The Last LaughMineSoc builds SU clubsOxjamCelluloid Screams

short fuse.editorial.

David Byrne-s online music streaming

Iceland’s creativity eruption

Friday October 25 20132

comments and rants on entertainment news.

It’s close to 4pm on a Wednes-day afternoon and you have a lurking feeling of needing to boogie. You see a sight that almost

stops your heart, the opportunity to attend a ‘Thriller’ dance class in the Studio.

You start to call all your friends to get them down for this wonderful event.

You’re energised!

‘Cause this is thriller! A ‘Thrill-er’ dance class.

And no one’s going to stop you from having the time of your life.

‘Cause this is thriller! A ‘Thrill-er’ dance class.

There ain’t no second chance for this opportunity to dance.

‘Thriller’ dance, tonight. No previous dance experience

necessary and bring a water bottle.

Thriller Dance Class

The latest installment of the Grand Theft Auto series has not been without controversy.

The game includes a mis-sion where the player has to ac-tively participate in torture in order to extract information. The mission cannot be skipped and involves such niceties as pulling teeth, knee-breaking and waterboarding.

Many would say that this is an-other example of the gratuitous, amoral violence which peppers modern video games, and at first I would be inclined to agree with

them. However, as with many con-cepts within the Grand Theft Auto series the mission is actually an excellent satire, showing how dis-graceful government sanctioned torture is.

This message is portrayed through what happens once the torture is over. Trevor (one of the game's main characters and a known psychopath with extreme murderous tendencies) begins to feel some remorse over the suffer-ing that he has caused the torturee, and instead of killing him as per his

orders, decides to drive him to the airport so that he can escape from Los Santos.

During this drive Trevor explains how torture is actually a very poor method of extracting information, and instead only exists to serve the desires of the torturer.

Through this Rockstar makes a strong point: if even a psychopath-ic, amoral serial killer disagrees with the use of torture then how on earth can it be right that govern-ments continue to carry it out?

If the mission concluded as the

torture ended then it would be gra-tuitous, and I would feel uncomfort-able playing it. However, Rockstar have included it in order to make an important political point that most developers and publishers would shy away from, and have brought the issue of torture into the minds of many of those who would not usually consider it. For that, I applaud them.

Robert Moran

Winter has tuly ar-rived in Sheffield, and with it comes another issue of

Fuse. We’ve scoured the far cor-

ners of the country to bring you excellent content including a Q&A with the cast of Ender’s Game with dreamy Harrison Ford and news of what our very own Minecraft society, MineSoc, have been up to following the opening of the new Union ven-ues.

It may be cold outside but festival season is far from over: this issue we have reviews of the Last Laugh Comedy festival and Sheffield’s Oxjam music festial.

And for all you fear-addicts out there, the Celluloid Screams film festival is about to start and there is a gruesome pre-view piece for you to feast your eyes on.

Amelia HeathmanKaz Scattergood

Our extremely scary Hal-loween cover comes from our new artist Jan Lüttgens. Want your art to be fea-tured in the next issue? Email us at fuse@forgetoday.com

Rockstar make a valuable political point with GTA torture

Amid the ebullient geysers and mischievous volca-noes of Iceland, books are being written more

per capita than in any other coun-try. And they're being written by everyone.

Or, at least, by one in 10 resi-dents, according to the BBC. It's a strange thought. As you go about your day, try imagining that the bus driver, or the frantic, over-worked woman behind the till at Tesco, or that weird, reclusive guy in your flat are all working on sprawling tomes of experimental surrealism, or gritty crime fiction.

We shouldn't forget that the creation of great literary art is a full-time occupation and only those who devote themselves en-tirely to its precarious pursuit can become true masters.

On the other hand, the process

of writing is valuable in itself, ir-respective of the artistic merits of the text it produces. The creative impulse is a magical part of hu-man nature and the more people who have the confidence to pursue it, the better.

If e-publishing makes it easier for those people to propel their contributions into the maelstrom of the culture, then good luck to them.

The obvious worry is that the more content available, the harder it becomes to sift through the dross and find the diamonds. More than ever, we need good filtering mechanisms to guide our reading habits, and that means intelligent professional reviewers; for all their faults, they're the only alternative to the hive-mind of the internet.

Mark Wood

Sweden may be most well known for ABBA, IKEA and Volvo but in 2007 something truly

incredible was launched there that is changing the way music is monetized. This is of course Spotify, and whilst consumers are finally getting to access music at a reasonable price, some well-respected artists are not so pleased with their end of the deal.

The latest to come forward has been David Byrne (of Talking Heads turned solo artist) in a convincing Guard-ian piece which leads with the dramatic statement: “The internet will suck all creative content out of the world”.

As much as I admire David Byrne, he is wrong. The fact is, if you want to listen to a wide variety of music, purchasing it all is out of the majority of people’s financial reach.

Byrne cites that Daft Punk only made $26,000 from Spotify plays of their in-ternational summer hit ‘Get Lucky’, the point supposedly being that this is a depress-ingly low ceiling. However, he neglects to tell us that they also sold 7.3 million singles. Why didn’t these people just stream the song? I propose it’s because music on Spo-tify is only borrowed and not owned, a simple analogy being that people don’t stop buying books because there

are libraries.A well-trodden argument

in streaming’s defence is that it provides a platform for new artists the chance to win over fans, which then funds them through gig tickets and merchandise. David Byrne seems to think this just doesn’t happen, and admittedly it is quite a weak point, but only because it’s so unquantifi-able.

So what’s the solution? By-rne admits he doesn’t have the answer, so I really fail to understand why he has even written the piece in first place.

Jack Ross

Wed Oct 30 4pm- 5pm, Studio, £3

David Byrne: factmag.com

q&a.

3 Friday October 25 2013

Tickets: £2.50Available from the SU box office

Anchorman: Fri Nov 1 19:30Elysium: Fri Oct 27 19:30 This is the End: Sun Nov 3 19:30

Kate Lovatt attended an event with the cast of sci-fi film Ender's Game, including

Harrison Ford and Hailee SteinfeldEnder’s Game was published near-ly 30 years ago, why has it taken so long to become a massive mo-tion picture?

Gigi Pritzker (producer): I had a nephew who read the book a long time ago and loved it, and this is a boy who had a hard time reading. So the fact that he read the book was shocking to me and I decided I needed to read it as well, and it was a terrific book he was right. And it took me 13 years to find Bob.

Bob Orci (producer): And the tech-nology didn’t fully exist. The effects had to be wonderful and audiences had to be hungry for it.

Talking about the advancement of CGI, was it [the film] some-thing that couldn’t have been made many years ago, so it’s now the right time to make this movie?

Gavin Hood (writer and director): With technology, what’s happened is that we’ve reached a point now where visual effects really are so good that they can either be well used or abused. What I love about Ender’s Game is that is does have fantastic visual effects but it’s also a story and its heart is about great characters and great character in-teraction.

Harrison then, turning to you, obviously a man who’s worked in this genre for many years and

you’ve seen CGI grow and change, what were the funda-mental differences that you saw working now on Ender’s Game that maybe you didn’t see back in the late 70s and early 80s?

Harrison Ford (Colnel Graff): In the olden days, and I was there, you put bits together and then you made a physical prop and you photo-graphed it. Now you can create it in a computer, and that’s basically the difference. The computer graphic allows you the potential, as Gavin mentioned, to exceed human scale. It’s a great aid to imagination and one of the best things about science fiction, I think, is the bandwidth of imagination that you can use.

How was it for you Asa and Hail-ee then venturing into the world of sci-fi, what was it like working with CGI?

