Ode to Happiness - Keanu Reeves' New Endeavour

On 18th June, Keanu Reeves held a book signing at Waterstones in Piccadilly Circus to promote his most recent endeavour and literary debut - Ode to Happiness. The book, described as a ‘grown-up’s picture book’, is written as a meditation on making the best of a bad situation and also as a tongue-in-cheek approach to coping with life’s miseries. With Keanu Reeves and the artist Alexandra Grant in attendance, the event focussed primarily on the driving force behind the book and what inspired it’s creation.

Ode to Happiness first started life as an impromptu  joke between Reeves and his friend Janey Bergam. Bergam had been listening to the most chronically depressing and self-pitying songs one can find on the radio and, imitating the melancholy which adorned the lyrics, Reeves conjured several lines depicting the kind of person who wallows in misery. From drawing a sorrow bath in his despair room to applying his I Hate Myself face-cream and putting on his Alone-Again silk pyjamas, Reeves takes the reader on a short journey through self-pity before concluding on the ‘high’ note that things can always get worse.

After the initial in-joke of the Ode to Happiness, Bergam secretly passed Reeves’ words onto her friend, Alexandra Grant, who then converted the words into images as a surprise gift for Reeves. However, what first started out as a rather elaborately designed joke grew into something more as it was passed around and shared with friends and family. People took a deep interest in the book and started wanting to purchase copies for themselves or friends. The consensus was that this was something to be shared, and before long the book was taken to German publisher Gerhard Steidl to achieve this end.

Reeves at the signing of Ode to Happiness

Ode to Happiness is not so much a book as it is a work of art. Reeves’ words are hand-written by Grant, accompanied by her watered-down black ink images, which just ooze melancholy. The whole design and concept of the book/work of art has a very organic feel to it, not just in the hand-written text and imagery, but the choice of paper, the cover… Everything about it is brilliant yet humble at the same time.  However, when describing the relationship between the text and the imagery, accompanied is probably the wrong word. They don’t feel as if they have been created separately at all, but somehow a consorted endeavour between literature and art, both word and image linked by a symbiotic bond. The very essence of the book is in it’s overall execution, no separate element can be distinguished from the rest.

A word that has been used to describe the book, and probably the most accurate existing word that can apply, is haptic - you can pick it up, feel it, smell it, and fully appreciate it as the physical piece of art it is (something you couldn’t do on the iPad). It certainly is something to be felt rather than read, both physically and emotionally. If Grants illustrations (again, not the right word for what they are to the words, but I don’t think there’s a word that exists that can do them justice) and Reeves’ tongue-in-cheek yet brilliant words don’t move you, then I accuse you of being dead inside!

One of the fundamental properties of Ode to Happiness is that it’s also subjective, in that the reader takes from it what they want. Some will read it and weep in empathic understanding, others will laugh at it’s gentle mocking of sadness, and others (such as myself) will remain stoically straight faced but able to appreciate the emotion behind it all the same. The imagery, too, is fairly subjective, with it’s watery and ethereal quality leading the reader to make sense of it in their own way. At the signing, for example, someone asked whether the final image was based on the Eagle Eye from Turkish mythos to symbolise protection, with the words “Things can always get worse.” written beneath. I, personally, saw the image as an unknowable event, a potential worsening of the situation that is unforeseeable, and also due to the book’s subjectivity that it’s applicable to everyone without being too specific. And that’s exactly it - there’s no single answer, just the many interpretations that can be drawn from it!

It’s only a brief little article, consisting of no more than twenty pages and shaped more like a large pamphlet (presumably it’s a step-by-step guide to coping with depression?!), and whilst there may not be much to it on the surface, it carries an incredible depth of thought. Reeves has a way with words, no matter how few or many, that somehow manage to penetrate the soul. Whether it’s just a clever play of words or a brilliant observation, he can’t help but move you.

