As you can tell from the title above, in the UK this movie has two names.
In the opening title-card, it's Marvel's Avengers Assemble. In the end credits, it's Marvel's The Avengers.
Apparently some accountant got afraid that British viewers might confuse the original name The Avengers with the slightly later 1960s ITC series starring Patrick MacNee. Really, I think that ship sailed fifty years ago now.
Mind you, Avengers Assemble is clearly the better title, even if it does appear to have been spliced in a bit harshly.
Quibbling over, I can't remember the last time that I saw a film which I enjoyed so much right from start to finish. My expectations had been set high over the past few years, and blow me if when this multi-crossover-sequel finally showed up, it didn't go and meet all of them.
Sorry, double negative - it met my high expectations!
With so many leads already established, very little time gets invested in introductions. Even Nick Fury - who's only really appeared before now in little-seen cameos - shows up in scene one and immediately carries the film.
Despite a huge returning cast, everyone gets plenty of screen time to themselves. Even the individual films' styles are paid attention to. Bruce Banner's appearance in South America comes with a similar sweeping tracking shot to in The Incredible Hulk. Tony Stark and Peppa continue to get plenty of wordy banter as they had in Iron Man and Iron Man 2. When Thor shows up, it's initially to battle in a dark bleak landscape not unlike Asgard in Thor. Even Captain America, who really should look out of place after his movie was set during wartime, admits that he fits right into another military setting.
However this movie isn't a disjointed jigsaw of different films. All the connections that I wanted to see made were. Thor has a fight with Iron Man. Then… well heck, at some point everyone has a fight with everyone else. It's sort of the comic book way.
Not to suggest that comic books are all about fighting. If you ask me, a lot of Marvel's success has been down to the amount of talking the characters are apt to do, and again, much of this movie is dialogue based. I dare say there are reviews out there that accuse the film of dragging during these scenes, but I found this a huge opportunity for the characters to breathe. When our arguing heroes begin to speculate that SHIELD is keeping stuff from them, the volatile politics of Thor begin to emerge again. Yes the plot is simple, and all the exploration of these scenes is the benefit.
Yet the comic book way is also about working together, and here the movie excels too. They partly form The Avengers because they have to, but also because they are unknowingly manipulated into it, both by Fury, and by Colson from beyond the grave. Tragic to see him die by the way - Colson's multiple appearances have made SHIELD more synonymous with him than with Fury. Still, a literally compelling loss.
The enormous battle across downtown New York just goes on for ages, and had my attention throughout. Five years ago at Trans Formers (another Marvel title!), when CGI robot battled CGI robot, I admit that I turned my brain off and carelessly drank it in. Not so here. There is tons going on, ingeniously led by Captain America, who as in the comic book knows everyone's strengths and how to maximise them.
Captain America: "Hulk? Smash."
The 3D throughout is awesome, but never more so than in this sequence. The Avengers whizz around the war-zone on various flying ships and pieces of debris, and we fly with them. What else is an action movie for?
Nitpicks, why sure I have a few, but again that's arguably part of the comics. Why didn't Iron Man let go of the nuclear missile earlier? Didn't Nick Fury get shot at the start? How did Loki know that that board was going to fly past at that exact moment for him to land on? And how are they supposed to have unwittingly captured a hologram?
Well, this film has a heck of a lot more answers than questions, which is a good ratio.
Hawkeye's good too, and Black Widow? She gets some great manipulative scenes, but in an otherwise male line-up, never overcomes looking like the token female. I don't know what to suggest there. Still, at least the writers don't seem to have noticed, and have written her as just another task-oriented bloke. I fully expect prequels for these two presently.
Alas, the New York location does make a few other recent Marvel movie characters conspicuous by their absence. The Fantastic Four, and Marvel's other more-famous-than-the-Avengers hero Spider-Man. Correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't Spidey's three movies the most popular Marvel film series ever? They so should not be rebooting that.
There were ten of us in that cinema. Yep, just ten. Three-tenths of our number saw the post-credits tag scene, for some reason moved up to between the 'opening' titles and the start of the end credits. (as is often the case these days, both shown at the end of the film) That scene was nothing to write home about, but nonetheless a reward for those of us who stayed.
Wonderful stuff.
And Stan Lee, still in Spider-Man 3 mode, shamelessly playing himself.
He's still the Avengers' biggest hero.
10/10.
(available here - Assembly may be required)
Labels: comics, films
Something of a Halloween episode this.
The gang are holed up in Gryffen's house on the night of an enormous storm, when the power goes out. Cue lots of jitters, apparent ghosts and people getting scared.
Well, this is K9. This lot aren't big on emotions, which frankly is a relief. The only one who gets any challenging acting to do is Gryffen himself, who dizzily encounters his wife and children coming back from the dead.
Well, of course they're not actually his wife and children - they're just too malevolent. Oh, and they're all zombies.
Try reminding K9 of this. He repeatedly tries to laser blast them, which of course goes straight through, presumably rather damaging Gryffen's already strange-looking house.
