Confederate States of America

Friday 6th of March was the day in which I prepared for the summer and went shopping for shirts. The sun was shining bright for most of the day and the chill wind had departed. My first venture was to the bank for a statement and cash and then to Wilkinson where I discovered the availability of folders with 40 pockets for 1.26 about a third of the price of others elsewhere and significantly less than the price of previous volumes at the same store. I bought ten with six black and two each of red and blue and considered a return later after my visit to Sunderland. I also bought the last six available packs of glitter at a £1 each and two greetings card

I had bought the Daily Mail, a pre birthday treat rather than walk the extra distance and back for the free paper, before going to the Ship and Royal for a bacon sandwich. Today we were provided with door stop sandwiches. I cannot recall a thicker slice of bread filled with thick cut bacon slices. It is just as well that having weighed myself and looked into a mirror before dressing the decision was taken to restrict future visits to no more than two a month until the first stone of weight had been lost.

I am not disheartened by the lack of progress so far because as occurred previously the first step is to achieve a basic improvement in mobility and with this the appetite increases because of activity and the fresh air, I eat quantatively more than less. However this was a phase which occurred last time and was followed with gradual progress as I altered both the quantity and quality of the diet and increased exercise levels. Come next Tuesday the main work begins.

I returned home via the supermarket escalator and undertook some work before setting off for Sunderland, motoring to Seaburn where I parked on the sea front just missing not one but two buses into Sunderland city centre. I was tempted to continue the journey in the car but stopped for what became a long wait, but then enjoying the journey on the bus with views over the bay and then the river. The Bay is picturesque but the river here is not. I went first to Mark’s and Spencer’s for the shirts, buying one white and one pastel yellow short sleeve for the summer and a packet of three, while pastel blue and yellow and then a more expensive shirt for this weekend with a tie to go with my dark grey pinstripe suit. At the recent funeral attended I had difficulty buttoning the shirt and going through the wardrobe when I returned, I realised that several collars were past their best.

The opportunity was taken of an offer of one pack of socks at half price with one at full and this worked out at a few pence over £1 for 14 pairs, in various grey tones to black. There was also a display rack of conventional coloured socks but all with glaringly colourful heels, only to be appreciated when not wearing shoes or house slippers. I used two Christmas voucher cards adding the balance required in cash. I then bought the last eight 40 pocket folders at Wilkinson before waiting sometime again for the bus, and as before two then came together. Having reached the parked vehicle I filled up with petrol at the supermarket garage where about every nine months I have bought sufficient petrol to qualify for a £5 shopping voucher. I have another three months to go, It was time for a cup of tea and a lattice slice of apple which was delicious. I read the Newcastle evening Chronicle which was much concerned that Newcastle Football club would avoid relegation, reminding of the succession of managerial teams, this season alone the failure to sell the club, and that the indifferent performances of players anxious to get away and the limitations of the remainder had made the team the laughing stock of the foot balling nation. That such a statement could appear in the be evening paper of the city was startling. It contrasted with the extraordinary continuing support of the public, admittedly a substantial number are prisoners having bought the three season ticket. My interest was in yet a further example of the misbehaviour and irresponsibility of the some footballers. Ashley Cole was arrested and fined for being drunk and disorder, swearing at the police after attending a night club until 2am. His wife Cheryl of the S Factor and Girl’s Aloud was away on a TV/radio charity filmed event climbing Kilimanjaro in central Africa.

For the evening meal I enjoyed two pieces of fish and the rest of the vegetables from the previous day which had accompanied two salmon fish cakes. Over the week I enjoyed a tangerine cheese cake in addition to a melon, grapes and bananas.

After further work and watching a double helping of American idol in which the final six places of the twelve were to be decided, but in a twist the thirteen became twelve which will mean a double eviction in the first week, possibly a treble. There were some surprises in those selected by the judges for the final three places, although it was not hard to understand why they made the first representative from Puerto Rico where the auditions had also been held for the first time, so as to maintain public interest and voting money at least for another week or so. Similarly some of those selected was more to do with having a balanced and wide ranging group of finalists. The cynical in me also says that they probably looked at the comparative voting strengths and had regard for the previous voting levels as an indication of the nature of the competition to come and the likely revenue.

I then watched an interesting documentary film on DVD, CSA - The Confederate States of America, based on the premises that the South had become victors in the Civil War. The programme was interspersed with adverts for Coon Chicken Restaurants in which diners entered through a large Coon face doorway, In Britain we might think that such racism was of a past centre but in fact a small chain of these restaurants existed in several states between the 1930 and 1950’s. Similarly a brand of cigarettes which had Nigger in the name also existed but was later changed to something less offensive. There were also some good twists which carried the stamp of authenticity. Matching the experiments in Nazi Germany before and during World War two in which political and racial prisoners were experimented upon much like we do animals to day in the cause of finding out more about physical development and illnesses, there were adverts inviting people to train for jobs which enabled them to become surgeons and medical assistants without all the years of study as part of the research programmes using Chattel Labour. The was also the selling of Chattels on Channel Land TV where the offer of the day was a prize specimen of Male with a prize woman worker and two of her vicinities. You could bid for each Chattel individually or for four as a group.

In terms of the documentary History made by the British Broadcasting Service, the war had been won because Britain and France had entered on the side of Confederacy in order to protect their slave owning interests in the Caribbean as well as those in Cotton. The enlightened whites surprisingly few the programme revealed who were not prepared to accept the ongoing slavery had fled to Canada where in the fifties the Cotton Curtain Wall had been created to prevent blacks and enlightened white from escaping into Canada. The USA had fought a major war involving millions of its young men in the conquest of central and south America. An army of slaves had been created with the approval of the owners on the understanding that they would be used in the front lines and the more dangerous of campaigns and the promise of freedom if they survived, but this aspect is reneged once victory is achieved. An Apartheid system is introduced through the southern continent and this result in a strong relationship with Southern Africa. There are also excellent relations established with African states in general whose leaders like the personal profit which can be made from selling their political opponents and excess population to the Confederacy.

An alliance was formed with Nazi Germany with Hitler invited to tour the Confederacy where he is encouraged to convert his proposed extermination of Jews programme into a slave labour system as in the Confederacy but with only limited success. Having previously converted the cheap Labour migrants from the east into the slave labour system, the Confederacy launches a pre-emptive strike on Japanese interests but the war did not go well until the wrecking of Japanese cities using H Bombs. There was also a successful campaign in the middle east to protecting oil supplies.

Earlier Abraham Lincoln was captured, imprisoned, and then pardoned and exiled to Canada. The payment of taxes is offset through slave purchases. In 1985 all religions other than Christianity are outlawed. Catholicism is permitted after much debate. At first the decision was to exterminate or exile all Jews but taking account of the contribution made in the Civil War, it was agreed to create a reservation on Long Island similar to that for the surviving native Americans.

However problems begin to arise at home and outside the Empire. Germany is defeated in Europe but only after there has been significantly greater loss of life, especially on the Russian front and which in effect prevents the development and expansion of communism. During the 1950’s abolitionists are successful in having an effect on educated members of the Confederacy so that by 1960 only 29% are in favour of slavery and the cause is taken up by Roman Catholic Republican John F Kennedy but because of foreign policy issues, it is not clear if he was responsible for trying to expand the Confederacy in Vietnam he is assassinated before being able to make domestic changes. A campaign by a Southern Senator and descendent of the first President swings the public mood back to Southern Protestant Biblical values with intolerance of homosexuality and tolerance of wife beating husbands as examples. However his campaign comes to an end with the allegation that in fact his family has “jungle” blood in them and he commits suicide. As the film ends there is a movement beginning to bring the vote to woman and given them similar opportunities to men for education and employment. There are signs off change as the documentary is shown in the Confederacy, hence the racist adverts, having been banned for a number of years, but no one is optimistic that real change will happen.

Wall Street 1987

Although I did not know, Princess Margaret, Vickie Hodge, Messrs Aspinall, Goldsmith, Stirling, Lucan and co, the contrast between their real lives as we, outsiders, are able to learn from writings and from film, and that of Kevin Whately and his family, yesterday’s principal subject, could not be greater, but they are only always able to learn and make judgement on partial truths. What people say of themselves, including to the confessionals, especially what they tell us in print is usually what they want other to see, feel, and think of them, and this understandable and usually there is nothing wrong with this. Life would be impossible if we question everyone and everything all the time especially those who directly share our lives at work, in leisure activities and at home with our immediate and extended families.

There are differences between those who attempt to get on with their own lives, and those of their friends and families without attempting to dictate or control the lives of others, and those who have some power or influence over the lives of others. We can understand and accept when well intentioned and appropriate decisions, choices, actions, taken in specific circumstances do not work out as well as intended, or indeed fail, but what should be our reaction when it is evident that actions were taken purely for personal profit or advantage or to cover up misdeeds, and how do we separate social action against the criminal and the unscrupulous from action which also affects their families, their employees, and in some instances, as we have seen recently, the majority of us?

This was an issue recently when over the weekend the Leader of House Commons and the person who undertakes the role of Prime Minister answering Questions at Parliamentary Question Time when the Prime Minister is unable to do so, made the comment during an interview that whatever the position of the law in relation to someone who headed a failed bank, they should not draw a pension of several hundred thousand pounds a year for life, and if they persisted in retaining this money, previously agreed with the Government as the terms of their leaving, the government would take legislation to ensure the position did not continue. In making the statement she referred to the Court of Public Opinion. Public opinion however is however not the collective response of you and me but of the owners and editors of the news media, and they often have undisclosed agenda’s and take positions without all the available information upon which to make a judgement. However this does not mean that the media does not also reflecting what the public who contact then are actually thinking and feeling, although again this is not usually a fair representation of their readers, let alone the public in general.

That is why I argue that despite its imperfections and limitations, including the ability of governments and others with power to influence and at times to control, the Rule of Law is the more important safeguard of the interest of the state and its people, than the particular form of government and its Parliament, even when the process is democratic. This is why the British Parliament is primarily, overwhelmingly, formed of those who have trained as lawyers, and this includes the Leader of the House. However this is not to be critical of Ms Harriet Harman, because she was saying what 99% of the population are saying and hoped that it was something which the government would do, even if we did not expect that this would happen and knew there were good reasons why it should not.

By coincidence one of the films sent to me and viewed yesterday was Wall Street the 1987 Oliver Stone film which I have now seen three times since its release. In the special features section of the DVD, Oliver and Michael Douglas who plays the asset stripping take over shark Gordon Gekko, admit that they have been horrified to learn than many of yesterdays traders and Hedge fund managers used to admit that the film inspired them to be someone like the character in the film.

