They call themselves cooks? I am referring to the candidates aiming to own a restaurant in the new BBC show with Raymond Blanc. At one stage of the competition Blanc's sidekick, a woman who is herself a restaunteur, said to Blanc: "I wouldn't allow any one of those people into my kitchens." She was talking about three couples who were each attempting to cook one course of a three-course meal, a course that "should reflect their style". I too wouldn't allow any of them near my kitchen for the simple reason that they seemed to me to be a positive danger to health.
One couple, a woman and her daughter, were trying to prepare a dessert that consisted of a few bits and pieces and some coconut juice and grated coconut. Hence what was required was, of course, a coconut. But how does one slice open a coconut? With a carving knife of course. The mother pressed the point of the knife against the coconut's armadillo-like shell and proceeded to hammer the handle with a rolling pin. To my amazement she actually succeeded in making a hole in the shell but the daughter had to run for a bowl to catch the juice before they lost it all on the floor. Next came the opening of a tin of something or other.... A tin? Cooking from basic fo0odstuff? Might as well open a tin of Sainsbury's peaches and pour some cream over them. Anyway, they now had the problem of opening the tin. And once more they attempted this task with the aid of 'our trusty blade' - the kitchen knife. The daughter pressed the point of the long knife against the top of the tin and, as with the coconut before this, proceeded to bash the handle with the trusty old rolling pin - while - get this - holding the knife vertical with her hand firmly gripping the blade. Blanc showed them that there does exist such a thing as a tin opener.
As they'd say in The Daily Mail about MP's fiddling: "You can't make it up."
Needless to say Raymond Blanc sent them packing before the end of the programme.
What I simply cannot understand is (a) how that useless pair ever got to be candidates (b) how any of the couples qualified for the programme since none of them I would trust to cook a sausage and (c) what are the other 100 000 people like who applied to get on this show and failed?
Saturday 31 October 2009
Tuesday 27 October 2009
Shane
I have just finished reading "Shane". The main character is not much like the film's version of him played by Alan Ladd; he is tall and dark and mean whereas Ladd is short and blonde and pleasant. Both versions of the story are fine: the novel is short, the film is long and more fully develops some of the people in the book who are just mentioned by name, barely described. Wilson, the gunfighter brought in by Fletcher to stir things up, speaks much more in the book than he does in the film (played by Jack Palance who, with only about ten lines to speak, won an oscar). The boy, Bob, is not so prominent as in the film and the closeness of Shane to the boy is not so strong, not so sentimental, though at the end when Shane leaves it's still very moving. There's a sort of epilogue in the book which, you feel after seeing the film, should not be required but surprisingly it works well, it explains a lot about the family and where they go from here and how the love they all felt for the mysterious stranger will be felt for ever.
Elisha Cook Junior is a great presence in the film (in the book he is a bigger man, a tougher guy) as he was in all the films he appeared in: he was stupendous in "The Killing" and great in "The Big Sleep". Any part he was given, never of course star roles, he invested with a quality that was his own, often nervous, sometimes mean, needy, pathetic.... What an actor!
Elisha Cook Junior is a great presence in the film (in the book he is a bigger man, a tougher guy) as he was in all the films he appeared in: he was stupendous in "The Killing" and great in "The Big Sleep". Any part he was given, never of course star roles, he invested with a quality that was his own, often nervous, sometimes mean, needy, pathetic.... What an actor!
Friday 23 October 2009
Longines
I own a Longines watch. It's lying in a drawer, not working, with no hands. It was there when we had a burglary and it's still there. Beside it were a couple of digital watches worth hardly anything; they're what the burglar took. He must have looked at the Longines, saw it was not working and had no hands and left it; the gold in it is worth more than the bits and pieces, such as white, gym socks, a pullover that he did take (though he also took a video machine and an expensive diamond ring which, a policeman who called said he probably would have sold to a second hand shop for a few quid).
I was told when I had the watch cleaned a long time ago that Longines were worth quite a lot but not working they were worth only the gold in them. I don't know what to do with this watch: to get it repaired at the Longines distributors would have cost me about £300 and that was about 15 years ago. Is it worth it? From the nostalgic point of view, that it was my father's before me, it would I suppose be worth it but it's a lot of money to be nostalgic about.
I wonder what a new Longines is worth these days. I was on a plane a long time ago sitting next to a man who said "Is that a Longines you have there?" I said yes. He seemed impressed. He told me he dealt in watches and that my Longines was worth about £600. Now? I showed it to an auctioneer who looked at it and said "worthless".
So there it lies with no strap and no hands and the inside is broken. I am told that gold is selling for high prices these days..... No, think I'll keep it a while, might win Ernie or Lotto.... Apart from nostalgia there's a sort of glamour about it: mentioned, I recall, in a Raymond Chandler novel - rich guy, probably a crook, dressed elegantly and "on his wrist was a Longines".
I was told when I had the watch cleaned a long time ago that Longines were worth quite a lot but not working they were worth only the gold in them. I don't know what to do with this watch: to get it repaired at the Longines distributors would have cost me about £300 and that was about 15 years ago. Is it worth it? From the nostalgic point of view, that it was my father's before me, it would I suppose be worth it but it's a lot of money to be nostalgic about.
