There seems to be a theme emerging…

Radio Times (30 August - 5 September)

What I’m Watching (Gina McKee)

“I love good comedy, like Black Books and, particularly, the first series of Green Wing…”

Radio Rebus

The new Radio Times (16-22 August) has Ian Rankin as the subject of its “What I’m Watching” column:

“Since The West Wing and Green Wing ended I’ve not really got into a series in the same way…I spend almost as much time listening to radio.  I wake up to Radio 4, but the radio in the bathroom is tuned to BBC Radio Scotland [he lives in Edinburgh]

Ah, that explains it…

Costa Verde.

 

In need of peace and quiet?  Want to be surrounded by woods and mountains, but not too far from lovely beaches?  Fond of cheese and beans? Spanish-speaking/in possession of a good Spanish phrasebook/travelling with a Spanish-speaking child?  Then, my friends, go here and, if I may make another suggestion, you could always stay here.

We had a lovely time.  Too short really, but such is the nature of life with teenage children - short family holidays=good, long family holidays=absence of friends, gossip, OMG-ing and LOL-ing.  Anyway, Brian and I can’t afford to be churlish, Daisy having interpreted for us the entire time we were there as we have, shamefully, about six words of Spanish between us.  I’d definitely recommend Asturias though.  It has a tourist industry, but one that seems to be aimed at the Spanish rather than at the Brits.  We were not the only British tourists in Espinaredo, there was one other couple staying there.  However, Edinburgh reserve fobade me from exchanging more than a single “good morning” with them until such time as we’d been neighbours for about 50 years.

We visited Covadonga (churches and Visigoths), Cangas de Onís (lovely market, Roman bridge and our first meal out) and Oviedo (cathedral, Asturian bagpipes and shopping), walked in the surrounding countryside (where we spent a lot of time choosing the perfect spot for a, strictly hypothetical, skinny-dipping picnic).  Tuesday was the festival of Our Lady of the Snows, which meant music, dancing and drinking til the early hours (although we stopped long before the locals).  We spent a day at the beach, near Llastres and had a lovely dinner here on our last night.

Photos to follow.

Oh, this year I’m off to sunny Spain…

…well, I hope it’s sunny, anyway.

Off to Asturias for a week.  I’ve never been there before. In fact I’ve never  been to Spain at all (I know!!) so I’m all excited.

Hasta luegos amigos.

Bah.

1) Too lowbrow for a high culture blog.

2) Too unhip for a popular culture blog.

3) Too ignorant for a political blog.

4) Too elderly for a pregnancy blog.

5) Too unshaggable for a sex blog.

6) Too humourless for a funny blog.

7) Too unobservant for an observational blog.

Hmm, perhaps I could corner the  “middle-aged, middle-of-the-road, menopausal minger” market?

Saw Mamma Mia!: the movie last night* and loved it.  It was so much better than the stage production.

 

*Which just proves I) and probably 2) as well. Oh, who am I kidding?  It proves all 7!

How will you spend yours?

More evidence of blog-induced paranoia in the “traditional” press.

The latest edition of Private Eye (no.1214) carries a review of Cityboy: Beer and Loathing in the Square Mile by Geraint Anderson.  After explaining that Cityboy had its origins in thelondonpaper as a “sort of pretend blog”, the reviewer sulkily observes:

Like anything that looks a bit like a blog, its author* was swiftly signed up to produce a hardback book for tons of money.

Unsurprisingly, given that this is how the review starts, the book is found wanting in almost every respect and the reviewer concludes by suggesting:

Maybe it was foolish to expect any more.  Cityboy might not have been a real blog, but this book does demonstrate many of the weaknesses of the form: arrogance, carelessness and, above all, a terrible poverty of imagination.

Arrogance, carelessness and poverty of imagination?  How irritating -  it’s not as if you’d ever find any of these faults in any other of the print media.

 

* I assume it was the column which “looked a bit like a blog” rather than its author.  Carelessness?  You decide.

Since I was last here I have…

1) Completed the Edinburgh Moonwalk with Daisy, wearing our mother and daughter matching bras as shown here:

 

2) Visited the Edinburgh Film Festival (newly happening in June) where I saw the following:

• The Edge of Love
• The Song of Sparrows
• Warsaw Dark
• The King of Ping Pong
• Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
• Gloss: The Director’s Cut
• The Wave
• Faintheart

I’d heartily recommend The Song of Sparrows and Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day.  The first is a beautiful portrayal of human resilience in the face of hardship, alternating between humour and pathos and the second is a gorgeous-looking (loose) adaptation of the book of the same name (published by Persephone Press).  It also stars the ever-watchable Frances McDormand. 

I’d also recommend Gloss (a warts-and-all look at the fashion industry in Moscow), The Wave (based on this novel, which was in turn based on a classroom experiment by this man) and, to a lesser extent, The King of Ping Pong ( a Swedish film about adolescence, a little lacking in pace for my taste).  Faintheart, although hilarious at times, wasn’t as funny overall as it should have been (given its cast) or, indeed, as it thought it was. 

