2242 Russia House part two First do no harm

The second part of The Russia House contains passages which resonate with me strongly, more than in any novel for sometime and which also aroused several memories. My reading has been slow as a consequence, slower than my plan for the week justifies, so I have struggled to complete the reading and writing of the second part when had hoped to finish before weekend.

I do not know if Le Carré visited Russia during the Gorbachev years but the image be portrays of Russian life appears authentic, especially that of Katya. She is woman who brought the manuscript of Goethe to the Audio Fair but otherwise she remained a mystery and even in the film while she becomes the lover of Barley and continues to be an important link with the author of the manuscript, she remains secondary to these two characters although all three are in the story foreground with the machinations of the secret services of the UK, the CIA and Russia secondary.

It was when I read of Katya in the book I began to see her more than Goethe as representing mother Russia at the crossroads of a new era. Knowing the ending in the film, I suddenly realised that perhaps like Renko’s woman in Gorky Park, she could return to Russia once the transition was completed. But the difference between the two women is otherwise significant.

Katya is a woman of ideals and passions but she is also rational and practical. We learn a lot about her in what I regard as the second part of the book commencing with chapter 6 page 143 when Barley arrives in Moscow and makes contact with her.

Katya juggles three lives, those as a mother of twins, sharing her small home space with her uncle, there is her work and then the independent woman of passions and spirit but how and why she came to risk her life because of Barley and Goethe is not immediately clear,
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She wants, as Le Carré says, to keep the paper thin walls between the parts of her life separate and understandably she has reservations about Barley because he threatens the immediate life and well being of her family, and her anxiety is reinforced when he arrives, wants to meet her socially and begins to question not only about Goethe but about herself when she is just the Go Between and cannot wait for him to go. Unlike Renko’s girl she is not driven by the desire to leave Russia, but to change it and to survive.

However we also learn a great deal about her present and past life and although she does not know it, she is open to someone like Barley, or anyone who can fast track a different life to the one she leads and also for her children, although she is also not a woman who lives for her children.

She explains the several levels of deals required to obtain material to make two cowboy style shirt as presents for the birthday of the twins. She has gained two tickets for a concert from the editor at the publishing firm where she works who believed he had made a drunken pass at her which she had resented but in reality it had been nothing, but she did not tell him that because of what she could do with the tickets. Then she traded the tickets for 24 bars of foreign soap in their colour wrapping paper and these in turn she was to trade for the cloth with the manager of the clothing shop who she believed had hoped for a different kind of transaction with her. She was to make up the shirts on the new East German sewing machine which she had traded for the ancient but sought after family Singer.

We learn that apartments, she has one on the site of former Aeroport, are allocated with precise spacing according to her family size, work, political and social position and where the partition walls between flats are such that you are affected by the lives of others as how you behave also affects them..... an alarm clock, a dog wanting walkies, a child’s incessant cry, extra loud music at a party and so on.

On the whole it was space, or the lack of it which also affected me, the sharing of a bed with three adult women throughout most of my childhood until starting secondary school. We had the top floor flat in the requisitioned house as well as sharing the garden and the walls of the 1950’s first council built three story twin blocks of flats we were allocated because the owners wanted their home back was not just strongly built but were built to look private and still do.

It was my noise playing the clarinet in airing cupboard which was the nuisance or playing my records as loud as possible using a footstall as a drum to beat out the rhythm of Sing Sing Sing from the Benny Goodman twin albums I purchased soon after going to work at the age of 16.

It was only later through my work that the nature of living in Council flats and housing estates was brought home. The aunties had been so proud of the three bed and then their two bed plain four walls and low ceiling flats where I would stay hearing the shoutings of the wild young single parent next door to my bedroom and to the noise of the family above. I learned how accommodation and location reflected how others saw themselves and affected how you saw yourself, and helped define what you wanted.

Katya had only a single bed in a room where there was only space for a wardrobe. The twins had to sleep in the same bed and her uncle in a made up bed in the lounge. I know that feeling only too well and even now living among by my ten roomed three storey terrace with walk in loft I could do with more space! If I will the euro lottery I will build the space to curate my work, to live and to entertain, with space for professional contemporary creative to work and go live and perhaps if the cash is sufficient, our own restaurant bar, jazz club but there would have to be sufficient to ensure its continuation after my death as well as for the family

We also learned in those opening pages that Katya had more than one lover, first a temperamental musician who kept bees illegally on the roof thus enabling her to give a jar of honey to a neighbour who recently lost her mother and whose father had been admitted hospital with a brain tumour.

We do not know as yet, what had happened to Katya’s parents or how her uncle came to live with her although they get all well and helps with looking after the children.

Later under pressure from Barley we also learn that she was married to someone she knew from childhood in Leningrad where she had been to university and developed a flair for languages and which enabled her to speak Jane Austin English better than most English folk. She had come to Moscow with her husband after their marriage where he managed a timber firm making prefabricated houses. He was a practical man who knew how to catch fish through ice, sleep in the snow and skin a rabbit from his early childhood in Siberia. She had been attracted to such a man rather than someone of the mind. I remember from my early professional life that some of my female colleagues were also attracted in this way, to a farmer perhaps someone earthy without complexes, a military man or a surgeon.

Another aspects of life in the city then and I suspect now is that everyone was trying to make additional money if they had connections. We would call the black market or street economy. The taxi that she takes and drives quickly in torrential rain despite the young driver forgetting to attach the windscreen wipes because if you leave them on they are taken, asks if she interested in fresh fruit, coffee, vodka, offered no doubt in the expectation she had only her body to trade. Earlier she mentions having a connection with access to the farms allowed to sell some of the produce, and could supply fresh chickens and we well as fresh eggs. One can understand how quickly such a people would take to capitalism at different levels, and those with the best connections would become the oligarchs while others the establish businesses of the mafia gangster.

I was also struck by the greater link between Russian and British men than say British men with the western Continental Europe. The continental Europeans like the wine and enjoy a glass or two with meals on at the pavement cafe but as people they do not go in for the binge drinking of English and the Russians where both nations have not just a high number of alcoholics but a growing number of alcoholics who become social and family problems. In the UK while the incidence of diseases has reduced especially from smoking lung cancer that from alcohol has jumped several fold.

I can understand how Barley liked the Russians but not why over the past decade so many Russian woman would like to become British wives to get away from the drinking of Russian men!

After the meeting with Barley we learn the steps she takes to receive a phone call from Goethe and it is during this passage that Le Carré communicates the fear and suspicion and the risks she and Goethe are taking. It is also evident that they have been lovers but when, for how long and if still, she only later is to answer.

Back in his hotel room with its noising plumbing systems and convulsing ice box Barley had a different perspective fearing that he disappointed as a morally bankrupt man without convictions and that he had not shown immediate interest in her as a woman despite her beauty and intellect. She appeared to have run away from him which made her more interested to him.

He has a fantasy or two about her and is disappointed when his “editor” arrives and they have a conversation in which the assistant attempts to impart knowledge which Barley finds it difficult to comprehend tired and drunk until she rings and arranges to see him the following day and his assistant speculates whether she had written the manuscripts or was in contact with their author. It occurs that we in the west in the midst of the digital era, the phone and computer hacking, we should learn to expect surveillance as they did then in Russia and probably still do. The theme of my work as I frequently explain is that what we do and say can be viewed and heard by anyone. anywhere, anytime with the technology. But we are also in the era of the exhibitionist and the voyeur as I learned when visiting an independently run camera and video surveillance unit.

Meanwhile in the Russia House the events are monitored and distributed to those on the Bluebird circulation list which bemused and worried the Brits because Langley’s list included the Pentagon Scientific Liaison Board and the White House Academic Advisory team.

There were elaborate precautions taken over the next meeting between Barley and Katya after calling for at her home. He had taken her to a safe house which Barley pretended was the flat an artist friend who was away although the kind of artist had not been explained which made questions by Katya difficult. She resisted all his questions about Goethe or whoever had provided the manuscripts. He asked if she knew their content which she summarised as “my country’s involvement in anti human weapons of mass destruction over many years. It paints a portrait of corruption and incompetence in all fields of the defence industrial complex. Also of criminal mismanagement and ethical shortcomings. These he felt were as much her feelings as those explained to her by the author

Barley was able to establish that her contact was a scientist who believed there was little time left and therefore need for openness and honesty was great. She was unable to say how he knew so much as the information covered so many areas of interest, If we see one goal clearly we may advance one step. If we see all goals at once, we shall not advance at all.

I have been mulling over this point for sometime. I need to have an overview of my work, my life, my year, my day, the world, but if I spend too much time contemplating the enormity of the challenge I do little, whereas if I set tasks for the day, the week, the year and proceed to their accomplishment I make progress and am more content with what I do.

The Author is reported as saying there are times when actions must come first and we must consider consequence only when they occur. I agree. Too much consideration of potential outcomes may well freeze action and let others dictate events and their outcomes. However if there is opportunity it is wise to consider outcomes and therefore avoid blind alleys, pitfalls and bobby traps.

“We regard the destruction of Russia as preferable to the destruction of all mankind,” was quite a statement for anyone to make and I am not sure if anyone would believe this in reality.

We are tribal by nature and inheritance and the idea of sacrificing ourselves and all we know for the sake of others we do not know it a concept impossible for me to accept.

