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Time Out
11-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Skyline and chill? Bangkok's coolest cinema is literally on ice
If Bangkok in August is a film, for now, it's not the breezy rom-com of your dreams – it's a sweaty, water-logged drama, heavy on atmosphere and low on personal space. The rain doesn't so much fall as loom (but it will, heavy), ready to arrive when you've just dried your shoes. Heat clings like a subplot that refuses to resolve. In such a climate, air-conditioning isn't a luxury – it's a plot device. Which is perhaps why Skyline Film Bangkok has decided to stage the cinematic escapism of watching films on an actual ice rink. Not just cold air, but frozen water beneath your feet. This isn't your usual 'movies under the stars' scenario – it's movies under the rink lights, surrounded by frost and the faint scrape of skates. You get the sort of chill that even a theatre's air-con can't match, plus the unexpected pleasure of pairing popcorn with the faint scent of Zamboni polish. Sub-Zero Ice Skate Club x Skyline Film, a two-day event presents six films for all temperaments – from existential daydreamers to pink-plastic idealists – served with complimentary drinks and the option to glide, twirl or cling nervously to the barrier during free skating sessions. Because if you've come all the way to an ice rink to sit still, you may as well earn it. The setting is Sub-Zero Ice Skate Club Sukhumvit, where August 23-24 will see a parade of genres unfold against a backdrop of cold mist and rinkside chatter. Tickets are B550 – a sum that buys not just a seat, but a mood, an atmosphere, a narrative break from the weather outside. Film schedule: Saturday August 23 Doors open at 1pm (Free Ice Skating 1pm-2pm) Me Before You, 2.15pm Lou Clark, 26, is still working out the plot of her own life when she accepts a job caring for Will Traynor, a wealthy man paralysed in an accident. She's untrained, unprepared and – without warning – pulled into an emotional story she didn't audition for. Doors open at 4.30pm (Free Ice Skating 4pm-5.30pm) Barbie, 5.45pm When Barbie discovers a crack in her flawless facade, she swaps pastel-perfect Barbie Land for the unpredictable mess of reality, with Ken loyally (and cluelessly) in tow. Doors 7.45pm (Free Ice Skating 7.45pm-8.45pm) The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, 9pm A photo archivist at Life magazine daydreams his way out of routine, imagining himself as a globe-trotting hero on impossible adventures – until real life calls him to act. Sunday August 24 Doors open at 1pm (Free Ice Skating 1pm-2pm) Beauty and the Beast, 2.15pm Belle's imprisonment in a castle ruled by a Beast raises an old question: can love outgrow appearance? Doors open at 4.30pm (Free Ice Skating 4.30pm-7.30pm) The Theory of Everything, 5.45pm The romance of Stephen Hawking and Jane Wilde begins in light and brilliance – until his diagnosis reshapes their future, without dimming their bond. Doors open at 7.45pm (Free Ice Skating 7.45pm-8.45pm) One Day, 9pm Dexter and Emma meet on graduation day, then reunite on the same date every year – a friendship, a maybe-romance, a relationship defined as much by timing as by feeling.