Warsaw Dark was either an interesting piece of art house cinema or a load of pretentious tosh (I’m inclining towards the second opinion).  The film was Christopher Doyle’s second outing as a director and here I have to put my hands up and say that, although he clearly enjoys a reputation as an outstanding cinematographer among those in the know, I’d never heard of him.  However, any opinion I have or may have of him in the future could hardly have been enhanced by his performance at the Q & A session after the film.  Doyle shared the stage with his director of photography, Rain Li and the film’s producer, Marianna Rowinska.  What was obvious from the outset, though was that Doyle had to be in the limelight at all times.  When either of his colleagues attempted to answer a question, he gurned away on the sidelines, ensuring that the majority of the audience was looking at him.  Odd behaviour, I thought, for a man who presumably chose to spend his life behind the camera rather than in front of it. 

The Edge of Love deserves special mention, if only because it was so thoroughly disappointing.  Dealing as it does with the relationship between Dylan Thomas, his wife, Caitlin and his former lover Vera Phillips, I had expected this film to be an exploration of human emotion.  According to the IMDb synopsis, this is a film in which “The passion and pathos of legendary poet Dylan Thomas is told through the lives of two extraordinary women.”  Sadly, nothing could have been further from the truth.  I found it impossible to care about any of the characters for the majority of the film and, given that there were so many references to sex and love, the whole thing was strangely lacking in passion and almost sterile.  The only genuinely emotional scenes in the film were the battle scenes and Captain William Killick’s resulting post-traumatic stress.  Killick is played by Cillian Murphy and, while he’s lovely to look at in the early part of the film, the poor man is given dialogue so mannered and clunky that it sounds as if it was written by a pompous fourteen year-old who’d read too much bad romantic fiction. Keira Knightley as Vera at least makes an attempt at a Welsh accent (even if it is of the “There’s lovely, boy-o” variety).  Sienna Miller’s accent, on the other hand, is from everywhere and nowhere.  They both perform well as clothes-horses, though (ooh, scratch your eyes out!) with Keira looking picture-perfect in her 1940s garb, while Sienna showcases boho chic to great effect.  Matthew Rhys’s portrayal of Dylan Thomas ironically reverses historical fact with disastrous consequences.  Thomas was famously ugly but charming, Rhys is considerably better looking but about as charmless as it is possible for an individual to be.  It is really is straining the bounds of credibility  to suggest that one let alone two women could have been won over by this self-serving monster.  To quote Tom Paulin: I didn’t like it.

3) Spent two nights, with Brian, on the beautiful island of Skye.  We stayed here and here.  Skye is wonderfully peaceful and, although the weather was miserable, the scenery always looks dramatic.

At last.

Sometimes you discover a book, television programme or piece of music that perfectly crystallises your thoughts and opinions on a particular subject.  For me, “Takin’ Over the Asylum” was just such a television programme.  This award-winning six-parter, shown in 1994, was the most sympathetic portrayal of mental illness I’d ever seen in a TV drama.  Perhaps I was more than usually interested in this subject - I’d been treated for post-natal depression after the birth of my first child a couple of years earlier - but, even allowing for that, I remember it as being truly impressive, skillfully written drama - touching without being sentimental, funny without being cruel and dramatic without being hysterical.

So why no video or DVD release?  Your guess is as good as mine but, anyone who knows me well will at some time in the last 14 years have listened to me bemoaning the fact that this series never got the recognition it deserved.  I remember watching the BAFTA ceremony that year and when Donna Franceschild accepted her award, it was obvious that the assembled audience didn’t have a clue what she had won it for.  Her speech was followed by polite, slightly bemused applause.

And why a DVD release now?  Well, “Takin’ Over the Asylum” was also significant for providing a young actor called David Tennant* with his first televsion role.

Right, I’ve told you mine.  What’s yours?

 

 

* He was heart-breakingly good.  I always said he’d do well!

…and then I go and spoil it all

Did anyone else hear this earlier this evening?  Robbie Williams investigating the paranormal, a subject which has apparently long fascinated him?  I ask because, during the programme, Robbie and co-presenter Jon Ronson meet Ann Andrews, a woman who believes (or claims to believe) that her son, Jason, is an “indigo child” sent to heal Planet Earth.  She also claims that he is regularly abducted by aliens and that she has photos of these incidents but that the quality of the photos is poor because “she only has a disposable camera”.  Robbie’s friend (can’t remember his name) asks her why she doesn’t get a better camera.  She replies that she is hopeless with “anything technological”.

What I really want to know though is this: was I the only cruel bitch who, towards the end of the programme, laughed out loud at the following exchange?:

Ann Andrews: You look like Robbie Williams.

RW: I AM Robbie Williams.

AA: I thought you were but I didn’t want to say anything in case I looked stupid…

Like I said, cruel but I couldn’t help it.  Poor woman.

P.S Doesn’t Jon Ronson have an irritating voice?  Or is that just me as well?

Let’s get this party started.

Yesterday evening I was googling recipes for canapés (and what else would I have been doing on a Saturday evening ?)  when I came across a recipe for “Bacon and camembert WANTONS”.

Now, they sound like just what you need to make a party go with a swing…