Donald Clarke

• Sequels
• July 31, 2012, 22:18

The rumour had been floating around for a while. So canyons did not shake when Peter Jackson confirmed that The Hobbit is to appear as not one, not two, but three films. Parse the details and the news seems even …

• Olympics
• July 29, 2012, 22:41

Yesterday, I put together some incoherent words on the subject of patriotism. If you can’t be bothered to read the piece, here is the shortened version: I’m largely against it. While perusing the column, I had another read of George …

• Uncategorized Video Games Way off topic
• July 25, 2012, 17:13

I was desperately trying to hang on until August, but I just couldn’t manage it. As you will be aware, that is the month when  – because ordinary people go on stupid “holidays” — newspapers get desperate and begin commissioning …

• Trailerspotting
• July 24, 2012, 02:44

The new trailer for Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master is with us. Let me say two things first. These things are true. They are irrefutable. Number one: this film will kick bottom. Number two: if PTA really wants us to …

• Politics
• July 22, 2012, 23:02

Following the ghastly events in Denver on Friday morning, we have, thank goodness, heard little from the prescriptive mob that so often seeks to blame popular culture for the decline of western society. A few articles have asked whether Christopher …

• Uncategorized
• July 20, 2012, 12:05

This can’t be real. Can it? Writing today in The Ticket, I commented on the disturbing rise of a kind of internet fanaticism in relation to movies in general and as regards Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight franchise in particular. The …

• Hell
• July 17, 2012, 17:40

Well, that was timely. I was halfway through a piece for Friday’s Ticket — miss it at your peril — on the rise of the internet hyper-fan as it relates to The Dark Knight Rises when a more than usually …

• Deaths
• July 16, 2012, 12:45

Yes, until yesterday, she was still with us. Holm, who was 95, is memorable for a relatively small number of roles from Hollywood’s golden era.  Always dryly witty and slightly hoarse in her delivery, she enlivened the indestructible musical High …

• Film Festivals Horror
• July 15, 2012, 20:29

It was another impressive year at the Fleadh. I will hold fire before going into too much detail about the pictures because a full report is to appear in The Irish Times on Tuesday. But I was impressed by Ciaran …

• Uncategorized
• July 11, 2012, 15:09

Don’t worry. This is not an obituary. It seems that Peter O’Toole, now 80, has decided to lay down his metaphorical trowel and retire from the boards. ”It’s my belief that one should decide for oneself when it is time to …

• Deaths
• July 9, 2012, 16:22

Obviously, nobody was better at being Ernest Borgnine than Ernest Borgnine. But that great actor, who has died at the age of 95, did have the honour of defining a cinematic type. No doubt, when burrowing through photographs, casting agents …

• Trailerspotting
• July 8, 2012, 22:22

It’s an interesting one this. Last weekend, a grubby, plot-light Steven Soderbergh film took in more than $36 million at the US box-office. Okay, it wasn’t one of Steven’s most challenging films: the piece is closer to the eccentric (and, …

• Divorce Tom Cruise
• July 2, 2012, 23:42

The developing story (or should we say chatter) concerning the break-up of the marriage between Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes offers a text-book example of the lunatic way that news gets around in modern times. A solid narrative has already …