Ferdie Rous, Author at Catholic Herald

Ferdie Rous

‘Computer Says No’: Mr Bates vs the Post Office

January 22, 2024

Artificial intelligence is nosing its way into every aspect of our lives, perhaps nowhere more significantly than in the workplace. As with the internet and social media before it, every industry from automobiles to wellness are falling over themselves to make the most of the available tools, especially since ChatGPT and Open AI came onto

French dressing: Napoleon is too fast

January 03, 2024

Ridley Scott’s latest historical blockbuster Napoleon whizzes through the emperor’s action-packed life, says Ferdie Rous. In this highly episodic retelling, Ridley Scott slaps up a broad sweeping tableau of Napoleon’s life. From the field of Austerlitz to the burned-out husk of Moscow and the packed hall of Robespierre’s National Convention, we skim through Le Petit

The music is good, but a new musical about the Gunpowder Plot lacks direction

November 30, 2023

Too wordy and worthy? The music is good, but a new musical about the Gunpowder Plot lacks direction, says Ferdie Rous. In Treason, we have another musical about a struggle for freedom. After Les Mis nearly 40 years on and the global phenomenon that is Hamilton, it’s fair to say that making a song and

Tolkien’s lessons of hope for humanity, fifty years after his death

September 02, 2023

JRR Tolkien died 50 years ago, on 2 September 1973. If you ask a fan of his work what they most struggle with in his epic Lord of the Rings trilogy, they will um and ah but more often than not they will reluctantly nod at the songs. Across all the books (but featuring only

Acclaimed director William Friedkin dies, but The Exorcist lives on

August 08, 2023

With news of the death of William Friedkin, director of The Exorcist, in Los Angeles on Monday, Ferdie Rous looks at why this cult classic still burns bright in the public imagination over half a century after it was first released Love it or hate it, everyone has a view on The Exorcist – whether they’ve read the

The abdicant generation

August 02, 2023

Many of us find it less inconvenient to be on our own, without the responsibility of commitment. The other day, I was walking across London’s Southbank at night with a friend – let’s call her Charlotte – when a chap sporting a scraggy beard, an eclectic long-johns-and-shorts combo and carrying a complicated configuration of bags

Reviews: Visions of Eden before the Fall

February 02, 2023

Ferdie Rous explores the parallels between Avatar: The Way of Water and the new season of Yellowstone

Keeping up with the Companions

December 02, 2022

Ferdie Rous joins the breakfast shift at the Order of Malta’s Soho café feeding London’s homeless

Netflix’s All Quiet on the Western Front: a poignant anti-war flick undermined by cheap history

November 07, 2022

Eric Maria Remarque wrote All Quiet on the Western Front nearly a century ago. Many of his readers and his friends had traipsed through support trenches and gone over the top into the desolate No Man’s Lands of Belgium and Northern France. They had fought, killed and seen the human form brutalised beyond recognition. The horror and absurdity of

Hollywood must rediscover the art of storytelling

October 19, 2022

There is more to the medium than the message. The Woman King is a case in point

Stories from a gentler time

July 01, 2021

First broadcast 60 years ago, Journey of a Lifetime explained Christian concepts to Sunday TV viewers

Northern Ireland Executive call for independent victim-centred investigation of Mother and Baby homes and Magdalene Laundries

January 26, 2021

Northern Ireland's ruling Executive in Stormont have ordered an independent investigation in to Northern Ireland's mother and baby homes, following the publication of a report today.

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