Sex Education - Season 1 (2019 Ben Taylor, scr Laurie Nunn)

Did John Hughes write this? I mused, over eighties synth music, denim, pot and teens at high school. It has a curiously dated design (and soundtrack), but I don't mind.

Asa Butterfield's typically confused expression works well here; as sex therapist Gillian Anderson's son, he's going to put the kids right, with the help of Emma Mackey, a free-spirited rebel (who we know has some dark side). With Ncuti Gatwa as his gay friend and Connor Swindells (Vigil, Emma.) as the bully with the big dick.

We're beginning to love Mackey's character and performance, she's half-French (co-starred in Eiffel with Roman Duris) and a virtual newbie, as is Nunn, whose only previous credits are three shorts; Gatwa funny and most watchable - a bright future ahead we think.

Kedar Williams-Sterling is the shapely swimmer, Alistair Petrie the head teacher, Mimi Keene the bitch, Aimee Lou Wood, Chaneil Kular, Patricia Allison (becomes Otis' girlfriend at just the wrong moment), Mikael Persbrandt (plumber).

Auditions must have been amusing - 'Can we see your orgasm face?'

Produced by Eleven for Netflix. China Crisis 'Christian' stuck in my head.

Uprising (2021 Steve McQueen)

Beautifully made three hour documentary tells the story of three events that ignited the black South London Community in 1981. It only came to our attention when we had Radio 2 on in the car and it was a very unusual dub reggae song playing, (think it was Sir Collins and his Mind Sweepers, but oddly elusive) which turned out to name all the victims of the New Cross house fire forty years ago.

Good use of (plentiful) news footage, reggae songs and Lover's Rock, coverage of survivors, National Front activity, other uninvestigated fires at black community centres.

We must watch Small Axe. And I May Destroy You.

The Starling (2021 Theodore Melfi)

The CGI starling was, I feel, a mistake, and there's two too many montages to songs. But we like Melfi's other films (St. Vincent, Hidden Figures; Going in Style he co-wrote), and William Hurt's usually worth watching in anything. 

Melissa McCarthy's struggling on her own, with husband Chris O'Dowd in care home following death of their baby girl, pesky bird keeps attacking her. Some rather obvious symbolism going on. 

Shot by Laurence Sher.

Vigil (2021 Tom Edge & co-scr)

It is of course a CGI submarine. Couldn't understand the moment where they're about to collide with tanker so dive under it - I would have gone left or right myself.

Loved the set-up. The investigating detective (Suranne Jones) has had an uncomfortable  experience in the water. She can't send messages out. Her GF has to use familiar stuff to secrete information coming in.

Martin Compston, Rose Leslie (The Good Fight), Shaun Evans, Paterson Joseph, Adam James, Lorne MacFadyen (no relation), Anji Mohindra, Stephen Dillane, Lolita Chakrabarti.

Edge wrote Strike and Judy. The title Vigil is oddly elusive.

In episode 5, Suranne finally has a shower (only because of a Sars threat, however), but still we haven't seen her eat anything.

Generally exciting, but the last half hour's a bit boring.

Endeavour: Terminus (2021 Kate Saxon)

So enjoyed this, what a joy to see a brand new Endeavour film. This has a pall of doom hanging over it, with Thursday's son Sam missing in Northern Ireland, and sinister events in a haunted hotel. Where's Marple? But also Lewis is having so much fun again. Name 'Loomis' obviously familiar from Psycho but also (I am reminded) Halloween. Indeed, Q suggested they should have delayed transmission a month - very good idea. Also getting echoes of The Shining and even The Old Dark House.

Really great writing, nice to see Caroline O'Neill and Sara Vickers having great scenes. With Adam Ewan, Marion Bailey, Anna Burnett (with the white 'go go' boots), Martin Hutson, Ben Bishop, Estella Daniels, Jennifer Kirby.

You just knew Fred would come to the rescue.

Well, that was the 33rd film in the series, same as Morse and Lewis. 'Terminus'. Is that the end?

DP Mark Waters, editor Anthony Combes.

"It's beginning to thaw..." Yes, yes. Also loved "I'd tear the world down to get him back."

Ballymurphy - series of killings of innocent civilians by British Army in 1971.

