RIP David Lodge

 

David Lodge was nearly ninety when he died last week. There are numerous obituaries on the internet. I can only add that I always looked forward to his latest book. On the 19th November 2009, I included a review of one of his novels deaf sentence. The author himself was losing some of his hearing, as I am now. So I will read it again to see how he coped. Here is what I said:

But if you want good writing, David Lodge is your man. This is the eighth novel of his that I have read, and "deaf sentence" is up there with the best. The words are music to the ear. Retired professor of linguistics Desmond Bates is going deaf, and the story revolves around his coping, or not, with his affliction. It is funny, poignant and life affirming. Brilliant.

Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl

 

I rarely post about TV programmes, but Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl is included in Sight and Sound film reviews as it was shown in a few cinemas. Nick Bradshaw tells us "Nick Park and his crack corps of modellers have honed another marvel of homespun mayhem and northern burlesque ungirded by iron-strength irony". I was slightly disappointed in that it did not quite match previous films. But there was still much left to enjoy. See my comments in the review of the winter edition of Sight and Sound magazine. 

Garden in New Year 2025

 

The bulbs next to the dwarf wall were already sprouting before Christmas. On a frosty January morning, it was great to see a promise of the spring to come. Then today I noticed the hyacinths appearing for the first time.

RIP Johnnie Walker

 

It was only on the 10th October that I posted about the retirement of Johnnie Walker, the BBC disc jockey. His death was published on the last day of December following his passing on the Tuesday. There are many obituaries on the net. I previously said how he was important to my drive home on so many early evenings.

In the Sunday Times of 5th January, there was a lovely piece by his friend and fellow DJ Bob Harris. He said that Johnnie was "stubborn, rebellious, fearless, generous and kind" and how he kept going despite suffering from idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. "I will always remember Johnnie as a broadcaster who set the bar for all of us". That maybe why I remember his Drivetime shows so well.

Review of 2024

 

Every year I seem to start my review with some photos of the garden. It must be that all the borders are so bare this time of year, it's nice to look back to when they were full of flowers. The photo above is from the end of June. I planted dahlias too early in the bedding border, and most were eaten before they became established. They were replaced with some verbena.

My favourite flower is still the rose Blue for You.

We had two good holidays. Buxton in June.

And Chichester at the end of September. We will always remember the polo at Cowdray Park on our way down.

The circular routes that I can walk from the house that I wrote about this time last year have continued in 2024. Then in February I set out to trace the route of Wendover Brook from it's source to where it joins Bear Brook, all on my post of 18th February.

I have only been to the theatre twice this year. Redlands at Chichester and The Buddha of Suburbia at the Barbican. But there have been some plays shown live in cinemas with more next year. This year I cancelled my subscription for Cineworld in Hemel Hempstead, it's just too far to drive there and back. The Odeon in Aylesbury does not have the same choice of film, but The Rex in Berkhamsted has movies that do not have a release in the main chains. Here I saw a few marvellous films including Perfect Days, my favourite film of the year. 

In this week's Culture magazine in The Sunday Times, film critic Tom Shone picked his thirteen best films of the year. Somehow I had seen ten : The Holdovers, The Fall Guy, The Wild Robot, The Taste of Things, Twisters, Civil War, Challengers, All of Us Strangers, Drive Away Dolls and Poor Things. Inside Out was for children, The Bikeriders did not appeal and The Promised Land that I can watch on iPlayer. My film studies have included some excellent series on Sky Arts including Classic Movies, Art of Film, Powell and Pressburger and Classic Art and Cinema. 

I look forward to Sight and Sound Magazine every month, however I had only seen twelve of their top fifty films of the year, although most of these have never been on general release. Their Number one was All We Imagine As Light and if I wanted to see it, I would have to go to the Rex in Berkhamsted in January. We also made a visit to the BFI Archive for their Heritage Open Day in September. My favourite book of the year was Ann Patchett's Tom Lake.

Finally, back to the garden and particularly the lawn. Having dispensed with the services of the totally unreliable Green Thumb, the Pro Kleen products were a success. Their iron sulphate worked a treat on the moss (even the very far end looked better) and their Grass Green fertilizer was perfect.

I started this Blog in December 2006, eighteen years ago to coincide with my retirement at the age of 62. Having reached my eightieth birthday five days ago, I hope to keep posting for some time yet.

Sight and Sound Magazine - Winter 2024/2025

 

EDITORIAL

Mike Williams tells us about his job as an editor before going on to review those who had appeared on the  front cover of the magazine over the last year. 

OPENING SCENES

The films to look out for in 2025 are described by Arjun Sajip, continent by continent. America, for example will give us The History of Sound from director Oliver Hermanus with Paul Mescal on a search in New England after WW1 to record local folk music. Paul Thomas Anderson has cast Alana Haim (again) in The Battle of Bakton Cross. Bong Joon Ho follows the brilliant Parasite with Mickey 17. Then there will be Kurosawa Akira's High and Low, Steven Soderburgh's Black Bag with cate Blanchett and Michael Fassbender, and Edgar Wright's The Running Man with Glen Powell going back to the Steven King novel. From the UK comes Maggie O'Farrell's Hamnet and Danny Boyle's 28 Years Later. 

