My nearest cinema and a review of “Joker”
October 27th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
As all my friends know, I am a massive cinema fan. I see a fair number of films and review all of them online.
Now, when I moved to London’s South Bank seven month ago, I was excited that I would be living so near so many cinemas. Indeed the British Film Institute – which I immediately joined – is barely 10 minutes walk away.
But then I discovered that amazingly the Sea Containers Hotel, which is literally on the other side of the road from my block of flats, has a Curzon cinema in its basement. It’s only one small theatre of 56 seats and it only shows a film on weekends – but wow. And this weekend, for the first time, I strolled across the road to see “Joker”.
How did Arthur Fleck become the arch-villian of Gotham City the Joker? What were the events that led to the child Bruce Wayne – later to become Batman – witnessing the murder of his parents? This movie – brilliantly directed, co-written and co-produced by Todd Phillips – provides answers to these questions in what is perhaps the best cinematic work of the DC Universe.
At the pulsating heart of the film is Joaquin Phoenix in the eponymous role. Now we’ve seen some superlative portrayals of the Joker on the big screen – Jack Nicholson in “Batman” (1989) and Heath Ledger in “The Dark Knight”(2008) – but here Phoenix is simply mesmerising in a role which he totally inhabits and for which he lost an incredible amount of weight. Every movement and every line is compelling and distinctive. As he managed to do in “Gladiator”, Phoenix somehow contrives to make the viewer understand and even sympathise with a complex character denied love.
The supporting actors – most obviously Robert de Niro – are uniformly convincing, the rendition of Gotham City is captivating, and the sound and music gripping in a film that scores on every front. This is a work that will not attract a wide audience, given the dark material and its occasional but brutal violence, but deservedly it will win many award nominations and could well garner Phoenix an Oscar.
Posted in Cultural issues, My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
Who would have thought that anyone would be interested in my diaries?
October 25th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
I started keeping a diary when I was 13 and, since then, I haven’t missed a single day . This means that I’ve kept a diary for almost 58 years or 21,114 days to be precise. It is a personal diary written only for me – but this week I was visited by an historian who is interested in looking at a selected period.
David Kynaston is half way through a huge project involving the writing of six books on post-war Britain covering the period 1945-1979. He has already published the first three works: “Austerity Britain” (1945-1951), “Family Britain” (1951-1957) and “Modernity Britain” (1957-1962).
He visited me this week to discuss his next book, which will cover the period 1963-1967, and to look at my diaries for this period. He would like to use a few quotes from my diaries when he revisits me to study them in more detail.
My diaries will make only a tiny contribution to his project since I was only 15-19 at the time and my comments are understandably youthful, but it was a time of Beatles music, Bond films, the space race and Labour Governments.
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (1)
A review of “The Metamorphosis And Other Stories” by Franz Kafka
October 23rd, 2019 by Roger Darlington
In my early 20s, I read all three of Kafka’s novels – “America”, “The Trial” and “The Castle” – as well as some of his short stories including “The Metamorphosis”. I had thought that this would be the end of my Kafka phase but, some 50 years later, a Czech friend bought me a handsomely-bound collection of a new translation of no less than 38 short stories, so I was back in the world of the Czech Jew who wrote in German and created an inimitable vision somewhere between dream and nightmare.
Kafka spent almost all of his life in his native city of Prague but, as a member of the small German-speaking Jewish community, he was doubly isolated from the Czech/Christian majority and in addition had a contentious relationship with his father. All these factors profoundly influenced his writing.
The most striking works in this anthrology are “The Metamorphosis”, “In The Penal Colony” and “A Hunger Artist” which are among the few longer narratives. Most of the other stories are really short – often a page, a paragragh, even a sentence, but always intriguing and usually unsettling.
The stories are opaque and open to many interpretations but common themes are a lack of control and justice, a sense of anquish and menace, and a illusionary search for meaning. Not for nothing has the word “Kafkaesque” gone into so many languages.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
Why aren’t more consumers engaging with the broadband market?
October 22nd, 2019 by Roger Darlington
Recently the consumer organisation Which? published new research – gathering an in-depth understanding of why consumers aren’t engaging in the broadband market.
This behavioural research identifies six key barriers to engagement among disengaged consumers:
- Consumers have low confidence in assessing what they need and identifying a suitable package
- Consumers are confused about how pricing works in the broadband market
- There is a lack of effective communication about current and alternative packages
- Consumers believe their service is ‘fine’. This is despite many experiencing problems or paying a relatively high price for their package.
- Consumers aren’t willing to risk changing provider as they worry that it may result in a worse broadband service
- Consumers believe that making changes to their contract may result in unexpected add-on costs.
You can read more of the insights uncovered in the full report written in partnership with BritainThinks here.
Posted in Consumer matters, Science & technology | Comments (2)
How could an animation film for children cause an international row?
October 21st, 2019 by Roger Darlington
This weekend, I took my two granddaughters (aged 8 and 3) to see the new animation movie “Abominable” and they loved it. They were able to identify with the young Chinese girl Yi, who lives in Shanghai, when she discovers a yeti on the roof of her apartment block and endeavours to return him to his family on Mount Everest. What could be more charming and innocent?
