BOB & BROOKE A STRANGE RELATIONSHIP

Bob Hope, a Londoner born in 1903 and Brooke Shields, born in New York in 1965 shared a working relationship that bordered on the bizarre. A new starlet ascending the Hollywood ladder and a legend considered passé often pictured together, usually with Bob wearing outfits and wigs of varying degrees of silliness. For some reason Brooke consigned the relationship to the dustbin when recollecting her journey to stardom, perhaps reflecting that on the way up Hollywood demands that you step over those on the way down.

 

SHEER SHARK ATTACK!

Sharks and comic books have a long and glorious partnership. A shark on a cover is visual dynamite and when combined with a muscular hero or svelte heroine you should have a publication that flies off the shelves.

My all time favourite comic cover is Guns Against Gangsters number 6 by legendary artist L.B. Cole which is peak Shark Comic Cover. The frightening jaws of doom menacing a fearless femme fatale brandishing a knife and Red ankle-strap Stilettos.

The glory days of Shark Comic covers was the Fifties when pulp titles went for sensation on the cover to sell the contents within and these covers have a raw power that has been diluted through commerciality over the years.

It was inevitable that with the growth of Marvel and DC we would see the humble shark adorning all sorts of covers in all sorts of situations.the art, probably more polished, the colouring more expansive due to technological advances but for me, you just can't beat the old covers where the apex predator shared top billing with the star

JAMES CAAN

The actor James Caan sadly passed away and perhaps he is best known for his role of Sonny Corleone who perished in a hail of bullets, or Jonathon E the anti hero of future violent sport Rollerball. His turn as the author beset by a super fan with an obsession verging on lunacy in Misery or his many muscular and intense performances will be remembered with respectful pleasure.

For me, his turn in Michael Mann's Thief (1981) as the main protagonist Frank, is his most important role. Important as it's the defining and most influential Neo Noir performance of all.

The Neo Noir aesthetic showed early signs of definition in the seventies but really became identifiable in the eighties Frank in Thief is almost a blueprint for what followed with the likes of Drive, Heat, Payback, The Grifter, Momento and many others.

Caan plays an antihero of real intensity who gets caught up in a web that he has little control of. His performance as the existential protagonist struggling to complete his journey is superb.

With Thief James Caan may very well be the godfather of Neo Noir.

James Caan 1940-2022

THE JOY OF BOOKS

I am going on holiday. Not earth shattering news I know, but for me, it's the first holiday in two and a half years due to a number of conspiring factors. This time around I'm taking books, plenty of books. No electronic media for me. I may take one of the books I read again every couple of years;

I might buy something new, or borrow a book. I may opt for something I've never got round to reading but always wanted to. I might even buy a trilogy or collection. I do like a good biography and might need to spend an afternoon browsing in an actual bookshop.

One thing I do know, is that when I lay down in the warm Mediterranean sun and open a book I will be transported to another place, the stresses and worries of recent times will be temporarily lifted and I will feel relaxed, at rest and very happy. That, dear reader, is the joy of books

TIM SALE

Tim Sale, the noted Comic Book artist died last month at the  age of 66. The thing about Sale's style is that, in an age of conformity in illustrating comics his draughtsmanship was clearly identifiable as his. Sales' work on Batman is as defining of the character as anyone's and he was jointly responsible (with Jeph Loeb) for my favourite Batman story, the complex and highly original The Long Halloween.

Sale also provided the artwork for the revolutionary NBC series Heroes along with work in the Independent Comics world as well as the mainstream. I'm not going to say much more about Sale. I'm going to let his art speak for itself.

RIP Tim.

NEVER MIND, IT'S BOLLOCKS

Where to begin with director Danny Boyle's Pistol on Disney+, it's hard to know as there are so many faults with it. Nice middle class chaps with excruciating cockney accents make up the main body of actors which is not to detract from the helium ingested Kenneth Williams vocal acrobatics of Thomas Brodie-Sangster's Malcolm McLaren. One is reminded of the Black Adder The Third thespians when viewing the portrayal of the erstwhile svengali in full flow. 