EDITOR'S CHOICE

Some gift recommendations from the contributors. 

IN CONVERSTION

Jesse Eisenberg talks to Lou Thomas about his new film A Real Pain that he wrote, directed and starred in. A visit to Poland on a holocaust tour. He mentions producer Emma Stone and what she brings to the table.

Nothing interesting in FESTIVAL, MEAN SHEETS or READER'S LETTERS

THE LONG TAKE

I had not heard of Humphrey Bogart's third wife, the actress Mayo Methot. Nicole Flattery tells us she was often cast as the second female lead, often a hard bitten dame. She had worked on Broadway when younger before Hollywood called. But she and Bogie were hard drinkers and their relationship ended with depression and violence before he met Lauren Bacall. Mayo died in 1951 at the age of 47. Nicole runs through her movies and calls her "a dame to be reckoned with".

TV EYE

This is all about the 1973 BBC ghost story shown on Christmas Day. The Stone Tape looks far too scary. Andrew Male thought that it was certainly of it's time in attitude (but an "HR victimisation claim if made today). The programme is all about a team using it's brand new audio equipment to record other worldly screams. Written by Nigel Kneale whose BBC's Quartermass is just not scary when watched today.

FLICK LIT

Nicole Flattery talks about the 1970 novel Desperate Characters that is set in New York. "Their own elegant town house in a recently gentrified part of Brooklyn". And the one boarding house left with nine or ten tenants. The 1971 film starred Shirley MacLaine. Nicole compares it with the 1961 film La Notte by Michelangelo Antonioni.  

THE MAGNIFICENT '74

We are in the December of 1974, so are we coming to the end of Jessica Kiang's pieces with this title? That month there were big blockbusters: Airport '75, Earthquake and The Towering Inferno. "How a supremely dazzling year for American cinema ended in disaster". She goes on to say that before 1970, the studios were in disarray with their flimsy output. But then in 1970 came Airport, a big blockbuster with big stars, and then two years later the success of The Poseidon Adventure. All had big names and paved the way for 1974's success.

IN MEMORIAM

These are the obituaries for those who died this year. Donald Sutherland was never even nominated for an Oscar despite his appearances in Klute and Don't Look Now. Another full page for Anouk Aimee, winning a golden globe and Oscar nomination for A Man and a Woman from 1966 as well as starring in Fellini's La Dolce Vita and 8 1/2. However, there were so many people I had never heard of in all sorts of categories. Small mentions for Roger Corman, the director Norman Jewison and the cinematographer Dick Pope who worked for 35 years with Mike Leigh after filming rock concerts and pop videos. He was Oscar nominated for The Illusionist in 2006 and Mr Turner in 2014.

FILMS OF THE YEAR

Here we have a countdown from number 50. There were so many of which I ad never heard. But 16th is Perfect Days (my favourite of the year), 7th is Love Lies Bleeding equal with The Substance and Anora is at number 2. See my reviews. There were many that never reached mainstream cinemas such as Emelia Perez at number 17 and La Chimera at number 3. I might get to see the number 1 All We Imagine as Light. 

We also get long articles on The Year in War Cinema, The Year in Late Style (Megalopolis), The Year in Documentary Film, The Year in Animation and The Year in AI. 

The Year in TV: So much of what was said came from streaming channels. We get Discs of the Year, and Books of the Year.

THE BRUTALIST

Five pages about this film, but it is three and a half hours long. Too much for me at the cinema. Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones star under the direction of Brady Corbet who was also the co-writer. Mona Fast talks abut their co-operation and all the research she did. Shot in Vista vision to give the film scale. About an architect so such a shame it's too long.

NOSFERATU

A remake of the original  1922 film and the 1979 remake, director Robert Eggers (I liked his The Northman) delves into the background. But this is definitely a horror movie as a full page photo will testify. So maybe not. Eggers tells us "Synthesising all these mythologies was a challenge". I bet.

AT THE MOVIES WITH ..... AMY ADAMS

Her film Nightbitch is out soon. She talks about her favourite movies.

RUMOURS

Rumours is a film set at a G7 summit in Germany that sounds totally bonkers. "So wilfully outside the mainstream" with three directors and starring Cate Blanchett.

CHRISTMAS FILMS

A lot of those chosen are not at all Christmassy. (Stalag 17 and Godfather Part 111 ?) The only new film was Christmas Eve at Millers Point - that has no general release.

REVIEWS

These include Babygirl starring Nicole Kidman. Director Halina Reijn tells us the film was "an opportunity to bring my Dutch, more liberated ideas to the US". "A superb Nicole Kidman". Then The Brutalist (see above). Juror #2 is a legal thriller set in a courtroom and directed by Clint Eastwood. Maria is the biopic of Maria Callas starring Angelina Jolie. Written by Steven Knight and directed by Pablo Larrain that follows his Jackie and Spencer.

Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl in cinemas and on the BBC over Christmas. There were so many references to other films. The voice of Ben Whitehead stands in for Peter Sallis. I loved the last words: "I'm a happy nifty Norbot. I love to trim the hedge". Which spelt out "THE END". 

