The Arcade Fire

In absolute awe. Just can't stop listening to the melodies of their last feat, Neon Bible. The relentless crescendos of vocals, the incredible reinvention of the organ, the choirs, the drums, the beautiful voices of Win and Régine. The best album I have heard since Thom Yorke's The Eraser, although the two are not really comparable.

Some tracks here. Others here. But you should simply go buy the album and play it ad nauseam...


Anyway, since I mentioned Thom, and in a Le Ducesque twist, Radiohead's blog shows several pictures of them carving out their new album. And Thom is growing a beard... and is getting every day closer to my idea of a God-on-Earth:


Sigh...

And then there were 299...

300 opened last night in London to packed cinemas, and we were there, on the front row of the Islington Vue for enhanced visual stimulation, enjoying every rippling bit of it. To call it a gloriously camp video game is an understatement. It's as close as you can get to gay porn, without getting an R18 certification.


The film oozes homosexual double-entendres all over the place, from a Xerxes modelled on RuPaul trying to get every muscular man to kneel before him, to a Rick Wolfmeier-lookalike Leonidas, leading an army of semi-naked muscle-marys. There are also some of the campest lines in the history of cinema:

Captain: On these shields, boys!

Persian Officer: SPARTANS! Lay down your weapons!
Leonidas: Persians...COME AND GET THEM!

Leonidas: We're in for one wild night!

Xerxes: Cruel Leonidas demanded that you stand. I require only that you kneel...

Leonidas: You have a good thrust!


Oh, and did I mention those rippling abs? We estimated that over 1m must crunches have gone into each actor's 'character' preparation. And not one of them was wasted...!

As for the whole Iran-US political controversy, it's simply far-fetched. The film is just brilliantly ridiculous, and if anything it's the Persians - with their multicultural army and grottesquely-complicated (and ineffective) war machines - that resemble the US, not the Spartans.

Another movie to... er... go down in history as a queer classic pretending to be a straight macho epic. Brilliant!

Random vibrations

Creating a Community

So just in case you were wondering, someone out there is seeting the rules of the Community. They are:

1. Create something worth building a community around.
2. Identify and recruit your thunderlizards—immediately!
3. Assign one person the task of building a community.
4. Give people something concrete to chew on.
5. Create an open system.
6. Welcome criticism.
7. Foster discourse.
8. Publicize the existence of the community.

I think we're pretty much there...

(pic courtesy of kimgilmour @ London Photos)

Apocalypto

Le Duc recently posted possibly the best review of Apocalypto I have read, so I won't indulge here. Suffice to say, I share most of his take, including the South Park quote. It is - literally - an amazing film, in the sense that your eyes will remain glued to the screen for the duration of the movie. There is, indeed, little psychological introspection, but then who cares? No one ever thought this was what the movie was about.

The unknown cast is extraordinary, and proof once again that all that money spent on acting schools is mostly wasted. If the director knows what he's doing, 70% of the job is done. The remaining 30% is in the hands of the producer (I am told).

The Good German

There are some films that just make you wonder: what were they thinking!?!? The Good German is one of them. The plot twists and turns in the most improbably-complex manner, leaving everyone - including the characters - frankly bored, until it comes crashing down in one of the most memorable anti-climaxes I have ever seen.

The undoubtedly beautiful photography fails to distract from some of the poorest performances Cate Blanchett and George Clooney have ever given, not so much because they acted badly, but because you could see that they couldn't care less for the fate of their characters. And indeed, nor could we after 105 minutes of pain and boredom.

What were you thinking, Steven?

He said. She said.

He said . . . I don’t know why you wear a bra; you’ve got nothing to put in it. She said . . . You wear pants don’t you?

He said . . ….. Shall we try swapping positions tonight?
She said . That’s a good idea - you stand by the ironing board while I sit on the sofa and fart!

He said . … What have you been doing with all the grocery money I gave you?
She said . .Turn sideways and look in the mirror!

He said . . ….. Why don’t you tell me when you have an orgasm?
She said . . .. I would but you’re never there.

He said . ….. Why don’t women blink during foreplay?
She said . . They don’t have time

He said . . How many men does it take to change a roll of toilet paper?
She said . We don’t know; it has never happened.

He said . . Why is it difficult to find men who are sensitive, caring and good- looking?
She said . . . They already have boyfriends.

She said…What do you call a woman who knows where her husband is every night?
He said . . . A widow.

He said . .. . Why are married women heavier than single women?
She said . . . Single women come home, see what’s in the fridge and go to bed. Married women come home, see what’s in bed and go to the fridge.

Quadruple Bill

Four in a row, to get over the fact that the Eurostar was stranded and the continent isolated, so I couldn't go and celebrate with Little Pea the start of a New Europe.

