PET HATES? I DON’T HATE PETS, JUsT THESE NUMPTIES!
So, after a break for a few weeks, here I am with yet more to discuss, talk about rant about etc. I hope you’ve all been well and not missed my incoherent ramblings too much. For those of you who have I promise that there are quite a few different things coming on to these pages, from my shortest story yet about “HOW NOT TO IMPRESS A CELEBRITY” to the deely on my much anticipated trip to the supposed gay capital of the UK (although that said I encounter more gays at work in Manchester than I did in Brighton. Go figure!)
But first, I couldn’t let a moment go by without mentioning this as it’s one of those things that I know everyone who experiences my blog will have experienced at one time of another and when the moment came I thought “I can’t let that go”. The people that we’re talking about today are that rarest of people, they’re those clowns that, when you turn a corner with room to spare between you and an approaching car, decide that the best course of action is to speed up.
WHY? That’s what I’d love to know. To be honest I’d love nothing more than to chase these arseholes down, flag them to pull over and shout at them, why? What realistically is their problem? If you assess and correctly judge that there is indeed room, then what will speeding up and crashing into you by these tools achieve? What would they actually say to the police if they did crash into you...
“Well, Officer they were turning in front of me so quickly that my only course of action was to slam on the accelerator and crash into them!” because these days, it’s all computers. In the past when we drove the pedals controlled the vehicle but more and more with newer cars a pedal tells a computer to slow the car down and then then car slows down. The computers are like like little in-car black boxes monitoring a person’s driving, meaning it would become pretty clear, pretty quickly what had caused any crash like that . . . Driver error on the other side. So why do it?
And here’s where I lose it a bit because I don’t know. I mean there’s certain bad behaviour where when I see it occur I can think well I get that, I know why that has happened, but this one not only seems illogical but it seems downright dangerous. The last time this happened we were making the turn and there clearly was, at the speed the oncoming car was going, enough time to make the turn, but of course you start to pull out and they decide that they’d better speed up and deny you that turn, even though by that stage you’re already in the turn, I mean, it’s like they expect you to immediately reverse back down the road you were exiting, but you can’t do that so all you can do is get out of there as soon as possible and thank your luck that when they whisk past you that your premiums have not just shot up.
THE FOURTH IN AN INCREASINGLY LESS OCCASIONAL SERIES
FORGOTTEN FILMS THAT SHOULD BE REMEMBERED
Okay, so we’re four in and I already know what number 5 will be. However let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. We have number 4 to look at, and what a number 4 it is. This is the first absolute classic that I have covered in these pages; true, both “Sex, Lies and Videotape” and “Manhattan” have garnered much critical acclaim from critics and cinema goers alike but they still aren’t regarded yet as classics, whereas as today’s film is. It is a film from the golden age of black and white cinema and is a movie that seems to savour the shadows. It’s not really a noir film but the subject matter is certainly black; a young heiress being blackmailed over pornographic photo’s in a seedy world fueled by sex, drugs and murder with a criminal overload overseeing all of it behind a mask of respectability. It is probably the film’s stars best ever film, although it is often overlooked in favour of a rousing patriotic number. It is littered with great lines and if you don’t know what it is by now then you really need to see it before you suffer . . .
THE BIG SLEEP (1946)
(Love this poster)
Black and white thrillers don’t come any sexier than this. Bogart and Bacall’s second film together is fraught with sexual tension between the two leads that has rarely been surpassed. In their early scenes together the dialogue is rich with animosity and yet it is totally apparent that they are into each other. It is one of the many appealing aspects of this tale of a Los Angeles underbelly and a conspiracy that drags everyone into its sticky web.
Humphrey Bogart plays jaded private detective Phillip Marlowe, hired to help disabled former bounder, scoundrel and all-round gadabout, General Sternwood, who is immediately likeable in his curmudgeonry (if that’s even a word) with a blackmail plot his youngest daughter, Carmen, has become ensnared. This gets solved relatively quickly (but not without a fairly decent body-count) but it’s the disappearance of the General’s friend (son almost), Sean Regan, that piques Marlowe’s interest, and the more he keeps digging the more people tell him to stop. The General’s second daughter, Vivien, is drawn to Marlowe but caught so far in the conspiracy she has to continually push him away, which just makes him all the more curious as to what really happened, leading to a sensational ending.
