12 Strong review: The true story of America’s 9/11 counter-attack is boiled down to a bland horseback war drama January 25, 2018 In the weeks following 9/11, the US sent a covert team into Afghanistan to liberate (and bomb the absolute bejesus out of) a handful of Taliban-occupied towns. The squad joined forces with a local Afghan warlord, and together they traversed the mountainous region on horseback, calling in airstrikes, gunning down Taliban troops and kickstarting [...]
More and more pets are taking to the skies to join us abroad, but what happens to our four-legged friends when they fly? January 25, 2018 Air travel, it’s easy to forget, is arcane magic. We strap ourselves into big metal tubes to be voluntarily catapulted thousands of feet into the sky, a place where there’s free sour cream and onion flavoured pretzels and tiny bottles of vodka, and where we’re furious when the wifi doesn’t work. It is only the [...]
Nestled deep within the Ecuadorian cloud forest, Mashpi Lodge is a hotel at one with the nature surrounding it January 24, 2018 Shortly after the turn of the century the former mayor of Quito, Roque Sevilla, bought up a vast chunk of the Ecuadorian cloud forest from a local logging company, and turned the land into one of the largest privately owned conservation areas in the country. Somewhere in the centre of it all, on the site [...]
Jumanji review: Not quite a rumble in the jungle, but a good stir nonetheless December 21, 2017 Jumanji, an entertaining enough 1995 film about rampaging jungle animals that definitely exists on a VHS cassette in your attic somewhere, embedded itself into the pop culture fabric thanks to its now-terrible, but then-mind blowing CGI effects. Effervescent clown-person Robin Williams helped too, as did the kitschy cryptic allure of the central board game’s [...]
The Greatest Showman review: A musical airbrushing of the sordid history of the freak show December 21, 2017 Like a circus-themed, two-hour long Adele video with original-Jumanji-era CGI elephants and lions, The Greatest Showman is a whitewashing movie-musical about the life and trials of PT Barnum, originator of the big top and freak show, and infamous exploiter of hirsute women. Hugh Jackman stars, and does a decent and sincere enough job belting [...]
Beats Studio3 Wireless review: The W1 powered Apple headphones mark a coming of age for Beats December 20, 2017 Since being taken under the protective wing of Apple’s hardware team, hippity-hoppity cool-person company Beats has become the official high-end headphone of iOS. And with that came a number of critical changes. The Beats Studio3 Wireless headphones use the same W1 chip found in the AirPods, meaning they seamlessly pair with iOS devices without [...]
Impressionists in London at Tate Britain doesn’t have enough impressionists in it November 7, 2017 The year is 1871 and French artists are pouring out of Paris like so much spilled milk, the pail they once called home having been kicked over by the recalcitrant mule that, in this metaphor, is the Franco-Prussian War. Among the thousands who sought refuge in Britain were conscription-dodging Claude Monet and his associated network [...]
Nobu Shoreditch review: Sophisticated Manhattan-style dining arrives in London’s coolest postcode October 27, 2017 The ever-expanding Nobu empire of classy and upmarket Japanese restaurants plants an incongruous outpost in the gritty hipster bricklands of Shoreditch. A cavernous basement lounge hidden beneath the first Nobu hotel in London, the restaurant exudes the refined early-era Bond-villain aesthetic of Tokyo’s fine dining scene. A giant glass wall allows an adjacent light well [...]
Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL review: Simply the best Android phones ever made October 18, 2017 Google’s new phones are rather good. The Pixel 2 and its bigger brother the Pixel 2 XL (identical in every way but shape, size, price and battery) are straightforwardly excellent. They are simply the best Android phones ever made. Life-changing, envelope-pushing, they can shift a paradigm from fifty paces. They do your laundry, improve your [...]
I went up a mountain in Sri Lanka to meet a reclusive mystic and here is what I learned September 14, 2017 Somewhere high up in the hills surrounding the town of Kandy in Sri Lanka, there lives a man called Rahju. An artist, spiritualist and musician, Rahju practices meditation while riding along coastal roads on his motorcycle. His paintings are inspired by the writing of Buddhist philosophers and the intergalactic observations of the Hubble Space Telescope [...]