Boston Globe
22-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
William Cran, ‘Frontline' documentarian, is dead at 79
He began his career with the BBC, but he mostly worked as an independent producer, toggling between jobs on both sides of the Atlantic. He was most closely associated with WGBH's 'Frontline,' for which he produced 20 documentaries on a wide range of subjects -- some historical, like the four-part series 'From Jesus to Christ' (1998) and 'The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover' (1993), and some focused on current events, including 'Who's Afraid of Rupert Murdoch' (1995). Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up He won a slew of honors, including four Emmys, four duPont-Columbia University awards, two Peabodys, and an Overseas Press Club Award. Advertisement In 1986, he produced 'The Story of English,' an Emmy-winning nine-episode series for the BBC and PBS about how English became the world's dominant language. He, with journalists Robert MacNeil, the PBS news anchor, and Robert McCrum, turned it into a book. Mr. Cran produced two multipart documentaries based on books by historian Daniel Yergin: 'The Prize' (1990), a Pulitzer-winning history of oil, and 'The Commanding Heights' (1998, with Joseph Stanislaw), about the history of the modern global economy. Advertisement These were complicated stories, but Mr. Cran was able to frame them around characters and narrative threads that kept viewers engaged over several nights. 'I learned from him that less is more, that the script is not a shortened version of the book, but rather captions to go with the picture,' Yergin wrote in an email. 'He always stuck to the facts, but he always wanted dramatic tension.' Both documentaries were well-received, despite their potentially dry material. 'Using every familiar element of the documentarian's art, producer-director William Cran has created a masterpiece,' The Washington Post wrote of 'The Commanding Heights.' William Cran was born Dec. 11, 1945, in Hobart, on the island state of Tasmania, Australia. His mother, Jean (Holliday) Cran, was a teacher, and his father, John, was a science lecturer. The family moved to London when William was 6. He studied classics at Oxford, and though he knew early on that he wanted to make documentaries, he also dabbled in theater, directing two plays in London. After graduating in 1968, he became a trainee at the BBC, where he rose to producer, using then-novel techniques such as reconstructed scenes, and pursuing new genres including true crime. One early documentary was '1971 Luton Postmaster Murder,' about two men who were wrongly convicted of killing a British postmaster. But Mr. Cran grew tired of being what he called a 'company man,' and left the BBC after eight years. He moved to Toronto in 1976, becoming a senior producer for the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.'s investigative news program 'The Fifth Estate.' Two years later, David Fanning, an executive at WGBH in Boston, reached out to him about a documentary program he was creating called 'World.' Advertisement Mr. Cran flew to Boston for a meeting -- and got stuck in the blizzard of 1978. While holed up at Fanning's home, the two cooked up an idea for Mr. Cran's first documentary for the program, 'Chachaji: My Poor Relation,' a story of modern India told through the family of writer Ved Mehta. 'What was particular about Bill is that each one of his films is different,' Fanning said in an interview, adding, 'He would do these surprising things. He would say: 'I think I want to build a set. I want to build a bedroom in the studio.'' Fanning trusted Mr. Cran so much that in 1983, when 'World' was rebranded as 'Frontline,' with a tighter focus on current events, he asked Mr. Cran to produce its first two documentaries, with the first about corruption in the NFL. The next 'Frontline' subject, '88 Seconds in Greensboro,' probed the 1979 deaths of five people after a pro-communist march was attacked by members of the Ku Klux Klan and American Nazi Party in North Carolina. Four local camera crews had filmed the bloodshed. Mr. Cran and his team 'edited the combined footage into an amazingly complete anatomy of a murder,' wrote TV reviewer David Bianculli in the Akron Beacon Journal. In 1993, Mr. Cran led a 'Frontline' documentary team that looked into possible abuses and compromises by the longtime FBI director in 'The Secret File on J. Edgar Hoover.' The four-part series built a case that Hoover, who led the agency (and its forerunner) from 1924 to 1972, potentially made concessions to organized crime and other groups to avoid public disclosures of his gay relationships. Advertisement 'Our investigation found that this master of political blackmail was wide open to blackmail himself,' Mr. Cran said. 'There is overwhelming evidence that the mob knew it had nothing to fear from Hoover's FBI.' One of Mr. Cran's most historically expansive documentaries, the series 'From Jesus to Christ' (1998), took shape after Fanning met with a WGBH producer, Marilyn Mellowes, who was working on a documentary to bring more cultural and political context to the life of Jesus and the New Testament. Fanning agreed to bring aboard additional resources, including Mr. Cran as a senior producer and director. 'We make no judgment about faith, and we make no judgments about divinity,' Fanning told journalists. The documentary framed the life of Jesus in the wider realities of Roman-controlled Galilee, described by scholars as a center of Jewish resistance and activism. Jesus, meanwhile, was not raised amid a pastoral idyll - as portrayed in some accounts - but mingled with people from across the Roman world and was probably well aware of the political foment around him, the documentary suggested. Mr. Cran's first marriage, to Araminta Wordsworth, ended in divorce. His second wife, Stephanie Tepper, who worked with him as a producer on several films, died in 1997. His third wife, Polly Bide, died in 2003. He married Vicki Barker, a CBS journalist, in 2014. She survives him, as do three daughters from his second marriage, Jessica, Rebecca and Chloe Cran; his sister, Vicki Donovan; and a granddaughter. Many of Mr. Cran's films continue to be watched. 'Two months ago,' Yergin said, 'I was walking up Madison Avenue and someone -- out of the blue, startled to see me -- stopped me to say that watching 'Commanding Heights' had changed his life.' Advertisement Material from The Washington Post was used in this obituary.
