Hello to those out there in the night time.. I'm once again wading through a big old document attempting to make it into a shorter, snappy one. To get back into the swing of it for new year, perhaps a series of wafty, not very-well-fleshed-out posts, a la the daily papers when all their real journos are on leave.
Last week I got to share a dvd with Mr B that was my Dad's favourite from his childhood, and has a special place in my heart since he taped in off the tv in the 80s.
The Thief of Bagdad (as it was spelt then) is a fantasy from 1940. It has star-crossed lovers, a cunning street urchin played by Sabu who was famous as Mowgli in the Jungle Book, awesome painted backdrops, thousands of extras, wicked special effects, jaunty tunes, a sprinkling of laborious dialogue and of course a wicked Grand Vizier.
I'm glad to say Biz was somewhat captivated too and I think we agree about how movies first and foremost tell stories, and you sometimes only need a suggestion for a special effect to understand what's going on and go along for the ride. There are a bunch of effects movies nowadays that leave the final sequence entirely up to CG characters, and they just don't work, because you just don't give a rats about what happens to them. League of extraordinary gentlemen and Van Helsing case in point.
Other movies enjoyed recently were Volver and Borat. Actually not sure if enjoyed is quite the right word for the latter. Squirmed through and questioned the bounds of good taste more like. I'm coming out of the closet though - I thought the nude-in-the-conference-centre scenario was comedy genius.
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