From sci-fi to soaps, cult TV to classic comedy, Memorabilia Birmingham is a Mecca for collectors, film buffs and sci-fi fans – and HeyUGuys has five pairs of Saturday early entry e-tickets to give away for the 19-20 November show at NEC Birmingham.

This year’s Memorabilia guest list includes KAI OWEN (Torchwood); SIR DEREK JACOBI (The King’s Speech, I Claudius); COLIN BAKER (Doctor Who); ARTHUR DARVILL (Doctor Who); BRUCE BOXLEITNER (Tron, Babylon 5); JOHN CHALLIS (Only Fools And Horses); Doctor Who companions KATY MANNING, SOPHIE ALDRED, DEBORAH WATLING, SARAH SUTTON and LOUISE JAMESON and five of the cast of HBO fantasy hit Game of Thrones.

Other stars meeting fans and signing autographs at the show include MARSHALL LANCASTER (Ashes To Ashes, Life On Mars); ANTHONY VALENTINE (Coronation Street); IAN OGILVY (Return Of The Saint); ALEXANDRA BASTEDO (The Champions); BARRY HOWARD (Hi-De-Hi!); SUSAN JAMESON (New Tricks, Coronation Street); PETER EGAN (Ever Decreasing Circles); FENELLA FIELDING (Carry On Screaming, The Avengers); MARTINE BESWICK (From Russia With Love); scream queen VERONICA CARLSON and many more!

For a full Winter Memorabilia Show guest list check out www.memorabilia.co.uk and visit www.memorabilia.co.uk/birmingham/tickets to purchase tickets.

The tickets we have to give away are for Saturday 19th November only and to enter, you must be free to attend.

To be in with a chance of winning the tickets, simply answer the following question using the form below:

Who plays Eddard Stark in the TV series, Game of Thrones?

COMPETITION NOW CLOSED

T&Cs:

• The give-away e-tickets must be printed out in colour and provide early entry to Memorabilia on Saturday 19 November only
• You must be free to attend the show on Saturday 19th November to enter this competition
• Open to UK residents only
• Only one entry per household will be counted
• The competition will close Wednesday 16th November at 12pm midday
• The winner will be picked at random from entries received
• No cash alternative is available

The usual T&Cs can be found here. Good Luck!

Next Monday, to coincide with the London Film Festival, HeyUGuys are teaming up with our friends at Who’s Jack and Jameson to host a rather special night. On Monday the 17th of October HeyUGuys will be taking over the Jameson Apartment on Greek Street for an evening of drinks and demons with a Q&A for the film Demons Never Die. It’ll be the first ever HeyUGuys event and we have 15 pairs of tickets to give away to our readers for you to join us. The event will take place between 19:00 and 22.30.

Many of the HeyUGuys Team will be at the event and we’d love to see you down there. The evening will consist of (in no particular order), fun, laughter, silliness and drinking. We have also lined up a very special panel and will host a 30 minute Q&A with some of the cast and crew from brand new British movie, Demons Never Die.  We have already confirmed writer/director Arjun Rose​, producer Jo Podmore and star Jason Maza with more guests waiting to confirm so keep your eyes peeled for updates. It’ll be an excellent chance to put your questions to the creative team behind the film and mingle with the cast and crew in the bar afterwards.

To be in with a chance of winning tickets to come to this great event, simply answer the following question using the form below:

Who wrote and directed the movie, Demons Never Die?

Please only enter if you are free to attend the event on Monday 17th October.

COMPETITION NOW CLOSED

The small print:

• Only enter this competition if you’re free to attend the event on Monday 17th October 7pm  – 10.30pm.
• Open to UK residents only
• Only one entry per household will be counted
• The competition will close 14th October at 13.00 GMT
• The winners will be picked at random from entries received

The usual T&Cs can be found here. Good Luck!

Twentieth Century Fox is 75 years-old this year and to celebrate this anniversary The London Film Museum on the Southbank is currently hosting a special exhibition which runs from July 19^th to August 30^th.

Founded on May 31^st 1935, the studio has produced some of the best loved films from the last half century, including the likes of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Sound of Music, The French Connection, and both the Planet of the Apes and Alien series. The studio’s iconic Art Deco-inspired logo (surrounded by those glistening spotlights) has been ingrained in the minds of all cinema fans, and has particular resonance to those who came of age during the original Star Wars movies.

The exhibition has collected a wide array of props, costumes and assorted memorabilia from the archives at Fox. A huge replica of ‘Rexy’, the Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton from Night at the Museum is one of the impressive displays here, as are the selection of costumes from a more contemporary line-up of films from Fox’s back catalogue – Moulin Rouge, X-Men, Minority Report, Master and Commander and Fantastic Four.

