December 2015 book and film review

BOOKS

COUSIN BETTE, by Honore de Balzac.
In the Paris of the 1840s, rich men are prepared to disgrace themselves and lose every centime they own to win the favours of France's most beautiful strumpets. And these all-knowing tarts are perfectly happy to let them do it, if they can secure a sable coat or a prettily furnished apartment out of it. Meanwhile, the less attractive, spurned females plot terrible revenge on the men who have ditched them for more glamorous models.
Balzac, along with such geniuses as Emil Zola, Charles Dickens and George Eliot may be considered one of the great masters of the novel, painting characters with the vividness of a Van Gogh combined with the psychological insight of a Freud or Jung. I have been asked why I neglect modern writers for these long dead fictioners of a bygone age: my answer? They're better, that's why.

THE KILLING DOLL and LIVE FLESH, by Ruth Rendell.
In the first of this "double bill" of Rendell novels placed together in a single edition, a young man sells his soul to the devil, mainly in order to be tall. He learns the black arts, and the white ones, and things seem to be working out wonderfully for him. He does indeed start growing, and from being a Billy-no-mates he becomes popular, especially with the ladies, while his sister too becomes entranced by the strong, self confident man her brother has become. So much so in fact, that she asks him to use his art to kill an enemy. And when that person dies, she realizes his powers have no limit...
In Live Flesh, we find a psychopathic rapist just out of a ten year stretch in prison for paralysing a policeman by shooting him in the spine. He doesn't really feel guilty about what he has done; it was all a matter of unfortunate circumstances in his mind, though others might disagree. Then by chance he discovers where his victim lives and decides to track him down and explain his actions. Surprisingly he is not rejected by the man; indeed an unlikely friendship blossoms. But once a psychopath...
These two book were written in the 1980s, so quite late by my standards (see above) but nonetheless I found them to be excellent examples of the "crime thriller" genre, well written and skillfully plotted. This is my first time with Ruth: it may not be my last.

FILMS

ZERO HOUR! (1958) D- Hall Bartlett. An airliner takes off and meals are served. However, everyone who chooses the fish course goes down with food poisoning, including both pilots. It is left to a former airforce pilot to bring the crate in safely. Only problem there; during the Korean war a mistake costs the life of his best friend and he has been unable to fly since, afflicted with PTSD. In his case this translates to him intermittently turning the engines off or pointing the plane straight at the ground as he is taken by recurrent flashbacks. Sound familiar at all?

It should do. The 1980 film Airplane is basically a shot-for-shot remake of this effort, plus jokes. Airplane  represented the high point of post Python, Saturday Night Live-type American comedies and is generally considered to be a hoot, even today. The original, however, (also owned by Paramount) though scripted by Arthur Hailey from his book (he went on to write the best seller Airport, also filmed) is a bit of a dirge. Dana Andrews plays it straight down the line as the pilot who is more of a liability than anything- frankly a six year-old could have done a better job. Linda Darnell plays his ex, a little plump by now but still gorgeous. I mean, it's worth getting the plane down in one piece just to preserve her, right?
Truly awful.

CAROL (2015) D- Todd Haynes. An upper-crust New York family are splitting up, and as the relationship moves into its death throes, the woman (Cate Blanchett) finds herself becoming fascinated by a young female photographer (Rooney Mara). They decide to go on a road trip together, but the husband, suspecting his wife is a lezzer and knowing this is regarded as "immoral" by the courts of the day (it is set in the early 50s) sets out to gather some damning evidence against her...

This low key story, beautifully acted and directed, is based on the short story "The Price of Salt" by Patricia Highsmith, hence the atmosphere of threat that seems to pervade every frame. It has gone down a storm, especially in Europe where it won an award in Cannes and was hailed in the US as one of the 10 best films of the year. So far it has only received limited theatrical release here, but trust me, it is definitely worth seeking out.
Excellent.

AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON (2015) D- Joss Whedon. The Marvel comics superheroes get together again to fight implacable foes, this time capable of affecting their minds and turning good guys into bad. How can they defeat their enemies? And do we give a toss?
Yes we do, apparently. Although costing a cool quarter of a billion dollars to make, it has already grossed $1.4 billion, thereby confirming the producers' faith in the project, which was brought out in several formats: 2D, 3D, IMAX and probably feelies too.

I won't lie to you. I got annoyed at around 20 minutes in and, tired and angry, stopped watching altogether after about 45 minutes. Wiki says there are no less than 3000 separate special effects scenes in it, enough to provide sensory overload for all but the most dedicated teenage gamers, for whom I presume the whole film was designed. Compare this with the budget for Carol, which came in at under $12 million and has yet to break even. Perhaps it's me. Avengers scored 74% with Rotten Tomatoes, and as it was made in Britain and provided work for a great many Brits, I should be more charitable. Screw that.
Migraine inducing.

SPONGE BOB SQUARE PANTS: SPONGE OUT OF WATER (2015) D- Paul Tibbitt and Mike Mitchell. Oh no! Someone has stolen the secret formula for Krabby Patties and it's down to Spongebob, ably (sort of) assisted by his mate Patrick the starfish to get it back. All your old friends are here: Squidward, Mr Krabs, Sandy the squirrel (she's the one who has to wear breathing apparatus, cause she's a land animal, right?) and, of course, the dreaded plankton.

Beginning with a story by Stephen Hillenburg, Spongebob's creator, this movie is a lot of fun, with snappy dialogue and pleasing animation. It is something of a rare breed, being a cartoon film not made under the auspices of the all-powerful Disney corporation, who, now they own not only the franchise for all the Marvel comic movies (see above) but also Lucasfilms, is now only slightly less omnipotent than God.

BEFORE MIGNIGHT (2013) W/D- Richard Linklater. A good-looking couple enjoy a brief idyll in a beautiful beach resort in the Peloponnese before returning their jobs, he a successful novelist, she considering a job with the French government. Over the course of one evening they discuss what I call "the 4 Ls"- Life, Love, Liberty and Loss, without coming to any specific conclusions about any of them.

The film's action takes place nine years on from that depicted in the film Before Sunset and eighteen years on from the first film in the trilogy, Before Sunrise. All three films depend on the strength of the writing and of the two main players: Ethan Hawke (Jesse) and Julie Delpy (Celine). Both actors are credited on the screenplay list along with Linklater himself, so one wonders if he works Mike Leigh-style, "devising" scenes rather than giving the actors specific lines to read. Whatever, the result is highly successful and provides an effective antidote to the super- budget, super-hero movies which are so much in vogue right now. The film reminds me to some extent of the films of Eric Rohmer, who made his name in the 60s producing films consisting of highly attractive people discussing the eternal verities long into the night (My Night with Maud, Claire's Knee, Love in the Afternoon). And one thing you have to say about Linklater: he certainly likes a long term project. These films were filmed over an 18 year period, while his film Boyhood was made over the course of no less than 12 years. I have to say I admire that sort of sustained commitment.

8 MILE (2002) D- Curtis Hanson. A white rapper on the mean streets of Detroit is an endangered species, literally, but "B Rabbit" (Eminem, aka Marshall Mathers) is determined to win through the rounds of a rap beat-down to become the premier rapper of the Streets. One problem: he's almost paralysed by stagefright and to begin with can't even get the first word out. But this guy ain't no quitter...

With more than an element of semi-autobiography about it, and a strong central performance from Eminem, this film is highly satisfying, especially the rap component itself, which shows just what a demanding discipline rap is, when contestants must be original, insightful, stay on the beat and above all make it rhyme. Audiences agreed. The film made money, and even won an Oscar for best song of 2002.
Worthwhile.

ANGEL FACE (1952) D- Otto Preminger. An ambulance paramedic (Robert Mitchum) is called to a Beverley Hills mansion where an elderly woman is nearly dead from carbon monoxide poisoning. Despite the circumstances, he strikes up a friendship, which turns to a kind of obsessive love, with the daughter (Jean Simmons). Understandably, this doesn't go down too well with Robert Mitchum's current girlfriend, and a complex triangle begins to develop out of the Sunset Boulevard darkness. This can't end well...

Preminger's film has achieved almost iconic status since its release in 1952. Jean-Luc Goddard regarded as one of the ten best talkies ever to come out of Hollywood, and there is a consensus that it marks one of the peaks of the film noir genre. Its Freudian themes and claustrophobic, surreal atmosphere make it for me one of the finest movies I have seen this year.
Highest recommendation.

NANOOK OF THE NORTH (1922) D- Robert J Flaherty (documentary) Being a day in the life of an Inuk family as they eke out their lives in north-eastern Canada, high above the Arctic Circle. Nanook must catch a seal to feed his family, but they are intelligent, slippery creatures who are as keen to hang onto life as Nanook and his family are. With no tools beyond a harpoon and a length of twine affixed to a lure, the hunt becomes an epic encounter of man against beast, with the highest stakes possible: The Inuk live close to starvation, and if Nanook doesn't take a seal today it will be even harder tomorrow...
Midway through the hunt the weather changes and the family must make an igloo. This is achieved in under an hour using "breezeblocks" of compacted snow, but the interior would be completely dark, so a "skylight" is made in the roof using a block of clear ice taken from a nearby frozen lake. Once completed, the whole family concentrates on the hunt once more.

In a completely unaffected and unsentimental way, director Flaherty creates an incredibly moving film which had me close to tears at several moments,especially when a six month-old baby snuggles into a husky puppy- I'm leaking just recounting it!
After the film came out Flaherty was accused of staging certain sequences, but as documentary film makers have been guilty of doing this ever since, even the great David Attenborough not excepted, I think we can afford to be generous on this occasion. For the result is one of the greatest documentaries ever made: brutally realistic and supremely skilled in its production, and offering a unique insight into a world that has now vanished forever.
Magnificent.

Happy Nooo Year everyone!

Lists: dontcha hate them?