The big sleep was then, and it is now even, a huge influence on the the thriller genre. It’s tentacles of influence stretch all the way up to “L.A. Confidential” and even “The Departed” in its depiction of a sleazy underbelly which occupies and infiltrates every level of the social scale. It’s a vile world that affects the good and the bad in equal measure (something we’ve seen a lot of in the UK over the last few months) and Marlowe is cynical enough to know he can’t escape that world but smart enough to not get involved.
It’ a cracking performance from Bogey and he and Bacall have never been better than they were in this movie. The dialogue is sumptuous between them and although William Faulkner and Raymond Chandler get most nods from the critics for the script it is interesting to note that Leigh Brackett’s is largely overlooked for her work and yet the echoes of “The Big Sleep” can also be seen in “The Empire Strikes Back” with the relationship between Han and Leia. “Being held by you isn’t quite enough to get me excited” “Sorry, sweetheart. Haven’t time for anything else” and “You go too far” “Oh. Those are hard words to throw at a man, especially when he’s walking out of your bedroom” are almost interchangeable, such are their feel and construction. So, with its quality in no doubt why does it make the list?
Well, as I mentioned earlier with Bogart there really is only one film that everyone regards as “The One” and that sadly is “Casablanca”, which features many of Bogart’s most memorable lines. But in his career of course he did make a number of films that were worthy of remembering including “To have and Have not”, “The African Queen”, “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre”, “The Caine Mutiny”, “The Maltese Falcon” and of course, my favourite “The Big Sleep”. It is one of those films I never tire of recommending as it is a timeless classic that improves with age, and if imitation is the highest form of flattery then its echoes in films like “L.A. Confidential” and “The Departed” to name two of the most obvious films that owe a debt to “The Big Sleep”, show very much that not only that they still do make em like they used, but that when they do, it usually works out pretty well.
I would usually put a trailer here but as You Tube have bugger all that's useful sadly, you'll just have to take my word for all of the above.
It would be nice to be able to blog about what I want to blog about. It would be nice to write about my next in an increasingly less occasional series of forgotten films to be remembered, I would like nothing more than to write about my recent Brighton adventure, but I can’t. The UK is on fire and while no doubt many papers and news channels will have sanitised discussions as to the cost of these riots, they will also be very PC about it, too PC, it’ll be PC gone mad (which is probably what we need right now, preferably with a machine gun!) But here of course I don’t have to be PC and can reveal the full cost as it is and bring home how, due to these robbing, destructive little bastards, our economy is going to go even more down the tubes. So if you’re one of the shits that’s robbed something for free while trashing places, prepare for an education on the real cost of your actions to every household in the UK.
Now at the minute the news channels are focussing on the insurance costs, which will be astronomical, but wait a minute, that doesn’t affect every household, what’s the problem? This is one of those things that bugs me about people. Their tendency for stupidity. This is the same mentality as those muppets who claim for fake whiplash injuries, get a huge payout and then whinge that for the next ten years that their insurance premiums are going ballistic. Note to the not so wise. Insurance companies are businesses, therefore if they pay out a lot and lose money, everybody’s premiums go up. This means that now, car insurance for all the cars you torched will again go up for everyone in the UK, including the parents of these little shits if they even bother to insure their vehicle.
But that’s the only downside right? No. This means that house insurance will also go up for most people due to the extensive property damage cause by the rioters, businesses, however, will suffer the most though, in fact small businesses due to increased demands to beef up security may never be able to restart leading to more unemployment and less jobs, but for those businesses that do remain the cost of extra insurance premiums due to the riots will be passed onto ...you’ve guessed it, the consumer. Yes, everything from food to clothing to petrol to Old Spice will be that much more expensive for everyone’s over-stretched purse already.
But those are the only costs, right? WRONG! For there’s all the cost for the extra policing, their equipment, their overtime, etc, and who pays for that ...the Taxpayer through council tax so we can all expect that to go up next year thanks to these rioters (Not that their parents pay this as they’re probably on housing benefit!)
