Dear Reader
Paul Fournel, David Bellos and Jean Jullien
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Old-school publisher meets e-reader: chaos ensues There's a lot of good to be said about publishing,...
You Never Forget Your First: A Biography of George Washington
Book
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AN NPR CONCIERGE BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR "In her...
Gareth von Kallenbach (977 KP) rated Happy Feet Two (2011) in Movies
Aug 7, 2019
Mumble struggles to help Erik with his insecurities and inability to find his own heart song and dance steps. Erik ends up running away from Emperorland with a couple of friends, following the love struck Ramon (Robin Williams). Unsuccessful in love within Mumble’s penguin community, Ramon decides to head back to Adelieland and falls for Carmen (Sophia Vergara) who, of course, plays hard to get. So begins Ramon’s hilarious attempts at trying to win Carmen’s affection. While on their adventure, Erik and company stumble across Sven (Hank Azaria), a puffin that is mistaken for a penguin who can fly. Erik becomes enamored with Sven’s ability to fly and attempts to follow in Sven’s footsteps.
Once Mumble has found the runaway chicks, he forces them to return to Emperorland. Upon their return to home, they find a landslide has caused an iceberg to shift and ends up trapping their colony with no way out. Mumble must find help before it’s too late. In flies the self-help guru and fraud Sven to come and teach the penguins how to fly. Meanwhile, other animals in peril are an elephant seal (Anthony Lapaglia) and a couple of codependent krill named Will (Brad Pitt) and Bill (Matt Damon) who realized that their only place in life is to provide sustenance for the whales. Unwilling to succumb to their fate, the delusional Will forces the terrified Bill to swim away from their swarm and become omnivores in an attempt to move up the food chain.
In the end all these stories tie together to show a strong sense of community among different species. I do believe George Miller seems to have taken more of a commercialized approach when creating this movie. Miller once again attempts to send an eco-message regarding global warming with Happy Feet Two. Unfortunately the sequel’s message does not create the same emotional and heartfelt impact as its predecessor. Miller focused more on entertaining and visuals and less on the actual storyline which was very choppy and quite odd at times.
The animators definitely give Pixar a run for their money with their amazing Antarctica scenery details, their incredible animal close-up shots, the undersea moments with the krill and spectacular action sequences. The movie may not have had the substance of the first movie; however it was definitely enjoyable to watch. There was lots of dancing, singing and great laugh-out-loud moments; an absolute visual delight.
Written in My Heart: Walks Through James Joyce's Dublin
Emily Carson, Mark Traynor and Fuchsia MacAree
Book
James Joyce's Dublin sprawls through the intricate street networks of Dublin's inner city, quaint...
The Hourglass Factory
Book
1912 and London is in turmoil... The suffragette movement is reaching fever pitch but for broke...
All the Presidents Gardens
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The eighteen acres that surround the White House have been an unwitting witness to history-a...
That Swing: Poems, 2008-2016
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In this, his ninth book of poetry, lyric master X. J. Kennedy regales his readers with engaging...
The Magician's Land: Book 3
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"Dark, dangerous and full of twists". (George R. R. Martin, author of Game of Thrones). "Lev...
Troye Sivan recommended The Air Up There (1994) in Movies (curated)
ClareR (5674 KP) rated Killing Jericho in Books
May 28, 2023
Scott Jericho is back living with his traveller fairground family after a prison sentence that saw the end of his career as a CID Police Officer. He had violently attacked a Knight of Saint George - a far right thug he had been interviewing about the death of three Polish children. This also meant that he couldn’t be charged for the crime.
There’s some history of fairground travellers in this - all true, and both interesting and nice to know that we don’t call those more unusual fairground acts “freaks” anymore.
Believe it or not, Jericho has more problems than being an ex-con: he’s using drugs, has boyfriend trouble, and the man he was charged with attacking can’t seem to keep himself away.
Jericho’s life is complicated.
The murders are gruesome and really rather inventive!
And no one is as they seem, either. It’s a dark read.
There are a lot of surprises, and I enjoyed them all!
Many thanks to The Pigeonhole and to William Hussey for reading along too. This is the first of a new series, and I’ll be interested to know what happens to Scott Jericho next!