
6. Speak My Mind or Decision- N.Y.C.K. 
7. Get on the Road - Tired Pony
8. The Drugs Don't Work - The Verve
9. Unravel - Bjork
10. Watch You Go - Tyne-James Organ
11. Horizon - Aldous Harding 
12. Listen to Soul, Listen to Blues - Safia
13. River - Leon Bridges 
14. No Stars - Rebekah Del Rio 
15. Delete - DMA's 
16. Runaway or Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks- The National 
17. Into Yellow - Martin Luke Brown
18. Pain and Misery - The Teskey Brothers 
19. ​Misplaced - Riley Pearce
20. Elegy - Leif Vollebekk
21. Primitive - Annie Lennox
22. All We Do - Oh Wonder 
23. I Get Overwhelmed - Dark Rooms
24. Medicine - Daughter
25. The Finish Line - Snow Patrol

I'm not 100% sure that crying out your feels to your favourite sad songs is the best way to deal with your emotions, but sometimes we all need to go to dark places to find ourselves again after stressful or traumatic times and listening to "get your feels out" songs seems like a pretty innocuous way to do that; just make sure you bring your tissue box along for the ride! 

JOJO RABBIT
Release Date: 2019 
Rating: MA 15+ 
Running Time: 108 mins
Written and directed by Taika Waititi (who also stars as an imaginary Adolf Hitler) Jojo Rabbit is set to divide viewers with it's strange mixture of comedy, war and drama. This unexpected 'feel good' movie swings between poignant and disturbing depictions of the atrocities of WW2 and full blown Nazi-mocking humour, never really committing to any one genre for the duration.
Living in Nazi occupied Germany during the latter stages of WW2, young Johannes "Jojo" Betzler, his best friend Yorki and his imaginary friend Adolf Hitler attend a Deutsches Jungvolk Hitler Youth training Camp together. The camp is designed to offer boys the basics in Nazi training, whilst strengthen their hate for all things Jewish. However, when Jojo comes into close contact with a Jewish girl, all of his training and pre-conceptions are put to the test. 
This is really funny stuff; Taika Waititi, Rebel Wilson, Stephen Merchant, Sam Rockwell and Scarlett Johansson all bring a lot of comic relief and support to Roman Griffin Davis who plays Jojo with loads of flair and and an engaging fresh faced innocence.  However, this movie is not just all about the laughs, because there are a lot of important and valuable things being said here as well which definitely makes it one of the most original films of the year for me. 
For fans of previous Waititi offerings, you are certainly in for a treat and although there is no denying that Jojo Rabbit isn't not going to appeal to everyone's taste, it certainly appealed to mine. 
FINAL SAY: Definitely not a good time to be a Nazi. 
4 Chilli Peppers ​

So, the 2020 Golden Globe Nominations have been announced, which will pretty much dictate what I will be watching over my summer break. Yep, I am going to be hitting the couch and the cinema pretty hard over the next few weeks so that I can watch the actual Golden Globe Awards Ceremony live on Arena on January 6th and have some understanding of the content that has been nominated.
As an avid movie addict, I do feel very compelled to see at least 75% of everything nominated before an event of this calibre occurs in order for me to be discerning about whether a movie/program is worthy of the win or not. 
This year there is some really great news for those of you out there that don't like to go the cinema very often because quite a number of the nominated films and television programs are actually available through various streaming networks (which I have indicated below for your viewing ease) which means that you can watch a good swag of them from the comfort of your own couch in preparation for the big event. 
I cannot deny that there does appear to be a couple of incredibly great movies and television series that have been snubbed from the lists here, but this happens every year and I will get around to sharing my personal top pics of the year list very soon, so let's just go with what's been nominated here, and I will talk more about my personal choices for the best of 2019 in the very near future.
So, without further ado, here are the 2020 Golden Globe Nominations - happy viewing!
Best Motion Picture — Drama
1917
The Irishman - Netflix
Joker
Marriage Story - Netflix
The Two Popes - Netflix
Best Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy
Dolemite Is My Name -  Netflix
Jojo Rabbit
Knives Out
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Rocketman
Best Foreign-Language Motion Picture
The Farewell
Les Misérables 
Pain and Glory 
Parasite
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Best Limited Series or TV Movie
Catch-22 - Stan
Chernobyl - HBO
Fosse/Verdon - HBO
The Loudest Voice - Showtime
Unbelievable - Netflix
Best Television Series — Drama
Big Little Lies - HBO
The Crown - Netflix
Killing Eve -  ABC iview or Stan
The Morning Show
Succession - HBO
Best Comedy Series
Fleabag - Amazon Prime
Barry - HBO
The Kominsky Method - Netflix
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel - Amazon Prime
The Politician - Netflix
Best Motion Picture — Animated
Frozen II
How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
Missing Link
Toy Story 4
The Lion King
Best Director — Motion Picture
Bong Joon-ho, Parasite
Sam Mendes, 1917
Todd Phillips, Joker
Martin Scorsese, The Irishman
Quentin Tarantino, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Best Performance by an Actor in a Limited Series or Movie
Christopher Abbott, Catch-22
Sacha Baron Cohen, The Spy
Russell Crowe, The Loudest Voice
Jared Harris, Chernobyl
Sam Rockwell, Fosse/Verdon
Best Performance by an Actress in a Limited Series or Movie
Kaitlyn Dever, Unbelievable
Joey King, The Act - Hulu 
Helen Mirren, Catherine the Great - Foxtel
Merritt Wever, Unbelievable
Michelle Williams, Fosse/Verdon
Best Performance by a Supporting Actor in a Series, Limited Series, or TV Movie
Alan Arkin, The Kominsky Method
Kieran Culkin, Succession
Andrew Scott, Fleabag
Stellan Skarsgård, Chernobyl
Henry Winkler, Barry
Best Performance by a Supporting Actress in a Series, Limited Series, or TV Movie
Patricia Arquette, The Act 
Helena Bonham Carter, The Crown
Toni Collette, Unbelievable
Meryl Streep, Big Little Lies
Emily Watson, Chernobyl
Best Score for a Motion Picture
Little Women
Joker
Marriage Story
1917
Motherless Brooklyn
Best Original Song
“Beautiful Ghosts,” Cats
“(I’m Gonna) Love Me Again,” Rocketman
“Into the Unknown,” Frozen II
“Spirit,” The Lion King
“Stand Up,” Harriet
Best Performance by an Actor in a Comedy Series
Michael Douglas, The Kominsky Method - Netflix
Bill Hader, Barry - HBO
Ben Platt, The Politician - Netflix
Paul Rudd, Living With Yourself - Netflix
Ramy Youssef, Ramy - Stan
Best Performance by an Actress in a Comedy Series
Christina Applegate, Dead to Me - Netflix
Kirsten Dunst, On Becoming a God in Central Florida -  SBS
Rachel Brosnahan, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel - Amazon Prime
Natasha Lyonne, Russian Doll - Netflix
Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Fleabag - Amazon Prime
Best Performance by an Actor in a Drama Series
Brian Cox, Succession - HBO
Kit Harington, Game of Thrones - Foxtel
Rami Malek, Mr. Robot - HBO
Tobias Menzies, The Crown
Billy Porter, Pose -Foxtel
Best Performance by an Actress in a Drama Series
Jennifer Aniston, The Morning Show - Apple TV+
Jodie Comer, Killing Eve
Olivia Colman, The Crown
Nicole Kidman, Big Little Lies
Reese Witherspoon, The Morning Show
Best Performance by a Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture 
Tom Hanks, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood
Anthony Hopkins, The Two Popes
Al Pacino, The Irishman
Joe Pesci, The Irishman
Brad Pitt, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Best Screenplay
Marriage Story
Parasite
The Two Popes
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
The Irishman
Best Performance by a Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture
Kathy Bates, Richard Jewell
Annette Bening, The Report
Laura Dern, Marriage Story
Jennifer Lopez, Hustlers
Margot Robbie, Bombshell
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy
Daniel Craig, Knives Out
Taron Egerton, Rocketman
Roman Griffin Davis, Jojo Rabbit
Eddie Murphy, Dolemite Is My Name
Leonardo DiCaprio, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture — Drama
Christian Bale, Ford v Ferrari
Antonio Banderas, Pain and Glory
Adam Driver, Marriage Story
Joaquin Phoenix, Joker
Jonathan Pryce, The Two Popes
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy
Ana de Armas, Knives Out
Cate Blanchett, Where’d You Go, Bernadette
Beanie Feldstein, Booksmart
Emma Thompson, Late Night
Awkwafina, The Farewell
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture — Drama
Cynthia Erivo, Harriet
Scarlett Johansson, Marriage Story
Saoirse Ronan, Little Women
Charlize Theron, Bombshell
Renée Zellweger, Judy