The key moment of the film, in this respect, is when Michael addresses a share holders meeting opposed to his take over bid. He makes an impassioned speech in praise of greed. Greed is good he declares, greed will benefit you as share holders because of the price I am willing to pay for your shares and will benefit me because of the profit I will then make. Moreover if you do not sell to me you will find others queuing to take you over, but the price will be less.

The film is the story of Bud Fox, played by Charlie Sheen, who also played in the previous successful Oliver Stone movie Platoon, where I have the video. He is young Wall Street trader with drive and more ambition than is good for him. He one the traders allocated to cold call some of the big players. This reminds of when I worked for British Olivetti where I commenced work as a basic sales person calling on officers with one to five machines. Unfortunately my appointment coincided with the production of a new machine with a very soft touch which typists hated so although I obtained over fifty trials by chatting up secretary’s of office employees they did not recommend purchasing to their bosses and none were sold and the rest as they say is history when after visiting the 400 offices on my patch in the city over those first two months no one was interested over the next four and I ended spending most of my time travelling the circle line as autumn approached, or hanging around in pubs over half a pint or sitting in squares and other open spaces to pass the time. When I resigned everyone was upset because I had finished top of the sales school. Had I been successful I would have been moved into the medium office section of those possessing between 5 and 25 machines and then it the top floor team with those over 25 and where there were usually contracts to be bid for away from other suppliers. Even at my level of operation I did not have the heart for the tactics used albeit unsuccessfully given the poor functioning of the product, great design though. It was a bad machine and I was against trying to force it upon potential users who hated it, despite being able to recite the faults of the machines of our competitors. Oh I see you have a. Have you had the problem of? No. You have been lucky, for now etc.

In the film Bud has no such scruples. He has little contact with his father who has worked all his life in the maintenance of planes for a small independent airline which has suffered because of a crash and where the results are pending. Bud who has made daily phone calls trying to get an appointment with Mr Gekko calls on his birthday with a box of his favourite Havana cigars via his father, and manages to get five minutes of his time. Gekko is not impressed until Bud reveals that his father has disclosed that the investigation commission is to clear the airline of any responsibility for the accident and this will have a positive effect on the depressed shares. The success of this disclosure leads to Gekko wanting to find out how far Bud will go and sets him the task of spying on what an English rival is up to in New York, a man who has crossed swords and defeated Gekko in the past (Played by Terence Stamp. Bud is successful in finding out that his rival is interested in acquiring a steel making firm and this leads to Gekko setting about buying shares and using media connections to put up the price and which in turn forces the rival to make an even higher offer for the shares so he can complete his take over.
Having passed this test and been regarded with the favour of a former girl friend and interior designer of Gekko, Bud is signs up to a life of corrupting former friends and contacts for inside information which he then uses to buy and sells shares, in effect to himself using off shore accounts which are owned by Gekko although if things go wrong it is Bud not Gekko who has to take responsibility for the consequences of Insider Trading.

Bud is able to buy an expensive waterfront view apartment and begins to wear expensive suits and shoes which his girlfriend designs the interior, wears tailor made suits and shoes and eats at the finest restaurants. He invites his father, the union stewards and the company owners to a meting with Gekko and his lawyer who makes an offer to acquire the still struggle airline with a deal which will mean a temporary reduction in wages but the prospect of reinstatement and share owning options once the business is made profitable. Bud is to become the effective Managing Director. The firm is interested except for Bud‘s father played by his real life father Martin Sheen, and who played the president in, The West Wing, and is he second film seen in which father and son act together. As in the West Wing and several of his other roles Martin plays a man of integrity and in this film he is constantly reminding his son that a man should not be judged by what he is worth and he has nothing but distrust for Gekko and opposition to the trading and asset stripping ethic.

Bud then finds out that his father’s anxiety is more than justified when he learns of the intention to sell off planes, use available land for real estate development and raiding the pension fund once the employees have been made redundant. In his anger and guilt Bud then cooks up a scheme which he puts to Gekko’s rival in which also gains the cooperation of the firm’s owners and the trade union. The plan is to use his position to get colleagues to start buying the shares, forcing Gekko to pay an increasing higher price in his effort to gain control and then persuading his contacts to sell the shares at a profit, before launching a rumour which combined with the selling leads to market price taking a nose dive, thus enabling the rival to buy all the shares required for take over from the nominee holding controlled by Bud but at a price which with the cooperation of the existing management and workers will enable their company to survive and have a long term future. This causes Gekko to not only lose the take over bid but suffer a dramatic loss between the price paid and the price sold.

Thus Bud redeems himself after having a row with the girl friend who is not prepared to settle for anything other an ongoing money maker. He also puts the apartment on the market. This is timely because the financial watch dogs have become suspicious and arrests Bud who bursts into tears realising what is going to happen to him. There is a twist in which Bud confronts Gekko and Gekko makes an admission which is capture through a listening device in order to make the sentence for insider trading less. He has also surrendered all the remaining money he has made and gains the support and respect of his father and mother.

The film was made shortly before the great crash in the late 1980’s and that crash only helped to create the Hedge fund traders and encourage the devising of complex contracts based on volume deals with fine profits margins and potential for giant losses and to which governments and their supporting political parties headed by the USA and vied with each other to deregulate to enable vast personal fortunes to be accumulated on a scale not previously seen.

Only genuine international cooperation and national and international regulation is likely to re-establish confidence and morality in the banking system the various forms of speculation trading. I would be amazed if this was to happen.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Crystal Skull

In contrast to a film about the realities of political life in the US city, I watched the fourth of the films in the Indiana Jones series bringing back the team which created the first in 1981 Harrison Ford as Indiana and Karen Allen his former lover who in the latest Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, discloses her son, is in fact his child. The film is directed by Steven Spielberg with George Lucas one of three producers.

The first film cost $20 and made over $380 million with nine Oscar nominations and winning five in 1982. Two years later a prequel was released which met with mixed reviews but which also made a profit of over $350 million. There was then a gap of five years before the third film which featured Indiana as a young man as well as his current age and featured Shaun Connery as his father. The film cost twice the original at $55 but made over $400 profit and was considered to be the last, except that public pressure on Spielberg, Lucas and Ford for another continued.

It was decided to set the new film in 1950’s so that the Chronological age of Harrison in the series also matched his age in real life that is someone in their mid sixties. The setting also provided the opportunity to make the villains the Russians and make use of the idea about aliens and space ships current at the time (and since).

The enemy is headed by Cate Blanchette, a million miles away from her role in Lord of the Rings, as a villainous Stalin era fanatic wanting the ultimate brain controlling ability. The film is set in the era when the Soviets were known to have developed truth drugs and were experimenting with mind control techniques and which were used in the Korean War. There is the Michael Caine film the Ipcress File in which scientists are captured, brainwashed and rendered ineffective and the original Manchurian Candidate in which the son of a prominent political family is brainwashed while serving in the Korean War with other members of his platoon, to return with everyone saying the he is a hero saving their lives and this leads him to becoming public and political figure and leading to his attempting to assassinate the President of the United States.

The film opens is an excellent fast moving action sequence in which Indiana and his friend played by Ray Winstone as a long standing British agent are captured by a Russian military group complete with US army style vehicles and outfits and taken to a secret but poorly guarded store of secrets papers and objects in the middle of the Nevada desert. Ray has in fact sold out the information in the hope that he will be able locate an object which he recovered for the US Government and which has importance both in terms of the mind control project and locating the city of gold known as El Dorado, Winstone’s interest. When they enter vast store everything is in numbered boxes but Indiana thinks of an ingenious way to locate the boxes whose contents has intrigued him. It proves to be the remains of an being from beyond the known earth. I choose my words carefully as will be revealed later. They are looking for something which the box does not contain.

Indiana escapes but finds himself in a nuclear test site in desert where a small town has been created to see the effects of a the explosion which unfortunately is about to take place. Fortunately he closes himself in a lead covered fridge and is blown clear, manages to get out and is decontaminated, the first of several stretches of credulity in the film, which never takes itself seriously. As a consequence of his involvement albeit unwillingly Indiana is forced take a prolonged holiday from his university position and he is about to go off when he is approached by the son of his former lover and told that an old colleague has disappeared after discovering a crystal skull. He passes a letter and a document an ancient picture language and this sets them off to Peru pursued by the Russians. They find the skull but are captured by the enemy who also have captured his former lover and the young mans. Mother. The skull has powers and under its influence it tells Indiana to where to return it. Before reaching the destination there are various exciting adventures which include a drop down not one but three large water fall drops, escaping killer ants, a killer native tribe and several confrontation with the Russians. The film is full of references to other films of the period with the young playing James Dean in the Wild Ones. The film also touches on the beliefs/legends that many advances in human development were in fact passed on knowledge from superior beings. What they find is not a city of gold but the treasure of knowledge in the form beings with the power to communicate through dimensions of space and time. The film ends with Indiana and his former lover marrying in the presence of their son.

The film cost nine times the original to make and grossed nearly $800 million dollars so as before was popular at the cinema but received mixed reactions from the critics. At times what the film makers described as great fun seemed very silly, On one hand the latest technology was used creating in effect a video game in which the actors subsequently participated to provide the human face. Harrison Ford is said to have undertaken many of the stunts, to prove was an old man can do, although he admitted to keeping himself fit and that it took two weeks of intense effort to relearn to crack the bullwhip again. There were some good touches and ideal fare late on a Saturday night although it would have been more enjoyable if I had drank a bottle of Asti or several beers. John Hurt played his old colleague who they rescue and participated in the latter part of the adventure. Jim Broadbent plays the University Dean, friend and protector of Indiana when the FBI and the Un-American Activities investigators misunderstand the position. Sean Connery was invited to provide another link between the films as Indian’s father but declined offering the lame excuse that he found retirement too enjoyable.

The Last Hurrah

The last day of February ended with the feeling that I had, on a fine balance, passed the test set for each day. A good combination of project work, enjoyment and other activities. The other activities did not include a walk or much house work, but I did a number of little jobs but which did not amount to balancing the food enjoyment of the day

I considered going out for a bacon roll but decided on a brunch using the new grill plate which required assembling, lightly greasing the top plate and the eight individual under grill pans before switch on with the expected brief smoking, the cooling, then washing and drying before commencing a first trial cook. I had a medium to small portion of piece of peppered steak, accompanied by two small pieces of already cooked gammon, two eggs, one sliced tomato and one sliced onion. I started everything at the same time, prepared to eat individually as items cooked but was able to try them at the same time. The steak was cooked on the top plate and was about right with perhaps another few minutes but no more. The eggs in contrast were over done but fitted well into two of the individual small cooking plates and were easy to remove without breaking. I will try another time on the flat area of the grill plate. The tomato and the gammon together with the onion were topped off on the top plate and perhaps the onion need to go in earlier. I must try some mushroom, scrambling the eggs, some hash browns and cheese on small cuts of bread although this will be part of a sliced finger roll. I will save bacon for the bought out rolls, I nearly forgot heating up a small portion of baked beans. When in the mood I will try some thing more imaginative.

