The Fuscia Aurea and the Main Border

 

This was the main border in April 2015. I had removed an invasive Pyracantha and there was lots of room for new plants. These included the Fuchsia Aurea that I planted next to the fence. Over the years it seemed to have disappeared with all the shrubs and plants in front. However, this summer, nine years later, it has put in a far better appearance. 

As a comparison with the top photo, here is the main border in 2021.

Movies at Home: The Truth, Paris Texas and Youth

 

Well her daughter didn't think it was, The Truth that is. Legendary actress Fabienne played by the imperious Catherine Deneuve has published her memoirs. But her daughter, screenwriter Lumir played by Juliette Binoche, has taken exception and maybe in retaliation is making Memories of my Mother, a scfi drama. So this is all set up for some wonderful sparring between two actresses at the top of their game. Add in Ethan Hawke as Lumir's husband and a failing actor and there is lots to enjoy. Director Hirokazu Kure-eda in his first non Japanese feature has made the most of the film's settings in a luxury Villa and the scenes in Paris. After all their arguments, the two stars agree that "we get each other". Whether that is for better or worse, we are left to ponder. I have added the director's 2018 Palme d'Or winner Shoplifters to my to see list.

Another top director, Wim Wenders won the 1984  Palme d'Or at Cannes for Paris, Texas. In a desert in West Texas strides Travis Henderson (Harry Dean Stanton) looking like some kind of drifter. We watch the landscape, a silent man and the guitar of Ry Cooder. Just a haunting theme. A card in his pocket leads to a rescue by his long lost brother Walt who takes him home. Here I was so impressed by his ever loving wife Anne played majestically by Aurore Clement. The problem is that they took in Travis' son Hunter when Travis disappeared and this new relationship with his father is an emotional part of the film. Hunter's mother Jane gave him to her brother Walt to look after as she could not cope.

But what interested me was the location of the house high up in the Verdugo Hills overlooking Burbank Airport and the city suburbs way below. Later Travis and Hunter make the effort to track down Jane (Nastassja Kinski) and for some reason, it is she who fronts most of the film's posters. The movie is of it's time that is 1984. I found the first longer half far superior to the second, almost like two different films. It's quite a sad movie, lit up by some outstanding performances and the staggering light. 

This movie was also discussed by David Thomson in his book "Have You Seen.....". He says "I used to like it very much". But he is now less impressed and finds it "uncomfortable". As I said, it is of it's time.

Saved by a wonderful performance by Michael Caine, Youth could have been so much better. Instead of concentrating on the drama, it drifts off into art house type visuals as images are patched in. In the most luxurious hotel up in the beautiful mountains of Switzerland congregate the rich and the famous. The elderly ex conductor Fred Ballinger (Caine) is here on his usual summer break. Also here are Harvey Keitel  as Mick Boyle, a film director not accepting he is way past his sell by date. They do have some interesting conversations, but not enough that we can understand their past. 

Also here is Rachel Weisz as Ballinger's daughter and Paul Dano as actor Jimmy Tree getting into a new role. So there was plenty to look forward to, but unfortunately it is only the scenery and hotel interiors that are the best things about this movie. Co-writer/director Paolo Sorrentino thinks a number of short scenes can make up for the lack of a coherent narrative. He was wrong.

A note about the hotels used for the film. The 19th century Waldhous Flims Resort Spa, a five star hotel, and a few valleys away, the Besshotel Schatzalp in Davos. It  had the perfect view. Travel expert Simon Calder (who we love) said the film "knitted together two historic hotel resorts in mountainous Eastern Switzerland", courtesy of Emily Rose Mawson in The Independant.

Alice Guy at the Olympic Opening Ceremony

 

My post of the 27th February this year about Alice Guy was inspired by an article in the March edition of Sight and Sound magazine. The first female film director was French, and here she was, rising from The Seine at the Olympic Opening Ceremony along with nine other remarkable women from that country in the "Equalite" section. 

It took me a long time to find this photograph, most publications included photos of other statues of the ten. But then, low and behold, I found a piece from yalefilmarchive, who proudly announced this was she of their Alice Cinema. Hurrah!

Rose Blue for You

 

This was the rose Blue for You in June when it had masses of flowers. By early July they had faded and it was time for a pruning and feeding.

It is now ready to bloom again and I counted eighty six new buds. It seems to do well in a sheltered spot in the side patio next to the brick wall, soaking up the heat. The flowers are just beginning to arrive. They seem to be more blue than last month.

Cordon Tomatoes

 

When Alison brought home a tomato plant that had been given to her by her friend Phyllis, my reaction was that I no longer do veg. However, I was persuaded to give this a go, and started with planting it in a large container and placing it at the junction of the back wall and the conservatory.

Cordon tomatoes are grown on a single stem and are also known as vine tomatoes. All side shoots need to be pinched out and then also the top when it achieves the desired height. In our case at the top of our tallest support. It was lucky I had a full bottle of tomato feed. There are now about a dozen tomatoes having formed, Alison having the most important duty of counting them.