Whenever I tell people that I have a website that is dedicated to reviewing movies they always ask me the same question - What's Your Favourite Movie of All Time? As a lover of movies, this is one of the hardest questions that I ever get asked because it is almost impossible to choose just one movie when I have seen and enjoyed so many.
There is a reason that I have a Hall of Fame page that is dedicated to movies that I gave 5 Chilli Peppers to, and that's because I find it so hard to compare movies from different genres against each other. If someone asks me what my favourite movie is, I usually respond with 'that depends on which genre you're talking about.'
If I could have the option of choosing a favourite in each genre, then I could definitely tell you my favourites without any trouble at all:
DRAMA: Manchester by the Sea
HORROR: Rosemary's Baby
SCIENCE FICTION: Interstellar
​WAR: Inglourious Basterds
SUPER: Avengers: Endgame
COMEDY: Snatch
CRIME/ACTION: No Country for Old Men
ART HOUSE: Youth
FOREIGN: The Great Beauty (La Grande Bellezza) 
FANTASY: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
GRITTY: Melancholia
ROMANCE: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 
KID FRIENDLY: Kubo and the Two Strings 

So why are these my favourite films when I have so many more listed on my Hall of Fame that are also 5 Chilli Peppers worthy? Well that's easy, these are the movies that I go back to time and time again and always enjoy them just as much as I did the first time that I watched them. All of them had an effect on me in one way or another and all of them left me pondering after I had seen them. I guess that I really don't have one favourite movie of all time, I actually have 13, which also happens to be my lucky number! 

The winter holidays kicked off in style, as they always do at the commencement of the June/ July break because Zoe's birthday always occurs right at the beginning of this break every year. Today we celebrated her special day with a leisurely and much needed break together at Peppers Mineral Spa in Hepburn Springs. A full day of mineral spas, detoxing saunas,  a relaxation massage and a two course lunch injected just the right amount of respite and recuperation into all of weary and exhausted our lives, leaving us feeling fresh and pampered in every way. 
Seth spent a day at Ballarat's Winterfest as a volunteer for the Winteractive Arcade at The Mining Exchange where he worked the interactive tattoo booth and taught newbs how to use virtual reality, which he loved doing. So the winter break has really kicked off well for us, and the next few days will be for catching up on some rest, spending some time with my parents and getting together with a few friends. 
​As much I would love for this entire break to be all couch bashing and movie binging, unfortunately it just can't be because I really do need to get some jobs done around here, especially in the garden which is starting to look like the set of The Jungle Book. And this is the biggest dilemma that I face every holiday period, finding that perfect balance between self time, job time and time that I give to others.
In the past I would've had my entire two week hiatus booked out well in advance, but I try not to torture myself like that anymore. Then I went through a faze where I would just hide from everyone and not even return text messages so that I could slip unencumbered onto the couch everyday to binge watch entire seasons of TV, but I just ended up feeling like a big lazy lump at the end of the two weeks because I hadn't got anything important done.
These days I like to find a healthy and also not completely unproductive medium where I catch up with people that I  want to see (not people that I feel obligated to see), get a few things ticked off the household 'to do' list and also settle back onto the couch to binge watch TV and movies for a couple of uninterrupted hours a day. 
There is absolutely nothing selfish about making sure that you actually get some needed rest during your holidays, and sometimes that means that you have to politely say no to requests or put a 'to do' list job on the 'do later' list.
Besides I can admit that I practically limped over the finish line last week. I was exhausted, tired and still not 100% well after the dreaded lurgy smashed me apart two weeks ago. Choosing to take some time to completely repair seems like a necessity to me at this point and I really don't think that I have the energy to soldier on much more anyway if I am really being honest.  The time to go outlaw and reclaim some self time has truly arrived, and I am claiming my self time for myself...y'all hear me? I am claiming it! So step back and give me some room to reclaim my me time! Phewww... really got lost in the moment and went all Outlaw Josey Wales for a minute there didn't I? And that's how I know for sure that I need to claim back some me time and get some rest, I am literally going crazy! 

With the minds of many Australians firmly fixed on ANZAC day, it is inevitable that the concepts of heroism and noble efforts on the battlefields will be raised and passed around during this time of remembrance. Most adult Australians and New Zealanders would all understand the concept of The Anzac Spirit because it's pretty much a "national character" concept that was formed by a shared understanding that the tough-as-nails soldiers that fought on the battlefields of World War 1 were exemplary and uniting. Those qualities, although varied, are generally believed to be the traits of endurance, courage, ingenuity, good humour and larrikinism. With these qualities at their disposal, the ANZACs were able to demonstrate mateship and resilience under intensely difficult circumstances, making them nothing short of heroic.
​I cannot help but wonder whether the idea of a war hero is a bit lost on this generation of young people. I mean how well do they even understand the meaning of true heroism? And can they relate to an old ideal of what it means to be a real hero?
There is no doubt about it, a good hero or role model can appear to be hard to find these days. Gone are the days of soldiers proudly marching down the street after a hard won battle or an armour clad hero riding into town on the back of a noble steed triumphantly holding a defeated beasts severed head aloft, that is the stuff of history and fairytales, but that doesn't mean that the days of the hero are done for good. On the contrary, finding real life modern heroes is not nearly as hard as you may think it is, you just need to know what a real life hero actually is. 
If you ask any child to name one of their heroes, they will probably tell you the name of a Marvel or DC superhero that they love, and although they are citing a fictional character as their reference, they are not wrong about the qualities that they are recognising. Even children know that to be a real hero you need to possess certain characteristics. You need to be selfless, genuinely good and kind, courageous, willing to sacrifice for the greater good and willing to act out against oppression and injustice. Basically, you need to be able save the day and put things right, which is most definitely in line with our understanding of an ANZAC war hero, so our ideas about the qualities required to make a hero haven't really changed that much at all, however our ability to recognise them in real life certainly has. 
Long ago heroes had to be strong, stoic and more often than not male as well, but we are a lot more educated now and although we may not have parades in the streets and golden accolades for every heroic deed that is done, we do have a better understanding that people have the ability to be heroic every day if they attend to the basic virtues of being a hero. In fact, you don't really need to look that far to find the most amazing heroes that are flying under the radar all of the time.
You see, what it means to be a 'modern day hero' is to not only have all of those heroic traits that I mentioned earlier, but to possess them without any ego attached to them at all. Real modern heroes are doing brave and noble things not because it makes them look good or gains attention, they do them because they know that  that is what people in an evolved society do. They look out for each other, they save each other and they care about  what happens to their fellow humans, the animals and the planet. And they don't do it for the applause or the recognition, they do it because it is right and just.
Today we can find modern heroes in every walk of life. They are not just in army tanks, fire trucks, rescue helicopters and police squads; we know that they are also in hospitals, science labs, classrooms, supermarkets, standing at the bus stop, picking up their kids from school or even cleaning out your downpipes. You don't need a cape, a mask, a statue, a medal or a standing ovation to be a hero, you just need to have the right mindset and the right ethics.
Think about Frodo Baggins, a simple Hobbit from the Shire. He certainly wasn't the biggest, smartest, funniest or fastest creature in Middle Earth, but he was the hero that saved everyone from the rising and impending doom that was going to destroy everything. And how did he do it? Not with force or strength or by slaying everything that came into his path, no he did it with endurance, kindness and courage, the qualities of a true hero. 
The strength to step outside of a comfort zone, put others first and be relentless in the pursuit of justice is what makes someone a hero, which means that everyone has the potential to be a hero. EVERYONE. Anyone that has the minerals to save the day, no matter who they are or where they have come from, is a hero. And sure there will be war heroes, sports heroes and epic heroes to raise the banners for, but  let's not forget the everyday heroes that make the world a pretty amazing place to be. And let's doggedly talk more to our children about the virtues of  real life heroism and the selflessness that is required to fulfill that role, let's empower a generation of everyday heroes that are willing to be kind, courageous and just even when no-one is applauding their efforts or declaring them so!
​I think that the Foo Fighters said it best in their song My Hero -
There goes my hero
Watch him as he goes
There goes my hero
He's ordinary

