Black Goo at Tring

 

On Monday we decided it would be nice to have lunch in Tring. Instead of the usual places, we headed for Black Goo, a café where we had been once before. It was very busy but there was one table left next to the window. I chose the hash browns that came with a lovely cheese topping, other bits and pieces and masses of avocado. Alison went for the poached eggs which is a house speciality. Both were excellent. I think that the name Black Goo comes from the coffins of  Egyptian Mummies that when they were found were covered in this type of material. See the British Museum website.

Movies at Home: Thirst, The Good Liar and Nightmare Alley

 

I have enjoyed all of the films of Park Chan Wook, from The Handmaiden, Stoker, Decision to Leave and Lady Vengeance. However I was somewhat disappointed with Thirst, a kind of vampire story but not always an intelligent plot. Although the script is actually brilliant, there is not enough story and what is there is quite surreal.    It stars Song Kang-ho who was great in The Host, Snowpiercer and especially Parasite. He plays a Catholic priest who becomes addicted to blood after volunteering for a failed trial. he becomes involved with a friend's wife who turns into a more revolting individual than himself. However, the cinematography is pure class, the camera always on the move, up down above below and through corridors. There is too much gore in the second half which ultimately spoils the movie.

Adapted from the book by Nicholas Searle by Jeffrey Hatcher with direction by Bill Condon comes this strange two hander. Ian McKellen and Helen Mirren do their best in a story about a conman. Mirren is the target, but is she all she seems? There are plenty of twists along the way but I found the whole thing quite seedy. None of the characters have any redeeming features. The London locations are good but not enough to elevate the film from it's nastiness.

I posted a review of this film on 3rd February 2022 when I was impressed by the writing and direction of Guillermo del Toro. Every shot is like a piece of art, especially in the first half. The sets, the colour, the light and shade of the fairground. This time round I was less impressed with Bradley Cooper in the leading role. He was put in the shade by superior performances from Toni Collette and David Strathairn. The film is less good in the second half without them. Then the look is different and the story takes on a more sinister feel. Cooper's scenes with Cate Blanchett seem a little awkward as the movie veers to something nastier. But oh, the look.

A Circular Village Walk in December

 

Today I set off on a five mile circular walk that starts from the house. Turning left down Baker's Walk and then right down Church Lane before another left down Church Walk. The flood halfway down where the road crosses Wendover Brook is not as bad as it was.

At the end of Church Walk is the church of St Mary the Virgin.

At the end of the churchyard is a wonderful view of the Chilterns.

The field is muddy but passable. At the end of this field is a style that takes you to a much larger field. 

A long muddy path arrives at the Wendover Arm of the Grand Union Canal. Following it's upgrade, the canal path is fine. It arrives at Halton and that is where I follow the road as it loops around the playing fields of RAF Halton. Today there was a major event being set up on the cricket field. No cricket hasq been played there for years.

Arriving at one of the paths that follows Wendover Brook to the reservoir, I saw that the brook was now full of growth, it having been cleared earlier in the year.

At the end of this path is Weston Turville Reservoir. The Chiltern Hills in the distance are as grey as the weather.

Onto Worlds End Lane, a walk into Weston Turville and a loop around the village gets me to the five miles. For some reason my legs were far better in the last couple of miles and I managed to get up a decent pace. Where did that come from? What I like about this walk is that as well as circular, all the sections are very different. 

Our Christmas Tree

 

Our Christmas tree is thirteen years old this month. In December 2020 (see photo below) I said how it was becoming more difficult to lug the three pieces up and down from the loft. Four years later it is not any easier. The photo above also shows how a lot of lights are now not working. So will this be it's final year?

The Films of Powell and Pressburger - I Know Where I'm Going, A Matter of Life and Death and The life and Death of Colonel Blimp

 On the 18th November 2023, I posted a review of the first in a series about The Art of Film on Sky Arts: The Unique Styles of  Powell and Pressburger. I have now watched three of the films that were mentioned that were all shown on Sky Arts over the last few months. They all have something in common. But not just Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger who share the roles of producers, writers and directors. They are The Archers.

A black and white movie from 1945. I thought I Know Where I'm Going was the least successful of the three. Wendy Hiller plays Joan Webster, on her way to an island in the Hebrides to marry a much older but wealthier man. The film is about the journey, thwarted on many occasions by the weather. Stranded on the Isle of Mull she meets Torquil MacNeil played by Roger Livesey. A relationship develops between the two. 

Far better is A Matter of Life and Death, also from 1945. A mixture of scenes in colour and black and white, depending on whether we are on earth or in heaven. David Niven plays Peter Carter, the captain and sole remaining occupant of a Lancaster bomber, badly damaged and making it's way home from a mission in WW2. He's in contact with June, a radio operator played by Kim Hunter. Somehow he survives the crash landing on the coast, or did he? He does meet June and they fall in love, much to the concern of the powers that be in heaven as he should be dead. All very surreal but always interesting. June finds Peter a doctor, and who should turn up but Roger Livesey. The scenes set in heaven are a treat which makes this an ambitious and original movie.