Winnipeg Free Press
14-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
A grave task
To manage the world's most prestigious graveyard is no small undertaking. In a delightful dessert of words, Benoît Gallot is as lucid in his writing as he is in his affection for a gigantic gem — the 70 acres of beguiling cemetery called Père-Lachaise in the heart of Paris, where the dead are enveloped by life. It is vital, says Gallot, the cemetery's curator, to recognize that traditional cemeteries will become extinct if they continue to do nothing more than mirror death, and death alone, by presenting it in a sterile and barren setting emblematic of bereavement. The Secret Life of a Cemetery 'It took a 2011 decision by Paris City Council to change both my methods and my attitude. Goodbye pesticides, hello wild plants and animals,' Gallot writes. 'The cemetery I managed was no longer a place of death alone. Right before my eyes, it was becoming a haven of biodiversity for local plants, insects, birds, and even mammals. 'For years we turned away from cemeteries out of a fear of death. Now, the return of life may suddenly rescue them from the brink of extinction.' Gallot, obviously a romantic, explains: 'the beauty of Père-Lachaise lies in the fact you can easily get lost. What I love most about the cemetery isn't the celebrity graves but the bewitching sensation you can only truly experience when you're no longer sure of where you are. It will take your breath away and spark an irrepressible desire to come back, just so you can lose yourself in it all over again.' Père-Lachaise is a poignant marriage of 96,600 graves, over 200 years of history, the tombs of more notables than a history book, many of them blanketed with beautiful and bizarre tomb figures and an army of plants, flowers, wild animals, birds, insects and cats. They orchestrate a harmony of life over the dead. Père-Lachaise occupies about the same amount of land as The Vatican. Père-Lachaise's residents include the remains of 4,500 luminaries such as Oscar Wilde, Maria Callas, Marcel Proust, Frédéric Chopin, Jim Morrison and Édith Piaf as well as painters such as Amedeo Modigliani, Eugène Delacroix and Georges Seurat. It attracts 3 million visitors a year, the most in the world. Gallot became cemetery curator in 2018. As he puts it, 'I run an establishment where all the users are dead.' When Gallot was to be interviewed for the post, a colleague said: 'You're digging your own grave, man.' He and his family live on the grounds. The curator says the celebrity tombs are the main attraction for tourists. 'It wasn't until the second half of the 19th century that funerary art reached its golden age,' he says. 'Prominent families abandoned any semblance of sobriety, building grandiose monuments to show off their status and celebrate their success.' Gallot quotes Victor Hugo in Les Misérables: 'To be buried in Père-Lachaise is like having mahogany furniture. It is a sign of elegance.' (Hugo is not buried at Père-Lachaise.) A question Gallot has been asked more than once: 'Do you really keep Oscar Wilde's balls on your desk?' Jacques Brinon / Associated Press files French singer Édith Piaf is one of many notable personalities buried at the Père-Lachaise cemetery in Paris. He explains that this question refers to Oscar Wilde's tomb, which featured a sphinx statue with stone genitals. When unveiled in 1912, it caused a public outcry and was covered with a tarpaulin. Allegedly two women removed the genitals. The only record of it is in a staff report in 1961 as follows: 'the testicles… have been damaged by an unknown person.' Ever since, says Gallot, countless articles have claimed that successive curators used Wilde's genitals as a paperweight. 'Naturally, when I began my new job, I searched every filing cabinet and combed through the paperwork my predecessor left me. Alas, I found nothing,' he says. One burial site, a vault, was recently repossessed by the city. When gravediggers opened the vault, it was stuffed with 20 square feet of dead birds. Gallot speculates someone forced the birds through a crack in the gravesite after performing a voodoo ritual. Gallot ponders what his own grave will look like. 'I think I'd like my tomb to be large enough to hold myself, my wife, and our children — if they so choose. It would resemble a little garden with a small shrub in the middle, where robins could come to nest. A bench would give loved ones or passersby a place to sit. On the headstone, beside a witty epitaph, a QR code would link to my Instagram account so that people could continue to 'like' me in death. An empty planter at the foot of my grave would collect rainwater to serve as a trough for foxes and a bath for birds. 'In short, I would like my grave to be a place full of life.' Barry Craig is a retired journalist.