Some people hate lists. My dearest friend, for example, does. I, however, love them. When I was at medical school I created hundreds of them as a way of memorizing the immense slew of information it is necessary for the would-be doctor to absorb. And ever since I have found them of inestimable value in deciding which films to watch (as in the list of 256 "4 star movies" to be found at the end of Halliwells celebrated film guide) or books to read, as may be found in the closing part of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, where a community of people have committed the text of some of the world's great novels to memory in the absence of written books, most of which have been burned.

Let us start with television. Here there are only two items on the list:
1. BBC TV's Wolf Hall
2. Channel 4's Fargo, series 1 and 2.

Wolf Hall was unquestionably the best thing to come out of British television this year, and is a worthy successor to the great historical dramas of the 60s and 70s, namely The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Elizabeth R  and The Shadow of the Tower.
Both series of Fargo I found gripping, terrifying and totally addictive. Created and in large part written by Noah Hawley, they both exhibited high standards of acting and production values throughout, and completely justified the Coen brothers decision to allow the name of their great movie Fargo to be used.

FIVE BOOKS:

1. THE MAKIOKA SISTERS, by Junichiro Tanizaki
2. BUDDENBROOKS, by Thomas Mann
3. THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE DUKE OF MARLBOROUGH, by Winston S. Churchill
4. THE WHITE GUARD, by Mikhail Bulgakov
5. THE BOOK OF DAVE, by Will Self

TEN FILMS:
1.  SHOA D- Claude Lanzmann
2.  THE BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB D- Wim Wenders
3.  STILL ALICE W/D- Richard Glatzer
4.  OCTOBER 1917: TEN DAYS THAT SHOOK THE WORLD D- Sergei Eisenstein
5.  BOYHOOD W/D- Richard Linklater
6.  EX MACHINA D- Alex Garland
7.  SOPHIE SCHOLL D- Marc Rothermund
8.  THE TIME THAT REMAINS D- Elia Suleiman
9.  ANGEL FACE D- Otto Preminger
10.NANOOK OF THE NORTH W/D- Robert J Flaherty

Please note these are the best books and films I have encountered for the first time this year. Hence I don't count classics like The Third Man which I saw just a few days ago, possibly for the 27th time. I have been privileged to discover them this year, and you would do very well to do the same next year, should any of them have passed you by thus far. Enjoy!

Media supplement live: The Sleigh Ride

I am midway through BBC4's showing of the brilliant "All Aboard: The Sleigh Ride", which is what it says it is: a two-hour live-action journey across the Norwegian tundra by two women and their three reindeer. What is it about it that one cannot seem to drag one's eyes away from the  trudging? I don't know, but I was soon transported into a kind of zen-like state of calm most unusual for the Christmas period.

All I know is it is compelling television, and a kind that is catching on in Scandi big time: wood fires burning, even someone knitting a woolly jumper. I see it as a revolt from the blaring, tawdry razzle-dazzle of such things as Strictly and the X Factor.

After an hour I popped outside for a pee, and high in the sky a near-full moon was escorted by a great Moondog, a huge pearly halo dogging its path across the heavens. My little Christmas gift, albeit a day early.

Have a good one everybody.

How about this weather, eh?

We Brits love talking about the weather, though we are far from alone in that. In America, the Middle East, even South-east Asia, it is likewise a perennial topic of conversation. But boy, have we ever had something to talk about lately. In November, 352 mm of rain fell in Cumbria, or 14 1/2 inches, the greatest precipitation in Britain since accurate records began in 1889. Last night is believed to have been the warmest night ever recorded in December- and there, records go right back to 1659. Our central heating is primed to go on when the temperature drops below 17 degrees- and it did not come on this morning at 7.15 am.

What will January hold for us? The highest temperature ever recorded in January is 18.6 degrees, improbably somewhere in Scotland. It seems impossible to imagine that record going, but on the basis of what we have just experienced it could happen. 1988 was an exceptional year. In January it was so warm one day we sat out in the warming sun on my birthday (the 11th) while July was so cold, barely 10 degrees on St Swithen's day, the 15th, I clicked on the central heating- the only time in my thirty-one years in this house that has ever been necessary. That summer cold-snap was down to a Mexican volcano, apparently, but why is this "hot-snap" happening? The weather charts show consistent strong southerly airflow, itself unusual in the winter months, though not unprecedented. But those same weather maps show the warm air advancing all the way into the Arctic circle- and what that implies for that region must be a significant cause for concern- for polar bears if not climate change deniers- they've gone a bit quiet now, haven't they?

Paris climate talks: a new hope?

I can still remember clearly the bitter disappointment I felt back in early 2001, when newly installed President George Bush Jr refused to sign up to the Kyoto climate change protocols. Of course he refused because he knew there was no way he would be able to get the changes through Congress, but I just saw it as a very bad omen for the future. But that was then and this is now.

Today it seems likely the US, and even more importantly, China, are on the verge of signing up to making significant reductions in the emissions that are strangling our planet, the only one, as far as I am aware, that we've got. Sure there are still climate change deniers, but I put them in the same category as people who deny the world is more than 6000 years old despite the overwhelming weight of evidence that it is far, far older.

There are still major problems to be overcome, though by far the most important is that capitalism, the world's favourite economic system, is not compatible with care for the environment. The fact is that the more we produce, the more we pollute. Every time you buy blueberries from Argentina, or even munch into a burger, you are expanding your carbon footprint and contributing to climate change. Our lives have to get simpler and our demands less if the Earth is to have any chance of being the Paradise it could be.

I heard some meteorologist on the radio the other day saying "Every time you think, ' this is strange; I've never seen weather like this before', you're right". Once in 500 year weather events like the storms we saw in 2009 and 2014 have been repeated- just this month. Icecaps especially in the Arctic are disappearing faster than at any time in the last million years, and all the evidence suggests that the pace of change is accelerating. The world's nations have to come together right now to minimise these changes- otherwise we're screwed.

Donald Trump: not as stupid as he sounds

Every idiot's favourite presidential candidate knows his electorate and knows it well. Even his latest pronouncement on the banning of Muslim immigration was carefully calculated to appeal to the lowest common denominator amongst the American people- and it worked. Riding on the crest of a wave of paranoia following the killings in San Berdoo, he knows his bigoted words will have struck a chord with thousands or even millions of American voters.

That's how they do it. Hitler came to power on a platform which, inter alia, exploited first the seething resentment among ordinary Germans over their grossly unfair treatment after WWI, and second, the encouragement of underlying racism against the old fall-guys- the Jews. As history attests, it was a highly successful ploy, and Trump is hoping the same tactic will work for him next November. Please God it won't.

Should he be barred from entry into the UK though, as more than 100,00 petitioners have demanded? My answer is no. Let him come over here, if he really wants to (which I doubt) and enter into debate with us. He'll go away with a flea in his ear, and then blame us all for being terrorist sympathisers, or whatever. But it will have been worth it, for him at least. Never underestimate the anti-British feeling that lurks just beneath the surface of your average Yank.

Labour lets itself down

From about the age of 15 I realized, if I may be permitted an over-simplification, that Labour stood for people before profit, while the Tories stood for more or less the opposite. And when I worked that out I began leaning to the left, a position I have maintained ever since.

But the disgraceful events following the vote on Wednesday night have disaffected me profoundly to the ways of what we might call the "Stalinist left" within the Labour party.With people voting to attack Syria being issued death threats, this reminds me of the people who are prepared to kill doctors and nurses who work in abortion clinics. They love life so much, apparently, that they're prepared to kill to preserve it. And here we have people against the bombing of civilians threatening to kill people who support it.

 Even Ken Livingstone, someone for whom I have had the greatest respect for the longest time, has reverted to Stalinist mode when he suggests the war supporters in Parliament should be de-selected. Where's the love of diversity the Labour party has always stood for? I would have voted against extending the bombing, on the grounds that in almost all cases, bombs do not solve problems- rather they tend to create them. I anticipate a terrorist outrage in London within three months as the "price tag" IS will exact for our decision; meanwhile little if anything will change in the troubled region whose troubles we helped create. Strangling IS economically makes more sense, actively exposing the hypocrisy of states like KSA, Qatar and Turkey, all of whom have, either tacitly or openly supported IS or bought oil from them. But I'm not going to threaten the lives of people who disagree with me. That's not my way, and it shouldn't be the view of anyone on the left.

November 2015 book and film review

BOOKS

THE HOUSE OF QUEER TRADES, by G.K. Chesterton. Being a series of long short stories based on the extremely unlikely premise that a club exists where to qualify for membership an aspirant must prove he earns his living in a unique way. Hence we see a man who is employed  to act undercover at a society party solely in order to make another attendee look good. You think that's odd? You haven't heard the half of it. Written in 1905, when writers like Arthur Conan Doyle and GBS were at the height of their powers, this is an early example of the eccentric detective, long before Agatha Christie made a brilliant career out of her eccentric genius, and also predates Chesterton's most famous contribution to the detective genre, Father Brown.

You may find his writing style dated, with its long sentences and excessive punctuation, but these tales also have much to recommend them, especially if you favour the style of modern detectives like Adrian Monk.

THE WHITE GUARD, by Mikhail Bulgakov. It is Kiev in 1918. Following the Russian Revolution, the Russian army has withdrawn from its fight against the Germans and is now pre-occupied by stemming the Bolshevik takeover. One family waits while these spasms come to a head, hoping against hope that their lives and property aren't consumed in the ensuing conflagration. Their hopes are in vain. The men of the family, including a young doctor, are soon press-ganged into taking part in the resistance against the socialists- a resistance everyone can see is futile.

This is the master Bulgakov's first full length novel, and already we see the touch of genius which came to its full fruition in his masterpiece The Master and Margarita. We get right inside the lives, hopes and fears of its characters- the coward who is ultimately brave, the professional soldier who runs away at the critical moment, and all the while, the women who wait while their men leave their houses, maybe never to return. Terrific stuff.