The Hundred Foot Journey (2014 Lasse Hallstrom)

Steven Knight wrote it (also Burnt). In a Helen Mirren mood. Also very pleased to learn Linus Sandgren has photographed the latest Bond (and Tom Cross edited it). His lighting is terrific. If there is any. He has recently shot ads for Orangina and Cisco. No, not recently. How about a short film made on an iPhone and directed by Damian Chazelle? The Stunt Double. Here it is. Also Don't Look Up (Adam McKay, not released) and Babylon (Damian Chazelle, due for release 2022). And Paul McCartney video with Emma Stone, Who Cares.

So, that's The Hundred Foot Journey for you.

Finding Your Feet (2017 Richard Loncraine)

When posh Imelda Staunton finds out her husband's been having an affair for five years, she does what? Kick him out? No. Implausibly, she moves in with her sister Celia Imrie in a council estate. So that's a bit difficult to swallow. Anyway, what happens then is not especially exciting or original, but fun, as she learns to enjoy life and people again, especially Timothy Spall. Meg Leonard and Nick Moorcroft wrote it, and it ends up in Rome, so that's never a bad thing.

With Joanna Lumley, John Sessions, Josie Lawrence, David Hayman, Phoebe Nicholls, Indra Ové, Marianne Oldham (as the daughter, who's so much taller than Imelda she's rarely in  shot).

John Pardue was the DP and Johnny Daukes edited it.

Manhunt: The Night Stalker (2021 Marc Evans, scr Ed Whitmore)

DCI Colin Sutton (Martin Clunes again) is assigned to the case of a burglar / rapist who had perpetrated a string of crimes over a seventeen year period without being caught. He is, obviously, but sadly we don't learn anything about this psychopath. And even though we know he will be caught it's still entertainingly tense. A four-parter for ITV.

With Claudie Blakley, Jude Akuwudike as the Stalker, Diveen Henry, Matt Bardock.

Cal (1984 Pat O'Connor)

John Lynch, looking like he's strayed out of a Bresson and into this by accident, is understandably confused when he falls for the widow of a man he helped to kill in The Troubles, played by Helen Mirren. It's rather good, although I still don't know how the army found him as he hadn't revealed his whereabouts to anyone. Nicely lit by Jerzy Zielinski; music by Mark Knopfler.

Written by Bernard MacLaverty, from his novel. With Donal McCann, John Kavanagh, Ray McAnally.

Doomed love story in unusual setting.

The graffiti 'Remember 1690' is a reference to the Battle of the Boyne, controversially recognised by some as a great Protestant victory over Catholics and causing problems when one side or the other wants to march about it. The Northern Ireland situation is NUTS (and probably all the fault of the English in the first place).

Manhunt (2019 Marc Evans, scr Ed Whitmore)

Martin Clunes plays Colin Sutton, who tracked down the Twickenham Common killer against all odds. In Fact the WPC who alerted  him to the statement of a woman - who turned out to be a girlfriend of the killer - was more responsible than anyone - a nice little fact.

It's made in pseudo-documentary style, quite successful.

With Katie Lyons, Claudie Blackley, Peter Forbes, Stephen Wight.

Endeavour: Scherzo (2021 Ian Aryeh, writer Russell Lewis)

Lewis seems to me to have a joy of writing the seventies; he embraces it in a way that something like Grantchester for example doesn't do with the sixties. There's so much to enjoy here in the detail (a taxi fare is seventy-five pence), the music, the costumes; even though I didn't grasp the minutiae of the plot details. The scene of Strange picking up Joan for the ball is incredibly sweet.

That Morse is still grasping the clues through a fog of alcohol is impressive indeed.

A scherzo is a light and playful piece of music.

'The Dirty Squad'... indeed. Corruption in London resurfaces.

A Few Good Men (1992 Rob Reiner)

It did not get an Oscar nomination for the screenplay. It was nominated for Film, Supporting Actor, Sound and Editing (Robert Leighton) and BAFTA nominated for nothing. Jack is wonderful, but Cruise holds his own in crucial court scene. The editing is in the classic Hollywood style, i.e. going close on the actors on key moments. Nicely balanced, e.g. Kevin Pollak asserting the two soldiers are basically nothing but bullies.

There's a credit for Consultant William Goldman - this isn't the writer, who had nothing to do with it (though the myth persists even to this day on his Wikipedia page), but that is where I think the misunderstanding came from.

