Tuesday 29 May 2007

Films, Films, Films

So enough about the unemployment you’re all saying. Tell us about all the films this free time has enabled you to watch. Okay folks, I will.

In addition to going to the cinema more often I’ve been renting some films on DVD. So here’s a weekly round up.

Shattered Glass. Based on the true story of New Republic journalist Stephen Glass this is quite a compelling watch. A simple story well told. Hayden Christensen plays Glass, a young journalist desperate to impress his peers and his bosses with his fantastic pieces. So desperate that he begins to make things up.

Peter Sarsgaard is excellent as Chuck Lane, his editor, and there’s good support from Chole Sevigny, Melanie Lynskey, Hank Azaria and Steve Zahn.

Conversations With Other Women. Shot in split-screen, this features Aaron Eckhart and Helena Bonham-Carter sharing an evening at a wedding. It feels a lot more like a play than a film.

The split-screen aspect seems to lend weight to the film that it doesn’t really have and it’s only the strong performances of the two leads that carry it through.

The Queen. I never got round to seeing this in the cinema, but seeing as it’s a Stephen Frears film I always knew that it was going to be solid. Helen Mirren is never less than believable as the Monarch, but for me Michael Sheen is the stand-out as Tony Blair. He’s played him before of course in The Deal the drama Frears and The Queen’s scriptwriter Peter Morgan made for TV.

It’s another simple story made compelling in the telling, with The Queen reluctant to make much of a fuss about the death of Princess Diana. While Blair’s popularity among the British public grows in comparison. “You will experience this as well,” she later tells the Prime Minister.

Outfoxed. This is a documentary that looks at Rupert Murdoch and his Fox News company. ‘Fair and Balanced’ goes their slogan, but this documentary shows that they are anything but.

It focuses a lot on Bill O’Reilly, a man so contemptible, the more you look at him, the sicker you physically feel. He’s one of those talk shows hosts who is happy to listen to their guests so long as they agree 100% with him and his politics. Unlike radio talk show hosts who can cut their callers off, O’Reilly frequently resorts to shouting “Shut up!” and asking his technical people to “Cut his mic.”

One notable encounter features Jeremy M. Glick, the son of a man who died at the World Trade Center. O’Reilly had him on his show as he couldn’t believe that he would have the audacity to sign an anti-war petition despite being the son of a man murdered by terrorists.

Glick gives as good as he gets from O’Reilly, who grows increasingly irritated by Glick’s refusal to back down.

Outfoxed had a number of volunteers who watched Fox News round the clock and noted down various anomalies and curiosities about their coverage. Pro-Bush stories masquerading as news items, so called left-wing liberal correspondents backing down in debates with much tougher right wing presenters. However all the volunteers on Outfoxed were already politically aware and all of them had either strong-left wing sensibilities or were already aware of how much Fox skewers the news it presents. I would have found it more interesting had the people taking part been unaware of how Fox spins its news coverage.

Spiderman 3. I really didn’t like this. I was always a big Spiderman fan as a kid and although the films can’t play to all the strengths that made Spiderman popular as a comic book hero it didn’t hit enough of them to make this a success in my eyes.

For instance I don’t remember the comics having lengthy portions where Peter Parker greets over his girlfriend. I think he may have done it once or twice, but usually The Vulture or The Sandman or someone got in the way. In the film his mask routinely keeps coming off. I know you don’t want to keep the star of the film hidden under a mask all the time, but it’s Spiderman for chrissakes. And how come practically everyone knows his identity?

I also had problems with the black suit. Not because it turns Spidey into a darker character, but because it just seems to turn him into an obnoxious dick. The sub-Saturday Night Fever section I found excruciating.

As for the villains. Too many of them and none of them really given enough room to manoeuvre. There were some good bits in the film, mainly with the Sandman, but on the whole this was such a disappointment that it had me looking forward to the new Fantastic Four film.

The Pixies Live at the Paradise in Boston. This is a concert film of The Pixies playing a 200 capacity venue in their hometown last year. The band seems quite relaxed and chatty with the audience as they play through faves like Nimrod’s Son, Monkey Gone to Heaven, Debaser and Gigantic. The DVD also features a 12-song set from a Boston show in October 1986, filmed on a shaky camcorder and transferred from a bad quality video tape.