In the evening I created a bed of lettuce and cucumber pieces with some French dressing and then covered with pieces of the previously cooked and now cold mackerel mixed with prawns peeled from shell. I had not been looking forward to the cold fish having been unable to separate into two meals when removed from freezer and defrosted and cooked on the same day, but the combination worked well so that the mackerel did not overpower everything else. Staying up until three am there was a midnight soup in a cup and a finger roll filled with slices of gammon and peppered mustard. A banana, grapes and portion of Lemon Tort comprised the sweets. Another admission has to be a can of caffeine and sugar free Pepsi cola.

The film find of the day was a showing of the Spencer Tracy performance in the film the Last Hurrah, from a book written in 1956 by Edward O Connor and which was a best seller in its day. The book is believed to have been based on the former Mayor of Boston James Michael Curley. Both characters were of Irish descent with working class backgrounds.

Mayor Curley became a working class hero where he and a political associate served a short prison sentence for fraud in 1904, having served as a member of the Massachusetts state House of representatives 1902-1903 and then become an Alderman, they had sat the civil service examination to enable two men in their district to get jobs as postmen with the Federal Government. The going to prison created a dark reputation for political opponents who exploited the incident during his subsequent election campaigns.

He was elected to the US House of Representatives 1911 to 1914 and was first elected Mayor of Boston in 1914 until 1918, returning in 1922-1926, 1930-1934 and 1946-1950. In 1937 and 1940 one of his former party political friends defeated him for the Mayoral nomination, which is an indication of the love hate reputation developed for him within the party as well as those supporting the Republican Party.

The reason for this is the scandals throughout his political life, During his tenure as Governor of the State 1935-1937 the state limo was involved in several accidents, he was accused of the sale of pardons to state convicts, and the appointment of scores of poorly qualified individuals to public office. The media stories led to the Democratic leadership failing to endorse his candidacy for the Senate in 1936. However he was back in favour in 1943, elected to the United House of Representatives and serving for four years and a Member of the US House of Representatives 1943-1947. In 1943 he was convicted on a felony indictment for influence peddling from his involvement for influencing peddling to secure defence contracts, but using the slogan Curley gets things done he won his fourth term as City Mayor. He was convicted of a further offence during this last period as Mayor and continued to hold the office while he was in prison. Despite these serious failings he remained worshipped in the city and when he died he received one of its biggest funerals, two statues and his former home is now an historical site. He had nine children by his first marriage but his wife and seven of the children all died before him. One son became a Jesuit priest.

In the novel the Mayor is a colourful character with a dark past aged in his 70‘s and a widower who explains to his nephew, a journalists, the realities of political life and election campaigning as he attempts another term as the Mayor. However in a reminder of the last days of Margaret Thatcher recently viewed, his methods are no longer acceptable and he is defeated by an unknown political inexperienced Republican with a good War record, smart appearance and good manners. He has a heart attack soon after the defeat and city in mourns someone whose time was past.

The film follows closely the story of the book, I am told. The role was originally planned for Orson Wells but while away one of his team turned it down, some thing which Wells regretted and I imagine he would have played the role in a darker way than he much loved Spencer Tracy. Pat O’Brien and Basil Rathbone also featured in the John Ford Film and Jeffery Hunter played the nephew journalist. Although popular in the city, former Mayor and Governor, Curley had quickly disappeared from national interest, but the book and the film helped to soften his image although the film link with the individual and the city was denied at the time.

The Virgin and the Gypsy

Yesterday evening, February 27th, 2009, on a TV channel I cannot remember, there was a showing of The Virgin and the Gypsy, based on the novel by D H Lawrence. As A young man in the early 1960’s I had read some Lawrence. In 1960 I acquired Sons and Lovers and had seen the film staring Dean Stockwell and Heather Sear, but cannot remember the film being shown again, although I did see both television serializations by the BBC in 1981 and 2003.

Kangeroo is one of least known works and I cannot remember anything about the story. The Trespasser was his second novel and apart from knowing this from a note on the back piece alleging that the female character is one of the most interesting of all his female characters, I also have no memory and do not believe I have read the novel again since it was acquired in 1961 as part of the reprinting by Penguin of many of his works to mark the thirtieth anniversary of his death. The Rainbow was acquired later in the 1970’s and it was not until 1961, a year after the original complete text was published that I acquired my copy of Lady Chatterley’s Lover with its introduction by Richard Hoggart. The book was made into a film in 1955 which was banned by the Catholic Church in the USA, and then Sylvia Krystal starred in the 1981 version. I have also seen a French made film in 2006 which won an award at Cannes.

In 1969 Ken Russell produced his film, The Rainbow and then later Women in Love in which Glenda Jackson won the Academy Award for Best Actress. I will leave to another day, perhaps after re reading the novels I possess, writing about D H Lawrence in any depth, but for now I will mention that it is important to see a photograph of him as beardless young man and then the familiar portrait with one and which goes a along way to explaining his personal sexual orientation, and in his early travels he visited Monte Cassino in Italy and Malta, and he also taught as a school master at Croydon, a town three miles from my childhood home. It is important to also remember that in addition to his twenty novels and short stories he created twenty plays and books of poetry, including some collected editions after his death, sixteen works of non fiction, including four travel books with one on Psychoanalysis and the Unconscious and that he was also an artist painter. He wrote a prolific number of letters with seven volumes published and that some sixty books have been created by others on his life and on his works, sometimes devoting a book to a book.

The Virgin and the Gypsy commenced life as the main short story in a collection of the same name. Two young women return home from a residential finishing school in Paris, and home is a vicarage set in the countryside close to water in what the girls call the north but is in fact said to be the Midlands. Their father is the divorced, his wife having run off, hence having the custody of the daughters and the home is shared by a vicious and unloving grandmother and an equally censorious unloving married sister of the vicar whose husband is severely hen pecked but shows traces of rebellion and his true nature. One sister is willing to adjust to her new life and has gained a position which takes her out of the home and she is at ease in the local society but takes to heart the criticism that the daughters have too much of their mother in them for their own and anyone else’s good. The other sister has an unfulfilled passionate streak who longs to experience forceful sexual passion. She is pursued by an uneducated and unsophisticated son of a local industrial millionaire, but takes up with married Honor Blackman who has moved into community on honeymoon with her officer lover who she intends to marry when his divorce is arranged. She is attracted to their uninhibited life style, and which include the man doing his share of the housework. She is the virgin and the gypsy is married with children, also an uninhibited and passionate couple where the wife tells fortunes and the gypsy is brooding and masculine and makes things to sell with his hands.

Maurice Denham plays the angry and frustrated Anglican vicar who is ambivalent towards his daughters, tending to be protective but unable to talk about their mother and finding it difficult to reconcile his feelings with his Christian beliefs. I had professionals experience of interviewing two vicars whose wives had left for other men and in both instances the issue was the custody of children as part of divorce proceedings. It was as a consequence of these experiences that I first understood the difficulties married churchmen can have over their marital relations and their parenting, but also the problems for their female partners and their children although these days the converse is likely to apply to some female clergy and their families. The issue is wider, children of teachers who are unenthusiastic about learning, children of police who are anti authority, children who are pacifist of servicemen and so on.

At Ruskin I also saw at first hand the interaction between brooding ex miners, steel workers and such like who also had brains and female Oxford undergraduates especially those studying English Literature and their DH Lawrence! Before Ruskin I had found that young women were always willing to talk and sometimes cry on my shoulder but I was always you are like a brother. I thought I was nice and some of those they went with unscrupulous users. Such is was and is life! Alas it was several years more before my situation changed.

And the film? The Gypsy saves the Virgin when the local dam collapses and gets his reward and then she goes off to London with the emancipated couple.

Earlier in the day the surprise was the film Almost Famous, the semi autobiographical Cameron Crow film which was not successful at the box office but which received four Oscar nominations and won the award for Cameron for original script. It is a good film as well as being the best portrait of life as a sixties rock band

The undoubted star is the performance of Patrick Fugit then 17/18 playing a 15 year old who becomes a rock reporter for the magazine Creem run by Lester Bangs, played in the film by Philip Seymour Hoffman. Patrick was recommended by his drama teacher for the part and was immediately recognised as looking appropriately young, awe struck and inexperienced of life, yet bright and observant. Cameron had wanted to make this film for some time but met with no enthusiasm until his success with Jerry McGuire. His mother was hired to assist both with the Frances McDormand and to ensure that the character played by Patrick came close to how Cameron’s mother remembered his adolescence. Mrs Crowe by any standards is a remarkable women who worked as a Psychology professor and family therapist, a peace activist and for worker‘s rights and who performed skits around the house and was known to go to work on occasions wearing a clown outfit. She would not have been phased when school identified her son has having attention deficit, hyper active problem or when he graduated from High School at fifteen having been two years younger than the rest of his class through the latter part of the education system.

At high school he had started to write reviews for the house magazine and by 13 he was writing for an underground newspaper, the San Diego Door which had employed Lester Bangs who went on to edit the National Rock magazine Creem. Cameron maintained contact and commenced to write for the magazine. In the film his work came to the attention of the Editorial staff of Rolling Stone without realising he was such a young and inexperienced person although it is understood that they did have direct contact and did know he was only 15 when they first employed him as a contributing reporter and he was given the opportunity to interview Bob Dylan, David Bowie, Neil Young, Eric Clapton and the members of Led Zeppelin

At the age of sixteen Cameron was sent on a road trip of three weeks with the Allman brothers band and he interviewed the whole band and the road crew. He also adopted the approach of sitting unobtrusively observing what went on and Greg Allman became concerned that there was more to this young man being a reporter, insisting on seeing identification to prove he was not a police officer. He confiscated the recording tapes and it was only after representation to the President of their recording company, the tapes returned and the story published. This experience formed a core element of the film story.

Because existing music writers did not take to the hard rock bands, Cameron had an almost clear field in interviewing bands like Led Zepplin, The Eagles, King Crimson, Linda Ronstadt and Rory Gallagher. Cameron became a member of the full time staff as Contributing and then Associate Editor but when at the age of 20 the weekly moved from the West Coast to New York Cameron decided to leave although he has continued to contribute throughout he rest of his life to date.