I don't recall Pamela Rooke aka Jordan, being as posh as the portrayal of her seen here, nor was Siouxsie a shrinking violet as seen lurking in the background. As for the parents of Steve 'Jonesy' Jones (the main protagonist on whose biography this shambes is based), they are portrayed as a stereotypical abusive relationship couple you might see opening the door to their flat on the Jasmine Allen Estate to an investigating officer from Sun Hill nick.

The characters of Sid and Nancy are given far too much screen time in which to tell their parasitic and lamebrained story. Both actors struggle to bring any depth to the roles; which when you think about the vapidity of the toxic twosome is some achievement.

Which brings us to Anson Boon's John Lydon/Johnny Rotten. What can you say about his performance that hasn't already been said about Rik Mayall's in Drop Dead Fred?

Toby Wallace has neither the charisma or the screen presence to play the lead character and the other cast members playing  musicians and assorted famous faces are pretty bland in truth. Broadly speaking, Talulah Riley does an impression of Vivienne Westwood rather than a performance (broadly being apropos)

The only actor to come out of this with any credibility is as a young Chrissie Hynde. It probably helps that she did not have to try and conjure up an American accent, but she is very good

Danny Boyle is a talented and accomplished director but on Pistol he has seriously misfired. He's firing blanks on this one and no amount of bleary eyed nostalgia can redeem this six part series. How he managed to get this so wrong is a genuine mystery. What might have been a show on a par with Anton Corbjin's excellent Control turns out to be simply CaRRy oN pUnKiNG

HOUSE OF GUCCI-SHOWGIRLS MEETS VALLEY OF THE DOLLS

House Of Gucci is to Showgirls what Showgirls was to Valley Of The Dolls. It’s awful, hypnotically awful. It does for the fashion industry what Cats did for the feline community. That it was directed by Ridley Scott goes to show that the gods have feet of clay.  For the first ten minutes I thought I was watching a Mel Brooks' spoof.

Adam Driver’s performance is that of a somnambulist trying to avoid bumping into the furniture. Jared Leto’s character has the gravitas of an Adam West era Batman Villain, with a wardrobe to match. Jeremy Irons comes across as an ex SS General who escaped to Paraguay in 1945. As for Al Pacino, it would seem he was asked to reprise his role in Dick Tracy, only broader. Which brings me to Lady Gaga; her status as a gay icon can only be enhanced by a performance so full of kitsch that it belongs in a John Waters film from the 70s, her dialogue would not be out of place in Mommie Dearest.

Any critique has to address the accents. They are uniformly  as excruciating as Dick Van Dyke’s cockney in Mary Poppins.

The soundtrack, consisting of mostly Donna Summer, bludgeons home the era in which the film is set and the attempts to show a world of glamour and style are cack handed and as subtle as a Bernard Manning joke. 

So terrible is the whole enterprise that I wouldn’t be surprised if it were used as a method of torture on suspected members of Islamic State.

FOR FOLK'S SAKE

Folk horror, UK Folk horror in particular, is everywhere. The latest episode of Inside Number 9 gave us the straw mask/crown and cult like villagers dispatching the outsider, as first placed in our consciousness by The Wicker Man.

We've had In The Earth, Midsommar, Kill List, and a variety of other versions of  the perils of paganism, with Alex Garland's Men coming shortly. There's been The VVitch and BBC's the  Witchfinder, not to mention Radiohead's clever video for Burn The Witch and a plethora of references to the bygone age of Catweazle, Children Of The Stones and seventies village mysteries. But what's the fascination?

Maybe we have all had our fill of slashers, cannibals, zombies, werewolves, cyborgs, viruses and vampires and are looking closer to home to give our fear glands a workout.

What Folk horror gives us is a taste of that innate fear of being an outsider, of not belonging. It speaks of the unspeakable hiding behind the mundane. In American life there is the 'behind the picket fence' syndrome, but in the UK there is a feeling that there are more sinister goings on out there in the forests and woods of little England than dogging and dog fighting. 

