Sonnet #12

The D is silent...

Django Unchained is unarguably Tarantino’s return to form. I say unarguably, and yet, people are arguing it. It’s too long, it’s self-indulgent, it’s not Reservoir Dogs, it’s not historically accurate, it’s unnecessarily gory and so on. Stop whining. Tarantino has here produced a blisteringly funny and fantastically audacious film that entertains as much as it shocks; which is no mean feat for a film about slavery. 

*It is bloody. Incredibly bloody. I cringed in my seat as we see a runaway slave torn apart limb-by-limb by ravenous dogs. But the levels of gore are entirely necessary. Tarantino is addressing an issue that deserves attention and deserves a reaction, even if that’s a stomach-churning one. The depiction of slavery may not be 100 per cent historically accurate, but you sure as hell come away feeling nauseated by the concept. Far from belittling the suffering of the slaves by placing it in a comedic setting, Tarantino manages to empower. We at NamaKo applaud the ability to laugh in the face of death. Hollywood is traditionally nervous of tackling slavery but Tarantino hasn’t shied away on any level. You may not enjoy the blood and carnage being pushed under your nose, but for us, the closer we get to the gore, the better.

We’re in love with Christoph Waltz. Ever since his terrifying opening scene in Inglourious Basterds we have been intrigued and infatuated by this man and his ability to draw you in. He leaves you waiting for something, always aware that he’s capable of more than he’s letting on. But the entire cast were upstaged by Samuel L. Jackson’s extraordinary performance as Stephen. His character is the most unsettling of them all – the stooping elder-slave of Leonardo DiCaprio’s Candie is chilling and scarier than whip-brandishing white slave owners.

Django was entertainment in its purest form. From the KKK struggling with the eyeholes in their masks to Django’s emergence in a lurid, blue monstrosity after choosing his own outfit – there were moments of directorial genius from beginning to end. We left the cinema feeling elated and horny for Jamie Foxx.

*Picture - Little Whites Lies January 2013 issue

Sonnet #11

Let go and jump in

Sonnet #10

Silver Lining

Rhymes and life

Everything is better when it rhymes. It gives life a certain completeness that can never be achieved in reality. We are drawn to the structure and logic of the poetic form coupled with the liberating creativity of the boundless poetic subject. This sounds much more pretentious and wanky than it actually is: basically we love rhythm, and right now - sonnets are doing it for us.

The well structured, 14-line poems have captured our imagination ever since school and Shakespeare and 'the darling buds of may', 'my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun', 'shall I compare thee to a summer's day' et al. entered our lives. On the surface these look like the musings of a love-sick young man, with generic (if blindingly clever) attempts to woo his young lady. But when you take into account the fact that most of Shakespeare's sonnets were addressed to a young man, the genre takes on an entirely new and subversive format. And that's the angle we found interesting at NamaKo.

As you may have noticed, our blog has been filled with sonnets over the past few weeks as our team have been compiling their musings on city-life and the struggles of the creative youth into the terribly whimsical format of renaissance poetry. They couldn't be more diverse; from pigeon uprisings to the thoughts of a blue whale, from the description of an eclipse to the experience of insomnia, our sonnets are random, intriguing, and at times, quite wonderful.

Underpinning all of it is love. The sonnet is the quintessential love genre. Many of our sonnets are initially about the much bleaker topics of futility, boredom, unfulfilled potential, but, as doleful as it might sound; love is what ties it all together. Our love of the city, our love of the artistic struggle and our love of… whales. We want to spread some love around this often melancholy city - so look out for our sonnets gracing the streets of London very soon.

Get in touch if you'd like some personalised love in your life. Email info@namakolondon.com and our editorial team might write you a personal sonnet to lighten up your day. Or email us your poetry, we'll blog the best ones. Get waxing lyrical.

Sonnet #9

Sonnet #8

Sonnet #7