To
celebrate what I hoped would be successful procedures to remove cataracts from
both my eyes, five months ago, I planned a weekend visit to Croydon, the town
of my birth my birth in 1939 over the first weekend of October 2018. The
weekend lived up to my expectation because it was as if I was seeing everything
for the first time in vivid colourful clarity.
There were two exceptions, one of which reminded of the continuing
British failure to help and protect the most vulnerable of citizens. We are one
of the top successful economies in the world which should be able to prevent
poverty at home and contribute help to those in other lands. Yet I found more
people sleeping out on the streets of central London than ever before. Shame on
all of us and our government especially.
My
second full day proved something of a washout as the forecast light rain became
a heavy down power and despite a coat with a hood and an umbrella I was
drenched, and this also underlined the impact of the weather and the coming
winter on those out in the cold in
the streets.
My
sense of not doing enough and a need to refocus on priorities developed over
the weekend and was reinforced when reading the transcript of the first four
days of the National Child Abuse Inquiring hearings on Nottinghamshire and its
separate City Council local authority. I have expressed reservations that the
Inquiry has been deliberately limited to one form of sexual abuse and where
other forms not being investigated at the same level have caused life-long
disabilities and injustice. The Inquiry is rightly focused and centred on what
happened to victims and the Truth project remains for many the most important
aspect. However, for some campaigners and survivors there is also the issue of
the extent to which institutions failed and of deliberate, wilful cover up and
protectionism and for this reason there has been as much attention given to the
role of the Catholic and Protestant Churches as there is being given to
government and local authorities. The
negligence of the non-state child care organisations is also under scrutiny.
The government chickened out of tackling the role of the British state by
restricting the inquiry to England and Wales, and not giving terms of reference
which enabled one chairperson and panel to also examine the issue of a national
cover up, including Northern Ireland, Scotland and the overseas territories.
That relevant information from the separate enquiries is being passed to those
of charge of the England and Wales enquiry is a positive step but leaves
government open to the accusation of something to hide which should not.
I
continue to remind of what Norman Tebbit said on the Andrew Marr show the day
before Teresa May unexpectedly, including to some members of the Cabinet,
accepted the cross party call for a national inquiry before the police had
completed their enquiries and which arose from the 2012 PMQ, the present deputy
leader of the Labour Party, Tom Watson, had asked the former Prime Minister
David Cameron and where both a decade before had served on the Chris Mullin,
Sunderland constituency Member of the House of Commons led Home office Select
Committee which wanted to stop police investigations and bring to an end civil
compensation in cases where there was no successful criminal prosecution, a situation which was then current involving Sunderland
Council. Tebbit admitted the establishment cover up with disastrous
consequences. The cover up was not a conspiracy between individuals and
institutions but reflected the way things were done at the time, but I believe
with some glaring exceptions which the National Inquiry Team may establish.
However, the main cry which continues to come from victim survivors is to
prevent others having similar experiences to their own, and this I have always
suspected is an impossible to achieve objective given the nature of human DNA.
Also
overshadowing my weekend experience was the grim international news item from
global experts that without a renewed sense of direction and governmental
action the likely planetary warming of 3% spells the end of human and other
life as it is presently known on the planet within the present century, and
therefore within the potential life time of my children, and their children.
The
disaster ahead was reinforced by the latest investigation Stacey Dooley whose
work has been upgraded from BBC TV Channel to Channel One, perhaps because she
is also appearing on BBC Strictly Come Dancing.
Ms Dooley alongside Simon Reeve are unique because they have street
credibility, expose their themselves to great danger and also expose the
reality of themselves. On Tuesday after returning home I had a front seat as
Simon Reeve spoke for two- and three-quarter hours to a three-level packed audience
in the main auditorium of the Sage complex on the south bank of the River Tyne,
Gateshead. The subject of Stacey’s programme was the impact of the development
of consumer fashion where lead retailers are bringing out a new collection every month using low production enterprises in low economy countries
exploited workers and perhaps more
significantly helping to destroy the planet by posing the second greatest
threat to that from oil, The programme feature the destruction of an inland sea
from the growth of cotton and the use of water in its manufacture, and the
pollution of a great river from the poisonous waste which threatened the lives
and health of millions.