She went on; he says “the greatest burden is the past. We cannot execute the past. He says if we cannot execute our past, how shall we construct our future? We shall not build a new world until we have got rid of the mentalities of the old. In order to express truth we must also be the apostles of negation. He quotes Turgenev, A nihilist is a person who does not take anything for granted however much that principle is revered.”

I have read Turgenev from my 30 book series of Russian writers. I have Fathers and Sons in one volume, The Hunting Sketches and perhaps his most well known the Virgin Soil.

I have also written many times about the advertisement I placed in the New Statement about being a nihilist waiting for the bomb to drop and which led to two kinds of replies with a well known journalist for the London evening Standards suspecting that I was advertising wine and seeking a complimentary case to a beautiful young woman with who I became her lover, to a female journalist who took my play to read and never gave it back and to another young woman art student who came for a weekend to Ruskin bringing her friend who proved to be the most beautiful young woman I have ever met who came for a weekend with me to stay with a college friend at Liverpool and also to Birmingham, although we did not become lovers because of our chosen paths.

Katya said “I am not a nihilist. I am a humanist. It is given to us to play our part for the future, we must play it.” Yes I understand this but we must play the part well to the best of physical, psychological intellectual, spiritual abilities.

Barley pressed to now how long Goethe had talk like this. ““He had always been idealistic. That is his nature. He has always been extremely critical in a constructive way,” she explained. That also strikes a strong chord with me because although at times I have disturbed others it is because I have recognised better and best, hated my mediocrity in comparison, but always looked for ways to improve. Some will argue that I became addicted to experience, and yet the long hours spent alone in contemplation counter this, although I am a personality mixture of conviction, determination and completing finishing which can become an addiction.

Katya reveals that the authority has believed for a time that the possession of annihilation was so terrible they would have the effect of abolishing war. I have never thought that and if anything the weapons have had no impact on whether nations possessing such weapons wage war or not. The author has changed more in line with the USA thing that the greater the possession of weapons held the greater the capacity for peace.

She went to say that he become inspired by Perestroika and the prospect for world peace but he is not a Utopian and not passive. “He knows nothing will come of its own accord.”

This I have long understand that it does not matter what is ones talent, one potential you have to push yourself out into the world and hope to make early contact with someone, those who can help bridge the gulf from where you are to where you want to be.

He knows that our people are deluded and lack collective power (thus it is ever so). He goes onto say that the New Revolution must be imposed from above. By intellectuals, By artists By Administrators, By Scientists.” My response is hmm. The evidence from studies and my own experience is that planned change never works out as designed or hoped for unless you begin with clean slate and recruit to the organisation only those who understand what is required and are in agreement with it, otherwise it quickly becomes perverted to the prejudices and inclinations of those on whom the change is imposed. You cannot stand guard 24/7 on all those involved or employ others to do so. This is the fallacy of legislative government. Too many British politicians have thought all they had to do is pass a law, provide the funds and Hey Presto the law is put into effective practice. But I agree with the need for the leadership of the educated and creative but only if you can reach agreement. My mind immediately goes back to the first meetings of the Committee 100 when the majority of the Committee assembled and quickly was reduced to a steering working group of around 30 to 40 but even then power was taken by a couple of individuals and one in particular. The same with the Direct Action Committee.

What is worst is the uprising of the proletariat usually led by a fanatic or two and where the force of the proletariat is used to exterminate any opposition or anyone likely to oppose but who in turn also become as exploited themselves as before with the best literary example is George Orwell’s Animal Farm saying it all.

Barley is then able draw from her new information about Goethe as well as to be quoted his own words back from their meeting. “If there is to be hope we must all betray our countries”.

She explained that she had been sixteen and he 30 when they first met. She was studying French and German in her last year at school and was the star pupil. She had read Erich Fromm. I am impressed by this concept as someone who read Erich also at a young age: The Sane Society and the Art of Loving in particular.
She had also read Ortega and Kafka and seen Dr Strangelove in the era of 1968. She saw herself as a peace dreamer and a revolutionary. Her father was the Professor of Humanities at the University. Having taken down the wall around her she now talked and talked and this affected in a way he had not anticipated.

She had wanted to be with French students when they had rioted. They were proud of the American students who protested against the Vietnam War and they were regarded her comrades. Barley thought, I will never leave you.

He mother had died of TB and was already ill when she was born.

She had been taken by her father to see “A bout de Souffe” at a film club and it there he and introduced her to Goethe, real name Yakov. Her father said the man was his genius of physics and she had found him beautiful. She had fallen in love with him and after the show he had joined her with friends drinking coffee and then she had invited herself back to his apartment and they had become lovers, telling Barley the delicacy of their intimacy.

Her father had stayed up waiting and she talked to him as a stranger unable to sleep that night only to learn the following morning that Russian Tanks had gone into Prague. Yakov had got drunk and appeared to Katya to have thrown in the towel. She was ashamed and disappointed. She said she had addressed him like a Stendhal heroine saying he had taken an immoral decision and that she would never speak to him again. She had reminded him of EM Forester who they both admired( A Passage to India, A Room with a View, Howard’s End and Where Angels Fear to Tread are the most well known of his seven novels because of the films)

She had married Volodya but she had continued a relationship with Yakov, meeting in secret, occasionally, and with love changing to sex. She had ceased contact when pregnant with the twins but it was Barley and the effect on Yakov as Goethe which had brought the two together and now three people were connected in the circle. For some reason Barley asked if Yakov had children which someone stopped Katya in her flow. She revealed that he was against having children because parents make victims of their children and he did not want to add to the number of victims. Who said to someone bent on changing society? First do no wrong? A guiding rule for every social worker as well as politician.

The inquisition was coming to an end as he asked about how they kept in contact and if he was afraid of his situation. Barley had with him a series of prepared questions which he fired at her in quick succession and which should have alerted her that these were not the questions one would expect from a publisher. Her answers were all no. It was only then that she suggested he put the questions directly ad Yakov wished to meet Barley in Leningrad on the coming Friday.

He proposed three places at three times and you must keep to each. He will keep one and he asked me to say that he loves you. They then had a meal drained as two exhausted lovers.

2041 Montalbano, Avatar and how to Train your dragon

The past week has seen one previously experienced 3D film experienced on 3D TV and one 3D film which was viewed last year as 2D now also seen as 3D on TV. There was one new film State of Grace in the sense that I have a vague memory of having seen before and which because of its subject I will review together with the first three episodes of season 5 Sopranos. I will however begin with a new 10 part Italian Detective Drama Inspector Montalbano which although set in Sicily there has only been a momentary reference of the Mafia and which I rate alongside the Swedish Wallander, the French Maigret and the Dutch Van der Valk, Hercule Poirot from Belgium and Bergerac from the Channel Island Jersey,

Montalbano is also an individualist like the others who demands of his subordinates but protects and furthers their situations. As with all similar characters his private life has its ups and downs and is affected but his work as well as his inclination to be a law unto himself,

He has a long term relationship with a woman who lives on the mainland and which he and his colleagues refer as Italy, regarding Sicily as separate, and the couple visit each other by plane when they can and which appears not often given they both have demanding occupations. They both find the situation has disadvantages as well as advantages with his work affecting their relationship when she makes a special visit and then she questions if she is more than a sex object. A child encountered in the first episode has a significant affect on their relationship and the bond that been established over the greater part of a decade.

In the first episode a man is shot on a ship while at sea I cannot remember just within or outside Italian waters with one ship involved Italian but the man a citizen of a North African country. Montalbano is happy for the case to pass to others while he concentrates on the murder of businessman. I sensed the wife was guilty at the outset although she blames the man’s alleged mistress. The wife has an alibi that she left for a visit early that day and returned on hearing the news on In fact Montalbano proves that although the wife said she left early to visit she had never arrived and he then establishes that she got off the bus and got on another returning home, killed the husband and then left. This emerges later in the episode

Understandably Montalbano first thought is to find the mistress and visits the enclave of fellow countrymen and only later would have noted that she was of the same nationality as the man murdered at sea and of the country where was a dispute over responsibility. Visiting the enclave he makes contact with an old woman friend of the alleged mistress who has a son and both are said to have gone to stay with a friend of the old woman.

However the young woman and her son do not arrive at the friend and her home is found ransacked. The old woman shows where the alleged mistress had hidden her bank book which contained over 100 million lire which puts the series before 1999 when the euro came in and when such an amount was worth £50000, still a lot of money but not fortune. Although for someone with the background and living conditions of the young woman it was.

I say alleged mistress because her relationship with the business man is never clarified to my satisfaction

Montalbano also come across some people complaining about a young boy stealing snacks crisps and chocolate from children in a one neighbourhood on his way to and from seeing the old woman. This is also to have significance.

After placing information on the media a man comes forward to say he had seen the woman in a car at a bus stop arguing with a man. He had considered approaching but had refrained although he made a note of the vehicle registration number. Apparently in Italy at that time it was difficult getting an immediate trace even for the police. Here any police officer can get an immediate trace through their onboard vehicle computer. In Italy it could take days if not weeks so Montalbano has to pull strings to get a response which he then finds the information is blocked because of national security reasons.

