21st Century
A View From The Greenhouse; Reflections
As expected (once DJT got his feet back under the table), it became more than a possibility that the war in Ukraine could be brought to a conclusion of sorts. It may not bring the [more…]
Movies
Arts
Briefs Encounter – A reappraisal
After a chance meeting on a train platform, a married doctor (Trevor Howard) and a suburban housewife (Celia Johnson) enter into a muted but passionate, and ultimately doomed, love affair. With its evocatively fog-enshrouded setting, [more…]
Arts
Film Review : The Leopard
Luchino Visconti’s masterpiece is his 1963 historical epic The Leopard (Il Gattopardo, which – pendant alert – actually refers to a smaller spotted wild cat, the serval – the heraldic animal of the Princes of [more…]
Arts
A true Beauty – The Depth and Limits of Alain Delon
Forgive me, Puffins. I know he’s French. And an Actor. But I’d like to talk about Alain Delon’s face for a minute. In truth, it’s hard not to. Certainly, in the early years of his [more…]
20th Century
Scandal After Midnight
Busy times for Mrs Francis Killen. The adverts had been placed. The VIPs were on their way. The early weeks of 1960 saw her guests begin to converge on Merseyside. If her curly-wired bakelite GPO [more…]
20th Century
About Little Women
We play a game at work with girls’ heights. There is a reason for this. Colleagues are going to build a tunnel to the shop next door and steal their toys. To confuse the local [more…]
Arts
Killers of the Flower Moon, by David Grann
The ‘Flower Moon’ is the term the Osage Indians of Oklahoma use to describe that time of year with a full moon in May when the plains around them suddenly burst forth in millions of [more…]
Arts
Totally NOT Star Wars, No sirree : Starcrash – The Movie…….
It’s the late 1970s, and just hitting the big screen is a space opera in which a lightsabre-wielding smuggler embarks on a royal rescue mission, a talking droid sidekick provides comic relief, and a classically [more…]
America
Always Worth Saying’s Film Review
No review of Scoop, now available on Netflix, is likely to spoil the plot. The world and his country cousin can recall the 2019 Orphans’ Away Day trainwreck when BBC Newsnight’s Emily Maitlis scooped an [more…]