There are several aspects of this experience which he decided to incorporate into the fictional story. The first is the approach of his mother who gave permission for his road travels on the strict understanding that he phoned her daily, avoided drugs and did not get into trouble. It is understood that splendid moments in the film when she communicates her position to hotel staff, musicians and the “Band Aid” Members are closer to the truth than might be assumed.

For the uninitiated, the “Band Aid” are not the groupies, often under age who often were more interested in having a tally to boast about rather like autographs, but young women, still often under age, who loved the music and provided the band with on the road comforts if wives and long standing girl friends were not available. They also enjoyed the use of drugs as well watching the concerts from the side stage. How far girls were sold between bands as one tour ended and another started I have no idea although in the film that three girls including Penny Lane are bet on a the twist of a card is believable.

Penny Lane, real film name Lady Goodman, who is said by Cameron to be an amalgam of girls that he knew. In the early sixties when campaigning and then at Ruskin, I knew several who had similar personalities, including one encounter when I was out for the day with a female friend friend, I met an artist I knew from the CND movement who said he was going to Mexico as Europe was dead, artistically speaking, and invited her to go with him, although they had just met and she hesitated and nearly did. In the film Penny decides she is going to Morocco for a year and asks Patrick playing Cameron if he will go with him and he nearly does. The aspects of Penny which Cameron wrote and Kate Hudson captures brilliantly is the sense for free spirit, I had another female friend friend who went off on her own to India for six months in between sixth form and university, and another who had dropped out of her undergraduate place at Oxford University to have a child and was off to Marrakesh. At one level there was no fear, a wonderful sense of being alive and joy which they shared with everyone and anyone and yet there was also intense and loyal affection which was more often than not abused. They would and did survive whatever their circumstances and the contrast between them and the often inarticulate and uneducated young girls in care, sometimes reported to the authorities as being out of control by their parents, and who ran off getting into one disastrous relationship or life style after another, could not be greater.

Cameron has disclosed that he lost his virginity early on and the scene in the film also struck me as authentic from direct knowledge of some the young women observed although in my instances I was over twenty one.

The Allman Brothers and other bands of the period become Stillwater, a newish group with some success on a road tour by coach who graduate to private planes after an upgrade in management and who regarded the embedded journalist with considerable opposition and hostility, denying the authenticity of his story at first. The scene when one of the band goes off in the search of real real and accepts an invitation to attend a drugs and sex party held by ordinary teenagers who feed him excessive quantities of acid and encourage him to jump when he considered flying of the roof of the house also has authenticity as does the greater part of the film, hence its critical success.

I only experienced the 2 hour version of the film and will look out for the extended version which has an additional 40 minutes. There are some 50 music tracks of which 17 are included in released sound track album which won a Grammy for compilation soundtrack. On the successful album are Simon and Garfunkel America, The Who, The Beach Boys, Rod Stewart,(seen live) the Allman Brothers, Elton John Led Zepplin, David Bowie(seen live), Cat Stevens, Clarence Clearwater, Thunderclap Newman and Nancy Wilson, Cameron’s wife. Other on the film sound track are Black Sabbath, Sleeleye Dan, Dr hook, Chicago, Neil Young, Jimmi Hendrix, Deep Purple, Fleetwood Mac, Buddy Holly, Stevie Wonder, Joni Mitchell, and Jethro Tull. The film also won a Golden Globe for Best Musical/Comedy.

I wrote this while listening to my favourite Tina Turner Album, Only the best: The Best, Private Dancer, I can’t stand the rain; What you get is what you see; What’s love got to do with it, Steamy Window, Nutbush Windy City, I don’t want to lose you, It takes two, Look me in the heart, Let’s stay together, Better be good to me, Way of the world, Typical Male, We do not need another hen, Addicted to Love, Be Tender with me Baby, Love Think and I want you near me.

I did not go for the weekend shop until 5 and at first I thought I and left the recharged battery too long before the road trial. I delayed going out because I had to wait in for a delivery of white card from staples having managed to get a reduced price which works out a £5 including delivery and a free sports bag with water bottle, headband and small towel. I decided on making a second visit to Tesco on the Newcastle Road in he hope that they still had packs of the 100 grams of salami for £1. Alas it must have been old stock prior to the devaluation of the pound against the Euro. Given the information that eggs are not the cholesterol hazard previously believed I bought six eggs for 82 pence and yesterday I notice that adjacent was the offer of 15 for £1. Where is the logic in this? I also found two toffee Cheese cakes(frozen) at £1 each and grapes cheaper than Azda. I stopped at Lidl on the way back for 200 grams of salami for £1.68, not the Italian quality I am used to but it will do. Lidl has a selection of special offers every Monday and Thursday sometimes food but also clothing, household, officer and entertainment. This time I noted a gill for only £12.50 which I had seen advertised before but not in stock. This comprises a large griddle plate which can also be used as a keep warm plate and then under the rings can be fitted up to eight small pans, each capable of taking an egg, mushrooms, tomatoes, onions, ham and such like. Given eh price I decided there was little loose as my existing double quick grill had lost its coating and had become more difficult to clean, while this grill looked easier although was more fiddly and would take longer to cook. I left until Saturday to clean and use. I called in at Azda on the way home as I wanted to stock up on tinned veg, a lettuce, some meats. Until recently I had not seen any Southern fried chicken pieces as available at Morrison’s, but this time there was an offer of two carton for £5 each comprising seven pieces, providing four meals of three and four pieces which I usually enjoy with baked beans. For Sunday there is roast Pork Joint and for Saturday a nice think piece of peppered steak part of four pieces for £7, of which three went into the Freezer with the chicken. I remembered the re stocking of tinned vegetables. I have gone on off the small frozen packs for the time being, but I forgot the tinned rice. I bought a sweet melon and remembered the food bags for fridge or freezer. I had forgotten to supply the four pieces of Mackerel before putting in the freezer so had to defrost having two as a main meal and letting the other cool to fridge for a salad over the weekend. My one sin was to buy two packs of diet coke sugar and caffeine free, 16 cans for £4.

I had not accomplished as much work as planned given the other interest, including the result show for American Idol, but it felt a good day.

Oscar Triumphs 2009

For almost all my life after I was about six years and the Second World War had ended I have been interested in the Hollywood Oscars. For the greater part of my childhood I was taken every Monday and Thursday evening to the Odeon Cinema Wallington, because my care mother who worked in various shops in Wallington had befriended an usherette who got for her a half price concession card so that we paid only a few old pence to attend. I would also go to the Saturday morning Matinee for children and at weekends, if I was lucky I would be taken by older cousins to see films at Sutton where there was a Grenada and a Gaumont, or Purley where they was a Grenada and one other, or Croydon where there was the Davis which could seat several thousand as well as other Cinema chains. Sometimes I would also be taken by my birth and care mothers and their older sister to the Odeon Wallington at the weekend when during the interval between the two main pictures an organist would play and the audience would sing. In those days the cinema would be brightly lit and there would be curtains to be moved to the side to reveal the screen. There were three categories of films, the U which was open to everyone and the A film where children had to be accompanied by an adult and the X film where officially one had to be 18 but along with everyone else we would go as soon as we were sixteen and in my case had left school and started work. I have now seen almost all the films which were awarded the best picture, some several times with one the 1943 winner Casablanca, at least once a year.

I do not remember the 1927 winner Wings with 1928 The Broadway Melody, the first remembered. It was several decades later that I saw All Quiet on the Western Front 1929/30, seen several times along with Grand Hotel 31/32. I am not sure about Cimerron which I may be confusing with the Cimarron Kid which is being shown regularly on cable and satellite. Cavalcade, It happened one Night, Mutiny on the Bounty have been seen some several times from the 1930’s but I have a query about, the Great Zigfield not to be confused with the Zigfield Follies, another query is the Life of Emile Zola, but definitely, You cannot Take it with you and Gone with the Wind which was the favourite of my care mother who would see the film every time it was shown subsequently on television during her later life.

Others from this era experienced, and often viewed several times over the years which were highly regarded in their day, were A Tale of two Cities, Lost Horizon, A Star is Born, The Citadel, Grand Illusion and Pygmalion, Stage Door, Alexander’s Ragtime Band, The Good Earth and the Adventures of Robin Hood, San Francisco and Test Pilot, Dark Victory and Goodbye Mr Chips, Mr Smith goes to Washington, Of Mice and Men( I have book), Stagecoach, The Wizard of Oz, Wuthering Heights, Mr Deeds goes to Town, Little Women(I had the book and may still have)( which was an eleven plus film) Farewell to arms, I am a Fugitive from the Chain Gang, The Private life of Henry VIII and State Fair, The Thin man, Shanghai Express, David Copperfield and Les Miserables.

1940 Oscar winners were Rebecca, How green was my valley (I have the book) Mrs Minerva, Lost Weekend, The Best Years of Our Lives, Going My Way, Gentleman’s agreement and Hamlet which I saw in theatre when it was released, All the Kings Men, and Casablanca as previously highlighted. Others were The Razors Edge, The Yearling, Foreign Correspondent and the Grapes of Wrath, The Great Dictator, The Philadelphia Story, Citizen Kane, The Little Foxes, The Maltese Falcon and Sargeant York, Random Harvest, The 49th Parallel which I have just acquired the DVD, The Magnificent Ambersons and Yankee Doodle Dandy, For Whom the Bell Tolls and Heaven Can wait, In Which we Serve (have DVD) and the Oxbow Incident and Madam Curie. Double Indemnity and Gas Light, The Bishop’s Wife, Great Expectations and Johnny Belinda which I remember seeing at the Wallington Odeon. Miracle on 34th Street and the Red Shoes, again in theatre. The Heiress and Twelve O’clock High and the Treasure of the Sierra Madre.

The 1950 winners were All about Eve, An American in Paris, The Greatest Show on Earth and From Here to Eternity, Marty and On the Waterfront, Around the World in Eighty Days and Gigi and Ben Hur were all seen in theatres. Others in the running were Father of the Bride, King Solomon’s Mines and Sunset Boulevard, High Noon. Ivanhoe, The Quiet Man and Moulin Rouge(have DVD), Julius Caesar, The Robe, Roman Holiday, Shane, The Caine Mutiny, Seven Brides for Seven brothers, the Country Girl and Three Coins in the Fountain. Love is a many Splendid things, Picnic, Mr Roberts and the Rose Tattoo, Friendly Persuasion, Giant, The King and I, The Ten Commandments(have DVD) and Peyton Place, 12 Angry Men, Witness for the Prosecution and Sayonara, Cat on the Hot Tin Roof, The Defiant ones and Separate Tables. The Defiant Ones and the Diary of Anne Frank, The Nuns Story, Anatomy of Murder and Room at the Top (have book).

