Juno

Like the fictional teenagers of Dawson’s Creek, there are moments when the intelligent words spewing forth from the eponymous Juno are implausibly articulate but hey, who goes to the cinema to see real life? And really, that’s my only complaint. Of course, I’m never truly objective where Allison Janney is concerned and actually, Juno also stars two cast members from the tragically short-lived series, Arrested Development, so perhaps I was always going to love it. Yet although the cast was fantastic, what I particularly enjoyed was the script’s gradual evolution that gently altered my first impressions. When it comes to the pathetically simplistic nature of modern day cinema, a multilayered character is a rarity, let alone one that actually evolves over the course of ninety minutes – but on this occasion, I was proved wrong and it felt good.

One of those atypical film experiences by which it’s hard not to be touched, Juno deals with teenage pregnancy with humour and understated confidence. I’d recommend it to everyone apart from my father, for whom ‘understated’ is a terrible insult when it comes to movies, and who would rather extract his own liver than watch something that is even obliquely about babies.

Latium, Fitzrovia

I’m developing something of a disgruntlement about mid-priced restaurants. Maybe I’m getting old, or tight, but I would far rather go to a seriously fantastic restaurant once or twice a year, spending perhaps £100 a head or more, and eat in Pizza Express the rest of the time, than fork out £40-50 on something that isn’t really that much more special than a good gastropub burger.

Latium’s in the price bracket that I would cheerfully never revisit. The food was tasty, cleverly thought-out, well-presented and constructed using quality ingredients. The buffalo mozzarella was divine – but serving it with oven-roasted tomatoes, a mixed salad and slices of courgette was hardly inspired. My duck was good – but no better than the duck in The Stonemason’s Arms, Hammersmith. I’ll grudgingly admit that my dessert of yoghurt and berries was gorgeous.

I didn’t hate Latium – no one could, it’s not interesting enough to inspire hated – but I’d challenge someone to love it. And at nearly £30 for three courses, plus more for wine, for every 2.5 trips to a Latium-priced eaterie, you can go to Petrus once – surely an exchange no sane person would hesitate to make?

L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon, Covent Garden

In 1989, Joel Robuchon was voted Chef of the Century in France and his international restaurants currently hold seventeen Michelin stars between them, more than any other chef in the world. It’s fair to say I was pretty freaking excited about going to L’Atelier.

Merely stepping inside is a sensory shock. The room is dark red and glossy black with high seats around three sides of a huge cooking area and a double-height wall of succulent green plants. Think futuristic, Japanese Cheers with heavily-accented French waiting staff instead of Ted Danson. It was stunning and different and I was impressed – but I would’ve eaten the food in an ammonia-scented slurry pit. I’m not religious but I think Joel Robuchon may be divine – how else could he discover the combination of foie gras, port and parmesan for an amuse bouche, for example? Or the spectacular crab on guacamole and tomato? Oh god, or that mushroom and egg number that tasted like ambrosia? The duo of desserts were equally glorious and demanded a requiem to be sung as we swallowed them and mourned their loss. I love my food but it’s not often I’m silenced by it. Flawless.

No Country For Old Men

This film has been on my To Do list for months. The Coen brothers directed Fargo, an all-time personal favourite – but NCFOM stars the incredible Javier Bardem of The Sea Inside, The Dancer Upstairs and perhaps other The-Noun-Presposition films, so I was extra-excited. Then I had to calm myself because obviously being extra-excited is to invite anti-climax. Sadly I didn’t calm sufficiently.

It was visually stunning. The direction, the cinematography were faultless. The acting was fantastic: subtle, funny, believable. Javier was sinister. Tommy Lee Jones finally managed to redeem himself after The Fugitive, something I never believed possible. And I was pathetically proud of the awesome Kelly Macdonald who actually made me want to boast about my Glaswegian heritage.

But the plot let the side down: despite so many superb contingent parts, the story didn’t manage to justify the film. It wasn’t merely its bleakness: I know enough about life not to expect a satisfying beginning, middle and end, but this pointed to being a thriller and then singularly failed to thrill. Still, no regrets. Even despite the criminal lack of legroom at Islington’s Screen on the Green, for better or worse, it had to be seen.

Mohsin Hamid, The Reluctant Fundamentalist

Hardback books annoy me. They’re bulky in my bag and overpriced. Worse, The Reluctant Fundamentalist is more accurately a novella and thus feels like an even worse rip-off, but I’m discussing it at a book club next week and it’s not yet out in paperback so a purchase was unavoidable.

