Shrug.

Sue me.

5 things of note from this past week -

1. Travelling Light @ The National Theatre. Admittedly my tickets were freebies from a friend but still, it’s still definitely worth seeing. So what if the accents are ropey at times and who cares if the script is slightly clunky in places – it was lovely little piece of theatre.
   .
2. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol @ The IMAX!! Bloody good and again, well worth seeing  (at THE IMAX though, obviously).
   .
3. #DriveTime – aka ‘tweet along with Drive’ – came and went. It was fun, but could it have been better?
   .
4. The Descendents (w/ G Clooney). Dead good.; it just kinda… happens. He’s bloody brilliant actually, best thing/most nuanced performance since Michael Clayton. Yep. You should see that too.
   .
5. The future arrived, via my iPad. Still learning. Amazing.
   .

Bonuses: Sleb spotting in Soho, covered in snow at Speakeasys in Clapham and some gorgeous MEGACITY photography up in Leeds.

Drive: a stunning, nay breathtaking, film from 2011 (some would argue THE film of 2011). Woefully ignored by the Academy but adored by fans worldwide, its a glorious tale of love-driven revenge told through the haze of 70′s LA neon with a soundtrack to match.

Of Drive, I am a fan.

On Monday, Jan 30th 2012, Drive got its UK home release on both DVD and Blu-ray and, to celebrate said launch, film-studio-friendly agency, Think Jam, sent out early copies of the film out to a select group of fans on Twitter.

The aim? To kick-start a pre-scheduled participatory/group viewing, snappily referred to as #DriveTime.

Nice idea.

But not everyone agreed -

Dan has a point.

In fact, the whole conversation between him and Mike is worth a look (especially as both have proven experience in this kind of marketing). I stumbled across the conversation between the two of them after the film had finished, however found myself unknowingly agreeing with them midway through.

That aside, there’s also the very real issue of SPOILERS.

I would be gutted if someone I followed [on Twitter] unwittingly gave away key plot points throughout any film that I was yet to see (especially on THE DAY of its home release, ie; if you didn’t see it at the cinema then you’re stuffed). In fact, so much did it concern me that I issued my own warning before the film started.

Those issues aside, the ‘event’ seemed to go well. So well in fact, that my friend and I started kicking around some ideas around data visualisation that could work alongside it – yes, that’s right, we’re data geeks.

Bear with me, this is where things get interesting -

Data Visualisation around group events is nothing new, see The New York Times and the Super Bowl or before that, The Guardian and the World Cup; with swathes of data, you can make beautiful, beautiful visualisations.

But these events, they’re huge, global happenings with hundreds of thousands of tweets to process, giving you an extremely granular level of preciseness that you wouldn’t find with say, 1200 or so tweets… right?

Well, ish.

“…I bet they haven’t sold it in.”

One of the great things about these kinds of social media campaigns is that the data is (relatively) free and available for anyone to access. So what if you could steal the data from the Drive activity and not only present it back in a gorgeous fashion, but also demonstrate your skill as a potential new partner in doing so?

“Could you piggy-back another agency’s paid activity to showcase your own?”

Well, as I said, the data is there. So all you would need to do is farm that information and go from there… right?

Search term: “#DRIVETIME” – parameters 30-31 Jan 2012 – network: ‘TWITTER’ -

Export as .csv, group & subtotal the number of tweets by time published and… Voilà!

Look at that lovely data.

I’ve cleaned it up somewhat (only showing the data between 7pm and 10pm – the film started at 8pm) but you can clearly see the flurry of activity that happened throughout.

Now, we can sexify this chart (thanks Robbie) and we can also actually map the highlights of the film against the peaks and troughs of conversation.

A – 8pm: the film startsB – End of [the awesome] opening sequence, ‘Night Call‘ kicks in
C – The Driver meets the girl for the first time – it’s encapsulating
D – Combination of ‘Under your Spell‘ starting + a key killer quote from our hero
E – Sequence of Driver and Irene spending time together [intense]
F – That elevator scene
G – Dip for a(nother) particularly violent piece
H – Film ends, people loved it and tweet according

What are the takeaways from this exercise?

1. If you’re planning a scheduled viewing (over social media) make it both a) a universally accepted film (read: a classic that most people have seen) and b) perhaps one that’s not so visually sumptuous and arresting.
   .
2. Think about THE DATA. Alright there was a Storify after the fact, but if me and my friends can throw together a crude visualisation of what our collective tweets look like… then Christ, what else is possible?

Which in turn asks a bigger question:

If today’s brands (and consumers) are ready to remix anything and everything, what’s to stop the agencies of tomorrow doing the same?