But that’s about all the cost to the UK, yes? Nope. Because a lot of these Adidas wearing mother fuckers (that’s the brand that some of them were wearing on the BBC news) will be caught because they’re fucking stupid and of course they’ll need legal representation for their day in court which requires legal aid which will be paid for by the fucking taxpayer no doubt, and then what, well court costs, as if they can afford that, we’ll dig in out pockets again for you shall we, no not enough? Don’t worry because we’ll also have to pay for these little cunts incarceration as well. But there is an upside and that is while they are inside they won't be able to get their underage girlfriend's pregnant because they're too stupid to go to the family planning clinic and get some condoms for free.
In short they have ruined Britain with their rank fucking stupidity.
But you know as bad as that is, there’s even more tragedy here. Because someone during this rampant thievery has died. These aren’t just thieves were dealing with, but fucking murderers, and yet not any of these Dicks that are interviewed on the TV has expressed any sadness about that. It’s all the police are to blame they’re disrespecting us, from that silly bitch before, or that fat ignorant fucker in salford who was making out the police presence was causing the trouble. No doubt he didn’t think that when he found out his beloved Bargain Booze was trashed, I bet he was up in arms about that (or up in The Kings Arms drowning his sorrows) when the reality is people are being assaulted, attacked and killed by these bastards. These should be the headlines.
And the other thing that’s bad is also due to the extent of the violence, is that Mark Duggan is now being portrayed as some kind of gangster. The same kind of exaggeration and misinformation that was the catalyst for starting this is now going the other way. The family of Mark Duggan distanced themselves from the riots and yet now their son is being portrayed as some kind of gangster wannabe.
It is important to recognise in difficult times what we know and what we don’t know and while I will condemn these evil little shits on the streets, I’m not gonna condemn a man when I don’t know the facts of the investigation or even, more importantly, whether or not it was Mr Duggan they wanted to arrest (something I have not heard mentioned yet, or why they wanted to arrest him? Odd that.)
But in spite of that there has been one good thing come out of all of this and that is the British sense of humour shining through and so, as not to leave the blog on a downer, I thought I would leave you with my three favourite gags from this evening. So till next time take care of yourselves and not a 42 inch plasma TV from Currys.
When I saw all the chavs rioting on Tottenham high street I found a safe place to hide where I knew they wouldn't go.
The job centre.
Hello Rioters,
Look at your mirror, now back to me, now back at your mirror, now back to me
Sadly, you aren't me, but if you stopped using petrol bombs,
And started using Job centre you could potentially be like me
Look down, Back up. Where are we?
...You're at an interview with the man you could work for
What's in your hand? Back at me
I have it, It's an application form to that job you need
Look again. The form is now money
Anything is possible when you get a job and stop looting
Dear rioters, yes the country's in the shit, yes there are cutbacks everywhere and yes the government doesn't know it's arse from it's elbow but think of the unnecessary bill that you're running up by destroying everything! Oh, sorry, I'll be paying for that over the next few years while you're still sat on your arses except when you have to sign on!
So here we are with the second part of this series as promised with quite a few corrections to some bonkers Oscar decisions, most of which happened during the nineties, when really, there’s no excuse for it, we’ve all been around for quite some time and they should be more than capable of getting it right. So here we go...
1994 BEST ORIGINAL SCORE: REAL WINNER: JOHN WILLIAMS -SCHINDLER’S LIST. MY WINNER: MICHAEL NYMAN - THE PIANO
This first one is one I am loathe to do. I love John Williams. In my lifetime he has been my movie soundtrack guy; “Jaws”, “Star Wars”, “Superman the Movie”, “E.T.”, “Jurassic Park” and “Harry Potter” have all benefitted from his stunning soundtracks and during all these years he has also done countless others. But during this year there was another horse that should have been in the stalls, and, if it had, would surely have pipped the legendary Mister Williams. As I’ve said previously with the Oscars sometimes they don’t even have the fastest horse on the track and I can certainly justify that this year.
“The Piano” was a film were the music itself was a key component in its success. Like Holly Hunter, Anna Paquin, Sam Neill and Harvey Keitel the music feels like a fifth performer. “The Piano” was nominated for best picture and the music is an intrinsic part of that. If the music had sucked then you could have blown that nomination out of your arse! The reality is that it works and it works beautifully, it has to, and because of that it would be crazy to think that it wouldn’t get nominated, but it didn’t. But here on my blog we are not about what did happen, we are about what could and should have happened. So my revised Oscar for best original score goes to Michael Nyman. Michael, over to you...