Can you believe that I have been feeling so zenned out lately that I had totally forgotten what it felt like to get really angry? Sure I have gotten annoyed and antsy from time to time, but not full blown 'Mad Max Fury Road' for a while now. I'm talking really angry and uber frustrated because this week I did encounter those feelings for the first time in a really long time and it was so completely lousy in every way. I'd forgotten how genuinely shithouse those feelings are, and as a result of that I just didn't know how to process them. How the hell do people that are angry all of the time function? It's so exhausting being cross, I just wanted to go and have a lay down!
I was at work when it happened, which is the exact place that you do not want to be when you find yourself feeling ultra frustrated and pissed off, so I couldn't just go on an hour long hike into the bush or meditate the feelings out of me, I had to deal with them. If I was a big time shouter, trust me when I say that I would've been yelling, but I didn't yell....I just broke down. Snapped like a twig and wept, which isn't exactly the best way to process frustration but I suppose that it beats throwing a stapler at someones head or smashing their face into the side of the photocopier, so in the big scheme of things it wasn't a complete disaster.
I was however shocked at the uncontrollable outpouring  of emotion that I felt. I don't cry that often so I was quite horrified when my body just let go like it did, horrified but not disgusted or ashamed of myself for it, just shocked. I used to think that crying was a display of weakness because I was raised to believe that that was true, and in the past I would have been questioning whether I was going through perimenopause or something like it, but in the last couple of years of my life I have come to understand that crying is most certainly not a sign of weakness at all.
We live in a world that demands that we keep a lid on our feelings most of the time, but the truth is that it isn't really healthy to keep a lid on your feelings all of the time, that kind of thinking creates barriers and gives people cancer. There are going to be moments in your life when emotions are going to rise up from the shadows where you've worked hard to keep them contained and you will become, even if it is only for a few moments, unable to stuff them back down, and you know what? That's totally okay. 
Showing that you are affected deeply by something is not weak, pathetic or dishonorable, it's human. And as long as you aren't having regular breakdowns on a daily basis then it's totally acceptable to release a bit of tension and anxiety and let the tears flow on occasion. I remember hearing once that people only cry when the emotions inside of them get so big that their bodies cannot contain it any longer and so it has to find an exit, and that exit is through the windows of the soul. It's kind of beautiful when you think about it like that, it's cathartic and cleansing and purifying to the soul to cry once and awhile. 
And so I have had a big cry and let it all out and you know what, I actually do feel better for it. When you don't cry that often then people do tend to take notice when you do and I think that I probably couldn't have communicated my level of frustration and annoyance in a better way than I did now that I look back on it. However, one thing that all of this has taught me is that no matter how zenned out you may think you are, it is a very thin line between keeping your composure and being ridiculously annoyed and frustrated, and that no-one has it all together all of the time. 

The 91st Academy Awards are on tomorrow, which on top of the Golden Globes and the SAG awards I watch every year. This year I will be watching with a couple of good friends over coffee and nibbles, and I am so looking forward to it. I have managed to see almost all of the nominated materials over the course of the year and I am always keen to see if my personal opinions line up with the big guns at the Academy. 
If you haven't stumbled across the Academy Award nominations yet, here is a run down of the big ticket awards (the ones that I like to know the winner of the most). If you are more interested in the sound, design, costume and cinematography awards then check online for those nominations. 
I have underlined who I think the Academy will more than likely give it to and then my personal choice is in bold. 
Best Picture 
Black Panther
BlackkKlansman
Bohemian Rhapsody
The Favourite
Green Book
Roma
A Star is Born
Vice

Actor in a Leading Role
Christian Bale, Vice
Bradley Cooper, A Star is Born
Willem Dafoe, At Eternity’s Gate
Rami Malek, Bohemian Rhapsody
Viggo Mortensen, Green Book

Actress in a Leading Role  (Huge snubbing of Toni Collette in Hereditary here)
Yalitza Aparicio, Roma
Glenn Close, The Wife
Olivia Colman, The Favourite
Lady Gaga, A Star is Born
Melissa McCarthy, Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Actor in a Supporting Role (Huge snubbing of Timothee Chalamet in Beautiful Boy here) 
Mahershala Ali, Green Book
Adam Driver, BlackkKlansman
Sam Elliot, A Star is Born
Richard E Grant, Can You Ever Forgive Me
Sam Rockwell, Vice

Actress in a Supporting Role
Amy Adams, Vice
Marina De Tavira, Roma
Regina King, If Beale Street Could Talk
Emma Stone, The Favourite
Rachel Weisz, The Favourite

Animated Feature Film 
Incredibles 2
Isle of Dogs
Mirai
Ralph Breaks the Internet
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse

Directing
Spike Lee, BlackkKlansman
Pawel Pawlikowski, Cold War
Yorgos Lanthimos, The Favourite
Alfonso Cuaron, Roma
Adam McKay, Vice

Foreign Language Film
Capernaum (Lebanon)
Cold War (Poland)
Never Look Away (Germany)
Roma (Mexico)
Shoplifters (Japan)

​As usual, the horror and sci-fi industry gets another shafting, as does some excellent art house material yet again, but no surprises there really. And even though I do believe that Toni Collette was the actress of the year in Hereditary, and Timothee Chalamet was epic in Beautiful Boy  (and hey what about Paddington 2?) I won't be boycotting the proceedings. In spite of my moaning every year, of course I'm still going to watch the awards, I love the glitz and glam of it all!  And who knows? Roma could repeat the 1997 A Life is Beautiful effort  and sweep the Awards ceremony this year, it feels like it could be time to turn a spotlight on quality foreign cinema again. 
The 91st Academy Awards will air on the NINE network at midday in Australia tomorrow (Monday 25th February) and then again at 7.30pm on GEM if you want to see them yourself.

Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious or national group. When we think about racial genocide we generally think about all of the indigenous communities that were horrifically and systematically murdered, removed or bred out of existence because of greed and intolerance.
Native people with advanced civilisations like the Mayans, the Aztecs, the Incas, the native Mexican tribes, the Apache, the Navajo, the Cherokee, the Yuki, the Indigenous Australian and African tribes, the New Zealand Maori and Inuit tribes were all severely diminished or even completely wiped out when the Spanish, Portuguese, French, Dutch, British, Belgian and Russian explorers began to invade their lands.
These white invaders from across the seas came to rape, plunder and claim the land, at any cost. If they couldn't just overpower or kill the natives outright with brute force, which was often the case, then they crept in, in the most insidious of ways, spreading their diseases, destroying their crops and livelihood and abducting and enslaving their people, eventually destroying entire native cultures from the inside out.
And that, is genocide. And that is the stuff of history is it not? White man comes, white man takes and white man wonders why he is not trusted anymore. And we all like to tell ourselves that this is all just bad water under the bridge, that this type of thing does not happen anymore, that people have learnt from their mistakes and that genocide is not a modern construct but an ancient one. Well I hate to be the one to break it to you, but people haven't learned jack shit from their sordid and generally horrific past exploits because genocide has also feature heavily in the 20th century history as well, and in a lot of those cases, people have actually turned on each other, their very own people and it is just so disturbing. 
There were the atrocities of the Ottoman Empire/ Turkey when the Christian minorities of Armenia, Assyria and Greece were persecuted. There was the starvation of the Ukrainian people during the Soviet Famine of 1932. Then the mass deportation of Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians and the systematic slaying of Poles and ethnic cleansing of the Crimean Tatars by Stalin in 1937-38.  There was the mass killings of the Chinese people by the Japanese in the Nanking massacre followed by The Holocaust - when the German Nazis murdered approximately 3.8 million Jewish people and performed an ethnic cleansing of the Slavic countries. Then there was a genocide that was carried out on the Cambodians by the Khmer Rouge regime led by Pol Pot in between 1974 and 1979, and the list just goes on and on.....Tibet, the Congo, Somalia, Chechnya, Myanmar, ISIL... I haven't even touched the sides here, there are literally billions of lives and cultures throughout history that have been destroyed through means of genocide. And genocide is still going on today, it is happening right now and the end is nowhere in sight. 
So what have we learned through all of this killing? What is the take away from all of this bloodshed and civil unrest? For some, they have learned nothing and maybe never will, but for many of us around the globe we have learned that no-one is safe from persecution and that only through a united global mindset will we ever be free from another genocide.
The positive is that most countries have now signed to a peace treaty and will not tolerate the inhumane treatment of any ethnic, religious or racial party; and that is a very good start. We now also place more emphasis on learning from the past and understanding our torn history as humans and supporting the liberation of depleted and destroyed cultures.
It is not okay to not own our history, it is ours, we must own it and learn from it if we are to get better, and I do believe that we can, but it's going to take time and patience and empathy and ownership of what has transpired. And quite frankly, not everyone is prepared to own the atrocities of their own heritage which is going to slow us all down quite a bit, but that doesn't mean that we can give up, it means that we have to push even harder to drive home the message that no-one's culture, religion, ethnicity or race makes them inferior to anyone else and that no-one ever has the right to take that very human right away from anyone else. We have seen enough genocide in our past, wouldn't it be nice to see a lot more liberation and fraternity in our future? 