9/11 Press for Truth. This is a documentary that centres on the Jersey Girls, a group of women who all lost husbands or sons in the World Trade Center. They fight to have established what the Bush administration really knew about terrorists threats before 9/11 and what they did and did not do on the day to prevent them happening.

The film also features Paul Thompson, author of The Complete 9/11 Timeline, who discovered that a lot of articles containing some stunning facts about the terrorist threats to the US were being buried away inside newspapers and online.

It’s an interesting film, that leaves you in no doubt that at the very least those at the top in the US don’t really give a fuck what the general public thinks.

A Scanner Darkly. Another one I missed at the cinema. Phillip K. Dick’s novel, filmed then animated by Richard Linklater. Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, Woody Harrelson and Robert Downey Jr. all put in first rate performances. Yes, even Keanu, I think the animation format enhances his turn. Although obviously a drug fuelled story it flows very well and the pieces all fit together nicely. And what’s more it made me remember how much I love Winona Ryder.

Mutual Appreciation. I really can’t emphasise enough how much this film is about nothing. I’m a fan of the Brooklyn band Bishop Allen and when I discovered that the two guys in the band are also both actors and read a bit about the films they were in I thought, ‘I’ll look out for them if they’re ever released here.’

Well, Mutual Appreciation was one of those films. On limited release here it features Justin Rice as Alan, a singer who comes to New York, looking to put a band together to play his songs. His band’s songs are actually Bishop Allen’s songs and probably the best bit in the film for me was a nervy live performance of ‘Quarter to Three’.

I really enjoyed this film, but it’s not something I would recommend to people, because very little happens in it. It’s very naturalistic and in one scene where Alan arrives late and drunk at a party that’s wound down I couldn’t help feeling I’d been to exactly the same party.

There’s a little love triangle forming with Alan, his best friend and his best friend’s girl, but it’s so understated it barely gets going, doing to the blushing and fumbling of its participants.

If you imagine Woody Allen as a 25 year old singer/songwriter playing in a band called The Bumblebees you’re not far off Mutual Appreciation.

Special. Michael Rapaport is in pretty much every single scene as a man who discovers that medical tests have given him super-powers and as such he sets out to fight crime. But have they really given him super-powers and is that man really his doctor and are there really ‘suits’ on his trail? To be honest even by the end I’m not quite sure. Was the whole thing a metaphor for something else? Again I’m not really sure.

It’s quite an enjoyable film however. Even if it did seem a little bit baffling and it becomes much darker than it initially appears to be. Rapaport is always good in just the right role and he’s excellent here as a man whose desire to fight crime and have superpowers far outweighs his need to cling on to his sanity.

Ready Steady Live!


Anyone watch the biggest game in world football yesterday? Nah, me neither.

Doesn’t it seem even faintly ridiculous that the winners of yesterday’s “Championship” play off final (Derby County) stand to net more than the winners of the European Cup and the Premiership combined?

£65m they’ll be looking to make over the next season with massive parachute payments if they tumble straight back down.

Up here, Gretna will be looking secure a sponsorship deal with the local pie shop just to make sure their players are fed. Absolutely nuts.

Anyway, that’s not why I’m on. I’m on to ask did you see this ?

Anyone who’s ever bought a copy of our old magazine Cheery Bananas should dig them out, because slowly, every reality spoof show we made up for a laugh all those years ago is coming to a tele near you.

Friday 25 May 2007

The Boys From the Blackstuff

What I have to say in not unlike what Fraser has already posted. I went in to sign on this morning in Partick.

I too spent an hour on the phone a few days ago with a lassie in a call-centre, as she asked me a load of questions to inaccurately fill out a form for me. Among the major mistakes that she made was multiplying my final wage by ten, making it appear to the dole that I would shortly be in receipt of several thousand pounds, rather than a few hundred.

There were also a few questions on the form marked as 'UNANSWERED' when more accurately they could have been termed 'UNASKED'.