Enough preamble: TRF is the Booker-nominated story of Changez, a young Pakistani guy who goes to the USA for university, lands a top job in NYC and then struggles to come to terms with the changes in his life following 9/11. There’s also a bleak love interest to add breadth. It’s an interesting story and I’m glad I read it but the premise of the first person narrative spoken to a little-known third party really, really grated; it felt laboured and pointless and entirely devalued the result. In fact, the whole thing seemed somewhat clunky, like a recipe where the individual elements haven’t blended as intended – well-thought out, good in principle, but ultimately indigestible. I’m not saying I could do better, and I know that my novel’s attempts at plot devices would be as glaring as they come, but when it comes to recommending this book, I’m fundamentally reluctant.

I Am Legend

“Will is such a letdown,” observed Luke as we left the cinema, capturing the mood perfectly. Willard Smith III seems immensely likeable. In interviews he is polite, generous with his laughs and pleasingly humble. He clearly has a great eye for the popular but has also managed to make more serious movies. Yet somehow, his films always disappoint – and I Am Legend was no exception. It started off well, tension was built, the deserted Big Apple post-virus was impressive and believable. But all too soon, the promising beginning was ruined by a) schmaltz, b) faux-spirituality in the shape of a quasi-lecture on the continuing relevance of Bob Marley and c) gratuitous displays of religion. There was no conceivable need for most of the plot, motivation was at rock bottom and don’t even get me started on the impossible logistics behind Will’s basement laboratory. Unexpectedly, the CGI graphics were also very poor – the lions in the opening sequence were about as convincing as a repeat offender and the zombie-types looked pre-Jurassic Park. Big thumbs up go to the Alsatian who played an Alsatian with absolute conviction, but other than that I’d recommend a change of the title’s final word to ‘inadequate’.

Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now

I was suspicious about this book in the extreme: the cover looks religious and the only recommendation on the front is from Oprah. However, its virtues had been sung by two disparate sources and I felt I should humour them.

The Power of Now tells us that the future and the past are an illusion (an old-hat concept to a self-help addict such as myself); apparently the only way for us to be happy is to live in the present and surrender to the now. This is the kind of new age stuff that my father, Dan Brown’s biggest fan, would consider a criminal waste of paper and ink. I did slightly struggle during the more intense passages but there is no doubt that I could see the book’s relevance to my own existence. I’m not someone who thinks about the past too much but I have spent many years of my life (sadly no exaggeration) creating expectations that are then dashed and fears that are then realised. The cloying spirituality will deter many but after I acclimatised, I found The Power of Now profoundly insightful and I’m happier for having finished it. If you’re open-minded enough, it’s required reading.

Le Coq D'Argent, 1 Poultry

To my knowledge, I’ve never been to a Conran restaurant. This is odd because I live in London, developed a bizarre addiction to Habitat at a tender age and love eating in restaurants almost more than anything else on the planet. Sunbathing’s high on the list but going to a restaurant with a tan is surely the pinnacle of existence. Pallid, nonetheless I eagerly awaited my team’s Christmas lunch at the Coq D’Argent, a Conran eaterie in the heart of the City.

And it was lovely. Good service (despite some inter-staff bitching), delicious food (I had an excellent pigeon salad, rack of lamb and a chocolate fondant), wonderful wine and, since my bosses were paying, I didn’t have to be concerned about l’addition. But would I pay to go back there in my own time? Certainly not. Yes, it was packed – but it was soulless; delicious – but unimaginative; nice – but not special.

I don’t blame Sir Terrance – he certainly has the popular touch and the place was heaving – but for the money it wasn’t exceptional enough; my strongest memory is not the food but a fantastic game of Shag, Marry or Cliff. Could do better.

Isabel Losada, Men!

For the past few months I have become obsessed with self-help. I am single, thirty, moving into my first home, independent, self-sufficient – and this seems to be precisely the right time to address my inner core. But I can’t deny that one day, I will want to spend some time with a man. And I can’t pretend not to have noticed that very few men tickle my fancy. When I read the introduction to Men!, I agreed with the author’s assertion that almost everyone knows a ton of gorgeous, funny, wonderful single women but barely any available, presentable, dateable men. Eventually, Losada explains why: it seems to us like there are less dateable men than dateable women because there actually are less dateable men than dateable women. And too many potentially dateable men stay in miserable relationships for the wrong reasons. The only place our author found one she could bear was in Egypt, which wasn’t particularly heartening. Still, at least I’m not a freak for finding it hard to meet Mr Right – and I would have enjoyed the book if I could’ve stopped myself being jealous that it was she who was writing it and not me.