His female friend is spending a few days with him. And it is something which she says which makes him realise there is a connection between the woman is seen in the car but without the boy, and the boy stealing the food. His female friend accompanies and it she who is able to befriend the boy when he is found. They care for the boy and the child brings out the maternal feelings in the woman who is getting no younger and where she has reconciled with difficulty that for various reasons Montalbano is not going to marry her. However his position changes when he too befriends the boy who reciprocates the affection. It is the boy who explains that when his mother saw the man in the car driving up she told the boy to run into the adjacent field and hide. Then the boy recognises the mystery man who was killed on the boat. It is her mother’s brother!

Montalbano is able to work out from other inquires that the brother was a drug smuggler and that the businessman was a front operation for the smuggling. This is why the office was more of a flat with a bed than an office. This suggest that the young woman was his mistress but not conclusively because the money appears to have originated from the drug dealing, although again there are issues which also makes this unclear,

When she had seen the news of the death of her brother she had gone immediately to see the businessman at his home. I am not sure of the sequence of events but I think that she made two visits. The wife who knew about a relationship between the young woman and her husband, but not his involvement in the drug smuggling had been incensed to find the woman was in her home although it may have been coincidental and she had planned to kill him that very morning and blame the mistress. What is certain is that the young woman had been in that flat in the morning as her scent and found the body and panicked and feared for her life thinking it was the same killer who had killed her brother.

She had not taken the bank book with her in case she was caught and the money taken from her. It as all that she could give to her son with Montalbano fearing she was now dead. In order to smoke the villain out, now that he had been refused the known information about him from the car registration he put out a media story that the boy was missing having arranged for the boy to placed with the relatives of a policeman in the country. He tells his female friend to leave and the old woman to go and stay with her friends. Unfortunately before he can communicate this to old woman she leaves to check that the boy has not returned home. She is murdered but has not given up the location of the bank book. Montalbano takes the book to the Public Notary for its safekeeping in order that it should become part of his mother’s estate. Unfortunately this cannot happen until a body is found.

Montalbano uses further deceptions to bring the security forces to his door and he arranged for a camera to be place secretly. As anticipated a senior official arrives who admit their complicity in the affair aiding another government but unaware the intention was to eliminate witnesses. The assassin had already returned to the home country. Montalbano then uses the video tape to blackmail the official to finding the body. He breaks the man’s glasses so that he cannot be immediately followed and stopped before taking the tape into the safe keeping at his office. Fortunately the threat of public exposure works and an unrecognisable body is found washed up on the shore but here are personal effects which identify the woman as the boy’s mother. It is presumed that this is not the real body but a fix to ensure that the boy inherits his mother’s estate. I say fortunately because when he checks the tape he founds that he did not start the camera!

His woman friend reveals her frustration at not being married and not having children is affected by the boy who has reciprocated their affection and says he wants to be with them. The programme ends with impression that the couple are to marry and adopt the boy.

It is during the second episode yesterday evening that Montalbano goes to visit the boy who appears to be afraid of him. The boy explains that he is very happy in his new home especially as he has ”brothers” Although torn in his feelings the boy wants to stay. When Montalbano tells his woman friend this she is very angry and thinks this is either him trying to get out of his commitment or that the foster family are trying to take the child away from her. As the episode ends she makes a secret visit to see the boy and had decided to leave without seeing Montalbano. What happened is the boy had been happy to see her and said he loved her but also said he wanted to stay and she realised this was true and that it was an important outcome. She is devastated but had been persuaded by the policeman’s brother of the family to see Montalbano and explain what had happened. She is too upset to stay and leaves. It is possible at that moment to believe that the relationship has or will end especially as the possibility of an exciting new relationship with a young woman emerges. What may be an answer is a feature of the second episode.

In the second episode Montalbano is a car passenger travelling at speed on their way to the funeral of a colleague when to avoid a chicken in the road they hit a parked car by a large gated property They discover that the property belongs to a wealthy family in Bologna which his wife is renovating, staying at a hotel in Sicily. The vehicle is registered to her so it is puzzling that she has not been in contact. The police receive an anonymous call that there has been a murder and they investigate and find that the woman naked and strangled. Montalbano covers her body with a bathroom which he had found laying on the bathroom floor. There is a jurisdiction problem because of the location of the property and the situation is supervised by someone, I believe a presiding judge, where Montalbano has no respect and the man dislikes him and takes him off the case and criticises he interfered with the crime scene by placing the bathrobe over the body. In this story there are several strands which take time to come together to resolve the position.

He believes the evidence points to a crime of passion, with the husband of the woman the first suspect for consideration. It emerges that the husband became impotent because of an operation and made the marriage of convenience in order to stop speculation. His wife had male friends to satisfy her passions which she was frank about to her husband and he loved her like a daughter.

The woman has a friend in Sicily, a school teacher of physics who is also beautiful and who tells Montalbano that she remains unmarried by choice because she has not met the right man. At first she is defensive about her friend but later she admits her knowledge of the situation and I believe it is she who provides the name and information about the latest man who Montalbano contacts by phone, and Art dealer in Bologna and says he as an alibi.

The main who is arranging the renovations is also a suspect and in particular his son who has learning difficulties and followed the woman as a puppy. The young man is shot dead by the local police when they go to arrest him living in a cave. They claim he had a bomb in his hand, a grenade. Montalbano is suspicious of this. The father and son were not registered gun owners and therefore they could not claim the man was armed. Montalbano insists on seeing the grenade which is of the Second World War and is aware that there is a museum of weapons at the police station. It begins to emerge that there is a connection between the anonymous call about the death, the killing of the boy and the mafia when Montalbano is sent a tape showing the head of flying squad plant the grenade to obtain clear finger prints. Montalbano visits and urges the police chief to act to prevent a scandal unfolding which affects everyone.

He has visited a woman to apologise for not being able to attend the funeral and she mentions that an internationally acclaimed violinist lives up stairs that no longer goes out but plays concerts for her. The episode has Violin in its title and Montalbano was surprised at the crime scene that an expensive looking violin case was opened when it was established that the woman did not play. The story emerges that the woman had passed by the accommodation one day and had heard violin playing and called and asked if the musician would given an opinion about a violin she had found at the property. It was an important instrument which he had arranged to repair and then to play. He had given the woman with her knowledge a good violin but not one of significant value. This suggests she was suspicions of her lover’s interest in the instrument.

The violinist explains that he has petite mal which had become worse and fearing an attack during a concert he had given up performing, except for his neighbours.

Despite providing an alibi Montalbano is able to establish that the woman had gone to the airport to pick up the lover and he had murdered. The episode opens with the woman late at night calling at a garage on her way to collect him.

He had significant gambling debts to the mafia and learning that she had a valuable violin he had murdered the woman and replaced the violin with a factory made one. His actions had been witnessed by the young man with learning difficulties who had then been killed by the police. He had developed a bad foot which had swollen so he had removed a shoe which was had held when he emerged from the case as requested.

At the police station there is a uniformed officer who appears clumsy and who Montalbano and his colleagues find a nuisance as well as a joke. When they are asked to send someone on a course to learn about computers he appears the ideal candidate. When he returns he presents his certificate which indicates he was the best student on the course and which appears to have been run on the mainland for forces throughout Italy. They are surprised and impressed by the achievement and see their colleague in a new light.

During the episodes there is contact between Montalbano and the attractive teacher who leaves a message at one point to say she has information which could of assistance. They live close to each other in a coastal town and she calls one evening to see him with the information. He does not invite her to stay because he is busy working on papers related to the case but before she departs she indicates she is open to his calling on her at anytime for anything signalling that she has found her man. As the case ends and his relationship with his long term partner at a distance has reached crisis point because they both appreciate that the boy has found somewhere he wants to stay, Montalbano seriously considers taking up the offer of the young woman and drives to where the teacher lives. We here his thoughts that the case had been one full of mistakes. He drives away deciding that to call however inviting would have been another mistake. He contacts his long term partner to say that he would like to come and visit that weekend. She is pleased with the news and will pick him up at the airport.

I wrote the following a day or so after Friday January 22nd 2010 when I watched the film Avatar at the 12.40 Cineworld Bolden first showing where my seat voucher was accepted plus £1.80 for the 3D and 80p for the special glasses which I kept.

“The film has been long in the making with an initial script
Held back when the Director James Cameron of Titanic appreciate that the technology was not yet available to realise the project as conceived. The film having reputedly cost half a billion dollars to produce and already raised a one billion presently running second to Titanic. Two sequels are already planned with the usual spin offs of books, toys, including computer games DVD’s special Director’s editions and so on. Others will also seek ways to use the new technology and Sky has announced it is bringing 3D to TV.

Two years later almost to the day I celebrated the first months of my 3D TV with a showing of Avatar on the Sky channel, something I had been looking forward to since the purchase. I was anxious to see if my original reactions to the film remained constant. I have not been to see a film in 3D theatre since acquiring the TV set so am unable to judge if the assessment made by others that with active lens glasses the TV process is better, I hope to make the judgement over the next week.

“Lasting two and half hour you are projected into a different world, actually onto a different planet and a conventional story of anti US militarism, colonialism and international corporation capitalism versus environmentalism and nature. Only the bankers were absent although greedy shareholders were not.

