Things I Like ...

And simply, sometimes, I like to share with you Things I Like ... and I hope some of you like them too ... here are the things that have made the cut so far ... put the kettle on and have a read through a little Matt Henshaw Life Like Love History ! Peace, Love & Tea, MHx

Things I Like ...

Fire

Gardening

Film

Yorkshire Tea

LEGO

Tippy The Cat

See you all soon ! x

---===DOWNLOAD LINKS===---
https://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/it-aint-easy-my-life-ep/id814589358
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Aint-Easy-My-Life-EP/dp/B00I8ZDJZC/
https://play.spotify.com/album/733AAcf7c2KcZ75SUFlpi3
http://matthenshaw.bandcamp.com/album/it-aint-easy-my-life-ep
http://www.emusic.com/album/matt-henshaw/it-aint-easy-my-life-ep/14753983/
http://www.7digital.com/artist/matt-henshaw/release/it-aint-easy-my-life
http://www.rhapsody.com/artist/matt-henshaw/album/it-aint-easy-my-life-ep
http://www.napster.co.uk/artist/matt-henshaw/album/it-aint-easy-my-life-ep

Things I Like ... Film

Having stayed up last night watching the entirety of Ellen Degeneres bringing us the Academy Awards I feel like another thing I should share with you is that I Like Films. And you could say I'm qualified to talk in this area, perhaps more so than any other.

Film has played an interesting role in my life, like music, football and tea, it has been with me seemingly every step of the way, from being the kid I was in 1990 to the man I am now.

From watching The Lion King and Aladdin as a nipper and The Godfather and Goodfellas when I was little older, maybe not as old as I should've been, these films have informed my taste, views and outlook on life perhaps to a greater extent than any of the books I've read or any schooling that's passed me by. So, Disney films and gangster films, they might seem like polar opposites, and I know which you'd rather have your child watch, but the morality in the end comes down to being good, wholesome and kind ... the bad guys always end up dead or imprisoned, even if Ursula, Jafar an Cody Jarrett are hilarious, it's quite obvious to anyone with any semblance of sense that these are not the positive role models !



Along with my brother, I'm an avid list maker, bordering on OCD, we love to get together and decide what are our favourite cartoons, Oscar winners, comedy films, you name it ! And whilst we don't often agree, sometimes we do, it's always good fun, everyone has, and everyone's entitled to an opinion, great conversations ensue. And it's not likely that someone is going to beat me up when I tell them that I don't like The Lord of the Rings films, we'll probably just have a chat about it and enjoy a cup of tea, and maybe a biscuit.

I think one of my favourite appropriations of film talk with music is when Noel Gallagher said that "Oasis is Star Wars and Radiohead is Blade Runner", they're both great, have different levels of mass appeal, and they mean different things to different people.



And so to my qualifications, well I've a First Class Honours degree in Film & The Visual Arts, I could tell you an awful lot about Ealing Comedies, cinema verite and Third Cinema, but we'll save that for another conversation ... and don't get me started on Pixar Animation Studios !

Here's a video of me talking about 3 films that have "resonated with me" ... I hope you find it interesting and enlightening ... and I hope you feel I've got a long career as a talking head ahead of me ...



Here's some links to have a read of my essays ... if you've a lot of time on you hands ...
Film & National Identity
Scarface
La Grande Illusion & Poetic Realism
British Cinema & The Spiv Film
Hollywood & The Beatles
The Man In The White Suit - An Introduction
The Man In The White Suit - Ealing & The Historical Context
The Man In The White Suit - Textual Analysis
The Man In The White Suit - The Legacy of The Man In The White Suit
My Beautiful Launderette
I Know Where I'm Going (Powell & Pressburger)
Hollywood & Sunset Boulevard
The Jazz Singer
Singin' In The Rain
Nicholas Ray
Douglas Sirk
Robert De Niro & Jack Nicholson
Women & Cinema in the 1950s
Alfred Hitchcock & Rear Window
Documentaries & The New Documentary
19th Century German Nationalist Art
Pop Art
Winston Churchill, David Lloyd-George & The Liberal Reforms
Beauty & Truth - An Essay (2002)

I Love Walking Around the Midlands ...

