The Bearded Trio

It's an Indiana Jones movie. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.  IT IS an Indiana Jones movie without a shadow of a doubt.  The less than stellar reviews that begun at Cannes and simmered away ever since ultimately played on my expectations and I wasn't expecting much before watching Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny for the first time.  Maybe that was a good thing?   The opening twenty minute scene with a young Indiana Jones played at an immense pace, what you would expect from any adventure movie let alone an Indiana Jones one.  I can honestly say if those twenty minutes were all I got from the movie then I would have been satisfied.  Nice plus points for the casting having such a fantastic actor such as Toby Jones to accompany Indy.  Fun fact: Toby Jones character in The Detectorists is called Lance and the artifact they are after in the beginning is also a Lance.  Okay, maybe not a fun fact but still made me smile.  The de-agin...

Artist: C.A. Martin APOLLO 13 - A Retrospective Look Back By Douglas Meacham U.S. Release Date: June 30, 1995 Starring: Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, Bill Paxton Music by: James Horner Directed by: Ron Howard “HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM!” - Jim Lovell On April 13, 1970, the Apollo 13 spacecraft was three days into its voyage to the Moon. Its lunar module was supposed to be the third manned spacecraft ever to land on the surface. But instead, it ended up serving as a lifeboat for three astronauts striving to stay alive after a routine procedural check of their service module goes wrong. Twenty-five years later, a film was made to accurately portray the events of the mission that was dubbed “the successful failure.” Directed by Ron Howard, known for hits like COCOON and WILLOW, and starring America’s then leading man Tom Hanks as the spacecraft’s commander Jim Lovell, along with Kevin Bacon as command module pilot Jack Swigert and Bill Paxton as lunar module pilot Fred Haise, the...

The Art of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker I'm always a little weary about an "art of" book as some can be a lazy affair.  I've purchased similar books in the past and been disappointed that they have been just pages and pages of concept artwork and no real explanation.  No behind-the-scenes information or thought process.  But, thankfully The Art of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is not one of these examples.  Instead it's a book packed with beautiful artwork as you would expect but also a detailed look into the making of a movie and in particular how clever, talented people brought a Star Wars movie to the big screen. The book has a foreword by Doug Chiang who is an Academy Award-winning artist, author and production designer.  He is the creative designer for ILM and worked on movies such as Terminator 2, Forrest Gump and Star Wars Episode I and II.  We also get an extensive "who's who,"  a list of names and what they did behind the scen...

Movies In VR Are A Thing Of Beauty Recently, I decided to enter the Oasis and bought myself an Oculus Go .  If you're not familiar with what this is, it's basically an inexpensive introduction to the world of VR (Virtual Reality.)  It's a standalone device without the needs for cables that, although doesn't track your body movement does track your head movement giving the full VR experience.  It cost me £149 from Amazon (this is not a sponsored post) and I was eager to get my first taster of home VR.  Spoiler: I was not disappointed! The model I bought was the 32gb version, enough to see me install the apps I needed and copy across a few movies from my collection.  This process is simple.  Using the standard micro USB cable that is supplied, just plug it into your PC and copy your files across.  Since I had a few Star Wars movies this was my first choice. Next, I downloaded an app from the Oculus store called Skybox  which reads files in...

David Gawne Takes A Look To See Just How Good Jurassic Park 4K Is I t was Christmas `94 when Jurassic Park made its home video release debut. I can still remember coming home from school and holding the special fossil case VHS edition of Jurassic Park, knowing that the movie that changed my life was inside. I must have watched that tape over a hundred times. In 2000, both Jurassic Park and The Lost World were released on DVD. We could finally experience these movies without all the hiss and other anomalies that plagued VHS tapes. In 2011, all three movies were released on Blu-ray, but there was always something that bothered me about the transfers, particularly Jurassic Park; the warm, earthy colours of Isla Nublar were suddenly lacking. In 2013 the 3D edition was released but the general complaint was the overuse of DNR which removed some of the grain, thus robbing the picture of some finer detail. This was a shame as i loved the colours of the 3D version but something still was...

Unboxing 'The Amazing Mystery Box' L ast week I was lucky enough to attend Film & Comic Con, Cardiff at the Motorpoint Arena.  While I was at the Showmasters event I came across a stall stacked with these mysterious boxes.  "The Amazing Mystery Box" was the name of the stall and they were promoting a kind of loot crate subscription.  They were selling one off boxes and I fancied purchasing one to see what was in the box.  Curiosity got the better of me.  After a quick chat with the owner who said they understand what fans want and try to get official merchandise.  In fact most of the Doctor Who stuff has come from the now sadly closed Doctor Who Experience gift shop that was in Cardiff Bay.  Anyway, I asked if he had a theme related to The Bearded Trio and he keenly handed over a Star Wars themed box.  He promised me that the £19.99 boxes will have at least £40 worth of goodies and if you want to splash out a bit more then there's a box ...

