"The Drop", directed Michaël R Roskam

Movie, 2014

While this is a film with huge potential for failure - a slurring method acting loner, rescued dog etc. - this slow burner builds a tense and twisting plot and genuine foreboding atmosphere. There's also a refreshing straightforward setting and story telling with no artsy tricks, crushing soundtrack or CGI, just the goings on in a bar, its assistant manager and people orbiting him. Slow and glorious for it, even if the pooch occasionally gets tiring.

"I Live Under a Black Sun," by Edith Sitwell

Novel, 1937

Based on the lives and loves of Jonathan Swift, who is here painted as an arrogant consumer of the lives of the two women who love and who almost literally, bodily nourish him. While the novel occasionally judders along, and while it sometimes feels as if the reader is expected to know more about Swift than the layman might, this is a compelling tragedy, with some poetic description which is staggering in its beauty and evocation. A bit a mixed bag, overall, but largely effective in holding the reader's attentions and sympathies.

"The Martian," directed by Ridley Scott

Movie, 2015

Man in space film, which is entertaining enough, but falls between too many different areas as it tries to tackle and ends up feeling, at times, like an all singy-dancey feel good film. Fine if you like that sort of thing. On the way, there are special effects aplenty and some interesting debates - how to grow food in space, how to PR a disaster and how team dynamics work. All great; all easy on the eye. The main character's constant cheeriness is, however, a little difficult to watch and fully believe, although there are a few odd performances (Jeff Daniels particularly) and the plot and pacing might have been a little more interesting.

"13 Ghosts," directed William Castle

Movie, 1960

Take out the outrageous Illusion-O gimmick, which neatly and effectively removes most of the tension in the film and leads in to some fairly tedious special effects, and 13 Ghosts is a pretty effective haunted house movie. While younger characters and cast members grate, Margaret Hamilton (the witch in The Wizard of Oz) is a sinister, enjoyable presence playing a twisted housekeeper along similar lines to Mrs Danvers in Rebecca. Daft hokum, of course, but  watchable and, where there is no call for the Illusion-O viewing goggles, some moments of genuine tension. A strange picture, overall.

Here's a trailer which hints at daftness.

"Spectre", directed Sam Mendes

Movie, 2015

James Bond as you've seen him before, plenty of times. Yes, this is a film which is easy on the eye and there are thrills aplenty, but this doesn't compensate for the trite references to old films in the series, which come thick and fast. Even the plot's premise  - the danger of big data and surveillance - feels like something half-baked and turned up from a few decades back. Blofeld, Aston Martins, fights with Jaws-like assassins on trains, super-villain lairs and, indeed, Spectre abound, but do little to move the franchise on.

London to Paris

Sorry. This isn't one of my pithy book or film reviews, but a call for help. I'm on a sponsored bike ride from London to Paris in September, in memory of my Mum and on behalf of the National Osteoporosis Society. I have a Just Giving page for those who'd like more information....

"The Field of the Cloth of Gold", by Magnus Mills

Novel, 2015

Another super-real world beautifully crafted from the everyday, in which seemingly innocuous comings and goings suggest seismic undercurrents. This time, Mills sets his action in a field at an unspecified time and looks at the inter-relations of different tribes and individuals as they settle down and get on with each other, or fail to do so. The end of the book, after the hints, suggestions and actions preceding it, is wonderfully underplayed but convincingly uneasy. A real submersive, subversive delight.