Arts & Culture

SCEPTICAL is the only way to describe how I felt about the new series of Dr Who. I cried, I laughed and I cried some more when David Tenant said farewell in the last of the Dr Who Specials on New Year’s Eve. I didn’t know what to make of this new doctor, Matt Smith, with his weird alien-shaped face and funny accent. I was convinced that I would not, could not, like him and therefore with a sceptical heart, I tuned in to watch the first in the new series on BBC recently. Before I begin explaining about the new Doctor, I should explain a little about the show in general. I have featured it on numerous occasions but as it is a new series, I will recap. Dr Who began on BBC in 1963 and ran until 1989 when it was felt that the adventures of the Doctor and the sets were all becoming a little bit too …

So a big budget disaster by Mr Catastrophe himself, Roland Emmerich, seemed like a good way to kick off my consumption of Bluray films. I mean if ever there was a guy you could trust to put it all on the screen it’s Emmerich.Never one to put stars or even subtlty over spectacle, he’s hit the Hollywood money button dead-on with such hits as Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow – not what could be considered measured, character driven pieces, but wildly successful and entertaining nonetheless.What could be more perfect for the director than a potential world-ending scenario that has not only historical credentials that predate the Bible, but has also had a load of tinfoil-hat wearing believers waxing apocalyptic on the internet for as long as alt.fruitloop.kerrazee has been around for them to compare apocalypse survival notes and new techniques for hat making? The damn thing has “hit” written all over it.Except for one small detail – instead …

IT’S not many senior citizens who would admit that they had enjoyed themselves in a trendy Dublin nightclub, but for the Forever Young Choir, it was just one of the venues where they have done what they love doing most – singing and having fun.Over the past year and a half, the Ennis-based 30-member Forever Young Choir have been building up their repertoire of songs and perfecting their performances.They recently performed a number of songs in tribute to Bishop Willie Walsh, a member of the choir, at a civic reception in his honour held by Ennis Town Council.Chairman and founder member of the choir, Ennis man Aidan Deegan, admitted that it was his “brainwave” to start the choir. “I had seen a choir of senior citizens from the United States, Massachusetts performing in Glór over two years ago. All the members were between the ages of 74 and 94. I thought to myself, if they could do it, so could …

A FREE CD featuring some of the highlights of last summer’s Riches of Clare lunchtime concert series is being launched next week.The promotional CD, featuring renowned traditional Irish musicians from Clare such as Tony Linnane, Maeve Donnelly, Siobhán Peoples, The Kilfenora Céilí Band, Pádraig Rynne and Chris Droney, among many others, will be available free of charge during the 2010 Riches of Clare series from local branches of libraries around the county.The series began in 2005 inspired by the UCC Traditional Music Society’s Seomra Caidreamh series. “These were free concerts, organised by the students, where local musicians would perform. They were often the highlight of a working week and a great opportunity to hear musicians performing in a more formal but intimate setting,” Finola Ryan, co-ordinator of the series explained. After leaving UCC, Finola suggested the county arts office run a similar series, promoting Clare-based musicians. The 2010 series will continue to be free of charge and 16 concerts are …

WORLD-renowned singer songwriter Christy Moore returns this weekend to the North Clare town he immortalised in song.

MINOGUE’S Bar in Tulla will play host to The Unwanted on April 16.The trio consists of Cathy Jordan (also lead singer of Dervish), Sligo native Seamie O’Dowd who plays guitar, fiddle and dobro; and Californian Rick Epping, who plays harmonica, concertina and jaw harp.They brought out their first album last year, Music from the Atlantic Fringe, which mixes influences from both Ireland and America. According to Cathy, “It would be quite an eclectic sound in terms of instrumentation but I think there is an overall cohesive sound and it’s the product of to-ing and fro-ing across the Atlantic. Rick is from California but he lived in Ireland for years and settled here again about four years ago. All the rest of us are Irish but we would have a foot in Americana too.”While she says that Dervish has been her first priority over the years, as time goes by, she is less enamoured with travelling and spends more time on …

Wherever you go in the world you will find memorials to those that fell in the two World Wars. Below many of these plaques and memorials you will find the words ‘lest we forget’ etched in. These words serve to remind all of us of those who fought and died in the fields of Europe and beyond against tyranny and hatred.However, when we think of World War II, our thoughts usually fall to Europe and the battles in France, Germany and along the Baltic and Russian Front. We, and those who make historical drama, have often forgotten about a ferocious war that raged on long after Europe had been reclaimed and Hitler was dead.The battle in the Pacific Ocean was ferocious, bloody, harsh and unrelenting. It was a battle of hatred and bloodlust. It took place not on the fields and mountains but in the dense and unrelenting rainforest of islands that most had never heard of or would ever …

Kick Ass DIRECTED BY: Matthew Vaughn STARRING: Aaron Johnson, Nicolas Cage, Chloe Moretz, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Mark Strong CERT: 16 You wouldn’t know by the weather but the summer blockbuster season is almost upon us – and what’s this coming over the hill? An action movie based on a series of graphic novels? Oh no, I hear you groan. Someone please put me down.My sentiments exactly.But wait – Kick Ass is no ordinary comic book movie. This isn’t another mega-budget, CGI, 3D extravaganza with the power to bust box office blocks with all the character and personality of a three-legged, senile horse. It’s a small-budget, independent feature whose creators gleefully exploit the freedom of not having to answer to the studio suits or adhere to their cinema cliché and big explosion quotas. And so it plays like what might have happened if Quentin Tarantino had made a superhero movie in the days before he had access to big bucks – though …