THE UNLIKELY PILGRIMAGE OF HAROLD FRY, by Rachel Joyce.
A recently retired man receives a letter from a woman he hasn't seen for 20 years telling him she is dying. The letter comes from Berwick-on-Tweed, 500 miles from his home in south Devon, but he resolves to walk all the way there. He writes that he is coming, and could she do him the courtesy of remaining alive until he arrives? What follows is an epic journey of the feet, but also of the soul. I would not be spoiling the plot by saying he does get there. At the end of the book there is a route map listing all the way points, including his final destination, complete with the line: "Devon to Berwick- 687 miles in 87 days". So right away we know he makes it, but it is his method of making it that is the substance of this book. So it's not will he make it, but how does he make it? And will Queenie be alive when he does?

Someone once said "It is better to travel hopefully than to arrive", which might be the subtitle to this book. I often walk to collect my thoughts, and therefore I can identify at least to a limited extent the journey of Harold's mind. Walking gives us time to think, and Harold's thoughts inevitably hark back to the past: his marriage, the problems of his troubled son, and Queenie herself, the dying woman who Harold used to work with until the day she suddenly left, without any explanation. What happened?

Rachel Joyce writes  in a simple, unaffected style which suggests she has attended many creative writing courses and learned all the rules of modern writing. It is light-years away from being as skillful as The White Guard, but as modern writing it is pretty good and has certainly captured the imagination of the reading public, who have bought the book in its millions.

THE BOOK OF DAVE, by Will Self.
It is 500 years in the future. Sea levels have risen by more than a hundred feet; most of London and the south of England  is under water, and society appears to have reverted to the middle ages. An elite still rules though, and has based its doctrine on a book found buried in the hills of Hampstead Heath.
Now go back 500 years, to Dave, a London taxi driver prone to depression who struggles through life under the intolerable stresses and strains of a failed marriage. Deprived of access to his son by the courts, he writes an epistle to him to explain his position, but in the event decides to bury it instead. It is this book, full of Dave's bitterness and misogyny, which is uncovered centuries later and offered as the way things should be in the brave new society that has emerged from the depths.

I didn't read this book for a long time after it came out, partly because I heard Self had invented a new language he uses in the book, and to be honest I felt intimidated. I shouldn't have worried. The "new language" turns out to be a phonetic form of contemporary cockney- "mokni" and although there is a learning curve one soon comes to grips with it, aided by a very helpful glossary at the end of the book. And what emerges is a quite extraordinary piece of writing, establishing Will Self as one of the most exciting writers alive today. Here we do find someone whose talent may be meaningfully compared to the greats of an earlier era, like the great Bulgakov himself. Stunning.

FILMS

CLERKS (1994) D- Kevin Smith. Being a day in the life of a bunch of no-hopers who run a convenience store in small town USA, and the even less-hopers who come in to score their fags and booze. Coming with the tag-line: "Just because they know you doesn't mean they like you", and filmed in monochrome, we are guided through an anarchic and sometimes hilarious series of incidents which include the introduction of "Jay and silent Bob", who initially enter the store to shoplift, but then invite the clerks to a party instead. The fact that they're supposed to be working doesn't deter J and SB. Are these people irresponsible or what?

Well written and featuring some surprisingly good acting, this is really quite good, and established Kevin Smith, who also plays Silent Bob, as a new force in American cinema. Noteworthy.

WHIPLASH (2014) D- Damien Chazelle An aspiring drummer (Miles Teller) would become part of an elite music academy, but has to impress their director of music (J.K. Simmons) first. And he is hard to impress. Very hard. His method is teaching through humiliation, a method with which I am familiar from experience with my father, grammar school and especially at medical school. And while it is true that I never forgot the things I learnt in this way, I never forgot how it made me feel either.

The film really revolves around a central anecdote told by the brutal teacher:
"Charlie Parker would never have been great if Joe Jones hadn't thrown a cymbal at him"
Meaning that sometimes extreme measures have to be used to bring the best out in people. Is this right? Do we have to be bullied to reveal our hidden greatness, or are there other, more gentle methods that can achieve the same result? An impressive movie with several fine performances (J.K. Simmons won the best supporting actor Oscar for his portrayal of conductor Terence Fletcher)

WILD (2014) D- Jean-Marc Vallee. Following the failure of her marriage and the death of her mother, Cheryl Strayed decides to walk the 1200 miles of the Pacific Coast Trail as a way of re-booting her life. Only thing, Cheryl hasn't had any previous experience of walking beyond schlepping over to the convenience store. Never mind. She's got her plan and she's going to hang in there, in a way she never really has with anything else in her life.

Comparisons with this film and The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry are inevitable. Both are about epic journeys of self discovery, even though one concerns a gnarly old git and the other one of Hollywood's premier foxes. Both  attempt, in their own way, to discover something vital that has been missing from their lives for so long, and both succeed, though in very different ways. Which leads me to wonder when they're going to film Pilgrimage, with perhaps Jim Broadbent as Harold, Judi Dench as his wife and Vanessa Redgrave as Queenie. It's a smash hit waiting to happen...
While we wait for that, try this very creditable attempt.

AMERICAN SNIPER (2014) D- Clint Eastwood. Chris Kyle is an all-American boy who joins up after 9/11, mainly because he reckons he can put his skills as an outstanding marksman to good effect in Iraq to blow away ragheads. Which he does. And that's the film, right there. We have Sienna Miller playing a peripheral role as his wife, reduced to someone Chris occasionally calls on his mobile, sometimes even at the height of battle. Should he be doing that?

I have a lot of respect for Clint Eastwood, his legendary right-wing politics notwithstanding. He had tremendous screen presence in movies, from his "man with no name" of the "dollar" movies, to his  uniquely successful Dirty Harry roles. Behind the camera too he has enjoyed great success, especially with the brilliant Unforgiven and the twin movies about the Battle of Iwo Jima, told first from the American and then the Japanese perspectives. But here he has faltered. American Sniper turns out to be little more than a jingoistic, chauvinistic rant on why the USA is number One. Bradley Cooper does well with what he is given, but the character of Chris Kyle (a real person, who was himself shot by a nutter with a gun- those who live by the sword, etc) is almost a cypher.
Disappointing.

STARMAN (1984) D- John Carpenter. You remember when they put a special golden record on the Voyager One spacecraft so that after it left the solar system any extra-terrestrial culture might have an insight into the humans who sent it? OK, So ET does find it and sends Jeff Daniels to Earth to do some field work. First move, and a wise one, is to snag Karen Allen. He does this partly by obtaining a lock of her late husband's hair and morphing himself into an exact copy of him. But as we might expect, the Men in Black get to hear of him and would cart him off to Area 51 and dissect him out.

John Carpenter is another American director I have a lot of time for. Ever since his terrific debut Dark Star and the even better Assault on Precinct 13 he has been making highly watchable, if sometimes flawed movies. And this one, which I somehow missed when it came out in the 80s, is one of his best. Jeff Daniels has rarely been stronger, and Karen Allen's understated performance is excellent.

MY SUMMER OF LOVE (2004) D- Pawel Pawlekowski. Working class girl Mona (Natalie Press) is being driven mad by her brother (Paddy Considine) who has turned the pub left to them by their parents into a happy-clappy meeting house. She turns to a wealthy girl of her own age (Emily Blunt) and an unlikely friendship develops. But will it stand the clash of very different cultures? Turns out poor little rich girl has a past of her own, being expelled from her posh finishing school for getting drunk. So maybe there can be a meeting of minds. Or can there?

Set and filmed in Yorkshire, this well written and directed Brit movie went down well, with a lot of praise for the two central performances. Certainly worth a look.

MADAME BOVARY (1991) D- Claude Chabrol. A beautiful, but bored girl from Normandy (Isabelle Huppert) thinks she has done well to snag the local GP, but almost immediately realizes she has made a big mistake. It isn't long before she is seeking solace in the arms of another. And another...
Following closely the text of the original classic from French master Gustave Flaubert, this sensitively made film is graced by the extraordinary, but highly unconventional beauty of  La Huppert, one of France's finest actresses. It is she who makes us believe in the story, as much as Chabrol.
Madame Bovary was remade only last year with Mia Wasikowska in the lead role. I haven't seen it yet, but it will have to be very good indeed to better this earlier effort.

Oh I get it George: it was all just a big windup

So. George Osborne has decided not to institute those changes in tax credits after all. But while this news will come to many as an enormous relief, I wonder if those millions are not also entitled to some sort of apology. For months now, they have been going through spasms of anxiety as they asked themselves the question:
If they push these cuts through, how I am I going to cope?

Now it seems the Tories can balance the books without recourse to hammering the poorest in our society, or at least when they do it will be by smaller increments, so hopefully no one will notice. But what astonishes me is the political ineptitude of a group of men who seemed happy to launch the whole dumb, vindictive little idea in the first place, and then were apparently astonished that many people, including members of their own party, thought the plan was unduly cruel, even by Conservative standards.

You can just picture them, after the election in May, going:
This is great! Now we don't have to worry what those damned libdems think any more we can do what we like! So lets get out there and screw the poor and look after our own,  just like we always do- more champagne anyone?

Back to those people who believed their tax credits were going to be cut. Never mind an apology, shouldn't they now be entitled to compensation? Damages for unnecessary emotional pain and suffering, post traumatic stress if you will, should be paid out. In a kinder Universe.

The times they are a changing

For as long as I've been alive Russia has been the "fuck you" state. From despots like Stalin and Krushchev, through to 1991, when Russia made the transition from a communist state to a criminal state in less than a year, they've gone their own way, ignoring the protests of the rest of the world.

Just this year, when a world consensus formed that the rule of Assad in Syria was a bad thing, Russia chose the opposite course and went to war to keep him in power. But it seems one bomb on a plane has changed all that. Sure, they're still saying they support Assad, but from ignoring the threat of IS they have suddenly become its biggest opponent, curiously bringing them into line with the west in a way that hasn't occurred since the end of World War II. Who saw that coming?

To me it demonstrates yet again what a complicated and unpredictable world we live in today.