The concept was brilliant. A government supported with the latest weaponry mining corporation was moving over a planet stealing essential minerals by force of arms and exterminating the natives if they proved unwilling to get out of the way, but like the USA did to native Americans, the Brits to Africa and Asia, Australians to the aborigines, the Spanish to middle and Latin America, the Romans to Europe and the Middle East, China is doing now. The Russians and Germans were more ideological wanting totalitarian domination as well as economic wealth, as were the Catholics and the Muslims. And as with all conquering and exploiting races you begin with offering colourful beads and education. The brilliant part was create a creature with the same physical characteristics as the natives, a blue skinned lithe humanoid with a mane and tail and of great agility in terms of climbing and crossing the narrowest of pathways suspended at fantastical heights, but controlled by a human being who experienced everything that happened while encased in a communications pod within the breathable confines of the space station. The atmosphere on the planet is such that without breathing apparatus you not survive within a few minutes.”

“Sigourney Weaver is the Chief Scientist heading the contact project who before the film story commences had failed in an attempt to persuade the people to cooperate with the exploitation and semi destruction of their planet by through her own Avatar making contact and living with one of the tribes and learning each other’s languages. The tribes are primitive in wearing the briefest of clothing for functional purposes and film audiences, and use bows and arrow for hunting and protection from hostile creatures with which they share the planet. However they are sophisticated in their understanding of nature and its interconnectivity. They have a unique ability to bond with creatures, such as a form of horses and a prehistoric type of bird. They are also able to connect with each other and their ancestors through a special kind of tree and they have respect for all life so that when they kill a creature for food or in self defence they and give thanks and mourn the passing. I was reminded by the work of James Burke and his book Connections.”

The enterprise is run by a weak chief executive which is unlikely, and the worst kind of redneck general which is again unlikely, and the weaponry which includes large robotic vehicles for individuals and the helicopters and gun craft are all heavy metalled and cumbersome which is again unlikely. The story line is laboured and predictable and the script is basic. Some of the action sequences were self indulgent attempts to show what the latest film technological advances can do.

Jake Sully, played by Sam Worthington, is a loyal American serviceman who has lost the use of his legs in a campaign and comes out to the planet to replace his twin brother who had been trained to use the Avatar already in preparation. He has no difficulty in accepting the request to keep the General constantly updated with intelligence about the tribe to which he becomes attached and he also quickly gains the confidence of the science director. His first trip into the new world nearly ends quickly in disaster but he is rescued by the daughter of the head of the tribe after he appears to have a special connection with the environment and about which she is anxious to report to her parents. Her brother and the man she is expected to mate are hostile to the new arrival especially when the mother who is a kind of spiritual mentor assigns her daughter to educate the Jake Avatar in their ways. He provides the kind of entree which the science director and the military have been seeking and both give him considerable leeway during a three month period to persuade the tribe to move to a different area as the corporation wants to mine the minerals which happen to be located under their homeland a giant tree within which they live. In order not to be under the daily control of the military and the corporation executives Sigourney moves the control centre for herself and Jake onto one of the floating mountains which is another of cinematic tricks in the film. Understandably working on daily basis in such proximity with the daughter of the tribal leader they become attracted and as is often the position of those who work undercover with a group or cult for any length of time they begin to identify with their comrades vales and objectives rather than retaining those of their employers or their own culture.”

“The situation comes to a head when the corporation starts to move onto the tribes immediate homeland without notice when their plea to be allowed to persuade the tribe to move is agreed but quickly fails, the General moves in to destroy the tree and then when the tribe supported by others resists, the General gets permission to bomb them and their home land especially the sacred tree of their ancestors. There is then a dramatic encounter between the highly organised and equipped military forces and the guerrilla forces led by the Avatar who has admitted his original purpose and been ostracised until he manages to bond and harness the greatest bird in the sky as a symbol that he has the will and the ability to help them combat the corporation. There is then a battle of skill and wits in which the tribe are supported by creatures previously their enemies. When Sigourney is fatally wounded there is an attempt to transfer her psyche into the Avatar to make it an independent functioning member of the society but she is too weak although her being is incorporated into the tree. After they have successfully beaten the earth force in battle and driven back to their dying planet Jake successfully transmute from his disabled body in a fully functioning member of the tribe as the consort of the leader’s daughter.”

In terms of the story I will add that that the indigenous people on the planet are not only taller than human beings but morally superior despite the gulf in technology and weaponry. Therefore the same arguments about the conflict because of the need for one theoretical advanced economic society over energy can bee applied to what is happened on the earth now between China and Africa the USA and South America, Europe and Libya, US and UK and Iraq, Iran and North Korea etc.

I also thought the visual trickery of 3D as excellent again and more effective in the close up experience of the Television


I was tempted to see the 3D version of How to train your Dragon after that it was highly regarded at the time of its release and went to receive several Oscar nominations as well as hatful in the animation industry awards. I then saw the film Sky’s premier release in June of last year as 2D and yesterday I watched the 3D. The film was a financial success grossing half a billion over three times the original budget. The film is not suitable for the very young but having said this it is designed as a counter culture for those films advocating violence and macho toughguyness. The film is set on a mythical Viking Island inhabited by a wide range of colourful dragons that are regarded as the great enemy and children of both sexes are brought learning how to become dragon fighters and dragon killers. The problem is that killing creatures does not appeal to the son of the village chief, Stoick the Vast. Hiccup, the name says it all, tries to design a machine which will bring down a dragon to prove his worth to his father who treats him with contempt.

One evening he believes he has hit a dragon flying over and goes out to search. The following day he finds the creature with a damaged tail which prevents flying. Given the opportunity kill the creature he finds that he cannot do so and gradually makes friends bringing the animal some food. He searches a book about dragons and work out how to provide a replacing tail wing to enable it to fly with the consequence he is able to fly with the creature. He keeps this secret from the rest of the village but uses information from the training of the creature to control the various small dragons used to help the young people in their training as dragon killers. The most successful of these will be given the honour of killing one of the capture dragons before the assembled village in the dragon arena.

On one of his flying missions he discovers that all the dragons on the Island are under the control of a super dragon that lives inside a great mountain and their function is to keep the creature supplied with food. They have no interest in attacking human other than in self defence. When he is attacked by another dragon his dragon comes to his aid and is captured by the village and against the pleas of Hiccup his father takes the dragon with the combined Viking force to locate the great mountain and the monster animal. The consequence is that the giant dragon become free and burns the Viking ships and generally threatens to kill the forces on the ground. They are saved by Hiccup and the other youngsters who have been quickly taught to also fly some sympathetic dragons and keep the monster busy until Hiccup is able to free Toothless. By some skilful and dangerous manoeuvres the two manage to get the monster to destroy itself but only with the result of Hiccup falling into the inferno created and Toothless trying to rescue him. The Viking chief finds the dragon badly injured and no sign of his son until the dragon reveals his boy injured but alive cradled within the wing of the creature. The picture ends with dragons and Vikings living in harmony and teenage Astrid and Hiccup becoming more than just good friends. Good fun for a family.

The 3D effects considerably enhance enjoyment of the film.

2240 Russian Salad in Gorky Park and the Russia House with Count Basie

In this break from the Leveson Inquiry there is opportunity to catch up on a number of activities and projects including the work of John Le Carré in book and film, and with of my favourite Le Carré film The Russia House because of the romantic, happy and amusing nature of the story which is devoid of grimness of much of confrontation between the intelligence services of the USA, GB and the Soviets headed by Russia. The opportunity was also taken to read the book which functions at a different level.

The film is even suitable for watching in Valentine’s week unlike the reality of the cold war even under glasnost and perestroika where double dealings, betrayals and death continued. Whether loss of lives, expenditure in time and effort was helpful to any of the sides is debatable especially to those of us on the outside gleaned from news reports, literature, film and TV.

The action commences in Moscow at an international attempt to interest the Russians in the English Language Talking Book Audio cassette Fair. The film opens when a woman arrives at the adjacent stand to that hired by Bartholomew Scott Blair, the part owner and manager of a book publishing firm of Abercrombie and Blair. She asks Niki Landau (not to be confused with Andreas Niki Lauder the Formula I racing driver) if he will take a book Barley Scott Blair as he is known who she says he has agreed to publish. Barley nick named after the basic substance of beer was not at the Fair because the aunts who partnered him in the family business, helping to keep it afloat and in the life style which he had accustomed, decided against branching out into audio tapes so he has instead gone to his bolt hole in Lisbon unknown to the intelligence man who is the voice of the book.

The book was first published in 1989 the year when it can be said the Soviet empire disintegrated in a series of independence moves as President Korbechev also attempted to move Russia into a new order. (I have Gail Sheehy’s 1991 biography). The arms race and its industry remained at the forefront of Western economies and politics, at the time that Polish but London based Niki brought the package back to London and not finding Barley had contacted several government departments until making contact with British intelligence.

In the film the role of the character Niki Lander does not impact to the same effect as in the book although even here the role is described as prologue. Niki is fed up with making depressing trips where income rarely balanced costs and he longs for a more comfortable life. Although the persistence of the woman has annoyed him and he was a little disappointed when she declined his invitation to a nice dinner he accepts her assignment because her plea reached to the nice being within his outward shell.

In his search to find Barley followed also by the UK intelligence service we also learn more in the book about Barley that he was married for instance and has two grown children with their own lives, and that he belonged to a London club in addition to his ability to play jazz clarinet and chess against all comers.

