Isle of Wight News on Ventnor Blog

Blues fans don’t forget that this Saturday night the Winter Gardens will come along to the sound of Big Joe Louis and his Blues Kings.

The award-winning “Jamaican Blues guitar supremo” will be dishing up some real down-home Blues with his band and bringing the venue to life.

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You probably know that there are some pretty impressive video game developers on the Isle of Wight in the guise of Stainless Games.

Well, the Island now has another game developer that it can be proud of – Team Mango, which yesterday, released its game, Dysnomia.

They’re on a very different scale to Stainless, as there is but one in Team Mango – Gareth Williams.

Written on the Island
In an amazing feat of persistence and programming skills, Gareth has created a very slick looking video game, all coded by himself on the Island, from start to finish, in ten months.

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If you fancy a night in watching a DVD, then take a look at the selection available at Island Libraries. At just £1 per night, they’re a great bargain. Ed

In 1997, Melbourne Australia, I was intrigued to review a film called ‘Gross Point Blank’, starring John Cusack and Minnie Driver, Joan Cusack and Dan Ackroyd.

A fusion of dark sarcasm, excellent soundtrack and strong character acting, this film revealed a side of enthusiastic, intelligent, madness that John Cusack portrayed extremely well.

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Ha ha. Do you know what VentnorBlog is called by the inner circle of the ruling Conservative council? Not VentnorBlog, the blog, or even that bloody blog as you might expect, but we hear on good authority, VB is simply referred to as ‘The Communists’.

Makes you laugh doesn’t it? Anything slightly to the left of Attila the Hun = Communists.

Oh well, what can you do?

Well if some of the lovely Tories weren’t already concerned about our lack of enthusiasm for Capitalism, they’ll be chocking on their dry sherries when they hear what John Hurt has to say when we chatted to him at the recent Minghella Film Festival.

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More acts announced today for the 2010 Bestival.

Joining the already bumper list of music talent will be Jonsi from Icelandic post-rock giants Sigur Ros.

He’s described as one of the most inventive and evocative artists around and we hear that this year he’ll only be appearing at two UK festivals, so make sure you catch him at Bestival.

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If you’re a fan of the Ryde Regatta, or perhaps you feel it could be improved, read on for this message from Ryde Councillor, Brian Harris. Ed

Ryde Town Council has set up a Regatta steering group to organise the event, which will run from Friday evening to Sunday evening, 2nd – 4th July, on the Eastern Gardens.

It will be family-orientated fun, especially in the daytime.

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At the end of the Minghella Film Festival we caught up with Gioia Minghella, the founder of the Minghella Film festival.

Gioia told VB how thrilled she was that the festival was once again, a huge success.

Gioia played tribute to her daughter Sophie, who was prolific in programming the festival and working all hours for weeks running up to the festival. She also thanked the businesses who have supported the festival, particular the Quay Arts Centre for playing host to the weekend.

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It’s only Tuesday, so normally way too early to start thinking about VB Picture of the Week, but we spotted this shot today and couldn’t resist handing out an award.

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A Jim Henson family fantasy for television seems an unlikely contender at a film festival, but at its screening in the Anthony Minghella theatre, The Storyteller drew heartfelt appreciation.

The series starred John Hurt, prematurely aged, rushing from one Grimm’s fairytale to the next in a pair of prosthetic ears and a false nose. He insists this was ‘nothing, really’, given his previous transformations.

Do children like ‘Art’?
According to Hurt, people are surprised when they find out who the series’ writer was. “When you say Anthony Minghella, they say, what?”

Initially, even Henson had his doubts about bringing Minghella into the project.

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This coming weekend sees the sixth annual Spring Blues concert take place on the Island.

On Saturday night, the Ventnor Winter Gardens will play host to some amazing blues talent, as Jamaican born Big Joe Louis makes his way to the south of the Island.

He’ll be bringing with him his band, The Blues Kings, and promising to deliver their special kind of real down-home Blues.

These guys have been touring the world for 18 years and have worked with the likes of Mississippi Delta Blues legend David “Honeyboy” Edwards, Van Morrison and Jools Holland, making this one gig you should not miss out on

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Great to receive this review from Lois, who was so moved by this events at the Minghella Film Festival, that she felt compelled to put pen to paper / finger to keyboard and submitted this so soon after the event. There’s a chance to witness another radio play today, ‘Eyes Down Looking‘ at 3pm today as well as other Minghella activities.