The Devil Wears Prada

There is enormous scope for a film that interrogates the fashion industry from the perspective of youth. Sadly, TDWP is not the new black. Certainly, the dialogue has a few feisty moments but nothing that will make the Ugly Betty writers lose any sleep. It’s impossible to sympathise with the protagonist, whose PA job is not nearly as awful as it is made out to be; so she has to get a steak which her boss then doesn’t eat? Boo hoo. Anne’s drippy chef boyfriend is so pathetic he isn’t trusted to speak more than four words consecutively; instead we are offered laboured visual clues ‘proving’ his worthiness, such as the fact that he makes her grilled cheese sandwiches after work. Blimey, if my boyfriend was a proper chef and then made me that fourth-rate crap, he’d be next on the Breville. As for the moment when Anne tosses her phone into the fountain… If one of my eight year old tutees came up with that scenario I’d scoff and tell her to ditch it immediately. Proof if it were needed that even a great premise and Meryl Streep can't make up for fundamentally lazy writing and unoriginal direction. Disappointing.

The X Factor: The Final

Really, I should hate The X Factor even more than The Secret Millionaire. By definition, talent shows celebrate the extraordinary, planting the idea that to be entertaining is valuable while normalcy is failure. These programmes have spawned the disease which has infected countless young people: spotlightis. Victims grow up believing that fame is a panacea. Being snapped continually by paparazzi, walking comfortably down a red carpet, being as accustomed to the noise of screaming fans as most of us are to the sound of our breathing – these are their right. A normal life becomes a botched life, working hard for little recognition seems pointless, an existence without famous friends is futile. I was like this as a teen and sadly there’s still a part of the old addict that resurfaces every so often.

The X Factor final was trite, melodramatic, terrible television but over ten million of us watched Leon triumph deservedly and I’m sure even more of us will witness the next victory in 2008. Slag it off all you like; feel superior, tut and then switch on Dispatches – but the pantomime season is upon us and there are certainly worse ways to spend a Saturday night.

The Secret Millionaire

The entire premise of The Secret Millionaire (Channel 4, Wednesdays, 9pm) is questionable: a fantastically wealthy person goes back to their roots, adopts an undercover persona of someone ‘normal’ (read: impoverished), connects with the local community and then, at the end of the show, reveals his/her true identity and hands over a random amount of money to those who are deemed to be worthy of such assistance. Could there be a more blatant advertisement for capitalism than this programme? “Oh, look at the Poor People with their awful lives, let’s throw money at them: that will make it all better because cash solves all woes.” The Poor People respond as if to a script – speechless with heart-breaking gratitude that someone has chosen to help them for no reason other than ‘because they needed help’. It’s over-simplistic, arbitrary and I’m afraid that I absolutely love it. I revel in the millionaires’ discomfort as they rough it, wince at their lack of awareness regarding the perceived hopelessness of so many people’s lives, and – yes – I well up when the cheques are handed over. Like binge drinking, money doesn’t solve life’s bigger issues, but a burst every now and then can be entertaining.

Winter Wonderland

The approach to Hyde Park’s Winter Wonderland is unquestionably special: an avenue of magnificent trees dripping with scarlet lights leads past ‘London’s biggest temporary ice-rink’ to the blinding white of the 50m observation wheel. Clustered around the periphery, the quaint German market is equally alluring from sixty paces but on closer inspection, the selection of Christmas decorations appears less than authentic and I remain unconvinced that Haribo stalls are staples of traditional Deutsche fayres. It’s rare that I leave a shopping opportunity sans purchase but the only tempting item was a reindeer hide that I rejected on both moral and transportation grounds.

We didn’t escape without spending any of our hard-earned coinage, however: a £7 foray onto the self-proclaimed Wheel of Excellence had its highs and lows – we loved the high-tech cabin complete with air-con and lighting controls but seeing the Millennium Eye in the distance reminded us what we were missing – and our £3 red sausages were tasty but the meat:bun ratio was disappointing. Somehow we managed to resist the terrifying Haunted House. As an inexpensive festive outing, the Winter Wonderland is worth a meander – but if it’s the feature event of your Christmas, you might require some sympathy.

