Category: Entertainment

Well Deserved

Entertainment

I have always loved Michael Caine’s acting work — whether his debut starring performance in Zulu, followed by Alfie, Educating Rita, Get Carter, and of course the exquisite Second Hand Lions, among countless others.

In fact, Caine has been one of the hardest-working actors of his, or any, generation — his first appearance on screen was in 1946 — so if Sir Michael has decided to pack it in at the ripe old age of 88, then good for him, say I.

What I always liked about Michael Caine was that he never forgot his roots — growing up in absolute poverty in London’s East End, he remained rooted in reality and unlike so many others, he never let the Hollywood bug get its claws into him.

I think I have more than a few of his movies in my DVD collection — ah, I see Zulu, Harry Brown, Pulp and Little Voice., not to mention appearances in A Bridge Too Far and Battle of Britain... choices, choices, choices.

Out Of Touch

Deep Thoughts, Entertainment

One of the besetting problems of getting older is that much of what passes for the modern-day zeitgeist  simply passes one by, either unnoticed or else rejected without even attempting to follow.

I must have been getting old when I was still young, because:

  • I have never watched a single minute of Dr. Who
  • …or the Kardashian women’s show
  • …or any of the “competition” shows like Dancing With The Stars
  • I never watched any of the Rocky shows after Rocky II
  • I’ve only ever watched the first three Star Wars movies, and even The Return Of The Jedi  sucked
  • I pretty much stopped listening to “new” popular music when grunge appeared (at age 40-ish)
  • I have never played an online computer game, of any description
  • and so on.

At some point, therefore, I must have started looking at new trends, and decided, “Best not” (in the words of Lord Salisbury, circa  1894).

Don’t even ask me about politics, cars or clothing.  (Longtime Readers will know all about my antipathy towards those modernistic monstrosities anyway.)

I know that everyone gets this way in their later years, but it seems mine started long before I actually reached my seniority, way sooner than when this happened to my friends of like age.

If I’d owned a house at that time, I’d probably have been yelling at the kids to get off my lawn when I was in my late twenties.

None of this means that I reject all things new, of course, just that I am extraordinarily picky about adopting any of them.  This is being typed on a laptop that is hundreds or times more powerful than the corporate IBM 360/40 I worked on as an operator in the mid-1970s, and I love the cord-free existence of Bluetooth and wi-fi.  But if I had to, I could easily revert to an earlier generation of comm technology.

I’m even getting bored of writing about this topic right now, so I think I’ll quit.  There are a couple of books that need reading — paper books, not that Kindle nonsense.

Image Problem

Entertainment, Movies

I’ve always thought that the problem with Daniel Craig’s portrayal of James Bond is that Craig doesn’t look like Ian Fleming’s description and characterization of Bond as a man with a cultured veneer, and a tough, ruthless man barely concealed just underneath.  It’s why Sean Connery was so good:

…but the rest were too heavy on the “cultured” (Roger Moore) or else pretty boys (Pierce Brosnan, Timothy Dalton) with no “rough” in evidence anywhere.  This doesn’t mean they’re bad actors (I’m a huge fan of both Moore and Brosnan), but they were just miscast.

By comparison, Daniel Craig is the complete opposite:  a street thug in a tuxedo, no sophistication to be found anywhere.

Which is why his swan song as Bond at the world premiere of whatever they’re calling the  latest car on the 007 money train is so jarring:

The jacket’s too short by two inches, and… pink?  No doubt the producers are setting us up for the next iteration of 007:  Jamie Bond, from West Hollywood.

To make things even worse, his co-star Leah Seydoux looks like a man in drag, and the movie has been dubbed the “wokest Bond movie ever“… to the whirring sound of Ian Fleming spinning in his grave.

All this means I’m unlikely ever to see this movie, but I (and people like me) am no longer relevant to the 007 Marketing Department.

Plus One

Entertainment

John Nolte provides a list of Clint Eastwood’s “offbeat” movies and characters, and I can’t really argue with any of them.

I just wish he’d made it a “top six” and added the much-ignored but superb Tightrope, wherein Clinty plays a New Orleans cop who is nothing like his Harry Callahan forebears:  he’s a single dad, vulnerable, a below-average cop who makes mistakes almost every step of the way.  He doesn’t even carry a .44 Magnum, but some teeny little .38 snubbie.

But the best part is that his investigation takes him into the murky world of deviant sex — which at first repels him, but after some time, and despite all his better instincts, starts to attract him and in so doing, draws him into his prey’s world, making him the hunted.

One of the most attractive features of Clint’s typical movie personae  is that he is strong in his beliefs, and when he straddles the line between right and wrong, he’s always aware of the line.  Not in Tightrope.  And his portrayal of the moral confusion and temptation to which he begins to succumb makes it, I think, one of his most compelling performances.

Watch it if you can get it.

Missing

Entertainment

Nobody seems to know who Sean Lock is in the U.S. (unless they watch stupid Brit TV quiz shows), but I for one am going to miss him, the sour, dark, cold bastard.

Question:  Does the full moon cause people to commit crime?
Answer:  No, it doesn’t.
Sean Lock:  Then why do I go out killing every month?

Sean Lock:  It’s amazing how many people will talk to you in a pub when you throw a pint of beer in dog’s face.

Question:  What is the traditional sport in which the contestants get thrown into a lava cauldron afterwards?
Sean Lock:  Show jumping.

Sean Lock:  I really wish they would.

Here’s Sean about Twitter…

…and relationships, and Glueball Wormening

…and political correctness, and why women earn less than men.

Anyway, Sean died of lung cancer last week, age 58.

Which makes the opening of this routine really ironic.