Days 600 and 601

Aka Saturday 22^nd September and Sunday 23^rd September

No more mouse related disturbances this weekend, no scratching, no nibbling of the traps, no nothing, so hopeful that is done and dusted with.

During the weekend I:

…listened to 'Vintage Grooves' (which arrived on Saturday) which is a compilation of, mostly, soul and funk tracks, such as Frank De Jojo’s ‘Turn Off The Lights’, James Mason’s ‘I Want Your Love’,  Grace Jones’ ‘Nipple To The Bottle’, Aretha Franklin’s ‘Rock Steady (Danny Krivit Re-Edit)’ and Gwen McCrae’s ‘90% Of Me Is You’, and sounds like the soundtrack to the best after-the-club, all-back-to-mine party. 10/10.

…watched a few films:

‘Triangle’, a great horrific thriller film, where Jess, played expertly by Melissa George, is caught in a time loop and (mostly) stuck on a deserted (or is it) cruise liner. I really like ‘Triangle’, but can’t really explain why without spoilers, but this article does a great job of explaining it, so I’ll just note that (a) some people suggest that it’s not a time loop, rather, Jess is in Purgatory and is reliving the day until she can accept what happens during that day and therefore move or to Heaven or Hell, or she is in Hell and is re-experiencing the day as a punishment and (b) that although the horror isn’t of the blood and guts type, there is plenty of the horror of being a parent. Of being separated from your child and of seeing your actions as a parent as a dispassionate observer.

The first ten minutes or so of the film show Jess as being a good single parent, but in the last ten or so minutes of the film Jess (and the viewer) sees these first ten minutes from a different point of view and we see that Jess hasn’t been coping with the pressure. That it has gotten to her, that she has become round up, angry and does lose control, and shouts at and hits her son (when he spills some paint) and isn’t the perfect mother. The horror comes from us realising, that as emotional people, we all have the potential to be monsters, that we’re just a sleepless night or two away from losing control and, in the heat of the moment, doing something horrible, such as hitting our child/child in our care. That while we condemn those parents/carers that brutalise their children, under the right circumstances, in the heat of the moment, we could do something similar. So, when Jess sees the second Jess hurting her son, it prompts her into actions that could be the catalyst for the time-loop, which may also be a subconscious way of Jess punishing herself.

‘Street Kings’ stars Keanu Reeves as a slightly corrupt cop, he breaks the law to get the bad guys, but he doesn’t take brides or looks the other way, who can feel Internal Affairs getting closer, especially as his ex-partner has been murdered and it’s been set up to look like Keanu was involved. That is a very nutshell description of the plot, there is a lot more going on, it’s twisty and turny, with double crosses, betrayals and not being sure who you can trust. 

 

I really liked ‘Street Kings’, it’s not your typical “bad guy turns good and eventually does the right thing in the end”, it’s a tad more complicated/involved, more "the goodish guy, worries that he might be getting too corrupt and tries to stop this slide". It’s well written, acted and directed, it’s almost an embarrassment of riches. Aside from Keanu, there’s James Ellroy, Forest Whitaker, Hugh Laurie, Chris Evans, Terry Crews, Common and David Ayer. 8/10.

‘The Italian Job’ and ‘Get Carter’, these are two iconoclastic British films and I’m not sure what I can say about them that hasn’t been said before. They’re both well written, acted, directed, great soundtracks, etc. that they are still enjoyable and absorbing even on the third, tenth, twentieth watch.

One thing I did note is that they are polar opposites, ‘The Italian Job’ is a joyful crime caper set in that slightly unreal world of the swinging ‘60’s, where criminals are lovable rouges, people stand for the National Anthem at the end of the days TV broadcast and British pluck overcomes all. Whereas ‘Get Carter’ is a dirty, gritty revenge thriller, very much set in the real world of long train journeys to Newcastle, smoking everywhere, dark and dingy pubs, rotary telephones and outside toilets. There's no fun or cheekyness, just the hardness of real life.