JOHN LEGUIZAMO'S LATIN HISTORY FOR MORONS
Release Date: 2018
Rating: MA 15+
Running Time: 90 mins
Colombian-American actor John Leguizamo brings his one man Broadway show to Netflix in this unmissable documentary about Latino history. Latin History for Morons earned a 2018 Tony Award nomination for Best Play on Broadway and is easily the most interesting chalk and talk history lesson that you will ever sit through.
When John's son falls victim to a white bully at a Manhattan private school for being Latino, John delves into his own history to try and identify the reasons for America's whitewashed historical recount and the hidden heros that have been sadly overlooked. 
The excruciatingly violent past of the indigenous people of America and South America is delivered here in an informative and effervescent way by Leguizamo who manages to illustrate all of the ugliness with a good speckle of humour and an engaging flair. However underneath it all, this is a harrowing tale about all of the native people that were slain and driven from their homes over the past 3000 years and the impact that is still being felt today as a consequence of that.
Everyone needs to see this, it is a powerful and thought provoking watch that offers a great overview into Hispanic culture for people (or morons like me) that don't know a lot about the topic. 
FINAL SAY: Violence is the lowest form of communication.
4 Chilli Peppers ​

The issue of gun control in the US is certainly a hotly contended one. America is completely unique from the rest of the world when it comes to their right to bear arms, because that right is constitutionally protected, and the American people steadfastly defend that right, even when it flies in the face of what is safe, logical and reasonable.
Although many Americans heatedly debate their constitutional right to bear arms, it turns out that they are actually bearing a shit tonne more arms than anywhere else in the world. In fact when it comes to owning firearms, no-one even comes close to the US when it comes to guns per capita, and the statistics are really quite alarming. 
Recently shared data from the Small Arms Survey listed the top ten countries with the most guns per head of the population. Below is the list from that survey with the number of firearms per 100 residents listed beside each country.
1. USA - 112.6
2. Serbia - 75.6
3. Yemen 54.8
4. Switzerland - 45.7
5. Cyprus - 36.4
6. Saudi Arabia - 35
7. Iraq - 34.2
8. Uruguay - 31.8
9. Sweden - 31.6
10. Norway - 31.3
The US is not only the leader on that list by a very long margin, but they also have more than one gun per person in their country! The only country that even comes close to the US is Serbia, but its firearm habit is part of a hangover from the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 90's and subsequent wars, and although I am condoning the fact that almost 76 people out of every 100 Serbians has a gun, at least there have been reasons to substantiate why there are so many guns in their country. 
Americans vehemently stand by their right to own firearms and defend themselves, however with the continuous onslaught of mass shootings claiming the lives of young and innocent victims, isn't it a moral and social obligation that the US reform their guns laws and enforce stricter purchasing and ownership laws?
In democratic countries where the incidence of gun ownership is much tighter, we also see a massive reduction in gun related deaths, it's hardly rocket science! Currently, Australia only has 1.4 homicides by firearm per one million people and America has 29.7, the highest in the world. Also, when you consider that Americans only make up 4.4% of the entire world population but own almost half of the guns around the world, well....it doesn't take a genius to see that there is a problem there does it?
Since 2012 there have been more than 1,600 people killed in the US in mass shooting incidents, and if you average out the number of shootings that occurred in 2015 alone (355) with the number of days in a year, it equates to there being more than one mass shooting per day in the US alone. That probably makes the it one of the most unsafe countries in the world doesn't it?
Come on America, wake and smell the coffee....countries with less guns and tighter gun laws have less gun related deaths, it's that simple. It is time to amend your constitution and drag your gun laws and restrictions kicking and screaming into the next millennium. Your steadfast commitment to bear arms is making your country unsafe, unappealing and unapproachable and unless you are going into a War of the Worlds alien attack type scenario any time soon, more than one gun per capita is just outrageously excessive and completely unnecessary. It's not too late to throw down your guns America and make a movement towards something more peaceful, united and humanitarian; there's never been a better time than right now.

Sometimes we want to watch simple movies that follow a pretty linear storyline and allow us to zone out or forget about our troubles. And then other times we want to watch something challenging, deep and meaningful; something a bit grittier that we can really sink our teeth into. Sometimes I really hunger for a movie that will challenge my thinking, push me out of my comfort zone or educate me in some way. If I come away from a film with a fresh perspective or some kind of new learning about a certain topic then I feel particularly pleased with my viewing choice. 
I have heard people refer to these influential and affecting movies as 'movies that matter' but it is pretty irrelevant what title you want to give them, it is what you take away from these movies that make them genuinely important and relevant. These movies can occur in any genre, and they are the types of movies that stick with you long after the credits have stopped rolling. They are not always 5 Chilli Peppers (Hall of Fame) material because they are not always easy to watch or easy to recommend to other people to watch because in short, they are not just another movie, they are 'an experience.' And there are some exceptionally good ones out there that I believe that everyone should see at least once in their lifetime. 
Here is a list of 20 movie experiences (in no particular order) that had a profound effect on me when I saw them for the first time, and although they may not all be 5 Chilli Peppers, they are most definitely important, relevant, thought provoking and absolutely worth seeing.

1. Mother! - Challenging/ Art House/ Gritty (4.5 Chilli Peppers)
2. The White Helmets - Documentary (4 Chilli Peppers)
3. Born into Brothels - Documentary (4 Chilli Peppers) 
4. Samson and Delilah - Challenging/Drama (4 Chilli Peppers)
5. Requiem for a Dream - Gritty/ Drama (4 Chilli Peppers)
6. The Thin Red Line - War (4.5 Chilli Peppers)
7. Into the Abyss - Documentary (4 Chilli Peppers)
8. Bowling for Columbine - Documentary (4.5 Chilli Peppers) 
9. An Inconvenient Truth Pt 1 and Pt 2 - Documentary (3.5 Chilli Peppers)
10. Apocalypse Now - War (4.5 Chilli Peppers)
11. Dead Man Walking - Gritty/Crime/ Drama (4.5 Chilli Peppers)
12. The Elephant Man - Challenging/ Drama (4.5 Chilli Peppers) 
13. Melancholia - Art House (5 Chilli Peppers)
14. The Great Beauty - Foreign/ Drama (5 Chilli Peppers) 
15. A Ghost Story - Art House ( 4.5 Chilli Peppers) 
16. 20,000 Days on Earth - Art House/ Documentary (3.5 Chilli Peppers) 
17. Downfall - Foreign/ War (4 Chilli Peppers)
18. Baraka and Samsara - Documentaries (4.5 Chilli Peppers)
19. The Last Temptation of Christ - Art House (3.5 Chilli Peppers) 
20. Schindler's List - War (4.5 Chilli Peppers) 

By no means are these easy viewing choices, remember that I did say that I like to be challenged by some of my movie choices, and these are all definitely challenging on some level. However, if you haven't already made the time to see these films then I would highly recommend that you do.
Full reviews of all of the above mentioned movies can be found on their respective genre lists on Spicywatch.com (under the genre drop down tab) should you require any further information.  
And I wish you well with your 'challenging' aka 'movies that matter' viewing adventures.  