So thank you Keanu Reeves and Alexandra Grant for your utterly inspired creation, and Janey Bergam for catalysing it, it’s the perfect guide during my darkest hours! However, I would have rathered you hadn’t scribbled all over my book. I used to sit next to someone at school who did that every maths class, and it really got on my tits…

If you’ve read Ode to Happiness, I’d like to hear your thoughts and feelings on it! How do you interpret the black spot on ‘things can always get worse’? Is it written more out of sorrow or joy? Have you ever run yourself a hot sorrow bath in your despair room, with a misery candle burning?! I certainly have! I even have a pair of alone again silk pyjamas…

Henry's Crime - If You've Done The Time, Do The Crime

This review can also be found on Step2Inspire.


The real crime is not committing to your dreams…

Last week saw the release of Keanu Reeves’ most recent film, Henry’s Crime, on DVD and BluRay across the UK. Having heard about the film’s humble indie beginnings and the amount of support Reeves gave to help produce the project, I was eager to see it. I had initially intended to watch Henry’s Crime when it was first released in cinemas, but due to a plethora of misinformation, some briskly vague box offices, firmly uninformative websites, and a long pilgrimage to numerous cinemas across central London, by the time I‘d found out where it was being screened, the film's short run at the box offices had come to an end.

Turns out it was at the Trocadero, a place I only associate with tourism, Laser Quest and business ‘bonding’ activities. Who knew it was a cinema too?!

Henry’s Crime is a film about Henry (Keanu Reeves), a toll-booth attendant who has been drifting through life, just making do, with no real ambition. That is, until he’s arrested for a bank robbery he didn’t commit. During his time in jail, Henry befriends notorious con man and long-term prison inmate Max (James Caan), who believes he’s ‘living the dream’. It’s here that it first dawns on Henry that he doesn’t have a dream, and upon release he decides he’s going to rob the bank he was falsely sent to prison for robbing in the first place. “If you’ve done the time, you may as well have done the crime.”

Out of prison, Henry meets struggling actress Julie (Vera Farmiga) who immediately knocks him off his feet at about 60mph. As it turns out, there’s a buried bootlegger’s tunnel running from the bank vault to the theatre where Julie’s starring in a production of Anton Chekov’s The Cherry Orchard. With the help of Julie and former cell-mate Max, Henry lands the role of Lopakhin in the play and throughout rehearsals he also begins to uncover the tunnel running from his dressing room to the bank. However, he finds himself falling in love with Julie, and is torn between his crack-pot idea of robbing the bank and his love for her.

Reeves summarises the film perfectly as an ‘existential romantic comedy caper movie’ (a most apt description if there ever was one!). Each character is shown to have little to no aspiration, a substantial portion of self-doubt, and a stagnant mind set, trapped by their circumstances and their seeming inability to change them. However, Henry’s “cockamamie” dream of a heist causes his sudden turn-around from virtual nobody to would-be-criminal, which in turn catalyses the others. Max begins to dream of using the cash to move to Florida, where grapefruits are “as big as your head” and there’s “all you can eat sunshine.” Julie and Henry fall in love, finding themselves in a tenuous romance and Julie confronted with her fears of a serious relationship. And justice is finally served as the perpetrator of the initial heist is in turn arrested for this robbery.

The film truly goes above and beyond the call of duty, and it’s clear the cast were dedicated to their roles and the movie as a whole, making what could have been a mediocre film into a great one. Although the film has no sense of closure, and doesn’t conform to the standard cinematic template of telling a story and wrapping it up at the end (something that would perturb some, unless they thought it would lead to Henry’s Crime 2: This Time It’s Fiscal), it successfully conveys the story it wishes to tell, ending with a sense of an ongoing tale with no clues as to what’s going to happen next (much like life, for which the film is a great metaphor). The film closes with the uncertain future relationship between Henry and Julie, leaving it up to the audience to conclude whether Henry’s grand gesture is enough to win her back or not, and features quite possibly my favourite final line of any film - “Fuck, Henry.”

