Mark Kermode has fast become my favourite critic due to his fast paced opinionated rants that make me laugh heartily (with the benefit of an uber quiff I might add). He is a man that has a vehement hatred for Pirates of the Caribbean yet digs the Twilight saga, see Basic Instinct 2 for what it is (a knowing wink at the camera) and was there when Werner Herzog was shot with an air rifle.
His memoir, named after the famous add campaign of Last House on the Left (Keep repeating…It's only a movie…only a movie...), is breezy and very funny, his prose identical to his verbal outbursts on 5 Live. The anecdotes mentioned include getting lost in Russia, his first experience with The Exorcist (his favourite film), being thrown out of the Cannes screening of Lars Von Triers' The Idiots whilst hurling obscenities in bad French and, of course, witnessing Werner Herzog getting shot, all of which is funny and self referential.
It's a little too breezy to be great but I don't think I've had so much fun reading a book in a long while. Thank-you Dr. Kermode…and Jason Issacs.
4/5
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