I read Dickens under duress at college, then didn't read him again for 10years. I thought of him as someone who wrote two-dimensional characters,sentimental plots, and "comedy" that some older people found amusing. Then Ireread Bleak House and I realised that I was an idiot. I laughed. I cried.Literally. This book gives me the sensation that The Lord of the Rings gave mewhen I was 11, that of being utterly transported.

A rather obvious choice, but it's my favourite film by a country mile. A near-perfect script. A string of amazing performances. Tom Cruise does proper acting. And just in case you haven't seen it, I will say simply that the frog sequence is touched by the hand of god.

They have been described as the Scottish love child of Sonic Youth andVangelis, which is almost right, though their tunes are better than SonicYouth's, and Vangelis rarely used howling feedback. The second track, "GlasgowMega-Snake," contains the meatiest, trouser-shaking guitar-riff I've heard ina long time. When my head is feeling black, I put this on and turn it up to11.

Gloriously depressing. There's stuff here that makes Kurt Cobain sound like Bing Crosby. Similar to drinking a bottle of whiskey and then lying down in front of a train. But in a fun way.

The best film I've seen in the last six months. An inspired treatment ofa seemingly unfilmable book (Laurence Stern's Tristram Shandy). It togglesbetween the on-screen story of the novel and the off-screen antics of themain actors playing preening, conceited versions of themselves. At least Iassume they're playing preening, conceited versions of themselves. Maybethey're really like that. It's all slightly disconcerting, as any filmversion of Tristran Shandy should be. And very funny, too. Plus, the maincharacter gets his penis shut in a sash window, which is always a treat.