Even through ‘The Italian Job’ and ‘Get Carter’ were filmed close together, 1969 and 1971 respectively, it feels like they bookend the swinging ‘60’s. ‘The Italian Job’ is like The Beatles and the British Pop explosion, full of fun, hope, excitement, colour and desire to explore, whereas ‘Get Carter’ is like Altamont, dark, thriller and horrifying, the end of the hippy dream and the start of a the three day week and a less hopeful and less happy decade.

…and on Saturday I did the G2 crossword:

…which went okay, I only needed to cheat on a fifth of the clues (five out of 24), although I would strongly argue that a ‘public space serving scones and creams etc’ is a tea room and not a ‘tea garden’ and I learnt that the capital of Ghana is ‘Accra’.

Day 599

Aka Friday 21^st September

This morning I did the G2 crossword:

…which went really well, and I only needed to cheat on two for the 24 clues, so close to a perfect go-around, but I couldn’t get ‘scraper’ from ‘hand tool for clearing surfaces’ and ‘misfit’ from ‘oddball’, which seem very obvious to me now!

…then I watched ‘The Rocketeer’, which I really enjoyed. Billy Campbell does a good job as Cliff Secord, who becomes The Rocketeer, the films lead, with great turns from Jennifer Connelly, as Jenny, Cliff’s girlfriend, and Alan Arkin, Peevy, Cliff’s friend and father figure and mechanical genius. But I think Timothy Dalton is best as Neville Sinclair, the baddie of the film, chewing the scenery like he hasn’t eaten in weeks. There’s also, Terry O'Quinn plays Howard Hughes, which is odd as he’s young in this film and I always find it hard to separate other characters he plays from ‘Locke’ in ‘Lost’.

‘The Rocketeer’ is a great pulpy science-hero flick. It’s kinda like the Brendan Fraser ‘The Mummy’, replacing the horror aspects with science-fiction, although there’s slightly less comedy in ‘The Rocketeer, combining the innocence of the past and tongue in cheekiness of the present/’90’s. In the film, Cliff and Peevy find an experimental rocket backpack and have to stop it from getting into the hands of the Nazis. Which involves gangsters, the FBI, Nazi double agents and Cliff and Jenny in a climactic battle with Neville and Nazis in and on a burning zeppelin. Great fun. 7/10.

…listened to Gabriel Gurnsey’s ‘PHYSICAL’ album. Mr Gurnsey is a member of Factory Floor and ‘PHYSICAL’, his first solo album, is a great electronic album that somehow manages to balance being both dancey and relaxed, both dancefloory and sofa-listening, physical and contemplative. 8/10.

...and re-read ‘Blood Stained Sword’, which contains two stories, ‘Blood Stained Sword’ written by Dan Wickline and ‘Demon Father John’s Pinwheel Blues’ by Amber Benson, linked by the art, by Ben Templesmith. 8/10.

‘Blood Stained Sword’ is set in the near future and Kenji, aided by Andrea, is investigating his father’s supposed suicide. Their investigation uncovers that Kenji’s father was murdered to cover-up and Kenji uses his Samurai skills, taught to him by his father, to extract vengeance and recover his fathers honour. I really enjoyed this story, which has echoes of the film ‘Red Sun’, Mr Templesmith’s art is a perfect fit for this neo-noirish story and Mr Wickline has made the characters believable, even though it’s a short story, they aren’t just cut-outs with no personality.

‘Demon Father John’s Pinwheel Blues’ is a vampire story about a young boy, Pinwheel, whose family are killed, and he is inducted into a Fagin-esh gang of vampires. Ms Benson’s story is smaller in scale and is about Pinwheel adapting to his new life and getting revenge., and really captures the language/thought patterns of being a child and has written a creepy villain. And Mr Templesmith’s art beautifully complements the story, Pinwheel and the other children look innocent and cherubic and the villain looks shabby and not dangerous, until the horror comes and it looks truly horrific, all teeth, claws and red.