This is a hugely intelligent adaptation. The cuts in length are achieved mostly by cutting subplot, and by telling stuff in pictures when it’s possible – the opposite of the Branagh version (charming though that is in its own way), that extrapolates extensions to scenes and typically illustrates text rather than using the language of film to contract it or comment upon it.

Almereyda has successfully translated a lot of the diegetic textual stuff to pictures too. Hamlet isn’t reading books, he’s editing a video diary that also functions as a natural environment for soliloquy (although mind-numbing spaces outside time, like a Blockbuster Video and a trans-Atlantic flight, also serve the same purpose). And the play-within-the-play is, of course, a film-within-a-film.

A few very gentle modernizations in the language work very well – I notices “reck his rede” becomes “reck his creed” (the DVD subtitles have “wreck his creed”, but I read that as meaning the opposite so that’s probably a mistake). Difficult vocabulary has mostly been avoided by cutting lines that would be incomprehensible to the modern audience. Those lines quite often refer to details of Elizabethan life or the Danish court that would not be suitable for the Manhattan setting anyway.

Julia Stiles, whom I typically have liked more than the performances have merited, is finally given material that works for her. Hawke, whom I often find annoyingly mawkish, is very very good, and Liev Schreiber is absolutely stellar as Laertes. The use of Bill Murray as Polonius in 2000 is noteworthy, he must have been cast just after Rushmore came out – does very well as a hapless father, with BRILLIANT little physical details as when he crams a wad of bills into the pocket of his son’s jacket.

I’ve seen it twice now… Allconsuming doesn’t support the level of my enthusiasm technically!

I actually bought this kind of ironically, to get to gloat over the obviously bad advice and shitty values the title and cover seems to promise. To my great surprise, those things are a clever ruse – there sneakily to smuggle out the best absolute beginner’s book in a vegan yoga lifestyle I’ve come across.

After a few very, very weak books, Cornwell is back on the proverbial wagon with Book of the Dead. Without too much or all too overt preaching (apart from the systematic Bush-bashing), she engages with some interesting themes (sexual and psychological violence, war, masculinity), reflecting them in the lives of her main characters as well as her criminals.

In the last third of the book, the plot veers away from psychological interest and every-day life, offering more of the implausible super-villain stuff that was the problem with the approximately seven thousand werewolf books that destroyed the series to begin with. That said, the denouement is deftly done and fairly entertaining – had I been reading a physical book I probably just would have read faster at this point and been less annoyed with stuff that nagged at me now.

Most importantly, we get excellent developments on Scarpetta, Lucy, Marino, Rose – and a new character I like very much, Bull. I genuinely thought the Scarpetta series was beyond repair, but I am genuinely looking forward the next installment!

The production of the unabridged audio book is excellent, Kate Reading’s narration top notch.

It is very helpful that the editor – Jonathan Bate – actually LIKES the play. Most editors haven’t.

But I don’t get why he thinks it’s so obvious that Lavinia isn’t ravaged in the same pit where Bassianus lies dead. May have to reread the salient bits again.

Ellen Page is an absolute goddess. She has that Audrey Hepburn thing where it almost hurts watching her on screen. Acting chops, too.

This film is a complete happy pill, but I’m not sure whether it hasn’t lost all the edginess of the original. Plus, even though Travolta is pretty darling as Mrs Turnblad, I’m not completely down with fat suits. Wouldn’t it be like blackface within the metaphorical frame of the film?

That said, Nikki Blonsky is a superstar, and the movie deffo worth seeing. I wonder whether her nickname was Nikki before she donned the dancing shoes of Ricki?

Lake and Waters have cameos in the film, naturally.

I think Stephen Tropiano had a great time researching and writing this book, but it is unecessarily wordy, poor in style and structure, heavy on exclamation marks and intellectually sloppy.

Tropiano graces us with his personal opinions on the artistic merits of many of the films mentioned, but does not have the space (or inclination) for detailed criticism, reducing his reviews to a rather pointless sprinkling of adjectives.

The secondary sources that he does rely on, especially Time and the NYT, are interesting, and his choice to place exploitation cinema in the teen film context is helpful. The segment on fifties cinema is the most lucid.

The book has no index.

Oh, the political angle is really cool! I guess I thought mecha entertainment to be all robots and dating, but the financing and political and military stuff here is getting very interesting.

It reminds me more than a little of Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game.

This may be the best book I have ever read. Kallio applies her considerable observational powers to her (and our) intimate relationships with movies. A lot of the stuff is idiosyncratic (like her habit of trying to keep her favourite films to herself) but the underlying insights are brilliant and universal.

Not that this combination of references will be of help to many people, but she reminds me of Cary Tennis, Sinikka Nopola and Umberto Eco.