I also
highlighted the out in the cold at
the commencement of writing mentioned those out in the cold this Winter as
reference to one of Richard Burton’s great roles as a Le Carré’s Spy and who decides
not to come in from the complex cold war interaction between British and Soviet
intelligence at the height of the Berlin Wall division of Germany. I did so because of an article tucked away on
the inside page of the Times Newspaper, provided free in the first-class lounge
of Newcastle Station after several pages on the latest public disclosure about
the two men who set out to execute a Russian traitor, endangering the life of
his daughter and then ending the life of a British woman unintentionally.
There
is no doubt that Russia under Putin is turning up the rachet of traditional and
the latest intelligence gathering and disruptive actions ever since the traitor
Edward Snowden went there having handed to third parties a vast quantity of
state secrets in data form. It is right that the British Government takes
appropriate action to defend the state and its people, and I have previously
declared that I sleep well at night knowing successive governments have, and
are doing, what is necessary. While I agree with those geopolitical and
military experts that the renewal of Trident was wasteful unnecessary, I have
also sided with those who explain that Britain must keep to the forefront of
research on nuclear, chemical and biological warfare developments, to find ways
to defend itself and this today also includes digital warfare
The
surprise of the Times article was what appears to be an uncontested admission
before the statutory inquiry on Undercover Policing set up Teresa May at the
same time she converted the non-statutory child abuse inquiry for England and
Wales, that ever since the Thatcher government British homeland as well as
external security and intelligence has felt able to break the law in the
National Interest. The article also
appeared to confirm my understanding that each new Prime Minister gets a
briefing of things which their predecessors did which they may wish to consider
appropriate to change. The articled claimed that David Cameron decided to
require a Judge to sanction new illegal activity which our homeland services
previously self-determined, but not to make the development public, although
obviously Home Secretary Teresa May would have also known. Mrs May is said to have changed this aspect
on taking office in 2015, hence the raising of the practice by interested
parties.
On the
train journey South, I also drafted a response to the final newsletter on the
latest meeting of the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party by Ann
Black, the constituency secretary of Oxford City which she has made available
to individual members as well as to constituency parties. She was not
successful in the recent ballot despite the increase in the number of members
representing individuals to reflect the increasing membership which is greater
than all the other political parties in Britain together, also the largest
political Party membership in Europe, where everywhere else in Europe on the
Left is on retreat against the rise of fascism. The reason why Ann was
unsuccessful was because of the emergence of an alleged pro Corbyn slate, I say
alleged because it is likely that some are more aligned to their own political
outlook than the principled politics of Mr Corbyn which is hated by many on the
far left as strongly by those in the blue centre and blue right.
I can
say this from some of the chats I have had with those attending the annual
Durham Miners gala rather than direct contact or knowledge of those who have
been successful, so apologies if I am wrong about them individually and
collectively.
I hope
one of them will follow Ann and provide a balanced and appropriate account of
the main issues discussed at future NEC meetings for the likes of people like
me who because of age, health, disability, family and other commitments can no
longer be as active as we would wish. The balance between the power of the
individual members of constituencies and the constituencies collectively, and
on a regional and sub regional basis, the Parliamentary Party, the Trade
Unions, and affiliate organisations was the subject of rule changes given
greater scrutiny and voting at the Party conference.
From
the comfort of the sitting room screen I noted that conference participation by
a more diverse, and a much bigger range of speakers were able to have their say
in the umbrella subject debates alongside contributions from shadow cabinet
members who all appeared speaking from one overall Party text. Surprisingly,
the loudest cheers for someone other than Mr Corbyn was given to Labour’s
Brexit secretary Keir Starmer, and who had
led a meeting of 100 Brexit interests within the Party until midnight
one evening to achieve an approach around which almost everyone within the
Party could unite and which offers rather than throws a gauntlet to Mrs May but
which she is unlikely to accept.