Cosmopolitan
06-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Cosmopolitan
Read V.E. Schwab's ‘Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil' Annotated Excerpt
Welcome to The Scroll, a new column that checks in with your favorite writers, asking them to exclusively reveal and annotate the best moments from their brand new books. We also get them to dish on their writing process and divulge a few plot secrets along the way. This round we chatted with V.E. Schwab, author of the iconic Villians series and The Secret Life of Addie LaRue. The author is changing what we thought we knew about our favorite creatures starting with a different kind of vampire story in her new novel Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil. Here, she shares an exclusive excerpt and talks about the power of writing hungry and vulnerable villains. I like to write fantasy that has a single point of departure, because you essentially start with both feet on the ground in a known place and then move from there. And I think I approach tropes the same way. My vampires do age, just on the inside instead of the outside. They wither and they decay morally, existentially, romantically until all that's left is the urge to hunt. 'The heart dies last' is part of that. The last piece to go for the vampire is also what was sustaining them emotionally. Sabine is a character that definitely strikes a very specific note. She is like, 'Kill first; ask questions later.' I think it's really important—especially when dealing with a villain—to show you that behind the curtain, there are still fears. It's showing you both her strength and her weaknesses. She is learning that she has something to be afraid of, but there is no moment where she is afraid. 'The heart burns last' is a lot of foreshadowing for every character in that scene, some in very, very literal ways and some in metaphorical ways. For an immortal, the passion, the hunger, the need, the desire is what keeps you going. It's the idea that once it's gone, there's nothing keeping you going. If you look at the three women at the heart of this story, hunger means a variety of things. The hunger to be free from the constraints of your life as it's been determined, the hunger to be recognized as a whole person, the hunger for rights, the hunger to be witnessed by somebody for what and who you really are. Sabine is driven by her hunger, in the literal sense, long before she's a vampire. Hunger is an insatiable thing. Hunger is like a moving goal post in life. We hunger for success and we hunger for recognition. We hunger for revenge, we hunger for everything. Hunger is at the heart of this book, in the traditional sense, because they're vampires. But there's also a really strong existential threat as there is with everything in this book. Each of the three women learn that, actually, no matter how much they feed, they will never feel satiated. At the end of the day, I am a fiction writer. I'm a fantasy writer. So I'm sure I got something wrong. Despite all of the research that I did, it's just inevitable. I am not a non-fiction historian, so I'm here for the vibes, right? I think I was so excited to look at three really distinct time periods and places, not only through the lens of history, but through the lens of queer history and closeting specifically. Queer people have always existed. It's not like we grew out of the soil a decade ago. These three women have such different historical contexts for their own identity and how they process it. I really wanted to talk about gay trauma and talk about queer joy. I really appreciate the need for both. I spent the first 15 years of my career not writing lesbian villains for that reason. But that's so reductive when we break it down because what we're saying is that queer people and queer characters don't deserve the same complexity and nuance as their straight counterparts. I write villains. That's what I do for a living. They're all messy, all accountable in different ways. These three women have moments where they are villainous and moments where they are heroic and moments where they are everything in between. I wanted to write somebody who made me feel seen. BOOK COVER: Courtesy of Tor Books. Excerpt and Annotations: Used with permission from Tor Books, an imprint of Tor Publishing Group, a trade division of Macmillan Publishers. Copyright © 2025 V. E. Schwab. Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, by V.E. Schwab will be released on June 10, 2025. To preorder the book, click on the retailer of your choice: AMAZON AUDIBLE BARNES & NOBLE BOOKS-A-MILLION BOOKSHOP APPLE BOOKS KOBO TARGET WALMART POWELL'S BOOKS HUDSON BOOKSELLERS GOOGLE PLAY
