Saucer (Stephen Coonts, 2002)

Taking a break from the classics and determined to get through some of the piles of books on the shelves in order to donate them to charity and clear some shelves, I picked up Saucer which I assume came in a boxed set of thrillers from WHSmiths as I have several stacked up. I say this a lot on this blog, but I went into it not knowing what to expect. It turns out the title summed it up! 

Young Rip Cantrell (with a name like that he would have to be American, right?) is doing some job in the Sahara on his summer vacation and comes across a saucer embedded in tens of thousands of year old rock. Professor Soldi's theories about mankind crashing to Earth in this saucer, and then 'devolving' into cavemen through lack of technological comforts and then evolving into the people we are today is interesting, but it's a sidebar to the real story which involves Rip and ex-Air Force test pilot Charley (a lady) flying the saucer out of the desert and back to America, and then to Australia and back to America again. All the while they are being tracked by US forces and the President, by Gaddafi's army (briefly) and then by a megalomaniacal Australian who kidnaps Charley and the saucer in order to sell it to the Chinese, Japanese, Russians or Europeans for $150 billion. 

It's all very far-fetched and full of little implausable plot glitches, and reads like the script of a Hollywood movie, complete with an over the top explosive third act on the villain's Australian cattle ranch, where each of the 4 delegates bidding for the saucer plants bombs, and the US launch missiles on an ally. Competently written, there's no sparkle and despite the enormity of the implications of finding a 140,000 year old saucer on mankind's history, the best bits are shunted for a Micheal Bay like chase through pretty locations with massive explosions and an under-written love story. It was a nice diversion for a week and now it can go to the charity shop.

Black Swan (2010)

2011 continues to impress in the world of cinema, this time with the creepy, psychological horror Black Swan. Masquerading as a drama about a ballet dancer who seems to gradually crack under the pressure of being the lead in Swan Lake, the movie is actually an unsettling chiller and one of the best horror movies I've seen in a while. 

Natalie Portman is excellent in the lead, ably supported by Eliza-Dushku-as-Faith-alike Mila Kunis in the role of her nemesis/double/dark side/what-the-fuck?!, with Barbara Hershey as creep personified as her pushy mother in a small but memorable role. Vincent Cassel is reassuringly Gallic as the ballet director, pushing Portman to breaking point in order to get her to play the role of Black Swan convincingly. 

Black Swan is one of those movies you can't stop discussing as you leave the cinema, talking about how great it is and also comparing notes on what you think it was all about. There were no definitive answers as to why Portman was seeing images of herself reflected in mirrors in different poses, or why she had a fantasy about sleeping with Kunis, or why Winona Ryder kept stabbing herself in the face with a nail file! It was real (cliché alert) edge of the seat stuff that had me squirming and occasionally watching through my fingers. The film really gets inside your head and toys with what you're expecting while drawing you in with masterful direction and a gorgeous score, adapted from Swan Lake. I hope every movie I watch at the cinema (and at home for that matter) is as good as this and the others I've seen this January.

Scandinavia (Tony Griffiths, 2004)

One of the books I took with me on our trip to Copenhagen in December was the non-fiction history Scandinavia, which did exactly what it says on the cover, namely giving a swift run through the last few hundred years of life in Finland, Denmark, Sweden and Norway (and, very briefly in one paragraph, Iceland). In just 280 pages, author Tony Griffiths zips through the history of 4 countries, and therein lies the biggest problem I had with the book. As alternating passages covered alternating countries, it was very easy to lose track of which historical leaders led which country, or which bit of which Scandinavian city he was talking about. 

The book would have been greatly improved through the inclusion of two appendices - one with a chronological list of leaders for each country, and a second with some bloody maps! It found it most odd that there's not a single map or illustration in the whole volume, despite being a book about a part of the world that is not that well documented. I know what the capital cities of each country is, but to be honest I'd be hard pressed to pin point them on a map, let alone know where some of the more obscure regions of Norway are or which towns lay on the Finnish border with Russia. 

Despite my grumbles, Scandinavia was a very interesting read, albeit occasionally infuriating. It's a fascinating part of the world, and I'm always open to learning more about this planet we call home. As ever, I read these books and then instantly forget everything I've read, or rather I couldn't call to mind specific facts or dates, but by osmosis I've processed information for later. The most interesting parts of Scandinavia where in the twentieth century and during the war years when each country had a different approach to getting involved, or had different enemies. It's fascinating stuff. Before the twentieth century the 4 Scandinavian countries used to be into a bit of 'wife-swapping' with each other and Russia, sometimes Norway and Denmark were united, sometimes Finland and Russia... it was hard to keep up with sometimes - maybe a 3rd appendix would be good, showing the various inter-relationships. 