K9 is knocked out and has to overcome a power loss to save his friends again, and everything gets wrapped up pretty quickly. There was some vague explanation for these ecto-plasmic simulations being merely echoes of Gryffen's family, but this lot just aren't that interested. I'd blame this on the 25-minute format, but The Sarah Jane Adventures enjoyed twice that, and often featured even less explanation.
And then at the end, when everyone's having a good old chuckle… did I see right? Was K9… actually… joining in???
Labels: doctor-who, tv
Oddly watchable redemption movie.
Miserable radio talk-show host Jack(Jeff Bridges)'s careless talk on-air indirectly causes the death of several innocent people. Years later he encounters the bereaved Parry (Robin Williams) - who has literally gone mad as a knock-on result of his rashness - and finds himself compelled to repay the inferred debt.
Well, obviously that's impossible - he can hardly reanimate Parry's lost love from the dead. Where the film itself grows legs though is in its maturing from restitution to restoration.
There are great moments in this (especially the songs) and fine performances all round, despite Mercedes Ruehl as Jack's girlfriend Anne being the only performer to score a part that isn't a stereotype. As such, her rapport with Jack is a rare thing to find on film indeed - a relationship in which both sides get some detail.
Despite this, director Terry Gilliam's usual flair threatens to let him down here, as too-keen jump-cuts, impossible camera angles and pantomime characterisations all threaten to distract from such absorbing compelling storytelling.
I know it's preaching to the converted, but here is a fantastic long quote that I thought was just brilliant, on every level…
Parry: "It begins with the King as a boy, having to spend the night alone in the forest to prove his courage so he can become King. Now while he is spending the night alone he's visited by a sacred vision. Out of the fire appears the Holy grail, symbol of God's divine grace. And a voice said to the boy, "You shall be keeper of the grail so that it may heal the hearts of men." But the boy was blinded by greater visions of a life filled with power and glory and beauty. And in this state of radical amazement he felt for a brief moment not like a boy, but invincible, like God, so he reached into the fire to take the grail, and the grail vanished, leaving him with his hand in the fire to be terribly wounded. Now as this boy grew older, his wound grew deeper. Until one day, life for him lost its reason. He had no faith in any man, not even himself. He couldn't love or feel loved. He was sick with experience. He began to die. One day a fool wandered into the castle and found the King alone. And being a fool, he was simple minded, he didn't see a king. He only saw a man alone and in pain. And he asked the King, "What ails you friend?" The King replied, "I'm thirsty. I need some water to cool my throat". So the fool took a cup from beside his bed, filled it with water and handed it to the King. As the King began to drink, he realised his wound was healed. He looked in his hands and there was the Holy grail, that which he sought all of his life. And he turned to the fool and said with amazement, "How can you find that which my brightest and bravest could not?" And the fool replied, "I don't know. I only knew that you were thirsty."
(available here)Labels: films
There is a certain emerging sense in this series that the makers have just written down a shopping list of modern Who-isms and soullessly reproduced them here in the hope of becoming as popular.
This week, as well as the regular recycled ingredients, the story takes a back seat to the characters having to confront their worst fears. If that seemed contrived in Night Terrors, The God Complex, and The Nightmare Man, then the same laziness here is at least consistent. Hang on, weren't those three other stories made after this one? Well, score one for K9 then!
Once again though, despite some lacklustre editing and acting, K9's edge is the characters' level-headedness about the topic. While Darius has more to get his acting teeth into this week, Starkey's wisdom gives the impression of a much deeper character than he's previously demonstrated. The plot is so thin as to not even be worth mentioning - even the scriptwriters don't seem to have bothered much. All the same, K9's confrontation with his first emotions was handled quite well and evenly.
Overall, this is going well.
I keep saying that don't I?Labels: doctor-who, tv
Edition of the BBC's long-running children's magazine programme, this time featuring an enormous truck, a report on a new rollercoaster, a kid who wrote into the programme, the annoucement of the winner of the design-a-gadget-for-Alex-Rider-to-use-in-Ark-Angel-by-Anthony-Horowitz contest, and the announcement of the winner of the design-a-giant-mural-for-the-Blue-Peter-garden contest.
Oh, and a report from said garden on a compost bin shaped like a Dalek that viewers Jim and Rhys had made and brought in.
I have to admit - that's a pretty impressive piece of model-making, not least because the Daleks hadn't appeared in new Doctor Who yet. On one level, I wish the presenter hadn't gone and grilled them on how it was done, as it kind of spoils the illusion.
But - what's this? All of a sudden the TARDIS materialises, and the ninth Doctor strides on!
He gawps at the compost bin, apparently mistaking it for a real Dalek, and declares "I've searched for you across time and space!" It's only at this moment that he realises that he's left his sonic screwdriver behind, and has to hastily improvise some kind of laser-beam thingy from his Blue Peter badge. (presumably once Ace's)
The compost bin now itself decomposed (*heavy irony*), the Doctor says his farewells and merrily heads off again. Well, the kids can hardly believe their eyes. They've just seen their beloved creation destroyed, and by the very guy who's supposed to be their hero! Boo!