Asa Butterfield (Ender): It was really exciting. Neither of us had done a film with this level of special effects and when you’re hanging there 20 feet off the ground surrounded by green screen and all you’ve got is the other action and the wonderful Gavin Hood shouting instructions at you as to what’s going on, it’s a re-ally interesting experience.

Let me talk about the book for a second as well, how familiar were you all with the book?

Bob: I’m excited to read it, it sounds great. I read it in 7th grade when I was 12 years old and I loved that it

didn’t talk down to me, I loved that it celebrated intelligence, I loved that it had complicated themes, I loved that it was a great space adventure, so it kind of hit all the sweet spots for a 12-year-old.

What about for your Asa? Did you ever read it or did you get the script and then go back to the book, how was it for you?

Asa: Yeah I read it just after I got the script and I’m a massive fan of science fiction so it was right up my street. For me, not just the charac-ter of Ender, but the whole world is so beautifully crafted in the novel that I wasn’t sure how it could be brought to the screen, but Gavin has done it justice, and he’s done it amazingly.

Hailee and Asa let me talk more about your characters, because they’re at the real heart of this. Let’s talk about the character rela-tionships that you guys have.

Hailee Steinfeld (Petra): When you meet my character Petra, you meet her at a time when she’s been at the battle school for quite a while. When you meet Ender, he’s instantly doubted by everyone else at the battle school because they won-der how he’s going to catch up with them. You could assume that my character, being one of very few girls at the battle school, and be-ing the only girl in the Salamander army, got quite a bit of the same doubt from other people around her. So when they meet each other

they’re really not looking for any-thing but a friend.

Gigi, you have an incredible cast, it’s like a who’s who of Academy Awards and nominees, was this the dream you had all those years ago?

Gigi: Oh I think at first, but in re-ality it’s become something ex-traordinary. I think when you have material as good as this it attracts incredible talent on all sides of the camera. The people we have that Gavin’s mentioned, our production designers, our stunt coordinaters are all fans of the book and all people who wanted to see this film get made.

Bob: Yeah people ask us ‘so what’s the process of deciding on Sir Ben and Harrison Ford?’ and I say to them you don’t decide on them, they decide on you.

Let’s move on to Sir Ben Kings-ley then, you have this incredible look in the film, let’s talk about the facial tattoos you have, they’re stunning. How many hours of makeup were you in everyday to get that look?

Ben Kingsley (Mazer): It started off as two hours and went down to an hour and 10. But I went very still in makeup, I don’t chatter, I gently run my lines through in my head. I just close my eyes, let the guys do their work and never look in the mirror, and after that hour 10 I open my eyes and there he [his character] is.

We need to talk about the train-ing school and the zero gravity because it’s like something we’ve never seen cinematically before. Asa, what was that like?

Asa: That was so much fun. We had quite a few weeks before filming practicing with the crew, getting up in the wires and just experiencing what it was like. After that we had an astronaut come in who showed us what it was really like to be in zero gravity, because often it’s ste-reotyped as being very slow and sluggish, but in reality it really isn’t.

One last question, they always say that a director has one sci-fi movie within them because they are such hard work; what are the unique challenges of sci-fi and also are we going to get a sequel?

Bob: We always say it’s bad luck to count your sequels before they hatch. If we are lucky enough for anything like that to happen, we want to know what audiences think and want to know what was inspir-ing and what wasn’t and make that part of whatever any future de-velopment would be. So although I have a title, we just barely finished this movie and want to make sure it gets all the respect it deserves and not think about what should happen next.

Friday October 25 20134

The comedy scene in Sheffield is booming. It is a city with a long comedic heritage and the Last Laugh Comedy Club also stands as one of the longest running comedy clubs in the country. The Last Laugh has regularly run comedy nights with performances

across several of the city’s top venues, such as the Lyceum theatre and the Sheffield Memorial Hall. In 2005, Sheffield comic favourite Toby Foster teamed up with Scott Barton and Yellow Bus Events to bring us Grin Up North – the Sheffield Comedy Festival, an event that has been well received and loved year after year.

Now, as a 20th anniversary celebration of the Last Laugh in Sheffield, the event is re-launched as the Last Laugh Comedy Festival, a month long celebration of comedy with a host of comedic talent from across the UK and all over the world. In past years people such as Michael McIntyre, Ross Noble, Dylan Moran and Tim Minchin have appeared in the line-up, just to name a few. In 2013, audiences can expect to see some of the best comedians at affordable prices. This week, Fuse reviews a wide range of these acts, including performances by Tony Law, Russell Kane, Andy Parsons and Alexander Armstrong.

Russell Kane - SmallnessAs the lights dimmed, the murmurs of the audience faded in anticipa-tion. Russell Kane’s voice began to bellow through the speakers as he introduced himself with a reference to a persistent heckler en-countered by his warm-up act Steve Bugeja, “Ladies, gentlemen, and Matt!” It became clear at the preliminary stage of the show that Kane would succeed in squeezing every last laugh out of the Lyceum.

Throughout the show, Kane took his audience through three areas of British smallness. The first was British reserve and our innate inward behaviour that leaves us first fearing ‘Who saw?’ before even con-templating pain when we fall. The second was a child-like apprecia-tion for the small things in life and constantly looking towards the next big step in life. The third was about wishing you were back were you once were, that longing to be back at home under your mum’s wing when you’re suffering from a combination of fresher’s flu and a bat-tered liver!

Raven Levi Tolson

Tony Law - Nonsense OverdriveHot on the heels of his Fosters-nominated show last year, ‘Nonsense Overdrive’ is Tony Law’s attempt to see if lightening can indeed strike twice. Laced with the same absurdity and dreamlike tangents that spiked his previous sets, ‘Nonsense Overdrive’ definitely lives up to its name.

At one point, Law refers to a girl in the front row who clearly isn’t finding his ramblings as funny as her mother. Law knows why. Not everyone stays on-board with his sporadic story-telling, jumping in and out of different accents for no reason and riffing with audience members who aren’t actually heckling him. But for someone who is tapped into Law’s sense of humour/timing/madness, then Law’s new show is packed with good ideas. But sadly, not all of them work.

If you like Law’s unreal anecdotes and buzzing intellect, then the lack-lustre of ‘Nonsense Overdrive’ can be forgiven. However, if you find yourself lost in the buffoonery of a man who really needs to pull up his trousers, then you might not easily excuse his failings.

Joanne ButcherAndy Parsons – I’ve Got a Shed

With his south-west twang, Andy Parsons of Mock the Week fame wastes no time in testing the waters with some rather crude, but ab-solutely hilarious, anecdotes. The fact that most of these stories mostly involve Andy embarrassing himself, either by falling off the back of a bus, enjoying a massage a little too much or getting locked outside a hotel completely naked makes you feel like you’re just listening to a mate recalling a funny story down the pub. In a good way.

Highly entertaining in Mock the Week, Andy Parsons completely comes into his own in a solo set. Basically, if you enjoy laughing at the expense of others’ embarrassment, you’ll like Andy Parsons. I had a smile on my face for two hours, which on a grim Sunday night is some feat.

Zoë Antell

Alexander Armstrong and His Band“What exactly were you expecting?” asks a sharp-suited Alexander Armstrong from the stage of the Lyceum theatre. From the sea of confused, middle-aged faces it’s apparent that no one honestly knew what they were expecting. Known for light tea-time entertainment on BBC gameshow Pointless and his comedic partnership with Ben Miller, Armstrong isn’t known for his aptitude with smooth jazz. The resulting 90 minutes proves to be a totally surreal, but genuinely entertaining Monday evening.