As an introduction to the histories of 4 fascinating countries, Scandinavia was successful. If I wanted to know more though I'd look to separate volumes on each for more depth and coherence. 

Zen (2011)

Last year we watched a lot of Wallander, the Swedish detective, to begin this year we saw Zen, an Italian detective. Except he's not really. He's Rufus Sewell and he speaks English with nary a hint of an Italian accent. Only the regular female characters are Italian, and then not all of them. This 3-part detective series was based on novels by Michael Dibdin (I've never heard of him either) which feature protagonist Aurelio Zen and are set in Italy. 

I've heard the TV series get some stick for having English actors in Italy, and some say it makes it inauthentic. I say this is a load of Rubbish. In the fantastic HBO series Rome, no one complained they weren't speaking Latin, and I've not seen Kenneth Brannagh's Wallander, but I'm pretty sure he's not Swedish - people seem to forget this is television drama - none of it is real! I have to say that I enjoyed Zen thoroughly, and not just because of the novelty of the beautiful Italian locations, mainly because of the light-hearted script and the impossibly smooth, well, zen-like nature of Sewell's handsome detective. 

Each episode involved an enquiry with a side order of corruption, and Zen is persuaded to have events turn out a certain way by his 'friend' in the ministry, although Zen usually, through no hard work on his part, lucks out and finds a way to satisfy everyone, especially this viewer. Zen is known for his conviction in a police force riddled with corruption, marking him out from his peers. He also gets the girl, the rather attractive Italian Caterina Munrino, although there was some doubt cast on her motives this hasn't panned out beyond her estranged husband turning up and shooting himself in the head. 

Even with such detective TV staples as a grumpy, shouty police boss, Zen the series manages to be a cut above usual fare. Like Sherlock Holmes last year, each episode was 90 mins and with only 3 of them, Zen didn't outstay his welcome. I'll be happy to return to Italy with him again. In fact, I'd be happy to watch Rufus Sewell exude cool in anything again. He's ace.

05/03/11 Update: The BBC has confirmed that they won't be bringing Zen back. But there's a chance he'll be back on a different channel. 

QI XL: Series H (2010-11)

QI always seems to be on, what with repeats on BBC and on Dave, so it's not as exciting when a new series appears on BBC1, but last Autumn series H started and ran until, well, actually I think the last XL episode is tomorrow night, although the series proper ended a few weeks back. I've not much to say about it, just that it's as good as ever, after a slight dip a series or two back when it moved from BBC2 to BBC1 and got smuttier somehow. Now all is well, and the blend of comedy and interestingness is just right. Long may it continue! Well, until series Z anyway.

Gulliver's Travels (Jonathan Swift, 1726)

Having made several trips to the cinema over the last couple of months, I've seen the new Orange advert starring Jack Black in Gulliver's Travels far more often than I'd like to. (On a side note, what's happened to the Orange ad guys from old? They were much more entertaining that the movie placement versions). And while I'd rather stick pins in my eyes than watch Jack Black's 'comedy' schtick in the movie, it drew me to Jonathan Swift's novel, which has been sitting on my shelves for a good few years. Although not in the Classic Adventures series of books, it sits comfortably with the adventure stories of Verne and Stevenson. 

I'm willing to bet that the new movie version has not one tiny bit of the wit and critique of humanity that Swift delivers in what is really a series of 4 adventures experienced by Gulliver over several years in the early 18th century. Gulliver's first voyage ends with him shipwrecked on Lilliput with a population of tiny, inches high peoples who, in the iconic image associated with the story, pin him down with ropes. What is less well known about the story is how Gulliver goes on to learn the language of the Lilliputians, helps to capture the neighbouring island's navy and eventually falls from favour when he pisses on the king's castle to extinguish a fire! The latter is not the behaviour you'd expect from a classic, let alone other mentions of bodily functions. They crop up again on Gulliver's second adventure in Brobdingnag where the people are many feet tall and Gulliver is the tiny one, and he has to run out into the garden to relive himself. 

In Lilliput, Swift examines the way that countries go to war over trivialities, in this case over how high a heel on a shoe should be. In Laputa, a floating city visited in part 3, Gulliver finds a race concerned only with music and maths. In Glubbdubdrib, again in part 3 (where Gulliver visits several regions), our protagonist finds a people able to bring forth the spirits of any dead person in history, so Gulliver enjoys himself conversing with Roman leaders and Greek philosophers. In Luggnagg, he finds that some of the race are able to live forever, a prospect he finds fascinating, but soon learns that although the live forever, they don't stop aging, and find a fate worse than death. 

