Before we voted to remain in the European Union, we went to see Independence Day: Resurgence. Typical of expensive sequels, the blockbuster was poorly scripted, overblown and inconclusive. Not a patch on the original – just like the referendum.
It was last knockings for Eddie the Eagle as we took our plush seats at Cinema City. The film’s been out for a while and we were two of four in the audience. For those unfamiliar with the story, the film chronicles the flight of Michael ‘Eddie’ Edwards who battled against considerable adversity and mean-minded ridicule to compete for Britain as a ski jumper at the 1988 Calgary Winter Olympics. He was the first British competitor in the sport for six decades – hardly surprising given they don’t get much snow in Cheltenham where he grew up. The stuffed shirts of the Olympic establishment loathed him and did their very best to knock him off piste. But the crowd loved the plucky little fella with his jam jar glasses, silly tash and aquiline antics. Everyone likes a trier and try he did. Eddie may not have kept his eyes shut as he chucked himself off the 90 metre ramp, but I did. He came last in both his events. It didn’t matter. A star (or sorts) was born.
I suspect the movie stretched the facts a tad but I was hooked right from the opening scenes as the little boy in callipers dreamed of Olympic glory and wouldn’t take no for an answer. Sheer joy.
It’s with enormous sadness that I’ve just heard about the death of Victoria Wood from cancer. She was, quite simply, my kind of act. Her body of work was astounding – TV sketch shows, stand up, sitcoms, musicals, plays and films (both comic and straight) – all containing the same depth of wit and unsentimental pathos that set her head and shoulders above the rest of her (mostly male) peers. Victoria Wood saw humour in the humdrum, the extraordinary in the everyday. She was a breath of fresh air from both the misogynistic old dinosaurs of her early career and the new breed of angry comics who thought shouting expletives at you was funny. And, she was generous with her words, giving her best lines to the talented cast of people she always kept close, Julie Walters among them.
I’m so pleased I got to see her (twice) at the Albert Hall back in the day. Victoria Wood has kept me laughing through four decades.
Image courtesy of the Guardian.
A couple of weeks back, Liam treated us both to a slice of cabaret at Norwich’s trendy Playhouse Theatre. We were front and centre for a night of song and gossip from veteran actress and national treasure, Anne Reid.
Ms Reid first electrified the nation when she was fried by a dodgy hair dryer in Coronation Street, Britain’s longest running soap. It was 1971 and the untimely death of her character, Valerie Barlow, had 18 million viewers on the edge of their lurid orange velour sofas – about 30% of the entire UK population at the time. After taking time out to do the family thing, Ms Reid returned to the boards and popped up all over the place in film and television. Later, as a 66-year-old jobbing actress, she bedded the future 007 Daniel Craig in the 2003 film, ‘The Mother’. She received a BAFTA nomination for her performance. I would too, if I had the chance to bonk James Bond.
Anne Reid hasn’t looked back since. These days, she’s better known as Celia, the Daily Mail reading bigot with a lesbian daughter in the romantic drama ‘Last Tango in Halifax’, playing opposite old-school socialist Alan (Derek Jacobi). It’s an engrossing tale of family dysfunction with tight, fast dialogue. The show’s been an unexpected worldwide hit for the BBC.
Back to the Norwich Playhouse. Thanks to Ms Reid’s touching renditions and recollections, we left the theatre on a nippy night feeling nothing but warm inside.
After all the fuss and frolics of Yuletide, it’s now austerity season. Nights are spent nesting on the sofa, cushion fighting over the remote control. Thumbing through the DVD collection uncovered a lost gem, something we’d picked up from the HMV bargain bucket and forgotten about. ‘Sunshine on Leith’ is the re-telling of the timeless girl meets boy story, played out in the streets and pubs of Edinburgh and set to the music of The Proclaimers. It’s a foot tapping joy from beginning to end with some glorious set pieces that really show off the Caledonian capital’s neo-classical elegance. Mind you, it’s just as well I’ve stepped out with a few Scots lads in my time. Those less familiar with Scottish brogue are advised to turn on the subtitles.
Following a full-on Christmas with family in London – all fun and no ceremony – the drying out time before the New Year’s festivities was a welcome respite. What better way to recharge the batteries than a Monday matinee at the flicks, taking in an energising blockbuster in the form of the latest Star Wars extravaganza? Generally, I’m not a big fan of your run of the mill, mass appeal, CGI-packed Hollywood juggernaut – all video game and no story. And while I loved the three original Star Wars films, the subsequent prequels were terrible. I feared the latest reboot of the franchise might be too. But the Force was with us and we were richly entertained by a crash, bang, wallop of galactic proportions. With a witty script, some familiar old faces, engaging performances and edge-of-seat special effects, the old fashioned good versus evil epic bursts with menacing Third Reich imagery and triumph over terrible odds. There are some delicious new baddies and a Supreme Leader with more than a passing resemblance to Harry Potter’s Voldemort. Roll on episode VIII.