The Paris bombings have united the world against IS, if the unanimous vote in the UN is anything to go by. But what happens next? The fight against IS is going to be at least as hard as the fight against the Nazis or the Japanese militarists. The world has changed out of all recognition since the 1940s, and we now face a foe like some many-headed hydra: cut one off and another grows, even more terrifying than the last. There are so many "soft targets" out there, places where people gather in large numbers and are virtually impossible to protect- shopping malls, sporting events, hotels, airports, the list is endless. We can't protect them all, and the more we try the more our freedoms are restricted.

The vote last night at the UN was unprecedented, and may mark a new phase in the fight against those men who would impose their medieval world view on us. But it's going to be a long, bloody road.

French tragedy: it may not be the greatest, but it is the latest

All across the world people have been changing their facebook profile picture to include the French tricolor. From notables like Mark Zuckerberg to ordinary folk like many of my friends people have wanted to "show a gesture of solidarity" with the French people in this, their darkest hour since World War II.

I'm not on facebook, but if I were this is one bandwagon I wouldn't be joining. Not that what happened in Paris on Friday night wasn't enormous: the deliberate targeting of young people celebrating their freedom by enjoying a night on the town. This wasn't just a reprisal, or a "price ticket" as the Jewish terrorists call it when they attack the Palestinians, it was a deliberate attack on people who don't share their perverted brand of Islam.

But where was all this solidarity when Kenya was bombed, or Nigeria, or Lebanon, or Pakistan? The list is endless. What about, for instance, those 224 Russians blown out of the sky only last month? The truth is that France is our nearest neighbour, and love them or loathe them, they are culturally speaking closer to us than any other race of people. Hence to single them out for our "gesture of solidarity" is to recognise how parochial we have become.

We should be educating ourselves to be world citizens, capable of feeling the pain of other oppressed peoples wherever they are, not just north-western Europe. We're not Americans, most of whom care very little about what happens beyond their borders unless it directly impinges on them. We're better than that, aren't we?

Give 'em some shtick

1.
David Cameron: These council cuts are ridiculous! They're closing libraries, after school services, even basic infrastructure. These cuts are beginning to affect me! I'm writing to the council leader right now.
Adviser: Er, you instigated them yourself, sir.
DC: What?

2.
Boris Johnson: I don't get it. These Palestinians actually don't seem to like me!
Adviser: Could it have something to do with the fact that you showed no interest whatever in their problems, whereas you bigged up the Israelis like they're the greatest race since the ancient Romans?
BoJo: What's wrong with that? The Romans were the greatest civilising influence in history. They told me that at Eton.
Adviser: Yes sir, but they were also a society based on oppression and rule by violence and murder.
BoJo; Like I said, what's wrong with that? Oh bugger them, I'm going back to Israel.At least they know how to put on a proper banquet. Here you just get mashed potato and olives. Mind you, at that last meal in Tel Aviv, that roast bastard-
Adviser: That's bustard, sir-
BoJo: What's the difference? All I'm saying is, they didn't give us any pigs in blankets with it, and to me that's wrong.

What I'm hoping to get out of Chilcott (but won't)

It appears we will finally get to read the two million words the Chilcott Enquiry is likely to contain some time next summer. But will any of those words really get to the nitty-gritty of the problem?

The invasion of Iraq in 2003 was based on false information- lies in fact. Tony Blair has apologised, sort of, for basing Britain's actions on those lies, But he thought they were true at the time, so what can you do? To that I'd say, OK, but how hard did you try to verify those "facts"? As I understand it, much of the "dodgy dossier" was based on a PhD thesis by Ibrahim al-Marashi, who was known to have rabidly anti-Saddam views. And his totally spurious assertions were swallowed wholemeal by both the British and the Americans, because it suited their purposes.

When weapons expert David Kelly suggested the dossier had been "sexed up" he was found dead in a field, apparently by his own hand, using a tiny blunt penknife. Odd. Then in 2011 the Observer obtained under freedom of information legislation a memo from John Scarlett, head of the ISC at the time, to Blair's foreign affairs spokesman Sir David Manning. Written in March 2002 it said that "it would be beneficial if the dossier obscured the fact that in terms of WMDs Iraq is not that exceptional".

If that isn't sexing up, I don't know what is. We all know that George Bush II wanted a war in Iraq for all sorts of domestic and economic reasons, and dragged Blair along with him, how reluctantly we're not sure, to add credibility to his plan. We do know they also wanted the French to get on board and had a mother of a hissy fit when they didn't. France does not seem to have collapsed as a result. We wouldn't have either. But Blair was so keen to stay "in" with Dubya he almost fell over himself adopting the poodle position. That's the crime he's guilty of: literally deceiving us into a totally unnecessary war, a war that saw half a million Arabs murdered, destroyed Iraqi infrastructure for years to come, enabled the looting of museums and ancient sites and encouraging the blossoming of Al Qaida and the birth of IS. None of this, none, would have happened if we'd held off and insisted on getting the claims of the dossier verified, but it never happened. You could say people believe what they want to believe, but I say it's worse than that: they didn't believe it in the first place.  I'd like to think Chilcott will at least hint at this truth, but I'm not an idiot. I know damn well it won't.

Media review supplement

MARLBOROUGH: HIS LIFE AND TIMES (BOOK TWO), by Winston Spencer Churchill
In my review last month I wrote of Book One of this vast biography of one of Britain's greatest soldiers, and wondered whether I would go on to read Book Two. How could I not?

Book One ended with arguably Marlborough's greatest military triumph at the Battle of Blenheim, where, technically outnumbered by the French enemy, used his classical trick of imagining what his enemies believed would be his most likely course of action, and then doing the exact opposite. Time and again this gloriously simple tactic worked for him, as he moved his troops, first in the expected direction but then, almost as an afterthought, moved them another way. Here and at so many other battles he was ably assisted by his great friend and ally Prince Eugene of Savoy, a magnificent general in his own right but who nonetheless invariably co-operated with Marlborough in his famous deceiving feints.

In Book Two, we find Marlborough still at the top of his game, forcing the evil French out of Flanders and threatening, especially after the brilliant, but bloody battle of Oudenarde, to pursue them all the way to the gates of Paris itself. But at home, enemies jealous of his status and power as the first citizen of England, sought to bring him down. Among his detractors were the political commentators Swift, Defoe and Thackeray, who in a tradition that has come down to us today, were anxious to prick the pomposity of the great and good, Marlborough being as great and good as they have ever come. And in their efforts they were supported, strangely, by Marlborough's own wife Sarah.

Sarah enjoyed the greatest confidence of Queen Anne in the early years of her rule, appointed to the prestigious role of Mistress of the Queen's wardrobe and relishing her role as one of her closest advisors. But over the years the Queen gradually tired of Sarah's incessant carping about her pet theories of government, eventually alienating her to such an extent that she was dismissed from the Court and the return of the Gold Key to the wardrobe demanded. At the time Marlborough was still commanding the Allied armies in Flanders and naturally the knowledge of his wife's disgrace spread around Europe and diminished his own status.  At this point his other enemies  plotted the downfall of the man who had done so much to enhance Britain's prestige throughout the world. Finally he is dismissed from his command and forced into exile.

Perhaps fortunately for Marlborough, the death of the Queen shortly thereafter restored him to the nation's affections (it had never been lost among the ordinary people, who treated him almost as a god) and he returned in splendour. He spent his remaining years living quietly, building his great legacy, the palace at Woodstock, still the largest non-royal palace in Britain.

All in all, I pronounce this book as one of the great biographies, beautifully written and packed with the most fascinating and sometimes horrific detail. Like the day of the Battle of Malpaquet, where hundreds of French troops were forced into a narrow, but deep stream, where, desperate troops jumping into the water on top of each other, led to 800 of them drowning within feet of the banks. Churchill's description of these terrible events bring the atmosphere of battle to life so vividly we can almost smell the cordite and blood.

Magificent.

October 2015 book and film review

BOOKS

THE BOOK OF IMAGINARY BEINGS, by Jorge Luis Borges. Being exactly what it says in the title, this remarkable little volume is indeed a comprehensive guide to the human imagination by way of the fabulous creatures it has dreamed up over the centuries. From famous monsters, like the Basilisk, whose mere glance was fatal, through the unicorn, dragon (there are several varieties) and minotaur, to less well known horrors like the Shaggy Beast of La Ferte-Bernard, a creature that survived the Great Flood and came to dwell in the area of the river Huisne in northern France, where it lived quietly unless roused, when it breathed fire upon cattle and men alike.

Reading these pages is a bit like staring at the panels of some painting by Heironymous Bosch and produces a similarly disturbing sensation, and of course Jung would would have much to say about the collective unconscious and the theory of archetype. Or we could consider how the people of the past sought explanations for the unexplainable in their world. Whatever, we find an utterly intriguing discourse on monster myths gathered from cultures around the world, and compiled by one of the acknowledged masters of 20th century writing. Highly recommended.

MARLBOROUGH: HIS LIFE AND TIMES, by Winston Spencer Churchill (Book Two). Please forgive the wind-up, but as I still have 100 pages to go before finishing this 2000 page behemoth (check the book above for a detailed description of what that is) I shall not post my review until I have. If you are interested, I shall post my review by Friday of this week. Sorry about this.

FILMS

ALEKSANDRA (2007) D- Alexander Sokurov. Amidst the chaos of the Chechen war, a young officer's mum arrives at the front to visit him and generally experience the war zone first hand. After wandering around the army camp she visits the town where the army is encamped. The locals are suspicious of her at first, because she is a hated Russian, but slowly she gains their trust and a touch of humanity and compassion is added to the horrible mix of death and destruction that is a civil war.

