Disclaimer
The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent anyone else's view in any way, including those of my employer.
© Copyright 2005
The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent anyone else's view in any way, including those of my employer.
© Copyright 2005
Following the Madonna news this week, the Sun has the best pun headline - which for once made me chuckle 
If the page disappears - Madonna & Ze Big Bruises
![You\'re Beautiful [CD 1]](http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B0009K9P3Y.02._SCTHUMBZZZ_.jpg)
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Not since 1995 has an artist held the top spot on both the singles and albums charts for five weeks. The last person to do this was Celine Dion with Think Twice and The Colour Of My Love. James Blunt manages to keep the top singles spot despite registering sales of only 35,000 a comparatively low figure for #1s this year. Wit no major new releases this week, it is possible that he’ll get another week at #1, but if the sales for this week is anything to go by, it will be with the lowest ever sales for a #1. The album sales are about 40,000 ahead of Coldplay, so he is likely to stay on top of the album chart for a few more weeks at least.
On the singles charts, some normality returns with three new entries in the Top 5, with the new Craig David song leading the way. This is a return to chart form for him after the #43 peak of his last song. Kaiser Chiefs fall a few places, but as this is based on download sales, this is not too bad. The song should re-enter higher when the physical single is released. On the album chart they climb one position to #3 - a move which takes them back to the peak position of their debut. Madeleine Peyroux makes another large leap up the charts - 52-28-11 - so is surely destined for the Top 10 next week. This climb may be due to television advertising that has been going on recently, and partly due to the current liking for jazz-type artists lke Norah Jones, Joss Stone etc. #1 singles sales this year: |
The Island (imdb)
My rating: 3 out of 5
This film is meant primarily as a comment about cloning, stem cell research, etc, and the perils of doing such a thing. This is taken to extremes in some ways in the film in that the ‘body parts’ have their own lives, even if it is in a very Orwellian environment where everything is monitored so that the clones are in perfect condition when they are required.
During the film there are some way over the top scenes, for example falling down the side of the building, and some awkward camera angles when the characters are running around, which does make it hard to work out what’s going on sometimes, but it’s mostly OK. There’s also many product placements during the film, some of which look out of place, for example the XBox logo while playing the holographic fight. Some of the technology also seems out of place for only 15 years in the future - eg trains that don’t run on tracks. For this to happen these days I think they’d need more than 15 years to get ‘track’ made up from the middle of nowhere.
(It was supposed to be set in 2050, but was brough forward because of the current interest in cloning, so they must have changed some things and either left in, or overlooked, others.) The film is slightly too long, although the large amount of action going on does make up for this.
Madagascar (imdb)
My rating: 2 out of 5
OK, not too sure about this film. There were funny bits and all the usual one-liners that you tend to find in kid’s films, but overall I’m not sure whether I liked the film or not. For me it really didn’t seem to get going. Sure, the penguins were good, but most of their scenes appeared in the trailers weeks before. The lion’s gradual decline to type by the changing of his mane was a nice touch though.
Not much else to add really…
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For the fourth week it’s no change at the top, with James Blunt sitting on top of both the singles and albums charts. This week though the sales numbers have started to decrease, albeit only by a few thousand on both charts. Enough has been said previously about him, so I’ll turn my attention elsewhere.
On the singles chart, the top three remain the same, (which has only happened 5 times since 2000, and there are only three entries in the Top 20 - unusual for these days where most of the top 10 seems to consist of new entries. This week Bananarama take a dive dropping 15 places. This could be due to the fans of the 80s Bananarama buying it in the first week and then the fanbase drying up quickly. It’s unlikely that it will make 5 weeks in the Top 75… Kaiser Chiefs, however, get a 15 place increase, climbing 46-31 - not bad for a song that was released in November last year! However, the last two weeks have been as the result of download sales only, with a re-release of the song due out next week. (Getting to #31 on downloads only means that not many singles are being sold!) As there is still a physical single available - one of the chart rules - this means that the record can re-enter. Down at the bottom of the singles charts Call On Me makes a probably brief return, but this makes its total weeks reach 25 weeks - the longest for a long time. Amarillo will probably become one of the longest stayers as it is currently on 21 weeks and climbed one place this week. Over on the album chart, The War Of The Worlds is still going strong, climbing back into the top 5. Besides the new film currently doing the rounds, which has it’s own soundtrack album, I can only think that it is staying in the chart longer as a new generation discovers ‘that 70’s sound.’ Kirsty MacColl gets a new entry at #17 with an anthology, The Best Of. She did have a 3-CD anthology out in April this year, but this did not reach the chart. (I can only assume because of the presence of other artists on the album?) Other than this the album chart remains remains reasonably static, with a few ‘older’ artists making up two of the remaing four new entries - Madness and Chris Rea. #1 singles sales this year: |
An article popped up on BBC this morning about ntl and their plans for the near future. The good news is that all users will be upgraded to 10Mb by the end of 2006 - all at no extra cost! This can only be good for XBox live sessions where it still sometimes struggles with my current 2Mb connection.
Of course, now I can’t wait, but our current speed works perfectly fine for browsing the web and email etc. The extra speed will help downloading and streaming - the reason for also increasing the cap to 75Gig a month.
However, there is no mention of upload speeds increasing… I hope they will, as that is probably the bottleneck for online gaming with ntl.
Charlie And The Chocolate Factory (imdb)
My rating: 5 out of 5
The 1971 version, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, was a marvellous film, showing all the eccentricity of Willy Wonka himself. Although the effects of the time were not like the CGI-fest most films are these days, the film managed to still portray the ‘madness’ of the factory and the workings of it. In the new Tim Burton version, film technology has moved on by 30 years and is therefore even more colourful and madder.
The size of the factory has increased and rather than just going through a ‘tunnel’ to get around, everyone gets to go on a rollercoaster ride from place to place, with chocolate swirling around everywhere. the oompa-loompa(s) are still just as good however, and because they all look the same it adds another bit of fun to the film. (He apparently filmed 100 roles for all the various scenes…) The glass elevator is how a glass elevator should be - see through on all sides, as it travels through the CGI scenery at great speed.
Johnny Depp is brilliant as Willy Wonka, once you get used to him playing the role differently to how Gene Wilder did. Johnny’s Wonka is a bit darker, and there is more background story to how he got to be the Willy Wonka everyone knows. He does seem a bit odd in that he seems to dislike children, and just puts up with them - unless he knows beforehand that he’ll end up with Charlie. In general there are more background stories in the film overall, but as I’ve not read the book, I’m not sure if these have been added, or are in the book as well.
The film has many funny scenes and there are plenty of laughs, and it’s probably a film I would go to see again to see if there’s anything I missed in the background! If you’re a fan of the original film, you should enjoy this one as well - it’s the original brought up to date, with a bit extra thrown in.
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This is going to sound a lot like the post I made last week. James Blunt stays at the top of both the singles and albums charts for the third week in a row. On both charts he has managed to increase his sales yet again, with singles increasing by about 12,000 and albums by 11,000. As I keep saying, for singles sales to increase is unusual, but to do it for 8 weeks in a row is quite bizarre! It could mean that when he starts going back down the chart You’re Beautiful could end up as one of the longer staying records of recent years.
Bananarama make a comeback this week at #14. Admittedly, it’s Bananarama sans Siobhan Fahey, but it’s not bad for a 12 year gap between hits. Another 80’s group Madness also make the Top 40 this week, but much further down at #38 - and only with a gap of 5 years. The album chart looks much the same as last week, with the highers new entry belonging to that most annoying of things, the Crazy Frog. I think I’ll give this one a miss! #1 singles sales this year: |
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