The book also explains the lengths Niki has to go to make contact with the intelligence service and the lengths they then go to quiz him about the woman and her package. He had played his part well, getting her to pretend she was passing to him the book in an anonymous plastic bag as a gift, the possession of which marked her as different from the average Muscovite who carried a string bag, in fact as he disclosed he was certain her manner, her dress suggested Stalingrad/St Petersburg as it has now returned to its original name and Russia’s second city and home of the greatest museum art gallery in the world.

The book also raises the discussion about what British intelligence should do with Niki as he had flipped through the three notebooks with over two hundred pages of text and grasped their potential significance without understanding the pages of formulae and technical notes. He was told to cancel the arranged visit to Gdansk so they could cover everything that had happened in minute detail. They wanted to know if he had been given special treatment on his way back home which might indicate that the book was a plant and they wanted to know about anyone and everyone that he might have mentioned the package and its delivery to him.

Fortunately for him he said nothing to anyone but attempted to find Barley and then persisted until making contact with the right people. At the end of the process with muttering dark threats he is presented with a cheque for £100000 financed by the Americans, told his overseas trips have ended and his movements will have to be monitored even with signing the Official Secrets Act. For some the requirements would be onerous but for Niki all his dreams had come true and he was able to open a video cassette store which did interest the police from time to time, by implication because of the material he sometimes stocked and sold, but nothing which his minders could not sort out for him. The only thing that was missing is that his path never crossed with Barley again, a precondition of the settlement but something he wished would happen in order to show his appreciation of the man until his death he believed was a professional spy, for how could you judge someone who appeared in a drunken stupor most of the time and then beat anyone and everyone at a game of chess.

The reason for this emerged during the first part of the book when it is revealed that Barley has an extraordinary precise memory of conversations was well of events. Fifty years ago as part of training I learned to make a process record in which I recorded as much of the conversations and interaction with a client I could remember and then applied my knowledge and in time experience to make an analysis of the problem, the situation, the judgement which could be made.

The intelligence service is able to trace the whereabouts of Barley from his bank statements which shows he rent of the property in Lisbon Portugal. They find him at a cafe playing Chess and he is invited to accompany the man from the Embassy where he is taken to meet a group with includes the CIA who are quite open. In the film the man from the Embassy Ned is played by James Fox and another of the group is played by Ken Russell the film Director who died last year. Martin Clunes is the technician recording the conversation in an adjacent room.

The film foreshortens through visual presentation Barley’s realization that while he has never met the Russian woman Katya played by Michelle Pfeiffer he has met someone who is likely to be the author of the manuscripts.

He explains that on his previous visit for a book Fair, the Sunday after drinking all night they had gone to Peredelkino in Jumbo’s car. to the grave of Boris Pasternak and then he had got into conversation with a man. Jumbo by the way was a Russian Gold Card man, closet Scottish Fascist and Black Belt Freemason. Peredelkino the writers dacha village.

There were some two hundred at the grave of Boris Pasternak which was steeped in flowers. A plane flew over and back no doubt taking long lens photos of those below.. Barley remembered he had quoted the lines from the Nobel Prize winning speech.


“Like a beast in the pen I’m cut off.
From my friends. Freedom, the sun
But the hunters are gaining ground
I’ve nowhere else to run”

Barley remembers that the man who spoke to them was Nezhdanov which those from the visiting Russia House were immediately able to amplify that Vitaly Nezhdanov had become a latter day hero with three one act plays opening in Moscow within the coming few weeks. Barley is pleased to have this intelligence having taken a great liking to the man with their visit to a Dacha, a big rambling house with some thirty people present; this was reduced to probably a dozen for the film. The hostess was a poet. And they spoke English which was essential given that Barley had only a handful of words which is surprising given his memory but there we are. Husband edited a science magazines and Nezhdanov was a the brother in law. That had sat together at lunch at one table drinking and talk about truth.

The closest I got to such a gathering was when at Ruskin when I was part of small group of politically orientated students who also had a sense of history and an international outlook. What happen to them I wonder? That there have not been other such occasions in the rst of my life is cause for regret.

The man was called Goethe, not his real name, but someone protected by the group, a genius, this was the man with whom conversation had taken place which Barley considered led to the manuscript being delivered to him.

Disarmament was not a political matter or military he had said but of human will. This was an important statement which resonated with me given my experience and actions. I would have added that politics ought to be about will but is has become the art of the possible with the Party framework and international capitalism. He had spoken well of Gorbachev arguing that the West had to find the other half of him while the East had to recognise the half they had.

In response to those who said the bomb had kept the peace for forty years he had asked what Peace?

They had gone in after the meal and the drinking to listen to Count Basie whose records I have on one original Long Play and a 3 disk boxed set as well individual numbers among my collection of Big Band Jazz. It was an interesting choice because the more likely artist could have been expected to have been Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman or Glen Miller if they were locked into pre World War one jazz swing, Basis was his own man and style but also main stream

Count Basie Dance Session
Straight Life, Basie Goes West Softly with Feeling, Peace Pipe, Blues Go Away, Cherry Point, Bubble, Right On, The Blues done come back and Plymouth Rock

And a 3 dick Box Set
Oh Lady be Good, Going to Chicago Blues, Live and Love Tonight, Love me or Leave Me, Rock a bye Basie, Baby dont tell on me, Taxi War Dance, Jump for me, Twelfth Street Rag, Nobody knows, Pound cake, Ho long blues, Dickie’s Dream, Lester leaps in, The apple jump, I left my baby, Volcano.

The devil and the deep blue sea, I never knew, Tickle Toe, Louisiana, Easy Does it, Let me see, Blow Top, Gone with the Wind, Super Chief, You betcha my life, Down down down, Tune Town Shuffle, I’m tired of waiting for you, Basie Boogie, Fancy meeting you, My old flame, Ton Thumb, Take me back baby, All of Me, One o’clock jump’

And the angels sing, Bolero at the Savoy You can count on me, Your and your love, What goes up must come down, Fiesta in Blue, Something new, Sub-deb Blues, Boogie woogie, Bubbles, How high the moon, Your’re not the kind, Jumpin at the woodside, Jive at five, Yesterdays, Blee Blop Blues, Straight Life, 16 men swinging, Nails, Two Franks. I have also experience the Count Basie at the former Grand Croydon Theatre, usually a cinema with several thousand seats but which hosted a number of visiting jazz band sin the later 1950’s and 1960’s.

He had gone to sleep in deck chair on the veranda with a blanket wrapped around him waking at midnight wondering where he was. It was Goethe talking to him saying that some things are necessary evils. All victims are equal none more equal than others. Both these were quotes back from what Barley had said at lunchtime. He had asked Goethe who he was with the response a moral outcast. I trade in defiled theories he added. Nice to meet a writer Barley had said asking what kind of a writer he was. There was no denial. History, lies, comedies and romances came the reply.

Asked where his idea came from he had spoken at length mentioning the obscene fantasies of politicians and generals of all nations and from liberated intellects from pressed ganged Nazi scientists, from the great Soviet people and after other thoughts adding occasionally from distinguished western intellectuals who happen to drop into my life,

He said he believed every word Barley had said at the dinner and promised that if he was not a spy he would promise something in return.

The gathering around Barley from the Circus and the CIA had then considered the material in the notebooks, its potential significance and Barley’s appreciation. It was decided that Barley should return and attempt to meet Goethe and that he should have an assistant, an Editor on the books so to speak of the Publishing firm and for this it was necessary to successfully spin a story to the Aunts. He had been taken back to England to a safe house cottage in Knightsbridge chosen because Barley had no connections in the area. with the costs borne by the Americans because they were going take control. There was three weeks of intense preparations at the end of which there was a special meal. A salmon trout on a silver dish two bottle of Sancerre and a rare single malt whiskey. I drank my first bottle of Sancerre late in life at a great meal in Le Touquet in him 1980’s with a whole crab starter and a ain course fish which I have listed somewhere having retained he bills followed by a double crème caramel and coffee. It tasted my first single malt at a club in Edinburgh one afternoon, bought by the chairman of the Dunoon CND after a meeting of the Scottish CND Committee.


Before departing the Circus people had checked his flat for his likely state of mind and discovered he had written from Stevie Smith

I am not so afraid of the dark night
As the friends I do not know.

And I learn by going where I have to go, which applies to me more often than not.

In Moscow Katya had been alerted and eagerly awaited his arrival.




It seems appropriate to include in this piece a review of Gorky Park, a film viewed in the theatre and previously on TV. Again it is a film set as Russian commenced to move between its past and its future with a few Westerners permitted into the country but at a time when movement for Russians was prevented except on official visits. While the politics of the country, its human rights record and relations with the West are the present in the film the story is that of the murder of three young women in Gorky Park, but no ordinary murder as the killer or killers had taken great steps to prevent identification by destroying face and hands, and clinically.

The other aspect of the film is the trade in the Sable which was regarded and in some countries is still regarded as the most luxury of fur coats. The creature lived in the cold wild forests of Russian, China and Japan but in more recent times is farmed. The premise of the film is that the hunting of the wild Russian Sable tipped with silver was strictly controlled with an ban on exporting pairs if live animals in order to maintain the price. Jack Osborne is an American with a licence to hunt the wild Sable and export the skins with appropriate premiums paid to the authorities.