1960 winners were The Apartment, West Side Story and Lawrence of Arabia (DVD and Seven Pillars of Wisdom) Tom Jones, My Fair Lady and the Sound of Music (Video Tape), A Man for All Seasons, In the Heat of the Night and Oliver and Midnight Cowboy. Others were Sons and Lovers, Elmer Gantry and the Sundowners; The Guns of Navarone and visited film site(DVD) Judgement at Nuremberg and Hustler, the Longest Day, Mutiny on the Bounty and Kill a Mockingbird. Cleopatra and How the West were won. Becket, Dr Strangelove (DVD), Mary Poppins and Zorba the Greek. Dr Zhivago. Ship of Fools, Darling and Alfie, The Sand Pebbles and Whose Afraid of Virginia Wolf. Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, Doctor Doolittle and Guess who is coming to Dinner. Funny Girl, The Lion in Winter and Romeo and Juliet. Butch Cassidy, Anne of a Thousands days and Hello Dolly.

1970 Winners were Patton and the French Connection, The Sting, The Godfather Part II and One flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest Rocky and Annie Hall, The Deer Hunter and Kramer V Kramer. Others were Love Story, Mash and Five Easy Pieces. A Clockwork Orange, Nicholas and Alexander, Fiddle on the Roof and the Last Picture Show. Cabaret (DVD) and Deliverance. A Touch of Class. The Exorcist and American Graffiti. China Town, The Towering Inferno and Lenny. Cries and Whispers, Jaws and Nashville, All the Presidents Men(DVD) and Taxi Driver. Julia, Star Wars and the Turning Point. Midnight Express and Heaven can Wait. Apocalypse Now and All that Jazz.

1980 winners were Ordinary People (I do not remember seeing) Chariots of Fire, Ghandi (DVD), Terms of Endearment, Amadeus (DVD) Out of Africa, Platoon (Video) The Last Emperor, Rain man and Driving Miss Daisy. Others Coalminer’s daughter. Raging Bull (Video), Tess and Elephant Man, Reds (seen in Paris), Atlantic City, On Golden Pond (DVD) and Raiders of Lost Ark (on ferry from Holland). E.T (DVD), Tootsie and The Verdict. The Big Chill, A Passage to India, The Color Purple and Prizzi’s Honour. Children of the Lesser God, a Room with a view, Hannah and her Sisters, and the Mission (DVD), Fatal Attraction. The Accidental Tourist, Mississippi Burning and Dangerous Liaisons. Dead Poet’s Society and Born on the Fourth of July (video) together with My Left Foot.

1990 winners were Dancing with Wolves, The Silence of Lambs, Unforgiven and Schindler’s List, Brave Heart and the English Patient (DVD), Titanic and Shakespeare in Love and American Beauty (DVD) Forest Gump Others Godfather III and Goodfellows. Bugsy, JFK (DVD) and the Prince of Tides. The Crying Game, A few Good Men(DVD), The Scent of a woman and Howard’s End. In the Name of the Father, the Piano and the Remains of the Day. Four Weddings and a Funeral, Pulp Fiction and the Shawshank Redemption. The Fugitive and Apollo 13. As Good as it Gets, Life is Beautiful, Babe and Sense and Sensibility. Secrets and Lies, Jerry McGuire and Fargo. The Full Monty, LA Confidential and Good Will Hunting. Elizabeth and Saving Private Ryan, The Thin Red Line, Cider House Rules(book). The Green Mile, and the Sixth Sense.

2000 winners are Gladiator(DVD) Beautiful Mind, Chicago(DVD), Lord of the Rings(both sets of DVD’s and books), Million Dollar Baby, Crash, The Departed and No Country for Old Men, Slum Dog Millionaire, Others Chocolate(DVD) Crouching Tiger(DVD, Erin Brockovitch and Traffic. Gosford Park, Moulin Rouge(DVD) and Lord of the Rings( Both sets of DVD’s book). Gangs of New York, The Hours (DVD), The Pianist (DVD and book), The Lord of the Rings (sets of DVD’s and book), Lost in Translation (DVD) Master and Commander, Mystic River and Seabiscuit. The Aviator, Finding Neverland and Ray (DVD). Brokeback Mountain, Munich, Goodnight and Good Luck. Babel, Letters to Iwo Jima, The Queen and Little Miss Sunshine. Atonement, Juno and Michael Clayton. Those highlighted had greater impact than the others. I do not remember seeing Oscar winners Wings, Ordinary People and did not see Million Dollar Baby with a question mark over Cimerron, The Life of Emile Zola and the Great Zigfield which I would need to see again to remember if I have seen before. Several of the Oscar winners and contenders from the 1930’s I did not see until the 1940’s and many of those from the 1940’s I am not sure if I saw first in theatre, or subsequently on Terrestrial or Satellite. Some films such as Margaret Lockwood are Wicked Lady or the early Walt Disney Films. Such as Snow White they left more of an impression, not always a good impression, than those which highly regarded in their day. Some films not on these lists were better or made a greater impressions than many included such as The African Queen, Les Enfant du Paradis (Oxford) Paths of Glory (Oxford), Richard III, The Third Man, The Thirty Nine Steps (original) and Whisky Galore, The Lady Vanishes (original) and It’s a Wonderful Life. Two films in Barry Norman’s 100 lists I did not see until recent years Wild Strawberries and La Strada with both in my Top List as well as Scenes from a Marriage and Saraband, Autumn Sonata and La Dolce Vita, the latter which I did see shortly after release. Many films affect me in childhood while as are important because of the place, the person/people association or the issues, films such as Get Carter and The Wicker Man from recent years, Morning Departure from immediately after World War 2, Bill Haley’s Rock around the Clock, with the dancing in the aisles, Turning the Key Softly and a Bridget Bardot on my first date, the choice of the first date to the disapproval of her parents. This makes me want to do a different piece on films which had an influence and why, if I can now remember or am prepared to say. Another piece will be on actors and acting performances. For example I do not believe that Doubt is a great film but the performances of Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman are together with the actors who play the young nun and the boy’s mother are outstanding. I thoroughly enjoyed Slumdog Millionaire but it was the performances of the children in the early part of the film which impressed more than the adolescents and young adults. I am in advance of myself.

For the greater part decade when I held a cinema see everything ticket, and commenced to keep records of films seen, reviews or my own notes, my interest in those nominated at the Oscars has increased. I have debate watching the Oscars live, resisting so far paying for Sky films as I have seen most of the films which they shown in Theatre or have already seen on TV, DVD or Video. This was the reason why I selected the internet DVD subscription instead because I wanted to look back on the films of Directors such as Bergman and Fellini, and then discovered Almodovar. There is a lot about the Oscars which I do not like, I avoid the Red Carpet shows where remarkably silly and uneducated young women chatter away about dresses and make stupid comments or ask the Actors cringe questions. While I understand that most individual acting performances are the result of the team work of the various technical and directorial staff on films which are often listed in the credits in their hundreds, why do recipients have to claim the crew is the best ever, every time. When a stage actor gets an award they talk of other actors and people who influenced them but I cannot recall hearing about the lighting or the sound. I also believe there should be a better way of paying tribute to those have died, because now it is terribly rushed.

This year I was tempted to go to bed, and keep away from the news until the Sky One showing of edited highlights on Monday evening. However a couple of years back when I did this, I was horrified to find that Sky used over half the two hours allocated to the red carpet, after awards interviews and parties and adverts. The problem is that Hollywood has become schizoid as it is split between those who want to make the award ceremony as big an earner as possible by restricting coverage to pay for view TV in one form of another and those who want more people to go and see the nominated films and make money that way and which involves making the viewing of the ceremony free.

In the event what happened was the wrong choice in every respect. I went to bed but was restless and tired and went to sleep waking about two thirty. I should have returned to sleep as usual but collected the battery operated radio from the bathroom and tried to listen to that, but was very tired so switched off and tried to sleep but could not, got up and listen to LBC radio on Sky digital where the two commentators were awful, sneering, without any good understanding of the cinema or the ability to communicate live events on the radio. They were typical example of the kind of journalists who only thrive on bad story or dramatic story news. They become quickly bored because they are such boring people and cannot cope when the predictable happens. Meryl Streep gave two brilliant performances this year, for Mama Mia and Doubt, superior to the two of Kate Winslet, although I thought her performances were also worthy of an award and superior to that off Angelina Jolie. I have not seen the other two actors nominated Anne Hathaway or Melissa Leo. However Kate had been nominated five times without success, or a Golden Globe until this year, whereas Streep has a total 15 nominations and two Oscars and over 20 other major awards including Golden Globes, Bafta’s and Life Achievement.

I have not seen Heath Ledger in the Dark Knight but did in Brokeback Mountain. He was a young man destined for greatness and his premature death meant that there was an additional reason for honouring him and his family. I would be surprised if his performance was in the same class as that as Philip Seymour Hoffman in Doubt though. Hollywood was split over Mickey Rourke, talented but messed up of his own making. I did not want to see the Wrestler because wrestling is more of a fixed fraud than professional Boxing, although a close run thing, with its fixing of gambling and other criminal aspects. I though Frank Langella was outstanding and head and shoulders above everyone else as best actor in a male role, butt with the recent attacks on the Gay community in the USA it was inevitable it would go to Sean Penn for his performance in Milk. Having not seen the wrestler I cannot comment on the Performance of Marisa Tomei and I am yet to see Penelope Cruz but she is a fine actress whose previous performance deserved recognition outside of Spain. I now come to best Picture and best Director. I thought Slum Dog Millionaire was the best all-round film of the year although I was disappointed that Boy in Stripped Pyjamas did not feature. However the extent of the awards given was more to do with two non performance reasons. The first is that Hollywood wants to compete more with Bollywood in India as India becomes an economic player on the world stage and secondly Hollywood wanted to show support for India following the latest Mumbai massacre and its opposition to what is happening in Pakistan and Afghanistan. I thought the visual effects and make up in Benjamin Button were brilliant as was the performance of Taraji P Henson as his surrogate mother. It is also an imaginative concept, however Brad Pitt is just below the level of the other nominated performance and the story was too Forest Gump for my liking. I enjoyed The Duchess so was pleased it gained an award for Costume and that Australia got a mention along with the Changeling which I thought was an important film and Angelina merited her nomination. There is only one regret rather than dissent and that is that In Bruges did not win the best script. I am usually opposed the gratuitous use of swearing in films but In Bruges is so dark witted, nearly said bloody funny, that for once it was the authentic use of the f word by the three central characters which added to an already rich script rather than detracted. That’s that I guess for another year or at least until the autumn as film makers usually save their best until the autumn and New Year.