Watching the actors perform live Anthony Minghella’s radio play, ‘Cigarettes and Chocolate’ this afternoon at Quay Arts, I now fully realise why only very few among us can claim to be ‘professional actors’. With just two hours rehearsal, the cast of seven, many from the original performance back in 1988, gave the play the justification it deserved with their outstanding performances.

Being a lover of radio drama and the mental images it conjures, being able to watch the performance live added an extra colour to the experience, and I was soon lost in Anthony’s world of frustration, sadness and humour, a rich tapestry that was created from his own life experiences.

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The Minghella Film festival comes to an end tomorrow, but there is a great lineup of events throughout the day to enjoy.

The morning kicks off with screenings of The Storyteller in Quay Arts and Cineworld. John Hurt and Duncan Kenworthy will be attending the screening at Quay and taking part in a discussion following the film.

Lunchtime sees the Big Italian Brunch at Quay Arts hosted by Gloria and Eddie Minghella.

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Tickets are still available for tonight’s concert at Quay Arts.

Barrington Pheloung wrote and performed the original music for much of Anthony’s early work, from the BAFTA-nominated soundtrack to Inspector Morse to Truly, Madly, Deeply.

Since then, he has gone on to become one of the most prolific composers for television and film in the UK.

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We caught up with the actor Alan Rickman, who had worked with Anthony on this first major film, Truly, Madly, Deeply where he acted opposite Juliet Stevenson.

Have a listen …

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Very flattering and kind words about Anthony Minghella from Patsy Puttnam and her husband, Baron Puttnam, or David Puttnam as he introduced himself.

Have a listen …

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Up next is another in the series of Vox Pops from the launch of last year’s Minghella Movie Marathon.

It was a great evening, with hundreds of people gathered to celebrate Anthony Minghella’s life.

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At the launch of the Minghella Movie Marathon last year, we made our way through the crowds of Minghella fans and asked for their memories of Anthony.

Anthony’s great sensitivity seemed to strike a chord with many of the festival goers that night.

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If you’re planning to have some quiet nights in, why not try out the DVD or book collection at your local library?

Here are the latest acquisitions for Ventnor Library.

DVD
An Education – 3 Oscar nominations
Julie and Julia – Meryl Street – Oscar nominated for Best Actress

Fiction
Clive CUSSLER Spartan Gold – a Fargo adventure
Annie GROVES Hettie of Hope Street – heart versus head…
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Tonight sees the launch of the 2010 Minghella Film Festival.

The event kicks off with the UK premiere of ‘The Be All and End All’.

The feature length film written by Steve Lewis and Tony Owen tells the story of fifteen year old Robbie who has only one thing on his mind – losing his virginity. The problem is that he’s in hospital with a fatal heart condition.

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The time has come again for our weekly trawl through the VB Flickr Group Pool for our favourite picture of the week.

No sooner had we started looking, when this spectacular shot by Julian Winslow of the gorgeous Keri Highland, singer songwriter from the US, jumped out of the page at us.

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If you fancy a night in watching a DVD, then take a look at the selection available at Island Libraries. At just £1 per night, they’re a great bargain. Ed

Written by Ronnie Christensen and starring Anne Hathaway and Patrick Wilson – an actor of immense bravado for appearing in the extremely intense ‘Hard Candy’.

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Thanks to Chris for sending us this video which had us in fits.

It seems that there’s quite a trend on You Tube for this kind of thing, with loads of other similar videos appearing.

If you need a good laugh to start your day click on the play button below.

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If you were at the Minghella Movie Marathon last year, you might have spotted this avid Minghella fan (in the middle) who attended all the screenings throughout the weekend.

Robbi Holman could quite easily be defined as a Minghella Super Fan (in fact she was by the CP).

Why you might ask? Well, because Robbi flew all the way from Texas to attend the festival and flew straight back home again afterwards. That’s some devotion!

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This year’s Isle of Wight Jazz Festival will not be going ahead, VentnorBlog has learnt.

We hear from one of the directors that the decision was made after what they cite as, “a number of difficulties and delays in response to the request to hire the Salisbury Gardens so that it is now too late to complete plans.”

When the Isle of Wight Jazz Festival was cancelled last year, punters who had already bought tickets were encouraged to keep hold of them to use at this year’s festival.

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Regular readers will remember the news that Islander Robin Ford has just launched a new collection of poems.

If you’d like to meet the poet and have your copy of his new collection, On The Brink, signed, then make sure you put this in your diary.

Robin will be attending a book signing at Waterstones in Newport next Tuesday evening from 6.30pm.

If you do go along, please don’t forget to say where you heard about it.