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alexsarllI know that for a lot of people New Year's Day is the 'never drinking again' day, but past experience suggests that for me that policy gets the year off to a depressingly sensible start from which it can struggle to recover. Unhelpfully, however, the Noble was shut, which left us in the Dairy. Now, taking it as read that the Dairy is not what it was, the place still feels even more dismal than it did right after its ill-advised refit. Why should this be? I think it may be that it faces the Larrik. The Larrik is probably the most depressing pub in London, this much we know, but I swear its baleful field of influence is spreading. Even walking (swiftly) past earlier on NYD, casting barely a glance inside, left me feeling somehow drained and grey. I think it must be the Dementors' local. I know it must be stopped.
Speaking of the festive wind-down: Poptimism's all-Number-Ones-all-night incarnation Popular is on Saturday, to which I would link except they still have the December details up, the rascals. And on Sunday, Bankside's annual Twelfth Night celebrations actually fall on Twelfth Night. Heartily recommended, subject to being up at that time on a Sunday.
Also on NYD: watched two films whose ghosts don't really prescribe their genre. Guillermo del Toro's The Devil's Backbone, even more than its sister film Pan's Labyrinth, is a film of the Spanish Civil War which encompasses some supernatural elements. They're relevant, they're integrated, but they don't feel like they rule the story; I'd call it a war story or a school story before I called it a ghost story. Interestingly, it does briefly hint at a dissonance which Pan's Labyrinth didn't mention at all, but then backs away - it's odd to make films of the supernatural which back the republicans, when they were so opposed to that sort of thing.
Similarly, Viv Stanshall's Sir Henry at Rawlinson End, a film I appreciated so much more with a few more years on me and a better grasp of the Bonzos' unique lunacy. The ghost is again part of the scene, driving the plot without dominating the tone. Having seen so many films derailed by a foolish insistence on following the rules of the genre in which they think they're confined, it's heartening to see two which can use genre conventions as a toolbox, not a straitjacket.
The fine publisher Dedalus Books, especially good for European and decadent classics, are likely to lose most or all of their Arts Council funding as part of the funding cuts for which the accursed Olympics take most of the responsibility. The Bookseller reports that the Council has concerns about their "business planning, inconsistent marketing and building new audiences". That sort of talk is dispiriting enough from shareholders, but from a body intended to subsidise the arts? The arts, that is, as distinct from commerce, if anyone else remembers the difference? Meanwhile, the Olympics budget spirals ever higher, with any nonsensical claim about its eventual rewards passing more or less unchallenged. Sham. Despicable sham.
Right; quick scan of the friendslist and then I'm settling in for the evening with my newly-arrived Oz DVD. January 2008: it's all about the bumming.
*Yes, like its opposite number 'The day the Earth caught fire', this is one of the meteorological titles which gets an airing most years. What of it?
Speaking of the festive wind-down: Poptimism's all-Number-Ones-all-night incarnation Popular is on Saturday, to which I would link except they still have the December details up, the rascals. And on Sunday, Bankside's annual Twelfth Night celebrations actually fall on Twelfth Night. Heartily recommended, subject to being up at that time on a Sunday.
Also on NYD: watched two films whose ghosts don't really prescribe their genre. Guillermo del Toro's The Devil's Backbone, even more than its sister film Pan's Labyrinth, is a film of the Spanish Civil War which encompasses some supernatural elements. They're relevant, they're integrated, but they don't feel like they rule the story; I'd call it a war story or a school story before I called it a ghost story. Interestingly, it does briefly hint at a dissonance which Pan's Labyrinth didn't mention at all, but then backs away - it's odd to make films of the supernatural which back the republicans, when they were so opposed to that sort of thing.
Similarly, Viv Stanshall's Sir Henry at Rawlinson End, a film I appreciated so much more with a few more years on me and a better grasp of the Bonzos' unique lunacy. The ghost is again part of the scene, driving the plot without dominating the tone. Having seen so many films derailed by a foolish insistence on following the rules of the genre in which they think they're confined, it's heartening to see two which can use genre conventions as a toolbox, not a straitjacket.
The fine publisher Dedalus Books, especially good for European and decadent classics, are likely to lose most or all of their Arts Council funding as part of the funding cuts for which the accursed Olympics take most of the responsibility. The Bookseller reports that the Council has concerns about their "business planning, inconsistent marketing and building new audiences". That sort of talk is dispiriting enough from shareholders, but from a body intended to subsidise the arts? The arts, that is, as distinct from commerce, if anyone else remembers the difference? Meanwhile, the Olympics budget spirals ever higher, with any nonsensical claim about its eventual rewards passing more or less unchallenged. Sham. Despicable sham.
Right; quick scan of the friendslist and then I'm settling in for the evening with my newly-arrived Oz DVD. January 2008: it's all about the bumming.
*Yes, like its opposite number 'The day the Earth caught fire', this is one of the meteorological titles which gets an airing most years. What of it?
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Date: 2008-01-03 08:26 pm (UTC)But yes, quite agree as regards the rest.
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Date: 2008-01-03 09:48 pm (UTC)guess which bit of yr post i am referring to!
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Date: 2008-01-03 09:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-03 10:10 pm (UTC)ANY MORE TAKERS ROLL UP ROLL UP
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Date: 2008-01-03 11:23 pm (UTC)Oz is so awesome though! I have never seen the first season before, all the people who get killed prior to the stuff I've seen turn up in other HBO stuff instead. And the ones who survive look so fresh-faced and innocent early on. Well, comparatively.
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Date: 2008-01-05 02:21 am (UTC)