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Dance For Me (Fenbrook Academy, #1)
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
I received this ARC from the author in exchange for an honest review.

This is about Natasha, a dancer–-ballet being her favourite–-who goes to an audition for a role in an advert but gets distracted during the audition by someone running into the room. Darrell, the distractor, is captivated by her and the ballet she performs and asks her to dance for him as his muse so he can figure out a way to make his latest project work.

Darrell was rather intriguing from the start and I liked how we saw him from Natasha’s POV first before seeing how he came to be at the audition from his own POV.

Helena must have done ballet at some point or this is one really well researched book.

Several chapters had me wanting to look online at the moves Natasha was performing with how well they were written; how beautiful it all sounded. Maybe it was Natasha’s feelings at those points in the book that made them seem so charged and captivating. And this coming from someone who has never had an interest in ballet.

I liked Clarissa. And Neil. And Jasmine. I liked everything!

Would recommend you read this if you like a nice love story. It certainly had me captivated from early on.
  
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Ed O'Brien recommended Screamadelica by Primal Scream in Music (curated)

 
Screamadelica by Primal Scream
Screamadelica by Primal Scream
1991 | Alternative, Indie
8.4 (8 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"Listening to this in Brazil a few years ago was a proper Eureka moment for me. We'd moved to the middle of nowhere for seven months, and I decided to properly have some time properly listening to music, so got a lot of stuff off Thom on a hard drive. I was really into Burial and that side of dubstep back then. Stuff that works perfectly underneath railway arches at 3am strangely enough didn't resonate on the edge of the rainforest, though. What did was Screamadelica. 

I'd first heard Loaded when I was studying at Manchester University in 1990. I remember it coming out after 'Fools Gold' and 'Hallelujah', and seeing Primal Scream on a double-header with Looper. I remember thinking, ah, this is good, a bit different for them, but they're jumping on the bandwagon, aren't they? Later, 'Don't Fight It Feel It' became the ultimate tune of that time for me. But away from that time, this album still stands alone. It's so colourful. It's like gospel dance music. It's got all the euphoria of house music, plus the community and love. It reminded me that that moment in culture wasn't just about the drugs – those drugs were just there to pierce the veil. Music held the ultimate power to bring people up. I want my music to have that joy, that light, that sense of possibility."

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Josh Sadfie recommended Shadows (2005) in Movies (curated)

 
Shadows (2005)
Shadows (2005)
2005 | Comedy, Horror, Mystery
(0 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"I remember when this came out; I was at a restaurant celebrating someone’s birthday, and I walked by a table that was talking about Mike Leigh, I forget what film exactly. But I chimed in and said something hyperbolic. The table remarked that they all worked for Criterion. I joked that I’d thought about tattooing a line across my chest with “Criterion Collection” underneath it (the old iconic Criterion logo design). I then explained our proximity to Ray Carney and our love for Cassavetes. This was the first time I heard that a big box set was coming soon. Cassavetes is a god and a hero. My introduction to his work as a director was A Woman Under the Influence, which I bought a single version of for our mother, who is petrified of the DVD and will never watch it. Bookie, Opening Night, Faces, Shadows, and the later-added Love Streams are film school for a hundred bucks. We watch the master turn actors into people and vice versa, and hold the feeling above anything else. In the words of JC (not a coincidence) in regards to Opening Night, about Hollywood: “It’s about time it took art and said, ‘C’mon, baby! Show me something!’” (Dear Criterion, please absorb Husbands, Minnie and Moskowitz, and Gloria as well.)"

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Josh Sadfie recommended Faces (1968) in Movies (curated)

 
Faces (1968)
Faces (1968)
1968 | Classics, Drama
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"I remember when this came out; I was at a restaurant celebrating someone’s birthday, and I walked by a table that was talking about Mike Leigh, I forget what film exactly. But I chimed in and said something hyperbolic. The table remarked that they all worked for Criterion. I joked that I’d thought about tattooing a line across my chest with “Criterion Collection” underneath it (the old iconic Criterion logo design). I then explained our proximity to Ray Carney and our love for Cassavetes. This was the first time I heard that a big box set was coming soon. Cassavetes is a god and a hero. My introduction to his work as a director was A Woman Under the Influence, which I bought a single version of for our mother, who is petrified of the DVD and will never watch it. Bookie, Opening Night, Faces, Shadows, and the later-added Love Streams are film school for a hundred bucks. We watch the master turn actors into people and vice versa, and hold the feeling above anything else. In the words of JC (not a coincidence) in regards to Opening Night, about Hollywood: “It’s about time it took art and said, ‘C’mon, baby! Show me something!’” (Dear Criterion, please absorb Husbands, Minnie and Moskowitz, and Gloria as well.)"

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A Woman Under the Influence (1975)
A Woman Under the Influence (1975)
1975 | Classics, Drama
(0 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"I remember when this came out; I was at a restaurant celebrating someone’s birthday, and I walked by a table that was talking about Mike Leigh, I forget what film exactly. But I chimed in and said something hyperbolic. The table remarked that they all worked for Criterion. I joked that I’d thought about tattooing a line across my chest with “Criterion Collection” underneath it (the old iconic Criterion logo design). I then explained our proximity to Ray Carney and our love for Cassavetes. This was the first time I heard that a big box set was coming soon. Cassavetes is a god and a hero. My introduction to his work as a director was A Woman Under the Influence, which I bought a single version of for our mother, who is petrified of the DVD and will never watch it. Bookie, Opening Night, Faces, Shadows, and the later-added Love Streams are film school for a hundred bucks. We watch the master turn actors into people and vice versa, and hold the feeling above anything else. In the words of JC (not a coincidence) in regards to Opening Night, about Hollywood: “It’s about time it took art and said, ‘C’mon, baby! Show me something!’” (Dear Criterion, please absorb Husbands, Minnie and Moskowitz, and Gloria as well.)"