The first two voyages, to Lilliput and Brobdingnag follow a similar pattern and involve descriptions of each land and peoples and how they're different from Europeans, while part 3 of the book takes in several races who are 'regular' sized but have particular quirks such as immortality. Each part allows Gulliver/Swift to muse on certain aspects of European behaviour in contrast to the peoples he encounters. It's an interesting journey and, once I could get into the way Swift writes (with random commas and semi-colons gallore), I really enjoyed the trip. I found the book even more interesting in part 4, where Gulliver finds that horses, or Houyhnhnms, rule the land, and primitive, caveman-like humans/Yahoo are kept as pets or run wild. 

The Houyhnhnms are fascinated with Gulliver, a clothed, educated Yahoo, and Gulliver is equalled bemused with how the horses' society works. They have no word for or conception of lies, and they live in harmony. In the most blatantly critical essay on society in the tome, Gulliver discusses with his 'master' how humans live in a world of crooked politicians, scheming lawyers and general baseness. In the telling, Gulliver decides that he wants to stay in the idyllic world of the Houyhnhnms and shun the human race with all of their faults. He shows even less regard for his wife and children back home in Britain than earlier, when on escaping the other worlds and returning home, within months he's back on a boat.

More than just a series of adventures with unusual peoples, Gulliver's Travels is amusing, shocking and critical of 18th century society, and there is much more to Swift's work than a man tied down by little people. It's a book that made me think and I enjoyed it for many reasons. And even more than ever I will definitely be avoiding the new movie version.

The Hell of it All (Charlie Brooker, 2009)

It took me a while to get through The Hell of it All, the third compilation of Charlie Brooker's Guardian columns, and not because I didn't enjoy it, it's just that a little Charlie goes a long way. 'A genius of spleen' reads the Independent's front cover quote, and they're right, but page after page after page of spleen can be fairly hard going. Brooker's style is hilarious and he's great at pulling apart awful TV shows in his Screen Burn columns or offering sarcastic comment on world events in his other articles. It's not often he showers praise on anything. So a couple of year's worth of splentic articles can become a little wearying if not portioned out over a few weeks, months, years. Brooker has a mastery with the English language that I can only dream of, and his way around a simile or metaphor is to be greatly admired. When you read Screen Burn you really do wonder at the amount of crap that is broadcast on TV these days, and Charlie Brooker is a great guide through the worst of it, talking honestly and with real vitriol, but he saves it for where it's needed.

Horton Hears a Who! (2008)

Not to blow my own trumpet, but I love how I can enjoy an awarding, historical biography one moment and then watch an animated movie adapted from a Dr Seuss book that features an elephant looking after a world that exists on a speck of dust and love it just as much! Every computer animated movie nowadays inevitably gets compared with Pixar's peerless output, but I've seen films that rival them for humour, originality and beauty, including Kung Fu Panda, Monsters vs Aliens, and now Horton Hears a Who!, from Blue Sky Studios, the people behind Ice Age. 

I had no idea what to expect from Horton and watching the credits my heart sunk a little to read Jim Carrey, Steve Carell, Seth Rogen were providing voices, as they can be very hit and miss. I needn't have worried though, for they were mostly unrecognisable and the voice cast was mostly irrelevant next to the stunning visuals and hilarious story in which they co-existed. In a really bizarre concept for a movie (not an original concept I know, the book came way before), Horton, an elephant, is minding his own business when he hears a noise coming from a speck. It turns out a world of Whos live on the speck, which Horton captures on the top of clover and clasps in his trunk. 

Mayor of Whoville, Ned, is able to hear Horton and encourages him to take the speck/his world to a safe place in order to prevent disaster befalling Whoville. The whole concept of a world existing on a speck of dust is quite philosophical, especially for something masquerading as a kid's movie. The two worlds of Whoville and the Jungle of Nool never interact, except through Horton talking through a drainpipe to Ned, and Horton's sanity is challenged by Kangaroo who doesn't believe anything she can't see with her own eyes. I suppose it's a comment on religion and belief, another odd choice for such a movie, but in many ways this is an animation to be enjoyed by adults as well as kids, in the best Pixar style. 

The humour is physical, wordy, visual, and steers away from pop culture references that so date the Shrek movies, although there is a superb pastiche of Japanese Pokemon-type cartoons, done in a 2D style and completely bizarre and hilarious, in keeping with the rest of the film. It's hard to describe all of the elements that go into making this elephant and his world so damn funny, it's a film that has to be seen to be believed. And it has the beautiful Jesse McCartney in a voice-cameo at the end. What more could one want in a movie?