Built around the indomitable character of its protagonist (played by Galina Vishnevskaya) this is a powerful, moving piece of movie making from one of Russia's best cinematographers

BIG EYES (2014) D- Tim Burton. In the late 1950s, aspiring artist Margaret (Amy Adams, and is she hot right now or what?) finds the courage to leave a loveless marriage and relocate to San Francisco with her daughter. There she develops a style of portraiture, especially of children, which emphasises their eyes (geddit?) to a massive and rather hypnotic degree. She meets Walter Keane (a pretty good Christopher Waltz) and they marry. Soon, with her reluctant compliance, he is passing her work off as his own and has the connections in the art world to take that world by storm. Not that the cognoscenti think much of the work, but the public lap it up to the point where Keane is one of the world's most bankable artists. But cracks form in their marriage, and as it falls apart she finally comes out and announces the work is not his at all, but hers. A thrilling legal battle ensues...

Normally I have a lot of time for Tim Burton's films. Beginning with Edward Scissorhands, through Beetlejuice and on to the especially fine Ed Wood, I have admired his skill and general attention to the smallest detail of the film making process. But here I had problems with the character development of the film's main protagonist. We see how  Margaret Keane can find the courage to leave her husband in 1958, at a time when that was anything but common, yet there is little explanation for why she allowed her husband to appropriate her work for so many years. I know people are befuddlingly complicated sometimes, but I'm just saying it kind of jarred with me. But as always, Tim's film looks great on screen.

UNBROKEN (2014) D- Angelina Jolie. Louie Zemperini grows up in rural California where he shows great prowess in running, to the point where he is selected for the Olympic team to compete at the Berlin Olympics. But war soon overtakes his life in athletics, and he joins up as a pilot. Then his plane is shot down over the Pacific and the crew drifts for no less than 47 days before being rescued... by the Japanese. Once ensconced in a prison camp, the commandant discovers the backstory to his latest charge, and determines to cut him down to size. What follows is an horrific account of Louie's life behind the bamboo bars, where a brutal contest of wills develops between the two men. One does everything he can to break him, the other is equally determined to remain unbroken. See?

Angelina had to do something to take her mind off having a double mastectomy, and turned to directing in this very creditable attempt which has attracted a lot of praise. It is certainly very well made and contains some memorable and harrowing scenes, perhaps cathartic in nature for La Jolie herself. Gripping stuff.

THE TIME THAT REMAINS (2009) D-  Elia Suleiman. Being the life and times of a Palestinian film maker born and raised in a Nazareth that was forcibly occupied by Israeli troops in 1948 and which has struggled to assert its Arab identity ever since. Whereas to some extent the film looks to Fellini's famous Amarcord, where an ageing director looks back over his long, illustrious life and wonders whether it was all worth it, this film has a unique, comic aspect which owes something to Jacques Tati. Like his previous minor masterpiece, Divine Intervention, a number of bizarre vignettes are presented which may or may not reflect real life, and which find themselves reprized throughout the movie in a disturbing, but also hilarious procession.

We would need to be made of stone not to appreciate his main point, which is that the Arabs who happen to live under Israeli control would prefer to be left to their own devices to lead their lives free of oppression, but Suleiman achieves this with the skill of one of the world's most accomplished directors. Brilliant.

THE DRESSER (2015) D- Richard Eyre. At the height of the Blitz, a famous actor (Anthony Hopkins) is about to go on stage to reprise one of his most celebrated roles, King Lear, but there's something wrong. Is he drunk, is he depressed or has he just reached the end of his rope? It falls to his dresser (Ian McKellen) to pull him together and get him on stage for his first cue. At times this seems an impossible task, and management are all for cancelling the performance, especially as the bombs are falling even as the curtain is rising. But after 226 performances, our dresser isn't about to let his boss fail on this, the 227th.

 Ronald Harwood's play was originally filmed in 1983, with Albert Finney and Tom Courtney in the main roles. I haven't seen that, but I must say it will have to have been pretty amazing to live with BBC 2's latest adaptation.  Hopkins is superb as the ageing thespian on his last legs, while McKellen is if anything even better as his fiercely loyal servant. Emily Watson also excels as Hopkins's long suffering wife. All in all, mark this one down if they choose to repeat it, maybe around Christmas.

MAN OF MARBLE (1977) D- Andrzej Wajda. In post-war Soviet Poland, a young man is hailed a hero of the people for his sterling efforts in the subtle art of bricklaying. He even has several statues built in his image- in marble. Twenty years on, a film maker decides to make a film of his life, but finds he has sunk into obscurity, and few people are even prepared to talk about him. Odd. But our director is a determined, feisty creature who won't leave her project alone, even if it ruffles the feathers of the communist establishment. Eventually, she tracks him down, and the whole, seedy story emerges...

Wajda has been at the forefront of Polish cinema since the early 1950s (Polanski began his career sitting at his feet) and has received wide acclaim, even in America, where they awarded him the Oscar for best foreign film for his The Promised Land in 1975. His portrayal of communist society as an animal that might live and thrive if not for he malign influence of the Soviet iron fist has struck a chord with critics and public around the world, and his skill in constructing a movie is perhaps unrivaled in central Europe, except by Polanski himself, who of course turned his back on Poland and settled in America (which as we know he had to leave in unseemly haste) If you're not familiar with his work, redress that oversight immediately...

THE BIG RED ONE (the reconstruction) (1980) D- Samuel Fuller. A crew of American grunts, all wearing a red "One" on their shoulders indicating they are part of the US Army's First Infantry Division, are led by captain Lee Marvin in the struggle against the Hun in various theatres: North Africa, D Day, Bastogne, the liberation of the concentration camps. Slowly their numbers are whittled away under the toll of battle, but they retain their cohesion, and, even less likely, their humanity amidst the inhumanity of war.

This sort of warts-and-all naturalistic portrayal of war was pretty unusual for its day, and hence carried a terrific impact at the time. This has been somewhat dimmed with the passage of time and the arrival of many ultra-realistic war films like Platoon, Full Metal Jacket and Saving Private Ryan. Even so this film retains the power to move as well as shock. Indeed, the recent television series Band of Brothers covered almost the exact same ground as this film, showing if you can't generate a good idea of your own, it doesn't hurt to borrow someone else's...

EXTINCTION: JURASSIC PREDATORS (2014) D- Adam Spinks. A motley collection of young folk journey deep into the Amazon jungle (funny, most of it looks more like the Forest of Dean, but what do I know?) to find and catalogue new species, but, as we might infer from the title, find rather more than they bargained for. You've got it. Before they know it they're being confronted by T Rex, allosaurs and velociraptors (oh yes, I know my dinos, almost as well as your average six-year-old, though I don't recommend any of them watch this). No longer at the top of the food chain, our crew quickly finds itself being viewed as excellent pre-dinner snacks.

Using lots of shaky hand-held camera work and creating a "what the hell's going on?" atmosphere, this film owes a big debt to The Blair Witch Project, which remains in the record books as the film to make the most money in relation to the cost of making it (it cost a couple of million, and to date has made nearly a billion). I guess the producers were hoping something similar might happen with this relatively low budget offering. Thing is, whereas Blair Witch was innovative, exciting and pretty scary, this is anything but. Most of the acting is execrable, the camera work annoying more than ground-breaking,  and I have already indicated how the locations do not in any way suggest it was set in the Amazon rainforest.
Dismal.

I don't like Jose Mourinho any more

When Roman Abramovitch paid £140 million for Chelsea in 2003, probably out of petty cash, it was natural he would want one of the world's hottest coaches to guide his side to victory after victory. It was, therefore, a wise move when he appointed Jose Mourinho to the job. He had just come out of the dramatic success of leading Porto, an hitherto unregarded Portuguese side to the summit of European football. After all, he had probably bet one his Russian billionaire buddies a million bucks (or even 1 dollar; it doesn't really matter) he could be the first among his cohort to own a club that won the Champions League.

When Jose arrived on the scene he made an immediate impact. Describing himself as "The Special One" ruffled a few feathers, but I was happy to give it to him on the grounds he was probably being ironic. And as everyone loves a winner, Chelsea's winning of several Premier League titles and FA Cups hardly detracted from his claim as indeed being rather special. Sure, the most glittering prize eluded him for many years, and after what must have been a titanic clash of egos, he left Chelsea in 2008 to join Inter Milan, where he won that very title in 2010. The same year FIFA (remember them?) awarded him their coveted Ballon D'Or as best manager in Europe. Kind of special, huh?

He then went to Real and didn't do so badly there either, and finally in 2013, tempted by a pay packet doubtless in 8 figures, returned to Chelsea. But Roman had already won his bet the previous year under the leadership of Di Matteo, so it was hard to see what more Jose could do for them other than keep on bringing home the silverware, which, to be fair, he did.

But this season has seen a marked decline in the fortunes of Chelsea and the man who leads them. Languishing at a most unfamiliar 16th in the league, Jose won few friends when he attempted to countermand the wishes of his own team doctor and indeed the rules of the game itself, leading to Eva Carneiro's departure for an undisclosed sum (I do hope it was a very large sum) combined with a confidentiality clause. Let's make this clear: he thought winning was more important than the health of one of his players. That's disgraceful. And just yesterday he must have been so rude to the referee that he was exiled to the stands for the 2nd half of the match against West Ham United.

Thing is, Mourinho can now be seen as being guilty of believing his own hype. He clearly thinks he is so powerful that even Abramovitch, who can afford to lure pretty much any manager in the world to work for him, will not dare lose him. But football is all about winning, and if he doesn't start winning soon, he will be fired. Roman, the 137th richest man in the world with a  mere $9.1 billion in assets, won't even raise an eyebrow when he gives him another 8 figure severance fee and gets shot of him. Perhaps then we'll hear a little bit less about how special he is, and realize that'she's just another talented football coach who lost his way. Boo hoo.

Sure, they're covering it now

I refer to the problems in the West Bank, which are now finally receiving some attention in the British media. But it's all: "another Palestinian has been shot by Israeli troops after a stabbing incident in East Jerusalem", or something like that.