The
exciting and moving aspect of this year’s conference is that some 250
individuals or more were able to speak, the overwhelming majority attending
conference for the first time, and weighted balance of young people, gender,
ethnicity, sexuality and psychological balance. However, the danger is that the
enthusiasm will be lost when the reality of the machinations by Mrs May to
achieve a Brexit which will enable her to stay in power unfold and where the
first move is to announce that austerity will end with the next budget. Her
attempt to attract the youth vote and the vast army of betrayed public sector
workers and public service users was the subject of Jeremy Corbyn’s first PMQs
after the conference recess and the way the parliamentary Conservative Party is
organising these events confirms my concern that she will achieve sufficient of
settlement with Europe which will enable a majority Parliamentary vote, sustain
her in office to avoid a general election by which time will also hope to achieve the unlikely situation if leading her
party into the next General Election after a full term parliament and in the
hope that she will not have to battle a
Corbyn led Labour party. I hope I am quickly proved a pessimist.
My
first experience of the LNER new regime which has replaced Virgin on the
Eastcoast line was not a good one as the coffee machine was out of order (yet
again) and we had to make coffee with instant and luke warm water. However,
staff, still wearing part Virgin clothing more than made up for the start with
exceptional general food and drinks service throughout the journey to Kings
Cross.
It is
extraordinary that in Croydon and observed on trains in and out of central London
the pace of putting up new tower blocks of offices and apartments appears to be
growing. In Croydon there are several tall cranes at work and existing office
blocks being modernised for contemporary and future use, while there are also
several large units empty and decaying. I was disappointed to find that the
developments around Tottenham Court Road station arising from the Elizabeth
line are still to get off the ground, literally as there are still large areas
to be developed. There was a similar situation by St James Park station and the
site of former offices of the Metropolitan Police.
My
Sunday walk between watching the latest Johnny English film and A Simple Favour
took me from Tottenham Court Station through Soho Square into Dean Street where
I discovered that my belief that Ann Haldane has been murdered a short distance from the former home of Karl
Marx was wrong as the blue plaque is for Sir Joseph Rogers across Dean Street
from the former Royalty Theatre and with The Crown and two Chairman on the other side of Bateman
Street. Karl Marx lived just a few doors away though!
My
Saturday was a washout after a good early morning traditional English breakfast
and two cups of white coffee at the George (Wetherspoons) before the scheduled
light rain commenced. I had planned to watch an afternoon showing of A Simple
Favour at the Vue cinema in the Valley Park Shopping and Leisure centre taking
the Metro to Therpia Way one stop before where Ann Haldane had lived for with
her parents just off Beddington Lane. Looking out around midday I saw the sky
overcast and light rain falling so I decided to make an early start with the
plan to visit the shopping centre across from the Jury Inn at the other end of
Landsdown Road where the Premier Inn is situated and eat a sandwich meal deal from Boots or
Sainsburys and where the plan was then an Bella Italia meal after the film,
using my Cineworld 25% discount. Despite the good breakfast I changed my mind
and decided on a lunch time cooked meal after a good look around the shopping
centre only to discoverer torrential rain falling when I went to exit.
I returned for a good look the new Alders
development of a Village low cost outlet containing most features of a departmental
store in terms of the good available on both side of the arcade between the
High Street and the George Street Tram stop. When the outlet village
development opened by the same people as Bicester Outlet village in Oxfordshire
with a five-year deal in 2013 the hopes were to employ over 500 full and part time
staff, about half the number which used to be employed by Alders in its heyday.