Daily Mirror
29-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mirror
Kids' most mischievous age revealed - as parents reveal antics that left them red-faced
A poll of 1,000 respondents found children are deemed most mischievous at the age of four, with 59% of parents claiming their offspring are frequently up to mischief Parents have been spilling the beans on some of the most hilarious and cringe-worthy situations they've found themselves in, all thanks to their cheeky little ones. A survey of 1,000 parents with kids aged between 3-11 revealed that four is the age when children are at their most mischievous. However, 55% reckon a bit of mischief is a good thing, believing it fosters curiosity and a spirit of adventure in their youngsters. Nearly half of parents believe a touch of naughtiness can also encourage creativity and problem-solving skills in their kids, while 45% reckon it helps them understand boundaries and how far they can be pushed. One mum shared how her kid managed to strut all the way to school sporting a pair of her knickers over his trousers. Another tot decided to give their parent's shaving foam a new home, smearing it all over their face to create a snowy white beard, before announcing plans to 'shave' the family cat. Thankfully, a quick intervention ensured the cat kept it's coat. One poor parent who took a nap on the sofa after a long morning of parenting woke without realising they'd been 'made up' with lipstick and mascara. Their 'new look' wasn't revealed until the doorbell went, leaving a delivery driver very confused. Another, unsuspecting parent got a shock when they discovered their salt and sugar pots had been swapped, leading to a rather salty taste in their morning coffee. According to the poll, a whopping 55% of all parents confessed they've been left blushing in public after their child kicked off a fuss. While a quarter of parents can often find this type of behaviour frustrating, laughter is the most common reaction to their little ones' mischief. The study was commissioned by Petits Filous, who have joined forces with father-of-three, Adam Thomas, to kick off a competition in search of the UK's cheekiest child. Professor Sam Wass, director of the Institute for Science of Early Years in East London and psychologist on Channel 4 's 'The Secret Life of 4, 5 and 6 Year Olds', commented: 'An increase of mischief-making among three-five-year-olds goes hand in hand with children of this age becoming wise to the theory of mind – that the thoughts in their heads are not the same as the thoughts in ours.' 'They are experimenting with the juggling act of pulling the wool over someone's eyes. But despite this being a sign of healthy curiosity, we don't want things to get out of control.' The research revealed that among families with multiple children, the youngest is often labelled as the most mischievous. While 19% think the middle child is the naughtiest, and 11% point the finger at the eldest, although 14% reckon all their kids are equally naughty. The survey also unveiled that as many as three in 10 parents reckon their own little rascals are more mischievous than other people's kids. With 11% estimating it would take their children just five minutes to get up to mischief if left unsupervised. DR SAM WASS'S TIPS TO ENCOURAGE MISCHIEF WHILE KEEPING BOUNDARIES IN PLACE: Respond to humour and playfulness with more of the same: Children aged 3-6 years old often like to play little games. It can feel hard for us 'sensible ones' to join in, but clamping down on playfulness and curiosity can send the wrong message. Even if you're tired, or stressed, it's always worth trying to see the funny side. Explain consequences: It's rare that a child wants to hurt themselves - it's much more common that they just act without thinking. When they do that, it can help to make them aware of the wider consequences of their actions. But the more gently you do this, and the more understanding you show for what motivated the mischief-making in the first place, the quicker the lesson will sink in. Show your reasoning: If you're trying to encourage children to learn and to respect social rules, then it helps to show reasoning. For every rule that you have, you should be able to explain why it is in place: it's about logic, understanding and intelligence - not force of will.