At the buroo I was met by a lot of Group 4 security guys who radio-controlled my appointment by letting each other know I was coming. "Mr. Brogan coming up to see Mr. Brown..."

"Check."


This was after two of them had a lengthy chat about the army.

My appointment itself went a lot smoother than Fraser's. I was met first of all by a charmless lassie who checked through the form for the obvious errors the call-centre lass made.

One thing I did discover during my interview was that the first 3 days of my claim don't count as they are deemed 'waiting days'. How many millions is that saving them over the course of a year? If I claimed for 3 days I wasn't unemployed for, would that not be termed 'fraud'?

I then spoke with quite an efficient guy who just really wanted all the details on my jobseeker form filled out so he could send me on my way.

And send me on my way he did, armed with a couple of phone numbers to call about jobs I'm not really interested in. Still every job he showed me paid more than the job I've just been kicked out of and a fortnightly trip into Jobcentre Plus offers more prospects than the scumbag company I was with ever did.

The 10 Minute Knock Back

Well, its been just over a week since Tom and I were unceremoniously chucked out on our arses by our former employers.

So far, its been productive time well used. Tom and I are both writing things we'd never have had time to do otherwise, we've done a bit of filming (more on that at a later date) and we have of course been enjoying all the fun of signing on and applying for jobs.

I was in to sign on today and a fucking bizarre experience it was to. These days, what with all the new fangled technology cutting about, it's all change down the dole or Jobcentre Plus as it's now known.

Instead of just tripping into a Jobcentre and having some half interested twat take down your details for about an hour, you have to call up "Jobsomeshitorother Direct", give them all your details, get a big wad of documents sent out to you that you have to fill out and THEN you get to go down the Jobcentre and have your time wasted by some half interested twat for about an hour.

To be fair, I'd have been less time this morning had I not had to help correct the dozens of mistakes the guy I phoned made and fill in the bits he just couldn't be bothered doing with a new start lassie, who had to ask a colleague every time she had to make a decision.

I was then passed off to a Pat Butcher lookalike for my "Jobsearch", which consisted of her complaining to me about her husband (who apparently can't just go and buy a kilt on his own - ah, you know what we're like us men eh?) before she started entering whatever the fuck she felt like on her computer record of me to the point where I wondered if my being there was in any way genuinely necessary.

I could certainly hear myself talking, but lets just say precious little of it made it across the desk.

She then handed me a bundle of paperwork before huckling me out the door because she'd double-booked me with a guy who had learning difficulties and hadn't been able to read the letter he'd received telling him his appointment had been changed.

Fucking rare eh? Canne wait until no-that-bright, overworked employees under this amount of pressure are handling my ID card details.

The place itself is hilarious now, all open-plan, with "jobpoint" terminals which work to the same functionality standards as their laughable website, sofas, "breakout areas" and designer, leather-bound cupboards that hold about two ring binders and a pencil, the kind of office you'd imagine Tony Wilson would have had in about 1986.

Also, for no reason I can put my finger on other than the possibility that they've finally realised they deal almost exclusively with bams all day, the place is crawling with Group 4 security staff.

Maybe they are all looking for work having been sacked after losing dozens of dangerous criminals? Who knows.

But that's not been the best bit of my week so far. That came the other morning when, bright and early, I applied for a job I had received via alert from S1 jobs.

I applied at 8.59am. By 9.09 I had received and email telling me to fuck off.

Despite being qualified for the job and it being a brand new ad placed that very morning I had apparently fallen behind a vast queue of people better suited to the position.

I am fairly accustomed to the feeling of not knowing whether to laugh or cry, but that was a new one even on me.

Sunday 20 May 2007

Zodiac

With my new found unemployment I can now go to the cinema in the afternoon and it was with this recently acquired cinematic spring in my step I went to see Zodiac (****).

The film tells the story of the sprawling investigation into a San Francisco serial killer in the late 60s. The always watchable Mark Ruffalo plays the hot-shot detective haunted by the case. Robert Downey Jnr. turns in yet another outstanding performance as an investigate journalist singled out by the killer in a bid to win media fame. Jake Gynellhall completes the triumvirate of male leads as a newspaper cartoonist whose casual interest in the case becomes an obsession.