"Sir, yes sir!"

Sense and Sensibility (1995 Ang Lee)

Emma Thompson and Hugh Laurie met at Cambridge; Rickman didn't. One good example of her great Oscar-winning writing is the Laurie character, who is rude and sarcastic almost all the way through; but when Winslet falls ill, there's nothing he won't do to help.

And the ?manservant who we haven't heard from at all: "..and seeing as she's been so affable a lady, I made free as to wish her joy". May have been straight from the novel, but I thought I'd mention it.

Greg Wise, Emma's husband who met her on this film, has just started as a contestant on Strictly Come Dancing.

It's a lovely film. And the sight of Elizabeth Spriggs hurtling along a London street in full costume is wonderful. And Grant helping to hide little Emilie Francois's atlas - and their ensuing friendship - is sweet. (Made me think it would be fun to write the story of how the little girl turned out - starting in India or China or somewhere exotic.)

DP Michael Coulter. Editor Tim Squyres. 

From Emma's published screenplay and diaries

And Kate's Oscar acceptance speech:

And the Golden Globes in Jane Austen's style:

Help (2021 Marc Munden)

Do you think when Stephen Graham gets a call from Jack Thorne he just says "Yes" immediately? You know you're going to get something visceral and award-worthy. (I am still really pissed off that Mr Graham was cheated out of the BAFTA for The Virtues.) Jodie Comer is also stunning as a care home worker facing Covid-19 - the centrepiece is the long episode when she's on her own at night and enlists the early dementia sufferer Graham to help move a dying patient.

Virtually the entire cast of Brookside joins in the fun*. Ian Hart, Lesley Sharp, Sue Johnston, Cathy Tyson, Angela Griffin, Charles De'Ath, Andrew Schofield (G.B.H.), David Hayman.

The very shallow focus treatment is distracting. Sound and music are used together beautifully (Niv Adiri and Jim Williams).

* One, actually. Ed.

I was delighted to learn later that it was Graham who referred the budding Comer to his agent and thus a new career was born (perhaps after they would have met on Good Cop.)

Three Men in a Boat (1975 Stephen Frears)

Short, made for TV version with Michael Palin, Tim Curry and Stephen Moore. The funniest scene in the book - trying to open the can of pineapple - is also the funniest scene in this - a nicely visual interpretation. Has an unexpectedly serious outcome. Adapted by Tom Stoppard (wish I'd watched the documentary now) from Jerome K Jerome.

The Shelley is 'From Laon and Cythna; or the Revolution of the Golden City':

No longer where the woods to frame a bower
       With interlaced branches mix and meet,
       Or where with sound like many voices sweet,
   Water-falls leap among wild islands green,
       Which framed for my lone boat a lone retreat
   Of moss-grown trees and weeds, shall I be seen:
But beside thee, where still my heart has ever been.

Stepmom (1998 Chris Columbus)

It will be no surprise from the director of Home Alone that there are pukey bits in this film, which isn't very well written. The credit 'Story by Gigi Levangie, screenplay by Gigi Levangie & Jessie Nelson & Steve Rogers and Karen Leigh Hopkins & Ronald Bass' isn't encouraging. Nor are lines like 'I'll hate her if you want me to' and 'Do you have a word limit every day you have to exceed'?

Acting pros no problem - Julia Roberts, Ed Harris and Susan Sarandon (though she does over widen her eyes once or twice too often). Jena Malone is the girl kid you don't want to hurl into the rapids. (Liam Aiken is the one you do.)

Stepmom struggles to win love of children; real mother develops cancer. It was John Williams' 777th score. Photographed by Donald McAlpine (The Dressmaker, Moulin Rouge, Romeo + Juliet, Down and Out in Beverley Hills, Moscow on the Hudson, Parenthood).

Nine Perfect Strangers (2021 Creator David E Kelley, director Jonathan Levine)

Enjoyed this as it began - Nicole Kidman gives a playful performance. It's funny. 'Tranquilliam'.

The perfect strangers are Melissa McCarthy, Michael Shannon, Asher Keddie and Grace Van Patten, Bobby Cannavale, Luke Evans, Samara Weaving and Melvin Gregg, Regina Hall. Staff: Manny Jacinto, Tiffany Boone.