However, despite the film being a comedy, don’t expect to be roaring with laughter throughout. That’s not to say the humour is lacking, in fact I found it most amusing, but it’s a much more dry and subtle sense of humour than one normally finds in movies. And I greatly appreciate that, it’s much more my sense of humour than quite a lot of the films that are listed under ‘comedy’. For the most part, I find that a lot of contemporary comedies are puerile nonsense that rely too heavily on vulgarity and bodily functions with a target audience with the mental age of five and what Freud would probably consider a suspiciously overactive sex drive, so it was incredibly refreshing to watch something with a more serious humour (is that a thing, serious humour, or is that an oxymoron?).

Overall, Henry’s Crime is a thoroughly enjoyable film with an entertaining narrative and a strong undertone reminiscent of the existentialist philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre. From the everyday sense of being accosted for something that’s not our fault and the little risks we take to the hyperbolic scenario of being falsely accused of robbery and then deciding to actually commit the crime, the film has a sense of the fantastic yet the believable. Considering it was almost never made, Henry’s Crime genuinely is a cinematic triumph that’s well worth a watch.

As an aside, Reeves has said that he wants everyone to have rampant sex after seeing the film, and as much as I hate to disappoint, I am actually pleased to say that I did not. Largely because I was watching it with my mother.

Doctor Who - A Good Man Goes To War Review

This review can also be found on Step2Inspire.


Demons run when a good man goes to war…

It’s the long anticipated mid-season cliff-hanger. The episode that will keep us waiting with baited breath until August (not literally, otherwise Steven Moffat would have a lot of asphyxiated fans on his hands). We have been teased, we have been tantalised, and now the threads begin to come together and the pieces fall into place.

The Battle of Demon’s Run, the Doctor’s darkest hour. As River Song puts it “He’ll rise higher than ever before, and then fall so much further.” A Good Man Goes To War opens with Amy, having just given birth to her daughter Melody (Melody Pond… If bells aren’t merrily chiming at this for you, seek help!), in the company of the less-than-desirable Clerics and fantastically sinister Madame Kovarian (or as I still fondly know her, Eye Patch Lady, played by Frances Barber). Meanwhile, Rory’s becoming remarkably more masculine and confrontational in the quest to find his wife, with he and the Doctor devastating the 12th Cyber Legion’s fleet in a bid to find out Amy’s location. From the first five minutes, you have a sense of just how epic the ensuing 45 minutes will be.

It’s definitely a monumental episode, with a generous handful of races turning up to assist in the Doctor’s mission. The war is fought, not with weapons, but with cunning, and the only thing that really explodes is the fleet during the token appearance from the Cybermen. Perhaps the episode may have been better named (albeit more lengthily) A Good Man Is Prepared To Go To War If Needs Be…

It’s hinted at numerous times throughout the episode that, due to the Doctor’s ongoing adventures, the meaning of ‘doctor’ is slipping from ‘healer’ to ‘great warrior’, which is the primary impetus for building an army (and a weapon) to destroy him. Whilst the Battle of Demon’s Run shows the Doctor rising higher than ever before with his ability to assemble an army more than willing to sacrifice themselves in his name, and winning without a fight, it doesn’t really convey his fall. It is largely his fault that all of this happened in the first place, seeing as he’s become such a legendary figure, but I can’t help but feel we have yet to see the full impact of this episode on the Doctor’s image…

There was only one part of this episode I didn’t quite realise the point of, and that was the introduction of the Thin Fat Gay Married Anglican Marines. That appears to have been their only purpose - to say those words - and pass into the annals (oi!) of history. The coupling of Madame Vastra, the Victorian Silurian, and Jenny, however, felt a lot more fitting, and would make for quite a good spin-off series set in the late 1800s. There’s a very revealing insight into Moffat’s mind - oh, I like that, Moffat’s Mind - with these two, a joke involving the exceptionally long tongue of a Silurian, which would (hopefully) go over the heads of most children!