On Saturday the huge shopping area appeared to employ less than a score and
there were few customers for the impressive huge stocks and where the owners
hope for several million customers a year. I waited under cover for the first
two scheduled trams, but the rain was so hard and tram so crowded that I
retreated making my way back into the Whitgift then to the under pass to get
back across the road, and even with my hooded coat and umbrella I was drenched
through on reaching the hotel and room
Around
4pm I was hungry and as it looked as the rain has eased, I made my way back into the Whitgift centre and back
through the arcade into George Street for a beef burger, chips and a pint of
Fosters at the George which I enjoyed for £5.99 and then back to the room to listen to Newcastle at
Manchester United where amazing they were two goals up in 10 minutes but went
onto lose in extra time 3.2. The Man U manager probably survives a little
longer, but the likelihood of Newcastle’s manager finding a way to leave the
sinking ship may have intensified.
Sunderland went back to third with an away win
By the
time the game between Newcastle and M U was over it was time for Strictly Come
Dancing, Simon Reeve Mediterranean tour, the X Factor and to catch the end of
the six-episode Mystery Road.
In
Strictly Ms Dooley redeemed her poor showing last weekend but the main revelation
and turn around was that of Graham Swann. There were some exceptional
performances with the participants gaining nines, one a quartet of them. The X
factor continued in the awful phase of the six-chair challenge where the first
six of ten contestant get a chair and then four are evicted to make way for the
last four. It is all orchestrated a televised abuse of participants at its
worst although in general I agreed with the decisions being made. On Sunday
five of six female singers went on a shopping trip and to the Malibu home of
Simon Cowell where they were confronted not by one or two assistant judges but
a room full of big names song writers and record making people plus Leona Lewis
and other successful performers and former contestants. The sixth had been
denied a visa from the USA government and in the end, Simon decided to take
four five who performed and all of whom are good.
I
watched the delayed by an hour show to see the first of a four-part latest
Simon Reeve perspective on the Mediterranean commencing with an exposure that
Malta has become a corrupt murdering tax haven for criminals, and one presumes
supported by the Catholic church as it once did prop up Franco and fascism for
decades. He then moved on to drug smuggling as a way of life in Calabria before
going on a sixty-mile trip to Albania where the blood feud still dominates
although the new regime was said to doing its best to bring about change. As
Simon revealed in his brilliant 3-hour show on Tuesday he joined gangs, drank
too much and got into trouble as a teenager leaving school with no examination
passes and finding getting work difficult. He then got lucky taking a job in
the post room of a national newspaper and then even luckier getting an
assignment because no journalists were present on a Monday as usual. He used
his initiative and although continuing in the post room he became sufficiently
useful to become a reporter, leaving to write a book which when published
failed to sell, until 9/11 as his book was about the prospect for Terrorism and
Al Qaeda. This led to researching and
writing more books until the first researched in advance travel and adventure
programme was launched on the BBC and to date he has been to 120/130 of the 200
official countries in the world as well as visiting several who have not been
recognised.
I also
managed to catch the end of the six-episode Australian Mystery Road which
retraced familiar ground on the feudal nature of the outback small town.
Sunday
proved a good day although it began badly with no fast trains scheduled to
Victoria and a four coach stopping train
crammed tight so I took an empty stopping train to London Bridge instead and on the jubilee to Green Park and from there to a cold but dry
and sunny Leicester Square where the first surprise was to find the Odeon
cinema having a major make over. The Moon Under Water Wetherspoons was still
open and although costing £1.50more than Croydon I enjoyed another traditional
English breakfast for under £5 and three cups of good coffee for £1.55. in 1948
I made by first visit to the Square after watching Stanley Mathews play for
Blackpool against the Arsenal, although standing with uncle George behind one
of the goals I could only see the far side of the game. We had fish and chips
in the Lyons Corner House and then watched a film at the Odeon on what was the
first memorable good days of my life.
After
breakfast there was time for a walkabout and to find fake snow was being
propelled from above the entrance of the Cineworld to mark the opening of a new
Disney film. I also went to see the progress being made to turn the Trocadero
complex into an hotel noting the number of rough sleepers using the undercover
throughway at the side to the cinema which used to be a Cineworld. The Cineworld now occupies the site of the
Empire where the façade has been retained but little else. It was evident this
was a good day to be about London streets as the summer crush of holidaying
visitors had ended and the Christmas shopping and entertainment rush is yet to
commence.