The King's Speech (2010)

What can I say about The King's Speech that hasn't already been said? It is as brilliant and perfect a movie as the reviews and plaudits suggest, and everyone in it, from Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush and Helena Bonham-Carter to Michael Gambon, Guy Pearce and Timothy Spall are uniformly faultless. 

It's a movie that doesn't feel (Oscar) worthy, it's enjoyable, it's interesting, intriguing and rivetting. It has wit and emotion and heart, but it's not cloying or sentimental. Telling the story of Bertie, son of George V, brother of Edward VIII and then King George VI himself, a prince and then king with a stammering problem in the age of radio. As plots go, there's not much more than overcoming the stammer, but of course there is so much going on - this is a story about real people and actual events that resonated through history. The King's Speech of the title, working on several levels, is George VI's first radio broadcast to the country and the Commonwealth on the outbreak of World War II. As well as taking in the build up to war and the fascinating abdication crisis (as recently featured in Upstairs, Downstairs and Any Human Heart) the movie shows the royal family as human beings, in much the same way as The Queen did.

I cannot think of a single fault with the movie. It held me spellbound throughout. Wonderful.

Just William (2010)

Over Christmas the BBC put out a charming 4-part comedy adaptation of Just William in midday daily slots. It was a curious way of showing the series, and I bet many people missed it, but I've got the Radio Times - forewarned is forearmed, or something - and remembered to record them all. I was pleased that I did as it was a great new addition to the mostly uninspiring Christmas schedules. 

Daniel Roche, of Outnumbered fame, played William and he was surrounded by great British comedy actors including Rebecca Front, Caroline Quentin, John Sessions, Daniel Ryan and Warren Clarke who were provided with a top notch script by Simon Nye, of Men Behaving Badly fame. Set in an idyllic 1950's English country village, William and his friends had typically childish adventures, wandering where they wanted, getting into scrapes. It was all jolly good fun and evocative of a time when kids were allowed to play outdoors and have friendships with elderly male gardeners (Roy Hudd). 

Roche proved he can act as well as he can ad lib in Outnumbered, and he was quite cute when William was faced with an annoying little girl, Violet, or with a tomboy girl he could discuss toads with. The scheduling of the show and the stars would imply the series was aimed squarely at children, but the adult cast provided enough humour and the script enough wit to divert me for half an hour a time. Good stuff.

Love and Other Drugs (2010)

The prospect of a nude Jake Gyllenhaal was all it took to entice us into the cinema to see Love and Other Drugs, well, that and the good reviews, and the fact Anne Hathaway is usually reliable. I'm not completely shallow... 

The movie is a unusual take on a rom-com, in that the sex is fast and dirty, and then feelings get involved, love doesn't come easy and Maggie's (Hathaway) Parkinson's disease creates problems. While the two are getting physically and then romantically enmeshed, the movie also explores Jamie's (Gyllenhaal) job as a drug salesman in 1990's America. He ends up being a promoted of a new wonder-drug called Viagra, whose sales go through the roof and Jamie's fortunes increase. He uses his access to doctors to try to find a cure for Maggie, which doesn't turn out too well. 

I'm finding it difficult to sum the movie up as it's about a romance, it's got drama about drug consumerim, and then it's a comedy on top. So there are serious moments when Maggie's Parkinsons becomes more pronounced causing her to get very angry and upset, and then there are hilarious bits with Jamie's overweight brother being caught wanking while watching a home sex movie of Jamie and Maggie! Reviews have found the mix of comedy and drama and Viagra distracting, but I thought it was a movie with everything, which didn't feel like it short changed any aspect and didn't rush anything. 

Gyllenhaal and Hathaway are both so talented, whether at comedy, physical and verbal, drama or high emotion. Perhaps the final declarations of love at movie's end weren't as moving as they could have been (that's the writing rather than performance), but Hathaway delivered a consistantly sympathetic approach to Parkinsons without ever being twee or worthy. She should be up for an Oscar, but I fear that the role isn't showy enough to be noticed. Gyllenhaal shows how gifted he is at getting laughs, something he doesn't do nearly often enough - he was as delightful here as in the early Bubble Boy. 

Oh and the nudity? Hot! Gyllenhaal barely left anything to the imagination, and I'll be happy not to see Hathaway's breasts again for a good while!

The Mosquito Coast (1986)

A recent retrospective in Empire magazine on Peter Weir's directorial career lead me to record a couple of his films towards the end of last year. The first, The Year of Living Dangerously didn't do a lot for me, but the second, The Mosquito Coast, I found to be much more accessible and enjoyable to watch.