Had a much needed day out with Zoe and Seth in the city yesterday. We meandered the streets of Melbourne for hours, stopping in at some of our favourite haunts and taking in all of the sights, sounds and smells of the big city environment. Melbourne is somewhere that I love to visit regularly because it doesn't matter how many times you go, there is always something new to discover and the shopping is always fantastic.
We hit up Lush for bath bombs, Haigh's for chocolate and Daiso for some random Asian goodies because those places are an absolute must for us when we go to Melbourne, and then we headed over to Chinatown for a huge teppanyaki feast for lunch which did involve Seth getting most of an omelette tossed into his face from our very cheeky chef. It was quite amusing for us, but not so amusing for Seth who was showered in hot egg pieces that were being flung straight off the steaming teppanyaki grill at his head, but it was all just part of the fun and no real harm was done.
We ended our fabulous day out exploring the Alice in Wonderland exhibition that is currently showing at ACMI, which was a feast for the senses and a real treat for me since I am such a massive Alice in Wonderland fan. The highlight of the exhibition was definitely the Mad Hatter's Tea Party where you entered a room and sat down for a 'virtual' seat at the Hatter's table. Cakes magically appeared on plates and virtual tea poured into cups as we sat amid the butterflies in the mushroom forest. It was pretty exciting and the kids that were sitting near to us were so delighted and enthralled by the scene that it was impossible to not get swept up in the magic of it all, I mean when do you ever get to attend a real Mad Hatter's Tea Party? 
In spite of the cold, wet and blustery weather trying to keep us at bay, we all had a great day out and managed to dodge the Melbourne showers as we went about our business. Today however, has been a completely different story with the rain completely overtaking our Sunday and forcing us all indoors and close to the heater. It has probably been the wettest day of the holidays so far, but I am not complaining because a day of curling up on the couch with Netflix is never a bad day in my mind.
I have managed to binge watch a couple of TV series and watch quite a lot of movies over the break so far. I am slowly making my way through my 'to see' list, which mainly consists of long and gritty movies that I haven't got the time or the mental stamina to deal with during the term. Here's one of my favourite viewings so far these holidays, but as I said, it's long and gritty, so do see it, but only when you're in the right frame of mind to do so, it's tough going.

BEASTS OF NO NATION
Release Date: 2015
Rating: MA 15+
Running Time: 137 mins
A gritty war drama written, co-produced and directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga who also acted as his own cinematographer during filming. Based on the novel of the same name by Uzodinma Iweala, Beasts of No Nation comes on strong with it's striking and horrific depiction of a young boy who becomes a ruthless child soldier. 
Young Agu's Ghanaian village is torn apart when rebel and government forces begin fighting in the streets. His mother and sister flee for safety, his father and brother are murdered and Agu escapes capture by hiding in the jungle. He is found by a ruthless militia group that operate under a vicious commander (Idris Elba) and after undergoing a brutal initiation process he becomes a fully-fledged member and begins his transformation from boy to soldier. 
This is a sobering and uncompromising look at the human cost of war and the exploitation of the innocent and desperate. Idris Elba deservingly won a SAG award for his unforgettable and disturbingly good portrayal of the opportunistic sadist commander, and I am genuinely confused about why he didn't get an Oscar nomination that year as well. All of the child performances are amazingly good, especially Abraham Nii Attah who portrays Agu's transformation perfectly and was awarded the Marcello Mastroianni Award for Best Young Actor at the 72nd Venice International Film Festival. 
Beasts of No Nation is by no means an easy watch, but it is most definitely a worthy one. 
FINAL SAY: I saw terrible things....and I did terrible things. 
4 Chilli Peppers ​

Toothache really is in a realm all by itself. This week I had a pretty tough week, so tough that I let my entire routine go out of the window because I had to. I was in excruciating pain for days and even though the worst of it is over, I am still basically like a cantankerous bear with a splinter in it's paw. I didn't eat, didn't sleep longer than a two hour stretch, didn't do yoga or meditation, didn't practise any of my usual lessons or even (God forbid) complete a blog. What I did do, between my work hours was moan, groan and lay about on the couch drugged out of my mind watching bullshit TV and hating my life.
How did I get this way? Well let me tell you a little story about heartache and the loss of God....just kidding...it wasn't actually that bad. Let me tell you about the time that a dentist butchered me though....
On Saturday of last week I went to the dentist for my routine six month clean and scale. I didn't have any concerns about my teeth and I was in really good health. I was however seeing a dentist that I wouldn't usually see, which would turn out to be one of my worst errors in judgement ever. My usual dentist has a life of luxury and only works 4 days a week from 9am to 3pm, which renders him pretty much useless to the working class society, so I thought I would do the right thing and not take time off for a routine clean and scale that I would just go to another dentist at the same practise, after all it was for a 20 min check-up not a root canal.
Anyway, this new dentist, let's call him Dr Slaughter, had me in the chair for an hour. He x-rayed, poked about and gave me a very thorough deep clean, which at the time I thought, okay great, obviously I needed all that. And even though I didn't enjoy it, I figured that I must have needed the extra invasive cleaning and told myself that I was getting value for money. 
The first day after the cleaning I was fine, and the second I was mildly uncomfortable, but I have had periodontal work so a little oral discomfort is not foreign to me. By Tuesday, shit was getting real and I had started to take Panadol and Nurofen on two hourly rotations. Let me point out that I NEVER take cope dope, not ever, it has to be serious for me to even go there.
Anyway Tuesday night, no dinner and a little sleep - too much pain. Wednesday I had to travel to Melbourne for a work PD, almost 3 hours each way, that was a long day with a lot of pain, drugged myself with over-the-counter remedies to an illegal level and soldiered on. Picked at a couple of things, didn't sleep again and woke up to thumping, pounding, shooting pains and nausea on Thursday. After being so tired and so empty and so exhausted for so many days I finally crumbled. Tears and tears, I gave in and made an appointment to see the dentist, my usual dentist. 
After some inspection and another lot of x-rays, he confirmed that my teeth were excellent, but some of my gums were so inflamed that they were higher that my teeth in my mouth. Well, that explained the pain alright. Toothache, or in this case, deep gum pain is a special hell all of its own. I have not felt so worn down, unwell, exhausted or overwhelmed by pain since I was in labour over thirteen years ago. It was BAD, so bad. I even had another good cry at the dentist's office and he felt so sorry for me that he called me at home (after hours) the next day to check on me. 
So my teeth were fine, it was a gum problem. I had to be referred to a periodontal expert to have a look as well, but even he was confused because the x-rays looked good. After examining my swollen and agonisingly tender mouth he concurred with what my dentist had said and also believed that some type of bacteria had entered my mouth during or just after the cleaning process when my gums were open, and that Dr Slaughter had caused trauma to my gum area by being too invasive. Basically I had a secondary infection of a fierce kind, one that required strong antibiotics and even stronger pain killers, which my dentist happily prescribed to me. 
Being keen to get some pain relief I went in hard on the drugs, which did give me a most welcomed nights sleep, but did also cause me to violently chunder into the garden on Friday morning after I took too many of them and then tried to drink a coffee. Live and learn. I am a bit of a prescription drug lightweight, and when you never have them, they work really well. So this weekend I have basically been lying about half out of my skull on pain relief and doing as little as possible. The antibiotics are working beautifully and everyday I get a significant reduction in pain and discomfort, so hallelujah to that! 
The lesson in all of this is? Don't ever go to a strange dentist, just organise the time off and see your usual one. Well, that's my take away from all of that anyway. Make an appointment at the slightest hint of 'after' pain before you start to contemplate self-surgery like I was and most importantly don't let one butcher put you off of going to the dentist forever, which is going to be my biggest hurdle now. Honestly, the thought of a dental check up right just sends shivers of dread straight down my spine! 
Thank God for Marvel, who was delivering another delightful instalment of super this weekend, honestly the distraction couldn't have arrived at a better time, and what a mighty fine distraction is was!