Our scandinavian friends have their fair share of pagan rites and rituals and share an appreciation of the changing of the season, dancing round a totem and tales of sacrifice and witchery. But, perhaps the puritans of early America are our nearest counterparts and their dark doings in the forests and woods of New England have real resonance. Great examples are The VVitch and American Horror Story: Roanoak.

This Century, that's getting on a bit now, may be for Folk Horror what the 40s were for Film Noir. There are many strange and ambiguous tales being told on the small and big screen and if you've not dipped a toe into these waters I would recommend the following as a glimpse into the past, present and future of Pagan Horror, this is a chronological list to set you on your way into the underbelly of the beast.

1. Häxan (1922)
2. Night Of The Demon (1957)
3. Black Sunday (1960)
4. The Witches (1966)
5. Witchfinder General (1968)
6. The Blood On Satan's Claw (1971)
7. The Wicker Man (1973) 
8. The Shout (1978)
9. Eyes Of Fire (1983)
10. Tilbury (1987)
11. Lair Of The White Worm (1988)
12. The Blair Witch Project (1999)
13. Wendigo (2001)
14. The Reaping (2007)
15. Wake Wood (2009)
16. Kill List (2011)
17. A Field In England (2013)
18. The VVitch (2013)
19. The Ritual (2017)
20. Border (2018)
21. Apostle (2018)
22. American Horror Story : Roanoak (2019)
23. In The Earth (2021)
24. Lamb (2021)
25. Men (2022)

*There are also a plethora of Asian Folk Horror Movies. More about them on a future post

CRASH! BANG! WALLOP! WHAT A MOVIE!

 

A plate of haute cuisine served with a fine wine in opulent surroundings is never really a bad thing. Nor is a classic novel, a life affirming piece of music or an example of art at it's finest, but sometimes one wants a big fat burger. That, in cinematic terms is what Michael Bay's Ambulance is.

Bay, for many years now has been the king of bombast over content, the go to guy for big bangs and fast frills. With Ambulance he has managed to blend high concept 90's action with Tarantinoesque pop culture references. The star of the movie Jake Gyllenhaal is in the top three Hollywood actors this century and has shown his ability in films like Zodiac, Nightcrawler and Prisoners and in this role he plays it perfectly as an anti-hero turned, out and out bad guy. His presence and energy literally drive the film as does his co-star Yahya Abdil-Mateen II. They make a great yin and yang partnership.

The pace of the film is exhilarating, the action given great velocity due to absurdly audacious drone camera work. Is it a guilty pleasure? In a way yes, but that detracts from it's quality. As a heist movie it works well as there is real jeopardy for the leading characters, as a buddy movie it also works as the inter dynamics of the two leads works well. 

The concept is executed perfectly and with great pizzazz. It's cousins are The Rock, Speed and Con Air, in fact The Rock is referenced by one of the characters.

I have seen several movies of real quality this year, Licorice Pizza, Titane, Belfast, Red Rocket, Boiling Point, The Worst Person In The World, all of which I would have to say were 'better' films than Ambulance, but I can honestly say that (so far) Ambulance is my favourite of 2022.

Why not take a ride while it's still on the big screen? After all who doesn't occasionally fancy a nice big juicy burger?

BANDS OF FUTURES PAST

Manicured Noise, Blurt, Delta Five, Section 25, Quando Quango,Spizz, Monochrome Set, 23 Skidoo, Rema Rema, Rubella Ballet, Television Personalities, Lydia Lunch, Snatch, Marine Girls, Josef K, Dolly Mixture, Mod-ettes, Mass, The Soft Boys, Richard Strange, Fad Gadget, LiLiPUT, Au Pairs, In Camera, Young Marble Giants, Clock DVA, DAF, Modern English, The Raincoats, Kleenex these are just some of the support bands that flourished in that glorious era at the start of the 80's when concert going was almost a nightly event. The venues were large. small, obscure, well known and downright bizarre. The main acts were very much a part of what people called Post-Punk and there was a general feeling of experimentation and possibilities.A visit to see Joy Division, Gang Of Four, Magazine, The Fall, Killing Joke, Wire, The Pop Group and the like inevitably meant there was an opportunity to see different support acts all over London and beyond.