The film tells of Allie Fox (Harrison Ford, who I thought was excellent) and his family (including Helen Mirren as his wife and the wonderful River Phoenix as son and narrator Charlie), who he moves out of their comfortable US home to find somewhere to live untouched by the so-called American Dream and it's rampant consumerism. They end up in the jungles of central America, on the Mosquito Coast (which apparently covers Nicaragua and Honduras, and was historically a British protectorate), Allie buys a village and they set about building a self-sustaining housing-complex out of the jungle around them. Allie's crowning glory is a massive refrigeration system that provides air conditioning and doesn't run on electricity.

While offering comment on Americans and their comfortable, commodity driven lives, the movie is also a study of how Allie's pursuit of purity drives a wedge between himself and his family, and leads to him committing murder, accidentally blowing up the refrigerator and burning down the village. Soon Allie and his long-suffering family are floating up-river on a raft, trying to avoid religious missionaries, whose God Allie believes in less than the green-backed diety.

Ford delivers a powerful performance, perhaps not very subtle, as Allie becomes more and more untethered from reality and the needs and hopes of his family. Mirren is good in an underwritten role of a devoted wife who will follow her husband anywhere, but it is Phoenix who shines at the age of just 15, showing what a massive talent he was. He initially believes his father's good intentions and willingly follows him, but he gradually comes to suspect that Allie is not interested in the welfare of his children, and when he learns that Allie lied about the US being wiped out by a nuclear holocaust, the bond between the two snaps - but not irrevocably.

The Mosquito Coast explores interesting themes and is filmed in lush jungle surrounds, providing awesome vistas and a colourful backdrop for the domestic story to unfold against. For this is a movie about a boy who idolises his father and comes to realise that he isn't as strong as suspected, and that he has faults. It's a universal tale and Ford and Phoenix have not been better in anything I've seen them in before. The movie has made me seek out others from River Phoenix's tragically short filmography so I look forward to seeing more of him soon.

Mannen som log / The Man Who Smiled (2003)

Over Christmas BBC4 showed some new Wallander movies, although not series 2 of the show starring Krister Henriksson, rather a series of TV movies with Rolf Lassgård in the title role. The first one shown, and the first we watched (the only one so far!) was The Man Who Smiled which, unlike the Henriksson series, is adapted from one of Henning Mankell's original novels.

It's a bit weird seeing someone new inhabiting the role of Wallander, and all of his police colleagues, and seeing the character of Linda taking a minor, non-police role. Once I'd got past the fact that this Wallander is heavier, grumpier, angrier and more prone to boughts of fast and sweaty sex with hookers (he didn't know she was one, honest!) I enjoyed this mystery involving the region's most famous man, some scary African statues and a sharp-shooting assassin. Writing this 2 or 3 weeks later, I've only a hazy memory of it all, except to say that I remember the movie being very atmospheric and, well, 'Swedish'!

This Wallander was more verbose, less likable, but no less watchable. I look forward to watching the others currently sat on the recorder.

Any Human Heart (2010)

The cast drew me towards Any Human Heart, and not just Gillian Anderson. Jim Broadbent, Matthew Macfadyen and Sam Clafin (new to me, quite hot) all played Logan Mountstuart at various stages throughout his fictional life from the early 1900s, through the wars and into the 1980s. It was an interesting device, and one that worked nicely, helped along by the flashbacks and forwards, latterly to an elderly Broadbent rummaging through his old diaries and piecing together photos of the women in his life. 

Through Logan's youth and first marriage, Macfadyen took over the role at the end of episode 1, and held it until 3/4 of the way through episode 3, allowing Broadbent the final episode. Along the way Logan collects marriages and vocations, though he is nominally a writer, of two books at least. Strangely, the men playing his friends have aging makeup rather than being portrayed by different actors when in their 60s and 70s, but I suppose that would have been confusing for me, the simple viewer.

Logan is recruited into British intelligence by one Ian Fleming, and charged with looking after the recently abdicated King Edward VIII, played with gusto by Tom Hollander, with Gillan Anderson his venomous wife, almost unrecognisable with dark hair as Wallis Simpson. Later on Samantha from Sex and the City pops us as for an affair with Macfadyen, and then she dies with Broadbent (I could make an unflattering remark about not needing aging make up, but I'll leave it alone). 

Aside from cameo-spotting and following who's playing who at what age, Any Human Heart was a moving, intriguing drama, that was never less than enjoyable. Logan wasn't really an everyman, as his first marriage is into the aristocracy, then he publishes a book, curates an art gallery in New York and ends his days destitute in France looking out for a woman who reminds him of his tragically killed second wife, Freya. His character is very human though, in that his life is a succession of choices, forks in the road - or a toss up between good luck and bad luck as Logan has it. 