The final days of summer are upon us, and though we should be enjoying the last days of light joyously, for many the reality of this time of the year is something altogether quite different. People are starting to show early signs of fatigue as the Christmas holiday period fades into the backgrounds of our lives once again. The daily 'grind' becomes the norm, temperatures are ridiculously inconsistent with very little sign of rain and the misty mornings of early autumn have already arrived. What is still alive in my vegetable garden is hanging limply, our water tank is bone dry and the gale force winds blow everything off our deck every other day. One can easily lose sight of the bigger picture at this point of the year; but not me!
March is always one of my most favourite months of the year. There is always something to celebrate on every, single, weekend in March. With the thought of autumn looming, people get super outdoorsy all over again in pursuit of their final days in the sun, which means that my events calendar is always chock-a-block. Add to that a long weekend, an upcoming Easter and for me, two weeks of school holidays and woohoo! You have got the making of one of the best months of the whole year. 
I really enjoy autumn as a season, especially out here in Enfield. Autumn out here means blackberry and apple picking and also mushroom foraging. Bush walking is at its best out here in the autumn, because there is far less risk of snakes and heat stroke. We always have plenty of water on the dam for the our resident ducks in the autumn time and the garden gets some much needed moisture from the heavens. The threat of bushfire is gone, and although the days get slightly shorter, you appreciate them all the more because you know that the days are also growing darker and that soon the sun will no longer hang around in the sky for many hours a day. 
March in Ballarat is particularly good I think. The Begonia Festival, The Golden Plains Arts Trail and White Night are all on and free to access; but there are also heaps of other things that I love about March as well, like the Academy Awards Ceremony (duh!), International Women's Day, World Harmony Day, Solitude Day and this year Good Friday and Easter Saturday as well. Loads to look forward to, and I get to have my birthday in there as well. Yep, for me March is one of the best months of the year, so it is without any sadness at all that I say farewell to another summer in my life and welcome a new season with much enthusiasm and excitement, because there are so many more wonderful days ahead to be enjoyed! 

MUDBOUND 
Release Date: 2017
Rating: MA 15+
Running Time: 134 mins
An American period drama directed by Dee Rees and based on the novel of the same name by Hillary Jordan.  After premiering at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival, Mudbound was released on Netflix and deservingly earned four nominations at the 90th Academy Awards due its excellent depiction of rural American history.
Two men return to their poverty stricken farming homes in Mississippi after serving their country overseas during WW2. They struggle greatly to re-adjust to a rural lifestyle after the war, especially in a small town filled with racism and discrimination. 
Mudbound is an exceptionally powerful post-war movie. The storyline is completely believable, the cast is exceptionally strong and the struggles of the characters are deeply affecting. I was riveted for the entirety of this movie and was really impressed by the onscreen efforts of Carey Mulligan, Jason Mitchell, Mary J. Blige, Jonathan Banks and Garrett Hedlund. This film deserves to get a lot more attention, it is worth making the time to see it. 
FINAL SAY: I love them all equally. Every mother does. 
​4 Chilli Peppers ​

It's that time again, the time for me to unleash my viewing loves and loathes for the year of 2017. In total, I watched 279 movies and 62 TV series in 2017, so yeah, it is fair to say that I have a robust addiction to entertainment and that I have a fairly good idea of what is out there.
My biggest undertaking for the year was a rewatch of the entire Lost Series, 121 episodes in total, and although it took me the better part of the entire year to get through, it was worth the effort. Next to the Twin Peaks Reboot, Lost was the next biggest mind fuck of the year for me.
I must say that the bar raises every single year for me because movies and TV are constantly improving in quality and there is a never ending stream of excellent viewing to be had. That makes it a lot harder for me to discern the best,  but also a lot more enjoyable in the long run.
However, without further ado, here are my picks for the best and worst of 2017, my full reviews of these movies can be found on their corresponding genre lists. 
BEST MOVIES OF 2017:

• IT  - Horror  4.5 Chilli Peppers
• A Ghost Story - Art House 4.5 Chilli Peppers
• Mother! - Challenging 4.5 Chilli Peppers
• Blade Runner 2049 - Science Fiction 4.5 Chilli Peppers
• Baby Driver - Action 4 Chilli Peppers
• Dunkirk - War 4 Chilli Peppers
• Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 - Fantasy 4 Chilli Peppers
• Logan - Super 4 Chilli Peppers
• Get Out - Horror 3.5 Chilli Peppers
• A Dark Song - Horror 3.5 Chilli Peppers
• T2 - Trainspotting - Drama 3.5 Chilli Peppers
• Logan Lucky - Action/Comedy 3.5 Chilli Peppers

BEST CATCH UP MOVIES OF 2017: (Movies released before 2017 that I finally saw in 2017)

• La Grande Bellezza (The Great Beauty) - Foreign 5 Chilli Peppers (Hall of Fame)
• Manchester by the Sea - Drama 5 Chilli Peppers (Hall of Fame)
• Moonlight - Drama 4.5 Chilli Peppers
• Arrival - Science Fiction 4.5  Chilli Peppers
• Nocturnal Animals  -Drama 4.5  Chilli Peppers
• Hidden Figures - Drama 4  Chilli Peppers
• Moana - Kid Friendly 4  Chilli Peppers
• The Edge of Seventeen -Comedy 4 Chilli Peppers
• The Conjuring 2 - Horror 4 Chilli Peppers
• Captain Fantastic - Drama 4 Chilli Peppers
• Samson and Delilah - Gritty 4 Chilli Peppers
• The House of the Devil - Horror 3.5 Chilli Peppers
• The Mermaid - Foreign/ Fantasy 3.5 Chilli Peppers

WORST MOVIES OF 2017:

• Kong: Skull Island - Fantasy 2 Chilli Peppers
• The Great Wall - Action/ Fantasy 1.5 Chilli Peppers
• The Ghost in the Shell - Science Fiction 1.5 Chilli Peppers
• A Cure for Wellness - Horror 1.5 Chilli Peppers
• Loving - Drama 1.5 Chilli Peppers
• Valerian and the City of a 1,000 Planets - Science Fiction 1.5 Chilli Peppers
• Baywatch - Comedy 1.5 Chilli Peppers
• Yoga Hosers  -Comedy 1 Chilli Pepper
• The Bye Bye Man  - Horror 0 Chilli Peppers
• The Greasy Strangler - Art House 0 Chilli Peppers

BEST TV SERIES 2017:

• Big Little Lies - Drama 5 Chilli Peppers
• The Handmaid's Tale - Drama/ Fantasy 5 Chilli Peppers
• American Gods - Horror/ Fantasy 5 Chilli Peppers
• Atlanta - Drama 4.5 Chilli Peppers 
• Godless - Western 4.5 Chilli Peppers
• Game of Thrones S7  - Fantasy 4.5 Chilli Peppers
• Stranger Things S2 - Science Fiction 4.5 Chilli Peppers
• Twin Peaks Reboot - Art House 4 Chilli Peppers 
• Mozart in the Jungle - Drama 4 Chili Peppers 
• Alias Grace - Historical Drama 4 Chilli Peppers 
• AHS - Cult - Horror 4 Chilli Peppers
• Peaky Blinders S4 - Historical Drama 4 Chilli Peppers
• Better Things - Comedy 4 Chilli Peppers
• A-Typical - Drama 3.5 Chilli Peppers
• Girls - Final Season - Drama 3.5 Chilli Peppers
• The Sinner - Mystery/Drama 3.5 Chilli Peppers

As far as bad TV series go, well I was so busy watching really high quality TV that I managed to miss all of the shit this year, so I'm not even putting in a category for that. To be honest, I think that this year may have been one of the best of years for quality TV that I have ever known, which fills me with a lot of hope for 2018. 
Hopefully you will find something on my lists that you haven't seen yet and will now go and see on my recommendation. Also, you now know what to avoid like the plague if you should have the misfortune of coming across it.
I hope that the holiday period is being kind to you all, happy viewing!