No doubt, merchandising will break all box office records judging by the window display in our local Disney Store.
I’ve always admired Alan Bennett’s writing – witty, insightful, dead pan and very British. He has a remarkable knack of making magic from the ordinary and finding humour in the humdrum. If only I had a fraction of his talent. So when the adaptation of his play ‘The Lady in the Van’ was released, we bought our tickets and nudged politely past the grey herd at Cinema City, fruity red in hand. ‘The Lady in the Van’ is the far from ordinary tale of a crabby old woman living in a battered Bedford van squatting in the driveway of Alan Bennett’s North London home. He offered a parking space for three months. She stayed for fifteen years. Alex Jennings’ portrayal of the unsentimental and stoic author is uncanny and Maggie Smith as the aromatic old eccentric with a van-load of dark secrets is splendid. Top notch film acting is all in the eyes and the delivery. Maggie Smith lit up the screen with both. I feel a BAFTA coming on.
The clever script, littered with crisp one-liners, gradually unveils the old girl’s back story and, in doing so, reveals quite a lot about the author himself. To write any more would only spoil the plot. The supporting cast playing the hand-wringing Camden Town socialistas, desperate to see the back of the old bag, is rock-solid. There are some nice cameos from a few of the former pupils from Alan Bennett’s ‘History Boys’ too.
Here’s the trailer…
Last year, while dining with an old friend at the Assembly House, Norwich’s delicious Georgian gem, we stumbled upon the making of ’45 Years’ starring Sixties starlets, Charlotte Rampling and Tom Courtney. I caught the ravishing Ms Rampling rushing past in a dressing gown as I emerged from the little boy’s room. It was quite a shock, I can tell you. So when the film recently came to town, we went to see what we had inadvertently gatecrashed. I’m so glad we did. Filmed entirely in Norfolk and around Norwich, 45 Years tells the story of long-buried secrets disinterred with devastating consequences just days before a 45th wedding anniversary. Atmospheric and suffocating, comforting certainties are chipped away to reveal a marriage un-fulfilled. Norfolk’s low wintry skies, normally big and uplifting, only add to the bleak claustrophobia. Both Charlotte Rampling and Tom Courtney are superb.
45 Years is a very British film. There are no Hollywood moments, no overwrought emotions, no final redemption, just the stoicism of a seemingly rock solid relationship in silent crisis. Classy and brilliant.
It’s Oscars night and the smart money’s on Eddie Redmayne as Best Actor for his extraordinary portrayal of scientist Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything. Part love story, part biopic, we saw the film last month and were utterly mesmerised; by the performances, by the score and by the story. Hawking, everyone’s favourite cosmologist, was diagnosed with motor neuron disease at the hopeful age of 21 when he was a rising star at Cambridge. He was given two years to live. He’s now 73 and his place in the heavens is assured. As for Redmayne, he is Hawking’s doppelganger and when he smiles, the entire screen lights up. What kind of cinematic trickery is that?
Grey gays are in the news right now. For a start, Joel Grey, the actor who found fame as the camp Emcee from Cabaret, came out publicly at the grand old age of 82. His revelation prompted a conversation about the point of coming out so late in life, as if sexuality only preoccupies the young. For me, coming out at any age is better than never coming out at all. I guess that’s easy for me to say but I’m saying it anyway. A story I recently heard on the radio illustrates my point. A carer used to visit an elderly man. One day he unburdened his ‘dark secret’ and confessed to her that he was gay – but his shame stopped him from ever acting on his feelings. He died as he had lived. Alone.
And then there’s the Royal Pardon granted to Alan Turing. This was the man who cracked the Enigma codes used by German U-boats in World War Two and who many historians believe shortened the conflict by two years. Alan Turing was gay. Shortly after the war, he was convicted of gross indecency (a crime that only applied to gay men) and was chemically castrated. A fine reward from a grateful nation. He committed suicide soon after.
Following a determined campaign by his family, Alan Turing was pardoned in 2013, nine years after the offence of gross indecency was itself finally repealed. Last year, a film about his life was released, starring Benedict Cumberbatch as the mathematical genius. And now, the success of the Imitation Game has encouraged a new campaign, this time to pardon all 49,000 men convicted of gross indecency. Most of these men would have had their lives torn apart by this nasty little law. Some will be still be alive. Benedict Cumberbatch, the lovely lovey with the glorious name, has signed an open letter to the British Government in support of the campaign. There’s a petition. Please sign it if you can. I think it’s the least we can do.
I’ll finish off with my own little story about coming out in old age. Liam and I were having a bottle of red in our local when we overheard a conversation by a couple of old codgers standing next to us at the bar. It went something like this:
You’re never too old for a cuddle. I wonder what the happened in the end?
Perking the Pansies 