... with an iPod full of Ska music, I feel like I'm in a Shane Meadows film !

It's true, I do. Always keep a bag of satsumas close to hand too ...

So, the wheels are in motion. The foundations of my online empire are being laid, lay slain to all those who have come before me, I shall cast forth and hence forth a righteous blade and slash with a fearless energy and almighty anger on all those who doubt the power of the online word and a tickle from the feather duster of Matt Henshaw ... basically kids, what I'm trying to say is, I've got a new website in the pipelines, loads of ideas to put into place online, not just music, but there is music being packaged and processed as we speak, but there's tonnes more where that came from ... it's going to be monumental, and you'll be the first to hear about it ... I Promise !

In the meantime, here's a picture of me graduating from the University of Leicester ...

... hopefully you can tell it's me from the chin ... and, also, you wait there all afternoon in ridiculous heat dressed like a div looking to join some mysterious cult and then you get on stage and all you get is a handshake ! Goodness, gracious me ... all good fun though, and it's nice to feel decorated, honoured and such.

Spread the Love, see you on the other side,
Matt Henshaw BA Esq.

Happy Halloween ...

Here's a scary picture for you ...

Can you believe this was over 8 years ago !?! (I've been corrected, it was just over 5 years ago ... still, I feel old!)

Matt Henshaw & Censored on Ilkeston on Victoria Park bandstand in '06 ... film trivia ... bandstand featured in the Shane Meadows film Once Upon A Time i n the Midlands with Robert Carlyle ...

Working at Sight & Sound and Total Film ...

So, over the last month or so I've been getting involved in some extra curricular activities.  Working the news shifts and researching for Sight & Sound (the BFI's monthly magazine journal) and Total Film magazine.


You can go over to TotalFilm.com now and have a read of some of my stuff ... more links will follow on this website (Matt Henshaw's Movie Blog) but you can enjoy this feature I did for the upcoming Jennifer Aniston, Colin Farrell and Kevin Spacey flick Horrible Bosses ... not bad eh ?


And for the most part I got to look at pictures of Jennifer Aniston ... which was all part of my research ...

Good times, good times !


Stay Tuned,
With Love,
Matt Henshaw x

My afternoon as a film extra ...

So, on Tuesday I signed up to be an extra in the movies ... It was so much like Ricky Gervais' comedy series 'Extras' it was tooooo funny ... the stories to be heard and the conversation to be had with the other extras was priceless ... and the way the "actors" do not speak to the "supporting artists" is just funny funny funny ...

Got myself in the Jane Austen Pride & Prejudice gear for my role ... "Train Passenger 2 - Student (Posh)" ... I think I pulled it off que well ... I had to pretnd to be amazed by the speed and motion of the brand new locomotive ... I received some direction and hung out the side waving my top hat in the air and feeling the breeze on my face ... it was difficult to be amazed by the speed of the train as the cars I could see in the distance on a nearby A road were flying at many times the speed of the old loco ... nevermind, good fun anyways, and I made the most of the catering ... demolished plenty of food ...

The film is called 'The Story of Lion', set in the 1830s and about the steam train driver who drove the first journey from Liverpool to Manchester ... as far as I could glean anyway ... should be around next year, will keep my ear out ...

Here's some links if you want to know more about the choo choo train ...
http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/mol/collections/transport/lion.aspx
http://www.asterhobbies.co.uk/pages/models/lion_history.htm
http://www.southernsteamtrains.com/alion2.htm

History lesson over ... now for some music ... had a video shoot yesterday afternoon for this little ditty ... lookin fly ... should be hitting your screens later in the summer ...