I'm often interested by fiction that bumps up against fact, and here as in Upstairs, Downstairs, and later The King's Speech, the period of the abdication is particularly fascinating. It's also interesting to see how Logan changes with the world, or to see how it leaves him behind. The direction made Any Human Heart stand out, with some stylistic flourishes that stayed the right side of pretentious, and were more affecting. Brilliantly acted, with a superb cast, this was a hidden gem.

French and Saunders: Series 1 - 6 (1987-2004)

It's taken a few months to get through all 6 series, slotted in among other DVDs and TV commitments, but we finally finished off the French and Saunders box set last week. None of the myriad Christmas specials were included, and not a single minute of a special feature, so what was there represents 6 series of laughs without much context or explanation, the shows stand by themselves. 

The first series is easily the weakest, with a higher ratio of unsuccessful sketches and unfunny bits, and the forced fake setting of a variety show at the BBC is a lot more believable and fun in the 6th series. The final series proper stands out due to the non-standard structure, playing like a docu-soap of the 'real' French and Saunders putting together the show they are actually starring in. It's all a bit 'meta', or something. Series 2 - 5 take the more standard approach of a load of sketches tied together without much of a storyline moving around them.

It's from series 3, if I remember rightly, that the movie parodies kicked in and became the highlight of each show, giving some structure to each episode, though not a lot. My favourites are the Misery parody and the spot on Silence of the Lambs one, with the Krankies and Christopher Biggins among the light entertainment stars of the early nineties locked up alongside Dawn's Hannibal Lecter. The House of Idiot is also pretty memorable, although I'd be hard pressed to remember anything about the House of Elliott that it was spoofing. 

Therein lies some of the difficulty with accessing the comedy in the earlier series - French and Saunders were topical, and some of the sketches, without any accompanying explanation or research online, don't strike such a chord so many years later. I remember Sonja, the ginger popstar, so Dawn's impression is amusing, and obviously Madonna's still around, but there were characters based on popstars I've never heard of, but thankfully these sorted of dated bits weren't frequent.

The best sketches are the timeless ones, or the ones with celebrity cameos. The first couple of series often played the musical numbers fairly straight, like they were imposed on them by the BBC, but later French and Saunders dicked about in the background, enlivening performances by Lulu, and, for a whole series, the late, great Kirsty MacColl. And, as much as I love Dawn and Jennifer, who really are one of the funniest double acts ever, they are given a run for their money by the hilarious Raw Sex, who began as the fake series 1 variety show's musicians, played by Simon Brint and Rowland Rivron, and went on to carve their own niche in each French and Saunders series, excepting 5 & 6 where they were sorely missed. Mel & Sue had regular parts in series 5, and even contributed to the scripts, and the lovely Liza Tarbuck was their 'producer' in series 6. Great casting, and showing how the central pair spread the comedy about around supporting players.
Watching all 6 series one after another, it really stuck me how excellent French and Saunders have been at comedy characters since the beginning, be they fat, randy old men, simple farmers, teenage girls or parodies of themselves in the oft bizarre 'white-room' sequences. Jennifer Saunders in particular disappears utterly beneath a costume or prosthetics and an accent - she *is* Jodie Foster as Clarice Starling - while Dawn French is harder to mask she's just as witty and a huge bundle of fun. I hope the BBC sees fit to release the specials on DVD sometime soon. Especially the well-remembered Titanic parody.

Black Beauty (Anna Sewell, 1877)

The next Classic Adventures hardbook plucked from the pile was Black Beauty. This is one of the few I attempted to read when I got these books back in 1993, but I never made it through to the end for some reason. Reading it again, from beginning to end, I think I know why. It's because horses are essentially boring. 

If I was a pre-teen girl, maybe Black Beauty would have held me spellbound. As it is, this first-horse narration of a horse's life, complete with detail on saddles and bits, with an occasional adventure like a fire, is pretty pedestrian stuff. It's a well-written book, and it's an interesting concept - telling a story from a horse's POV - but it did little for me. At least I can say I've read it now. And move on to another book. 

Oh and where Three Musketeers, Treasure Island and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea made me want to seek out good movie versions, I won't be tracking down any filmic Black Beauties on Amazon.co.uk

Attitude: I think I love you

Burlesque (2010)

The last trip to the cinema this year was to see Burlesque, a movie I've been looking forward to for a long time. I've seen the trailer several times, the poster was up in Copenhagen, and the prospect of seeing Cher act and sing again was almost too much! So what if the reviews have been average at best, this was a musical starring Christina Aguilera and The Cher!