Where and when the Doctor heads off to next is anyone's guess, although his lonesomeness, combined with his mellowness about the 'Dalek''s presence, and general madness rather suggest that this is an event in the much talked about but little committed-to time war. Heck, maybe in the current timeline the Daleks had even evolved into a design that made them look like redecorated compost bins. At any rate, before Rose and after The Millennium Of Doom then.
(I suppose this was shot at the same time as Eccleston was at BBC Television Centre for his contemporary interview on the show, although admittedly he looks much happier here than he did at any point throughout that)
Back in the studio, the finalists of that same garden's mural competition are being announced. That's a fairly prestigious prize there - the winning drawing will actually get made full-size, and then sit in the famous Blue Peter Garden at BBC Television Centre forever! As I watched the short-listed entries, I had to agree with the presenters that they actually were all rather good. The evergreen one had a timeless simplicity about it.
Ultimately the entry that did win turned out to be perfect. This featured the faces of all the presenters that Blue Peter had ever had, along with a little bit of room left over for a few future ones to be added. Initially I thought that looked to require too much upkeep, and indeed only contained a finite amount of space in which to add future presenters, but tragically that's just what made it so appropriate. Two years later the BBC announced that it was brain-beggaringly selling TVC and moving everything up north to Salford. As a result, I guess the mural turned out to contain just the right amount of spare room after all.
A bit of a shame that the Doctor didn't hang around to see that winning entry. He might well have taken a second look at Peter Purves' face and declared what an uncanny resemblance it bore to a space pilot he'd once travelled with. Mind you, he never noticed the same space pilot's uncanny resemblance to that even earlier guy in the Empire State Building.
Funnily enough, at the time, that famous building was being invaded by compost bins too, mind you that happens a lot there…Labels: doctor-who, tv
Labels: diary
If I haven't made enough comparisons with The Sarah Jane Adventures yet, this week people are getting turned into zombies.
Aided by some parallel editing, and a TV that displays what he's talking about, K9 reads Mr Smith's lines pretty well, though he might shoot me for saying so, especially since Mr Smith spent all five seasons of that show reading K9's lines.
Anyway:
K9: "Poor Starkey. He's in an induced state of empathetic bliss."
Whatsisname: "Meaning…?"
Gryffen: "He thinks he's in love."
K9: "Long term exposure to cerilium destroys free will. It was absence of free will that caused the destruction of the planet Ceres. Ceres had a two-class society - the master and the scribe."
Malena (at school): "Hi Jorjie."
K9: "The scribe class was controlled by the application of cirilium bracelets."
Malena (at school): "I've got something for you."
[Malena offers Jorjie a cirilium bracelet]
K9: "Over time, a symbiotic relationship between scribe and master developed. The master was enchanted by the scribe, and the scribe had no thought but to complement and assist the master."
[Jorjie takes the bracelet and considers putting it on]
"They were so entranced with each other, they never noticed they were on a collision course with a giant asteroid."
Whatsisname: "Ooouch."
K9: "Chunks of cirilium formed meteorites - still hurtling throughout the galaxy."
Gryffen: "But - why did it blow up Drake's weapon?"
K9: "Cirilium explodes if it's forced on an unwilling subject. The mind control only works if you accept it voluntarily."
Jorjie (at school): "Thank you."
Malena (at school): "Aren't you going to put it on?"
Jorjie (at school): "I…"
Vibeka (at school): "Starkey adored mine. He said it made my skin shine."
Gryffen: "So - if the Department were able trick people into wearing cirilium, they'd have the perfectly obedient unthinking population they've always dreamed of."
Or repeatedly read about in the history books.
In fairness though, one of the refreshing things about this series is the way the characters take everything under their belt. Alien tech doesn't phase any of them one bit, and no-one keeps on talking about how cool they or their lives are. Granted, the show misses some of the wonder as a result, but that's a trade-off I'm willing to take.
Also, at the end, K9 solves the problem by shooting-out all the bracelets, rather than switching them into reverse or just getting everyone to chant their own name or something similarly lame.
Afterwards, everyone still forgets about their possession though. Not that they really need to in this series. While the whole thing is still awkwardly unpolished, it's clear that the writers are really a lot more interested in this future society that they've created, than in the humans who populate it.
However, this is improving, as some of the emerging characterisation is actually developing into banter…
[Gryffen is repairing K9]
Gryffen: "Stop wriggling! I know you're dying to get out of here."
Starkey: "Gryffen, how can you tell if a girl likes you?"
Gryffen: "That, my dear boy, is a mystery beyond all realms of science."
K9: "Incorrect. By analysing the level of canulating defac 2, the Heurons are able to calibrate the degree of attraction between two beings within one milojoul."
Gryffen: "No wonder you're single."
[Enter whatsisname]
Whatsisname: "Ah aye, Fido, ya're still grounded are ya?"