My wife travels to Palestine regularly, and has made many friends in that embattled region; in Jerusalem itself, in Bethlehem and in the refugee camps which surround it. And from these correspondents a very different tale emerges. A virtually continuous curfew has been imposed on the Arab population in many "trouble spots", and a generous soul might even say this is for their protection. For the last several days Jewish settlers have been emerging from their mountain-top redoubts, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons, and roiling through the streets of places like Bethlehem and Ramallah, bullying, beating and occasionally shooting any Arab they don't like the look of. The IDF, charged at least in principle with protecting all the citizens of Israel/Palestine, do nothing about this beyond basically telling the Arabs to stay indoors. It is probably good advice, but scarcely does much to address the situation which, with bitter irony, resembles in some ways the Germany of 1938, when blackshirts roamed the streets of German towns, beating and killing any Jews they could find and destroying any Jewish shops they came across. This sort of behaviour, best exemplified in the famous Cristalnacht, is not a million miles away from what is happening right now in the West Bank.

We hear daily reports in our media of soldiers killing Arab stabbers and would-be stabbers, and then the subject moves on. We don't hear how some of these knife wielders were not actually found in possession of blades at all when their bodies were examined, and even that blades have been planted on these corpses to add legitimacy to the soldiers' acts. It's hard to know the truth, but the reports from intelligent, reliable and not particularly  radical contacts my wife has out there tell us that the situation is deteriorating into a kind of living hell for the occupants of the West Bank, and that it can't be surprising when some of them turn to acts of extreme violence in response to the oppression many of them have known all the days of their lives.
To put it another way, they're mad as hell and they aren't gonna take it any more...

We're breaking laws? What laws?

Don't try telling an Israeli they're in breach of international law. First, you'll be labelled antisemitic, because that is their standard response to any criticism of the Israeli state. If you try and press your point and they're still there to listen, and you mention that under international law their military occupation of Arab lands is illegal, they'll come back at you with the following killer argument: how can Israel be accused of an illegal occupation of a land which, under the name of Judea and Samaria, has been their property since the time of Abraham?

Ever since 1948, when the Zionists drove the Arabs from their lands and houses, the Palestinians have been counted among the world's forgotten peoples. Forgotten by the British, who were glad to wash their hands of the whole messy business, forgotten by the Americans, where the Jewish lobby has laboured night and day ever since that time to ensure the US's undying support, and forgotten even by those neighbouring Arab states whom you might have thought would be more active in publicising the plight of their fellow Arabs.

Now, with ever increasing incursions on their land, and ever increasing harassment from the fundamentalist settlers, some Palestinians have declared, and not for the first time, that enough is enough. A few have even taken the law into their own hands and attacked the interlopers with knives. Can we blame them? No one else is going to help them, so they're going to help themselves, even though they stand a very good chance of being blown away by the IDF within minutes of their deeds. Now that's what I call courage: being prepared to die for what they believe in: freedom and the right to basic human rights. And until they get it the murders are going to continue. The Palestinians aren't going to go away- indeed, they can't. Except for a fortunate few, most Palestinians are prisoners in their own land, denied the right to travel freely, squeezed by a burgeoning population of Jewish settlers who would love nothing more than to be given free rein to drive the Arabs right out of the West Bank and into Jordan, or to hell itself. They don't care... Do you?

Liars all

Liar 1: Vladimir Putin and the Russian government.
Putin has been honest about one thing. He has vowed to support the "legitimate government of Syria", that is to say the Assad regime and is definitely doing that. But he also said he wishes to join the west in its assault on IS. The truth is he has very little interest in doing that. All the evidence indicates he is actually targeting the opposition groups within Syria, people who simply want to live free lives and do not wish to be barrel-bombed and chlorine-gassed by their own leader. But they oppose Assad's leadership and are therefore legitimate targets for Russian bombs and missiles. You just wish Putin would come right out and say it.

Liar 2: the American military. Last week an MSF hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan was bombed, and bombed repeatedly, by American warplanes. First they said it couldn't have been them, then they admitted it and said it was a "mistake". Some mistake. They continued bombing it for nearly an hour after the hospital staff phoned the military and told them they were a hospital and could they stop killing their patients and medical staff. The truth here is that the US army had received intel that Taliban fighters were holed up in the hospital, making it another "legitimate target", without getting any on-the-ground confirmation of this. Turns out it wasn't even true.

Liar 3: David Cameron and the Tory party. Yesterday at the Tory party conference DC was trying to get us to believe that they are the party of the poor, whereas Corbyn's Labour party are terrorist-lovers and Britain haters. Lies.
Probably a lot of people in Britain do believe the Tories support the poor. Just no poor people. They've had to endure the bedroom tax, and will soon see their incomes further curtailed by the ending of tax credits. In fact the Tories are ideologically committed to make the lives of the poor worse, because why should the well-off subsidise  a group of lazy, feckless individuals who would rather sponge off the state than do a day's work? Why make life easy for them? If they want a better life then they should go out and get a job, like the rest of us. As for Labour, why should a desire to talk to all sides in a seemingly intractable conflict be interpreted as a love for terrorists? Because that's what they want you to believe.

Liar 4: the BBC. All this week things have been going from bad to worse on the West Bank; Palestinians stabbing Jewish settlers, Israeli soldiers shooting dead children for stone throwing, thousands of Muslims being denied the right to worship at the Al-Aksa mosque. How do I know this? Not because I watch and listen to the BBC news, which has remained almost mute on the subject from the outset. Jeremy Bowen was almost fired for telling too much truth about the invasion of Gaza and has since been sidelined. Now you have to go to alternative sources to find out what's going on out there. Even Sky news has been more forthcoming. Why? Because there is an unstated agenda in the highest echelons of the BBC: to support our friends, the Israelis, and that's even more important than reporting the news honestly

September 2015 book and film review

BOOKS

AGNES MARTIN: HER LIFE AND ART, by Nancy Princenthal.
Agnes Martin (1912-2004) grew up in the Great Plains of western Canada, but soon realised her artistic career would be better served in the United States, where she moved in 1931. From quite early on she started creating large (6 feet by six feet) canvases covered by grids of lines, often drawn in pencil and deliberately not perfectly executed. The spaces between the lines would be filled in by subtle colouring, creating a strange, other-worldly atmosphere that is hard to describe without actually witnessing them in the flesh. Critics and other artists began to call them outstanding examples of minimalism,  though throughout her long life she resisted the classification, preferring to call her work abstract expressionism. And despite (or perhaps because of?) her recurrent schizophrenic breakdowns, she slowly attained a cult status as one of America's finest artists.

Art books are often worth looking at only for the reproductions they contain, with the text disappointing in the extreme. There are exceptions of course, like Hilary Spurling's superb life of Matisse, or Michael Holroyd's brilliant account of the life of the original Bohemian, Augustus John. I am pleased to say Nancy Princenthal's book may belong in this latter category. Intelligently argued, intimately researched and, despite its occasional excursions into the arcane world of artistic interpretation, still accessible to an unsophisticated reader such as myself, this book provides a unique insight into the life of one of the most talented but enigmatic artists of the 20th century.

STORMBREAKER, by Anthony Horowitz. An adolescent boy wakes up morning to find his dad has been killed in a car crash. Or has he? To Alex Ryder the facts don't add up, and when he is approached by MI6 to continue his father's work as a spy he realises he was right. What follows is a madcap caper into the world of industrial espionage with the highest stakes imaginable...

My wife suggested I read this as an example of superior fiction aimed at the 12-18 market, because she suspects my own forte may lie in that direction. And, much as I might like to think I have a Proust-like creation in me, I think she could be onto something. I could certainly do worse than write a book of this calibre, which rips along like a river in full flood, with almost every page packed with one kind of murder and mayhem or another. I read the whole thing in a single sitting, which has to be a good sign for any book. Anthony Horowtiz is carrying all before him at the moment. His Alex Ryder series of books have sold in their millions; he is in demand to write screenplays for the biggest movies, and the Ian Fleming estate has chosen him to write a brand-new James Bond book (Trigger Mortis). It doesn't seem to bother AH that his books are aimed at an adolescent market; maybe it shouldn't bother me either...

MARLBOROUGH: HIS LIFE AND TIMES, by Winston Spencer Churchill.
Born into an ancient, well connected but scarcely wealthy family in the 1640s, John Churchill rose to become one of Britain's most illustrious (and wealthy) soldiers. A man of infinite good fortune, his first big break occurred when he became the favourite of Barbara Villiers, Duchess of Cleveland and mistress to Charles II. She not only had the hots for him, but was extremely generous to him into the bargain, giving him the money he needed to launch a career in the army, at a time when that was a pre-requisite. Later he was to become a central player in some of the most important events in British history: the ousting of the Catholic King James II and later on the battlefields of Europe, fighting (and defeating) our old enemy, the French, not once but many times.

I decided to read this book as the latest in an occasional series of reading at least one book by every winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. It was written in 1930s, in Churchill's "Wilderness Years" while he was waiting for his dire predictions about the rise of Hitler to come to pass, enabling him to steady the helm at the moment of Britain's darkest hour and ultimately become her saviour.
Churchill's writing is meticulous, exhaustively researched, often witty and certainly pulls no punches. Obviously he is happy to admit his bias: the Duke of Marlborough, as John Churchill became, was Winston's great great grandfather, and it was his huge accumulation of wealth that enabled Winston, two hundred years down the line, to enjoy a life of privilege and luxury. But Winston is not afraid to tell of the warts in his personality: his legendary meanness (he would never take a cab in London, as did every other rich man, because he thought they were overpriced) and his moral conundrums (he betrayed King James despite swearing his undying allegiance). But about one thing Winston is unwavering: his ancestor was the consummate warrior: able, like all the greatest generals. to see the small as well as the big picture, and also possessing that most intangible but critical faculty: good luck.
I am only half way through the thousand pages of Book One in this four volume behemoth. Will I go on to read the others? Let's see how it goes...