Similar to Coyote Ugly, this movie had a standard girl goes to big city and shows off her new talent, rises to the top of her profession. While Ugly had pole dancing, Burlesque has well, something that's not really Burlesque, but involves lip-synching to old numbers and dancing in underwear. That is until Christina's Ali rocks up to Cher's (well ok she plays a character called Tess, but really she's Cher) club and starts wailing like a good 'un. Then the club institutes a new regime of singing and dancing in underwear. See the difference?

Another thing the two movies share/Cher (haha) is a hot male lead. Where Ugly had beautiful, dark, small-but-perfectly-formed Adam Garcia, Burlesque has gorgeous, ripped, tall hunk Cam Gigandet, who we see a lot of at one point. What an ass. Hot. Anyway, while Aguilera's alright at acting, she's more about the warbling and dancing, while Cher is of course an all rounder, Gigandet imbues the movie with heart and acting chops, which surprised me I have to say. I was expecting him to be as wooden as Aguilera... but that's not fair, she does ok - in fact she's pretty unrecognisable until she opens her mouth. 

The songs, all 10 of them (original ones), were all good toe tapping numbers with Show Me How You Burlesque a highlight, my only grumble is that there weren't enough of them spread over the movie's almost 2 hour running time. And Cher only gets two!! Welcome to Burlesque is fantastic, but it's the slower You Haven't Seen The Last Of Me that is quite rightly getting all the plaudits. It's classic Cher, yet it's melancholy and sad and amazing.

Burlesque isn't up there with Moulin Rouge and Chicago in the pantheon of top musicals, but thanks to Cher, Stanley Tucci's way with a camp line or two, and Aguilera's gusto in the music numbers, oh and Gigandet and his perfect abs, this is a movie I'll be happy to revisit and sing along to the soundtrack with again and again. 

 

Upstairs, Downstairs (2010)

There wasn't a lot of exciting new programming to look forward to over the Christmas period in 2010, but I was intrigued by the glossy new series of Upstairs, Downstairs for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it had the same writer as the wonderful Cranford, and secondly it had a great cast, led by Keeley Hawes, who I was expecting to have gone back in time to 1936 after a bump on the head. 

Although a little slow going over the 3 episodes, a number which the BBC seems to believe constitutes enough for a series, and set in a very cold looking house, I found the show to be rather good. I'm too young to have seen the original series on ITV in the 70's, and I've never wanted to seek it out on DVD, so armed only with a knowledge gleaned from the Christmas Radio Times feature I found some of the first episode to be a bit too concerned with making connections and lingering shots with references to the old show. Jean Marsh, who co-created the original series and starred in both as Rose Buck, provided the only real link with the two series, and I thought she was excellent here. 

Dame Eileen Atkins, so stern and school-marmishly enjoyable in Cranford, was a more fun, witty and likable character here, what with her brightly coloured tights (like an elderly member of the Saturdays), her pet monkey and Indian servant. She brought heart to the upstairs cast, as Hawes does a wonderful line in frosty, and her onscreen husband, played by Ed Stoppard (who's also turned up in Any Human Heart and Zen on my TV screen in the last month) didn't leave much of an impression.

Much more interesting were the downstairs characters, with Anne Reid's cook a particular favourite. Her meeting and photo session with Cecil Beaton was a lovely touch. What I liked about the series was how it bumped up against real life events, such as the rise of fascism and King Edward VIII's abdication crisis (also appearing in Any Human Heart, and the forthcoming The King's Speech) and the different class' reactions to these events. If they do another series, I'll be watching, though I hope there's a bit more warmth to be found.

Hung: Season 2 (2010)

I enjoyed the slow-burn of season 1 of Hung, so I was pleased to see season 2 was pretty much more of the same. It's a relaxed sort of comedy-drama, of the sort you might expect from HBO, by which I mean there's very strong language and far too many shots of naked ladies. 

Thomas Jane is deliciously dry as baseball coach - turned male hooker Ray, and his pimp Tanya got ever more ludicrous this season. She made friends with a black male pimp, in order to find out how she should deal with her 'ho and how to make money from clients. She then had a spectacular breakdown and whipped her boss at her publishing company with her belt... 

For some reason Ray wanted to get back with his drippy ex-wife (Anne Heche), and his twins celebrated being fat and Damon wrote a creepy poem about sister Darby, before getting stoned. Lenore, Ray's other pimp, wandered around Ray's house completely starkers and generally got a load of great lines. So all in all, a good, easy watch, with some social commentary on the state of American jobs in Detroit thrown in for good measure.