I
exchanged a Lloyds bank voucher for adult ticket worth £10 I would have paid as
a senior for the latest Rowan Atkinson Masterclass in facial expressionism. As
he readily admits the series has silly
to stupid story lines but somehow this works although there were not as many clever or genuine
funny moments, but there was some response from the two sets of boys in the
theatre, the first nearby with their father, and then second at the front with their parents, the only
others watching the 11.05 starting film and where the performance include
nearly half an hour of starters.
This
meant I had 55 mins between shows to get to Tottenham Court Road and back and
then head for Boots Piccadilly for a £3 triple sandwich which I eat sitting on
the cold but now dried concrete seating which surrounds the green space of the
square opposite a crowded Mc D as the
area filled up with Londoners on a day
out and visitors from a far. I had also
passed a model or actress being photographed sitting on top of a post box aided
by a full camera crew.
The
number of open topped tourist buses is increasing with different route and big
prices. The second Odeon in the Square has also made way for an Hotel but
appears to move to the nearby once independent cinema a couple of minutes’ walks
away.
By
mistake the end row seat booked was against a wall at the far end of a row and with
the film attracting a fair audience I was able to exchange the voucher seat for
one of the remaining available on the aisle. I had heard good things about A
simple Favour which Dr Mark Kermode also liked but suggested at the end of the
film you ask, “what was that really about?” The film is a tour de force by Anna
Kenrick as a widowed young mum with a son who lost her husbands and half-brother
in a car accident which is part of the very dark to black revelatory tongue in
cheek and very funny story telling. This
is a very clever and very enjoyable film with Anna’ performance Oscar
nomination worthiness.
I then
made my way to Victoria to make use of 25% discount because of the Cineworld
subscription to the Café Rouge although the meal was no a success. The pâté
starter was good but small as was the portion of chicken with mash dish, and I
did not enjoy the beer which proved a bad choice alongside the food, so I drunk
separately before a good cup of coffee. But just was well the 25% was off both the
food and the drink reducing the cost from £28 to £21. The chicken chasseur dish on the train back
was more enjoyable, and free with the first-class ticket. The catering staff were not as generous or
sustained in the provision of food and drink as on the outward journey when I
had acquired two sandwiches, a slice of cake, crisps, biscuits and a whisky
with ginger for the evening in addition to the food and drink during journey
and a copy of the Times which contained the TV viewing as well as the story on
homeland security’s extracurricular activities.
On
returning on the Sunday I caught the last part of the new female Dr Who and had
to wait until Monday evening to understand the story of the first episode which
promises much. I pressed the record series button. The journey home on thee Monday was mixed
with having to stand from East Croydon to London Bridge, paying the £2 extra
for not waiting to use my travel card at 9.30 and then going to wrong platform
for the earlier train. The LNER lounge at Kings Cross has been change a little but
long gone are the days when pan au chocolat or croissant with butter and jam
was available. I settled for crisps, banana and a goon read of the Times. Time Out has also changed beyond recognition
and I decided against the China Daily. I worked out the right train home before
everyone else so found a single seat adjacent to a luggage rack which took my
case upright and next to the toilet. At Newcastle I was able to use a ramp down
to the platform and was able to reveal to a Newcastle born and lived 80-year-old
the existence of the lift and undertrack passage. I was home in time to get
organised for a Sainsbury delivery where using a voucher and nectar points I
paid only £30 for £50 of groceries.
The
opportunity is taken for an update on other recent film, sport and event
experiences. I did not make one visit to watch live football last season and
events St James Park have not encouraged but the opportunity of an aisle seat
for unde £20 at Sunderland proved a good
decision on a nice bright day and was rewarded with a four to one goal win and indication of some promise that the mixture of new talent
with some long serving an loyal
rejuvenated players could see a return to the Championship and progress from
the humiliation of half empty 50000 seat
stadium.