IT
Release Date: 2017
Rating: R 18+
Running Time: 135 mins 
A supernatural horror directed by Andy Muschietti and based on the highly successful 1986 novel of the same name by Stephen King. Clearly audiences are thirsting for excellent retro horror tales because IT swiftly became the highest grossing horror film of all time and the third highest grossing R rated movie of all time. 
It's 1988 in a small American town called Derry and something insidious is lurking in the sewers; an ancient evil that feeds on the fears of children and presents itself as a clown called Pennywise. Seemingly invisible to adults, Pennywise starts to abduct the children of Derry, and turns its sights on a tight group of friends called The Losers Club. 
With all of the terrific friendship dynamics  and comradery of The Goonies, Stranger Things and Stand By Me  and all of the creepiness of a James Wan horror, IT has a formula that works on so many levels. Not only is there a creepy as all shit clown torturing the children, but all of the adults in Derry seem to be rather unpleasant as well which adds another layer of turmoil to this already emotionally affecting tale. 
IT is most definitely the best horror movie to come out of 2017. The acting is on point, with Bill Skarsgard delivering one of the most memorably disturbing horror characters of all time in Pennywise. He is however exceptionally well supported by a young and fresh faced cast who are all bringing their A game here as well, with notable performances being delivered by Finn Wolfhard, Sophia Lillis, Nicholas Hamilton and Jeremy Ray Taylor.
The visuals are certainly dark, dreadful and nightmarish; but the coming of age story that is playing in the background is not at all drowned out by the grim effects, which was really pleasing to see. IT is a true horror gem and a must see movie for fans of quality horror.
FINAL SAY: We all float down here. 
4.5 Chilli Peppers ​

Don't you hate it when people borrow things and then never give them back? 
I can't even begin to tell you how many books, movies, CDs and items of clothing I have lent to people over the years and how many of those items were never, ever, seen again. Don't get me wrong, I love to share in the joy of my findings and have no problems with lending things out, but when I never see a lent item ever again, well I'd be lying if I said that I didn't get a little annoyed. 
I also really hate asking people for a borrowed item to be returned, it's so bloody awkward. That shit is way out of my comfort zone and it is not something that I like to ever have to do, but on a number of occasions I have had to ask for an item back because I have legitimately needed it for some reason and god, actually asking for it back - it is so horrid, I really hate doing it. I always feel like such a total asshole asking for a borrowed item back, even though it is technically mine, it just feels bad to ask for it, like I am taking it before they are done with it, which totally defeats the point of lending it out it in the first place. 
I have been known to lose the odd book that has been lent to me, I'd be a liar if I said that I didn't, but I am usually very reliable with my borrowing because I know how much it sucks to have things that you love just disappear from your life. In truth I know that hoarding items and having attachments to things (especially inanimate things) is not healthy, but I must be honest and say that when I purchase an item and I love it, be it a book, movie or crappy cotton scarf, then I don't want to lose it forever; besides in many cases it also means that I need to replace it because I loved it so much; that too has happened to me many times before.
The most heartbreaking thing that I borrowed and lost forever was a pair of earrings that I loved, I still don't know what I was thinking lending them in the first place to be honest. They weren't expensive earrings, but they were not replaceable because they were vintage, so alas I lost them forever. I also lent a jacket out once that I really loved wearing and never saw it again either, that one hurt too; but if you borrow then you run the risk of losing things forever. So I suppose the ultimate message that I am trying to send out here is pretty simple really, never lend out anything that you can't stand to lose. Now if I could just follow my own advice I would probably save myself alot future heartaches. 

It is during these difficult times of unrest in the world, that people start seeking out someone to blame for the atrocities, they do it without really thinking and they do it  in an attempt to alleviate their concerns. With the string of recent terrorist attacks in the western world, we have all suddenly been forced to pay attention to a problem that we had yet again, allowed to be pushed to the back of our minds.
Even though extremist and terrorist movements are ongoingly killing hundreds of civilians across the globe, we don't hear about it on a daily basis. The media isn't publicizing the ongoing horrors of the middle east, and that has given us the luxury to not consider all of deaths in places like Syria or Afghanistan from the ongoing battles. However, it is ongoing, whether we think about it or not.
​To put it into perspective, so far this year there have been 544 terrorist attacks across the globe, resulting in 3704 fatalities. Because we don't really hear about these daily bombings and deaths, we don't really think about them either; it's out of sight and out of mind for us and we are generally pretty comfortable with that scenario because, let's be honest,  it is easier to just not know. That is until the threat starts to move a little closer to home, that's when we pay attention. When people from our own country are dying, then suddenly our heads are turned and our concerns of a possible threat becomes very real and very personal and our thoughts start to ponder our own safety, and for many the question is raised - who should be held responsible for these acts of terror?
​It has become increasing difficult to ignore the threat of insurgencies like Al Qaeda and Isis and their extremist terrorism tactics, but we cannot allow their behaviours to dictate our common sense and our decency. We must not only remain vigilant to stamping out these oppressive regimes, but we must also remain sensitive to the pressures that these types of tactics place on muslim communities in general; and the difficulties that arise for muslims on a day to day basis as a direct result of these extremist attacks. 
Just the other day I was being taken by taxi to collect a rental car, my driver was a muslim gentleman from Pakistan. He had opted to wear a beanie instead of his turban on that morning because it was the day following the Ariana Grande concert attack in Manchester. He said that he, his friends and his family were all concerned about the backlash that they may be facing in light of recent events. He said that the pressure and prejudices are always very intense for them after these types of things happen, and now that the public are aware that most of these western attacks are being undertaken by western muslim extremists, then that pressure on them is even higher again. 
It is most certainly a time to present a united front against these terrorist groups, but our fight must not be misguided or misdirected, we cannot let our fear become our undoing, we cannot let hate in, and on that front I do worry. I worry because fear makes people irrational and desperate for someone to blame, but we must remember that this recent rise in westernised terrorist attacks is not  just a western problem, it is a global problem, it always has been, and we must find a way through it on a global level.
Now more than ever, it is the time to open our doors to the oppressed and the beaten down people of this world and to say that we will together fight this tyranny. It is the time to share in compassion and empathy, to build bridges not walls, to share our resources and to not let the hate of these terrorist minorities spread any further than it already has. It is time to hold true to our humanity, stay strong in our dignities and determinedly reinforce our common ground. That is the only way that we can truly defeat the extremists that we are all facing in the world today - without the fear that they so desperately want to strike upon us, but by standing tall- side by side -together - as one. 

I have come to the understanding that I am not a very interesting person. It's a fact and it is totally okay, I don't have a problem with it. It's just that in the past I have always stupidly considered myself to be reasonably interesting. I may have even had an ego about it once upon a time, you know the whole I'm so edgy and different crap that we tell ourselves when we desperately want to stand out but generally don't. Yeah, I've always liked the idea that I was a bit unique, I mean who doesn't want to seem interesting? Anyway, after examining the way in which I interact with other people and live my life, I have decided that not only am I am not very interesting, but that I'm probably seen as a bit of a weirdo.
If I was meeting me for the first time, I would definitely think that I was an odd-bod, and that does not mean interesting or edgy, because odd is just plain odd. I actually think that I would annoy myself pretty quickly. There are a lot of things about the way that I function that bother me intensely, and I am not stupid enough to think that they wouldn't bother others as well. 
Don't get me wrong, I know that I do have good attributes, I am not flavourless, I am just not very interesting. I am not trying to insinuate that I have the personality of a plastic spoon or anything, I mean I know that I am a bit quirky and I have a decent sense of humour and enjoy a range of unusual things, but that really doesn't constitute 'interesting' in my books. 
I haven't done anything heroic or changed the world in any significant way. Mostly, I just talk way too much about movies and TV, I generally find small talk and chit-chat awkward, and if I am being really honest about myself, I am not that easy to talk to. I cut people off and go off on the weirdest tangents, I often manage to annoy myself mid-conversation! 
The combination of these things would lead most people to think that I am utterly boring or socially retarded or just plain rude, and they'd be completely correct in that thinking. I am actually a bit of all of those things, and I own that. I own my inept small talk capabilities, my over zealous attitude to cinema, my often inappropriate jokes and my disinterest in mundane idle chit-chat. I am annoyingly aware that I have very little in common with much of the world and that I can bore people to the point of distraction. I am just not that interesting. 
But in truth, how many genuinely interesting people are there in the world? There are a lot of good people, hard working people and busy people, but are they really all that interesting? I say yes, because I am so often fascinated by the complexities of others, and I do believe that everyone has at least one really excellent tale to share about their life that is worth hearing. However, that doesn't mean that I find all people interesting all of the time, and some people are dull, there is no sugar coating that fact, but I do believe that everyone certainly can be interesting from time to time.
Perhaps we are just not that interesting to ourselves, I mean after living with myself for 43 years, I often get bored of me! And maybe it is normal to feel bored of ourselves, maybe it is just a signpost for change and reinvention. However, when I focus on the incredible lives that some people have lived and the amazing things that some people have achieved, that is when I really feel like I am not cutting it in the leagues of the 'interesting' as far as the human race goes, but I guess not all of us were designed to be heroes were we? And even the little and uninteresting people have a role to play in the big scheme of things. 