Jesse Eisenberg writes, directs and stars in his film A Real Pain, visiting Poland with a cousin. We Live In Time has Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield and dips back and forth in time - "narrative temporal hopscotching". 

DVD and BLURAY

Mainly new releases of old movies including the 1933 original of King Kong.

WIDER SCREEN

An interesting article about film collectives.

BOOKS

Silent to Sound is Geoff Brown's study of early British cinema from 1900 to the early 1930's looks interesting. Unfortunately Pedro Almodóvar's The Last Dream does not.

FROM THE ARCHIVE

From the Winter 1960/67 Edition comes Humphrey and Bogey, where Louise Brooks looked at her and his relationships with the major studios where they were under contract. One interesting comment was that in 1921/22 there were 2,044 plays produced in New York! But from all those actors, only four made the big time in films.

Hot Stew, going into a dark house and Ordinary Human Failings

 

 It all started with a lovely short history of Soho where the book is based. "Luxury flats stood on crumbling slums like shining false teeth on rotten gums". There are many interesting inhabitants whose stories alternate in short sharp chapters. We hear a lot about Precious and |Tabitha who reside in one of those older tower blocks owned by rich Agatha Howard. She wants them out. Among the down and outs are Paul Daniels and Debby McGee, not their real names. In the later chapter "Debbie McGee: Redux", Cheryl Lavery (her real name) has disappeared. We knew she found a deep opening in the ground and thought the worst. But these few pages were brilliant, on their own, worth reading this book.

There are other characters whose stories seem detached from the main narrative, only to make connections towards the end. Bastian, Rebecca, Glenda and Laura could be from another story entirely, but their twenty something relationships are well told. This is a really entertaining book, sharp and clever once you get used to the prose. I found it absolutely stunning.

Having read all of Jane Gardam's novels, I am going back to her short story collections. These are not included in her anthology "The Stories" and are much older works.
BLUE POPPIES
Lillian's mother is in her nineties and accompanies her daughter to Clere, the home of the duke and duchess. Witty and sensitive.
CHINESE FUNERAL
An Englishwoman and her husband are in Hong Kong and join a trip into China. Not what they were expecting.
ZOO ZOO
Another nonagenarian, Sister Alfege, is a German nun in a convent in Kent. All about how she left her homeland before the war and stayed. She is on her way to a place that can nurse her poor legs. But the nuns who accompany her there have a shock on the way back.
THE MEETING HOUSE
The Quakers have an old building in a deserted place, high up in the hills of the far north west, only visiting in the summer. New arrivals seem to torment them. But is this a ghost story?
THE DAMASCUS PLUM
An introduction to the gourmet food and fish of the East Kent coast. A visitor is young Klaus, very intelligent but with no imagination. Treating him to a dinner of many courses that he enjoyed but never remembered.
DEAD CHILDREN
Ancient Alison Avery is meeting Pete and Annie, her two grown up children to talk about her will. But for various reasons that doesn't happen on this particular day. They walk on the common that is still home to the old lady, her remembering when they were children. But remember the title?
BEVIS
The longest of the stories by far at nearly 40 pages. Our narrator is 13 and his ma a widow. That leaves Auntie Greta Willis and her huge daughter Jilly. The young ones are off to see their frail grandmother in a care home that becomes a surreal adventure. Jilly hopes to meet Bevis, a much older man, the object of her affections. Thwarted by a big twist at the end.
TELEGONY
Three short but connected pieces.
1: going into a dark house
Molly, who we have met before, is now 94 and the narrator's "mother's friend". Molly says she "is frightfully mean" but is the opposite. (Once buying the narrator a car). Her investments are amazing, but she she lived in a house that has no heating. Now in a little house on an estate for retired people, but still driving her own car.
11: Signor Settimo
He is that new photographer that has opened for business in Shipley of all places. Mrs Ironside persuades him to take a photo of her daughter, here is Molly as a schoolgirl.
111: The Hot Sweets of Cremona
We know this is where Settimo came from, but here is Molly's daughter Alice (now herself a grandmother) with a friend talking about Molly, her mother and all that family history. These three short stories are a kind of experiment, but for me, the least successful of all.

It's 1990 and Tom Hargreaves, a youngish reporter on the make, stumbles upon the story of a missing girl. Is this his big break? He muscles in on the residents of the Skyler Estate. Here we find the main character of the story, Carmel living with her elderly father John and brother Richie. But it's her young daughter Lucy who the police think is involved and taken to the station. As a result the family are hidden away in an old empty hotel by Tom's newspaper. Richie "could have cried with relief at the smell of whisky and spilt beer on the carpet".

Tom wants to get their story but all he gets, as we do too, is their background. Nolan brilliantly describes what is going through the minds of the three as they consider their lives. Richie's is particularly well written as we hear about his twenty one year old self and the mistakes he made. Throwing away the chance of something good. His father's story about his marriage to his first wife when both so young is equally good. But the main thread belongs to Carmel, her relationship with an older man, becoming pregnant with Lucy with whom she is almost estranged. It's her stepmother Rose who was the backbone of the family. Her loss is always there.