The red suit and t-shirt combo worn by Brad Pitt in Fight Club is also here – a nice reminder of the studio’s more subversive output.

Fans of sci-fi will also be pleased to see props from Star Wars (including various light sabres and original storyboards from ‘Empire’), alongside a life-sized model of the original H.R. Giger-designed alien from the film of the same name.

The exhibition is a fun opportunity to see these items up-close and in the flesh (the costumes in particular are very impressive), and it’s a welcome addition to the range of already eclectic memorabilia on display within the museum.

You can find out more about the exhibition here.

To mark the 75th Anniversary, Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment will be releasing many of its unforgettable back catalogue films at special promotional prices from retailers including HMV and Play.com.

San Diego Comic-Con or SDCC is the biggest movie conference in the world and kicks off in a couple of weeks July 22nd – 25th. Last year, an estimated 126 000 people attended over the four days.

If you know nothing about the film conference, click here to find out more but in a nutshell, it’s a chance for some of the biggest movie studios in the world to show off their new movies that we can expect to see over the next month months and beyond.

Today, the organisers have released the schedule for the first two day as to what we can expect. The first two days have been released and you can click the links below to read in ful what will be happening when:

Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday

HeyUGuys were recently invited to a really interesting event, a debate between legendary film producer Lord David Puttnam and award winning City columnist Neil Collins. The debate was entitled “The script is mightier than the spreadsheet” and was pitched as an evening of bold banter and discerning debate.

The event was incredibly enjoyable and lived up to the above description. At a time when, in the UK, debating is back in the public spotlight it was a pleasure to watch two intelligent and accomplished orators discussing an interesting topic.

Held at the Home of Alfred Dunhill in London, the debate was held in front of a collection of people brought together to represent both the ‘Creative’ and ‘City’ sides of the debate.

The introduction made it clear that Puttnam was the favourite to win and predictions from bookies who had been consulted put him clearly odds on to win. This did not seem to discourage Collins who still made a valiant attempt to fight the corner of the City, despite the fact that he pointed out he was not on the side of the ‘City’ that ran the economy into the ground.

During Puttnam’s opening speech he produced a prop for the debate which helped with his popularity at the event. He had brought with him the actual Oscar (pictured below) which he was awarded for his work on the Best Picture winner Chariots of Fire. This, coupled with an excellent speech in which he included an anecdote about the power of cinema to even stop a civil war made Collins’ rebuttal an unenviable task.

Collins made it clear though that he was not against the power of cinema (the script) and made well argued points about where British cinema has gone wrong in the past. His argument appeared to mostly be in defense of the fact that  if it were not for the metaphorical ‘spreadsheet’ films of power and worth would never be made.

Although a lively debate it was clear that the two men did not wholly disagree with eachother and they both seemed to appreciate the symbiotic but somewhat antagonist relationship between the ‘script’ and the ‘spreadsheet’ and that each had very different roles to play.

Once the debate was over a vote was taken and the audience was asked to vote for either ‘City’ (Neil Collins) or ‘Creative’ (Lord David Puttnam). Unsurprisingly Puttnam won with a majority vote and the event drew to a close. Puttnam was awarded a cheque for £10 000 which he chose to donate to UNICEF and Collins was given a cheque for £5000 which he chose to donate to a charity for children affected by Down’s Syndrome.

We are hoping to have some video of the event soon to give you a flavour of the debate but we’d like to know what you think, is the script mightier than the spreadsheet?

You may be forgiven for assuming that a rainy Thursday night, trapped in the beating heart of the tourist-clotted West End of London, would be a far from wondrous experience.  Ordinarily you would be right.  Tonight, however, was no ordinary Thursday, tonight Wonderland came to London Town!

The Walt Disney Company and Sky 3D / Sky Movies HD presented to the world the premiere of Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland.  The already auspicious occasion was given a royal seal of approval by the attendance of Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall and, of course, by the presence of your intrepid HeyUGuys team.  In an age when we are bombarded with entertainment options even as we slouch on the couch, when new films seem practically to open daily, there remain a handful of names which can elicit glee from even the most cynical of entertainment hacks.  Tim Burton is one such name.  Happily for fans of his quirky world he has a little black book of Names himself, and they all appear to pop up in his Wonderland.