K9: "GRRRRR."
Aim for perfection - nothing less.Labels: doctor-who, tv
Thirty years ago I saw my first Carry On film.
At the time I had no idea that Carry On Spying was part of a series, however every subsequent encounter with the team has been a disappointment, because no other entry was ever as good as this one. And I'd only ever seen the second half.
Weirdly, I have never even once seen it billed again, and believe me, I actually have been looking for 30 years. Even a year or so back when the Daily Mail were giving away dozens of Carry On DVDs for free, Carry On Spying was not among them. TV schedulers seemed to have an aversion to it.
Until three days ago that is, when it was showing on Film4. Admittedly, I've been out of the country quite a bit this decade, and we have only got a digital set-top box in the past month.
So this morning I put in the VHS that I had recorded of it, and proceeded to look for the answers to three 30-year-old questions:
1. What happened in the first half?
2. How accurate was my memory of the second half?
3. (important one this) Was it really as clean as I remember it being when I was a child?
Answers
1. In the event, rather than having missed the first half, I turned out to have missed more like the first half hour. This ran quite slowly, but unsurprisingly it featured the four protagonists - Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Bernard Cribbins and Barbara Windsor - being sent out on a case.
2. Despite the passage of three decades, I remembered absolutely tons. Tons. I could list examples, but it would just be too long. While I would like to think of this as a positive achievement of my long-term memory, the more likely explanation is just how much I enjoyed this at age ten (or thereabouts).
I even recognised some of the musical cues!
3. Yes! Despite Carry On's reputation, this is almost a kid's movie. Sure there's the odd funny sounding name or vague innuendo, but I can't help supposing that fans of Carry On are probably non-plussed by this entry's tameness. Conversely, for me, this is exactly why I loved this so much. Even the scene in the brothel runs more like a pantomime.
The film is edited so slickly that the rhythm of gags just keeps getting tighter, packing more and more ideas in. The movie's rollercoaster final sequence features quite a long linear geography to keep track of, revealed and then revisited at a breakneck pace. It really helps that it looks as though the four leads have been left free to improvise and react to everything individually. Wherever you look, there's someone being funny!
And I've never been a huge fan of Kenneth Williams, but here he is astounding. Despite the larger than life slapstick of the whole movie, in every shot his performance manages to be even more over the top. The result is that he has more screen presence than anyone else I can think of. What an inspiring performer.
The calender to my right might tell me that I'm 41 these days, but right now I feel ten again.
To me, the only disappointment about this film is that the series did indeed carry on, but not in this vein.
(available here)Labels: films
Published in 2000, I bought this on Sunday 29th April 2007 from the man himself when he and Steve Apirana came to perform at my church.
Well, a further five years on, it seemed rude not to listen to it.
Speaking of the passage of time, Derek recounts his musical career here in roughly chronological order, fitting unreleased works in where they come, such as track #11 Show Me Your Heart, which he wrote for a baptist fundraising appeal.
As I was continuing to be slow on the uptake, it took me a few numbers to work out that this was not a Christian album as such. Sure, Derek's religious convictions shine through in places, but his strongest expression of it lies embedded in the opinions that he voices. Right from the opening 1986 track Wasteland through the wry observational comedy of #9 Strange Logic, and on towards the end, the CD retains a somewhat accusing tone, a fact of which Derek sounds somewhat apologetic in his sleeve notes.
"15 New Zealand Day
I wrote this on New Zealand Day (aka Waitangi Day) - a day commemorating the signing of the infamous treaty between indigenous Maori of New Zealand and European colonists. As is plainly evident, the day I wrote this things weren't going particularly well."
The final track - #18 Cast The First Shadow - was appropriately enough recorded especially for this retrospective. It's a millennium song - revolving around a graveyard that would be one of the first places to receive the dawn of 2000 - with probably the most overt lyrics on here.
"But when God appears majestic from the heavens,
On the first day of forever,
All illusions will be shattered,
All crosses vacated,
All mysteries unravelled,
And when I see his glory,
I wanna cast the first shadow,
Cast the first shadow,
Cast the first shadow."Labels: music
Is this a book with a free CD, or a CD with a really big inlay booklet?
Geoff Sample provides about 70 minutes of detailed British birdsong recordings, enhanced by equally detailed written notes. Although much information is duplicated in both (handy for revision), the prose differs in each. On the one hand the book contains more facts than the CD's narration, but on the other… well, there is simply no substitute for actually hearing the noisy critters.
I've just tried listening to the whole CD while reading the entire 30-page book at the same time, and while they do complement each other admirably, my brain's attempts to concentrate on both written words and audio at the same time were literally sending me to sleep. (clearly I'm no bird-brain)
This combination doubtless works best if you're trying to learn this stuff. Then you can dip into each in isolation as and when necessary. By the end of this I gave in and just lay back with my eyes closed taking in the beautiful melody.
And I have to hand it to the recordists. Convincing the natural world to perform in front of a microphone must be both time-consuming and highly frustrating, yet thanks to these guys I can enjoy these spectacular charms of nature in comfort. The pheasant on track 94 sounds human!