There’s good support too from Anthony Edwards, Elias Koteas, Phillip Baker Hall and Chloe Sevigny.

The film is equally intriguing and horrific. The killings happen in painfully lingering detail onscreen. It’s less flashy than David Fincher’s previous films and at just over two and a half hours, possibly it’s slightly long.

Good performances all round though.

Thursday 17 May 2007

Merry Redundancy and Happy New Giro

Well, yesterday Fraser and I were finally thrown onto the scrapheap by our employer. Apparently they were going to buy us cards, but couldn’t get out to the shops. They only had Christmas cards. Still, we were only too glad to be offski. Being made redundant is the biggest career opportunity I’ve had in 3 years working there.

And there were literally parties in the street, as we made our way into town to join Sevilla and Espanyol fans enjoying the entertainment before the UEFA Cup Final.

An enjoyable match it was too, with Sevilla being
just too strong for Espanyol. A pishing wet Glasgow night being the only disappointment of the evening.

On my way home the 62 was characteristically mobbed. It was packed with your usual punters on their way home, several Spaniards on their way back from the game and what else? Yes, that’s right - bams.

Up the back of the bus, (where else?) were 3 guys intent on making everyone else’s trip home as uncomfortable as possible. A guy in a Liverpool shirt sang off colour songs about the
Munich Air Disaster. His final’s not 'til next week, so fuck knows why he was out, even next week I'd be dischuffed to hear his patter. Not be outdone, the local bams overshadowed him. The quieter of the two was content just to punch the roof of the bus repeatedly, but a big shaven headed bam wearing a Celtic shirt and a Spanish flag punched the roof and sang songs about the IRA all the way along the road, and was still at it when I got off in Partick.

Makes you proud to be from Glasgow eh? Thousands of football fans come from abroad, don’t say one word out of place, have a good time, despite some of them going home unhappy and who causes bother? Glasgow Bams.

Below are some photographs - of opportunistic local newspapers, Spanish fans in town, the redundancy boys and the bus home. Also can anyone tell me what the Daily Record were going for in that headline below? It makes no sense to me at all.










Wednesday 16 May 2007

"I Can Kick"

This is very funny. This is actor Crispin Glover on David Letterman. Below that is his follow up appearance a few years later where Letterman wants an explaination for his behaviour. (The sound on the second one is quite poor.)



World Of Employment Get Ready

Looks like today, maybe, just maybe I and Tom's last day...

Thank fuck. Here's Curtis Mayfield.

Tuesday 15 May 2007

Roofers Get Ready

If you're a roofer head on down to Jumpin' Jaks on May 27th as there may be some work for you as two karoke singers have a track record of wrecking the building.

General manager Quentin Collier told the Razz: "Craig and Brian literally blew the roof off last time they were here.

"I've had to book them again just to stop people asking when they'll be coming back".


What? To fix it?

Monday 14 May 2007

Psychic Daughter

If like me you're marking time until the company you work for throws you out onto the street like so much rubbish, you may like to watch something funny.

So have a look at this sketch from Last Call Cleveland.

Thursday 10 May 2007

T-Break Showcase

For the last three nights I’ve been in King Tut’s to see the T-Break Showcases. I was there to review them for a magazine called Artrocker.

The showcases were for unsigned bands. A judging panel selects 12 bands to play on the T Break stage at this year’s T in the Park. With 6 bands playing every night you may expect one or two duffers, but the standard was pretty high.

Over the three nights my favourites were The Little Kicks, Little Doses, Radars and Theatre Fall. You can hear some mp3s on their websites or you can go to the T-Break site to hear songs from all 48 bands on over the week in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

I’ve got some photographs from across all three nights or you can look at James Cadden’s much better photographs from last night’s show.

Wednesday 9 May 2007

Simplified Day Fares

Has anyone else noticed that the day fare on First Bus has gone up to £3? It’s now £3 all day as opposed to £2.85 before 9.30am and £2.55 after.