Is The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp their masterpiece, or just a failed jumble. I thought The Archers had bitten off more than they could chew. It's all a bit of a jumble and far too long at two and a half hours. It has a lot of history on the net. It precedes the previous two films as it was made in 1943. One of the first films in glorious technicolour. A kind of comedy that follows the life of Clive Candy played by (you've guessed it, Roger Livesey) as he makes his way through the first world war and in the peace that followed. But it's the switches of time that destroys any real coherence to the plot. 

From the start set in the second world war, it back tracks to 1902. Then Candy is off  on an unauthorised mission to Berlin where he meets Edith Hunter played by Deborah Kerr. A set piece in a large nightclub involves the German army and brings Candy into contact with an officer Kaunitz played by Anton Walbrook. It is these three main characters who form the basis for what happens next. 

However, suddenly we are in 1918 and this is where the film seemed to lose it's way. Clive marries someone who looks very like Edith. Finally we fast forward to 1939 so it's difficult to keep up. It is a light and witty movie but far too ambitious and episodic to make real sense. And why the wives of the two men should end up dead before them is silly. Deborah Kerr was far nicer than any of the men in her three roles. A failed masterpiece.

Inside Cinema Shorts Episodes 61-70

 

"Everyone loves a good cameo" says Ali Plumb in Episode 61 Cameo Overload. But she shows far too many to mention here. From David Bowie in Zoolander (2001) to Alfred Hitchcock putting himself somewhere in all his movies. But what was David Beckam doing in King Arthur (2017). However our presenter's favourite was "the late, great Stan Lee".

Of course it's Escape to Victory that starts off Carl Anka's The Beautiful Game that is episode 62. But it's not easy getting films about football right. But Kes (1969), Gregory's Girl (1981), Bend it like Beckam (2002) and Fever Pitch (1997) did OK. Although I skipped the documentaries.

Leila Latif tells us about Senegalese film maker Ousmane Sembene in Episode 63 The Father of African Cinema. A pioneer.

Here are Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan in 2003's Freaky Friday that starts off Episode 64 Body Swaps. We see the original 1976 movie later. Tara Judah takes us through so many going back to 1948 and Vice Versa. 13 Going on 30, The Change Up (2011) and even Jumanji. 

Episode 65 is Uncanny Spaces from Wendy Ide. It's about when films deviate from physics. Such as Jack Nicholson losing touch with reality in The Shining (1980), Jim Carey being set up in The Truman Show (1998) and Anthony Hopkins succumbing to dementia in 2020's The Father. Among other examples we see obvious stuff from Harry Potter and Inception (2010).

Who else but Keanu Reeves in Episode 66 The Cult of Keanu. James King looks at  these films that star this one actor, in all sorts of different genres.

It's Caitlin Quinlan who looks at Underdogs in Episode 67. They come in various forms, but are typically young, male and American. Typically Rocky (1976) and lots more. It was more interesting to see female heroines in films such as A League of their Own (1992), Fighting with my Family (2019), Whip It (2009), She's the Man (2006) and Million Dollar Baby (2004).

Episode 68 is All About Bette. Yes it's all about Bette Davis, and Anna Bogutskaya takes us through " a career spanning six decades". From Of Human Bondage (1934) when she first showed her anger and belligerence that were to become her trademarks over the years. Anna tells us "how she went through physical transformations that were such a trademark of Bette. Her greatest role may have been All About Eve (1950) but she was also famous for her totally deranged role in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane (1962) where her sparring with Joan Crawford is so well remembered. 

Christina Newland surprisingly presented Episode 69 about boxing: Heavyweight Drama. Not my favourite genre as we see films from 1926's Battling Butler (directed by Buster Keaton no less) to all those of the modern era. We also saw lots of boxing documentaries.

In the last of these ten shorts, John Cunningham looks at The MacGuffin in Episode 70. "They may seem every day objects" but are crucial to the plot. It's always something that motivates the characters, always an object like the ring in The Big Lebowski (1998) that kicks off the whole story. In Mission Impossible 3 everybody wants to know "where is the rabbit' foot". They are everywhere in the Indiana jones movies. The word Macguffin came from screen writer Angus MacPhail in his collaborations with Alfred Hitchcock. It just had to be him.

James Bolam

 

We have been watching the BBC detective drama series New Tricks for many years. The first series started in 2004 and finally finished with series 12 in 2015. Every episode is on BBC iPlayer and we have started all over again. One of the stars was James Bolam who played Ex Detective Chief Superintendent Jack Halford. James is now 89 and it occurred to me that I did have a photo on this blog from when I saw him on stage at the Theatre Royal, Brighton in 1968. See post of 22nd March 2009. With Liz Frazer and a young Ian McKellen.