Tag Archives: Justin Timberlake

Top ‘Road Trip’ tips – How To Have The Perfect Road Trip.

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Top ‘Road Trip’ tips – Emma O’Boyle, TripAdvisor spokesperson

In The Open Road, out on DVD 25th April, Carlton (Justin Timberlake) and his friend Lucy go on a road trip across America to find his estranged father and bring him home. Long car journeys with family and friends can be tough going at the best of times, so whether you’ve got a long drive to a festival or a summer adventure coming up, here are some top tips for avoiding the many potential road trip pit falls.

Prepare your car – have your car inspected before you go, change your oil and check fluid levels. Make sure you have all relevant documents – including licence, insurance and registration – and that you know where they are all at all times. Keep a cool bag with drinks and snacks and re-fill this at rest stops. Bring a first aid kit.

Keep small change in several currencies – be prepared for road tolls. Most toll booths will accept coins only, so avoid an embarrassing reversing-out-the-queue moment and make sure you have change to hand.

Bring suncream – you can and you will get sunburn through the car window

Beware roaming charges – check with your mobile provider before you leave to find out what charges you could incur and how best to avoid these

Bring zone-out material – you’ll be in close quarters and ‘alone time’ will be difficult to come by when your fellow road-trippers start getting on your nerves. Stock up your iPod, tablet, laptop etc. with your favourite TV shows and DVDs so you can block everyone else out when needs be.

Miles and Kilometres – Be aware that your speedometer may be in miles, but the speed limit measured in kilometres depending what country you’re in. Know the conversion (1 mile = 1.6 km) or you could end up with a nasty speeding ticket

Be ready for sleep – bring a blanket and pillow to make yourself more comfortable in between driving shifts and, if you’ve booked a hotel, remember that most check-in times are between noon and 2pm, so plan your driving schedules accordingly

Prepare a good and very extensive playlist – you will have difficulty finding a radio station in many locations, so bring your own music. Make sure you playlist is at least a few hours long so you don’t find yourself listening to the same ten songs on repeat

Go to the bathroom at every rest stop – even if you don’t need to because the next one could be very far away. This will avoid any uncomfortable and embarrassing roadside stops.

Bring embassy and government contact numbers with you – in case you lose your passport or any other important documentation, be sure you know where your nearest embassy or consulate is at all times so you can you rectify the situation as soon as possible

Share the driving and do it in shifts – a tired driver is an unsafe driver

“The Open Road is out on DVD 25th April.”

The Social Network. {Film Review}

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It is rare that a movie is looked at as a joke, but destroys all predictions and exceeds all expectations. This movie is by far the most (unexpectedly) damn good movies of this year. Who’d thought a movie about the creator of Facebook would be this interesting?

As you can probably tell from the trailers and the poster artwork, it’s a movie about the creation of Facebook. Though that’s only the plot-device for the narrative, and is instead a character study of Mark Zuckerberg (played brilliantly by Jesse Eisenberg). The character is beautifully ironic, he creates a website for friends all over the globe to connect with each other and yet he struggles to maintain his friendship to others (as little he has). He’s more of an anti-hero, focusing on his ambitions than his personal relationships. It becomes satirical, and one of the terrific things the character has been portrayed. Supporting cast from Andrew Garfield, Armie Hammer Jr. (as identical twins) and Justin Timberlake all deliver terrific performances. Garfield brings much emotional weight to a character that has been deeply trodden on, as he slowly gets involved with deception and betrayal.

The writing for the film is absolutely fantastic. Aaron Sorkin (known for creating The West Wing) writes one of the most exciting screenplays I’ve heard in 2010. It delivers with so much wit and charm, that it’s hard not to find this compelling and absorbing. The delivery from the actors is electric. It can be hard to take all in with such a quick pace, but it adds to the character traits each person has. It also should get enormous recognition to director David Fincher. After the very well made but slightly shallow Benjamin Button, you can tell Fincher is in familiar territory. The way he inter-cuts the court cases with the story of Facebook’s creation, it makes you wanting to know what happens next. It’s something that made Zodiac so exciting and intense to watch, also a film about obsession and achieving success.

Overall; One of the top best films of 2010. A solid piece of filmmaking that drags you in from the very start. A case-study on how to produce drama in an exciting and interesting way. Predicting a strong award contender, even should get nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Director. Extremely recommended in the highest order!

5 stars!

By Owun Birkett

Musical Style {Style}

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With new artists continuously emerging from all walks of life there is constantly something fresh on the music scene however when an artist comes to the forefront of the public eye, it’s not just their music that makes them famous. It is their personality, their style and of course their fashion.

Fashion and music are inexplicably linked.

This idea is of course, is not a new phenomenon, think back to ‘The Beatles’ and their iconic suits, ‘Kiss’ and their unmistakable face paint, as well as Run DMC and their Adidas. In the case of Run DMC, fashion even influenced their music with the song ‘My Adidas’ which was a result of the group “rockin” their “superstars/shelltoes” with the tongue sticking out and no laces, making a huge impact on both hiphop and future generation styles.

More recently, Lilly Allen started the idea of wearing prom style dresses accompanied by trainers and Oasis set an example which Manchunians especially still emulate to a certain extent, with the casual-smart way of dressing.

Even hair styles are copied, this is seen again with the Oasis style; they are more dated now but even back in the 1980’s the long curls on men were copied from artists such as Brian May from Queen, amongst others.

A lot of these music producing fashion trends emerge and continue to appear for years to come. For example, Run DMC’s style; the fashionable street/sports wear, this is still very obviously apparent within the hip-hop music scene, take a look at Jay-Z or Justin Timberlake, but new versions are constantly evolving as well such as the N-Dubz, ‘Dappy-hat’ is a particularly obvious and surprisingly popular one of these.

An infamous trend which emerged some time ago is the Punk Music scene, which although materialized up to thirty five years ago, remnants of it are still constantly surfacing.

Vivienne Westwood is a prime and noted example of this but these characteristics are seen across the board with even high street stores using qualities of the style. For example tartan dresses and ripped jeans.

Fashion will always be influenced by music, the only question is, whose is your favourite artist?