A quick succession of beautifully-realised jazz standards, such as ‘Is You Is Or Is Your Ain’t?’ and ‘A Nightingale Sang in Berkley Square’ make it clear that Armstrong plans on playing this evening straight. Each song has clearly been carefully selected and is dearly loved by all involved.

Closing joyously on Chas & Dave’s ‘Ain’t No Pleasing You’, the man currently conquering the BBC proves that he is a performer with many nuances. Alexander Armstrong and His Band successfully provide a safe and entertaining evening for all. But mostly middle-aged Point-less fans.

Rhys Handley

To read the rest of these reviews, visit our website at forgetoday.com

For more information on The Last Laugh Comedy Festival, go to www. lastlaughcomedyfestival.co.uk/

With a host of famous faces guaranteed to tickle your funny bone, the Last Laugh Comedy Festival 2013 is not to be missed.

Image: Sheffield City Council

5 Friday October 25 2013

Starting out as a small game about building whatever you can im-agine, Minecraft has since tran-scended its humble, indie origins

to become a massive phenomenon in the gaming world.

The University of Sheffield’s Minecraft Society (MineSoc) stands as a testament to the game’s place as an icon of con-temporary video games. Now entering its third year, MineSoc recently complet-ed their greatest achievement: recreat-ing the refurbished student clubs - Fusion, Foundry and Studio - in the game.

It was a project undertaken by four committee members: Adam Poulston, James Brook, James King and Chris Sher-lock. The group were given a tour of the areas of the Students’ Union a week be-fore it officially opened where society president, Adam Poulston, took loads of pictures to refer back to when they would reconstruct the space in Minecraft.

The team were also given floor plans. However, this would lead to one of the difficulties they faced. Treasurer and server admin, John Brook, explains that: “In Minecraft everything is one metre blocks and when you’re trying to fit that in with something that is like a quarter of a metre you can’t do that. So a lot of it

was done by eye.” The whole project took 40 hours of work with 4 hours spent

on lighting alone.

That’s right; they not only recreated the space, but also the lighting system. In Mi-necraft, electrical systems are wired us-ing a material called redstone. It can be complicated to pull off and the team had to restart the wiring from scratch at one point. You can see their incredible handi-work on YouTube.

However, for all their work the commit-tee were disappointed that they didn’t recieve the publicity they had hoped for. The video is now a lost relic of 40 hours of MineSoc’s hard work; at the time of writing, their video only has 265 views, and for something so impressive, that is not nearly enough.

Apart from S.L.U.G.S, MineSoc are the only dedicated video game society in Sheffield. S.L.U.G.S had their own Mi-necraft server at one of their LAN events, but the committee insist that MineSoc of-fers something different. The society has its own server that members can access online, outside of the University network. Payments for membership (a paltry £4 for the year) go towards maintaining and upgrading this server, so that members can continue to play together. John ex-plained that with LAN games, members would have to take their gaming rig to a set location. He said: “to a lot of the people who play Minecraft, that’s a lot of effort.” The setup they have now al-lows members to play Minecraft together with the minimum of fuss. You are only al-lowed to join the server if you are on the user whitelist, which you will be added to when you have paid the membership fee.

Minecraft is known primarily for its open-ended gameplay and being un-competitive, but MineSoc devised an al-ternative way to play with the Minecraft Olympics last year. A series of aggres-sive games were held, the most striking of which was the aptly named “Survival Games”. Based on the Hunger Games franchise, players spawn in a field with the goal to kill each other off until only one player survives. In the middle of the field is a chest with weapons. Players can either make a grab for the chest or run away and create their own weapons with the materials available to them. It sounds surprisingly cutthroat for such an innocent game as Minecraft.

The greatest challenge for MineSoc at the moment is getting people to take committee roles. Most of the current com-mittee have been around since the begin-ning and they are currently in their final year at university. If they can’t find peo-ple to take over next year, MineSoc may well be finished. It’s a massive shame for such a sociable society which fosters cre-ativity and team-work that has inspired this new venture with the Students’ Union. Hopefully, new members will be eager to take the mantle from the old committee and take MineSoc to new heights.

Rebuilding the union venues took a year...or just 40 hours in Minecraft

Words: Joe BrennanArtwork: Frankie Morshead

8 Friday October 25 2013

OXJAM

Music editors Nicky and Rachel talk to Oxjam and attend the charity music festival

9 Friday October 25 2013

Ever felt your live music experience was lack-ing a little philanthropy? Oxjam may have been your answer. On Sunday October 20, Oxjam festival took over four of Sheffield’s

finest venues along Division street for one day only. If you’re not familiar with Oxjam, this is the skinny: it’s a month long music festival, taking place in tiny towns and vast cities all over the country. Organ-ised in whole by teams of talented and enthusiastic volunteers, Oxjam has one aim: to raise money and awareness for Oxfam’s cause through the medium of local live music.

“Oxjam is especially good because the

focus is on local bands, driving grassroot

campaigning”Oxjam is a great festival for two reasons. Essentially it’s

providing a loud, live, interactive platform for fighting pov-erty whilst also giving smaller, local bands a chance to per-form their material in front of a massive audience. The audi-ence really is giant: since the festival’s beginning in 2006, more than 4,000 bands have played at 3,000 Oxjam events up and down the country to a staggering 800,000 people. “Oxjam is especially good at raising awareness about global

issues and funds for the causes because the focus is on lo-cal bands & acts” says festival

man-ager Rich-

ard Ripley. “It really does drive grassroots campaign-

ing and is more inclusive for all to enjoy”All in all, they’ve raised £1.75 million, an awe-

inspiring amount of money straight from the pockets of the music loving population. “The money goes to Oxfam, who use it to help support some of the world’s poorest people”, says Richard, “they spend the majority of their money across three different areas; emergency response, development work and campaigning for change”. In addition to this, proceeds from ticket sales will also help Oxfam build toilets and irrigation systems, provide clean drinking water for schools as well as green energy resources and mosquito nets. On a social level, the money will also go towards training farmers and efforts to further womens rights across Africa. Oxjam’s statistics are a clear sign that the festival has a lasting and productive effect on people’s lives for the better.

This is the fourth Oxjam takeover for Richard, and the first for fundraising co-ordinator Ben Cater, so they’re both par-ticularly keen about settling in Sheffield.

“Sheffield is a fantastic city with some excellent local music, so were excited about this takeover the most. We’ve worked alongside some truly inspirational people, whose drive, deter-mination and enthusiasm for music and making a difference has made these events a possibility. We really can’t recom-mend getting involved highly enough!”

Oxfam have earned quite the reputation in musical circles, employing volunteers in mass to do the festival circuit. It’s a pretty sweet deal for the volunteers too; free entry to festivals like Glastonbury for three days work, and the satisfaction that you’re helping all the little kids in Africa. “Having stewarded at Glastonbury myself,” says Ben, “I know first-hand what a difference that contribution makes to Oxfam. Festivals are a fantastic opportunity to engage with people, explain the cause you’re fighting for and encourage them to help. In Shef-field, where the music scene is particularly strong, festival/gig goers are really enthusiastic about Oxjam because the major-ity of people who come to our festival have a shared interest.”

Richard said highlights included New Camaros, the Gentle-men and I Set The Sea on Fire. “We’ve been very fortunate that we’ve been able to secure an eclectic mix of bands and artists across the four venues; the Bowery, the Great Gatsby, the Hop and the Green Room, which allows us to cater for a variety of tastes.”