..oh and look, no spoilers.

1. Troll Hunter! I arrived home yesterday to discover that someone had sent me both the newly-released Blu-Ray of  Troll Hunter as well as a rather funky matching t-shirt. Which in turn meant that last night I finally got to watch a film that I’ve been busting to watch for AGES. You’ll be pleased to hear I was not disappointed and – freebies aside – I’d genuinely recommend seeking it out for its pure scandinavian bonkersness alone.
   .
2. Rubbish QR Codes. I spotted this ridiculous QR code placement on the tube earlier this week and popped it up on Flickr without thinking about it. Jonathan Waddingham spotted it and, before we knew it, a whole new QRFail blog had been set up. I love Twitter for this kind of stuff. Good work, friends.
   .
3. #CommsChat. The engagement currency post from Jan 11th got a fair bit of pick up [Huzzah!] and as such, Communicate Magazine asked me to host their weekly Twitter chat with my blog post as the theme. Cracking stuff, with some really nice banter too. Worth a look.
   .
4. The Marketing Academy opened up nominations for their third year of scholars this past week and – having been a part of the successful first year of entrants – I honestly cannot recommend this enough.
   If you know of a high-potential, rising star in the field of advertising, communications or marketing, why not nominate them today?
   .
5. Beef Welly! I love cooking. But last week I had guests over and one particular guest insisted on putting together a Beef Wellington with not only the best damn piece of beef I’ve ever laid eyes on (thank you Ginger Pig) but also the finest homemade meal finesse I ever did see.
   It was my first and it was superb. Try it.

It’s old, I know. But I fancied sharing it.

In short: the best Transformers film to date*
*Not exactly a hard thing

High points

• 1960s!
• OMFG! BEST TRANSFORMING SCENE… EVER!
• EPIC BATTLES
• SENTINEL PRIME!

Low points

• THE END IS HORRIFIC
• WHY IS MEGATRON IN A SCARF?
• MEGATRON / NEW GF SCENE OF FAIL

Going to the NYC premiere was fun (as was the Michael Bay screening in Miami), but the film – although featuring several rather spectacular set pieces – was not awesome. Figured the best way to illustrate this was through the above ‘interest curve’ idea that I nicked borrowed from Total Film.

S’all I got.

Stunning, vicious, cold, visceral, glorious, sexually-charged, breathtaking, chilling, gorgeous, arresting – DRIVE is one of my films of the year.

Ryan Gosling is silent and broody to the point of irritation, but carries the weight and predatory confidence of the deadliest scorpion; deadly, quiet, lethal. His ‘Driver’ is an anti-hero of our generation.

The 80s vibe, that riffs from the opening credits, through the electro synth soundtrack and down to the inevitable, violent crescendo, is a perfect fit for the squalid neon backdrop of downtown LA.. But, despite the retro undercurrent, this is a thoroughly modern piece of cinema.

Its dark, foreboding symbolism mixed with an almost continual referential nod to classics gone by (Hallowe’en, Bullit, Scarface to name but three) creates a kaleidoscope of  imagery that – even at its most gruesome – is impossible to turn away from. The use of light, colour, sound, words… or lack thereof on all counts… is encapsulating.

I am in love with this film.

See it.

NB: I’ve just IMDb’d the director, Nicolas Winding Refn, and it turns out he’s directed two films that I’ve been busting to see for ages: Valhalla Rising and Bronson.

They’re next.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is a stunning film.

The original, gut-wrenching thriller smashed into my face like an iced bucket of water; it was fresh, cold and very, very dark. I loved it. Admittedly, I am yet to see Hornet’s Nest or Played with Fire.

(Nor have I read the books but I’m sure that’ll change shortly)

However, something I wanted to share today is this awesome trailer for the US re-make of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Two words that should send a shudder down any film purist’s back are ‘US’ and ‘Re-Make’ but, this is Fincher we’re talking about kids. David. Fincher.

His last film, The Social Network, was very, very good. The first trailer, which dropped back in July 2010, showed that (with such contentious source material) he really meant business.

I think it’s fairly safe to say that this time ’round, he’s done it again.

It drives and it beats and it rages. Like the film itself will do so too, I’m sure. Bring it Fincher, I can’t wait.

Finally, before I go, I have to share one more thing. There’s a new Muppet film coming soon (no, really) and, to help build buzz and interest, they’ve been gently ripping off the trailers from other upcoming films. Dragon Tattoo is no exception.

This, is perfect.

Note: this is not your average email, but we’ll come to that shortly.

