So the Godfather of Soul is not with us anymore. Sex machine’s gone at the age of 73. Surprisingly, he didn’t die of heart attack but of pneumonia.

Hope he went straight to hell, where he belongs with all other legends. They’re gonna have some more fun, no doubt. Let the jam begin!

I saw a last year movie last night, while on my way to my holiday retreat in, hm, Newcastle. For some hours I hesitated, but then a flat battery in my iBook and inability to fall asleep made my choice. Plus, I was wood to it by two facts – filming location (Tuscany) and leading star (Harvey Keitel).

It was called… Le me see… “The Shadow Dancer”. Or you might encounter the same under an alternative title, “Shadows in the Sun”. However, it wasn’t, as one might expect, about issues troubling Sun Microsystems, but about a much harsher subject. I’m only joking, obviously, there is no harsher subject available.

It’s about a wannabe writer Jeremy Taylor (Joshua Jackson) sent to Italy by a publishing house to find another, yet greater American writer, Weldon Parish (Keitel), who – for some 20 years now – isolates himself in rural sunlit Italy, and what is even worse, doesn’t write and publish anymore.

It meant to be a romantic comedy, but it’s a simple nonsense. And I decided to spoil it for you, so let me brief you on a few basic facts. First and above all, let’s make things clear: this movie is a complete crap. It’s pathetic and shallow, and enhanced by mediocre dialogue.

This unbelievable yuppie wanker Jeremy drives down to an idyllic sleepy village in his BMW convertible, manages to find Parish, get him to start writing, he himself starts writing as well and what is the most ridiculous of all, picks up Isabella (Claire Forlani, known from Meet Joe Black), a superhot, supercool twenty-something babe, who happens to be Weldon’s daughter. And gets laid. Obviously, she’s got nothing better to do but to wait for her prince charming rounded by village drunks and jerks.

Bloody hell, it really was a one bad movie! Except for Tuscan sceneries and chick Isabella, otherwise it was an exemplary disaster.

Of course, Harvey Keitel doesn’t have much reputation left, the only thing he really starred at since Pulp Fiction and I can remember was a great ad for Johny Walker, for which he deserves my deepest gratitude. As the classic would say: “What’s wrong with you? Your ass used to be beautiful.” Why did he take a role like that at all? Or was beautiful Isabella his secret fluffer? One can only speculate.

I don’t expect anybody to go and see this movie, nor to get it on a DVD, but would you be a in a bit masochistic mood and want to torture yourself, get ready for fast forwarding. It will be a must.

Media shape our lives. And ever since JFK didn’t make it to Dallas Trade Mart, we face live (or almost live) presence of defining moments which everybody remembers. Everybody knows where they were and what they were doing when they heard Neil Armstrong pronouncing his rehearsed “one small step for a man”, or, more recently, when they learned about 9/11.

Or when Diana died.

Diana, Princess of Wales, a high profile celebrity beloved and abused by press, was killed in a car accident in a Paris tunnel, hunted by paparazzi in late August 1997. Those who followed her since she got to know Prince Charles, were with her in her final moments, so the tabloids could feed every voyeuristic braincell on the planet its urge to see, judge and gossip.

And now there is a movie about this tragic accident, or rather, what followed between the Windsors, Downing Street and the public (again, primarily represented by the press). It is a movie about inevitable change that modern world brings, when news are being covered as they happen, instantaneously and with a hype that sells.

Diana, no longer a member of the royal family, but by far most popular of the royals, dies. The queen (Helen Mirren) and the rest of the family spends the week after her death in their summer retreat at Balmoral Castle, quietly coping with circumstances. However, increasing media frenzy pushes the newly appointed prime minister Tony Blair (Michael Sheen) to intervene and “advise” the Queen in order to save the royals “from themselves”. So Diana gets a public funeral, Union Jack is flown at half mast over Buckingham Palace and our monarch even addresses her nation in live televised statement.

I have to come to terms with two feelings I experienced while watching this flick; first, magical and subtle performance by Helen Mirren, who collected quite a few awards for her role and more are definitely coming, and, second, slight and bearable, but still constantly present, boredom. That, of course, only because I’m not a die-hard docudrama fan. Because, as I realize, this is one of the best rated movies of the year.

Still, to a certain extent, I understand this movie a bit differently to others. I don’t see The Queen only as a play on a change of values or traditional principles and standards, but also as a exclamation of increasing media power in the globalised society. The power that can easily shift values and stands, wherever they’re good or not.

It’s undeniably difficult for an everyday man to talk about Almodóvar’s movies, including, but not limited to, his newest flick called Volver which just hit Australian indie screens.

Pedro seems to understand the incomprehensible – a woman’s soul. And while exposing this miraculous issue to unenlightened (male) crowd, he’s also giving the Hollywood industry incapable of producing strong female character movies a lesson. Kinda treating bad education, isn’t he?

The story of Volver evolves around a female part of a family, sisters Raimunda (Penélope Cruz) and Sole (Lola Dueñas), their dead mother (Carmen Maura), their friend and neighbour Augustina (Blanca Portillo), and Raimunda’s daughter Paula (Yohana Cobo).

Sisters’ mother died in a fire some years ago but then somehow comes back to look after their ageing aunt. Once auntie dies, she moves in with Sole. In the meantime, Raimunda is fighting different issues as her spouse Paco was taking his fatherly love too far and dies after being stabbed by Paula in self-defence, so there is a body that has to be disposed of.

That all happens within opening fifteen minutes of the movie. From there, central characters are given almost two hours to untangle their relationships. That offers the female cast, but primarily Penélope Cruz, enough time to assure us of their talents. No wonder they all snatched the award for the best actress in Cannes this year (as did Pedro himself for his screenplay).

Movie starts with a mystery return, but it really concentrates on down-to-earth feelings and everyday subjects that matter the characters – from looking after the graves to looking after themselves. And it’s all quietly interlaced with love these characters share.

The movie is vibrant and funny, and while partially dealing with harsh subjects like incest, murder and painful dying, not even mentioning healing the wounds of hearts, it does so with grace and unyielding passion, so typical for every Almodóvar’s movie.

However, without denying Pedro’s zeal or professionalism, one should still distinguish between a masterpiece and a good movie. This one bears a trademark style, ideas, places and even people, but still happens to be a little bit short of the former.