Tag Archive for 'Credit crunch'

Couch Potato Pickings | Oliver! A musical movie for the current economic climate

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Beth
on July 11, 2009
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You wouldn’t think it, but this 1968 musical movie with its Dickensian storyline is of surprising relevance today.

Yes, yes, you know what I’m about to say - it stars pretty child star Mark Lester in the title role, and of course we all know now, if we didn’t before, that he is the godfather to Michael Jackson’s children.

However, that’s not the only topical feature of this film. It may be set in the Victorian era, but while you’re singing along (and you know you will) check out how pertinent the song’s messages are within today’s economic climate:

Oliver! Oliver!

Never before has a boy wanted more

Redundancy is rife. Many business are asking their staff to take less money or unpaid leave. It’s not a great idea for ask for more in the current climate.

You’ve Got to Pick a Pocket or Two

Large amounts don’t grow on trees. You’ve got to pick a pocket or two.

Bear this in mind when out in crowded areas. Street theft today is of course better policed and CCTV is a deterrent, but there will still be those determined to have a grab at your wallet.

Oom Pah Pah

There’s a little ditty they’re singing in the city especially when they’ve been on the gin or the beer.

Things are not so affluent in the city these days but budgets are still accommodating bankers’ booze-ups. It’s more champers and cocktails than gin these days but the city celebrating hasn’t ended.

Fine Life

If you don’t mind having to go without things it’s a fine life

Food for thought. And speaking of food…

Food Glorious Food, hot sausage and mustard
While we’re in the mood - cold jelly and custard!
Pease pudding and saveloys!
What next is the question?

Childhood obesity that’s what. OK, it’s more pizza than pease pudding these days, but gorging on any sort of food is never a good idea.

Who Will Buy?

Who will buy?

Communications skills are more important than ever for businesses in today’s economic climate. It’s not just what you sell, it’s how you sell it. That’s the key to winning over customers.

One of two musicals with an exclamation mark showing today (Mamma Mia! is on Sky Movies Comedy at 8pm) you can see Oliver! on G.O.L.D. at 6pm.

Out on DVD | The International

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Jason Best
on July 6, 2009
in DVD Releases
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The International - Naomi Watt’s tenacious New York assistant district attorney & Clive Owen’s dogged Interpol agent pore for clues as they try to expose a crooked bank in Tom Twkyer’s gripping thriller

Gripping – and presciently topical - thriller The International finds Clive Owen’s dogged Interpol agent and Naomi Watts’ equally tenacious New York assistant district attorney joining forces in a bid to bring to a cabal of villainous bankers to book. As the duo follow a global trail of money laundering, arms dealing, terrorism and political assassinations, they discover that the larcenous bankers (inspired by real-life crooked bank BCCI) will stop at nothing to evade justice.

Run Lola Run director Tom Twkyer’s movie pushes all the right buttons in these credit-crunch times, stoking our feelings of outrage and injustice as the bank’s crimes are revealed, and then offering the possibility of vicarious revenge. He stages some great set pieces, too, including an assassination at a political rally in a Milan square and a ferocious shootout at the Guggenheim museum in New York that leaves the art works on the walls shredded and the viewer’s nerves utterly jangled.

Released on 6th July.


To activate the sound in the trailer: hold your cursor over the screen to reveal the control panel and click on the volume control in the bottom right-hand corner.

The Best view | The International - Clive Owen & Naomi Watts have crooked bankers in their sights in gripping topical thriller

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Jason Best
on February 27, 2009
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The International - Clive Owen’s Interpol agent Louis Salinger gets the bad guys in his sights

Filmmakers have it tough these days. Whoever they pick as their villain, an interest group somewhere is bound to take offence. With The International, though, director Tom Tykwer has found some bad guys almost everyone in the audience can unite in hating: bankers.

Yes, it’s a dastardly bank (only one?) that is at the heart of a larcenous conspiracy that is causing mayhem around the world in this gripping – and, oh dear, so topical – thriller.

Determined to bring the evil bankers to book, however, are Clive Owen’s dogged Interpol agent Louis Salinger and Naomi Watts’ no less tenacious New York assistant district attorney Eleanor Whitman, who are following a global trail of money laundering, arms dealing, terrorism and political assassinations. But the international bank they have in their sights, the IBBC, is a slippery foe…

The International - Clive Owen’s Interpol agent Louis Salinger & Naomi Watts’ assistant DA Eleanor Whitman

Inspired by the activities of the shady BCCI (dubbed the Bank of Crooks and Criminals International), which was founded in Pakistan in 1970s and collapsed in 1991, The International is a thriller that pushes all the right buttons in these credit-crunch times, stoking the viewer’s feelings of outrage and injustice as every fresh enormity by the bank is revealed, and then offering the possibility of vicarious revenge.