Miranda: Series 2 (2010)

Rounding out 2010 was the second series of Miranda, the old-fashioned sitcom that is just so inexplicably laugh-out-loud funny. Miranda's relationship with Gary almost moved to the next level, but they didn't actually get round to sleeping with each other, as Miranda found out he'd married a girl for a green card. 

There was a fantastic bottle show starring just Miranda and her frightful mother (Patricia Hodge) in a psychiatrist's office. Although the episode slightly wasted the peerless Mark Heap in the guest star role of psychiatrist, Hart and Hodge proved to be a wacky, neurotic, down-right hilarious twosome. The lack of plot (although there's never really much of one) let the comedy have free rein. 

It's uncool to lack such studio-based comedy, but I love the catch phrases: 'Such fun!', 'Bear with, bear with, bear with', '... are we?', 'What I call...' and my favourite, Stevie's Heather Small mask asking 'What have you done today, to make you feel proud?' The best moment of this series was the cut-away gag (very much like you'd find in Family Guy) of Stevie and Miranda playing Where's Miranda? featuring Hart dressed as Wally. Marvellous.

 I'll also mention 2010 Unwrapped with Miranda Hart, which was alright when Hart was on screen, but the rest of the made up/doctored footage was ho hum. I don't know if I'll bother with 2011 Unwrapped, should there be one. I look forward to series 3 of Miranda though!
 

The Best TV Moment of 2010

Ugly Betty: Season 4 (2009-2010)

Both a sad event and a happy one, Ugly Betty's fourth and final season went out with a bang just before Christmas on E4. This season saw Betty sort her hair out, get some fashion sense, find some designer glasses and eventually have her braces removed, but she was still the neurotic, lovable, hilarious Betty I came to know and love all those seasons ago. 

So much happens in the world of Ugly Betty, and there have been sex changes, murders, baby kidnappings... lots to keep up with. Season 4, if I remember rightly, as they all blur into one past episode, involved Betty's new role as junior editor at Mode, saw her love-interest with Matt rekindled and then abruptly end as he disappeared off to Africa. Thankfully a drunken phone call to Henry on Betty's trip to London didn't result in them getting back together, but instead Betty's career took her away from Queens, New York, the US to London in the finale. 

Meanwhile, Wilhemina's estranged daughter turned up to con her mother, and Connor went to jail; Marc didn't get much of a storyline for himself, but was hilarious and provided a touching 'mentor' role for Justin; Hilda dumped her Karate Kid / Mayor boyfriend for bad boy hunk Bobby, and eventually married him, after suffering a miscarriage; Amanda found she had a talent for fashion and quit as receptionist, after a bit of fun between the sheets with Daniel, and happily found out her father was the gay guy from Mad Men; Daniel got involved in a daft cult and stopped moping after dead ex-wife Molly to hop into bed with Amanda again; Clare Meade got in touch with her long-lost adopted son, which didn't turn out very well for Wilhemina when he accidentally shot her; and Ignacio... well he got to cook and be paternal. On a plus note, his sometime girlfriend turned up for the finale. 

I was very pleased with how Ugly Betty wrapped up everyone's storylines, even bringing back elements you'd forgotten, like Amanda's father and his Tweety bird tattoo. The defining and most brilliant part of season 4, and of the series as a whole, was it's treatment of homosexuality - it was never an 'issue', and when camp, flappy Justin declared he was enamoured by a girl in his acting class, I was afraid the writers had wimped out with the character. Thankfully, Justin was just-in... the closet that is (poor joke, I know). When his (admittedly hot) classmate Austin kissed him, and Justin realised that he had been scared to admit his sexuality, the character and the plot flourished. To see a young teenage coming out story portrayed so sensitively was so wonderful and positive, it swelled my heart everytime Justin and Austin were on screen. And the defining moment came during Hilda's wedding party, when everyone was paired off dancing, and Justin chose the moment to admit he was paired off too. It was beautiful to see the courage and the acceptance from his family, who knew, but were willing to let Justin open up in his own time. I really hope Mark Indelicato goes on to big things, his portrayal of Justin was the best.

Then again, I hope all of the cast go on to big things! I've enjoyed every single one of them, especially Becki Newton's caustic and laugh-out-loud hilarious Amanda, an utterly underated comic actress. America Ferrera, who was revealed to be drop-dead gorgeous as Betty blossomed, is also undervalued - she puts so much into making Betty a likable and ultimately believable heroine, especially within such a cartoony environment. The only actor I know who's moved on to something else is Vanessa Williams, who's now in Desperate Housewives, which is excellent, but confusing as there were several weeks where the two shows overlapped on E4! 

Ugly Betty is a show I see myself returning to on DVD. It's hilarious, it's touching, it's witty, it's gay, it's camp, it's cool, it's Betty.