I think I'm qualified to say that Hello! magazine is perhaps the worlds most intestine severing pile of buttwax ever rolled out of a four colour press anywhere in the world, outperforming even the most tiresome caravaning magazine in terms of vapidity (although it lacks the all-important tent ... Read review
Advantages: Can be used to light fires or clean up, erm, accidents Disadvantages: Costs money and wastes precious ink and paper
...Peace behind the cover of Hello magazine. There will be secret basements with biochemists trying to avoid the omniscient and penetrating gaze of Big Beckham. The concentration camps will be filled with philosophers and physicists. Academic journals will become one-man illict samizdat jobs, published on secret presses and distributed by masked men in back rooms of pubs. Libraries will take off and leave for the shores of the smart.
... ...the places that you see Hello most often are the places that take an hour and charge you fifty quid. I mean, bugger that. The fact that you have to sit there and, usually, peruse Hello! while you wait just puts me off. I mean, I take books to hairdressers / barbers now if I have to wait. I'd much rather be found hiding behind Orwell or Nietzsche than flipping through this rag.
I mean, for crying out loud, the fact that I can search ... more
I think I'm qualified to say that Hello! magazine is perhaps the worlds most intestine severing pile of buttwax ever rolled out of a four colour press anywhere in the world, outperforming even the most tiresome caravaning magazine in terms of vapidity (although it lacks the all-important tent peg reviews); yes, Hello! is appalling.
I write so, because of a recurring nightmare of mine. It is in a Britain much like the one we are living in today. But with one fundamental difference. The stupid people have taken over. Yes. The management executives (who, for all their BMW's and Armani suits probably sneak a peek at Hello! when nobody is looking, then walk off saying things like "There's no I in team, you know" and "We need a paradigm shift for this business" even though when you quiz them about Thomas Kuhn they fob you off) and the fifteen year old McDonald's drive through girl blowing bubbles with some appalling pink gum combine in to some all-encompassing force of cruel stupidity.
Outlaws will be made of everybody. The next Anne Frank will be a literature student who has to try to hide a copy of War and Peace behind the cover of Hello magazine. There will be secret basements with biochemists trying to avoid the omniscient and penetrating gaze of Big Beckham. The concentration camps will be filled with philosophers and physicists. Academic journals will become one-man illict samizdat jobs, published on secret presses and distributed by masked men in back rooms of pubs. Libraries will take off and leave for the shores of the smart.
Okay, I'm being a bit snobby and Orwellian here. But it's true.
Hello! magazine is appalling, trite nonsense. Inside it's pages it contains pictures of everybody I absolutely and totally abhor. Whether it's David Beckham or Sarah Ferguson, I can't think of the last person who adorned the pages of this glossy ulcer who I had even a modicum of interest in the life of.
Hello! is linked inextricably with expensive hairdressers. I either go to a barbers (who charge about a fiver and do it in ten minutes) or to a friend (who charges about £7 and does it in fifteen). That's the typical bloke way of doing it. And you can talk about anything from footie to philosophy during those ten or fifteen minutes. But the places that you see Hello most often are the places that take an hour and charge you fifty quid. I mean, bugger that. The fact that you have to sit there and, usually, peruse Hello! while you wait just puts me off. I mean, I take books to hairdressers / barbers now if I have to wait. I'd much rather be found hiding behind Orwell or Nietzsche than flipping through this rag.
I mean, for crying out loud, the fact that I can search BBC News Online and get results for "footballers' wives" is dreadful. Admittedly, one of the stories was about how Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, was calling for people not to watch the ITV programme because it's shallow and materialist (all the while saying he rather liked The Simpsons).
Is this all our culture is able to create? Vain stories about uninteresting people who get even less interesting when they open their mouth? There has got to be more than this.
I do not, of course, advocate banning such a publication. Generally, experience shows that banning something only makes it more popular. Also, as a civil libertarian, I'm completely against that sort of thing because it goes against my entirely justified belief that freedom of speech is a good thing.
No, the ham-fisted rubber stamp of a censor is too good for this publication. I do not have a problem with the words and images, or the fact that they are printed on to flattened out sheets of dead tree. No, no, nothing of the sort.
What I have a problem with is the appetite for this kind of utter crap. What kind of a view of the world must you have to actually find Katie Price interesting? I am not saying that you should enforce chastity upon yourself. I mean, I'm not totally sure I would find myself sexually excited by Katie Price. She seems a bit like a cross between the B-movie "Weird Science" and Michael Jackson. You kind of wish you could say to the surgeons "You just had to take it too far, didn't you?". No, don't lock yourself in to chastity. But don't look to Jordan or any of these people for reading material.
Hello! itself is not a problem. It is everything that comprises it - the very idea of a 'celebrity', and the system of 'gossip' propagation - as if any of this were some big secret and not just a PR opportunity to sell, well, whatever. I am not advocating that we replace this with 'pretentious' high culture. But honestly, Hello! is the bottom of the barrel.
And, no. The criticism easiest to make in this situation is the "but you secretly love it". No. This kind of Freudian bull has to stop. I condemn it not as a way of covering up my lust for Hello!. I condemn it because it's crap. And I condemn it because the view of the world that Hello! inculcates is thoroughly appalling.
Advantages: Excellent TV Guide Disadvantages: The rest of the magazine
...their wedding and reception to Hello magazine. The only thing I can hope is that these two 21 year olds did it for their fans (yeah right). I guess it just goes to show you can never have too much money. It is nice to know that when we buy any singer or groups songs, we are donating it to allowing them to lead such a nice life. Did I hear someone say I am jealous? Bloody right!