Can Star Wars: Jedi Challenges Make You Feel Like A Jedi? Star Wars: Jedi Challenges is a neat all in one AR (Augmented Reality) package for your phone that will put you in the Star Wars universe right from the comfort of your living room.  The New Multiplayer Option Allows Jedi battles between loved ones. What's in the box? Star Wars: Jedi Challenges has landed on my doorstep and I couldn't wait to get my hands on this exciting bit of tech.  I'm a sucker for things that come in good packaging and straight away Star Wars: Jedi Challenges gets top marks.  All the kit is neatly packaged in one box with a pleasing feel to the whole thing.  It projects quality.  A good start. That box was satisfying to open In the box you get a decent mock up of a nice shiny lightsaber.  It's a little on the light side (weight not Force.)  Out of the box it was three quarters charged which was convenient because you soon realise there are three things you nee...

A Review Of Ready Player One By A Fan Of Steven Spielberg Ready Player One has hit the big screens and don't worry, it's good.  Phew!   From the first moment the screen fades in with the now associated 'Jump' by Van Halen to the final climatic scenes with the UPS van under attack, accompanied by Back to the Future soundtrack cues, this film is a dream for anyone who is a fan of popular culture especially from the 1980's. But, you probably knew that anyway.  After all, retro is most definitely in and this film has retro references by the Big Trak load.  Some references are obvious but others are a blink and you'll miss it.  Look out for the "Re-Elect Mayor Goldie Wilson" campaign poster, a tip of the hat to Terminator with the thumbs up and of course plenty of Back to the Future references with Alan Silvestri's original soundtrack. Movie Or The Book? The movie version of Ernest Cline's Ready Player One is different to the book but tha...

Have you ever thought you could do a better job than Elon Musk?  Do you wish you had your own space agency like SpaceX?  How about having millions of dollars at your disposal and a vision of getting to Mars?  Well, Surviving Mars may just satisfy your urge to get to the red planet. Surviving Mars is a construction and management game for PC, Xbox One and PS4 that sees you launching a mission to Mars with the ultimate intention of getting people up to the red planet and self-sustained.  The game looks gorgeous and is an extremely polished game.  Well, that’s no surprise as it’s brought to us by Haemimont Games and those clever people brought us the Tropico series. You start out with decisions to make.  Mission Sponsors will govern your starting budget and what perks you receive.  Choose International Mars Mission as your sponsor and you will start with a bucket load of money but choose SpaceY and you have less money but get an extra rocket to lau...

'From Bedrooms to Billions: The Amiga Years!' is a feature film documentary that takes you on a detailed, and I mean detailed journey through the development, and life of the Commodore Amiga. If you grew up in the 80's and 90's then you will know how cool the Amiga was.  I remember the first time I powered up my Commodore Amiga 500 and dropped 'Shadow of the Beast' into the disk drive.  I was blown away by the graphics, sound and music.  Especially as my previous computer was a trusty ZX Spectrum and that's how it was for millions of computer users in the late 80's.  Going from a Speccy or C64 to this leviathan, this monster of a machine was mind blowing. The Amiga introduced me, for the first time to classic games such as the mighty absorbing Lucasarts titles.  The Secret of Monkey Island and Indiana Jones were just a few games that were new to me and it was the Amiga that allowed me to experience the talents of Ron Gilbert and Tim Schafer for...

It's been 20 years since Bill Pullman's character in Independence Day picked up a microphone and passionately told the pilots in waiting that 'we will not quietly into the night, we will not vanish without a fight etc etc, you get the idea.  But it's hard to think it was 1996 when the aliens first came to Earth and took out some of our favourite landmarks. Independence Day: Resurgence is set, conveniently 20 years after ID4 and since 1996 the people of Earth have set aside their differences, pulled together and thanks to alien technology integration enjoyed a higher quality of life.  As a result of this new technology they've also boosted the Earth defenses and prepared for another invasion.  This time, naively the human race think they're ready.  As you can guess, they're not. As you've probably gathered by now the aliens return bigger, much much bigger.  In fact we first see the mother ship ripping through the moon, taking out the defenses se...