A variety is certainly what we got. On a rainy Sunday after-noon, we made it to the first of the four venues, the Hop, just in time

to catch the tail end of spoken word poet Ado-lfus’ short set. Some-

where in between

Scroobius Pip and Ghost-poet, Adolfus’ sensitive and accu-

rate poetry, set to a gentle guitar accompa-niment, is performed with great feeling and a cheeky

sense of humour. Next up is the livelier Ryan Young, a singer-songwriter

whose voice fills the high ceilings and space of the venue. Playing songs from his debut EP, as well as a cover of Johnny Cash’s ‘Folsom Prison Blues’, Young recalls the strident guitar music of Jake Bugg and Frank Turner.

“Adolfus’ sensitive and accurate poetry is

performed with a cheeky sense of humour”

We cut Young’s set short to head over to the Bowery in time for Ollie King, another young singer-songwriter from Shef-field. Although promising, King’s set falls flat, mostly due to a lack of audience. Things do pick up with a brilliant rendition of Arctic Monkeys’ ‘Do I Wanna Know?’ and one of his own songs, ‘Dance Song’, from his upcoming EP.

The highlight of the night comes from another Sheffield band, Seventors. Formed of three girls and one boy, the band make the most of intricate vocal harmonies, and al-though they lack a drummer, we hardly notice. Finishing with two unlikely covers, first ‘Club Foot’ by Kasabian, and the Black Keys’ ‘Lonely Boy’, it’s a shame to see them go.

The Green Room is the next stop on our Oxjam tour, where we catch Hail to the Eskimo. We’re struck by the lack of bandmates; what is usually a five-piece band appears to now consist of two. The band have decided to perform a short acoustic set, in anticipation of their decidedly more explosive set at the Bowery in a couple of hours time; “don’t worry guys, you’ll get the full effect tonight!” They take tracks from Hail to the Eskimo, giving songs a minimal, pensive twist, as well as their acoustic project, Murder at the Seaside. Serene tracks like ‘New York’ and ‘Coffee in the Morning’ work won-ders in a small venue like the Green Room, but we can’t help thinking this performance is the calm before the much more engrossing storm later on.

Oxjam was a festival with great promise, so it’s a shame that the event didn’t quite follow through. With such great acts and an even better cause, it’s surprising that the audi-ence in Sheffield didn’t come out in full force.

If you want more information or to get involved, it’s worth visiting the website, oxjamsteelcity.co.uk.

Fuse. games

10 Friday October 25 2013

When future genera-tions hear the name Mother 3, they’ll most likely ask “what on

earth is Mother 3?” What they won’t say is “Ah yes, the quirky, hi-larious and heartbreaking Game Boy Advance RPG from Japanese writer Shigesato Itoi”, because that would sound odd. But they’d be right - because Mother 3 is all of those things and quite possibly one of the finest games ever made.

From an opening in the rural idyll of Tazmily Village, the story soon takes a tragic turn. Underpinning every bit of silliness from that point on is a vague sense of unease - a feeling that the colourful, fun at-mosphere and characters are a brightly painted mask stretched tight over a rotten core.

Still, what a mask it is. Simplistic but expressive sprites are the or-der of the day here, and the lov-ingly designed environments bloom with colour, detail and life.

The Nowhere Islands are a sight to behold regardless of how old the game might be, and the inven-tive music-based combat system only adds to the appeal. The music is ably provided by veteran com-poser Shogo Sakai and varies

wildly in style. Between rock tunes belted out in the game’s strange, mountain-top nightclub, and the moving piano pieces which accompany emotional story seg-ments, there’s everything orches-tral, poppy or electronic. What-ever your style, there’s bound to be something you’ll walk away humming.

Of course, this retrospective would be much more relevant if western gamers could actually play Mother 3, which of course they can’t.

Despite putting the protagonist, Lucas, in 2008’s Super Smash Bros. Brawl, no official translation exists. You’ll either have to learn Japa-nese, play the admittedly excel-lent translation from dedicated fan Clyde Mandelin or settle for play-ing Earthbound, the series’ previous game, which is available from the Wii U eShop.

It’s a shame though - because words alone cannot do Mother 3 justice. It really is unlike anything else.

Robin Wilde

CULT CORNER

Pokémon X & Y, the first games in the Pokémon franchise to have a world-wide release, have clearly been highly an-

ticipated - over four million copies sold in the first 48 hours certainly speaks for itself.

The opening cutscene, as you fol-low a Fletchling flutter into your bedroom to wake you, is designed to evoke warm fuzzy feelings – this is the start of your biggest Pokémon adventure yet. Being on the new 3DS of course means the graphics have made a giant leap from the last game, the transition into an ex-tra dimension feels natural and the controls are smooth.

The game holds true to previous titles, you get to choose a starter poké-mon (Froakie, Fennekin or Chespin), and visit the re-gion’s Pokémon profes-sor to be set off on your quest to fill the Pokédex and gather information on every pokémon.

Your journey will see you traverse the Kalos re-gion, training your team, tak-ing on the region’s eight gym leaders and the evil Team Flare, before finally head-ing to boot out the elite four and become the Champion.

X & Y add loads of new features that give the game more depth and places these Pokémon titles in a league of their own. ‘Pokémon amie’ allows you to pet, feed and play games with your Pokémon to increase their friendship towards you, while super training provides a way to boost your teams’ EV stats via mini games.

There are also opportunities for trainer customisation with clothes, accessory shops and hair salons throughout the game. Your charac-ter is also displayed rocking your chosen style on both your trainer card and in battles. The addition of

the brand new ‘fairy’ type, which is super effective

against both ‘dark’ and ‘dragon’ types en-sures that there is

no longer

a clear superior type.Potentially the most notable new

feature, though, has to be ‘Mega Evolution’. A select number of Poké-mon can ‘mega evolve’ for the du-ration of battle when holding a special mega stone.

In this special form, a Pokémon’s appearance is altered as well as their abilities, stats and sometimes even their type. Some Pokémon, such as Charizard and Mewtwo have different mega evolutions de-pending on if you’re playing ver-sion X or Y.

Anyone hoping to “catch ‘em all” will have a task on their hands with this game. The Pokédex is bigger and better than ever, boasting 718 pokémon, including 69 new ones to

discover.And it’s not like Ninten-do only throw Pidgeys

and Caterpies at you for the first two hours of gameplay – fan

favourites start show-ing up right from the off.

Every new route holds excitement as you nev-er know what you’re

going to find as the tall grass parts.

Even the most nostalgic fans will struggle to go back and

replay older titles after this.

Lexy Monks

POKÉMON X & Y3DS9/10

Sony have been machine gun-ning out the big budget ex-clusive titles in the latter half of this year, despite their PS4

launch being right around the cor-ner. We have already had the fan-tastically dark The Last of Us and coming soon will be Gran Turismo 6.

But with October comes the launch of Beyond: Two Souls, another rare entry into the genre which Quantic Dream created with the PS2 title Fahrenheit and more recently Heavy Rain.

In Beyond you play as Jodie, who you take through her unique, turbu-lent life from birth until potentially death. However the game doesn’t flow chronologically, it is recalled from Jodie’s middle-aged self’s broken memory of her past.

At first it’s jarring, but as the timeline of Jodie’s life is filled in, it becomes clear how this jumping around time really creates a deep connection with the characters in the game and makes the drama all the more impactful. It’s difficult to talk about the story without spoiling it, but the best description is that it is a confusingly ordered pile of beauti-ful pieces that only make sense at the end.

Jodie is special, she has an abil-ity to communicate with the ‘In-

fraworld’, think of it as another dimension that runs parallel to our own, where entities can exist and sometimes interact with our world, but aren’t visible.

Aiden is her silent invisible com-panion in this other world, and he leads to some amazing gameplay opportunities as you switch from controlling Jodie, to and from Aid-en.