He cuts a deal with corrupt officials to export three pairs to the wilds of Sweden where he has a farm. This involves the secret building of a trunk by the three young women on the promise of being smuggled out Russia. Assigned to investigate the case is Arkady Renko a man who describes himself as solid and methodical, a modern but loyal Russian with no illusions about the nature of his society and who meets with an American detective, whose brother has disappeared and has been given permission to enter the country to investigate what happened with the help of the authorities. Renko (American actor William Hurt and not to be confused with John Hurt, the British special Bafta award winner) becomes concerned when the KGB show no interest in the deaths of the young women and his suspicion rises when at the weekend Dacha of the Chief Prosecutor Lanskoy (Ian Bannen) he meets Osborn (Lee Marvin) and his girl friend Irina Asanova. With the help of an assistant (a much thinner Richard Griffiths) and a university Professor the face of one of the girls is reconstructed to help identification and that of a second head which remains to be completed.

Renko works out that someone skilful in skinning the Sables to prevent damage to their fur is the ideal candidate for the murder of the young woman and he keeps an eye Osborne and his girl friend as does the American and the KGB, Eventually Renko and the American prevent a KGB officer from completing the injection of a lethal substance into Irina and Renko takes the young woman to his flat to recuperate. He tries to persuade her to be open about Osborne and the killing of the three young women but she still has hopes of also being taken to the West which she believes the other girls have been able to do so with his help, Renko and the girl become lovers and in order to shake her out of her illusions he confronts here with the head of one of the girls. She admits the plot but then runs away.

When Renko and the American go to check out the second head they see a KGB officer leaving the building with it in a box and they follow to where he hands it over to the Chief Prosecutor and Osborne. The head is that of the brother of the American Detective. Later in a Russian baths Renko confronts the Prosecutor and in a fight kills him.

In order to create dramatic tension the rest of the story is left to unfold with first Renko and two associates going to Sweden where Osborne lives, and who had advise he is leaving Russia for good as a wealthy home on the city and an isolated fur farm close to a forest. Renko has come to retrieve the Sables and kill Osborne but is told by a senior official they have come to cut a deal. When he meets Osborne and is taken back to his luxury home he is shocked to Irina him having managed to get out of the country. He and his colleagues arrange to meet Osborne at his farm where first he finds the American gutted and tied to a tree because he had killed one Osborne’s dogs, Osborne appears with the six pelts of the Sable but a cautious Renko is convinced that one of his colleagues is also a traitor and in the subsequent fight Renko, Osborne and Irina are the only ones to survive. It is Irina, who kills Osborne emptying the magazine into the body,

Renko has discovered that Osborne had previously exported another set of Sable which he lefts out into the wild. The girl wants Renko to leave Russia and join her in the west. He explains that back home he had agreed that his permission was to retrieve the Sable and Kill Osborn and then return with the freedom of the girl being his price for taking the risks. In any event he says he is a Russian and would not be content in the West. The girl offers to return to Russia with him but he admits she needs the freedom. He offers a prophetic thought, given when the book was written and the film released (1983) that hopefully things will change and they will be able to be together.

Despite all the effective efforts against the use of animal fur for coats, a Russian Sable three quarter length coast is on Bay at present for £63000 sold by a Chinese firm. I recall a dinner held by the Association of Directors of Social Services North East branch where all the wives accept my partner wore fur coats (I need to write up aspects of that event in the context of allegations made by someone investigating the abuse of children in public care.

Amy Winehouse Back to Back
Rehab
You know Im no Good
Me and Mr Jones
Back to Black
Love is a losing game
Tears Dry on their Own
Wake up alone
Some unholy War
He can only hold her
Addicted.

Franz Ferdinand
Jacqueline
tell her tonight
take me Out
the dark of the Matinee
auf achse
cheating on you
this fire
darts of pleasure
Michael
come on home
40

The Essential Bob Dylan
Blowing in the Wind
Don’t think Twice Its Alright
The Times they are a changing
It aint me Babe
Maggies Farm
It’s all over now Baby Blue
Mr Tambourine Blue
Subterranean Homesick Blues
Like a Rolling Stone
Positively 4th Street
Can you please crawl out your window?
I want you
Just like a woman
Rainy Day woman
All along the watchtower
Quinn the Eskimo
Ill be your baby tonight
Lay Lady Lay
If not for you
I shall be released
You aint going nowhere
Knocking on Heaven’s door
Forever Young
Tangled up in Blue
Shelter from the Storm
Hurricane
Changing of the Guards
Gotta serve somebody
Blind Willy McTell
Jokerman
Tight connections to my heart
Silvio
Everything is Broken
Dignity
Not Drunk Yet
Things have changed



Marc Bolan T Rex
20th Century Boy
Get it On
Metal Guru
Ride a White Swan
Hot Love
Jeepster
Telegram Sam
I Live to Boogie
Children of the revolution
Sold Gold Easy Action
New York City
The Groover
Truck on Tyke
Debora
One Inch Rock
Light of Love
Dreamy Baby
London Boys
Celebrate Summer
Teenage Dream
The Wizard
Desdemona
Pewter Suitor
King of the Running Spires
By the Light of the Magical Moon
It is Love?
King of the Mountain Cometh
Cosmic Dancer
Raw Ramp
Life’s a Gas
Sailors of the Highway
Thunder Wing
Born to Boogie

Christmas Bop

Laser Love
Life’s am Elevator
Soul of my suit
Dandy in the Underworld

2239 Review of a week in February 2012 and poor films after BAFTAS

The past week has been productive although I have deviated from the plan for the weekend first deciding to attempt a summary of my life to-date which so far has developed as 12500 four of five part extended essay, I enjoyed watching Le Carré’s Russia House and have commenced to read the original text. I had planned to commence to undertake an overview of Leveson so far but just as well it has been delayed as ten senior Sun managers and journalists have been arrested in dawn raids with their homes turned upside down so more on both aspects in a moment. The British Academy of Film Awards took place on Sunday night and although I have not the major of the films mentioned, I felt the awards were well distributed.

The weekend was disastrous for regional football teams. And because of the cold I have eaten well with little physical exercise but manager to hold the weight. I won 6666 games of patience against the computer with over two thousand in succession, but my efforts to move from level 3 to level four chess have been thwarted by momentary lacks of concentration.

The mini series of Mad Dogs came to and end and Spartacus Vengeance ironed in glorification of blood and lust. The discovery of the weekend was a new Italian Police Detective series called Montabano which looks as it is going to be as engaging as Ramanzo Criminale with a dozen large helpings of one hour forty five minutes without advertisements of BBC Channel Four. I watched Avatar on 3D TV and notched up my appreciation of the film with other films The Lincoln Lawyer, The Adjustment Bureau, Battle Los Angeles and a revisit to American Beauty. Phew first a food review.

A week Sunday saw red meat with a baked bean and tinned tomatoes mix while yesterday the was a reverse meal day of a salami and bean salad with roast chicken tinned potatoes peas and carrot mix in the evening with sufficient over for two further meals during the week. There has been three portions of stir fry vegetables over the ten days because of half price offers at Morison’s, twice with chicken and once with lamb and today a lemon grass sauce which I Iiked and wish I had acquired more of the half price offer which I suspect has long ended. I will investigate tomorrow.

There has between one pizza although the baking stone has proved a disaster, too big for the over and difficult to clean. There has been one meal of the prawns in breadcrumbs and filo pastry. There are no more packs of the Tex Mex at Asda although there are at Morrison’s but for £5. There has been one curry also a variation with Thai sweet and spicy concoction. Fish as a main course was a white fish in breadcrumbs and lamb steaks twice.

Because of the cold I have enjoyed more porridge for breakfast than before but had to have a spell of using up the mushrooms which started to go off. Could not large packs of the open variety so had to settle for a more expensive cartons of the breakfast size yesterday which should last three days. I have also supplanted some daily diets with a helping of fruit and nut cereal which is more filing that the other two

There has been plenty of fish for the evening salad with prawns and smoked mackerel interspersed with half a quiche where I am enjoying a vegetable option. There have been two portions of sprats in batter and breadcrumbs which reminds I need to break off to make a note for tomorrow’s shop. I have been very good cutting out afters with one tin of rice spread over two days although I fancy some now with a cinnamon topping and the big treat some cherries about £4.50 worth in money which provided three good portions. There have been several cuppa soups usually with crackers sometimes at odd times in the day. I have also taken to drinking cups of tea again as I cut down on fizzy drinks to no more than one a day and with several days relying on iced water.

My sleeping pattern has been all awry with today for example going to bed at 1 am and rising at 7 so six hours is a good average but them coming very tired around 4 went up to bed and slept for a couple of hours waking to an interesting dream.