1995 BEST PICTURE. REAL WINNER: FORREST GUMP. MY WINNER: PULP FICTION.
Oh boy, it’s gonna be hard not to rant on this one but I will try. In the past there have been many times when critics have disputed the best picture winner, “Oliver”/”2001: A Space Odyssey”, “Annie Hall”/”Star Wars”, “Ordinary People”/”Raging Bull”, “Chariots of Fire”/”Raiders of the Lost Ark”, “Dances with Wolves”/”Goodfellas” and even “The Kings Speech”/”The Social Network”. However in all these cases the films that did win were at least good. This year though was arguably the first year were the best picture winner was a turd!
Amazingly this is the year were the academy had two of the best films of all time to choose from and could’ve gone either way, but didn’t. While “The Shawshank Redemption” was a sleeper, “Pulp Fiction” was the coolest kid on the block. It was the bad boy at school wearing a leather jacket and sleeping with the girls in the fifth year while only on the fourth. It was the film a thousand film students wished they’d made but only Quintin Tarentino could. “Pulp Fiction” was and still is a powerful film with far more to say than the critics give it credit for. Like the previously mentioned film, Pulp is a film about redemption and all the characters within the film are redeemed, save one, who is killed by the fact that they learn nothing. Many people don’t see this as they seem to be incapable of rejigging the pieces in their head and seeing the whole story. Now many of you might think I’m some guy who just spouts what the film critics say, but in this case it was far from.
When I saw the trailer for Pulp I was not interested, in fact I loathed the very look of it; and when I eventually went to see it I went with my arms folded and a scowl on my face. I was sure gonna have an opinion on it but if it was going to impress me it would have to work bloody hard! It did. In the lobby that night there was a stand with four different Pulp posters. Before the film nobody cared, after the film there was a mini melee to get them (I got ALL four!) The strangest thing about Pulp though was that although the subject matter was quite harrowing sitting through Forrest Gump earlier that year was more of an ordeal (I hate those “It’s-okay-to-mock-the-disabled-oh-wait-they’re-actually-really-good-at-sports”patronising movies. Hate them!)
So when the Oscars came round I like most people thought it would be a walk in the park for Pulp. The first shock of the night came when Martin Landau won Best Supporting Actor for Ed Wood (leading to Samuel L Jackson’s famous mouthing “shit”. Brilliant!) Then of course Gump picked up awards for best actor (er...really?) and Best Director (this year Best Director must have meant best direction of badly faked film clips with celebrity voices so badly faked they looked like they should be on “The Simpsons”). But then came the final insult of the night, the coup-de-ville or something. Best Picture went to Forrest Gump. The film critics were stunned, the media were stunned, the audience were stunned. It was, even more so than Raiders/Chariots, the biggest Oscar travesty of all time.
But on this blog we are all about making the world right, so Mr Tarentino, here is your award. Please take to the stage.
Quentin: Well it’s about F****** time, you M***** F******! I couldn’t F****** believe it when they F****** said that Forrest F****** Gump had F****** won best F****** picture. I mean for F*** sake, what do I F****** have to F****** do to F****** get the F****** Oscar I deserve. Mike, F****** thanks!
Me: Er ...I think the F words mean friendly.
1998 BEST ACTOR: REAL WINNER: JACK NICHOLSON (AS GOOD AS IT GETS) MY WINNER: RUSSELL CROWE (L.A. CONFIDENTIAL)
Boy, how much does the academy struggle with films that are big on ensemble acting. It’s like there’s so much good acting going on they can’t actually tell who is doing what? In 1999 this is what happened with Curtis Hanson’s superior thriller, “L.A. Confidential”. The funny thing is though that it wasn’t just the academy that was bamboozled by this one. Almost all of the principals got nominated at one ceremony or other across the globe and they did win a few, but now, looking back, it is easy to see what I could see at the time. Russell Crowe is stunning in this film. From the first scene teaching a parole violator a lesson through to the final frantic gun-fight. Crowe’s Bud White is hero and villain from one minute to the next, liked by the audience and hated another in equal measure, but without it ever feeling fake. Crowe’s White’s truth is always to himself and we are never in any doubt of that. Having grown up in a particularly grim neighbourhood I can say with absolute certainty that his portrayal of a man with a switch in his head is frighteningly accurate.