These become slightly more normal (oddly) when the staff are revealed to be microdosing the patients who then unburden themselves of their troubles. I wonder why Dr Seuss never thought of that.

Stylishly photographed by the useful Yves Belanger. Jonathan Levine directed The Wackness and 50/50.

Ultimately, Q went off the drug element and the Kidman character's just too weird so we gave up. Kelley wrote the crappy The Undoing and Big Little Lies, Doogie Howser and its sequel, LA Law, Boston Legal

Endeavour: Striker (2021 Russell Lewis d. Shaun Evans)

Finally, but sooner than we thought, Russell's football-themed film begins with a bomb in a university - one of the 'angry brigade'? Morse is a bit of a mess, drinking too much and being late. At least the old gang are reunited, though Strange (Sean Rigby) has lost a lot of weight - how come? (He was stabbed by the tow path killer in the last film.) And even Joan makes a reappearance, a typically uncomfortable encounter with Morse.

DS Bright's hair's looking rather long. 'Carry on.'

'I'll sleep when I'm dead' sounds like a reference to a rock album.

That was the Coppid Beech Hotel in Binfield as the location of the fashion show.

Shaun's done a good job with the action and actors.

Crocodile Dundee (1986 Peter Faiman)

A film curiously lacking in script - you could summarise the plot in two sentences, and considering it was quite a hit, I thought Paul Hogan looked largely uncomfortable in the lead role, leaving Linda Kozlowski to provide the charm. I remembered correctly that the couple fell for each other; they married in 1990. David Gulpilil gets a remarkably high billing for his two minute appearance.

Photographed by Russell Boyd.

Airport (1970 George Seaton & scr)

"Stewardess! If there's any brandy on board, pass it out!" One of the last old school Hollywood studio productions, from Ross Hunter at Universal - Easy Rider and The Wild Bunch (and - arguably - Bonnie and Clyde) had changed everything. Arthur Hailey's source novel provides a multitude of characters whose fates intersect one night in a blizzard. They are: Burt Lancaster and Jean Seberg, Dean Martin and Jacqueline Bissett, Helen Hayes (winning Oscar), Van Heflin and Maureen Stapleton (Reds, Interiors, Cocoon, Heartburn, Plaza Suite), George Kennedy, Lloyd Nolan, Barry Nelson, Dana Wynter, John Findlater, Jessie Royce Landis.

Some of the split screen stuff is so dated it's cute.

DP Ernest Laszlo, music Lionel Newman, Art direction Alexander Golitzen & E. Preston Ames, editor Stuart Gilmore (most of the Preston Sturges).

Thoroughly enjoyable.

Are Jean Seberg and Eve Marie Saint interchangeable?

Marple: The Mirror Crack'd (2011 Tom Shankland)

Written by Kevin Elyot, staying close to Christie's 1962 plot, which was (arguably) influenced by the story of Gene Tierney, who had a premature and handicapped child as a result of meeting someone with German measles when pregnant.

With Julia McKenzie are Joanna Lumley, Lindsay Duncan, Hugh Bonneville, Nigel Harman, Victoria Smurfit, Caroline Quentin, Martin Jarvis, Charlotte Riley, Will Young.

DP Cinders Forshaw.

Finding the Way Back (2020 Gavin O'Connor)

Written by Brad Ingelsby. Labourer Ben Affleck, an alcoholic with a failed marriage (to Javina Gavankar) and difficult relationship with his sister (Michaela Watkins), is invited back to former high school to coach failing basketball team. There's nothing really original or that interesting going on here, but, y'know. It's engaging enough.

The Way Back was the original title, which is better, but still not good enough. Same Again? 

The Lost Weekend remains the definitive drinking film.

Eduard Grau has a lens flare thing going on which seems like part of the design. Editor David Rosenbloom is not of course related to Ralph Rosenblum (you idiot).

Coach: Al Madrigal. Team: Brandon Wilson, Will, Ropp, Melvin Gregg, Charles Lott JR.  Da'Vinchi, Ben Irving. Glynn Turman (bartender).

Deceit (2019 Niall MacCormick)

There's a bathroom at the beginning of this dramatized police procedural which is so disgusting that I almost gave up then and there, though Q reminded me Eddie Marsan was in it and we should proceed. I'm quite glad we did because good though he (always) is, it turns out Niamh Algar (Calm With Horses, The Virtues) is the star of the show. Telling of undercover copper  and her attempt to trap Wimbledon Common killer in the early 1990s. Shot very high contrast and colourfully (Jan Jonaeus).