The Way to the Stars

The Way to the stars was a Terrence Rattigan script which continues where Angels One Five left off. This time it is John Mills who plays the newly qualified pilot in 1940, a former school master attached to an established flying unit used to attacks from the enemy on their base and who have quickly become an established part of the local town and community. The focus is the small hotel with permanent paying guests which includes a married aunt and her companion niece. The new arrival also has a shaky start with his first landing and takes time to settle in.

The Squadron Leader, Trevor Howard in his first film role is shot down and killed, and his position is taken over by Michael Redgrave who initially shares a room with Mills at the airfield. Redgrave marries the manageress of the hotel and they have a son and Mills falls for the niece staying at the Golden Lion hotel public house with her aunt. He is about to pop the question when Redgrave is killed and this leads him to sever relations with the girl on the grounds that those engaged in war have no right to marry and have children until the conflict is over. Because the film is to have a happy ending, (it was released in 1945), Mills is able to survive by being transferred to operational control after completing his first period of flying missions and then is transferred back to flying, to bombers at another aerodrome after the USA enters the war.
The film pays tribute to the contribution of USSAF service personnel who also quickly settle into local life outside of flying although the brash and forward ways of some take some getting used too. The film skates over some of the realities, especially the conflicts between American and British services over relationships with unmarried girls and some wives. Instead, the focus is on a happily married USSAF flight Captain who strikes up a genuine friendship with the widow and her son, and the community, entertaining local children at an annual party arranged by the local Anglican Vicar played by Felix Aylmer. The Captain is about to be sent home to become an instructor but hesitates in part because he has not heard from his wife, because of a hint at the relationship with the landlady developing beyond friendship and because he does not want to leave his nine person crew of the Flying Fortresses who are also nearing completion of their period of mission.

Just after announcing his decision not to accept the instructor’s post there are three missing pales on a mission and after two make it back, the damaged plane of the USSAF Captain returns with one of the four engines damaged and other problems, particularly that there is a 500 pound bomb lodged which cannot be released. All nine crew members parachute to safety but the Captain refuses in case the plane falls in such a way to harm the local community and therefore he crashes the plane ending his own life. The part is played by Douglas Montgomery.

A feature of this production was the poem For Johnny

For Johnny


Do not despair.....For Johnny-head-in- air,
He sleeps as sound....As Jonny underground.
Fetch out no shroud... For Johnny-in-the-cloud;
And keep your tears...For him in after years.
Better by far......For Johnny-the-bright-star.
To keep your head.....And see his children fed.

The poem is written in the film by Michael Redgrave for his wife played by Rosamund John, it is given to Bonnar Colleano after the death of the his Captain. Bonar Colleano was an actor from New York who became a well known film and stage actor in the UK. This was his first major role and he went on to appear in a number of films set in wartime and Once a Jolly Swagman, a film about motorcycle speedway with Dirk Bogard which I remember well. He was killed in a sports car accident at the age 34 years. A very young Renee Asherson plays the niece who eventually is to marry John Mills in the film. Stanley Holloway plays a local who is generous with his cash buying the flying boys drinks and entertaining at the piano, as long as they listen to his long funny stories which he always manages to get wrong despite endless repetition. Basil Radford plays a long standing member of the aerodrome operations and Bill Owen as the young member of the ground crew who eventually gets to fly in the Lancaster Bombers with John Mills and who also survives. The film also marked the debut of a very young Jean Simmons who sings part of one song at a dance in the town the night before the children’s party at which Bonnar Colleano explains that his Captain has not been able to come and how much he cares for them all. Rosamund John reassures that the town will never forget the sacrifice made by the captain,

The film therefore covers the great part of the war in the Air. The British squadron are posted over seas for a time returning at the end of the film. John Mills, with Bill Owen in tow, has to force land at the aerodrome returning for one mission where he has been acting as the path finder and this gives him the opportunity to meet up with everyone especially Renée Asherson who has been courted by Bonar Colleano. The film also has something of the quality of First of the Few by attempting to put the war in perspective, doing this by showing the deserted airfield and quarters and those involved have gone their separate ways, after the war has ended.

.
A modern take on the young flyer of the First World War is provided in Aces High which starts at an English Public School with the Headmaster reminding of the Crusades, the Armada and that the importance of playing the game for the games sake! The head of house is Malcolm McDowell who has joined the new Army Air Force and he expresses the wish that the war will not be over before his fellow pupils are able to join in. There are shots of him with his parents and girlfriend. He is confident to the point of being arrogant and has the world before him

The scene switches to a couple of years later when one of the adoring young men at school where McDowell was head of house arrives at an airfield in France when Dowell is the Squadron Leader. He is revealed as the brother of McDowell’s fiancée. McDowell needs a constant flow of alcohol to get in a plane and to undertake the responsibility of sending a regular flow of new recruits to meet their deaths. Another young officer played by Simon Ward has lost his nerve and threaded to desert if Simon cannot find a way to get home on medical grounds. The staff officer is played by Christopher Plummer as someone who is part of the Public school upper class world of Edwardian England who tries to maintain standards amidst the horror.

This is reflected when after McDowell shoots down a plane where the pilot survives, he claims him for 24 hours to mark his survival and give him a party before going into captivity, in a scene reminiscent of the film of Colonel Blimp in which a capture German officer known to Blimp before the war is invited to dine at his club on parole.

The new pilot survives his first flight and then is taken by Dowell to the French front line to collect the German pilot and this provides the opportunity to bring home the reality of the war which the three 1939-1945 films do not. There is a crocodile of men blinded by mustard gas, medical staff covered in blood and a [padre attending to the dying and the dead,

An aged Ray Milland and Trevor Howard play staff officers at the HQ who need to know if a gap in photograph recognisance is a natural hill or a fortified position and decide a photograph must be taken although a continuous bombardment and counter bombardment of the big guns is taking place in advance of an assault to gain ground. The potential cost is calculated with the loss of a pilot or two against that of several hundred or men if they advance and find the hill is a concrete gun emplacement. When at HQ to get the orders McDowell asks about the issuing of parachutes he is told that the request is rejected because it would likely get in the way of the pilots using their initiative to protect the plane.

On a subsequent mission a pilot jumps to his death rather than stay in plane when it is on fire. The senior officers chat about Lloyd George having a bedroom next to the Cabinet Office with a separate entrance to entertain his lovers.

On the photography mission Christopher Plummer is killed although he manages to take the required photos with the plane piloted by the new recruit who is much affected by the death. The squadron is then required to attack spotting balloons and during this mission the brother in law to be gets his first kill and then accidentally crashes into an enemy fighter coming in the opposite direction. At least he has had a night out with his comrades at a local French Inn frequented by ladies of good virtue one of whom takes the young man to her home. McDowell is then seen greeting three fresh faced recruits while he tries to write a letter to the parents of his fiancée. This is most realistic of the four films and released in the mid 1970’s when feelings about the war had began to soften and a new generation had grown up without any knowledge.

The new format for American Idol has worked out better with the final thirty six divided into three groups of 12 for performance and instead of those with the lowest votes dropping out, the three with the highest votes go forward taking 9 of the 12 finals places and with three wild cards from those nominated by the judges, I assume. While it is a public vote the judges and the programme designed appears to be able to largely steer by the choice of songs, the order of singing and the adverse comments about those they do not want to further. This week I agreed with their comments and the public response which included the young man who lost his wife and the red neck construction worker also with a wife and young family. A young girl rocker also won through. I can see the young widower making it to the top three at this stage.

I did a shop at Tesco supermarket and took time to check out what was available and the prices, I walked into the town centre in the morning for the last DVD and found that the one issued was not the same as that advertised so took the voucher to Tesco to see if I could also get the one missed yesterday. Alas it was the same. However I took the opportunity to take a look and make some purchases including salami, back to the pre recent rise price which took 100 grams for £1 to £1.60. Having read that eggs in moderation do not raise cholesterol after all I bought six for two omelettes accidentally breaking the shell of one as the boxed slipped while taking from the car. It was here a salami omelette for lunch with some fried sweet pepper, followed by a banana and four crackers with spicy chutney as a started. They also do three medium size chickens for £10 but had one with an eat this weekend date was available for £3 so I also bought this for Sunday. I enjoyed a smoked Mackerel salad on the previous evening. I did not buy more Hot Cross buns. Grapes were available at the same price as the station greengrocer and were a better quality. The treat is a Lemon Tort with 2 for £1.50 and which divides into four portions so have eight in total which will last over the next two weeks if I can stretch to a piece every other day, but which is unlikely.

Angels One Five

Angels One Five is the operational flying height of 15000 feet for the Spitfire war plane created by R J Mitchell and the name of a British War film set at the outbreak of World War II when the British Air Force amounted to some 50 squadrons, in theory about a thousand planes and pilots, although they were never at full strength because of losses, against a force several times its strength with the capacity and training base to replace losses, and to increase its numbers which Britain did not. (The) First of the Few is the story of Mitchell and the Spitfire

Given the British Board of Film censors U certificate rating which made Angel’s One Five. a family film, it presented combat in way which protected the younger members of the audience from the reality of death and injury in wartime, but it created the atmosphere where just below the surface excitement of Biggle’s, the drinking and the horseplay was the reality where every time a pilot set off he knew the odds of surviving rapidly diminished. These were very young men and few came home to the parents, wives and girlfriends.

As an adolescent, and then as a young man, in his first job it was my privilege to know three such men, men who came back. In fact I was about twelve years of age when with the help of the local Conservative Member we were rehoused in the top flat of a requisitioned house in Wallington shared with a former RAF flyer his wife and son, and later when the house was returned to its owners we were rehoused together in flats built by the council after the war, two blocks of six flats, three stories in height which everyone thought were private rather than Council because of the attractive way they looked, and still do. Until this morning I had been writing that I was younger when the move was made and only now I remembered that I started at the John Fisher School from the home we shared with the sisters of my birth and care mothers and the married sister and her six children. Then in my first job at the age of sixteen, working for Middlesex County Council, in a large tall building in the Vauxhall Bridge Road, now used by the Random House Publishers, I was attached to section of six men, originally five all of whom had served their country in one of the three armed services. One of the five was a wartime flyer and but I believe the sixth who joined the section and was the youngest had completed National Service in the RAF but I am unsure now if he had experienced combat as had the others. All the three homes were in walking distance of London’s former great airport at Croydon, and where over 140 rocket bombs fell.