The music created sounded like the sound of the future, it had complexity, light and shade and a Funk influence soon wound its way in. 

Looking back on those glory days, it's remarkable how affordable it all was. Getting there was cheap as chips, ticket prices were very very reasonable and refreshments at the venues took into account that none of us had a lot of money.

What it felt like was not so much as a movement but a load of bands emerging with a bit of musical aspiration, a load of bands that had their own little niche. And on top of that we also had the wonderful Two Tone bands who gave us something extraordinary and unifying.

Many, viewed that era as a bit po-faced but anyone who saw the likes of Spizz Oil/Energi/etc,  Blurt or Television Personalities will tell you that there was a lot of good old fashioned fun at these gigs.

The recorded evidence of this period has given us some amazing albums and singles but they don't capture the vibrancy of that era, the buzz of seeing so many new bands and of course the performances. These bands could play, and those that were still learning their craft would give the audience something to think about. That, for want of a better word, Post-Punk period was fantastic. It felt like the future, now!

THE NEXT CHAPTER

You can't write about popular culture without being effected by what is going on in the world, popular culture does not exist in a vacuum therefore the ongoing pandemic looms large in any thoughts and ideas based on experience of popular culture.

The year just gone; Covid II, was as unrelentingly challenging as it's predecessor, Covid: The Awakening, albeit in slightly differing ways.

How can I write about the movies I saw, exhibitions I went to, TV I watched, Music I heard, things that I read and other "stuff" without that writing being through the Covid prism? That's the challenge I suppose. Despite my best efforts; travelling outside of rush hour, masking up, getting vaccinated etc, I tested positive on Christmas morning, with full symptoms for good luck. Ho Ho Oh No! Therefore I saw out the last of 2021 and the start of 2022 in bed.

I believe that everyone is entitled to an opinion, even the hard of thinking, but to those who say that Covid is not real, let me tell you, it is and it's bloody awful having it! feeling unwell at any time of the year is not good but having worked extremely hard, keeping my business afloat, all year, I was looking forward to this period. Time to take it easy, a trip to the coast booked and the opportunity to relax, see friends and generally enjoy some down time then Whack! Covid intervened like the unwelcome gatecrasher it is.

One thing being isolated and confined to bed does for you is give you time to reflect, time to take stock, time to remember.

Amidst life during war time we all need to be entertained, pleased, thrilled, made happy, made sad and generally experience the light and shade of popular culture and 2021 gave us these variances.

Being at home meant opportunities to experience some great TV; The Serpent, True Story, Help, I Am Victoria, Squid Game, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Vigil, Behind Her Eyes, Marcella, Clickbait, Brand New Cherry Flavour, Black Summer, American Horror Stories, American Horror Story, What If..., Ted Lasso, Wandavision, Love, Death & Robots are all examples of the diversity on offer.

Trips to the cinema, for me, where great experiences. Just to be able to visit a half empty cinema and immerse myself in another world felt like a luxury. My movie going highlights would have to be In The Earth, Dune, Lamb, Another Round, Surge, The Little Things, Old, Censor, No Time To Die, Invincible, The Lost Daughter. I also saw Blade Runner in 70mm with my nephew (His first time seeing it) which was a great experience. 

Streaming services gave me the opportunity to see a variety of films.  Black Bear (My film of he year) Promising Young Woman, The Green Knight, The Last Duel, Army Of The Dead, Coda, Spiral and many more too numerous to mention.  I think it's fair to say that there were gems if you dug deep enough.

An exhibition here, a gig there and the odd trip to the football was a reminder of what London has to offer, and it is with this spirit I plan to face up to 2022. I can't have another year waiting for the bombs to fall. I can't have another year listening to Lord Haw Haw and his ilk. What I can have, is the belief that when you're going through hell its imperative to keep going and you know what? Popular culture helps.