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The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976)
The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976)
1976 | Drama
(0 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"I remember when this came out; I was at a restaurant celebrating someone’s birthday, and I walked by a table that was talking about Mike Leigh, I forget what film exactly. But I chimed in and said something hyperbolic. The table remarked that they all worked for Criterion. I joked that I’d thought about tattooing a line across my chest with “Criterion Collection” underneath it (the old iconic Criterion logo design). I then explained our proximity to Ray Carney and our love for Cassavetes. This was the first time I heard that a big box set was coming soon. Cassavetes is a god and a hero. My introduction to his work as a director was A Woman Under the Influence, which I bought a single version of for our mother, who is petrified of the DVD and will never watch it. Bookie, Opening Night, Faces, Shadows, and the later-added Love Streams are film school for a hundred bucks. We watch the master turn actors into people and vice versa, and hold the feeling above anything else. In the words of JC (not a coincidence) in regards to Opening Night, about Hollywood: “It’s about time it took art and said, ‘C’mon, baby! Show me something!’” (Dear Criterion, please absorb Husbands, Minnie and Moskowitz, and Gloria as well.)"

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Josh Sadfie recommended Opening Night (1977) in Movies (curated)

 
Opening Night (1977)
Opening Night (1977)
1977 | Drama
(0 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"I remember when this came out; I was at a restaurant celebrating someone’s birthday, and I walked by a table that was talking about Mike Leigh, I forget what film exactly. But I chimed in and said something hyperbolic. The table remarked that they all worked for Criterion. I joked that I’d thought about tattooing a line across my chest with “Criterion Collection” underneath it (the old iconic Criterion logo design). I then explained our proximity to Ray Carney and our love for Cassavetes. This was the first time I heard that a big box set was coming soon. Cassavetes is a god and a hero. My introduction to his work as a director was A Woman Under the Influence, which I bought a single version of for our mother, who is petrified of the DVD and will never watch it. Bookie, Opening Night, Faces, Shadows, and the later-added Love Streams are film school for a hundred bucks. We watch the master turn actors into people and vice versa, and hold the feeling above anything else. In the words of JC (not a coincidence) in regards to Opening Night, about Hollywood: “It’s about time it took art and said, ‘C’mon, baby! Show me something!’” (Dear Criterion, please absorb Husbands, Minnie and Moskowitz, and Gloria as well.)"

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Heather Cranmer (2721 KP) created a post

May 8, 2021  
On my blog today, gaze upon the Christian thriller THE PARIS BETRAYAL by James R. Hannibal, and learn some interesting spy hacks! Enter this amazing giveaway to win a print copy of the book, a really cool spy camera pen, and a $10 Starbucks gift card!

https://alltheupsandowns.blogspot.com/2021/05/book-blog-tour-and-giveaway-paris.html

**BOOK SYNOPSIS**
After a rough mission in Rome involving the discovery of a devastating bioweapon, Company spy Ben Calix returns to Paris to find his perfectly ordered world has collapsed. A sniper attack. An ambush. A call for help that brings French SWAT forces down on his head. Ben is out. This is a severance--reserved for incompetents and traitors.

Searching for answers and anticipating a coming attack, Ben and a woman swept up in his misfortunes must travel across Europe to find the sniper who tried to kill him, the medic who saved his life, the schoolmaster who trained him, and an upstart hacker from his former team. More than that, Ben must come to grips with his own insignificance as the Company's plan to stop Leviathan from unleashing the bioweapon at any cost moves forward without him--and he struggles against the infection that is swiftly claiming territory within his own body.

Award-winning author James R. Hannibal ratchets up the tension on every page of this suspenseful new thriller.
     
The Battle of Algiers (1966)
The Battle of Algiers (1966)
1966 | Classics, Drama, War
7.4 (8 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"The notion of making a fiction — meaning you look at it and you think it’s all documentary footage, but it’s all shot. And the reality factor of that is something that makes you able to escape into the film; the fabric of that fiction is so believable and completely knitted together that you buy the proposition of the film — even when you see people getting shot and there’s no blood coming out of their bodies or whatever. There’s something about shooting something [in black and white] — and I’m talking about two movies that are in black and white, we should say, except for the part [in Andrei Rublev] where they show the color of the fresco of the Russian icons. I really like movies that are in black and white, because you feel like you are watching a movie. We associate it with things that were filmed at that time, that would have been filmed in black and white. So there are different concessions and commitments to make to a limited palette for a reason. When I make a movie like Miral, there’s a kind of reversal stock that I’m using outside and sometimes it really feels like Technicolor, like a movie like Exodus, and there are other moments when it’s rougher and it feels like The Bad Lieutenant, or something like that."

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Architecture & Morality by Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark
Architecture & Morality by Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark
1981 | Pop
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"Similar time to The Human League obviously - it's just another synth-pop classic. It's when O.M.D. still had a much more experimental edge and yet similarly to the League, they had some stonking tunes, the two 'Joan Of Arc' ones, and 'Souvenir's on that as well, which I absolutely adore. I remember I bought the single of 'Souvenir' and probably the single record that I have played most in my life. I just kept it on repeat on our old record player in the house. That would have been in Enniskillen Woolworth's, probably along with Roland Rat or something - everybody buys shit records at the time as well and accidentally buys good ones when you're that young. I hold all of the above in mind when writing music and yet you're also trying to expunge them from your mind as well! It's a very complicated process - you can't help being the sum of your parts and you can't help little bits of the things you love coming out. If a certain chord does a certain thing in one of those songs that makes you kind of tingle, then you're looking for the tingle, but you're not looking to do it with the same chord, if you know what I mean! So you might use the same kind of mechanics but not the same notes."

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