The story of the film Angels One Five is a simple one. A young man, training to be a doctor at university, a member of the volunteer student flying corps enlists, trains, and is eager to go into combat, but is delayed because of injury after a near miss accident with another aircraft that has been shot up and without communications and other instrumentation, and has to make a hasty landing. The new young pilot crashes the new aircraft as a consequence and which does not get him off to a good start with his new colleagues and in part because of injury, he serves three weeks assisting in the operations room. However he overcomes this difficult start, forming a relationship with Michael Denison who is the operations room commander, and who takes over a squadron as the story progresses, and Dulcie Grey, who does not play Michael’s wife in this instance, but the stoic and resourceful wife of the second in command of the operations room, and who lives at the end of the runway putting out a guiding signal each night despite the blackout and continuing even when the property is bombed. She introduces the young flyer, played my John Gregson, to a local nurse and the sister of another flyer, and the two establish a nice relationship which leads to plans for a first date meal out together one evening.

The airfield commander officer is Jack Hawkins, who appeared in a number of wartime time films notably The Cruel Sea and his is the father figure, man of compassion who understands more than most of his men, and their relatives, how the odds are stacked against their individual survival and that of the country in general should Germany chose to invade. He is not casual bout general discipline and security, but understands that every time his men take to the skies some do not come back and he must inform the parents, the wives and girlfriends, relatives who he has invited for drinks every Sunday evening, until the news comes that the enemy are about to launch raids on the Airfields and their command centres.

The young flyer gets the opportunity to go into combat with initial success but fails to return on the evening of the first date as we learn during the film, several others, including the former squadron leader. The film also pays tribute to the young women who manned the operations room and the RAF ground crew and defence personnel whose sergeant major is played by Geoffrey Keen, who was subsequently to star in a TV series called the Planemakers or such like.

The film obviously will mean more to the generation of parents who saw their sons, and their daughters leave home for the first time, not to return as well as those who had partners and friends, and also by those of us who although children experienced the fear of the bombing and were also present when the dreaded telegram arrived. The film also has meaning for younger people to day.

The R J Mitchell story is also one which present day generation should know about. He only lived for 42 years dying from cancer in 1937. He left school at sixteen years and gained an apprenticeship at a locomotive engineering works and at the end of this he work in the drawing of the firm and continued to study engineering and mathematics at night school. At the age of twenty two he joined Supermarine Aviation at Southampton and married Florence Dayson and was appointed Chief Designer, then Chief Engineer in 1920 and Technical Director in 1927. In 1928 the company was taken over by Vickers, in the film for half a million pounds, but only on the understanding that Mitchell remained with them for five years.

Between 1920 and 1936 he deigned 24 aircraft including light aircraft, fighters, bombers sea planes, and flying boats. In addition to the Spitfire he established an international reputation for winning the Schneider Trophy which was an a time trial competition for sea planes which attracted worldwide media interest, with the first race in 1913 and Britain winning the following year. The Italians won in 1920 and 1921 but it was Mitchell’s plane which won in 1922 as a private entry. In 1927 with Government backing Mitchell designed planes came first and second. His planes won again in 1929 and 1931 and as the event become biannual, the original trophy was handed over for good and is seen as The London Science Museum Flight Section along with the winning 1931 plane. In the film the government were unable to financially sponsor either the 1929 or 1931 races because of the depression but an eccentric and far sighted aristocrat who was concerned that Britain was at risk by not rearming and staying ahead of the flight race for speed put up the necessary funds.

In the film Mitchell is reputed to have thought of the bird inspired single wing structure soon after joining the firm but it was rejected and he left the first for a period of a week before the firm said they wanted him to develop his idea. Before then the job of the designer had been to construct a plane around the engine with separate fuel tanks and two wings. Mitchell conceived the idea of the single wing which were integrated with the rest of the body and placed the fuel tanks in the floats. As a result of his design quickly followed by others speeds increased from under 200 Mph to over 300. In the film he commenced to concentrate on a British fighter plane after a holiday trip to Germany as guests of the Glider Club, during which time he learnt of Germany’s rearmament intentions and political ambitions. This is fiction as he never visited Germany.

His first deign was rejected by the RAF because of its unsatisfactory performance so he re-designed a new all metal plane bringing together the least technical advances developed elsewhere in the UK and USA and his genius was to marry these advances with his expertise in high speed flying. The prototype first flew in 1936 and in subsequent tests reaches a speed of 369 Mph and the RAF ordered 310 in the first instances.

Mitchell underwent a colostomy for rectal cancer in 1933 but continued to work and live well until his death, taking flying lesson and getting his pilots licence in 1934, something not mentioned in the film which suggested that he died as a consequence of ignoring medical advice to give up working and rest. This was added to the film released in 1932 as a message to everyone that doing their duty to resist the Germany meant putting Individual lives into the service of the country whether as part of combat forces or other ways of assisting in the war effort.

The film commences with a short and powerful history of what happened in Europe and how at the time when the film was released Britain and her then Empire stood alone against Germany who boasted they would be in London before the end of the summer. It is generally accepted that had Hitler invaded in 1942 Britain did not have the production strength or defences to have succeeded in repelling the attack. Without the superiority over the Spitfire and the brave young men who flew them there is little doubt that Germany would have succeeded. Over Twenty Two thousand Spitfires and derivatives were built as the basic designed could be improved where as the Hawker Hurricane quickly became obsolete

His son Dr Gordon Mitchell married Alison Barrow and they had three children with his wife dying in 2005 but his son lives on in Cotswolds. In 2005 all the surviving Mitchell family including two great grand children went to London to watch a statue of Mitchell displayed at the Science Museum. I not know its present whereabouts.

The actor who plays Mitchell in the film Leslie Howard bore little physical resemblance to Mitchell who was large and athletic. He was also working class with fierce temper. Leslie Howard was shot down and killed by the Luffwaffe in 1943 while in a transport plane.

In the film the Test pilot and personal friend from school days is played by David Niven and the film is a flashback of their work together told to young flying officers who are in awe of the plane and its designer. The principal test pilot was Jeffrey Quill after Joseph Summers. Joseph Mutt Summers was the Chief Test pilot at Vickers Armstrong and he undertook the first trials of the spitfire as well as 309 other aircraft by 1946. He was the pilot for the first bouncing bomb experiments used for the Dam Buster. He was awarded the OBE in 1946 and died after surgery in 1954 aged 50. Nothing further is known of him. Jeffery Quill who took over the testing of new versions of the Spitfire during the war had a long and important career. Mr Quill lived near Shoreham airport on the South Coast and began a non commissioned career in the RAF, aged 18 and half as an acting Pilot officer. He went solo in just over half the time as normal in those days and in 1932 in joined a squadron of fighters and started to fly aerobatics in order to test his and the plane’s maximum capabilities. In the 1934 he joined and the commanded the RAF metrological flight which involved a twice daily flight to 25000 feet to provide the best and latest data. Because of the way he operated he was awarded the Air Flying Cross. In 1936 he joined Vickers as assistant to Mutt Summers aged 23. In 1936 he narrowly missed death after a plane failed to come out of a spin at 3000 feet and looked as if it smash him as it feel and a he came down by parachute landing on the Kingston Surrey bypass. I lived at Teddington Middlesex 1967-1969 which was just beyond Kingston and en route to the home of my birth and care mothers, and their eldest sister. He was appointed in charge of development and production flying at the commencement of World war Two and decided that to do his job properly he would become a combat pilot and during 19 days he shot down two enemy planes. He wanted to stay on but the top brass felt he was too valuable and recalled him to his official position. When in 1942 allied fighters were being overtaken by the Foch Wulf 109 it was planned for Quill to be taken to France to hijack one of the planes and bring back. Fate intervened in that a German pilot mistakenly landed one in England unaware where he was.

After the war he continued as a major test pilot and wrote several books primarily about the Spitfire and became President of the Spitfire Society.

Romanzo Criminale

Having written of a real gang which controlled London throughout the 1960’s, corrupting senior politicians both main political parties and gaining supporters among leading personalities of the day I decided to watch Romanzo Criminale which has similarities with the Banda della Magliana, the notorious brotherhood which dominated Roman crime between 1970 and 1990.

Contrary to popular understanding the Sicilian Costa Nostra is only one of the Italian regional crime syndicates. The Mafia has always been a loose federation of criminal families taking over districts, cities and towns and which spread to the USA and to Australia as consequence of emigration in the nineteenth century. It is estimated there are100 such families in the Palermo region with four to five thousands members. As a consequence of internal war and government crackdown as many as 1000 members have been killed and many others imprisoned where the government has gone to great lengths to stop them continuing to run their organisations from prison. The “family” compromise the familiar head and deputy, legal adviser and captains of the groups of soldiers. Over recent decades the emphasis has been on creating legitimate business with an estimated turnover of 120 billion USA dollars in Italy alone.

The most powerful crime organisation in Italy comes from Calabria, the M’drangheta or Honoured society with an estimated twenty thousand members with is income estimated in 2007 to be around fifty to sixty billion dollars in Italy to come mainly from drug trafficking although it also has legitimate businesses such as supermarkets, restaurants and construction. There are estimated 100 families and four to five thousand members in the region but there are groups in other parts of Italy, Spain, Portugal Germany, and Holland, Belgium. The USA, Canada, Australia, Eastern Europe, Columbia and the UK. The M’drangheta only recruit through blood relationships which lead to stronger units. The Camorra is also Southern Italy based in the Campania region around Naples and is older that than the Cosa Nostra, more violent and includes protection rackets as well as drugs. The clans act independently so there are constant violent feuds but have gown substantially with over 100 units around Naples and over 6000 members. They are reported to control 2500 bakeries in Naples, the distribution of milk, fish and coffee. Their main interest is Prostitution, Gambling and Blackmail. They have also become involved with Nigerian drug gangs and the Albanian Mafia. In the UK there was an attempt to control Aberdeen because the city had no history of organised crime. The Sacra Corona Unita (United Sacred Crown) is the smallest of the organisation with an estimated 2000 members from the Puglia region in the 1970’s as a breakaway from that Camorra. Among their specialist interests are loan sharking and money laundering, pornography, gambling and kidnapping with links to the Russian Mafia, Serbian Mafia Columbia as well as Albania and Sicily.

