Category: old blogging

urf. I’ve just eaten the biggest roast dinner in history. It was delicious, but now I can’t move. I’m pretty good in the kitchen, but sometimes I think it may be bad for my health! I was going to go down to w2 for the live music that’s on tonight, but I think I’ll skip it. Still, I can reach the pinot grigio without leaving my seat, so shouldn’t complain.
Anyway, I promised to say a bit more about the film. It was excellent. When you consider that it was made in 1957, the year that The Bridge On The River Kwai swept the board at the Oscars, and Peyton Place and Gunfight At The OK Corral were filling the cinemas, it can’t possibly have had a huge audience even then. Today, the New Park was about one-third full – maybe fifty people. All I can say is that a lot of people missed an opportunity to see a great piece of cinema on the big screen.
Woody Allen used Wild Strawberries as the basis for his film Another Woman, which I’ve not seen. Watching it, you can see Bergman’s influence on European and Hollywood cinema. This is a road movie, but not in the usual style. It’s more a journey of self discovery, as opposed to the American ideal of a journey into a great white future. The main protagonist, Isak Borg, confronts his past and discovers himself, rediscovering friends and family as he goes. The story relates a single day in his life, when, as an old man, he travels from Stockholm to Lund to collect an award. Along the way, he bonds with his daughter-in-law, befriends some young travellers, visits his mother and confronts his own demons through dreams and flashbacks.
The script, cinematography and acting are all brilliant. There is subtle mixture of cold hardness and heartwarming tenderness, moments of sadness and moments that are genuinely funny. The highlights for me were the performances by Victor Sjöström as Isak (Sjöström was an important director in his own right) and the phenomenally beautiful Ingrid Thulin as his daughter-in-law, Marianne. Both were good friends of Ingmar Bergman, and it is obvious that the three of them were able to communicate well in the making of the film – there is a natural rapport.
I suspect the print of Wild Strawberries I saw today is doing the rounds of art cinemas in the UK at the moment. If it comes to a cinema near you, go and see it.
(EDIT: Wild Strawberries received an Oscar nomination in 1959 for Best Screenplay.)

Had a brilliant walk by the canal down to Hunston and back, admiring the newly-cleared banks (all done with volunteer labour – respect due to the Canal Society) complete with scattered patches of yellow celandines and nodding daffodils. I spotted a pair of extremely brightly coloured kingfishers flying fast and low over the water, and a little grebe doing that funny submerging trick that they do when disturbed.

When will IDS listen? When you have figures that are as popular with the general public as Portillo, Clarke and now Chris Patten saying the sort of things they have been saying, combined with an extremely disaffected party chairman and a 1922 committee that is said to be "incandescent with rage", surely it is time to go, for the good of the party?
Honestly, I can’t see anyone voting for them at the moment, certainly not me. At present, Charles Kennedy has my vote. I can’t be the only person who thinks that way.

The film was excellent. More on that later. Only had a pint in The Nags, as I’d forgotten that they don’t run a lunch menu on Sundays (only the excellent carvery, and I didn’t want that when I have a full-on roast planned for later), so came home stopping at the pastie shoppe on the way. But it’s a lovely afternoon, so I’ll definitely take a walk.

I do not find this at all surprising. Making museums free of charge is, in my opinion, a good thing. However, doing so does not make them cool in the minds of people who, regardless of background, get their culture from The Sun and Corrie. Perhaps the museums could try to broaden their appeal by getting support from a few icons of popular culture. Getting Posh and Becks to take Brooklyn for a day out to see the dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum would make a great photo opportunity. And, let’s face it, the dinosaurs are cool.

An impressive URL. via LMG.

Went to see Ted’s band play The Fountain. I saw the first half of their set, which was good, filled with good bluesy rock tunes. But, I have to say, though the band was good, the singer wasn’t as good as Paul F – he just didn’t carry the (very packed and hot) audience with him.
After that, beer in W2 with Cat and Nicky, with sightings of DA, Kearn, Stein, Matt and several others.

This site cropped up in my referral logs and made me smile.

Let’s not mention today’s football result for Brighton, ok?
Doing my figures has taken me longer than I thought, so I haven’t got back to the shoe shop. This will be a good thing as far as my credit card balance is concerned. And the figures look pretty good too.

Hmm. A bit behind schedule with the day so far, not least because I have spent longer than anticipated in the city centre, poking about the shops. However, I completed my bank errands, bought some stationery for PFE, purchased a new paperback as I’ve nearly finished A Cook’s Tour, bought some odds and ends in Boots, did a full-on shop at Waitrose and spied a pair of really smart boots in Russell and Bromley. But although I am tempted to go and try them on, I shall resist until I’ve finished my paperwork.