If you’ve not seen the film before (I haven’t), it’s about a teenage girl (the amazing Saoirse Ronan) who has been trained by her ex-CIA father (Eric Bana) to basically be a complete bad-ass. Think Hit-Girl from Kick-Ass [but slightly older and with less pink wig-ness] and you’re probably halfway there.

Anyway, like I said, she’s been trained to be THE PERFECT ASSASSIN and then well, from what I can see from the trailer, Cate Blanchett turns up and the proverbial really hits the fan.

Speaking of which, the trailer is worth a look -

What do you think? I missed this at the cinema as I had only just got back from my mad trip across Siberia, but it does actually look quite good. IMDb gives it a solid 7/10 and, I think I probably will pick this up at some point also.

So, why am I blogging about it? Given that a) I haven’t actually seen it yet and b) although the film looks good, it doesn’t seem to be the kind of epic masterpiece that normally drives me to put e-pen to e-paper.

Well, it’s that email I mentioned at the top. It would seem that HMV and Universal have teamed up to create a rather awesome Foursquare-based treasure hunt across three major cities in the UK (London, Birmingham and Manchester) that kicks off this weekend.

Based around the central themes of the film, each hunt contains six codes that need cracking and from there you end up with six locations that need checking into.

The prize for completing said task? Er.. a weekend in Berlin! Sweet.

If you’re any of the above cities, your orders are available c/o The Galinka Project (but be quick, you only have until Monday). In the meantime, I have codes to crack.

Catch you later.

2. This trailer for new TV series ‘AWAKE‘ just dropped and it looks immense.

via the never-ending blog of awesome that is, Super Punch

Let’s get this straight – I am a geek.

Wolverine #90 got me into comic books and since that fateful day in 1995 I have dipped in and out of the comic book universe as I saw fit. In fact, tracing it back further still, growing up watching Christopher Reeve save the world as Superman influenced my life with and love of the superhero genre, definitely. But we’ll come back to him later.

Back at the turn of the millennium, Bryan Singer, whose directorial arrival was heralded by the sublime Usual Suspects, was tasked with bringing the world’s most unluckiest superheroes to the big screen.

To be fair to the guy, he didn’t do a bad job. Generally considered to be more of a taster of things to come, the first X-Men film definitely proved the concept, and when X-Men 2 (X2) arrived, we finally saw Singer’s vision fully coloured in before our eyes; Wolverine cut-loose, cameos-a-plenty and of course, that epic epic Nightcrawler opener.

Excellent stuff.

Since then though, with the X-Men at least, we have not been so lucky. X3: The Last Stand was frankly, terrible. A rushed schedule (largely in part to a last minute director change) not helping much and what with Mr Singer departing to work on [the extremely underrated] Superman Returns, the wheel was left unchecked and the series lost its course.

The less said about X:Men Origins: Wolverine the better.

Which brings us to First Class.

A few years ago the ‘Origins’ moniker was attached to a number of X-Projects (with Wolverine getting the first stab, so to speak) and First Class was one of them. When the news broke that the film was going ahead, it was promising to say the least.

First off, irrespective of takings (both X3 and XO:W both broke $200m at the box office) the studio knew they had to do something to prevent yet another bad X-film being made. This is a good sign. Second?  Singer was back. This time taking a writer/producer credit and – in a match that seems to be made in geek heaven – Jane Goldman and Matthew Vaughn (fresh from their own successes on the fantastic comic book adap, Kick-Ass), stepped into the roles of screenplay and director respectively.

The Gods were smiling.

But then, reports of a rushed production started appearing, followed by a poorly received above the line campaign and, to top it all off, every time a set pic was leaked, the ‘fans’ heaped scorn upon a franchise that was already fighting an uphill battle. Not cool.

When then trailer finally dropped, people did not know what to expect –

“Hang on, this actually looks quite good…”

Four months later, tickets were purchased and with much trepidation, we entered the cinema. Set in 1962, just before and during the Cuban missile crisis, First Class riffs on its 60s backdrop perfectly. With retro black lines drawn across the inevitable training montage scenes as well as a very suave, almost Austin Powers-like, Charles Xavier – brought to life by my second favourite actor in this film (I have a top three), James McAvoy. The time of the piece is set perfectly and trust me, it works.

Coming in third in the aforementioned trio of awesome, comes Kevin Bacon as the nefarious Sebastian Shaw. Hell-bent on world domination through a hitler-esque survival of the fittest, Bacon excels here. Fans of the books will understand that physically, in build at least, the two aren’t exactly similar however, with a combination of sheer stage screen presence and the film’s iteration of Shaw’s mutant power, this is swiftly forgotten – Kevin Bacon is Sebastian Shaw.

In at number one, our star of the show, Erik Lensherr – aka – Magneto.

