Jarhead

I went to see Jarhead with Em and Log on Saturday. Based on former Marine Anthony Swofford’s best-selling 2003 book, the film’s about a Swoff (Jake Gyllenhaal) and his time in the ‘Sink’ during the Gulf War.

We follow the Swoff’s sniper/scout platoon from boot camp through to the end of the war. Along the way we begin to feel for the troops, particullaly Swoff and Troy (played by Peter Sarsgaard, who puts in a magnificent performance), and while we hope that they never have to fire their weapons, we also quite want them to “get a kill” – as that is all that some of them want.

The film reminded me a lot of Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket, not surprisingly considering the subject matter and inherent references. I need a second watch but I think this film is up there with those greats. It really shows the way in which war changes people and the effects that this has on society. A must see.

Jarhead: 4/5

Theatre

Another good week has passed. I haven’t seen much of Bob as he’s spent most of the week in his room, but the time we’ve spent have been productive.

Oscar was good, we spent some time looking at lorries on the internet and went for a little walk. I managed to avoid going shopping again thankfully.

Bob and I are currently (when he comes out) writing a letter to the theatres to suggest to them to put Sunset Beach on stage. This is an interesting undertaking which has Bob explaining that we need to list all of that characters so that none get left out.

I’ll be finishing that today no doubt.

Newsvine

I have just been inviited to join the Newsvine private beta and it has already changed how I view news on the web.

Basically Newsvine consists of the Wire and the Vine. The Wire is news from the Associated Press and the Vine is news articles that have been ‘seeded’ by other users onto the site.

Once joined you can read and comment on any news item as well as vote for those you find most interesting. Eventually those stories which have the most votes and/or comments will find their way to the top of the front page: thus in theory the most interesting stories should be the ones that you first see.

As I mentioned above one can also ‘seed’ news that one sees elsewhere onto the site, this can lead to all sorts of different news appearing from sites all over the world.

There is far far more to the site than this, though I won’t write any more for now. It is currently invite only but I have so invites left so if anyone’s interested just leave your email and I’ll see what I can do.

I’m Back

I’ve been so busy the last two weeks so sorry for not writing. My schedule has slowed back to normal now so I should be posting more frequently.

Justin has come and gone, he stayed on my floor for a week during which time we managed to see quite a bit of London and spend quite a lot of money. I also got to see Clare and Sandie and met Justin’s friend Max.

Work has been quite good, Bob has been doing really well, and apart from a few days this week when he wouldn’t come out of his room (because I didn’t want to take a copy of his timetable home with me) we have been getting on vey productively. He still thinks I’m sinful for not believing in God – and thinks that it is very rude to say that ‘someone so important’ doesn’t exist – but I think he quite likes me now.

My last session with Oscar also went well (though I hadn’t seen him for about 3 weeks because he’s been working), we got to play playstation and he showed me his model collection.

Next week the world!!