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Summer vacation

As I mentioned earlier, I saw a few movies in the summer holiday. One of them was Prometheus. To tell you the truth, I wasn't expecting very much from this movie, as several movies from Ridley Scott have been disappointing, but I quite enjoyed it. I don't think the ending was very coherent, and I'm not sure exactly how it links in with Alien, but there was some good acting and it was quite exciting.

Summer Vacation

Most of August and most of September comprise the summer vacation at Japanese universities. Two months sounds like a long time, but unfortunately it's really only around six weeks. We also have many meetings and marking tests and things like that, so the holiday actually whizzes by. I had a short trip with my family to Hiroshima and a few other places, and a couple of days at my wife's ancestral home, and I also found the time to watch several movies. The rest of the time, I was working pretty hard, although I unfortunately wasn't able to complete any big projects. Oh, no!

Writing 4

Hi, everyone, and welcome to Writing 4! This semester's themes are writing book reviews and podcasting! I'll give you more details in class.

Blog stats

Post Counts

• February/March/April: 10
• May: 14
• June: 9
• July: 9

Word Count

• Total so far: 

Book reviews

• Total so far: 18

Essay

• 1st version
• Revised version

Juppun ha Juubun stats

• April 16th: _______ words
• July 24th: 
• Longest: 230 words (July 23rd)
• Shortest: 94 words (April 23rd)

Never Let Me Go

Blog stats (last class)

Post Counts

• February/March/April: 10
• May: 14
• June: 9
• July: 6

Word Count

• Total so far: 

Book Reviews

• Total so far: 18

Essay

• 1st version
• Revised version

Soccer

As you probably know, now is the time between Premier League seasons. Some of the players are busy  preparing to play in the Olympics, while some are doing pre-season training with their clubs, and others are on tours with their clubs. Manchester United is one of the clubs on tour, and the newspaper report I read said that Shinji Kagawa was their best player.

England had a warm-up match against Brazil—their last match before the Olympics start—and Brazil won 2–0. Commentators said that England looked very poor, and they are pessimistic about England's chances of getting out of the group.

Olympics

As you know, the Olympics are starting very soon in London. You may have heard that there are several problems associated with the Olympics. The biggest one is that the company that was going to provide security for the Olympics suddenly said that they weren't able to get enough personnel, and that they weren't even sure how many people they could provide. In addition, England's transport system is rather old, so there are worries that people won't be able to get to the venues in time.

Movie, Movie, Movie

There are many good movies coming over the summer. In the previous post, I talked about Brave and The Dark Knight Rises. In this post, let's look at some other movies that are coming soon. The first one is Man on a Ledge, coming this month. In August, 7 Days in Havana is coming. I don't know much about this one, but it is directed by Benicio Del Toro.

Films

In recent months, I've been missing many movies because of being too busy, so I decided to make time to see Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. This movie is very cerebral, and it's most enjoyable for its performance by Gary Oldman. (You may remember him from Léon, where he played the police captain, starring alongside Jean Reno and Natalie Portman.) It isn't exactly a true story, but it's inspired by a true story of British spies becoming double agents, so it's useful for informing us about recent British history.

As you probably know, there are lots of other good movies coming over the next couple of months. Brave is due to start on July 21st, and The Dark Knight Rises is coming on July 28th.

July 9th 2012

Today, if you have extra time, please try QWERTY Warriors and the Dolphin Game. You can find the links on winkhome.

Movies playing now or coming soon

This season is traditionally a very good one for movies. It's a good chance to catch some good but not blockbuster movies before the summer holidays, when a few mega-hits are shown endlessly. Let's think about some of the movies that are playing in movie theaters now or are coming soon.

Movies

Last week, I went to the US. On the plane, I saw three movies. The first was called 50/50. It was about a man who was diagnosed with cancer and has to decide how to live the remainder of his life. It was quite moving. Then I saw Safe House. It wasn't a great movie, but it stars Denzel Washington, one of my favorite actors, so I enjoyed it a lot. Finally, I saw The Artist. The Artist was made last year, but it was a silent movie, which is very unusual these days. This was the best of the three movies I saw on the plane. I thought the acting was great, and the story was very moving.
There are several movies playing now that I'd like to see, including Route Irish and Midnight in Paris. But maybe I won't have time. But I do plan to see the new Spiderman movie when it comes out next week.

Euro 2012 again

The Euro 2012 competition is over for England. Early this morning, the last quarter-final, between England and Italy, was played. No goals were scored in the regular 90 minutes, so extra time was played. There were no goals in extra time, either, so the match went to penalty kicks. Two of England's players missed, so Italy went through to the semi-finals. They will play Germany, probably the best team in the tournament so far. The other semi-final is between Spain and Portugal. Those are very interesting semi-finals, because Spain and Portugal are neighbours on the Iberian peninsula, and Germany and Italy are traditional rivals and they are the most successful teams in history excepting Brazil.

Most English fans accept that Italy played much better and that England were quite lucky to go so far. England's biggest problem was its very low possession, which I think was less than 40% today.

Euro 2012

A while ago, I wrote about the beginning of the Euro 2012 tournament. The England team, due to play tonight, has lost many players to injury, and there are lots of worries in defence, midfield, and attack. Perhaps the most problematic area is midfield, because Frank Lampard and Gareth Barry both got injured shortly before the tournament, and Jack Wilshire has been injured for a few months.
In attack, England has had problems for a long time: there is usually no real partner for Rooney, and Rooney himself is suspended for the first two matches.

Movie Essay details

DEADLINE for 1st draft: June 29th
DEADLINE for final draft: July 20th
Length: about 1000 words

• Don't use the Century font.
• Leave a wide margin on the right side.
• Write in paragraphs. Give the essay a title, but don't use sub-headings.
• You can of course use the short posts you have been writing, but you should use them mindfully. The essay needs to be one coherent whole.
• Send it as a Microsoft Word attachment to me by the deadline.
• After I have commented on the 1st draft, please work on making the essay better to hand in a final draft.
• After sending the attachment, you can copy the content into a blog post (both the first draft and final draft). Before copying, save the text as a .txt or .rtf file. Add links and pictures to the blog post.

EURO 2012

As you may know, the Euro 2012 tournament has finally begun. Groups A, B, and C have had their first games, and tonight Group D, with England playing France, starts off.
The major upset so far has been Holland's loss to Denmark. Germany won, as most people expected, and, last night, Italy and Spain drew. Russia played very well in their first match.
I have been very busy, and I don't want to be sleepy at work, so so far I haven't watched any matches. And from Tuesday I'm going to America on business, so I probably won't be able to see any matches then. But I do hope to watch tonight's match!
England has had very bad preparation for the tournament. The coach, Fabio Capello, resigned a few months ago, and then it took a long time to find a new coach. The new coach is Roy Hodgson, and he has had only about a month to get ready for the tournament. Many of England's best players got injured shortly before the tournament, and Wayne Rooney is suspended for the first two matches. England's goal tonight will be not to lose, rather than winning.

No class on June 18th

Remember that I'll be away on June 18th: no class on that day!