Stephen King movies are making a Comeback!

Remember all those cheesy Stephen King movies? Yah, me too (not all of them were cheesy, but let's start with the cheesy ones).

There was IT [1990], about the scary monster Pennywise that had a penchant for dressing up as a clown and eating children (and it was quite scary)! There was Secret Window [2004] which starred Johnny Depp and was just awful. Oh my goodness... remember Christine [1983] the killer car? What about Dreamcatcher [2003]? Firestarter [1984]? 

Of course there have also been gems, but they have been few and far between. The Green Mile [1999], Carrie [1976], The Shawshank Redemption [1994] and of course The Shining [1980] to name but a few.

...but guess what. I'm not joking. They're making a comeback. So much so in fact that...

Tod Williams the director of Paranormal Activity 2 has been pulled on board to direct CELL by Stephen King, and, and and, it's starting filming this Autumn...

... and that's not all!

Pet Sematary is also being pushed forward. The screen play is being rewritten by the same guy who wrote the screen play for Stephen King's 1408. I'm terrified! Anybody watched Pet Sematary? Holy moly, that freaky zombie child and the scary woman in the attic... I can't contain my goosebumps! I'm waiting with bated breath...

...and that's not all!

So the biggest piece of Stephen King movie news is... IT is coming back, but not as a made for TV movie. 

Oh no. It's coming back as a HARDCORE big screen, gonna make you cry yourself to sleep theatre spectacular. I say this because they have pushed for AND been given approval for what we'd call in the UK an 18 rating. That means it's gonna be gory. It's gonna be fowl. It's gonna be scary, and hopefully, it's going to terrify future generations as much as the original IT movie scared us. 

Get ready to be scared my friends. Very, very scared!

Joyland, the novel, which is gonna be released on June 4th has ALREADY had film rights bought up. The book hasn't even come out yet!!!! In fact, the guy who's producing and directing it is the very same guy who adapted and directed The Help (random)!

Also Stephen King's 'Good Marriage' has just started filming in Sleepy Hollow. There's enough King movies coming soon to get me reading!

Oh, and here's some quick news about CBS's Under the Dome. They just released a commercial for it! And because I'm so so wonderful I've got it for you right here!


I spoil you guys huh, haha!

On a side note
Sadly, and once again, any talks on making the EPIC Dark Tower series by Stephen King in to movies has flopped. It's so sad. We have the movie technology to turn his wild-west fantastical sci-fi awesomeness in to feature length films. I'm waiting though. Waiting as patiently as I can muster.

Read More

The Book Crisis in the UAE

We have a book crisis here.

It is a pretty absorbing issue for book-worms and can be quite frustrating. Let me explain why.

Y'see, here in the UAE we have Borders, we have WH Smith, we have smaller book franchises and we also have the mega-book shop in Dubai Mall called Kinokuniyah also known as Book World which is just... amazing! We have one second hand book store in Abu Dhabi, and that's pretty much it. Pretty much all the book shops I've been to around here have always been small (except from Kinokuniyah), having just a small selection of current best-sellers, and a ridiculous over-abundance of YA books (sorry YA fans!). 

Every book-worm, I hope, is going to say 'well, what about libraries?' and y'see that is the shocker. There are no real libraries here. Sure they have libraries, but you're not allowed to borrow the books; in effect, you gotta bookmark the novel you're reading and return to it every day for an hour or two to get your fix.

Books here are EXPENSIVE (mostly because they're imported). There's no Amazon here (well, you can have books delivered here but they're a pretty-penny) though I do believe a recent online company is trying to follow from Amazon's success and make it big in this region; but even still, they won't be as cheap as Amazon or others.

The thrift store (second-hand book shop) I recently visited was impressive. It had a great range and is in down town Abu Dhabi, the only problem I had with it is that it just wasn't organised as well as it could be - but I'm hoping they will sort it soon. [By the way, that book shop is a Thomas Harris wonderland. They have all his books three times over at least.] The way they get their books is through donation. Expats returning to their country of origin, or moving on, need somewhere to dump their books, so they say goodbye to their beauties and leave them with the shop. The books there are cheap, I'll give them that, BUT they're also old books, you're not gonna get new ones.

There has been a recent initiative by two Emirati girls called The Book Shelter. They quite literally saw how desperate the book reading community feels here, and so they did something about it. An interview with them will be coming up soon!

Some Cafe's are also jumping aboard the bookish rebellion by stocking shelves in their establishments with books that not only can be read at your table but taken away with you... free of charge and you choose if you want to return it. I visited Circle Cafe in Abu Dhabi and interviewed the manager there, that will also be coming up soon, and he showed himself to be a very enthusiastic promoter of this bookish movement.

It's interesting to note that certain photographs in magazines are censored here in the UAE, books are not explicitly (I'm not sure if books criticising the country/government, religion etc would be sold openly here though). WH Smith was advertising the 50 Shades books without any censorship at all; they had the books on their front tables at the front doors! In fact a colleague walked in to work with it tucked under her arm the other day - no questions asked!

The majority of the country are expats from around the world (around 80%) and so the Kindle and the Nook has proved to be blessings for the bookishly challenged. Kindle is sold in many shops around here and it has opened up a new world for us impoverished readers! Unfortunately we have to try to beat the system and put in British or American addresses to ensure that we have the best and widest possible array of books. It's sneaky, but true; otherwise we get stuck with a smaller selection, pining away until rights and what not allow the book to be sold in the Middle East.

Things aren't all that bad. I love that book stores flourish here and that young people (and old people) are able to access books, I just wish they were more affordable and that a wider array was available. I can't complain too much though because the UAE is realising that those of us who read are starving for more. You never know, this bookish-revolution may just lead to lending libraries...

maybe!

Read More