Next time I go out to the garden, I'd better pay a bit more attention.
Labels: books
Like its principle characters, this film doesn't so much fly, as flutter.
Chickens mount a breakout from the farm they're incarcerated in. Oh, and it's by Aardman Animation. You can pretty much fill in the rest.
AA have always set a high bar for themselves, so when a film like this one scores lower, it's still a hit.
As always, we get fun lovable characters, tons of inspired ideas, and no end of excellent dialogue.
Rocky: "Over in America, we have this rule: if you want to motivate someone, don't mention death."
Ginger: "Funny, the rule here is, always tell the truth."
Ginger: "You know what the problem is? The fences aren't just round the farm. They're up here, in you heads. There's a better place out there, somewhere beyond that hill, and it has wide open places, and lots of trees... and grass. Can you imagine that? Cool, green grass."
Hen: "Who feeds us?"
Ginger: "We feed ourselves."
Hen: "Where's the farm?"
Ginger: "There is no farm."
Babs: "Then, where does the farmer live?"
Ginger: "There is no farmer, Babs."
Babs: "Is he on holiday?"
Ginger: "He isn't anywhere! Don't you get it?"
Ginger: "Fowler, you have to fly it. You're always talking about 'back in your day'. Well, today is your day."
When Mrs Tweedy purchases a huge complex machine that Ginger and Rocky get trapped inside, there can be no doubt that this is Nick Park playing at what he loves best.
Also, the reveal of how Rocky has had a public image of flying without being able to, is pure cinematic magic.
However, as tends to be the case with Aardman's theatrical releases, for some reason the trade-off is the jerky picture quality. Their TV productions have always moved much smoother than this.
Still, if you have a thing for watching films that look like they have been shot on a phone, then Chicken Run will reward you greatly. The simple plot, and unusually straightforward climactic sequence, are definitely not the studio's finest hour, but with Aardman there just are no bad hours. Ever.
Like its characters, this never quite soars, but certainly manages to succeed.
(available here)Labels: films
I feel disorientated.
In two ways.
1. Geographically.
This London is not one that I recognise. I therefore cannot place where these events are set. I don't even know the suburb, let alone how to get there by tube.
In this episode K9 'saves' some members of the public when (presumably) the London Eye goes haywire, so we must be on that green by Waterloo Station where I took my mum and dad in 2001. However despite a lot of close-ups of the area, this just doesn't look like that stretch of the Thames. This is partly because of the colourful surrounding fauna, and partly because the sky looks so clean. But mainly it's because the River Thames does not appear to be running alongside it. (although it is elsewhere in the vicinity)
But this is the London of the future, so of course the landscape is different. In the future, it's been rebuilt, something of a necessity after alien engagements like the battle of Canary Wharf. So maybe they simply relandscaped, moving the famous big wheel a bit?
Except that they will keep on cutting to those aerial shots of more contemporary-looking London, although admittedly not in this episode. Rather than helping to seal the illusion, these images keep on shaking me out of my dogged presumption that what I'm watching is set where it was shot - in Australia.
After all, so many residents of this future version of London do seem to sport Australian accents. This is quite at loggerheads with the main Doctor Who series, in which most residents of London quite rightly sound Welsh.
K9 however is even more industrious with anatopisms than The Sarah Jane Adventures, and that's saying something. Except that these aren't really anatopisms. An anatopism is when a thing is out of place. It's not so much that these elements are out of place, more that there there is no clear place for these elements to exist within.
The only true Brit here seems to be the professor, but even he is an overseas stereotype of a Englishman, complete with obsession for drinking tea.
(reminiscing) "There used to be a café there - they served the best baked bean sandwiches in London!"
(giving advice) "Chaps, get out of there!"
(expressing surprise) "Thompson's plumb pudding!"
I say, Mrs Tea Lady, next week we may well find the fellow writing a postal order for two shillings and six in payment of a spiffing new pair of union jack braces, what? Rather!
2. Philosophically.
Can you read what this news ticker tape says? (you can click to enlarge) For one moment there the reference to a "Mr Smith" made me feel as though I was connecting with an old friend from The Sarah Jane Adventures. And then, it turned out, that I was.
That's meant to be a reference to the Doctor isn't it? Suddenly realising that he can use time-travel to get rich. As if he'd (a) never worked this out before, and (b) have any use for the money.
A similar gag headline reads "Electronics company recalls model THX1138 self-aware oven for refusing to cook bad food." Somehow these vague stabs at referencing other SF just feel too silly in a world that we have to believe in in order to care about it.
But y'know what? I'd love to see more connections made with the bigger Doctor Who universe that this series is weakly permitted to be a distant relative of. I know they're not allowed to make many direct references to the BBC's properties, but that has never prevented writers of comicbooks from being clever. For example, maybe instead of creating all these new Halloween-costume type races, they can hire writers from the original series who likewise retain the rights to their own creations.