In the film a group of delinquents leave their home town and set out to become successful criminals in Rome with the nicknames Lebanese, Ice, Dandy and Grand with the latter dying at the hideout after crashing through a police road block. Some years later after minor crimes and imprisonment the idea of kidnapping and extortion is put into practice. The victim is killed but the ransom paid and instead of dividing the sum five sixth is put into the pot to buy drugs as the first steps in taking over Rome as the Krays had taken over London. In the reality there was a kidnapping of the Duke of Massimilano Grazioli Lante della Rovere in 1977, he was murdered, the ransom obtained and with the money invested in crime in Rome with the intention of taking control. While the film focuses on the lives of three men and their loves it is set against the background of real events in which the group flourished. This included involvement with new fascists groups such as Nuclei Armati Rivolzionari responsible for the 1980 bombing in Bologna. The Secret services( SISMI), the Grand Master of the Freemason Lodge Propaganda Due P2 and a Nato clandestine anti communist organization. In the film they called in to help find the location of kidnapped Prime Minister Aldo Moro. In real life they were linked to the former Grey Wolves Member who made the 1981 assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II.
The group was unusual because they acted as partners making equal shares and paying dividends which was maintained through families when individuals were imprisoned. Even when they made money to own villas, Rolexes and driver Ferraris they were expected to continue as criminal labourers.

They were also implicated with others in the murder of Roberto Calvi of the Banco Ambrosiano in London in 1982 where the main share holder was the Vatican Bank. The bank crashed after it was established to have laundered money for the Mafia channelling funds to the Polish Solidarity Movement and the Contras in Nicaragua. In 1983 a fifteen year old Roman girl disappeared and later there was evidence that a member of the gang was among those who tried to broker a deal with the Vatican for her “release” in exchange for the attempted murderer of Pope John Paul. A feature of the film, and of the reality of the these groups is that they depend on a network of paid or terrorised informants in the judicial systems, police, prosecutors, magistrates and judges, as within the prison service, customs and border controls.

It was a grey wet day all day. I did not go out until after lunch with posting a packet at the post office my first call and then finding that there were a few copies of the Mail at Smiths and able to obtain the DVD. I needed a cup of tea and a sit down while it rained and enjoyed reading the paper. There was no Prime Minister’s Question Time earlier, presumably because it was half term, and an article the paper revealed that the Tory gap over Labour had risen again to 20 points. The weekly attacks and media reporting has clearly had their effects as well as dissatisfaction with what has happened with the need to fund bankers on astronomical incomes and bonuses while Members of the Cabinet, particular the Home Secretary exploits the rules to get the best level of expenses without understanding how this looks to workers being made redundant and those running businesses who cannot get working capital and reasonable rates. It smacks of the abolition of the ten pence tax rate. I remembered to do a second check on composition of shops and stores realising that I had missed two card shops two shoe shops, two jewellers, two sports wear and several others. A third shoe shop is closing as has a larger fashion store and there was one other bakery. Interestingly there is only one small Travel agent but others elsewhere, one Noble’s amusements and one bookmaker.

I enjoyed a chicken escalope with beans for lunch and soup with a gammon salad in the evenings. A banana and grapes and not hot cross buns.

It is easy to see that Doubt was originally a stage play an despite the brilliance of the acting of Meryl Streep, Hoffman and the rest of the cast the film, and as I understand also the play lacks an effective ending.
The story is set in a private White mixed Catholic second School in the Bronx with one black pupil. The Catholic Parish appears to only have a teaching role in terms of the basketball and the rest of the staff is an order of nuns headed by Streep. She is a traditional strict disciplinarian who teachers as well as pupils are afraid of and she has a view that children will commit sin unless they are closely monitored. Two of the pupils, including the black boy serve at mass, and one of the younger Sisters who believes the children should find learning fun and inspirational, reports concerns about the relationship between the parish priest and the boy when she smells alcohol on the breath of the boy. When the Streep, Sister Aloysius, confronts the priest he explains that the boy had been reported to him and because he knew something of the home circumstances and the way the boy was being treated by other pupils he had covered up something which would have meant the boy should not continue to serve at mass.

I was concerned about aspects of authenticity although I do not know how the Catholic parishes operated in New York State at the time and certainly they were advance in operating mixed sex denominational schools something which did not exist in England at that time except at the junior/preparatory level, as in common with the Grammar schools there were separate schools for boys and girls. The first point is that in England there would not have been just two serving alter boys for the weekend masses, especially those with a choir and sermon and for masses celebrated in this way there would be two or three priests, and half a dozen alter boys part of a larger team who would have training sessions, a rota with, standby substitutes to cover for holidays, and sickness. As in the film roles were divided but everyone was trained to do any role in case someone failed to turn up as scheduled.

At both the junior and secondary level it was customary for the school to hold a mass once a week and on special Saint Days. At the primary school, the oldest class, may be two, of ten to 12 year olds and about thirty pupils in total, attended the ordinary week daytime mass, where older boys served at the mass in their last year. There were only four or five of us and only two were required for the mass which was a simple one lasting about half an hour where as the full versions, sung and with sermon would last an hour and longer at Christmas and Easter. The boys serving at the mass would make our own way back to the school about half a mile away and sometimes we would be given a cigarette and on a few instances those who wished were given a taste of the wine which unlike the Anglican Eucharist was not given to the parishioners.

The maid of the household of one of the boys found part of a cigarette in his trousers, reported to the parents who then reported to the school head when learning its origin held a meeting of all the serving boys and the priest who was made to apologise while the head mistress who was not a nun, made it clear we were not to smoke or drink. At the secondary school we had out own Chapel where the whole school attended the weekly mass and during one of the years pupils were required to serve at mass once a term given the numbers involved. This was more frightening than at the parish church less one forgot the Lain responses or the timing of what one had to do.

The film and play opens with the priest giving a sermon about doubt and there are two other instances if I remember correctly of mini sermons and in all three instances they are unlike those I remember from that time which were formal and strictly based on New Testament texts.

The play and film are constructed around two issues. The first is traditional Catholicism and the new approach which was developed in the fifties into the sixties and which may have been the situation in the parish earlier. The role of the Priest extended beyond that of priest holding masses, confessions, weddings, christenings and funerals, and organising Sunday school in the afternoons. He would have been the spiritual heads and guide to any catholic School which did not have priests on the staff. He visited the homes of parishioners and would have meals when invited. My mother and aunt would invite visiting priests to their home when in their eighties and arranged with a couple from the church to go out for a meal even when my mother had developed the first stages of memory loss. There was also a wide range of organisations and activities attached to the church groups, wife/mother groups, youth groups, for the elderly as well as general social activities and societies such as the St Vincent de Paul, the Knights of St Columba. There are seventy catholic based interest groups recognised although many operate on a diocesan than parish level today, and most having national and international structures. The difference has been between style with the priest and someone like a school head having authority, being a distant even frightening figures and someone with whom parishioners and children could more readily identify with. The problem with some priests and nuns is that they never had experience of a normal adult social relationship, let alone an adult sexual relationship, with priests going to seminary schools as preteens and nuns entering convents directly from care homes. Although part of a large family, my mother was trained by the Sisters to first take Sunday school classes and prepare young children for communion when she was preteen, teaching classes as a teenager at fourteen as well as playing the piano for school hymns and the organ at church.

The interesting aspect of the film and play is that Sister Aloysius was married became a nun at widowhood so she knew something of the world and men. One of her best lines is every easy choice made today will have its consequence tomorrow. She has banned the use of biro bens in the school knowing it will end the skill of penmanship. She confiscates a transistor radio with ear piece from a member of the class and then admits she has becomes addicted to its use, listen to news of course and not music (when did the radio with ear piece become freely on the market?). The problem is that the Sister quickly jumps from father Flynn being a priest who is trying to relate and ingratiate himself with parishioners and the children into a paedophile. This is the second and major issue of the film. Has father Flynn had a sexual relationship or made sexual overtures to the boy. He certainly behaves as if he is guilty when she confronts him with her beliefs about his behaviour after falsely telling him she has made contact with parishioners from his previous placements raises similar questions about his behaviour toward male pupils. He uses his position and the hierarchical structure of the Catholic to prevent her pursuing her beliefs in a way which the audience is left in no doubt of his guilt.

However then here is the final scene, both of play and film, when the nun who first raised the alarm and who has been absent because of a family bereavement, returns to find the head sitting alone outside on a winter’s day where the snow is laying thickly. She confirms that the priest has left the parish, something the audience already knows because he has said farewell to the Parish at a mass, but we now learn that although she reported the situation to the Bishop, the priest has been appointed to a new parish with a bigger school so that in effect he has been promoted. She then admits to having doubts because although his reaction to the her information that she had contacedt the previous parish appeared to confirm her suspicions, she had to admit she was bluffing and that she is no longer as certain as she was of his guilt.

I felt that this was a more honest and realistic ending than most critics have commented although it is a cinematic and dramatic let down. What the film and play achieves is to explain the nature of the Catholic church hierarchy which despite the extensive social networking did result in the widespread sexual and physical abuse of children and adult parishioners until general exposure in the 990’s and the decision to create more effective safety machinery within all parishes.

I have mentioned before that I admire the cinema reviews of James Berardinelli because he is consistently objective and brings a thoughtful and wider perspective to his assessments. He begins his review with these profound words, “It is one of life’s bitter ironies that one of the first things lost to moral certainty of the capacity for compassion. Righteousness is a cold, hard position, and an unshakeable one and allows no room for one of the most basic tenants of human existence, doubt” However it is this reality which the unscrupulous use and not helped by the adversarial British legal system instead of one based on an inquiry to establish the facts and hopefully the truth. The test beyond all reasonable doubt protects those false accused but it provides machinery for the guilty and sympathetic lawyers to defeat justice.
I liked aspects of film which provided hints why the priest and the boy developed a bond. The priest show feminine qualities such a liking for pressed flowers and clean nails. The boy’s mother also hints that her son has revealed a feminine nature and which causes a negative reaction in his father and this leads the Brussats in their Spirituality and Practice review that this explains a relationship without necessarily involving a sexual intimacy: the priest saw in the boy what he had learnt to see in himself. However I also have to add that professionally I was once involved with a similar young man because the courts where as a consequence of specialist psychiatric treatment, it was discovered he had been seduced several years earlier by a family friend and where as a consequence of the treatment his personality changed, and the relationship with the father became a positive one. The character in the story was right that questioning the child, however carefully was unlikely to reveal the truth. The boy I mentioned was unable to communicate with me or anyone until the treatment and I remember when I nice lady came to visit when I was aged between eight and ten years as part of an application for me to be taken into care because of the continuing lack of accommodation which meant I was sharing a bed with three adults. She asked who my mother was and about my father. I said my father had died in the war and that my mother was my aunt. How much of this was under instruction or simply made up I cannot remember.

I remember being afraid of what was to happen to me and in general being afraid of anyone who asked a question about my parentage. It was several decades later before I was able to talk about it.