HACKSAW RIDGE
Release Date: 2016
Rating: MA 15+
Running Time: 139 mins
Not since Saving Private Ryan has there been so much graphic bloodshed depicted on the battlefields, but what this movie does have that Saving Private Ryan failed to deliver is a lot more heart and an extraordinary true story about a real life war hero. Written by Andrew Knight and directed by Mel Gibson, Hacksaw Ridge plays out like an old school war movie from days gone by. I felt like I was watching something that could've been made in the 1970's with much better effects, and I found that aspect extremely pleasing. 
​Desmond Doss enlists in the army during the outbreak of WWII. Being a conscientious objector (C.O.) and a Seventh-day Adventist, Doss refuses his right to carry or use firearms during war, and choses to be unarmed medic during his call of duty in the the Battle of Okinawa.  His heroic efforts at Hacksaw Ridge made him the first C.O. to receive a Medal of Honour. 
This is a war story that deserves to be heard, and even though Doss was clearly motivated by his religious ideals, the film doesn't feel preachy or heavy handed in that way. Andrew Garfield shines as Doss, giving the best performance of his career thus far and earning himself a Best Actor nomination at the 89th Academy Awards. The supporting actors are all excellent, with notable performance from Vince Vaughn, Sam Worthington and Hugo Weaving. 
​It is rare for a biographical war hero film to not feel like it is glorifying war in some way, but I didn't get that from this film at all. Gibson has done a fine job of telling Doss's story with dignity and passion, minus all of the bravado which, if the end testaments from Doss and his war friends are anything to go by, is exactly the way that Doss would've wanted it to be told. 
FINAL SAY: Help me get one more.
3.5 Chili Peppers ​

Spent the day in Geelong with Seth, Zoe and Lachlainn on Friday, which was lovely. We all went to see the latest Alice in Wonderland offering - Through the Looking Glass. I must say that I am seriously glad that I went to see this on the big screen, because it was so visually pleasing and I doubt that it is going to translate very well onto the small screen. Overall though...let's just say that it wasn't as good as the first one. Not tragic, just not as good - 2.5 Chili Peppers for me, which is pretty tepid really. Just a shame about the weak story line really, because the cast was very strong, there just wasn't enough good material for them to work with. 
I decided to get practical this weekend and get my vegetable patch up and going for the winter season. Hardly exciting stuff, but hopefully we will be eating collards, beets and cabbages in the coming weeks if I have any success with this planting effort. That's the problem with having a vegetable patch, it is quite a lot of effort and there is never any guarantee that your crops won't fail, which is such a shit-house feeling when it does. I suppose that it puts some perspective on just how hard it must be to be a farmer though, because if my livelihood was dependent on my harvest success rate, lets just say that I would be broke or dead by now. 
On Sunday, Craig, Helen and I went out to Creswick to learn all about fungi. A lady named Alison Pouliot (a specialist in all things fungi-like) runs these fantastic fungi foraging workshops in Victoria every Autumn. Craig and I have been trying to get into one of these workshops for years, but they are always booked so far in advance that we've previously had no luck getting in. This year we got in super early and snagged ourselves the opportunity to learn about the types of mushrooms that grow in our area and most importantly, which varieties are safe to eat. Turns out that we have an abundance of two 'safe to eat' varieties growing on our property, and after we got home, I promptly set about foraging some up and trying them out. And yep, they're edible alright and bloody delicious too. Fried some up in garlic and butter with a little salt and pepper and woohoo, a taste sensation! And I am not sick or dying, so that's a good sign that I have learnt to correctly identify those varieties as well. I do believe that I am going to enjoy many Autumns of fungi feasting off the back of that workshop, so that was a mighty good use of my Sunday. 
Between all of that planting and foraging, I also managed to see a movie that I did really enjoy, but I don't think that this one's going to be everyone taste. Ha! Who am I kidding? Most of the stuff I watch isn't to everyone taste, probably a lot isn't to much of anyone's taste if the truth be told! But anyway, here are my thoughts on Tarantino's latest effort. 

Went across to Geelong to see Zoe and Lachlainn today, they have got themselves a really sweet little two bedroom unit in Belmont which they have set up and made really cosy for themselves. We are still adjusting to life without Zoe around here, it hasn't even been a week yet, but she appears to be very happy and well organised in her new arrangement, so now it is just up to us to learn to live without her, which isn't going to be easy since we all adore her so much.
There was much emotion surrounding Zoe's departure, with all three of us at home feeling a bit shell shocked by the event, even though we knew that it was going to happen, nothing really prepares for you the day that your kids leave home. I can't even leave her bedroom door open yet, her room is being treated like ground zero around here. She has still left a lot of her furniture, but it isn't the same space anymore and it feels really weird being in there. It is an intensely odd and melancholic feeling to be in her space, knowing that it is not really her space anymore, it's pretty hard to describe but it's definitely not great. 
Zoe and Lachlainn do have a set up spare bedroom and that does mean that I can stay over with them and also have an excuse to go to the beach and do some shopping around Geelong, so there is a slight up side to all of this. I will definitely be seeing a lot of them still, it is only an hour trip door to door so we aren't that far apart, but still...it's far enough, it's not home with me that's for sure! 
It has actually been a really hectic week for us all, with me returning to work on Wednesday, Craig and Seth shifting Zoe to Geelong on Thursday and Seth heading off to start his final year of primary school on Friday, there has been very little down time to be had in the melee of events, but it has all gone smoothly and we can't ask for anymore than that. Perhaps if I wasn't still staying up until the wee morning hours watching movies then I wouldn't feel so tired, but the movie fiend in me just cannot be sated. Last night did an intense 3 hours and 20 minute sitting to finally see something that I have been meaning to see for years now, and even though I have blood shot eyes today, it was definitely worth it. 

APOCALYPSE NOW - REDUX
Release Date: 1979
Rating: R 18+ 
Running Time: 210 mins 
Shrouded in controversy during it's filming, this ground-breaking masterpiece offering from Francis Ford Coppola provides some extremely provocative viewing. This "Redux" version literally means "returned" from exile- but what it really means is that it has been expanded and remastered from the original version, adding considerable length but also spectacular detail to the overall effect. 
Nominated for eight Academy Awards, and confusingly only winning two, but winning the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, Apocalypse Now is rife with surreal imagery and symbolism that details the horror, violence, confusion and madness of the Vietnam War. 
US Army assassin Benjamin Willard (Martin Sheen) has been assigned the job of terminating a dangerous and deranged renegade named Colonel Kurtz (Marlon Brando) who has gone rogue and become a Warlord deep within the jungles of Cambodia. 
Apocalypse Now is a work of great vision, and is arguably considered to be one of the best Vietnam War movies to have ever been made. The acting here is undoubtedly superb and the budget must have been massive, because no stone has been left unturned when it comes to authenticity and atmosphere. This is one film that will continue to haunt and shock viewers for generations, and it is most certainly deserving of the incredible time that it takes to watch it and then properly absorb it. 
FINAL SAY: Terminate with extreme prejudice. 
4.5 Chili Peppers