The
high culture experience was an open-air concert by the German born Opera Singer
Jonas Kaufmann in the huge Walbuhne amphitheatre seating over 20000 in a forest
outside of Berlin. He sung a large collection of Italian favourites including
familiar ballads in a language unfamiliar I suspect to many in the German audience
and where they and we in theatre did not have the benefit of sub titles, I made
my way and paid he additional £6 fee to the Cineworld in Newcastle still under
major redevelopment. I also made my way to Newcastle on successive evenings for
a theatre performance and then an evening to mark Our Finest House at City
Hall. In my last general review, I
mentioned finding a woman unconscious in the street on my way home from
Newcastle one evening and that an ambulance arrived within 5 minutes. During
the opening half hour of the play The Last Seam at Northern Stage at the end of
September a man collapsed, and it seemed ages before a paramedic ambulance
arrived and half an hour before we were allowed back into the theatre where the
cast recommenced with a short reprise before going through the rest of the play
without interval. The play features the mid-eighties miner’s strike in a
Doncaster area pit village and the impact on the lives of the miners and their
families after the subsequent pit closures throughout Yorkshire, Northumberland
and Durham. The play proved deeper and far more political than anticipated and
was appreciated by a good size audience in the second of the two main theatres
in a building I got to know well when it was the annual home of the Royal
Shakespeare company for a month. The restaurant
snackerie is where there are sometimes performances as the third stage and restaurant
and bar purpose built plus the box office on the side facing the square leading
to the impressive student union building. I usually time my arrival to find a
seat and did so before the performance during the interruption.
The
previous Sunday I had made an early Sunday afternoon visit to the Custom’s
House South Shields for Dennis Skinner the veteran miner and left-wing Member
of Parliament answer questions before a showing of 90 mins film about his
family from Clay Cross and subsequent political life The Nature of the Beast.
The film could have done with better editing but overall it provided a
brilliant portrait of this unique Parliamentarian who has devoted his life to
the welfare of constituents regardless of their background and political
allegiances. The opportunity was also taken to view the displays about local
pits at the South Shields Museum and Art Gallery.
I also
attended Our Finest Hour at City Hall where the BBC Big Band played a two-hour
show of music highlights from the early years of World War 11, interspersed
with a commentary from Kevin Whately well known nationally as Inspector Lewis
and some previously live recording by Winston Churchill. Annie Gill mezzo
soprano also entertained with standards such as a Nightingale Sang in Berkeley
Square, I’ll be seeing you, Nightingale in Berkeley square, Sally, Every Time
we say Goodbye and We’ll meet again. While the audience was more my age than
younger but there were a few children spotted and a few under thirties.
I
cannot remember if I have recorded visiting City Hall in June to see Eric
Burden for the second time in two years where the evidence was of an
extraordinary voice in decline but where is still to put on a 90-minute show
without a break. The theatrical highlight of past months was a new adaption of
the early episodes of When the Boat comes into a two-hour show, which opened at
Customs House in South Shields to a couple of weeks of packed houses. This has
led to buying for £30 a DVD set of all 51 episodes which first broadcast in the
1970’s and where the issues of striking and scabs in a mining community here in
the North east centred of Gallowshields, a hybrid for north and South Shields
in opposite backs of the river Tyne and where this year I failed to cross over
and back on the ferry.
I
enjoyed the final games of 20 20 cricket competition this year able to view
without the need of glasses but never planned to attend Finals day in
Birmingham after my traumatic experiences first at the Rose bowl Hampshire
where my car broke down in the way and I
could not find the hire car on returning to the park and ride having decided
not to watch the final but finding the bus did not set off until after the game
ended. Durham were never in the only semi-final
in which they played as Chanderpaul forgot he was in the limited over game. The
experience of going to Birmingham was just as traumatic which confirmed that
the majority attended were there to dress up in fancy dress and get drunk. I found
myself out of food hungry paid a lot of money for inedible rubbish and then
lost my way back to the accommodation a nightmare. Never again.
