The Sigla Blog

I’m a big fan of John Crace’s Digested Read - where he trawls through a current, much-reviewed book and gives his own synopsis in a few hundred words - in The Guardian. Usually it’s very funny. This week, it’s Cherie Blair’s memoir, Speaking For Myself, and it’s hilarious.

June 2007: Although I hadn’t wanted Gordon ever […]

Woolworth’s have had to ditch a new bed range called Lolita, which is aimed at six-year old girls. Parents kicked up about it, unsurprisingly. Who’d want to tuck their little girl up in a bed named after a precocious pre-teen who is taken advantage of by an older man?
According to Reuters:

“In Lolita, a 1955 novel […]

*You’ve probably seen the above ad as part of Trócaire’s Lenten Campaign for International Women’s Day about gender inequality. If you haven’t, no doubt you’ve heard about the row with the BCI who have banned the ad because it was deemed to have a “political end”. Red Mum discusses the controversy and Hugh also […]

When you hear the words “Nazi propaganda films”, most people immediately think of Leni Riefenstahl, The Triumph of the Will and other fervent homages to the Third Reich fatherland. Very few people will be aware of the fact that a sub-genre of propagandist cinema existed in 1940’s Germany: the so-called ‘Irish films’. A documentary called […]

It’s been a while since there’s been a decent creative spat but who better than Germaine Greer to kick things off with a pseudo-racist rant about Monica Ali’s Brick Lane. Producers of the film adaption of the book have not been permitted to film in the eponymous area of East London. Greer, in a […]

Tuppenceworth takes up the story of MCD, Oxegen and libel. Even though the Irish Independent published an article last weekend entitled “How we feared for our lives at Oxegen . . . festival-goers relive their nightmare” and various other sources have reported on the alleged downside of the festival, it seems that

The BBC reports that Hugo Chavez has opened his own film studio to make South American films as an alternative to Hollywood fare. The article says: “He has also accused Hollywood of portraying Latin Americans as violent criminals and drug traffickers, and urged children to turn away from superheroes such as Superman.”
Wow. Is Superman more […]

As mentioned in my Da Vinci review, Ron Howard makes very particular kinds of films and often surrounds himself with the same personnel. So forgive me if I’m a bit perturbed to hear that Brian Grazer, a producer who has worked with Howard on several films (including the Da Vinci code), is going to be […]

In today’s Observer woman magazine Louise France uses an interview with Periel Aschenbrand as a springboard to a debate on the future of feminism. Aschenbrand is more agit-prop sloganeer than academic feminist and uses fashion, popular culture and her own body as a vehicle for her ideas. Most famous for her ‘The only bush […]

It may have taken Dick Cheney nearly 24 hours to disclose that he accidentally shot a friend while out on a hunting trip in Texas, but Cracked.com have been quicker off the mark with their ‘Dick Cheney:
A History of Violence’ photo cartoons.
I particularly like the one above.

Colm Bracken thinks that women are less interested in current affairs than men. He believes that in post-Sex and the City Ireland, the Irish female is more concerned with shopping than politics.
I agree with him about Candace Bushnell - Sex and the City was an amusing diversion on metropolitan life. After a couple […]

As if scientists aren’t busy enough with Bird Flu epidemics and breeding green pigs, they have also concluded findings that reveal today to be the saddest day of the year.
That’s right, forget disembarking from bed on the wrong side, murderous PMT, mild irratation, lack of sunlight, or cartoon rainclouds over your head: today your […]