FILMS

BLACK SNAKE MOAN (2006) W/D- Craig Brewer. A tenant farmer (Samuel L. Jackson) finds a barely conscious girl (Christina Ricci) lying in his driveway and takes her in to tend her wounds.Turns out she's some sort of nymphet and has already landed herself in big trouble with her boyfriend (Justin Timberlake) because of it. When Jackson learns of this he decides to take a hand and chains her to a radiator, vowing he will not release her until she mends her ways. Sooner or later his novel form of therapy is going to be discovered...

Here we have an interesting premise, and the fact is that the players make a very good fist of bringing the narrative to life. Jackson of course is a well established class act, Ricci convinces as the horny teen, while Justin Timberlake does a creditable angry dude.  And it is well enough written and directed to produce a satisfying whole.

HER (2013) W/D- Spike Jonze. Disappointed in love, Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix) seeks solace in the solid state charms of a hyper-intelligent, self-aware computer (yeah, that old chestnut again) voiced by Scarlett Johansson. Phwoar! What an operating system! Phoenix soon realises the awesome nature of "Samantha's" software (sic). She doesn't only talk exactly like a human being, she talks like a charming, intelligent, sympathetic and compassionate human being. What's not to like?
And that's not the half of it. "Samantha" is also designed to demonstrate a phenomenon (this is theoretical at present, but watch this space) known as technological singularity, in which a computer is capable of learning and refining itself at an exponential rate. In Samantha's case this goes all the way to becoming hurt when Phoenix starts seeing a real woman.
Her went down a storm in the US when it came out, receiving Oscar nominations for best picture and best screenplay. At the time I refused to have anything to do with it because of Johansson's involvement with the Sodastream company, which at the time had built a factory in one of Israel's illegal settlements on the West Bank. Now that they have been persuaded to see the error of their ways and pulled out of the occupied territories, I can now forgive Scarlett and enjoy this remarkable and thought provoking film. I have admired Spike Jonze ever since the extraordinary Being John Malcovitch, and with this film he proves he is now one of the most gifted writer/directors in America.

SHEENA QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE (1984) D- John Guillermin. Somewhere in darkest Africa, a little blond girl is abandoned and brought up by local tribespeople who harbour a great secret: the volcanic soil on their land is capable of curing all disease. Later, as the little girl grows into the gorgeous Tanya Roberts, the secret is uncovered by a ruthless dictator who would have the super-soil for himself, and kill whoever gets in his way. But Sheena, God bless her, isn't about to let that happen, and she uses her acquired super-powers (she can communicate telepathically with the animals, one step up from Dr Doolittle there) to foil her dastardly opponent.
OK. Nice plot, beautiful star, what could go wrong with that? Almost everything, as it turns out. Sheena: Queen of the jungle is a truly awful film, sloppily directed, poorly written and containing some of the worst acting I have ever seen in a film of this scale. And that's saying something. Not, I hasten to add, from la Roberts, who can act and whose beauty shines from first frame to last, but even there we find a problem. Not content with simply making the most of Tanya's abundant charms, director Guillermin chooses to make her wear the most ridiculous electric blue contact lenses, which produce an absurd, farcical effect.
John Guillermin has form. He made The Towering Inferno in 1974 at the height of the disaster epic vogue, and followed that woeful effort with the even worse remake of King Kong in 1976. He established a rep as someone who could handle the logistics of a big budget movie, sort of never mind the quality, feel the management. But seriously, unless like me you are a committed Tanya Roberts fan, you should avoid this one carefully.

EASTERN PROMISES (2007) D- David Cronenberg. In a London maternity hospital, a pretty young midwife (Naomi Watts) discovers a hand written diary on the body of a fourteen-year-old girl who dies in childbirth. Naomi is part Russian herself, but cannot read the Russian text, so she takes it to her Russian uncle. They don't know the identities of the people named in the diary, but there is pretty damning evidence against whoever they are. Meanwhile the London based Russian mob hears of the missing diary and are determined to recover it, as they are the ones mentioed in its pages. They send one of their most trusted lieutenants (Viggo Mortensen, Cronenberg's favourite actor) to recover it and exterminate whoever he thinks fit. But Mortensen, perhaps understandably, develops a soft spot for Watts and is reluctant to execute her and her family. The Russian mob, however, didn't get where they are by showing mercy to people who have in any way troubled them.

Made with the usual Cronenberg attention to detail and depicting the kind of horrific violence for which he has become famous, this is a gripping and frightening movie, with Naomi Watts convincing and Mortensen showing again he is so much more than a Tolkien hunk. But beware, blood alert, beaucoup blood alert.

MAPS TO THE STARS (2014) D- David Cronenberg. In LA, a hip therapist (John Cusack) has two children: one is a kind of Macauley Culkin type adolescent megastar, the other, Agatha (Mia Wasakowska) was sequestered away in a mental institution following a psychotic episode when she set fire to the family house with her family inside. She herself  barely escaped with her life and was badly burned. As the film opens we find her looking for her family among the Bel Air homes of the rich and famous. When she finally tracks them down they are not exactly pleased to see her, but she lands on her feet when a fading Hollywood beauty agrees to take her on as her PA. But if she thought this would mark an upturn in her affairs, she is sadly mistaken...

This closely observed minor masterpiece follows in the wake of such movies as Nashville and Crash, with its overview of Hollywood denizens drifting through their confused, hypocritical and fucked-up lives. In his first movie made in the US, Canadian Cronenberg has for once forsaken his penchant for what Stanley Kubrick called "ultra-violence" and made an intelligent, thoughtful film with insightful performances from all its players. Quality film making from one of the world's most durable directors.

SOPHIE SCHOLL (2005) D- Marc Rothemund. In wartime Berlin, Sophie Scholl (Julia Jentsch) and a band of dissidents are engaged in the highly dangerous pursuit of leaving anti-nazi propaganda sheets inside public buildings. But on her very first day she is captured by the Gestapo. She is sent to the "People's Court" where she pleads guilty, even though knows her crime attracts the death penalty. But if she throws herself upon the mercy of the court?

And there you have it. A remarkably simple tale based on real events and covering much of the same ground as Hans Fellada's magnificent novel Alone in Berlin, this film is graced by fine acting performances throughout, but none more so than the incredible achievement of Julia Jentsch as the doomed Sophie Scholl. Her style is almost minimalist; her face barely moves, but all the emotion and raw fear is there on the screen in horrific detail. An exceptional if extremely harrowing movie.

THE WOMAN IN BLACK (2012) D- James Watkins. A young accountant (Daniel Radcliffe) goes to a remote house in the country to wrap up the estate of a dead woman. The locals won't go anywhere near the place, though they won't say why. Then a friendly landowner explains the place is said to be haunted, and that children died there in mysterious circumstances. Radcliffe is a sensible soul and refuses to subscribe to the haunting theory to account for the various odd noises and even sights he thinks he sees. But it isn't long before he has no option but to review his assessment...

Based on the novel by Susan Hill and produced by Hammer studios (to date it has been their most successful movie ever) this is a truly gripping and frightening movie. I first saw a televised version of this tale way back in 1988 and had difficulty sleeping that night. This is a worthy remake, using a similar technique to that employed by Robert Wise in his celebrated thriller The Haunting, in that (at least in the early reels) we don't see much, but enough to scare the pants off us. Later the action is more upfront, and then it is really terrifying. If you like a good ghost story, this is one of the best.

MYSTERY ROAD (2013) D- Ivan Sen. In a remote township in the Australian bush a young girl is found murdered and dumped in a storm drain. It falls to the local cop, aboriginal Jay Swan (Aaron Pedersen) to track down the culprit. There are few clues to go on, and a culture of silence to break through. With a spot of free time, Swan gets in a bit of target practice. He places three beer bottles on fence posts and then drives away, hundreds of yards away, to a point where he parks up and gets out his Winchester 30.06 hunting rifle. Then with the aid of a telescopic sight he takes aim. From this distance he can't even see the bottles without the sight, but he picks one off, then the second. The third he misses... Turns out he is not the only member of the community who fancies himself a crack shot. It's one thing when you have a beer bottle in your sights, but what if it's a human being you're aiming at. What then?
What then indeed. This film winds up the tension in a relaxed, almost languid style that we know is completely deceptive. For, as we gradually learn, the stakes are high: 10 kilos of high grade ice have gone missing; the dead girl was involved in some way and the putative owners of the speed don't care who they have to off in order to get their merchandise back.
 A highly satisfying Australian thriller.

Nice one squirrel

We have a hazel tree in our garden, and every year as September begins, its produce attracts the attentions of the local squirrel population. Not many to be sure; natural predators in the form of cats, many cats, patrol the area in the hope of having a nice little snack. But there is one who can be seen in our garden every day. He is big, strong, and very, very quick; he doesn't look like he's about to be taken down by any stupid moggie.

Our two cats are fascinated by him and have chased him several times, but now they appear to have given up and instead maintain a watching brief. Despite this Squirrely should beware letting his guard down even for a moment. Like all cats they are possessed of infinite patience, and the slightest lapse in his concentration is all they need: then they will strike. But for the present he enjoys the run of our garden, using all the thoroughfares normally used by the neighbourhood cats and sufficiently fleet of foot to evade them. For the moment...

THE GREAT LUNAR ECLIPSE: HOW WAS IT FOR YOU?

Last night I "programmed" myself to wake at 4 am and somewhat to my surprise it worked. I looked out of my bedroom window and with my naked, decidedly poor quality eyes I could barely see a thing. When I used my high quality 7x42 night glasses though,, it all came into glorious focus: a huge, surreal, coppery orb hanging in the sky, lit only by the light filtering through the outer edges of our own atmosphere, as the Earth itself was blocking any direct sunlight falling on its surface.

As lunar eclipses occur every three or four years and each one can, unlike solar eclipses, be seen over a large area of the Earth's surface, I have seen many in my lifetime. The marvellous thing is that every one is different, depending on atmospheric conditions here on Earth. Although the dark, coppery hues of last night's eclipse are not uncommon, sometimes, as in 1975, the moon can all but disappear altogether. whereas in 1995 the moon wore a bizarre, pizza-like appearance not unlike the surface of Io. In summary, lunar eclipses are a wonderful sight, easy to see and occur relatively often even in the brief timespan of a human life. If you didn't catch this one, don't worry: the next is due in 2019 and I'm confident it won't disappoint- clouds permitting that is...