This is, without doubt, the best looking game on the market, at least at its usual close quarters, hu-man scenes and indoors, where 90 per cent of the game takes place.

When in large expanses, there is some pop-in but since this type of scene is rare in Beyond, it’s never really an issue.

Interestingly, the whole game is in a 21:9 aspect ratio, the same as movies, this gives a letter boxing effect on normal 1080p TVs that are 16:9, which empathises the cin-ematic nature of Quantic Dream’s games.

Throughout Beyond it becomes apparent how well executed this concept is, as the visu-als are so striking and the

acting so real that it is more than entertaining enough just to watch, but the con-stant player input and decision making keeps your attention up, and involves you in the sto-ry so much more than any movie would.

Its staggering visuals are incredibly valuable to the game, and you will need a great TV to do it justice.

The only problem that you might have with Beyond is that it isn’t that difficult, how-ever that would be missing the point. Beyond is not meant to be a challenge, it’s an expe-rience and one that will leave you breathless, and in awe, it’s unlike anything else in any form of media, and it is definitely worth multiple playthroughs.

Christopher O’Grady

BEYOND: TWO SOULSPS39/10

MOTHER 3Game Boy Advance

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“The visuals are so striking and the acting

so real”

Fuse. arts

With winter creeping up, and the first students tentatively looking to-wards the heating, it

seems fitting that Shakespeare’s A Winter’s Tale arrives at the Crucible.

Director Paul Miller attempts to let the play speak for itself, and a strong ensemble cast deliver plenty of striking moments.

The play presents the ideas of re-birth and reconciliation through two almost jarringly different halves. The first half revolves around the tragic descent of the King of Sicilia, Leontes (Daniel Lapaine) into a manic state of jealous rage. Falsely believing his wife’s has been unfaithful with his childhood friend Polixenes (Jonathan Firth), he refuses to acknowledge that the daughter she is carrying is his own.

Whilst Lapaine is undeniably stun-ning in being handed a free reign of the space to throw his tantrum, it is the performance of Claire Price as his wife Hermione which really stands out. Price cuts an impressively resilient figure of purity as her petu-

lant accuser bounces around her, all sweat and saliva.

The end of the first act is notably a home to the immortal stage direction, “Exit, pursued by a bear” This iconic moment is handled in an understated yet highly atmospheric fashion. Bolts of lightning illuminate the bear’s threatening emergence before it dis-appears almost immediately after the audience can pick it out of the shadows.

The second act transports the ac-tion 16 years into the future and away from the courts of Sicilia to the simpler, rustic Bohemia. The play shifts dramatically in tone from trag-edy to comedy and this is present in the pleasant contrast between Bo-hemia’s bright appearance and the tensions of its neighbour. Leontes’s daughter, Perdita (her name itself is “lost girl” in Latin) has been by raised by a shepherd and attracted the at-tentions of Polixenes’ son.

The injection of comedy that keeps the second act moving is mainly provided from Keir Charles’s ukulele playing Autolycus and a fantastically flaboyant Young Shepherd, portrayed by the squeaking Patrick Walshe McBride. Unfortunately things fall a little flat as the lovers’

escape sees the focus return to Sicilia, and after all the hard work done in the first act, the remarkable ending somehow feels distinctly lacking in magic.

Simon Daw’s staging feels at times innovatively minimalist yet at others a little bare. Dressed at its best for the Bohemian sheep-shearing festi-val, the presence of a striking giant sheep’s head fashioned from straw provides an eye-catching backdrop to the large set-piece festivities.

Ultimately the production finds the sheer amount of faith required from its audience a little out of reach. That’s not to say it isn’t a strong pro-duction. It elicits emotion, in particu-lar in Leontes’s concerning treatment of his newly born daughter, and you laugh where you’re supposed to. However, the play struggles in making both halves feel like they’re meant to be together.

A Winter’s Tale is playing at the Crucible Theatre until Saturday No-vember 2.

Sam Russell

Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s enthralling novel, The Shadow of the Wind, is a dark and exciting tale of literary obsession and mystery.

Set deep in the heart of Barcelona, the story is based in the wake of the Spanish civil war, amidst all the uncertainty and horror of the revolution. Zafon’s novel is literary excel-lence; it is a story about a book and its power to inspire and, at times, destroy.

On a cold morning in 1945, an antique

book seller takes his young son, Daniel, to a mysterious labyrinthine library tucked away down the cobbled streets of Barcelona’s Old Town, known as the Cemetery of Forgotten Books. Instructed to pick just one book from the thousands hidden away, Daniel selects an obscure work by unknown author Julian Carax, an innocent discovery which will change his life forever.

Captivated by the book, Daniel is swept along in his quest to shed light on this mysteri-ous, enigmatic author. As he pieces together the tragic life of Carax, Daniel identifies many unnerving similarities to his own life and realises that he has the only surviving copy of The Shadow of the Wind, which is, in fact, highly sought after. In particular, a terrify-ing faceless man who seems to be straight

out of Carax’s books is tracking down all the works and burning them. In what starts as harmless literary curios-ity, it soon becomes an in-tense and dangerous race to uncover the mysteries of Carax himself.

With themes of passion, love and adventure, this crime fiction novel is irresistible and gripping. This book has the per-fect recipe for success, a shock-ing twist, lovable characters and a thrilling plot, highly recommend.

Grace Waters

BOOK CORNER

THE WINTER’S TALEThe Crucible6/10

THE SHADOW OF THE WINDCarlos Ruiz Zafon9/10

Friday October 25 2013 11

MONKEY BARSThe Studio8/10

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The Studio Theatre was the backdrop for Chris Goode’s Monkey Bars, an original performance which gives us an insight into children’s voices in society: some-

thing that we usually ignore.Described by the Telegraph as “hilarious

and poignant by turns” Monkey Bars takes transcripts of 72 children aged six to 11 from a range of sociological backgrounds, com-menting on religion, social affairs and more personal topics.

Described as “child’s play: the use of un-edited transcripts encapsulates the innocence and vulnerability of children, whilst still giv-ing them a strong voice” this verbatim script is performed “by adults as adults, in adult situations”

As the audience began to take their seats, the faint strum of a guitar was heard as a member of the cast lovingly serenaded a plate of green jelly. Although this was at first quite bizarre, the intimacy of this moment felt

as though we as an audience were taking a voyeuristic stance as we were invited to ob-serve the innocent nature and spontaneous quirkiness of children.

Presented on a minimalist stage, the actors worked closely as an ensemble to create be-lievable scenarios for the dialogue to take place. With help from ambient, melodic mu-sic, the bare stage was transformed to eve-rything from a swanky wine bar to a leafy park, using only white boxes to divide the stage.

The juxtaposition of mature scenarios pre-sented alongside the colloquial, sometimes vague language of the children provided an air of nostalgia amongst the performance. It reminded the audience of their personal ex-periences as a child, and encouraged them to reflect on their own childhood, leaving a sense of unity amongst us and the children. On more than one occasion, we have all felt conflicted, sad and even confused; it is some-thing that affects us all, regardless of age, gender and social class.

Prior to the show, some people have had many preconceptions of what this perfor-

mance would entail. For instance, some may have expected the cast to deliver caricature like performances of children, dressed in oversized coats, slobbing around the stage in ill-fitting shoes. Admittedly, they couldn’t have been more wrong.

Monkey Bars is a unique performance which cleverly reveals the unedited voices of children, as they comment on subjects seen through their own perspective. The infusion of humour, sadness and sentimentality make Monkey Bars refreshingly brilliant.