First Bus portrays this as good news on their literature. They call it ‘simplified day fares’. Awful good of them cos it must have been bothering people how to break that £3 into £2.85/£2.55. Should they buy a newspaper, a bottle of water, a packet of chewing gum?

Problem solved say First Bus. We’ll just take it all. Nice and simple. £2 and £2.50 are also pretty simple to understand. Never thought of that First Bus, eh?

Of course the service will be improving by the same percentage…

Friday 4 May 2007

This is England

I went to the cinema for the first time in ages last night. The first time since I saw perhaps the year’s worst film The Number 23. I went to see This is England. Shane Meadows’ latest has a lot in common with his last film Dead Man’s Shoes.

They both spotlight violence, bleak council estates and gang mentality and how some people threaten and dominate those weaker than them. You‘re probably aware of the film’s plot, but briefly, set in 1983, it centres on a 12 year old lad, who lost his father in the Falklands. He falls in with a gang of skinheads and comes under the spell of Combo a skinhead recently released from prison who thinks its his duty to claim back what ‘is England’ from immigrants and everyone else he thinks has a better time of it than him.

The film captures skinheads well. Some of them were just into the fashion. The haircut, the clothes, the music. Others saw it as some sort of solution for why their lives were shit. It in no way glamorises violence or racism. In fact it makes it seem pretty pathetic. It’s people trying to dominate folk weaker than them. And that goes up as well as down as we see Combo at a National Front meeting looking up to NF leader (a great understated cameo from Frank Harper), who’s dominating and controlling him in the same way he’s attempting to do with the younger lads.

One of the film’s stars Andrew Shim sums up how the film differs from other skinhead films well in an interview with Britfilms.

"See, that’s the thing, ‘This Is England’ has captured it perfectly. Films like ‘Romper Stomper’ and ‘American History X’ focus on the racism and kicking the s**t out of each other. They don’t do true skinheads the justice they deserve and show what they were really like. They were listening to Reggae and Reggae artists were making music for skinheads."

The cast are all excellent, Thomas Turgoose is the most talked about cast member, being the young centre of the film, but Stephen Graham is also excellent as Combo. It's dark and it's brutal in places, but it's well worth seeing.

The This is England website has a lot of good behind the scenes video and other stuff.

We Have The Numbers



A while back, friend of 'Pish Ronnie of This Place Is Dead fame got a tattoo based on some graffiti he'd seen on holiday in the States. Here are some possible follow ups.

Sometimes you need to be reminded that people can be just brilliant.

Thursday 3 May 2007

Modern Covers

This is an interesting article from the LA Times about a new reprint of Penguin classics. The books have been printed on uncoated paper and feature introduction from modern authors.

However the article focuses on the fact that the covers have been designed by comic book artists like Dan Clowes, Joe Sacco and Chris Ware.

It’s Election Time!

This is a long one, but don’t worry it’s funny.

Fraser got a leaflet through from the Scottish Christian Party the other day there. Over at This Place is Dead Ronnie has posted some highlights from their campaign. They include:

•...you have a chance to vote for a Christian political party that has an All-Christian candidate list…

•Tommy Sheridan … famously ripped up Brian Souter’s ‘Keep the Clause’ referendum ballot paper.

•Patrick Harvey the Green lead MSP … is Scotland’s leading promoter of young schoolchildren being taught about homosexuality.

Patrick Harvie did the NO2ID gig with us a few weeks back, so he can get Glue hauners anytime he wants. Never once during that night did he talk about finding schoolchildren to bum. Not once. Though I didn’t go out with him after the show.

The Scottish Christian Party are run by one Rev George Hargreaves, pictured right. When I had a look at some of their policies I noticed a little anomaly or two.

• Reinstate the death penalty for severe crimes

• Legislation to ban abortion

• Provision of Christian religious education should be mandatory

• promote biblical alternatives to the current criminal justice system

• That Mechanical Copyright Protection enjoyed by songwriters should be extended to featured recording artists and record producers

• That a minimum royalty percentage (the level of which should be decided through consultation with the music industry) should be paid to featured recording artists and producers on exactly the same basis as is currently paid to songwriters


Hang on, law and order, anti-abortion, forcing religion on people, recording artists and record producers should be getting more money?? Eh?