· Two pages of "Diary of the Week" are followed by 4 pages of Coronation ... ...in the second half of Hello magazine.
· We restart with 4 pages of "This Week" which is just a round up of news reports.
· Then god somebody hand me the sick bag, five pages of Gloria Hunniford and her husband having a break in Dublin. Oh, how the other half live, yet again. You see them in their expensive clothes lounging in their expensive home and wonder what it was she had to offer that made all the difference? Personally I can't see why she ...
Wayne10ch 30.01.2002
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Hello
Advantages: Keep up to date in all things glossy and shiny! Disadvantages: No real news. Just pretty pictures!
As I have stated in my other reviews, I am a bit of a nosy parker and I love looking at what is going on in other peoples lives. Why? No other reason then because I love people watching. Looking at what others are doing, how others live their life. Everyone is different. This also includes celebrities. I am not a huge fan of the news, but, celebrity news... now that is what I am interested in. You can call me shallow, sad, whatever…. But I can not ... ...actually reading about Victoria Beckham and her day out shopping for specially made blue metallic Bonsai trees (or something along those lines….!)
One way of me to get my weekly gossip is through the glossy HELLO! Magazine.
It is a weekly roundup of all things rich and famous. Now I will admit, I do not actually BUY the magazine. (Neither do I steal the magazine!) I work in a reception that gets it delivered every week. So before we put it out ...
izzoh 29.10.2008
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Hello
Advantages: Good to get your bonfire going Disadvantages: Everything about it
Are our lives really so empty that we feel we have to fill the void by reading about "celebrities'" lifestyles?
Today I have been unfortunate enough to have been given a copy of Hello! magazine (there is no way on this earth I would buy it). Still - there is one good thing to come from it - an opportunity to write an opinion for Ciao.
Hello! magazine is a glossy mag full of pictures of celebrities arriving at parties, celebrities at award ceremonies, ... ...let us not forget the frequent articles on the Royal Family and anyone even remotely connected with the Royals.
In this article I have here in front of me; dated March 6 2001; there are features on all of the above. What I cannot believe is that there is a 20-page (yes 20 pages!!!) feature on Celine Dion and her "miracle" new baby.
Celine and her husband, Rene have been trying for a baby for 6 years, and after some fertility treatment, Celine finally ...
Dizz 11.03.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Hello
Advantages: Well produced Disadvantages: Ingratiating, sycophantic drivel
...in. In the world of Hello there is no rail crisis, no problems in the NHS. World hunger and deprivation exists as a photo opportunity – how good that God makes most of its natural disasters strike where the sun shines.
This leads me to the crux of my problem with Hello. The magazine treats its celebrities and particularly royalty as Gods. In doing so it appears Godless and without compassion unless that compassion is recognised and revered ... ...the concept of royalty and Hello by the way it sycophantically depicts the Royal family only reinforces my view that they are a waste of money.
Hello presents a soft-glow rosy view of celebrity. A place to show how happy your relationship is, somewhere to quash rumours of health problems after a starlet slips to a size 6, a platform to show off the latest off-spring . For me there is no gap in my life which I feel needs to be filled by the contents ...
polydeuces 03.03.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Hello
Advantages: Good TV guide Disadvantages: Where are the celebrities?!
...her death. One thing that Hello can receive praise for, however, is the separate supplement. If there is a significant event, then you can bet that Hello! Magazine will print a ‘life in pictures’ supplement.
Page 55 brings us an advert for Vodafone, and for their Valentine’s service. And once that is read a brief article on Liz Hurley covers those glossy pages. This is where the ‘7 Days’ supplement is attached to the ... ...Subscription…
Subscription to Hello costs about £50 for six months or £90 for a year if you live in the UK, and prices reach up to £180 for the rest of the world if you do not live in Europe and your copy of Hello! has to be sent by Air Mail.
Website…
Hello! Magazine’s website address is www.hellomagazine.com.
To Summarise…
Hello! Magazine is a favourite with many but not a favourite with me. There seems to be too much ...
danieletheridge 18.02.2002
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Hello
twenty different episodes too so expect to see repeats!
The show is said to truly reflect the wisdom, outlook, and humour of creator Bill Cosby. I have not met him personally so I wouldn?t know but, I guess that kinda sums him up!! The series of books, later to be developed for the television was researched alongside educational specialists to ensure that they were good and wholesome (as my grandmother would say!) The show is designed to help kids face their everyday experiences and the people who share them.
Little Bill always greets the viewer by saying "Hello Friend!" This saying was inspired by the ?Hello Friend/Ennis William Cosby Foundation?, established in memory of the goals and dreams of Ennis, Bill Crosbys son. Im afraid I know no more info about the foundation than that! With humour and believable characters, it is a lovely ...
kerryzach 01.05.2004
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Little Bill
Advantages: briliant original comedy at its best Disadvantages: no more series
end in Dom running down the road, leaving the poor "star" wondering what is going on.
One of my favourites was the snail on the zebra crossing, that was classic, and the look of the motorists when he got up and walked away.
There are way too many good ones to write down, in fact they are all brilliant.
Never again can you hear the nokia phone tune without shouting HELLO, those who watch laugh with you and those who don't look at you like you've gone completely mad!
With a brilliant soundtrack, something I think I will buy!
This was a great series, I have now watched series one, unfortunatley there won't be anymore, but he is planning a few specials.
If you haven't yet seen this, then I suggest you give it a whirl, they are now out on DVD and video, trust me you will be laughing your socks off. ...