However the Oscars are of course notoriously political and in this year Jack Nicholson just happened to appear in one of the biggest stinkers of his career, the terrible “Mars Attacks” in which he played a dual role and wasn’t particularly good in either. However he also starred in “As good as it gets”, a mediocre comedy at best, (If ever there was proof that the universe has a sense of irony this was it,) which for some reason garnered a fair few nominations, and thanks to one of the weakest best Actor fields in years he picked up his least deserved Oscar to date. However I am here to correct these mistakes and so it’s now my pleasure to welcome self-confessed chatter-box, Russell Crowe, Russell, here’s your award.
Russell: Thanks. (Leaves stage)
Mike: Aah, you just can’t shut him up, can you?
1998 BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: ROBIN WILLIAMS - GOOD WILL HUNTING. MY WINNER: ROBERT FORSTER - JACKIE BROWN.
Okay, so for many this is going to be the most contentious of all my revisions as this was a popular winner in its year but I’m not doing this just to suck up to the popular vote, ( ♬ It’s my party and I’ll award where I want to! ��) and this is one that I do feel most passionate about.
When Robin Williams was nominated for “Good Will Hunting” it was his fourth nomination. He had previously been nodded for “Good Morning, Vietnam”, “Dead Poets Society” and “The Fisher King” and although great in all 3 he had also been well beaten in each of the years concerned (although with that in mind we could also discuss Hopkins’ best actor award for “Silence” but lets save that for another day) so when he was nominated for “Good Will” it must have felt like the easiest decision ever for the academy (if there’s one thing they don’t like it’s multiple award nominees who don’t go on to win ...It leaves a horrible unfinished feeling in the academy’s mouth.)
But this year there was a proverbial Spaniard in the works. This year an actor that no-one expected to do something spectacular did something spectacular. Robert Forster in “Jackie Brown” is awe-inspiring and puts in a performance that simply gets better with age. In “Jackie Brown” he is the emotionless middle-aged man going through life who’s unexpected meeting with a woman who smashes through his life with the force of a train crash awakens thing inside him that he is incapable of controlling (I adore him leaving about 3 different numbers for her to contact him. It is one of the sweetest movie moments ever!) by contrast Robin Williams’ emotional range is limited in “Good Will Hunting” due to the nature of the role he is playing. However Robert Forster’s Max Cherry is whole calvacade of emotions, but it is all topped off (Like the cherry of his name) by a stony facade that hides a lot but is still possible to see through the cracks emerging,
HERE BE SPOILERS LOOK AWAY NOW in fact the final scene where Max watches Jackie leave is like witnessing a man stepping outside his own body and watching himself die. OKAY YOU CAN READ ON NOW
But in this year Robert had no chance of winning. Simply put, it was Robin’s turn. But on my blog I make the rules. Robert step forward for your award.
Robert: (Stony faced) This is the proudest moment of my life. (walks off)
Me: Makes it all worthwhile.
HERE BE SPOILERS AGAIN
OKAY YOU CAN LOOK BACK AGAIN NOW
2000 BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: REAL WINNER: ALAN BALL - AMERICAN BEAUTY. MY WINNER: CHARLIE KAUFMAN - BEING JOHN MALKOVICH
Hollywood has in its time produced many great Jewish screenwriters. One thinks of Billy Wilder, Mel Brooks, Neil Simon and Woody Allen instantly (well you do if you’re me!) To that previous list another name can now be added, Charlie Kaufman. Over the years Charlie has developed a knack for creating film scripts that challenge our ideas on identity and hat it means to be human. His first such screenplay, amazingly, was the one here, and what a stunning debut it was. In all my time as a film buff I have never seen anything that comes close to the inventiveness and surreality of “Being John Malkovich”. Simply put, as a screenwriting debut it is simply unsurpassed. But as I’ve said before the Oscars are a strange beast and if they have their favourites one year they tend to walk away with all the big prizes when perhaps sometimes the more outlandish, but also the more deserving films, get overlooked. But not here. I am here to amend such oversights and so it is that I say, Charlie, take the stage.
Charlie?
Oh.