So it's tough to place these events, either geographically in London, or philosophically within the Doctor Who universe.
In fact, even the soundtrack just doesn't belong where it is. The dubbing in this is terrible. Outdoor dialogue has an echo. By the 'London Eye', Drake's dialogue doesn't even look like it's for the same shot.
As for K9, we're still not even sure which K9 he is. This episode reveals that his arrival in the first episode was from the Galactic Peace Assembly some 50,000 years in the future. This marginally improves his odds of being K9 Mark 1 from after his remaining with Leela on Gallifrey at the end of The Invasion Of Time, but before the events of the Time War, yet still isn't remotely conclusive. Hmm, we're still waiting then.
However, the joy emerging in this series seems to be, if you'll excuse the pun, its nature as an underdog. Here's hoping that the team rise to the challenge and make us root for them.
They've clearly created an entire original world of their own for these adventures to take place in, but I still have yet to feel at home here.
But maybe that's because I'm a Londoner.Labels: doctor-who, tv
Ten years ago today was my father's funeral, at which I stood up and delivered the following remembrance of him:
When I was very young, about 25 years ago, I remember sitting in our dining-room and looking down at a red slipper. The red slipper was sitting on the carpet in front of an armchair. The slipper also had a problem. The slipper had begun to come apart at the toe, so that the front of the sole was hanging down like a gaping open mouth beneath the whole of the front of the foot. Suddenly the slipper began to talk to me.
"Good evening Stephen." the slipper said to me. Although I was only about 5 at the time, I managed to have quite a conversation with it. It turned out that the slipper had a twin brother, who I don't think it got along with very well. I remember at one point the slipper actually fell off, revealing a foot, that continued to agonise for several seconds before realising its nakedness and fleeing back into the slipper in embarrassment.
The other thing I remember is the foot's voice. It was the same voice that Father Christmas had whenever he recorded messages for us, it was the same voice a puppet emu later had, and it was the same voice that the man who always looked after me used to have. The man whose bike I used to ride to school on the back of. The man who took care of all the complicated things like telephone-bills and family holidays. The man who always seemed to be around while other people's lives were taking place. What was this man's name? His name... was... 'Daddy'.
I remember daddy taking a magic marker pen and drawing a big smiling face onto a yellow baloon, and then using static to stick it to the dining-room wall, so that this big yellow face would just hang there, smiling down at us.
I remember a kid I knew saying to me that if his dad and my dad ever got into a fight, then his dad would win because his dad was stronger. I remember knowing how wrong he was, because I knew that the idea of my dad getting into a fight was utterly inconceivable.
I remember my dad sitting down in the living-room, sneezing, and rocking his chair back so far that he broke the living room window.
I remember my dad getting his book Smokey published, and receiving a royalty cheque in the post.
I remember my dad making several home-made rugs.
I remember my dad singing, sometimes to us, sometimes to himself, sometimes to the cat.
I remember him doing the Rubik's cube.
I remember the smile on dad's face whenever he watched an episode of Sergeant Bilko.
I remember going to Hampton Court Palace, and seeing dad in his full work uniform, welcoming the three of us with a huge salute.
I remember dad working all day at Hampton Court, coming home at 6:30 for a sandwich, and heading out again half an hour later for his evening shift at Richmond Theatre.
I remember him accidentally appearing in a national newspaper standing inside the theatre foyer, next to Princess Alexandra.
I remember that the Department of the Environment decided to transfer my dad away from Hampton Court and to work instead at Kew Gardens for a few weeks. Within a day or so, Hampton Court Palace had famously caught fire and suffered extensive damage. I remember my dad watching the blaze on the news. "Typical!" he said. "I leave them alone for one day and look what happens!"
I remember how much he enjoyed baking apple and blackberry pies, using fruit that had grown in the back garden.
I remember the way that, whenever he was making a telephone call, his voice would start to boom around the entire house. "Hello? Dave this end! How are you getting on?" He wasn't shouting, his was just enthusiastic to talk.
I remember all his work for the Conservative Party - canvassing, telling, even organising jumble sales. I remember how pleased he was on Father's Day 1995, to receive a book written by and autographed "To David Goble" by Margaret Thatcher.
I remember my dad always had trouble telling us what he wanted for Christmas, because he was happy with what he already had. "What do you want for Christmas?" we would ask him. "I've written you a list!" he would explain, indicating an almost-blank piece of paper on the mantle piece containing just the 4 words 'First Day Cover Album'. So we'd rack our brains, get him the old favourites, and on Christmas Day he'd correctly guess each of them in turn before unwrapping them. He told me that he liked doing this, because he liked puzzles, and the gifts we got him certainly bore this out - crossword books, quiz books, a de luxe Scrabble set. In fact, his knowledge of words was really encyclopedic.
I remember on January 1st 2000, him opening the french-windows so that he could watch all the fireworks.
I remember he had a spell in hospital last year. I remember him saying that he was extremely grateful for everything that had happened with the family, and we all knew what he was actually saying.
