...When the wolves come out of the walls then it's all over. If you want to know what's all over, and who 'they' are, then you should find yourself a copy of Neil Gaiman's "The Wolves in the Walls". It is obviously a childrens story, but as with all Neil's work, and the work of many childrens authors these days, there's plenty for adults too. Unfortunately for you, you're too late to catch the Improbable play of the book. Here are some photos to tease you even more with what you missed. I wish there were some better shots to be honest. Something to show just how amazing and fluid the set designs were; how Dave McKean like they managed to get the whole look and feel. Although you can see how good the wolf puppets look you can't see just how good the puppeteers were, how the whole experience was injected with humour, a perfect counterpoint to the implied horror of having the wolves come out of the wall. The kids in the audience loved it, the adults roared with laughter in all the right places. Definitely the best piece of theatre I have ever seen. According to this page they'll be touring with it again in the Autumn in the UK, and next year taking it to the US. Book a ticket as soon as you can, you'll not be disappointed

As promised. Here are some more images taken from Mirrormask. And if you still don't know who Dave McKean is then you're wrong. About everything probably.

How did this happen? the118show

You know when I said I was going to bug you with information about Mirrormask until it was out and you'd all been to see it? Well I forgot to link to these images when Neil Gaiman blogged them recently.

There's no Hitchhikers trailor available yet but there is this short little teaser to whet your appetites. Also, here is an interview with Michael Polis, one of the Mirrormask Executive Producers. I'm going to keep going on about it until its released and you've all seen it!

I went to see Zatoichi last night with Mike, one of the few people I know who was likely to appreciate it. The action sequences were brilliantly choreographed as was the tap-dancing! The whole cinema laughed out load a number of times as the comedy sequences were so good, and even Mike winced at a couple of the less funny moments!! Well worth seeing. It was shown as part of the Monday Evening Close Up features at Stratford Picture House. Unfortunatley they don't seem to have a full list of upcoming one-off films on their web site so, mainly for my benefit, here they are:

• July 5th - Under the Tuscan Sun
• July 11th - Taxi Driver
• July 12th - Fear X
• July 18th - The Untouchables
• July 19th - Capturing the Friedmans
• July 25th - Wag the Dog
• July 26th - The Station Agent
• August 1st - Jackie Brown
• August 2nd - Monster

If you didn't already know, today is Midsummer's Day or St. John's Day. That made yesterday Midsummer's Eve and the day I was supposed to go and watch an outdoor performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream by students at the Warwick Arts Festival. When Laura and I got there it was windy and raining and not condusive to an entertaining experience so we decided to go and see a film instead. So, we set off for the Showcase in Coventry only for me to head in the wrong direction on the A45, something I've done a couple of times now. By the time I realised we decided we might as well go to the Cineworld at Touchwood, Solihull. Given the quite limited choice they had on a Wednesday night we settled on The Day After Tomorrow. And what a fantastic choice we made. Let's hope it wins Oscars or something: Fantastic plot, brilliant acting and to top it all off its got bears in it, and timber wolves, and Emmy Rossum. And a joke about Friedrich Nietzsche. The special effects aren't too bad either. All in all a great movie and hugely enjoyed by myself and Laura; better than Shakespeare could ever be.

Another oldish link that I forgot to post at the time. Basically its a scary short film. Sit back relax and enjoy The Cat with Hands. Oh, its a .mov so you'll need quicktime or something, annoying I know, but what can I do? Edit: This link doesn't seem to appear in www.bloglines.com: http://homepage.mac.com/jbrimm/Cat-With-Hands.mov

My Director's Series DVD's turned up yesterday. Each DVD contains selected works of a different director. The 3 available are Michel Gondry, Chris Cunnigham and Spike Jonze. if you know who they are go out and buy them, they're great. if you don't, go out and buy them anyway, it'll be a good education for you. I had to pick them up from the post office and pay the ?3.99 customs charge (risk you take I suppose) plus the ?4.00 handling fee. Now what exactly is this ?4 for? I had to pick it up so they saved themselves from actually delivering it to my door. The only thing I can think of that they did extra was calculating the amount of tax I had to pay on top of the US tax I've already paid. Assuming the guy earns minimum wage that must have taken a real long time for him to work out for it to cost me ?4. Either way I think they're paying their staff too much for punching a few numbers into a calulator. I didn't think that this link deserved its own posting so I added it here. Clearly its only the second best web site because mine is the greatest ever. but he tries hard.