Not sure this was a good idea, really, conceived by Emilia di Girolamo, fictionalising the undercover cop who was used in a honeytrap which failed for that reason; and they had the wrong man to start with.

With Sion Daniel Young, Harry Treadaway, Nathaniel Martello-White.

I liked the little touch though about her teeth being too white for a meth addict and it blew the score.

Hearts Beat Loud (2018 Brett Haley & co-scr)

Vinyl store owner Nick Offerman and his daughter Kiersey Clemons start a band which causes her to reevaluate her future at UCLA.

The songs were performed live. They were written by Keegan DeWitt.

With Blythe Danner, Sasha Lane, Ted Danson, Toni Collette.

It was sweet but somewhat underpowered.

Three Identical Strangers (2018 Tim Wardle)

Three identical twin brothers, separated at birth, find each other. One kills himself (we're not really sure why). It turns out to have been a sociological experiment, that they were deliberately separated as part of an ongoing study. The filmmakers want us to believe that it's nurture as much as nature that's the key (Grace Hughes-Hallett wrote it). Strange, really, the strangest part being that after the adoptive parents visit the adoption agency, one of them walks in after their meeting and finds them toasting on champagne - the bullet was dodged.

The Chair (2021 Daniel Grey Longino)

Created by Annie Julia Wyman, Amanda Peet, written by them and Jennifer Kim and Andrea Troyer (and Richard Robbins).

Professor at Ivy League college Sandra Oh finds life as head of department too much. Colleague Jay Duplass, whilst getting into hot water himself, turns out to be great with her daughter.

With Bob Balaban, Nana Mensah, Holland Taylor, David Morse, Jordan Tyson.

We remain mystified at the fact that the electric toothbrush still does not seem to have caught on in the US.

An enjoyable way to spend 3 hours. Netflix.

Paris When It Sizzles (1962, released 1964 Richard Quine)

The Quine / Holden connection sent us back here after a goodly long time. It's from that period when American comedies went quite wacky. This is a quirky number, to be sure, a bit of a mess, really, but a very entertaining one.

In his autobiography Tony Curtis claims he appeared in the film as a favour to Quine. Holden was drinking too much and had to attend rehab so Curtis was brought in to fill screen time. Well he's only in it for about five minutes so that seems unlikely. Holden seems fine, at least early on in long takes - maybe his performance is a bit more edited towards the end?

George Axelrod's inventive script is about the writing of a screenplay, thus the film we're seeing is constantly being invented as it goes along. Ends up almost surrealistically with the finished film being held to ransom, whilst producer Noel Coward claims not to know writer Holden at all.

That Holden had been romantically linked with Audrey Hepburn back in the Sabrina days adds another element. She's great - loved the way she acts whilst typing. Did she greet cinematographer Charlie Lang with a kiss - and 'Will you make me as beautiful as you did in Sabrina?' To which he might have replied 'I didn't do that - it was you.' (Though released first, Charade began filming directly afterwards.)

You could drive through the Eiffel Tower  in those days.

Guest starring Marlene Dietrich and Frank Sinatra (in voice). Story by Julien Duvivier and Henri Jeanson. Edited by Archie Marshek (many films from silent days on). Music by Nelson Riddle. Paramount.

Just bought 'Golden Boy - The Untold Story of William Holden'. Must stop buying books. (As though to obey my suggestion, the book never arrived and I was refunded.)

The World of Suzie Wong (1960 Richard Quine)

The first in our Quine / William Holden double bill we hadn't seen before. Street-smart, illiterate prostitute Nancy Kwan becomes artist Holden's model / friend in Hong Kong. Meanwhile Sylvia Syms falls for the artist but he's falling in love himself..

Filmed much on location, (thus I actually could have seen my mum or dad in the background at any point) by Geoffrey Unsworth, and at MGM British; he and production designer John Box cunningly disguise the joins. Have actually eaten at Sea Palace restaurant. (Well, it may have been the Jumbo. But it's the same sort of thing.) Edited by Bert Bates again.

