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Awix (3310 KP) rated The Gorgon (1964) in Movies

Feb 10, 2018 (Updated Feb 10, 2018)

The Gorgon (1964)

1964 | Horror, Mystery, Sci-Fi

6.0

(2 Ratings)

Movie Rating

Every Day a Bad Hair Day

Hammer horror from the studio's imperial phase, with the period setting and star names (Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing) that might lead one to expect something quite distinguished. However, the premise is such an odd one - a monster from Greek mythology is lurking in German-occupied Europe, petrifying the unwary - that the film-makers really struggle to know what to do with it, settling in the end for a story structure partly knocked off from the less interesting kind of werewolf movie.

Well-directed in parts, with some good imagery and set piece scenes, but the movie struggles to give the cast the material they deserve and the meandering and repetitive storyline can only charitably be described as a plot. All a bit bleak and cheerless; inevitably comes across as slightly misogynistic too.

Kudos

Cori June (3033 KP) rated Tiger's Curse (The Tiger Saga, #1) in Books

Dec 3, 2018

Tiger's Curse (The Tiger Saga, #1)

Colleen Houck | 2011 | Romance, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult (YA)

8.6

(8 Ratings)

Book Rating

3.5 stars. I have read this book multiple times although it has been a while. I still enjoy the characters although the love aspect is a little trite to me. Kelsey is a great character full of emotion if a little naive and stubborn. Yes, there are somethings that happen too easily for her and she is a bit more go with the flow than one would really expect however it doesnt distract from the whole of the story. As a world building book i found it quite enjoyable and a pleasant read. Even if romance isn't your thing (it's not mine) the cross-cultural mythology is fantastic, literary licencing or not. Also some of the side characters are a little more than stereotypes which is a reason for the half star. The imagery is wonderful.

Kudos

Awix (3310 KP) rated The King in Yellow in Books

Aug 12, 2019 (Updated Aug 12, 2019)

The King in Yellow

Robert W. Chambers | 1895 | Fiction & Poetry, Horror, Romance

7.0

(1 Ratings)

Book Rating

Much-mentioned but seemingly little-read collection of short stories by Robert Chambers. The anthology owes most of its fame to the fact that HP Lovecraft was sufficiently impressed by some of the stories to retroactively incorporate them into his own mythology, something Lovecraft's disciples built upon with more energy than finesse.

The best of these stories do have a sense of subliminal encroaching madness and unease, as symbolised by the mysterious play mentioned in the title and its associated motifs, which is very impressively created. However, much of the remainder is a set of essentially interchangeable tales of rich young Americans studying art in Paris and swooning over beautiful young mademoiselles; they are quite heavy going and possibly not worth the effort of reading. The opening few fantasy stories are very good, on the whole; the rest not so much.

Kudos

Deborah (162 KP) rated Teddy Bears Tupperware and Sweet Fanny Adams in Books

Dec 21, 2018

Could have been really interesting, but it didn't work. It was too superficial and there were too many errors - some of them fairly elementary. If an author is trying to tell you that Elizabeth I was the niece of Mary I and that Jonathan Swift wrote Robinson Crusoe (although weirdly, later in the book the author is correctly identified as Daniel Defoe - not sure if it makes things better or worse!) then you can't put much faith in what else has been written. In other cases we are given stories to then be told that the use of the word/phrase precedes the aforementioned anecdote by however many years!

I think an approach on theme (mythology, science & maths etc) might have worked than just an alphabetical listing too, but the dip-in type of book can be quite popular in some quarters.