Amelia Mather

Fuse. music

X

Did you know that the Fratellis had ever broken up? Did you know that they have

reformed and have released another album, their third in fact, We Need Medicine? Me neither. But here goes.

Ever since we all stopped chanting the chorus to debut Costello Music’s most success-ful track ‘Chelsea Dagger’, the Fratellis all but disap-peared, appearing as if they had no more to give in the way of catchy, punchy pop-punk.

The success of We Need

Medicine then is sure to either re-make, or break this band.

Sadly, for the Fratelli brothers (who aren’t actu-ally brothers at all), there are fears that it shall be the latter. We Need Medicine, al-though by no means unpleas-ant on the ears, is equally nothing to rave about.

The first track ‘Halloween Blues’ rather clumsily stands out as the weakest song of-fered by the album. More than sounding like an appro-priate title track, the repeat-ing rhetoric around which the song is based merely resembles the type of drunk-en chanting you’d hear in Foundry toward the end of a particularly boozy Pop Tarts, albeit resoundingly less en-

joyable.Some tracks however,

those featuring toward the beginning of the album, ‘This Old Ghost Town’ and ‘She’s Not Gone Yet But She’s Leav-ing’ do show some promise.

It soon becomes clear though, that We Need Medi-cine simply represents a band unsure of which di-rection to head in. Although faint echoes of the sounds that made Costello Music so popular do pipe up every now and again, the album lacks any distinguishing char-acter, something which their debut album delivered in abundance.

Dale Callaghan

UPCOMING: DAVID BOWIE : THE NEXT DAY EXTRA / ARCADE FIRE : REFLEKTOR / LOS CAMPESINOS! : NO BLUES

12 Friday October 25 2013

The third studio album from New York based Son Lux, Lanterns, resembles a peak in an abusive relationship the musician has been keep-

ing with the love of his life. First track ‘Enough of Our Machinest’ is filled with cute indie tones ar-ranged in what could be a Scria-bin sonata only to drop the beat on your confused hips a moment later.

A sexy lieutenant in service of the malicious queen of postmodernism, Son Lux summons everything his inner ear ever came in contact with into a battle to rejuvenate the grace of chaos. In ‘Lost it t o

Trying’, candied dream-pop follows violent outbursts of electronic folk, motivational counseling session turns into suicidal whispering and pressing repetition easily co-exists with polyphony, all embedded

within in the sounds of crying nightingales, chimes and

cartoon horns.Some tracks, such as ‘No Crimes’ or ‘Ransom’, are

so full of energy that they miss the perhaps

more important goal of the immediacy of feeling and finally re-solve to simply stirring the bipolar tendencies in you. Lanterns may well be the best of Son Lux so far but certainly – and hopefully – it’s not his fi-nal form yet.

Barbora Kerkova

THE FRATELLISWe Need Medicine4/10

SON LUXLanterns6/10

CHERCloser To The Truth6/10

Cher’s new album, Closer to the Truth, is a wor-thy comeback for the 67-year-old pop icon,

indicating that she really has found a way to turn back time after all.

The lead single, ‘Woman’s Work’, starts the album off as it means to go on, with a rapid, infectious beat and a firm, fist-pumping brand of feminism that is very much in keeping with the tone of the rest of the record.

It’s clear from the outset that Cher still has things to say. Dedi-cating the album to her mother “and all the strong women in … history,” there’s a pervad-ing sense of female empower-ment throughout the record. It is most evident in the first half with songs like ‘Dressed to Kill’, an in-spired re-working of Big Brother contestant and Ordinary Boy Preston’s ill-fated solo output,

boasting provocative, vampy lyrics such as “Heads will roll and blood will spill/But how can you resist when baby I am dressed to kill.”

Of course, the album is not without its power ballads. ‘Si-rens’ is a noteworthy highlight, with its deliciously slow build-up and dramatic guitar solos. Both this and the cover of Miley Cyrus’ ‘I Hope You Find It’ are perfect songs for the Queen of back-of-the-throat-belting herself as she adds her own, more experienced spin to them.

Though the album starts intensely, it soon slows down to a more rea-sonable pace that seems n e c e s s a r y after the h i g h - e n -ergy on-s laught of the f i r s t half. B u t

the album never loses its impact and just as the closing song re-assures us, it is clear that whatever happens next, we haven’t seen the last of Cher yet.

Laura Stanley

Favourite band: Star SlingerFavourite track right now: ‘Dancin’ - Aaron Smith (KRONO Remix)

WHAT’S ON

Kyle IrwinEconomics

Martina Danelaite Magazine Journalism

YOUR PLAYLIST?

Favourite band: the BeatlesFavourite track right now: ‘Mojo’ - Alt J

Fuse. music

UPCOMING:ARCTIC MONKEYS:MOTORPOINT NOV 2/FUTURE OF THE LEFT:QUEENS NOV 5/PERE UBU: QUEENS NOV 7

13 Friday October 25 2013

Mellow and thought-ful in equal measure, Newcastle’s Lanterns on the Lake write for

chapels on hills and high-rise ca-thedrals, but until they get a call from His Holiness they’ll have to settle for bars like the Harley. New album Until the Colours Run takes the youth and intimacy of their early sounds and shapes them to the mould of a grown up band; with tonight’s set they’re willing to move beyond piano balladry and introspective song-writing.

The blue notes in opener ‘Pic-ture Show’ confirm that vocalist Hazel Wilde is sampling from a broader palette this time. Her bandmates launch into swagger-

ing rock band excursions and dizzying snare marches with-out a second thought, but the core remains the same. ‘Another Tale From Another English Town’ stands out, conjuring the grand echoes of touring partners Ex-plosions in the Sky, but otherwise the best moments are quiet and humble.

It’s not a perfect performance. Like an increasing number of British indie bands, they have a habit of taking off their gui-tars so they can wallop a spare drum, which is visually pleasing but clutters the mix and detracts from Oliver Ketteringham’s more nuanced work behind the kit.

Lanterns are still ironing out the creases on some of their new material, but part of what makes them so likeable is their impec-cably courteous stage manner.

Towards the end Wilde an-

nounces that they’re “going off stage for a bit so you can cheer for some more. Is that alright?” Wilde returns on her own to play a gorgeous new piano piece called ‘Green and Gold’, whilst the deeply evocative ‘I Love You, Sleepyhead’ swells to a gratify-ing climax and there’s a feeling that, although there’s more to come from Lanterns on the Lake, things are just fine as they are.

Duncan Geddes

LANTERNS ON THE LAKEThe HarleyOctober 14

When Chvrches exploded onto the blogo-sphere last August, their nostalgic 80s-electro pop was practically begging to be played live. But the Scottish band

stayed relatively close to their roots for the next few months, with the occasional venture to London with their live show.

This October however, Chvrches are taking their de-but live, up and down the UK to showcase why they are one of the best new bands in recent years. Their first English night on the tour, Sheffield’s very own Leadmill, proves just that.

The show starts with the explosive track ‘We Sink’. The audience are immediately taken in. Lauren May-berrys’s voice is that brilliant in real life; even swear words are shocking when coming out of her mouth. She may be small, and her vocals may be sugary-sweet but she doesn’t let the main Leadmill stage swallow her up, she demands to be noticed instead.

The set-list takes in hit after hit from their debut al-bum, The Bones of What you Believe, from the earnest

‘Recover’ to Chvrches’ more darker sound in the form of ‘Science & Visions’.

The audience is treated to a performance by Mi-chael Doherty, one of the band’s synth players, with his vocal-led track ‘Under the Tide’. Doherty’s perfor-mance stands out in the show for the contrast in his deep voice to Mayberry’s. It adds to Chvrches en-chanting persona, by making sure the tracks don’t all roll into one.