Alas Durham failed in the quarter final with a
home tie, but I enjoyed Worcester’s two wins from the comfort of a seat before
the telly. Ben Stokes, who I met as a boy, when brought by his father for a
Durham Summer school, survived the trial accused of affray but now he and Hales
face the charge of bringing the game in disrepute. I did manage to get to see
the penultimate innings of Paul Collingwood as a Durham player against
Middlesex. It will be interesting to see if he is in the running for the just
vacated England job or the offer said to have come from Scotland. Hopefully
next season will be better although I am not sure the wisdom of hiring one of the
banned Australian players involved in the ball tampering scandal.
The
great sporting event is undoubtedly the Ryder cup played on a golf course with
lots of water traps outside of Paris and where the European team trounced an
exceptionally good on paper USA team, but who clearly lacked the inspired team
work between players, caddies, coaches and their families which those watching
were able to witness in the European squad where both the newcomers and the
experienced contributed.
I have
also experienced some very good films in theatre. The most surprising film was Alpha about the discovery of a possible
relationship between humans and the dire wolf 20000 years back in history and
reminiscent of the relationship with those in the Game of Thrones forerunner of
the relationship with Man’s best friend. The film was experienced in one of the
refurbished theatres at Newcastle Cineworld with reclining leather seats with
tall backs and lighted lettering on the stairways. The language required
subtitles and the photography beautiful and likely to win prizes.
Black Klansman is a
serious film with comedic aspects, based on the true story of Rod Stallworth
the first black policeman in a southern state town of 1970’s Colorado Springs
where he poses by phone as a white supremacist phone and then using a white
colleague to penetrate the K K K at national and local level. The film ends
with an update on Trumps failure to condemn the rise of the KKK and racists and
fascists groups in the USA.
Another
unexpected experience was an afternoon special showing in Newcastle of Funny Cow and an exceptional
performance by Maxine Peake of the 2017 film on the childhood and making of
someone who becomes a legendry stand-up comic in working men’s clubs. The film
also has Alun Armstrong as the fading comic whose jokes many now know by heart.
In my
last round, up I highlighted seeing a film about Virtual Reality in the virtual
reality experience of 4DX at Newcastle’s Cineworld and this time Searching uses the format of Social
Media to help a father find out about his daughter and what happened to her
after she disappeared. The film is a good example of the appearance of anything
is only one aspect of its reality and contains several important truths about
relationships between parents and their children, the assumptions that we know
our families better than others and that those who sometimes appear good and
close friends, colleagues or helpers can prove to be our worst enemies.
A very
different kind of film was Crazy Rich
Asians which revealed an eye-opening insight into the very rich lifestyle
residents of Hong Kong, enjoyable but also a continuous underlying feeling that
this is all wrong. The current TV series Strangers
also provides a perspective on the corrupt aspect of the former British
state although its central character trying to achieve Justice for his murdered
bigamist wife appears on a mission to get himself murdered as well.
King of Thieves with
Sir Michael Caine, Jim Broadbent, Tom Courtenay. Michael Gambon and Ray
Winstone failed because the film attempted to evoke some sympathy for the aging
villains who successful robbed a vault in Hatton Gardens. The film also alleges
that the safes contained the products of the work of other villains and that a
significant proportion of the stolen items has not been recovered. It is
difficult to understand why this film was made and why the celebrity film stars
agreed to participate.
Because
if the priority to writing and conduct the required research there is less time
to watch films on TV and but where the Talking Pictures channel available on
Sky enables to recapture the films of childhood and youth and I sometimes view
several at a time when the situation allows.
An
important wartime propaganda documentary style film was The Lion has Wings has Ralph Richardson as a Wing Commander and
Merle Oberon as his wife. The film includes footage of Flora Robson in her role
as Queen Elizabeth the 1st. An earlier film which reveals all the
limitation of film making at that time is the 1934 version of the Old Curiosity Shop where a young girl
become the victim of murder and greed in one of Dickens poignant stories with
unhappy aspects,
A
disturbing film about life in the Australian outback small town Jasper Jones
which centres on racism and proved far more effective than the 6-episode TV
series Mystery Road.