Well, “Abominable” is the first co-production between US company DreamWorks and China’s Pearl Studio production firm and one very short scene in the movie has caused an international outrage.
There is a map of China which includes the infamous nine-dash line which depicts the territorial claims of China in relation to the South China Sea. The problem is that these claims are contested by Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Taiwan. So the release of “Abominable” in these countries has been highly problematic.
You can learn more about the international row here.
Posted in Cultural issues, World current affairs | Comments (0)
A review of the charming but poignant film “The Farewell”
October 20th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
This mostly Mandarin-speaking film is billed as “based on a true lie”. since it is the lightly-fictionalised experience of writer and director Chinese-American Lulu Wang. The lie in question is the deceit perpetrated by the family of Chinese grandmother Nai Nai (Zhao Shuzhen) when she is diagnosed with incurable lung cancer and given little time to live. She is not told that she is ill, but instead treated to an unprecedented family reunion through the device of a hastily-arranged marriage.
The events – amusing, moving, sad, poignant – are seen from the point of view of Nai Nai’s beloved granddaughter Billi, played with sensitivity by rapper-turned-actor Awkwafina (real name Nora Lum) whom I saw in “Ocean’s 8”.
Most of the narrative is set in the north-eastern Chinese city of Changchun, a metropolis with the population of London that is totally unknown to almost everyone outside China (including me). In fact, I have visited China four times and spent many hours in Chinese flats eating huge meals in large family gatherings, just as is featured so often in “The Farewell”, so much of the movie really resonated with me.
But, anyone with a heart will enjoy this delightful film with its subtle comparison of cultures and portrayal of very different – but all too human – characters, all of whom mean well.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
Brexit bingo – on the day of the Commons vote and the people’s march
October 19th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
A drink is not compulsory each time you hear these, but it might not be a bad idea:
- “Customs border in the Irish Sea”
- “Get Brexit done”
- “The will of the people”
- “17.4 million people”
- “No more dither and delay”
- “A reckless Tory Brexit”
- “No-deal cliff edge”
- “Chlorinated chicken”
- “No one voted to be poorer”
- “Race to the bottom”
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (0)
A review of the new Will Smith film “Gemini Man”
October 18th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
Although this movie has had poor reviews, I wanted to see it, partly because I like Will Smith (and you get two of him here) and partly because there was location shooting in Cartagena, Colombia during my visit there last year (the other non-American location – Budapest, Hungary – is familiar to me too).
Taiwanese director Ang Lee scored a success with the CGI film “The Life Of Pi” and the central plot device here – a brilliant hit man of 51 wants to retire after 72 kills but they send a young clone of him to take him out – had promise. I think the ‘youthification’ of Smith works very well and some of the action – notably a motorbike chase in Cartagena – is entertaining, but the plotting is weak and the dialogue is clunky.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
How did America come to be called America?
October 15th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
This is an interesting letter in the “Guardian” newspaper:
I fear Thomas Eaton (Weekend Quiz, 12 October) is giving further credence to “fake news” from 1507, when a German cartographer was seeking the derivation of “America” and hit upon the name of Amerigo Vespucci, an obscure Florentine navigator. Derived from this single source, this made-up derivation has been copied ever after.
The fact is that Christopher Columbus visited Iceland in 1477-78, and learned of a western landmass named “Markland”. Seeking funds from King Ferdinand of Spain, he told the king that the western continent really did exist, it even had a name – and Columbus adapted “Markland” into the Spanish way of speaking, which requires an initial vowel “A-”, and dropped “-land” substituting “-ia”.
Thus “A-mark-ia”, ie “America”. In Icelandic, “Markland” may be translated as “the Outback” – perhaps a fair description.
See Graeme Davis, Vikings in America (Birlinn, 2009).
Colin Moffat
Kingston upon Thames, London
Posted in History | Comments (0)
Which nationalities are the tallest and the shortest?
October 14th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
I’ve just returned from a week’s holiday in Montenegro and Serbia. I was surprised at how tall both the men and women were in both nations, so I’ve done a little research and I find that these are the 10 tallest countries:
The world’s 10 tallest countries
- Netherlands – 1.838m
- Montenegro – 1.832m
- Denmark – 1.826m
- Norway – 1.824m
- Serbia – 1.82m
- Germany – 1.81m
- Croatia – 1.805m
- Czech Republic – 1.8031m
- Slovenia – 1.803m
- Luxembourg – 1.799m
So, it was not just my imagination. Montenegro and Serbia are second and fifth respectively. Interestingly, two other former republics of the former Yugoslavia – Croatia and Slovenia – are also in the top 10.
So, what about the opposite end of the scale? Here’s the relevant data:
The world’s 10 shortest countries
- Indonesia – 1.58m
- Bolivia – 1.6m
- Philippines – 1.619m
- Vietnam – 1.621m
- Cambodia – 1.625m
- Nepal – 1.63m
- Ecuador – 1.635m
- Sri Lanka – 1.636m
- Nigeria – 1.638m
- Peru – 1.64m
All these data is for men, but the picture for women is similar. You can learn more here.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)