First: Sleeping Dogs (aka Sleeping Dogs Lie in the US, aka Stay). Quirky, funny and starring an incredibly handsome Bryce Johnson, it's one of those hugely enjoyable movies, which - like a good pizza eaten with friends - I will have forgotten in the sea of pizzas with friends I have consumed over my lifetime:


Second: The Family Friend (L'Amico di Famiglia). The new tour de force by Paolo Sorrentino, the acclaimed director of The Consequences of Love. Giacomo Rizzo is breathtakingly good as Geremia de Geremei, a grotesque moneylender in small-town Lazio still living with his even more grotesque mother. The film is bold. Not a single character is likeable. The plot buzzes is circles like an annoying mosquito in a hot summer night, and eventually stings you, leaving an itchy sense of frustration. I left the cinema slightly depressed about the pockets of decay - real and imaginary - that my country increasingly harbours:


Third: East is East, that classic British comedy set on the border between Manchester and Pakistan, starring an impeccable Om Puri and an equally impeccable Linda Bassett of Calendar Girls memory:


Fourth: and finally, late at night, with yet anoter bottle of wine by my side, and my companions crushed by the cinematic marathon, ¡Átame! (Time me up, tie me down!), by il maestro Almodovar. Fabulously-sensual Victoria Abril, electrifying Antonio Banderas (who's in pre-production for the Memoirs of Hadrian, one of 2 top novels, alongside Charlie Hunnam... yum!), plus Julieta Serrano, Rossy de Palma and María Barranco. We love them all.

And another term is over

Maybe I try too hard
The long drawn hours
of relentless fatigue

Maybe that's it
I should just give me a break
Give me a break
from this relentless fatigue

Maybe it's worth it
after all, the hours
and the sweat and the sore back
sore from all this toil
of relentless fatigue

Maybe, just maybe

Maybe I try too hard



(Photo courtesy: Exploding Dog)

300

Now now...

The White Countess

Probably the worst movie I have ever seen. Ever.
It included these hideous characters:


And these:

Plus of course these two


I don't really know what was worse. Realising that the Merchant-Ivory duo should be separated for good and confined to 2 very remote tropical islands, far enough for them not to cause further damage; or that the director of photography, the great Christopher "In the Mood for Love" Doyle, no longer knows his mouth from his...

Luckily we had such 'art' to entertain us:

Becoming Jane

Go and see this movie NOW!!!!! It's AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The weekend in pictures

It all started with Lady V and a squash... bound to happen, uh?

The angels of Exmouth Mkt

My new favourite Thai cook! Amp!!!


One for the boys...

Manu preparing 'saltimbocca', which turned out better than expected, actually...!

Tolgonai preparing her amazing Central Asian bread...

Tom looking thoughtful...

PDF looking... well... like PDF

And the next day... premiere! Here's Heidi preparing Lady V for the paparazzi. It took hours...

... but the results were great!

... and so were the furs (fake, of course) we wore for the occasion!

Final note: disgusted that London Lite didn't publish the images of Lady V, Mr G and me walking down the red carpet in Leicester Square. We looked far cooler than those tarted-up actors and actresses who made it on the central spread...!!! Damn...!

The tears of Bamako

What a strange, beautiful and sad film Bamako is, part documentary, part proper movie.
It made me - once more - want to return to Africa...
Maybe once this damn' MSc is over...

The end of an era is always the beginning of another era

No one knows how dinosaurs became extinct. To avoid similar confusion to future researchers, I have decided to document minute-by-minute the dramatic end of the PDF era and the beginning of the Heidi era. These are shocking images, so parents, please, you have been warned...

Here is the first, devastating image of PDF's departure:


Note to future researchers: something that even us observers of the cataclysmic event could not fathom was how he managed to fit into that tiny room so much junk:


Some observers were clearly too shocked to comprehend the gravity of the situation. This particular one, laughing at the impending tragedy, reminded me of the orchestra that carried on playing while the Titanic was sinking inexorably into the icy waters of the North Atlantic:


Soon, I was just left alone with an empty crate of memories:


But thankfully, there is no shortage of Americans in London these days, although it is still a mistery why so many of them would choose to live in a phonebox-sized bedroom with two Italian overpretentious arses. This one, at least, won't crack her head open every time she stands up under her bunk-bed:


Interestingly, she too seemed to be able to fit far more stuff than I ever expected into the phonebox-sized bedroom. I am wondering if they found some secret storage chamber somewhere under the floorboards... perhaps I should charge more rent to be on the safe side:


Now, one thing I was already missing from Paul's era was the extensive array of headwear and juvenile tools I could pick from in moments of exhuberance or dismay. Thankfully, Heidi must have guessed my thoughts, because she came extremely well-prepared: tiara and sound-emitting sword top my favourite list so far...


... followed of course by pink hat


One for the paparazzi: landlord (with safety helmet) and lodger (with tiara)


Yes, the room is beginning to look lived-in once more. The trauma only lasted for 2 hours, thankfully:


And it looks like there might be advantages to living with a young straight woman: I can actually hang... er... my calendars in her room, and she won't tear them down in disgust!


Goodbye, PDF... you will be very missed...

And welcome to your new home, Heidi!! Let the fun begin!!!

Counting the weeks, no longer the months...

Viva la Madonna!

Pop star Madonna has said she "wants to be like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and John Lennon".

That's coincidence: I wish someone would kill you, too.

U-S-A! U-S-A!

I am sorry, my dear American friends, but this is just too funny/scary

Dead Poets Society

Conversation over dinner reminded me of this old classic I loved madly when I was a kid. If I was cooler, I'd probably come up with some sophisticated critique à la Le Duc/Tot about why this film is fundamentally flawed, not encompassing the multiple layers of contraddictions of post-modern/constructivist intergenerational conflict, blah blah blah, and we'd all rather spend our precious time watching again a) The Rains of Ranchipur, b) Olsenbanden og Dynamitt-Harry mot nye høyder, or c) A bout de Souffle.

But back then, life was simpler and films made me cry when they had plots that spoke to the heart of an angsty teenage boy and when they had Ethan looking like this in them:

I love London

Where else?