I got up before 5 on Thursday to get on line early for the Travel Lodge sale and got six nights in Croydon plus return Journey by train for just over £100 in total for the Durham visit to Lords and with a day over to visit relatives. If the weather is not good or the cricket over quickly I hope to take a look at the progress being made in central London for the Olympics at King Cross in preparation for my second visit in at the of July. I was so confident about getting at least one pair of tickets that I purchased two ticket holders, one of which I shall use for my cricket season to show off! I was also successful in getting five nights on the Brighton Sea from for £55 in total amazing and will try for a train ticket when these become available. For some reason staying in Nottinghamshire for the Cricket in mid August proved more expensive but I managed to get the number of night required. With a trip to Mansfield in March I have 25 away nights arranged. Checking out my bookings I found the special offers were still on although £10 a night rooms are available for the odd night here and there. I am tempted to do something at the beginning or end of May when Durham are away at the cricket but will have to make a check on finances

I have also applied for one of the 5000 pairs of tickets for the Jubilee concert in London on June 4th the main weekend for events. The Queen is coming back to South Tyneside in July visiting a School in Jarrow. She visited last for the Silver Jubilee and I had a VIP ticket for the outdoor event at Gypsies Green. It has to be recorded that Mohamed Ali drew larger crowds and greater excitement when he came as was married at the South Shields Mosque. I attend the Civic Lunch and saw adult women including Councillors stretch at is feet so to speak.

Have deviated and detoured for an hour I must concentrate while I am awake and motivated to write on. First the sport as Newcastle went for a win at Spurs and were thrashed 5.0 there second bad result away from home in London. They must learn not to be over ambitious with their two exciting frontmen. Sunderland had a narrow loss against Arsenal and looked all set for the draw. There was also bad referring which did not help [. Hopefully they will turn the table in Saturday evening when they meet again at the Stadium of Light in the last sixteen of the FA Cup with the programme on ITV There are five games sin all showing with those involving Crawley Brighton and Stevenage most appealing. Although none are in £D although How to Train your Dragon which I enjoyed in 2D is. Warrington after a thumping win in the first week of Super league drew away this weekend but also on the box on Saturday clashing with Sunderland so I will record one and watch the other.

The sporting surprise was a splendid win by England in the one day 50 over event against Pakistan who turned up thinking they were about to give another thrashing after their 3.0 whitewash in the Test Matches. Captain Cook made an excellent 137 runs as Pakistan opened with their spin bowlers against Pietersen who hoped to face seam and failed again with 14 from 36. His place must be in doubt if he fails again tomorrow and on Saturday. Finn left out of the Test side despite his excellent bowling when he last performed rounded on the selectors in the best possible way reducing the home side to 53 for 4 taking all the wicket and from which they failed to recover, all out 120 runs behind an with 15 over that is 90 balls to spare.
Next the British Academy of Film and Theatrical arts held at Convent Garden with an even more spectacular and long red carpet canopy outside set to cope with the increased public interest and Hollywood interest as a barometer for the Oscars.

The one certainty was Meryl Streep for her Performance as Lady Thatcher although Hollywood may go for Viola Davis in the Help if Octavia Spencer does not the supporting Actress as she did in London. The Best film should go tot he film I chose not to see in Theatre, The Artist despite the black and white visual and the music which includes Sing Sing Sing. It is unfair to call it a silent film as there is music throughout. I can see the Help, The Descendents and most of all Hugo having a shout as soon or later the main prize will go to a film using CGI. I also avoid Help which sounded a sugar version of the role of black housemaid in the white families which paints over the continuing racism.

It was inevitable that Tinker Tailor got the best British Film award because all the hype and pushing and the fine cast although the compare Hugh hit the nail on the head when he made the point that condensed as it was the plot become incomprehensible to those who had not read the book and viewed the brilliant TV production. John Hurt was given a special award and Martin Scorsee became a fellow of the Academy while admitting he knew little about British film apart from their excellent crews. My delight was that Warhorse came nowhere but I look forward to seeing the Descendent and Hugo.

I thought the Adjustment Bureau a clever but flawed film. The film is part of genre where Angels in various guises come to earth on some Godly mission. The best loved is Its a Wonderful Life with Clarence determined to get his Wings and then the wartime Matter of Life and Death and Heaven can Wait. In this film the Angels are among us ensuring that we keep to God’s individual and written down plan because we have shown we are not capable of exercising free. The deity is not referred to as God in order not to offend religious sensibilities although the central argument for their intervention is one that most religious bodies would concur that human kind has abused free will and God has determined that until everyone learns to exercise that will is more creative and Godlike way it is suspend while a number of special individuals with the right basic qualities have their life plans controlled and if appropriate constantly adjusted, we would say tweaked to ensure they fulfil destiny and contribute to creating a world in which humans can be allowed to make their choices freely. Where this proposition crosses the acceptable line is of course that flies in the Christian belief that life is meant to be a struggle in which human can make bad ethical choices and condemn themselves to eternal damnation until such time as God gets fed up and calls a halt the whole caboodle in which instance the collective day of reckoning will arrive.

The best laid plans come to naught comes to mind as a set of particular circumstances throws Elise Sellas played by Emily Blunt who is planned to become a world acclaimed dancer with David Norris (Matt Damon) who is scheduled to become President of the United States.

They met up in the men’s room where she is hiding having crashed a wedding reception (one of many unlikelies in film) and the interaction leads to a kiss after she hears him planning his acceptance of defeat. Inspired by this contact he gives an honest explanation for the loss by having given too great a reliance on focus groups, opinion polls and presentation consultants a constant beef about American political life along with its corruption and bully which having been censured intensifies continuing in the same manner as before.
In this instance the speech has almost magical qualities and impresses all kinds of Joe’s and Jane in the street and David is back on his pathway tot he White House and saving mankind.

Sometime later unknown to the audience an Angel called Harry is told by one of his seniors to intercept David Norris for a few minutes before he make his way to the office of new job. The purpose of the delay although its precision a few minutes before his arrival is not explained, is to enable a squad of angels complete with security guards to freeze the entire office staff at the premises in order to fix the new seniors of Mr Norris to further his progress in the divine plan. The proposition that such divine intervention could only be achieved by such an earthly and physical manoeuvre is preposterous although it is essential for the rest of story as the failure of the delay means that David discovers the intervention and requires and explanation with warning.

There is a further complication in that David has meet Elise again on the bus and she giver him her telephone number which is written on the back of a card. The boss man on the ground explains that David has been selected to be part of a special plan from which there can be no deviation. He should not have witnessed what he has and if he discloses to any one his being will wiped and will be given a very different life outcome. Any involvement with the young woman is out of the question and the phone card is destroyed.

However a spark has been lit so although he continues to make political progress and does well in his occupation he send much of his free time trying to find the young woman. He does this on his own quietly, believing it is out of sight and mind of his official minders.

When they meet for a third he has difficulty explaining why he failed to contact her although she is still single and was clearly very interested in him she has since had at least one relationship which had led to an engagement. She is a dancer and he manages to get the name of her company and arranges to meet to see her after a rehearsal. Aware of this further contact the angel brigade keep him under constant surveillance using a form a hand held Sat life Navigators which controls the immediate environment as well as thought decision making process. Despite this ability they are required to keep within a limited range of their subject so if able to throw a curved ball they can be jolted off the navigation plan

This provides the opportunity for an interesting use of CGI as while they move around the city on foot they are able to use portals which enable speedy short cuts as fast as any motor vehicle or city centre train. The minders fix it that the two would be lovers do not meet up but David makes use of his creativity as well as motivation to eventually get to where the girl is rehearsing. It is at this point the local chief shows David the extent of her talent and that is scheduled to become an internationally acclaimed super dancers which he will ruin when after her causer her to have an accident and the doctors will decide that either it is a temporary sprain or a fracture which will force early retirement and a career as a dance teacher.

All appears lost until his personal angel minder intervenes having discovered that the two were originally destined for each other which is why there as the instant attraction but then the decision was taken that they would have separate destinies and that their paths were never intended to cross. Why this decision was taken is not explained

Harry decides to intervene in two ways. The first is to approach the Chairman directly with the plight of the couple and secondly he tutors David in how to evade surveillance and travel at speed through the city using the portals. The climax of the film is an intense chase between the couple and the official forces determined to separate them and make a permanent adjustment. Just when all appears lost Harry appears with a communiqué for the lead pursuer to say a change of plan has been put into effect and the couple are to stay together. A different kind of adjustment has been undertaken. It is good fare for Valentine’s day week although the ending that true love can overcome God‘s will is interesting nonsense.

Another of the American dream myths is the Lincoln Lawyer in which unscrupulous and amoral operators can be made to change their spots by a sudden bolt on insight into their iniquity. This time the proposition is that because everyone is entitled under the rule of law to have the allegations against them tested in open court it is morally defendable to use wealth and power, including wealth and power criminally obtained, as well as the laws procedures and precedents and the adversarial system to get the blatant guilty off. From my experience in the UK British lawyers have a sense of right and wrong and will not contest cases where the their any admission of guilt but in those instances concentrate on putting forward any genuine evidence in mitigation and for seeking mercy. I do not know the extent to which the sharp shooting money making amoral street lawyer is a Hollywood created myth but the number of times the story of the Lincoln Lawyer has been told, my instinct tells me it is not.

In this instance Mickey Heller is asked by a bondsman, always shady characters in Hollywood films along with Bounty Hunters to make money loaning you the instant cash to make bail, to take on Louis Roulet Beverly Hill playboy son of a wealthy and powerful property family. Louis is accused of brutally beating up a young woman who he claims picked him up in a bar. He claims that on arrival at her flat he had been hit on the head and recovered to find himself being pinned down by two neighbours of the woman who she had called for help. He and his dominating and pushy mother claimed he had been set up and that this was a shakedown. He would not pay up or plea bargain for a crime he did not commit and is most convincing about his innocence.