As one of the duo attempting to deliver retribution on our behalf, Watts is largely wasted, her role diminishing as the plot advances. But Owen is great, even if his expression - dour and determined – barely changes throughout the movie. Yet dour and determined is what the story requires. There’s no place here for Bond-like witticisms or Bourne-style heroics. Owen’s cop is an ordinary man, not a superhero.

The International - Clive Owen’s Interpol agent Louis Salinger hunts his prey through Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar

That’s not to say that The International doesn’t thrill. Twkyer, maker of the flashy, techno-driven thriller Run Lola Run, stages some great set pieces, including an assassination at a political rally in a Milan square and a ferocious shootout at the Guggenheim museum in New York, a sequence that makes imaginative use of the gallery’s famous spiral ramp and leaves a series of artworks shredded. Watching the scene, I thought for a moment, as one video installation after another took a battering, that a gang of militant anti-modernists (Stuckists, perhaps?) had invaded the building. But, no, the gunmen are yet more of the bank’s lethal minions.

In the week when disgraced ex-RBS boss Fred Goodwin has refused to give up any of his huge pension, we probably all need an outlet for our pent-up feelings of indignation and resentment towards the financial world’s one-time masters of the universe. A movie won’t change anything, but The International does deliver, if only briefly, a moment of catharsis. (General release from 27th February)


At the Cinema | Confessions of a Shopaholic

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Jason Best
on February 20, 2009
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 Confessions of a Shopaholic - Isla Fisher plays shopping-addicted New Yorker Rebecca Bloomwood

Sex and the City meets the credit crunch in this frothy chick flick starring Isla Fisher as a ditzy New Yorker who can’t stop shopping. Fisher’s wannabe fashion magazine writer Rebecca Bloomwood is hooked on buying stuff from the city’s designer stores – which has given her a mountainous credit card debt. Thanks to a typical rom-com fluke, though, she lands a job writing a savings advice column for a financial magazine under the pseudonym of ‘The Girl in the Green Scarf’, but her addiction to Prada and Gucci and other posh labels threatens to derail her career – and her budding romance with Hugh Dancy’s dreamboat of an editor.

Confessions of a Shopaholic - Hugh Dancy’s Luke Brandon sweeps Isla Fisher’s Rebecca Bloomwood off her feet

Confessions of a Shopaholic may satirise Rebecca’s shopping obsession, but with the same costume designer as The Devil Wears Prada and Sex and the City, it’s clearly as much in thrall to big brands as she is. Yet even though you’ll probably want to give Rebecca a slap, Fisher remains an appealing comic star. Like Fisher’s heroine, PJ Hogan’s film – based on British author Sophie Kinsella’s chick lit series - is bubble-brained but fun, if you can stand the glossy consumerism. (Released 20th February)

Confessions of a Shopaholic - Isla Fisher plays shopping-addicted New Yorker Rebecca Bloomwood

Movies for the Recession: The Devil Wears Prada

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Beth
on February 8, 2009
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Couch Potato Pickings

On Channel 4 tonight at 8pm

Anne Hathaway

What would you do to get ahead?

In fact, what would you do to simply stay in employment?

Before answering that question you should think very carefully

I’ve chosen this film to act as a warning. With redundancies happening left, right and centre, it’s understandable for the survival instinct to kick in, but how far would you go to keep that job?

Anne Hathaway,Meryl Streep

This film offers a harsh warning about what can happen if you sell your soul to get ahead.

Anne Hathaway

Not only do friends fall away and lovers look elsewhere, but it’s also incredibly foolish to turn your back on your work colleagues to get another foot on that career ladder. One day that person you once trod on could be the person recruiting for that ideal position.

Meryl Streep

Maybe I’ll… Movies for the Recession: The Pursuit of Happyness

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Beth
on February 6, 2009
in Couch Potato and Films on TV
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Couch Potato Pickings

On Sky Movies Family tonight at 10.15pm

Will Smith, Jaden Christopher Syre Smith

If you visited Movie Talk last week, you may have come across the first of my movie pickings to offer inspiration and comfort during the doom and gloom of the recession. Continuing the theme, this week I’ve chosen tonight’s rags-to-riches drama, which is also based on a true story.