The band seem to build in confidence throughout the show, from little interaction at the start to thanking the audience for “giving a shit” and fan-girling over Alex Turner by the end of the show. The audience is also treated to a surprise with Chvrches cover of ‘It’s Not Right, But It’s Okay’, taking the 90s Whitney Houston classic and putting their own spin on it.

Then, with a last rendition of ‘The Mother We Share’, they’re gone. But it’s firmly planted in the minds of the crowd that this is one of the hottest shows Sheffield has had in a while.

Amelia Heathman

CHVRCHESThe Leadmill October 12

Growling vocals, pound-ing drums and enough keyboard solos to make even Liszt blush. What

more could you want out of a Sat-urday night? Perhaps a night of Children of Bodom, Napalm Death, Insomnium and Medeia will help.

Children of Bodom are back once again, this time to promote their eighth studio album Halo of Blood, which has received critical acclaim compared to their more recent releases. None the less when Bodom get on stage there’s no stopping them, from start to fin-ish they are a force to be reckoned with. The same can be said of the brilliant support acts Insomnium and Medeia, both accompanying Children of Bodom very well with their similar melodic death metal style.

The same cannot be said about Napalm Death, who are good in their own right. However, the grandfathers of grindcore felt quite misplaced when tucked up in

this primarily melodic death metal line up.

Seeing Bodom hit every note during a keyboard/guitar ‘duo’ solo is a treat for eyes and ears. The audience is not only spoiled with a handful of new tracks but also a robust set of old classics such as ‘Are You Dead Yet?’ and a su-perb encore of ‘In Your Face.’

There are however some quite pretentious recorded speeches played between some songs that not only seem out of place, they also seem to quell the raging at-mosphere throughout the venue. But as soon as they’re over we are back straight into the madness again.

All in all, Children of Bodom and friends rocked the O2 Academy to its very foundations. Its going to be a long time until that happens again, it’s assured.

Matthew Till

CHILDREN OF BODOMO2 AcademyOctober 12

Follow us on Twitter @ForgePressMusic

DOTCOM

More reviews online

Read more reviews online at Forge Today Lanterns on the Lake: Stephanie Nicola-Miller

Chvrches: Youtube/Polweka123

Children of Bodom: Youtube/ Szopen271

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Art school confidentiAldir: terry Zwigoff

CULT CORNER

if you’re in the mood for one of the more odd college comedies, Art School Confidential is the oddball for you. The film is the

second collaboration between writer and indie comic icon daniel clowes and director terry Zwigoff.

Max Minghella plays Jerome, a freshman majoring in painting at strathmore college. By his own admission he wants “to be the greatest artist of the 21st century”, but he also wants to lose his virginity, preferably to beautiful art model Audrey (sophia Myles). on top of this, there is a mysterious killer on the loose, who eventually becomes entangled with Jerome’s

struggles.fully developed characters are

not to be found here. Most are meant to provide laughs and represent a certain attitude. The film is littered with small and wonderful perfor-mances; Jim Broadbent, plays an alcoholic artist, steven Buscemi is a loathsome gallery owner and Anjelica huston is excellent as an exasperated Art history teacher.

the funniest scenes involve Jerome’s class peer-reviewing each other’s work. Jerome is frequently frustrated that his technically excellent paintings are ignored in favour of his colleagues’ experi-mental (i.e: terrible) work.

Initially, Jerome fits into the mould of the socially awkward nice guy who tries to win the girl. it’s a grating character type that crops up in films like Loser and has become ubiquitous in recent years (thanks Michael cera).

As the film comes hurtling towards its conclusion, the laughs begin to subside and the college stereo-types fade into the background, eventually culminating with an un-comfortable message about art, and the role of the artist.

enjoying Art School will be difficult for some, primarily because the departure from comedy is so jarring. some of the jokes do fall flat - Jerome’s gay roommate pretending to be straight simply isn’t funny.

however, if you want a college comedy that’s different and a little bit twisted, Art School Confidential is worth your time.

Joseph Brennan

sleepy hollowdir: Various8/10

SMALL SCREEN

new show Sleepy Hollow at-tempts to bring the para-normal American novel The Legend of Ichabod Crane

into the modern day in a crime/ac-tion show. An imported Us drama, it has all you’d expect from a show in the paranormal genre: continued suspense, fast-paced action, and some gruesome and chilling mo-ments.

the show follows Abby, a police officer in the eponymous small town of sleepy hollow, as she is dragged into mystery when investigating a homicide by decapitation. soon aided by a reawakened revolution-ary war veteran, ichabod crane, she argues with authority to inves-tigate the perpetrator: a headless horseman.

there are no dull moments in the first episode, which is packed with (mostly) good dialogue, intense ac-tion, and drenched in suspense. the characters are fully-fleshed out,

and the plot flows naturally. that said, it doesn’t feel like

there’s a lot ‘new’ in Sleepy Hollow plot-wise. it sticks to tried-and-true tropes, such as the cop about to move on, fighting with bureaucracy during an investigation (“go home, get some rest”) and the mysterious character who knows something. it pulls these all off well, however, and it comes together nicely to make an exciting, enjoyable 45 minutes.

the main characters are all fleshed out fairly thoroughly, and the acting allows them to pop out the screen. nicole Beharie plays a great female lead in Abby, the wary-but-enthusiastic police lieu-tentant, but tom Mison (Salmon Fish-ing in the Yemen) is superb as the abolitionist ripped 250 years into the future, managing to portray ichabod perfectly as clearly bewil-dered, but trying to cope.

All-in-all, the pilot of Sleepy Hol-low sets up what could be a great new paranormal drama, steeped in intrigue, and definitely possible to get hooked on. If the first episode is anything to go by, it’s going to be well worth hopping on.

Theo Cole

you may be forgiven for thinking that Le Week-end is a rom-com for older people, judging by the trailers. the

film itself is a much more melan-choly affair, and it is so much bet-ter for it.

it begins with a tracking shot through a crowded train carriage en route to Paris. The camera final-

ly settles on Meg (lindsay duncan) and nick (Jim Broadbent): two vet-erans of marriage who are spend-ing the weekend in paris for their thirtieth anniversary. it is clear from the beginning that they are not particularly happy together.

this set-up is perfect for a me-diocre feel-good film, where the lovers’ relationship is given new life by the city of paris. however, writer hanif Kureishi is too skilled for such a humdrum plot.

Meg and nick’s marriage is ir-reparably scarred. Moments of

compassion between the two are found here and there, as they chase each other through their hotel or visit Montparnasse cemetery. But otherwise, there is a coldness that exists between them throughout much of the film. Duncan in particu-lar can be incredibly icy at points, but her performance is so accom-plished that she still garners sympa-thy. Broadbent is suitably subdued as well, highlighting his range when compared to his manic turn in Filth.

The film is all about Meg and nick, but they come across the lat-

ter’s old university friend Morgan (Jeff Goldblum). A slippery char-acter, his life serves as a contrast to nick’s. Goldblum gives a solid per-formance as the upbeat, but moral-ly flawed Morgan, and his surprise appearance also adds variety to the film and prevents it from getting stale towards the end.

regrets of the past and the un-certainty of the future are explored here. in an especially poignant mo-ment, Meg asks: “once the kids have gone, what’s left of us?” Kure-ishi’s writing and roger Michell’s

direction employ a slow, brooding pace to make these themes play out effectively. sex is also portrayed frankly here, with the couple using explicit language as they struggle with problems of intimacy. if you’re looking for a good first date film, this isn’t it.

Although not Kureishi or Michell’s greatest work, it certainly isn’t as good as their last collaboration Venus, Le Week-end is a mature film about love that deserves to be seen.