Only then did I discover that Rev Hargreaves, righteous man and hater of homosexuals, used to be a DJ. He was also a songwriter. Quite a successful songwriter as it turns out. In fact you’ve probably heard one of his songs. It was called ‘So Macho’. It was a big hit for Sinitta. Thanks mainly to its success in the gay clubs. He also wrote its double A-side ‘Cruising’.

Rev Hargreaves still sees royalty cheques rolling in to this day. In fact they enable him to trot out his hateful bile. Read more about it in The Times.

Patrick Harvie said in the Daily Telegraph, "I contemplated making So Macho my campaign theme tune. It would be very me. But I did not want to give Mr Hargreaves any more royalties."

Rev Hargreaves had his ‘spiritual awakening’ while living as a tax exile on the Isle of Man.

There’s an interesting article on him here. It points out that...

The party is also fighting in Wales. Their manifesto proposes lifting controls on over-fishing on the basis there is "a supernatural element in the restoration of fish to our seas."

Mr Hargreaves also says that the Welsh dragon on its national flag is a cause of sickness. He declared to the South Wales Evening Post back in March 2007: "Wales has been under demonic oppression and under many curses because of this unwise choice."

So, will you 'put your cross by the cross'?

Wednesday 2 May 2007

Tom Poston 1921-2007

I just read that Tom Poston died. You probably won’t know the name, but you’ll know the face. I remember him best from Newheart and Mork and Mindy.

He was always a reliable and funny performer. He summed up my obscure knowledge of televison when one day in the bar at the Pleasance myself and Iain (One Neck) were talking about him while Jo looked on at the two of us like ‘who on earth are you two geeks on about?’

Here’s a brief obit from News From Me.

It's...Like...Some...Beautiful Dream! Sort Of...



Saturday May 5th is Free Comic Book Day. This is just as it sounds, Xmas for comic book fans and a great way for people who are just “comic curious” to test the waters.

Various publishers are giving away up to 28 titles to anyone who walks into participating shops. It’s that simple. In Glasgow, Forbidden Planet are doing it, as are Red Hot Comics, who are based somewhat inconveniently in Castlemilk.

Of the two stores, Red Hot is by far the best, but as I said, it’s slap bang in the middle of serious bandit country.

So, If you’re just out and about, pretty much your only option is to get to Forbidden Planet and snap up some free shit.

There are some amazing things on offer from big publishers like Marvel and DC to loads of small press stuff covering slice of life tales to fantasy to Manga. I’m excited to say that the first "new" (it's actually reprinting stuff never before collected) Peanuts comic for 42 years is also part of the promotion.

Yes, this is a simple marketing ploy – the participants want you to buy comics from their store. They want to get you hooked on the crack that is regular monthly titles.

But you’ll get your free stuff even if you don’t buy a book. You should, but you don’t have to. So there’s no way to lose.

If you have kids, get them some free comics! And if you just fancy a look at the most immediate, most flexible and most creative medium on the planet, have a look for yourself.

Free comics!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

UPDATE

Tom's just been online and has found that Forbidden Planet are offering packs of Free Comic Book Day books to their online customers dependent on how much they spend, so there may be some kind of catch to what's on offer when you visit.

As I understand it, that's not in the spirit of the day, but I guess individual retailers have the right to use the tool whichever way they want.

I would say if they make you buy something to get a free book, don't bother. I mean, how are new readers going to come to the medium and to people's stores if you have to want to be in the store to buy something in the first place?

Doesn't make much sense to me.

"Hey! Would you like a free comic book designed to get you interested in the wonders of comics?"

"Ok"

"Fine, just buy a comic book then."

"But I'm not really interested in comics yet and don't know what to buy."

"No free book for you then!"

For me, thats just giving away stuff to existing customers isn't it? I've nothing against that, nothing wrong with rewarding loyalty, but where are the new readers in this equation?