A
mainstream movie I decided not to view when launched was the follow up to Jumanji sub headed (Welcome to Jungle) where high school pupils find themselves in the
midst of a computer game which they have to solve if they are to escape and
where they encounter someone else in the same predicament. This proved to be
traditional cinema with echoes more of Tarzan films than the latest computer-generated
epics and was therefore more enjoyable than anticipated.
The
most disappointing film was Talking Pictures showing of All night Long which as a dozen jazz musicians playing themselves
including Johnny Dankworth, David Brubeck, Tubby Hayes, Keith Christies and
Alan Ganley who I have seen play lives and Charlie Mingus who I have not. The
film centres on the ambitions of a drummer played Patrick McGoonhan to from his
own band fronted by a female jazz singer who has stopped performing at the
request of her jealous husband. The all-night party is held at their home and
among those present who Patrick hopes to persuade sign up his new band is a wealthy
jazz promoter played by Richard Attenbororgh. The story is unconvincing as is
the acting and specially written music has never been my kind of jazz.
I have
not had time to listen much radio apart from news and the Friday afternoon film
review with Mayo and Kermode. I caught up the ten episode the Corrupted based
on the books of G F Newman and which centre on corrupt people behind Thatcher
and includes issues of child abuse and false imprisonment. I enjoyed a ten-episode
performance of Jaws.
Just
in case I failed to mention previously More outstanding TV drama was the third
series of Unforgotten broad casting in six episodes in August with a fourth
series agreed. Nicola Walter is outstanding,
and she was supported by the brilliant Sanjeev Bhaskar.I
The
best recent television was the Bodyguard where a Home Secretary is assassinated
by state interests, and the Prime Minister is forced to resign. A rescued female
suicide terrorist turns out to be the bomb maker and brains of the cell. A
second series will find it difficult to match the intensity and credibility of
the first.
I am
also enjoying Press which has Ben Chaplin as the editor of the Post, a cross
between the Sun and the News of World, the only paper to make money but who
also admires the work of Herald whose Editor was nearly tempted to run the Royal
Opera House after the paper is forced not to print an edition.
The most
extraordinary engaging series available to view in sitting if wished is Killing
Eve with the most watchable female assassin ever played by Jodie Comer and
where Eve is an out of depth agent played by Sandra Oh and supported by a stellar
cast who enter in the black mayhem with enthusiasm and credibility. It was
quickly evident that this was too creative a series not to be continued but I
wish things had become a little clearer by the end of episode 8. Jodie has ended the lives of a dozen undesirable
men from mafia leaders to corrupt politicians, but another score is also dead
in her wake who deserve better and these includes nurses and female witnessed
as well as female Russian prison guards. Behind her paid for killings is the
secret group of 12 out to cause chaos and one assume save the world according
to their beliefs and sense of order.
I also
watched the ten episodes of Trust over a couple of days. The elongated story of
the abduction of the grandson son of John Paul Getty played by Donald
Sutherland. The series plays with truth as does the recent film which covered
the story convincingly in one two-hour film. In the series a ransom of 5 million
is used to establish a port on the Calabria coast by the local mafia who feel they
are the poor relations of the international families from Sicily and those Rome
based. Interestingly Simon Reeve looked at the growing important of the
Calabrian point and family dominated villages in his latest series travelling
around the Mediterranean. He also mentions the hypocrisy of Spain’s hold on Ceuta
while claiming rights to Gibraltar.
I am
not sure if I have mentioned the TV series Deep State with Mark Strong which I assume
accounts for recent political reference, A second series had been commissioned but
without Mark Strong.
Talking
pictures shown Nightingale Sang in Berkeley is a very different film to what
one could expect from the title. The
Devils Double has gratuitous violence as sex and is not recommended although of
interest as based on a son of the former leader of Iraq subsequently executed
like his father.
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