Brought to life magnificently by Michael Fassbender. The vengeful intensity that he brings to Magneto’s early years is completely believeable and, once his solo mission of revenge comes to the end of its first chapter, you understand completely why people are already calling Fassbender out as the next James Bond. Seriously.

The rest? Mystique and Beast (who share a number of interesting moments together) are noteworthy as is The White Queen, Emma Frost. However, the others are fairly forgettable. Perhaps it’s only Banshee’s Irish charm that keeps him from fading from my memory… Additionally, whilst Riptide manages to get through the film without uttering a single word, the award for most criminally under-used character goes to Azazel.

In comic book lore, Azazel is the father of X2’s Nightcrawler and, colouration aside, shares a similar look and power of his future son. It’s just a shame then that his [slightly russian?] origin was not explored further. But hey, there’s always future films – right?

Let’s be clear; X-Men: First Class is by far and away the best X-Men film to date. Given that X2 set the standard pretty high, this is praise indeed – especially for a franchise that was close to coming to an end.

Finally, don’t try and worry yourself about the time line too much; if you work under the assumption that Singer ‘did a Superman’ and ignored the third and fourth films in the series, then they kind of plug in together nicely. You learn how and why Mystique is the way she is, why Magneto is the way he is and – crucially – what happens after a young Erik Lensherr is spotted bending gates in a Nazi concentration camp.

In closing; if you’re a geek (and can forgive a bit liberty thievery here and there), you’ll get a kick out of this. If you’re not, it’s still a bloody good, almost caper-esque, action flick.
I’ll be honest with you, I didn’t leave the cinema completely blown away but now, a few days on from seeing the film, it has definitely grown on me.

Go see it.

…or lack thereof

If you have never seen Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, stop reading now. Immediately. Get yourself over to Play or Amazon or something and go get yourself a copy. Order it, download it, watch it and then come back.

Right, everyone else – still here? Good.

Believe it or not I managed to make it to my 17th year without ever seeing this film. My good friend Bodger, upon discovering my apparent deprived childhood would not let me leave his house again until I had seen it. Twice. Needless to say we were late for college that day.

Many, many things have been said about this film – none of which I’m going to try and emulate or even beat (perhaps another time), however one area that’s not touched upon that often is that of the awesome soundtrack to the film.

From the manic synths of Sigue Sigue Sputnik through to the soft, dulcet tones of The Smiths; the Ferris Bueller’s Day Off OST is a wonder to behold. Except… it doesn’t actually exist.

That’s right, perhaps one of the most bizarre yet luminescent and nostalgic collections of music ever to placed into one film was never actually released as an album.
The reason? The director, the supremely talented John Hughes, was worried about the mix of songs being ‘too eclectic’ to see as an album.

According to Wikipedia, he said:

“The only official soundtrack that Ferris Bueller’s Day Off ever had was for the mailing list. A&M was very angry with me over that; they begged me to put one out, but I thought “who’d want all of these songs?” I mean, would kids want “Danke Schoen” and “Oh Yeah” on the same record? They probably already had “Twist and Shout,” or their parents did, and to put all of those together with the more contemporary stuff, like the (English) Beat – I just didn’t think anybody would like it. But I did put together a seven-inch of the two songs I owned the rights to – “Beat City” on one side, and… I forget, one of the other English bands on the soundtrack… and sent that to the mailing list. By ’86, ’87, it was costing us $30 a piece to mail out 100,000 packages. But it was a labor of love.”

Amazing.

Thanks to a mixbag of research and Wikipedia, I’ve managed to hunt down a full track list for what would’ve been the FDO:OST.

1. “Love Missile F1-11″ (Extended Version) by Sigue Sigue Sputnik
2. “Jeannie” (Theme from I Dream of Jeannie)
3. “Beat City” by The Flowerpot Men
4. “Main Title / Rebel Blockade Runner” by John Williams (From, Star Wars)
5. “Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want” (instrumental) by The Dream Academy (a cover of a song by The Smiths)
6. “Menuet Célèbre” by (Zagreb Philharmonic Chamber Studio)
7. “Danke Schoen” by Wayne Newton
8. “Twist and Shout” by The Beatles
9. “Radio People” by Zapp
10. “I’m Afraid” by Blue Room
11. “Taking the Day Off” by General Public
12. “The Edge of Forever” by The Dream Academy
13. “March of the Swivelheads” (a remix of “Rotating Head”) by The (English) Beat
14. “Oh Yeah” by Yello
15. “BAD” by Big Audio Dynamite

And – minus a few that I couldn’t find in the library – I’ve managed to throw [most of] them down into a handy little Spotify playlist.

Enjoy.