The entire cast gave their absolute best performance of this season yet, and the concept was superb. It was good to see Matt Smith’s Doctor in a much more serious capacity, embracing the anger he would inevitably feel if one of his companions had been mistreated. It was also a pleasant change to see a more sombre River Song towards the end of the episode, with none of her usual banter, but a severity to match the tone of the final scene. Oh and what a final scene! It was utterly sublime,  and if there were one piece of television that could epitomise the potential of brilliant story-telling in Doctor Who, it was this.

Overall, A Good Man Goes To War was truly a spectacle to behold, and has taken it‘s place with The Doctor’s Wife as tied-favourite episode since Matt Smith took on the role as the Doctor. Obviously, though, the episode was largely a frame for the two biggest parts in the overall plot, Amy’s baby and who is River Song. The clues have been casually left lying about the place this series to show that those two points are actually one. Unfortunately, despite having bet with friends that River Song was Amy’s daughter, who was part-Time Lord due to travelling in the TARDIS, who was in turn the little girl who shoots and kills the Doctor in The Impossible Astronaut and regenerates at the end of The Day Of The Moon, I did not put money on my claims. All I’ve really done is either proven I’m very clever, or just quite good at guessing!

But now, with River’s identity revealed, and Melody Pond in the possession of Madame Kovarian, we’re still left with some questions… It’s now safe to assume that the astronaut that kills the Doctor is a young Melody Pond/River Song, and that’s the reason she was imprisoned (for killing the greatest man she ever knew). But to what end? Why is Madame Kovarian so intent on killing the Doctor? What effects will River’s Time Lord-esque DNA have on the future? The Doctor that dies, is he the Flesh-Doctor, or the Doctor in an alternate and aborted time line? Why does River essentially shoot at herself if it is indeed her in the astronaut?! Why did the Doctor mention Cybermats in The Almost People (new bet, seeing as there’s some fairly Patrick Troughton inspired content this series, we’ll see Cybermats return… Might stick money on that, this time!)? And more importantly, why do we have to wait until Autumn for the next episode?!

Doctor Who returns in the Autumn with the episode Let’s Kill Hitler. What a fantastically bizarre title! Presumably that will be followed up by Dinner with Pol Pot (credit for that joke goes to my good friend Lawrence Savill).

If you missed A Good Man Goes To War, WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU DOING THAT WAS MORE IMPORTANT?!
You may have this chance to redeem yourself by watching it on iPlayer here, but if you miss something as brilliant as this in future I may not be so forgiving…

Benedict Cumberbatch Joins The Cast Of The Hobbit

This article can also be found on Step2Inspire.

Backstage, after picking up his BAFTA for best supporting actor, Martin Freeman accidentally let slip that Benedict Cumberbatch would be joining his Sherlock co-star in Peter Jackson’s up-coming film(s) of The Hobbit. A little over a week later on the 31st of May, Ian McKellen confirmed this on his blog.

McKellen states that Phillipa Boyen showed him Cumberbatch’s close-up screen-test, which was “electrifying, vocally and facially.” But what is Cumberbatch’s role in the much anticipated prequel to The Lord of the Rings? Nothing about that has been given away just yet, but speculations include Bard the Bowman and the voice (and possibly, with motion-capture tech, the face) of Smaug the dragon.

Personally, I reckon Cumberbatch’s vocal quality would lend itself splendidly to the character of Smaug!

The two parts, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Hobbit: There and Back Again, are expected to be released on 14th December 2012 and 13th December 2013 respectively. Martin Freeman will be playing the lead role of Bilbo Baggins and Ian McKellen will be reprising his role as Gandalf the Grey. Other actors said to be involved include Cate Blanchett, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee, Hugo Weaving, Elijah Wood, Andy Serkis and Stephen Fry.