The Seventh Son, Yellowface and Family Album

 

Despite the fact that some of the science is baffling, ("sequencing the genome of homovannesiensis") this is a terrific novel. Set in the future, Seth is the product of some highly unethical engineering headed by billionaire and rogue scientist Lukas Parn. Talissa Adam thinks, as a surrogate, that she is simply carrying the baby for another couple that will fund her research. Little does she know.

We follow Seth as he grows up with his family. He goes to school where, although a little different to the other children, that is nothing really remarkable. The conversation the parents have with his teacher a the end of term is brilliantly subtle and superbly written. Fast forward to Seth at university and one of the oldest colleges. He hardly attends lectures but has some odd ability. In time something leaks about his background. Talissa comes back into the story, her later relationship with Seth (and his parents) is quite remarkable.

I'm afraid this was not my kind of book. Possibly a novel for readers much younger than me, maybe the language seeming how they must communicate. There was very little subtlety in the prose, but lots of swearing to compensate. The narrator was the most awful person that you could imagine. Fortunately I know no-one remotely like her. And it does the book absolutely no favours.

"Don't we all want a friend who won't challenge our superiority". That's June Hayward moaning about her successful "friend" Athena Linn. Well, that doesn't last long. One reviewer says it's "a lackluster examination of plagiarism, privilege and cultural appropriation that is too assured in it's own rightness". So is this a satire that just ploughs relentlessly forward to an ending that is even worse than what went before? I have no idea.

In 2012 our book club read "Moon Tiger" by this author. We were all very impressed by the novel and in my blog posting of 1st November I left a note to read another of Penelope Lively's books. It has taken me over thirteen years to do that, and only because an article in the Sunday Times on the 14th June included this book in "what to read if you loved Tom Lake". That is a new novel by Ann Patchett, a favourite author and just ordered today. The others listed were books I had read: Elizabeth Strout's "Olive Kitteridge" (27th September 2016), Anne Tyler's "Breathing Lessons" (27th January 2015) and Tessa Hadley's "The Past" (12th September 2016). The only one I had not read was Rose Tremain's "Absolutely and Forever" despite all those others of hers on my shelf.

Back to "Family Album" set in Allersmead, the large aging family home of the Harpers. Six, yes six, children. It took me a while to work out who was who as the story switches back and forth in time. The parents are Alison and Charles, children Paul, Gina, Sandra, Katie, Roger and Clare. We find out all about their childhood and later lives. Not forgetting Ingrid, a live in help for their mother. The descriptions of  the lives of this family are sometimes amusing, sometimes fractious, always interesting. Charles is an academic author of some well received works, but has trained himself to keep in his study and deaf to the goings on in the house.

Each child is introduced in later life as they arrive for a family party, a silver wedding. But mostly the first half is about childhood such as a holiday in Crackington Haven. Later, with the children grown, there are little gems with Paul back at Allersmead, always the black sheep of the family. There are wonderful sections for each of the family, with those parts that involve Gina that are just fabulous. Even Ingrid gets her own story. However, I had forgotten that Lively is such a great writer, I enjoyed dawdling over a paragraph wondering how you get to write this well. Poles apart from a book like "Yellowface".

The Garden in July

The main border is, perhaps, past it's best. But what is interesting is that some plants are now thriving as others fade. 

The bedding border now has verbena in different colours after the original dwarf dahlias were a disaster. But I did have room for half a dozen new ones which seem to be fine. Most not yet in flower.

Some of the roses have finished their first flowering and have new buds for a second bloom. Especially the rose Blue for You. Others are still in flower. Another "good year for the roses".

At the front of the side patio border, an echinacea has popped up.  I cannot remember where this came from, someone must have given it to me, or maybe from a seed packet. But it is doing OK, in about 5mm of soil. The asters are trying to invade it's space.

Only one of the three hostas at the end of the side patio has flowers. Not sure why.

I love the agapanthus, although they might look better in border than in a container. But this is their  third year.

I removed that very tall plant that was dominating the hot bed. The achillea seem better having been pruned earlier in the year. And the poppy has started to flower again.

See other posts for Hypericum Hidcote and the Acanthus. 

Next, a couple of photos from the end of the long border that do not get much attention. At the top, the yellow anthemis is backed by the white astrantia, and below the good old heuchera still flowers after all these years. Somewhere at the back, a transplanted piece of acanthus still appears every year.

There is a separate post for the large Acanthus, but due to the blight that has attacked the leaves, it has been cut back to leave a couple of new stems.

I found a rogue Buddleia in the long border that has now been removed and a peg inserted where it used to be in case it reappears. The whole area around the roses looks far better, especially the poppies.

And finally, the area at the end behind the laurels where I used to have the compost heaps, has now been completely cleared of the prunings of the leylandii from last years visit. An interesting area for the future. The stumps from the old Aylesbury Prune trees that died refuse to break down despite stump killer.