It's an exotic feeling film, which works well primarily because of Kwan, who was spotted by Ray Stark dancing in the British Ballet School and cast in her debut. Maybe that's why she's so good - she hadn't had the time to pick up any actorly tricks. Her later career was patchy.

Oh yes, someone wrote it. Novel = Richard Mason. Adaptation = Paul Osborn. Screenplay = John Patrick. There are other ways the plot could have gone. She might have disappeared and despite his attempts to find her she remains gone, so he drifts into relationship with Syms - a sort of L'Avventura. Or, that happens, but it's only Act Two, and maybe in the third act she reappears, with his child. But I like it the way it is - he's going to look after her... though whether he continues to paint remains to be seen..

With Laurence Naismith, Michael Wilding, Jacqui Chan, Bernard Cribbins (completely missed him), Ronald Eng (waiter).

Stuff with her friends / prostitutes and sailors is all good.

There's possibly more cheongsams in it than even In the Mood For Love.

Porridge (1979 Dick Clement)

Written by Dick Clement and Ian La Fresnais, it's nothing more than an extended episode of the TV show really, but very enjoyable. The usual cast - Barker, Beckinsale, Mackay, Wilde, Vaughan, Kelly - are joined by Julian Holloway and Daniel Peacock, as the new warder and inmate, respectively, Geoffrey Bayldon as the governor (who Q identified as Catweazle after 50 years) and Barrie Rutter as the escaping criminal.

Best moment: when Barker and Beckinsale are pretending to be a runner and his trainer and an observing farmer drily remarks 'There's a couple of escaped prisoners'.

Clement and La Fresnais haven't written anything since the Porridge TV series reboot in 2017 - you can't really blame them, both being 94. Their three part Rotter's Club adaptation from 2005 looks worth watching (no longer in print), as does Still Crazy. Spies of Warsaw needs a rewatch also.

(The next day we saw the classic 1974 episode 'A Night In', which takes place entirely in the cell, a two-hander between Barker and Beckinsale, beautifully darkly lit by Peter Smee. I can't see an episode like this coming out in anything these days.) 

Beckinsale died of a heart attack in 1979 aged 31, resulting from coronary artery disease.

Gloria Bell (2018 Sebastian Lelio & co-scr)

Julianne Moore works, parties, sings along to the radio, puts out the cat, tolerates a crazy neighbour, visits her children, dates. She starts a relationship with an odd man who seems in thrall to his apparently divorced wife and adult daughters - the suggestion is he's still living with them. And he keeps leaving without a word, so it's quite natural she paintguns him. And - Q wants to know - how does that cat keep getting in?

Where does all this lead us? I don't know, really. I guess it's a remake of his own 2013 film Gloria.

With John Turturro, Caren Pistorius, Michael Cera, Brad Garrett, Holland Taylor, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Rita Wilson, Chris Mulkey.

The poem was not e.e. cummings, but Claudio Bertoni ('I'd like to be a nest if you were a little bird..')

Well, there it is.

Save Me Too (2020 Creator Lennie James)

'I did not write it for myself' you will recall Lennie said about this - odd then that the character's name Nelly is sort of an anagram of Lennie.

Director Jim Loach is Ken's son and episode 1 is dedicated to Tony Garnett, who died in 2020.

A rather unnecessarily complex structure across the first three episodes had me wondering if I was watching The Father again. The story continues - Nelly is still looking for his kid, manages to help another, Grace, played by Olive Grey. Then the paedo who auctioned the girls (Ade Edmondson) is found dead.. Was it his wife, Lesley Manville?

Nelly's pub regulars are still around: Stephen Graham, Kerry Godliman, Alice Feetham, Thomas Coombes, Camilla Beeput, Jason Flemyng and Susan Lynch (Unforgotten, Apple Tree Yard, Great Expectations, Someone Else, Cracker).

Strong stuff, good in the way it looks at the two girls and how they respond to being freed - Grace is angry, voluble, volatile; Jody is initially catatonic. It isn't sentimental.

Why Nelly doesn't just tell the police where abuser Scottish Paul is, rather than try and confront him, I suppose is just down to the character, but the episode where he has to attend his daughter's interview and help the other girls' police appearance at the same time is mad - he should have just asked one of them to postpone. It points to an inevitable third season.

Editors Ben Drury and Sofie Alonzi (last three)