It’s set in early 1980s San Francisco, and stars Will Smith as a struggling salesman who is left alone to look after his five-year-old son when his wife leaves home. Determined to make a better life for himself and his son, he takes an unpaid six-month internship at a stockbroking firm but has to overcome poverty and homelessness as he pursues his American dream of wealth and success.

Maybe I’ll… Movies for the Recession: The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas

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Beth
on January 28, 2009
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We’re all fearing redundancy and worrying about it, so I thought I’d start looking out for those films that help soften the blow, show us that we’re not alone, teach us that change is good and inspire us to make big changes, starting with The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas on Sky Screen 1 tonight at midnight.

Listen to what these girls have to say when they’re told their brothel’s going to be closed down and they’ll lose their livelihoods?

Brewster’s Millions and the Credit Crunch

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Beth
on November 15, 2008
in Couch Potato and Films on TV
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Couch Potato Pickings

On Channel 4 this afternoon at 4pm

Brewster’s Millions: Richard Pryor, Lonette McKee

I initially chose this film because it’s about money, and we’re all worrying about that these days now that we’re waking up to the inevitability of a bleak economic future.

Yes, I deliberately picked this film because it seemingly offers the perfect 97 minutes of escapism. Right now we don’t have much money, but I considered that it would surely be fun to watch a man inheriting loads of it with the promise of even more if he can squander the first $30million.

But will it be fun? In preparation I had planned to play my own Brewster’s Millions game, devising a list of how I’d fritter away all those dollars. But as soon as I started thinking about it, I began to feel rather sickened.

Brewster’s Millions: Richard Pryor

Far from offering a slice of fun and frivolous escapism, picking this film today has actually provided much food for thought.

You see, it’s forced me to acknowledge my dire knowledge of economics, and because of that I’ve been driven to sit through a crash course on the current situation, delivered by American scientist Chris Martenson, available online here. According to Martenson, our lives will change drastically within the next 20 years, and, if we don’t take action now, we’ll struggle to cope with those changes.

Think about it, for the past few years all across the world we’ve been squandering money, just like Montgomery Brewster, and our governments have been bailing us out with even more money and we’ve been taking it for granted. If you look at it this way, what’s the point playing the Brewster’s Millions game, we’ve been playing it for real, as illustrated in this spoof:

And now, having grown accustomed to squandering so much, we’ve spent it all and we’re about to find ourselves back at square one with nothing to show for it except the clothes on our backs.

Brewster’s Millions: Richard Pryor, John Candy

Hmm, perhaps this movie doesn’t offer such escapist entertainment after all.

Couch Potato Pickings - Hairspray

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Beth
on October 13, 2008
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On Sky Movies Premiere tonight at 8pm

It’s Monday, it’s the 13th of the month, the cold I’ve had for a few days has now developed into a cough and we’re heading into a global recession.

What I need is a good dose of escapism. During the Great Depression they had Busby Berkeley’s musicals, following World War Two MGM musicals helped everyone back on their feet. There’s nothing better than a musical for taking you away from harsh reality. In fact, I’m sure it’s no coincidence that Mamma Mia! with its idyllic Greek island setting and feelgood Abba songs is still pulling people in at the box office, three months after its cinema release.

Tonight’s movie adaptation of the hit Broadway musical, starring John Travolta in a frock, has to be a fitting antidote to my Monday blues. It’s on Sky Movies Premiere all week, but today is the day that I need to see it most.

Couch Potato Pickings - The Crooked E: The Unshredded Truth About Enron

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Beth
on October 6, 2008
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On Hallmark this afternoon at 3pm

Since financial disasters are a hot topic at the moment, I feel the need to educate myself about the first major financial disaster to occur this decade.

US energy company Enron fell on its knees in 2001 following some irregular accounting procedures conducted the previous decade. Enron’s bankruptcy left thousands jobless and had a disastrous impact on the financial world. This TV movie tells the Enron story from the personal perspective of employee Brian Cruver. 

The ruthless, arrogant greed depicted in this trailer makes me shudder. It’s not only ugly to see, but it’s also quite frightening to acknowledge how a decent person can turn so quickly into a monster by their unquenchable thirst for riches.

I wonder what causes certain people to become so motivated by money like this. 

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