• Solo: A Star Wars Story

    May 25, 2018 - By 

    ‘I’m an outlaw’, declares Alden Ehrenreich’s young Han in Solo: A Star Wars Story, the latest in Lucasfilm’s line of standalone spin-offs. Emilia Clarke, playing Qi’ra, the One Who Got Away, laughs. She doesn’t believe him. And neither will anyone watching. Kylo Ren’s call to ‘let the past die; kill it if you have to’ is great storytelling advice masked as Oedipal anxiety, and it’s advice that post-prequels Lucasfilm, addicted to the past, is unable to grasp. Lucasfilm can’t kill the past because the past is the golden goose. Solo, written by father-son Kasdans Lawrence and Jonathan, and directed, in…

  • Paul G. Smyth @ The Lutheran Church, Dublin

    June 6, 2016 - By 

    A year or so ago, I was told about an amazing gig that had happened in the National Concert Hall. It was unlike any live performance that the person recounting the night had ever seen. From that moment I was intrigued and eager to see Paul G. Smyth perform. Smyth, a member of The Jimmy Cake as well as a revered genius in the art of improvisational music is probably one of the most important musicians in Dublin. A sentiment immortalised following an outstanding, and at times unnerving, performance on a remarkably beautiful summer’s evening in St. Finian’s Church. The…