Late one night he was moved to a new ward to make room for an incoming patient. My father asked the nursing staff to telephone us at home to let us know of his new location. When the phone rang at quarter to midnight and it was the hospital, for 20 awful seconds I honestly thought he was dead. When they said he had been moved because he was the healthiest patient in the ward, I knew I would never be so lucky again. A month later, when he was back home again, I told him of the misunderstanding. I figured that whatever he said might come as some comfort to remember when the day came when I would actually lose him. "We thought you were dead," I said to him. His reply? He fell about laughing!
One day last year father came home from the shops complaining that he had fallen off of his bicycle. This he was perfectly okay with. What rattled him though was the fuss that passers-by had insisted on making of him. The fact that he was almost 80 years old at the time didn't seem to occur to him.
I remember father walking around the house wearing an Anne Robinson mask over his face, and accosting each one of us with "You are the weakest link - Goodbye!"
In June last year, I remember sitting with him on a train heading into Waterloo, when out of the left hand window he spotted our intended destination - The London Eye. I remember how he sat up in his seat to get a better view. I remember the look on his face of sheer fascination. I remember what a lovely sunny day we had.
I remember how much he looked forward to his sister visiting for a week each year. I remember how we all enjoyed sitting around the living-room table each night, playing rummey as a family.
I remember when the cat had died on Christmas Eve. I remember Father coming in and gratefully giving him the same three or four big deliberate strokes as he always had when feeding him.
I remember Father talking for a long time about his days as a young man, and recounting to me all of the places he had worked, all of the holidays he had been on, and many of the old friends he had lost touch with.
I remember leaving the hospital one night, and saying that I hoped he had a pleasant night, something that always made him smile. "You do say some funny things, Stephen." I remember giving him a smile and some sort of small wave as I left. Despite the depression of 5 weeks in hospital, I recall him returning them.
The following night, I remember taking his hand and saying "Hello Father."
I remember telling him how much we loved him, and how grateful we were for everything.
I remember him relaxing, and finally completing his long life.
I have no recollection what happened next. After all, without my father there, what was there worth remembering? And the answer is of course, he left us millions of things to remember.
No-one is perfect, and my father used to complain about some of life's more trivial problems - silly misunderstandings, having to repeat himself, anything Neil Kinnock said. But we can't really hold these things against him.
It's far more interesting to remember the things he didn't complain about:
He never said "If only we had a bigger house." Instead, the 4 of us lived happily together, in the same semi-detached house for 27 years.
Although he played them for fun, he never groaned "If only I won the pools." Instead, he took a second job in the evenings.
He never wished "If only I had a better job." Instead he stuck at nearly all of his jobs until each one of them ended independently. How many of us wish we had more space, wish we had more money, wish we had better jobs?
Father was content to have been given a life by whatever great power had created him. My father accepted his lot and, rather than trying to change it, made the best of it. He was happy with his wife, happy with his kids, and, the icing on the cake, he was usually content with whichever cat he was feeding at the time. If only we could all be so certain of ourselves.
About a week before he died, father offered me this piece of rather morbid advice. He said "On days when life seems dismal, you've just got to get on with it."
And if we applied father's formula to our lives, maybe we would also enjoy as full and happy a life as he made his.
Labels: diary
Today it's been ten years since my dad's funeral.
Well, that was a day to never forget.
At the time I thought I was coping pretty well, but looking back I can see that I was a mess.
Hugely disorganised as always. Beforehand I was racing around to get shaved, washed and changed in time. Apparently, my dad possessed skills of organisation that I had not inherited. He had planned the specifics of his funeral several weeks earlier, indeed so effectively that now he could just lie back and relax while it all happened around him.
Come the hour, as the limo was pulling up outside our house, along with umpteen other friends, neighbours and relatives, inside I was frantically scurrying around trying to figure out how to audio-record the service. Apparently some short ceremony was performed in front of the coffin outside by a man from the undertaker's, but I missed it.
Eventually one of the funeral team came into my bedroom to see if he could assist me. He wound up carrying out in front of everyone my enormous battered 1980s ghetto-blaster and putting it into one of the vehicles. I got in the limo with a great amount of other audio kit, batteries, leads and microphones, and spent pretty well the entire journey trying to work out a way in which they could be plugged into each other to record the service. And I wasn't even sure if I would afterwards really want to retain a recording of such an event.
Pulling up to the crematorium, I could see a huge crowd of people waiting outside for us. Somewhere among them were my best friend, and my oldest friend. I had actually wanted there to be three of my friends in attendance. I think it's perfectly normal in such a circumstance to suppose that the deceased might in some ethereal way be invisibly in attendance, and if so I wanted Father to see that I had friends who he recognised, and that I would therefore be okay.
For some reason I scoured the group for a specific third friend, who I hadn't seen for a few years. I don't know why, but a part of me had hoped that he would have somehow heard about Father, and come along for my sake. I couldn't see him. Well, two friends was good too.