We've gotta have our nukes

Apparently, and it doesn't matter how much it's gonna cost, or even if it makes any sense. The government is pressing ahead with its plans to build the most expensive nuclear power station ever built, anywhere, the work contracted out to the Chinese and French, with you and me footing the bill, all to have "energy security" that new phrase trotted out by George Osborne et al to justify this project (they use the same spurious argument with fracking). Oh, they say, what if the Russians and Norwegians decide to turn off the stopcock- we'll be screwed, right? Not really. Sure, the Ruskies might do it, though to think the Norwegians would deny themselves the billions and billions we pay them for their gas is a bit of a stretch. Oh, and while we're on the subject of energy security, no one is going to turn off the wind any time soon, or the sun come to that. But such is the missionary zeal of a government which in many ways is just as radical as Corbyn, for some reason  they don't want to encourage sustainable forms of energy production. What is it, do they think it's all a conspiracy by the leftie/hippie faction to take over the world? It doesn't sound likely, but there must be a reason why the government is anxious to pollute and endanger the world rather than nurture it, but I haven't worked it out yet.

They're not the only ones. Yesterday on The Today Programme a former spokesman for Greenpeace actually said that he used to be anti-nuclear, but now what with global warming he's pro. Sure, nukes don't add to carbon emissions (neither does solar power, though that didn't stop this stupid government slapping a carbon tax on it), but they don't represent value for money, and their risks remain the same now as they did in the days of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl.

Wales is planning its own new nuke too, at Trawsfynydd on Anglesey. Not long ago the Japanese premier actually visited Wales and made a passionate plea for us to rethink. The Fukushima plant, he reminded us, was well protected against the possibility of a tsunami, but they never anticipated the unprecedented scale of the wave in 2011. His point being that it is impossible to fully protect such dangerous machines as nuclear power stations. Plus the fact that the waste from these plants remains dangerous for centuries, millennia in some cases. But that's a problem for our descendants, not us, right?

In summary, our current energy policy makes no sense to anyone outside a coterie inside the government and the vested interests who stand to make billions. Everyone else is going to suffer.

The problems of an unreconstructed republican

In 1977 I was lucky enough to get hold of two tickets to the Centre Court for the women's singles final between Virginia Wade and Betty Stove of the Netherlands. The Queen, unusually for her, because she has made no secret of the fact that tennis bores her, was also present for the occasion. Also present was my friend Ann Roberts, an Irishwoman from Derry ( I refuse to call that town by its ridiculous current name of "Derry/Londonderry", a pathetic term that tries to appease everyone but ends up pleasing no one) who having seen at first hand the way the gerrymandered majority protestant administration discriminated against the catholic population, denying them the best jobs, appropriating the best land and so on, was not likely to be well disposed to the figurehead of the British state. So when it came to the point where the crowd stood to sing the National Anthem, Ann remained sitting, and silent. As a gesture of solidarity to my friend, I did the same. I will never forget the level of unspoken hostility and, well, sheer hatred, that our little protest provoked. As it became clear there were two people refusing to stand and sing, people began to shoot angry glances in our direction; a crescendo of furious murmuring rose around us, until I honestly thought I and perhaps my companion also would be frogmarched outside and be beaten to bloody pulps.

Fortunately the moment passed and we all settled down to watch the thrilling events of that day unfold. Naturally we were ostracised by our fellow tennis fans,which didn't matter as English people who don't know each other rarely speak anyway. But the reaction that our actions brought about bit deeply into my consciousness. Something not wholly dissimilar happened to JC last week when he refused to sing the words of our National Anthem. The right wing media were on him in a flash; even his own colleagues had to draw him aside and warn him not to repeat such an unpatriotic act before the eyes of the world. I feel for him. Jeremy Corbyn comes from a lifetime's commitment to republicanism, and old habits die hard. But change he must, if he is to have any chance of taking the Labour Party to success in 2020. It's all very well to stand on the fringes of mainstream politics and hold views like his, but now he finds himself close to the heart of power: a member of the Privy Council and potential Prime Minister. Jeremy is going to have to learn the subtle art of compromise. My only fear is that he may have to compromise too much, and thereby lose the support of the very people who voted him into power in the first place. Suddenly the nation is saying things like "maybe nationalising the railways isn't such a bad idea after all" and even "do we really need that Trident thing in the world we now inhabit?".

So, Jeremy, in some areas the nation may want you to moderate your views. But not too much. We want you to change the face of British politics. We want you and your team to make this country a fairer place to live in, where the super-rich are taxed according their vast wealth and the poorest are helped out of the poverty trap. We believe you can do it, so don't shrink from your gargantuan task, even if you might have to mouth the words of God Save the Queen every now and then.

Speaking of Ashley Madison...

"Life is short. Have an affair" is Ashley Madison's tagline And it seems millions of people (mostly men, I  understand) have signed up, in total confidence as they thought, to get their rocks off in a completely no-strings-attached way. Imagine their mortification then, when hackers broke in and outed the whole damn miserable lot of them.

There's nothing wrong with having an affair, is there? AM subscribers might ask. The answer is, unfortunately for them, yes there is. Way back in the 80's, a male friend and I subscribed to this adage:
Once you stick your thing in, it gets complicated.
It doesn't say exactly that in the Bible, but that book's proscription of extra-marital sex does go to the same issue, as does contemporary law, which sees it as sufficiently serious to be grounds for divorce.

Put it another way, carnal relations between two people are always complicated, because sex is never just physical; it involves a whole range of powerful emotions, not only to those notoriously emotional beings called women, but to men as well. So, men, beware sticking your thing in: it gets complicated straight away, whatever Ashley Madison might want you to believe. Sex without feelings is no more than masturbation or paying for a hooker. Any other kind of sex is a big deal, and should only be engaged in with great care and sensitivity regarding one's own feelings and the feelings of any prospective partner.

"Ashley Madison", I forget the real name of the website's owner, would want you think otherwise, but then he would, wouldn't he? He's made millions out of selling a dangerous myth, though I am pleased to report that those profits may have taken a bit of a hit in recent weeks. Good.

Sexual harassment: a bit of a minefield for old gits like me

Charlotte Proudman (sic) was deeply offended when a fellow lawyer, granted, twice her age, complimented her on her on her "stunning" profile picture on the site Linkedin. She shot back with a broadside indicating that she found the comment "unacceptable and misogynistic". But although I have always tried to treat women as different but equal, and that part of me approved of her disapproval, another part of me felt a trace of sympathy towards the older (and perhaps rather pathetic) man.

Look at Ms Proudman's picture, especially her fringe.  Has she not applied some sort of perming device to it? Why? Presumably to enhance her attractiveness. In which case, I find myself thinking that if she has gone to some trouble to make her face look more pretty and appealing, why is she then offended when someone says they find it so?

OK, OK. I know I could be seen as missing the point here, that as La Proudman is using Linkedin as a forum for business contact, she doesn't want it to be used as some sort of Ashley Madison thing. But here's what worries me. Can we now take it that men can no longer say to work colleagues things like "you look nice today", or "I like that dress"? I rather think we can. I remember an incident a few years ago when my practice nurse came rushing in from the car having been caught in a cloudburst. I said:
"You look unusually attractive today, what is it?"
Her response was that maybe it was because her hair was wet. To which I said "Oh right, that's probably it." And that was the way it was left. No lawsuits for sexual harassment; no offence intended, none taken. I fear those days are long gone. If I tried a line like that today I'd either find myself in court, or handing over substantial damages out of it to avoid public exposure as a sexist brute.

You know what? I'm glad I'm retired.

Welcome to Dismaland, home of irony

Yesterday, after we had spent three hours in Banksy's Dismaland, my wife described it as "a nice day out". Her remark might be considered trite, but it was totally in keeping with the sense of irony that pervaded every brick of this unique institution.

Inside the walls of this former art deco lido which used to go under the not unironic name of The Tropicana, the "fun" begins as soon as you pay the £3 fee for entry. Carefully trained staff adopt a permanently dismal expression as they guide you in. And once inside you will find all the usual attractions of a funfair: Ferris Wheel, obviously bent shooting galleries, even a paddling pool where, for £1 you can guide miniature boats full of beautifully crafted migrants round and round in circles, running over others who are already in the water. What fun! Further inside an armoured police van with water-cannon fountain languishes in a pool, while over there is a bell-tent housing a collection of radical banners going back nearly a century of activism. Then there is a gallery housing examples of subversive art from some of the world's leading artists, including a novel creation by Damien Hurst, where a large beach ball hovers precariously over a base where a hundred vicious knives point upwards, waiting to burst it. Finally, at the far end of the site is the "library", featuring what was for me the focal point of the whole exposition, a copy of The ABC of Communist Anarchism, by the Russian/American activist Alexander Berkman, whose works are virtually sacred tests for anarchists the world over. In these hallowed pages you will find his demands for individual freedom and responsibility, plus the assertion that when free individuals come together in mutual consent there is almost nothing they cannot achieve.

This is the beating heart of Dismaland; it is what provides the reason underlying all of Banksy's work, and the people present seemed to recognise this instinctively. The demographic was mainly middle class/liberal, but there was none of the posing and commercialism that has marred Glastonbury in recent years, now the corporate dollar has taken over, and we can find Alexa Chung wandering around the fields in £800 designer boots. Here people are much more knowing, ready to take on board the tenets of anarchism, because we can now see, with the spasms of the refugee crisis swirling around Europe, the horrible shit the capitalist system has landed us in.

I urge any follower of this blog to beg, borrow, steal, or simply do as we did and queue up on the day and have a grand day out at one of the most amazing spectacles this correspondent has ever witnessed.