The Sky 3D reception for Alice in Wonderland was held in the Empire Casino overlooking Leicester Square.  The deconstructed chandelier floating impossibly above our heads served as a perfectly surreal curtain-up for the night to come.  I took a glass of champagne outside onto the balcony and drank in the scene below: hundreds of fans huddled together – an ocean of umbrellas and expectation.  Flashing bulbs and whirring cameras underscoring their shrieks.  The pantomime boom of the announcer’s voice sending Mexican waves of delight shuddering through the crowd.  And above everything – tangible even from my lofty perch – the electric thrum of excitement, hanging thunderstorm-heavy in the air…

Thursday 25^th February was a very important date for one and all!

Walking across the garden at the heart of the square to my date with Alice I realised quite how childishly thrilled I was by the entire event.  The movie itself was one I had been longing to see ever since its conception, but the premiere experience was simply magical.  When you have a love affair with cinema, one I suspect HeyUGuys’ readers and writers share, you understand the iconography of the premiere – the swooping lights, scarlet carpet and shining stars.  These are images as old as cinema itself.  Although the carpet in question tonight was grass green and sopping wet its impact was not diluted.  A premiere is a celebration of film and it was delightful to be present to see the celebration unfold.

Even through the shushing of sweet wrappers and crunch of popcorn in the auditorium I could still feel the heady effect of the carpet walk and crowd on the audience.  The giddiness of Christmas Eve was in the air as we swapped Cadbury’s Eclairs and urgent whispers until the flicker of famous faces on the big screen hushed our fidgeting.  They were here.

Alice in Wonderland’s stars in fact seemed unaware of their duty to be late and difficult.  It was our own royal family who chose to keep Hollywood waiting.  We watched as introductions were made in the Odeon foyer and held our breath as both breeds of royalty approached.  The good natured tutts and moans over the tardy Prince were silenced by the first bars of the national anthem and the audience rose to its feet as one.  A curious patriotism I have never witnessed before but oddly touching on this occasion.  Tim Burton addressed the room only briefly to introduce the film’s stars: Helena Bonham Carter, Anne Hathaway, Mia Wasikowska and Johnny Depp.  The poised Ms Wasikowska bore scarce resemblance to pale and interesting Alice as she stood before us with her namesake’s cropped hair and a Valentino Couture gown.  A shutters blink later they were gone.  The lights dimmed, Danny Elfman’s score swelled in the air and…

I shall tell you nothing more.

But fear not, you are spoilt for Wonderland choice.  Jon’s review of Alice in Wonderland is here and Dave’s pictures of the night right here.  HeyUGuys has gone a little Alice crazy – we rather hope you will too!

It is a cold December night in old London town.  An extraordinary tour bus circles the streets around Clapham Junction Station, prowling for the perfect place to pull up and party.  Opposite the station there stands The Clapham Grand ““ the grand old lady of popular entertainment.  Tonight she awaits the arrival of a titan of musical mythology.  Tonight her sound system and her stage will be pushed to the very limits of their one hundred and nine year history as the drums thunder and the guitars scream and the amps are cranked all the way up to eleven…

Tonight she will bow down to the loud sound of the mighty Spinal Tap!

On Thursday 3^rd December the Jameson Cult Film Club bestowed a generous gift upon lovers of great film and very silly rock bands by hosting a screening of rockumentary classic This is Spinal Tap.  Not ones to do things by halves when it comes to matters of movies and mixology, they filled The Clapham Grand to the rafters with Irish Whiskey and classic rock anthems, then parked a whacking great tour bus outside to serve as staging area for pre-gig drinks.  We like the way they think!

In 1982 legendary British metal band Spinal Tap were accompanied on their American comeback tour by fan and documentary filmmaker Marti De Bergi.  The footage he captured set the tone for the future of rock “˜n’ roll in cinema.  No band worked, played or rocked as hard as Tap.  No band flew so high or fell so far.  This is Spinal Tap is their story…

We all know Spinal Tap, we all love Spinal Tap (and above all we understand the awesome significance of Stonehenge to their tale) – well clearly so do Jameson Cult Film Club.  Our welcome drinks in the J Bar on the upper deck of the Jameson tour bus set the tone for the rest of the evening.  There was an overwhelming sense of humour and affection to the night from the outset.  The Clapham Grand is a damn funky venue and the contrast of walking from high tech VIP vehicle through her historic doors and smack into three icons of rock history was…genius.  Inside the venue a DJ span metal so retro it hurled us back in time.  The music forced our toes to tap and heads to nod and the crowd bowed down as one before him – the songs of Tap mingling with ACDC, Alice, GNR and Ozzy.  Three familiar gentlemen wandered the room, stealing the eyes of all the pretty girls and sporting the tightest trousers in England.  And all around tributes to the excesses of rock – mixed drinks lining every surface in the room, a stage dominated by a mighty bar lined with mules and whiskey sours presided over by a glowing green sign that bore their name.  This was Spinal Tap.