The French House, Soho

The bright bar downstairs is a delightful melange of bad pop art, complimentary olives and chesty barmaids who look like extras from Les Mis, with a sardined clientele who are still visibly livid about the smoking ban. But walk upstairs into the mirrored dining room and you’ll find an altogether different atmosphere: a handful of quiet tables, fantastic waiters and an air of refinement not in evidence three metres below.

The menu was the perfect length: the vegetarian selection was slightly lameass but I suppose that’s to be expected in a French restaurant. My pork was tasty although I won’t be ordering black pudding stuffing again in a hurry; my friend’s salmon looked nice but predictable. While the main courses lacked creativity, the desserts menu looked like an LSD trip in comparison. I had the apple and pecan crumble served with rum and raisin ice cream and white chocolate sauce, but like a good When Harry Met Sally fan, I ditched the two accompaniments and had it à la mode instead – much better.

Admittedly there were no fantastic surprises but there were no nasty shocks either and as a safe bet in Soho, The French House has it sorted.

Michael Clayton

Since his beginnings as an ER doc, George Clooney has developed a bit of a reputation for meaningful movie-making, consistently releasing message-filled flicks such as Syriana and Good Night and Good Luck. Michael Clayton is another feature with a moral story to tell – sadly it’s one we’ve heard before: an underdog (Tom Wilkinson) spots the evil in a big multinational farming company but no one will believe him and a struggling Clooney has to find a way to save the day – think Erin Brokovitch minus breasts.

To compensate for the wan plot, the desperate screenwriters decided to liven things up by messing with the chronology. I anxiously await the day when will this cheap smoke ‘n’ mirrors ploy becomes as transparent and derided as it should be. Added to that irritation, there were far too many random plot elements – the bizarre horse stand-off, the wayward brother, the poker addiction… And what was the bit about the children’s book? Red herring or just a load of carp?

Plot aside, the acting, camerawork and cinematography were all undeniably strong and other audience members were clearly captivated. Overall, a fair effort but undeniably a disappointing non-addition to the Clooney/Soderbergh canon.

Sway, Covent Garden

When I’ve visited Sway’s bar in the past it has always been heaving so I was surprised to find a near-empty restaurant and similarly startled when I saw the menu. For such a central location, the prices were unusually low: around £6 for a burger, Caesar salad or fish and chips. Sure, the choices were uninspiring but with an additional 50% off all food deal, courtesy of toptable.co.uk, it felt a bit like eating in Primark – so cheap, it seemed churlish not to buy one of everything.

In the end, we ordered six tapas for £10 (should’ve been £20). The deep fried element was disappointing; we left most of our tempura ‘king’ prawns which were about as regal as a night out in Basildon, but we loved the humous, and the halloumi and grilled tomato skewers were a definite highlight.

The faintly disturbing WCs are worth a mention – as grotty as they come, finished off with a vase of tall, crumbling flowers that were so dead they’d started to smell. For a bargain bite pre-cinema, Sway was spot on, but if you’re a serious foodie or lean towards OCD when it comes to public facilities, stay away.

The Darjeeling Limited

Wes Anderson’s back catalogue is both impressive and a fraction weird, which, in this time of indentikit dross, is a splendid combo. Rushmore was interesting, The Royal Tenenbaums was striking and The Life Aquatic With Steve Zizzou was gorgeous but conceptually a bit too strange for my rigid imagination. Happily, The Darjeeling Limited, Anderson’s latest offering, is the best so far – by far.

Set in a somewhat romanticised north of India, the film sees three unlikely brothers taking a journey in search of spiritual contentment following the death of their father. All three of the leads perform exceptionally well but Owen Wilson deserves particular praise for his unapologetic personification of a manic control freak while Adrien Brody’s wonderful face deserves an Oscar in its own right. Natalie Portman’s cameo is predictably breath-taking and the use of Peter Sarstedt’s classic ballad is superb; the only slightly jarring moment was the otherwise enviable script’s final line which descended into unexpected Joey-and-Chandler-esque schmaltz.

Visually arresting, extremely funny and awash with men who are wonky but mouth-watering: what’s not to like? I haven’t enjoyed a film this much for aeons and recommend it with the proviso that you replicate my low expectations on arrival.