To soften his image as a rule exploiting and bending bastard who will do anything for money Mickey has a beautiful young daughter whose care he shares with his ex wife who is also physically beautiful with an adorable personality who appears to have an ongoing relationship with the hotman, you know what I mean, and Mickey is otherwise monogamous and dedicated to his dubious trade. The basic flaw in this film is that there no justification why Mickey is as he is when it comes to the way he operates his trade. And guess what his ex wife is a prosecutor and her main beef is the way he gets arseholes off or plea bargains?

Now this is where the film also tries to draw a line between the really nasty devil villains and OK villains in that one of Mickey’s roles is to get some drug pushing, minor violent bikers from facing the full force of the law for their crimes. Instead of coming to his office they tend to drive up the free way in formation and direct him to a siding where they can put their beef to him. I cannot remember or care if it was one of bikers that Mickey had persuaded to plea bargain for life in exchange to the electric chair for a murder he insists he did not commit or how Mickey comes to the view that it was his client who had committed the original murder and was therefore also guilty of the brutal assault.

Mickey is able to get hold of a copy of the police file only to find that suspecting this is his modus operandus they have not included the photo of the knife which the perpetrator had used on the face of the victim with a jagged blade and unique handle and which belonged to Louis. He then realises that this knife was used in the previous crime and that the man he persuaded to plea guilty and plea bargain was innocent

It is at this point that Mickey finds that he has allowed himself to be a patsy for having yielded to the bondsman request for a fee for telling Mickey about the arrest of Louis when he finds that Louis and his mother had had Mickey and asked the bondsman to contact Mickey because they were aware he had been involved in the earlier case. By appointing Mickey they were aware he could not use the earlier info against his client who the man now admits he was guilty of both crimes but tightens his hold on Mickey by threatening to harm his daughter and ex wife if he does not keep his mouth shut.

Mickey uses his private investigator buddy to try and find out anything they use to nail Louis and then the private investigator is murder by a historical weapon which Louis has stolen from Mickey’s home after breaking in to confront the lawyer. The expendable use of Private I’s was brought home when I caught the tail end of a Gregory Peck film where he is a scientist who develop amnesia after he believes he is the cause of the death of his employer and family friend. He hires a Private Eye to try and find out his background and the man is murdered by those seeking to kill Peck.

Back to the Lincoln Lawyer who finds an answer phone message from the private eye which leads to evidence which could convict Louis of the earlier murder. What Mickey the does and is in fairness the unique aspect of the film which makes the production worthwhile. He uses all his established tricks to successfully get Louis acquitted but in doing so introduces evidence drawing attention to the murder and with the finding of guilt he is free to assist the police and DA with the evidence secured by the private eye for Louis to be immediately rearrested. This brings the wrath of the mother who has known all about her sons nocturnal cravings. It is she who has murdered the detective and it is she who now attempts to kill Mickey with the same weapon. Fortunately he has secured a gun of his own from his driver who he employed having lost his licence so although wounded he survives and in hospital learns that the man he persuaded to go to prison has been released and that the DA is going for the death penalty on Louis.

The film is based on a novel by Michael Connelly which is not and never will be on my list to read. Both young women were prostitutes with the latter who survived charging $400 a time. There is a red hearing of one of her clients on whom Louis attempts to put the blame which was the situation in relation the client he persuaded to plead guilty and who Louis had effectively frame for the previous murder, and no doubt countless others.

Just when one thinks that Mickey is about to mend his ways and get back with his wife and daughter now that he has seen the light he meets up with the bikers who want his help in another hopeless cause and who request a half price job because of their help in a way I cannot also now remember. Mickey shows that he really is a good guy by taking the case pro bono. However this was not the worst film of the week.

This accolade goes to Battle Los Angeles. The world is led to believe that a meteorite shower is expected to fall largely off cost and then on the seaboards and then it transpires these are sprayed weapons of Alien invaders. They have drone fighters that can target onto any electrical device and they have super personal fighters which remind of the super fighters in Avatar while the individual aliens appear mixtures of being an instrument rather like the Borg’s. The only way to take on what is evidently superior fighting force in numbers and equipment is to blanket bomb the area they ghee gained although why this should work is not explained. In such a situation we are asked to accept the ludicrous proposition tat a band of highly trained professional soldiers would be tasked to rescue a few civilians taking shelter in a local police station where the police are long gone or killed.

Almost all the film comprises the attempt of these men to complete the mission and includes someone who had put in for his release papers after combat experience and a training role. The civilian father of a young boy dies and so too do several of the soldiers. They not only rescue the remaining civilians before the obliteration bombs but manage to work out how best to attack kill individuals and they also destroy a Command and Control Centre.
And that is about it.

I assumed the creators of the successful blood and sex story of Spartacus the Thracian would find a way of continuing after he and his fellow gladiators had escaped from heartrending capability called a ludus, killing the couple in charge and going off to free their comrades and destroy their Roman captors. The motivation of Spartacus remained the Roman officer who had killed his people and sold him and his wife into separate slavery. There was a similar quest for his rival Crixus the Gaul who is in search of Naevia who was taken away shortly before the massacre which end the first series although were treated to a prequel in which Spartacus did nit feature,

"Fugitivus" covers the first days of their freedom as the two men lead and train others who agree to follow. Glaber the nemesis of Spartacus has become a Praetor -Not just Commander of an army but also holder of the important role of Magistrate which was that of a governor as well as Judge, in fact a local or regional autocrat. He is told by his father in law to abandon the good life he experiences and go off and capture Spartacus while Illithyia pregnant, with the child of Spartacus, we suspect, is unwilling to travel back to Capua with her husband for obvious reason but he having been commanded, commands her to be at his side.

The two take up residence in the somewhat derelict ludus being the best location in town where we have the surprise of the series in that Lucretia, the scheming wife of Batiatus who we witnessed stabbed to death awash with blood, survived and is living there. She is holds the secret of Illithyia who bedded Spartacus instead of Crixus as she had desired both in masks of gold. She is not compos mentis which is some compensation.

Oenomaus (the former chief man Doctore) who given his freedom and has left he ludus with honour before the uprising and massacre, feels that his sense of honour has therefore been badly damaged by these events and appears to live in the shadows of the City. He does warn Spartacus and Crixus that Glaber has returned with his men but this only acts as a red flag for Spartacus Vengeance. There is a battle after which Spartacus and Crixus agree that their best course is to move south of the city to recoup their strength and mount their campaign and also look for Naevia who Crixus has been told has been passed to one user after another. They free slaves as they make their way, giving the option of joining them in the struggle.

This factual account omits the graphic violence and nudity and sex! Something which one announcer explained was a warning if you would be offended and an invitation if this was your kind of thing.

"A Place in This World is the title of the second episode. There is sex and bloodshed as they encounter and ruthlessly kill a wealthy Roman at a villa in he countryside who admits he owned Naevia, used her and passed her on, who tells them that he owned Naevia for a short time before selling her to another villa owner further south.

The newly freed slaves of the villa are afraid of the sudden freedom, especially a young male named Tiberius, who used to be in a high position among the slaves. Tiberius attempts to kill Spartacus during the night, but fails. Spartacus will not see young Tiberius killed as repayment for the attempt, but would train him. A potentially big mistake.

Meanwhile in Capua, the recovering Lucretia receives messages from the Gods in a dream on how to defeat Spartacus. Glaber believes in her new status of Prophetess if only from public approval. In the Capua marketplace, Lucretia receives a note from a mysterious stranger.

In a flashback sequence, Oenomaus relives his purchase from the Pit by Titus Lentulus Batiatus in his youth, the discovery of honour and purpose of becoming a Champion. Oenomaus, in his search for death, faces many opponents in the Pits and after he is weakened from a fight, he is taken to the villa before Glaber by a mysterious stranger. The mysterious stranger is unmasked to reveal Ashur, former nefarious right-hand man of Quintus Batiatus, who is working in secret with Lucretia to some unknown ends. Tis resurrection day!

In the Greater Good Spartacus and crew free another band of slaves destined for the dreaded Mines. A slaver with his dying breath says that Naevia lives but is suffering in harsh servitude in the Mines. The man learning this news lies and tells Crixus he has heard Naevia is dead.

In Capua, Ashur using his usual methods attempts to beak the silence of Oenomaus about the location of the rebels. Ashur then taunts Oenomaus that his wife betrayed him for Gannicus his closest friend at the Ludus and former champion before Spartacus. Unintentionally he reveals that the purpose of move south was the search for Naevia.

Unfortunate Crixus learns the truth that his woman lives in the mines and Spartacus and some of the others support Crixus in his search and disguise themselves as slaves and as guards, Glaber who is under pressure to find and deal with Spartacus also learns of development and send his troops to the mines to await accompanied by Ashur.

Crixus is briefly reunited with Naevia, but they are overcome by soldiers. Crixus sacrifices himself for their escape, and Ashur delivers the blow that causes Crixus to fall dead or unconscious perhaps. Meanwhile in Capua there is another Games although the gladiators are of poor quality and the crowd restless although with some blood lust and nudity the crowd pleasure hots up.