Heading into the chapel first had its advantages. I got straight to the front and immediately sussed out where to hide my two tape-recorders (one was a back-up) and be reasonably sure of getting good sound. Once they and their associated leads and microphones were recording, I entered the front pew, and my only father's funeral began.
Our vicar - a cheery vicar-type vicar if ever there was one - led it, and within minutes we were singing the first hymn. After this I was supposed to be doing a reading. However I couldn't. I hadn't rehearsed it, and was paranoid that I would somehow stand up and read the wrong passage. Or collapse in floods of tears or something. Not that I felt like doing that, but I was very conscious indeed of how emotionally out of my depth I was. Forever. No problem, I thought, I'll just catch the vicar's eye and indicate that I need him to read it instead. He'll understand that.
Although he was standing barely a yard in front of me, at no point during any verse did the clergyman's gaze ever fall in our direction. Perhaps this was intentional - giving the departed's immediate family some privacy. All the same, as the hymn continued, in my edgy state I found that I was now attempting to do three things at once:
1. Sing the song.
2. Catch the vicar's eye.
3. Rehearse the reading. Yes, while singing the song and looking at the vicar.
In the midst of this uncharacteristic multi-tasking, I could also tell that I was missing out on the experience of my father's funeral. I'm sure that for some this would be an experience that they would like to disconnect from, but for me it was a part of my relationship with Father.
Anyway, the hymn ended, and I now had to leave the pew to do the reading.
I quietly began to walk up towards the lectern, Bible in hand. Behind my back I perceived a disquieted silence among the congregation. I felt as though they were muttering to each other "That's the son," and shamefully gulping back all their positive-mindedness in fear at how a man surely as devastated as I must be might hit back at it.
"So do not worry, my people Israel, for here are detailed instructions for the ritual cleaning of lepers..."
Well, no, I didn't really say that. I'm afraid I did the correct reading instead. In fact I may well have done two, I can't remember now. I could stop typing to go and check the tape back, but it doesn't matter. As I made my way down again afterwards, just as I was about to turn back into the front pew, the very last thing that I glimpsed was the third friend who I had looked for outside the front earlier. He had heard. He had come. He was sitting at the back. I won't pretend that that meant more to me than it really did, but it was a source of encouragement.
Presently I also returned to the stand to deliver the remembrance of my dad that I had written, and I'm not ashamed to say that my piece about him deliberately went for getting some laughs. Afterwards I heard that one person had been upset by it. Oh well, my dad had had a sense of humour, and looking back I don't know how I never really noticed it until after he had gone.
For the second half of the service, the pressure of performing was off, and I was able to start experiencing this once in a lifetime service. Nowhere near as much has remained in my memory from the second half.
Afterwards there was milling around among so many people outside. I hope to never forget the sight of one of my cousins standing in the sunshine with an enormous smile on his face. That's my family - what else are you gonna do but choose to focus on the pleasant? A year later I was to find our positions reversed at his father's funeral. Today was, therefore, also the last time that I saw AuntieJoanandUncleEric together.
I wanted to take photos of everyone - something my dad used to do at funerals - but I was afraid of intruding on people's feelings, so didn't. I regret that - present were relatives from both sides of the family, who thanks to distant English geography I had never before witnessed meeting each other.
That afternoon there was a reception at the theatre where Father had worked. Initially I hung around with my friends, but presently had to excuse myself, explaining that I didn't want to miss the experience of attending my father's funeral reception.
So then it was time to circulate the room, meeting so many new people who had known my dad in different contexts. I met my cousin on my mum's side for the first time - Father would have been pleased about that. I also met one of Dad's colleagues from when he had worked at Hampton Court.
At most of the funerals that I have attended there has been an open friendliness among those present, and this was no exception.
It was hard to believe that we had all got together in honour of this man, and tragically missed his also being able to attend by a mere couple of weeks. Such lousy timing.
It was also hard to believe that, given the importance that we all placed upon him, we would never again gather together in respect of our common association with him.
As I said at the start, that day was ten years ago today. I am blessed that life has not only continued, but also not changed very much. For a couple of years I thought about my dad a lot. Then for a couple for years I thought about him very little. Now I seem to have levelled out. I don't miss him, but my thoughts probably touch on him at some point most days. Of course they do - he remains a big influence on my life.
But for me, the feeling of that day ten years ago is summed up by a mental picture.
It's a picture of a relaxed crowd of friendly people standing in a country lane, with a beautiful distant mountain range visible beyond the horizon. They're all saying good bye to each other, shaking hands, and slowly dispersing. They are all heading for the same destination - those beautiful mountains in the very far distance - but naturally choosing differing routes. Some will take the roads, others are climbing over the kissing-gate to cut across a field, and I guess others will find other means, like following streams on horseback. Some will remain together, others will walk alone. Some will get lifts part of the way. Sometimes their paths will happily cross. And we'll all arrive at different times.
But one day, we will all be together again, reunited with the guy we all knew who has been airlifted ahead of us, to beyond the mountains.Labels: diary
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