Joseph Brennan

le weeK-enddir: roger Michell8/10

14 friday october 25 2013

tom Hanks’s new film, that will most probably be multiple award-winning, is based on the story of captain rich-

ard phillips and the somali pirates that descended upon the American cargo ship MV Maersk Alabama in 2009.

After what is a fairly mundane, domestic opening, the menacing pi-rates’ arrival creates a sense of ris-ing tension that barely stops to let

the audience catch its breath.the performances of the somali

pirates are stunning – the success of the film rides on their capacity to make the audience feel both hatred and empathy for them. Barkhad Abdi, as the pirate ‘captain’, Muse, makes a strong impression as the antithesis to hanks’s own captain: their dialogues throughout Billy ray’s sparse and realistic screen-play simultaneously entertain and worry. what makes the perfor-mances (and by extension the film) so electric is the volatility of them – we don’t know exactly what is go-ing to happen next, and with each

pirate constantly wielding a gun, we’re not sure we always want to find out.

director paul Greengrass, em-ploys his signature shaky-cam tech-nique, which really encapsulates the ‘close-quarters’ nature of the raid, and the way in which the eyes of both captain and captors dart and weave. The soundtrack is efficient in ramping up the tension; moments of silence combined with booming mu-sic help give a sense of light and shade about the film. This is also achieved through the cinematog-raphy. Captain Phillips has a very strong sense of contrast – the scenes

and action towards the second half of the film flip from day to night, showing to great effect the way in which phillips had to endure many tortuous hours of captivity.

tom hanks’s ability to fully con-vince as the captain is amazing. he never overtly appears as the hero of the piece, simply a man taken captive looking to survive by any means. towards the end he per-forms in a scene of catharsis as emotional as any of his other films (yes, even forrest’s mum dying), and it is both a relief and a tear-jerker to witness the deconstruction of any façade he maintained before.

we are constantly told by Muse, naval operatives, and countless other voices in Captain Phillips that “everything gonna be ok.” the phrase often rings both sincerely and sinisterly, and it is hard to know who to believe. through this mantra, however, the viewer is reminded that, despite appearances, the film and its eventual outcome may not be as bleak as it first appears.

Annie Mullineux

cAptAin phillipsdir: paul Greengrass9/10

Government secrets more or less stayed secret 10 years ago and whistle-blowers were few and far between. But then

along came Julian Assange with wikile-aks, which changed the entire face of whistle-blowing, espionage and indeed intelligence as a whole.

now we have The Fifth Estate, a film about this secret and elusive organisation, based on the book by daniel domscheit-Berg (the former spokesman for wikile-aks) Inside Wikileaks. it has already caused controversy within hours of re-lease as Julian Assange has labelled it a “bad film” from a “toxic book.”

The first surprise of the film is that it’s from daniel’s perspective. while some may wish for the film to be from Assange’s viewpoint, it is clear that we gain a more rounded, yet intangible view of Assange when we view him from the outside.

The film starts with Daniel as an IT guy at a small company, and from this we see his first meeting with Assange at the chaos computer club to the rise and fall of wikileaks. Along this journey we see

the explosive growth of wikileaks from a few files to the leaking of over 90,000 confidential documents about the Iraq war with the Guardian, the New York Times and Der Spiegel all supporting it in a global launch. The film also marks the complex relationship between daniel and Julian, highlighting how we can spend so much time with someone and yet never really know them at all.

The list of positives for this film are huge, but the highest accolade must go to Ben-edict cumberbatch for a stellar portrayal of Julian Assange. he has transformed from his typecast role of eccentric Brit-ish gentleman, to introverted Australian hacker with the sublime skill of a truly out-standing actor. his portrayal of Assange shows a man who exposes thousands of secrets, yet hides all of his own. daniel Bruhl’s performance as daniel domscheit-Berg is not bad either, but the show is sto-len by cumberbatch completely.

The film also utilises many cold light-ing effects and cGi graphics to highlight the importance of technology and its ad-vancement in the modern age, and inte-gration of real news footage to illustrate our current globalised media.

there are negatives, such as the lack of dialogue at certain points and rushed feel throughout the film, but then this all

adds to the air of mys-tery around w i k i l e a k s . it shows that things did happen too quickly, that e v e r y t h i n g cannot be ex p l a i n e d and that A s s a n g e is much more than the two d i m e n -sional hero or villain the news shows.

The Fifth Estate moves quickly and hits hard while hacking into your emotional core, leav-ing you begging that you knew how to write code and to join Assange’s legion of online revolutionaries.

Lewis Colson

the fifth estAtedir: Bill condon8/10

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15friday october 25 2013

this obscure indie film directed by paul wright tells the story of Aaron (George MacKay), a young man from a scottish

fishing village and the only survi-vor of a boat accident that kills his brother Michael (Jordan young) and four other men. outcast by the angry, resentful locals and spurned on by folklore and superstition, Aaron sets out to prove that his brother is still alive and to bring him back home.

But For Those In Peril is certainly not the charming, Life of Pi-like ex-perience that the summary might suggest. It’s not a film to step into lightly or even to enjoy. Merci-fully short at 92 minutes, the film is heavy with an oppressive, al-most unbearable sadness. it’s not the easiest film to watch, but it’s a

gorgeous piece of cinematic art, if you’re willing to get on board.

picking up after the accident, the film tightly follows Aaron as he deals with the loss of his brother. wright’s editing and camerawork are shaky, jumpy and fractured, masterfully reflecting Aaron’s grief and deteriorating mental state.

the script is packed with long pauses, harsh expletives, mumbles and awkward naturalism that ex-pose the raw humanity on display - every scene is beautiful, but awful.

The cast definitely aren’t afraid to dirty themselves with that hu-man ugliness. young up-and-comer MacKay is front-and-cen-tre for the entire piece and carries it like an old pro. As Aaron, his acne-ravaged face is almost constantly fro-zen in a sort of trau-matised vacancy, but he radiates anger, grief, loneliness

and madness brilliantly.A scene he shares with nichola

Burley - who plays his dead broth-er’s fiancée - is a standout moment as he pretends to be Michael to comfort her. here, two young actors show promise for excellent careers ahead. it’s truly traumatic stuff.

The rest of the cast is filled by Brit indie staples like Kate dickie and Michael smiley who all get their little moments to shine. dickie’s moments come towards the end; once when she mournfully signs along to a karaoke version of rob-erta flack’s ‘the first time ever i

saw your face’, and again when she comforts Aaron with an old scottish fairytale. she displays the strength of

a mother alongside drain-ing fragility. the cast is truly

committed and absolutely flaw-less.For about 75 minutes, the film is

a slow-burning, torturous study of

human grief in all its forms. But the finale takes a turn for the grue-some and surreal. the realism melts away into a display of total mad-ness and desperation. the violent, fantastical imagery rounds off the plot perfectly. weird as the ending is, it will linger in the mind.

For Those in Peril certainly is not a film for everyone. It’s harsh, de-pressing, slow and difficult. But, in the right frame of mind, it is a thing of beauty - an emotional, destruc-tive whirlwind. Just don’t take a date.

Rhys Handley

for those in perildir: paul wright9/10

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Ben Scull: Comment Editor

Tom Schneider: Comment Editor

Grace - Jeff Buckley

Croc: Legend of the Gobbos

Vernon God Little - DBC Pierce

Game of Thrones

Withnail and I

Station to Station - David BowieTotal War

Brave New World - Aldous Huxley

Every fortnight, we ask a couple of our editors to pick their Fuse-esque desert island necessities. This issue we ask our comment

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