I’ve just been passed a note from Charlie’s Mum saying he hates award ceremonies and isn’t coming out to play.
And you know what? That’s it. We are done with our revising and for my next Oscar blog I will be looking at the surprise decisions that were actually pretty bold.
All celebrity interviews are fake and no celebrity comments are real
The Academy, as the copyright owner of the Academy's “Oscar” statuette, and owner of its trademarks and service marks, including “OSCAR®,” “OSCARS®,” “ACADEMY AWARD®,” “ACADEMY AWARDS®,” “OSCAR NIGHT®,” “A.M.P.A.S.®” and the federally registered “Oscar” design mark, is required to protect its properties against unauthorized uses and infringements.
THE BLINDINGLY LOGICAL FOLLY OF THE WESTERN BIG BUSINESSMAN (A.K.A WHY AUSTIN POWERS WAS WRONG)
In “Austin Powers: International man of Mystery” Michael York asserts that the cold war was over, we won. At the time it seemed like this was correct. But one thing was wrong with this assertion. Sure, sure, the Eastern bloc had collapsed, Soviet Russia was no more and the Eastern European states had again embraced democracy. But the biggest communist country on the planet was still out there, and it was growing. Communist China over the last few years has done strange things with it’s resources and it’s money management and it has been difficult for the west to see or understand it’s thinking but the Chinese Government in this long game of financial chess has been far smarter than any Western businessman gave them credit for.
You see, Logic, if applied correctly, can show up the folly in the wisest man’s thinking. And I remember years ago when many, many companies started to move production and manufacturing overseas on a massive scale wondering how, if those jobs are going overseas, will people simply be able to afford to buy those products? For example, say a country has full employment and 1 company closes a factory and moves production overseas to cut costs, because the guy at the top of the business thinks that he’ll make more money because his costs have been cut and the product he’s selling in the west can stay at the same price.
However when 1000 business do this and put 1000 people in a thousand factories out of business then that means that 1,000,000 suddenly have less money coming in and therefore cannot buy (and probably don’t want to buy) the same products they bought before. Take HP as an example. I used to buy HP sauce. I now wouldn’t because they moved the factory to Holland, but like many people out there, I also wouldn’t because I can’t afford the price. So now, the product that before made them more money due to savings of moving overseas is now being sold at Home Bargains for a fraction of the price because they can no longer sell them for the same price they used to.
Now while all the manufacturing jobs were busy being sucked up (most notably by China) the big business men in the west didn’t seem to notice or care that the people that they wanted to buy there products were now effectively unemployed and could no longer afford them. They were so removed from reality and (In the US) were busy lobbying the republican party to give out yet more tax cuts, that they didn’t choose to see or didn’t choose to look at how consumer spending wasn’t being driven by jobs, but by credit; Cheap credit, because the west didn’t need manufacturing, and also because China was buying up US debt, although why at that stage was seemingly a mystery.
Now, a gigantic communist state buying up all your debt may have started alarm bells ringing in some leaders, but the economy didn’t need someone at the tiller, the West had the war on terror to worry about so it was just a case of spend, spend, spend. Of course the West was also creating financial products that would provide sustainable wealth forever. Only this was wrong.
The financial products were in reality little more than over-complicated pyramid schemes and when the last people on board were people with little to no money who were given mortgages they couldn’t pay that’s when the bubble burst and all hell broke loose, since then Western economies have been in free-fall with Republicans so terrified in the US of Tax Increases for the rich that the credit agencies have down-graded the US Government’s credit rating for the first time in its history. But we have also seen the emergence of what the chess game was about.
The global currency.
For so long, the US dollar has been the planet’s global currency. Commodities, most notably oil, are priced in it. But now China is making waves that its currency should be the new global currency and with the Euro and Dollar dropping faster than the Titanic it finally has the excuse it needs to justify such a move. This would mean that the world’s reserve currency and the world’s largest economy would be that of a communist state. Big business made short term gains to get rich quick but forgot that without jobs people cannot afford its products, the more money you spend in a communist country the more money a communist country has. China has become the dominant world economy not by military force but by stupid greedy businessmen.
People are speculating just what it will take to get the global economy back on track, but the reality is that it has not been on a track for sometime. China derailed it on to the sidings and merrily brought it to a stop without anyone noticing what was happening.