Excited before the screening even began, we loved every minute of the film.  As with An American Werewolf in London before, Jameson Cult Film Club seem to unequivocally understand how to take an event and elevate it to something truly unique ““ a once in a lifetime experience.  In the same way that you develop new appreciation for the things you treasure when you share them with the people you love, it is a delight to share a film with a crowd of fans who adore it just as much as you.  There is camaraderie in cult film, an involuntary membership in a worldwide club of other fans ““ you may never meet but you occupy the same state of mind every time you tune in.  I realise we may not always have the opportunity to see them in such convivial surroundings but the night served as a reminder that I should make more effort to watch films with people.  Some cinema should be social, some experiences should be shared.  If This is Spinal Tap demands such attention ““ who am I to deny it?

Our grateful thanks to Jameson and to Mauricio at We Are Social ““ you were an utter star on the night!  For London-proximate folk the next Jameson Cult Film Club screening takes place on 17^th March 2010. The picture will be a readers’ choice and has yet to be announced.  Perhaps we’ll see some of you there…

Halloween is a time quite custom designed for tricks, treats and terror.  In the world of cinema, there is no film as notoriously terrifying as William Friedkin’s The Exorcist.  As a special treat to Orange Film Club members, the tree-lined depths of Tower Hamlets Cemetery came alive tonight with clergy, fog, spirits and curious lights – all leading the way to a cinema screen in a clearing.  The eyes and ears of HeyUGuys were there in the dark, peering down the spooky paths, heart jumping in our dry throat waiting for something to go bump in the night.  And what a night it was!

Before the screening we spoke with Empire Magazine’s horror expert, Mr Kim Newman*, who echoed our awe over the astonishing location.  Kim had no hesitation in accepting Orange’s invite to come along and introduce the audience to their evening’s entertainment:

“I had many offers of something to do tonight” he told us, “this was by far the best – just look at it!”

We couldn’t help but look, it was utterly breathtaking.  There is something extraordinary, in the truest sense of the word, in watching a film outdoors.  To watch with your own personal headset, undisturbed by man, mobile or popcorn is sheer nirvana!  I have always lamented the death of the drive-in, I cannot think of anything more cool than seeing a favourite film under the stars.  Tonight though, aptly, the stars were smothered by a canopy of fog as we sat back to enjoy The Exorcist.

There is a reason The Exorcist still tops horror lists year on year, a reason over and above pea soup vomit and crucifix masturbation.  It is a chilling film – chilling because it is such a human story.  I thought I knew The Exorcist off by heart (indeed I had half considered the audio alternative of listening to the Director’s commentary despite my preference not to look behind the curtain of Oz) - I did not remember the film I watched tonight.  As a teenager I was obsessed by the pitch black bound novels of Stephen King and James Herbert but my favourite by far was William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist.  Time had contrived to make me forget Blatty himself adapted his novel for the screen.  Every heartbreaking human reaction and every regret, and moment of inaction, remains.  The themes of male friendship, pride and defeat are there and, in spite of the demonic melodrama, they still pack an earthly punch. 

This is not to say that pea soup puke doesn’t rock.  It was fabulous to sit among a crowd who cheer when a little girl vomits in the face of a priest.  The laughs of recognition when the-bad-man-who-lives-in-Regan declares: “the sow is mine”, alone were worth the journey!  Halloween is supposed to be a time to celebrate the gross and the ghoulish, it was just nice to find a gem among the gore.  The enthusiastic crowd seemed to agree, the closing credits were greeted with a huge cheer and excited whispers were heard stirring the cemetery long after the people began to disperse. 

When we caught up with Silent Cinema creator Damian Barr he was delighted by the reaction and still buzzing from the film.  It was amazing how much difference the wireless headphones made to the whole experience.  Pesky noisy people factor aside, it gave such a sense of proximity to the characters to hear them speak directly to you.  It made the film personal and I have fallen in love with the story all over again.  As well as turning HUG into something of a diva (who may demand that all our future cinema-going experiences take place in such exotic environs) this evening has reminded us to take time to rediscover the movies we think we know so well.  It seems they, like us, only improve with age!  

*We gave the traditional HeyUGuys question a Halloween spin and discovered that Kim’s favourite ’80s ‘horror’ movie is Blue Velvet.  As if we would forget to ask…