It's 1988 and rising features writer at New Republic magazine Stephen Glass has charm, style, modesty and good looks. Trouble is, his reportage is pure fiction. Billy Ray's film, based on a true story, juxtaposes two fine performances from Hayden Christensen, who plays Glass as a passive-aggressive manipulator, and Peter Sarsgaard as his editor Chuck Lane.
In 1967, John Peel used to justify the frequent inclusion of Bee Gees tracks on his legendary Perfumed Garden show by saying, "If you're going to copy anyone it might as well be The Beatles." He was right, of course, and this excellent comp is testimony both to that assertion and the undeniable endurance of the Gibb brothers' early material. Gerry Marsden, Billy J Kramer, Marmalade, Status Quo and Paul Jones are just some of the acts who elect to don the red velvet cape of love in order to deliver appropriately idiosyncratic interpretations of those delightfully eccentric songs.
Highly entertaining Stephen King adaptation, stylishly directed by David Koepp, with a mesmerising Johnny Depp as a best-selling mystery writer in the throes of a messy divorce who's accused of plagiarism—and threatened with unpleasant retribution—by sinister hillbilly John Turturro. Cue havoc on all fronts, and bodies piling up very quickly indeed. Splendid.
At a time when much British alternative rock is hobbled by the demands of 'authenticity', Brighton's Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster strike a rowdy, triumphantly rulebook-flouting note. Clearly, they have their heroes—The Cramps, Dead Kennedys, Melvins and Kyuss among them—but the band's wide-ranging vision suggests they couldn't churn out copies of the music they love even if they tried. The Royal Society explores themes of mental derailment and the black arts against a backdrop of the heaviest psychobilly, grunge-metal and stoner rock.