I wonder what a new Longines is worth these days. I was on a plane a long time ago sitting next to a man who said "Is that a Longines you have there?" I said yes. He seemed impressed. He told me he dealt in watches and that my Longines was worth about £600. Now? I showed it to an auctioneer who looked at it and said "worthless".
So there it lies with no strap and no hands and the inside is broken. I am told that gold is selling for high prices these days..... No, think I'll keep it a while, might win Ernie or Lotto.... Apart from nostalgia there's a sort of glamour about it: mentioned, I recall, in a Raymond Chandler novel - rich guy, probably a crook, dressed elegantly and "on his wrist was a Longines".
Wednesday 21 October 2009
Rabbits
A famous chef named Mossiman was on TV for a few minutes today to talk about a meal his father used to make on Sundays, and to demonstrate, as he talked, how to prepare and cook it (it was a short "fill-in" sort of programme so the ingredients weren't specified but you could see them). Looked a nice dish. A long time ago I'd have enjoyed it. But not now. I have not eaten rabbit for many years. When I was child my mother often cooked rabbit; it was a popular, cheap meal - chicken then was something of a Sunday treat, much dearer than rabbit. Then two things happened at about the same time. One day my uncle, home from the forces, walked into the dining room, sniffed the air and said: "Rabbit! I just cannot stand the smell of rabbit." Suddenly I was aware of the smell.... of course I had always been aware of it, but I had never thought of it as it being a horrible one. His remark did it for me, finished me with rabbit.
I might have ignored what he said and gone on eating it - I might have - but for the fact that myxomatosis was infecting rabbits all over the country just after he had apocalyptically made his announcement and, of course, no one would now eat wild rabbit for fear of catching it.
So rabbits went off my menu for good. I noticed it was back on the menus of some restaurants some years ago and this is a little surprising to me because about twenty years ago we had pet rabbits in the back garden until suddenly they died. From myxamotosis.
I might have ignored what he said and gone on eating it - I might have - but for the fact that myxomatosis was infecting rabbits all over the country just after he had apocalyptically made his announcement and, of course, no one would now eat wild rabbit for fear of catching it.
So rabbits went off my menu for good. I noticed it was back on the menus of some restaurants some years ago and this is a little surprising to me because about twenty years ago we had pet rabbits in the back garden until suddenly they died. From myxamotosis.
Sunday 18 October 2009
How Green was my Valley
I saw this film many, many years ago and thought it junk. It was, I thought, rather offensive to Welsh people like myself in that it depicted us as rather quaint, a bit foolish at times, foreign. When I saw it again many years later I liked it a lot. It had those magnificent scenes, characteristic of John Ford's Westerns: scenes that spread the action out of doors, scenes of great drama in court rooms - here in the chapel, scenes of brawls (mostly drunken) - here in the school yard. Then the scenes of the devastation down the mine when there is an explosion and the boy, Huw, goes down with the preacher, Mr Richards, to rescue Huw's father with, outside, the crowd of womenfolk and children waiting in anguish for their loved ones. "Kameradshaft" is supposed to be the greatest mining disaster film but its political message is too strong and contrived for me, and, cinematically, Ford's work is simply better.
This time I found it terribly sentimental in places and I found it difficult to place it in South Wales - not least, probably, because Ford had used a predominatly Irish cast (though most did their best to imitate Welsh accents); but it is a great film in that it's a film on a big scale with a big story and its full of life; it has the energy and drive of great stories which take in all aspects of humanity from the story of Huw's sister's love for the new preacher who cannot commit himself to the horridly real expulsion of a young woman from the chapel by the deacons for giving birth to an illegitimate child; from the birth of union activity to the emigration of two sons to America and other places looking for work.
I regard it as one of John Ford's "Irish Films" in that it wallows in sentiment that is a bit fake. When he was once asked about his films he replied "I just make Westerns". But like all expatriots (or those who like to think they are similar since they have family roots elsewhere) he saw Ireland through rose-tinted glasses: unreal, much loved but a sentimental love. His Westerns he saw them without the clutter of fanciful baggage.
There are some fine performances in the film: I think it is one of Walter Pigeon's finest performances and as for Donald Crisp, who won an oscar for it, one of his best and,surely, his funniest.
This time I found it terribly sentimental in places and I found it difficult to place it in South Wales - not least, probably, because Ford had used a predominatly Irish cast (though most did their best to imitate Welsh accents); but it is a great film in that it's a film on a big scale with a big story and its full of life; it has the energy and drive of great stories which take in all aspects of humanity from the story of Huw's sister's love for the new preacher who cannot commit himself to the horridly real expulsion of a young woman from the chapel by the deacons for giving birth to an illegitimate child; from the birth of union activity to the emigration of two sons to America and other places looking for work.
I regard it as one of John Ford's "Irish Films" in that it wallows in sentiment that is a bit fake. When he was once asked about his films he replied "I just make Westerns". But like all expatriots (or those who like to think they are similar since they have family roots elsewhere) he saw Ireland through rose-tinted glasses: unreal, much loved but a sentimental love. His Westerns he saw them without the clutter of fanciful baggage.
There are some fine performances in the film: I think it is one of Walter Pigeon's finest performances and as for Donald Crisp, who won an oscar for it, one of his best and,surely, his funniest.
Thursday 15 October 2009
Love songs
I thought I had cracked it: why was Wagner's Leibestod from "Tristan and Isolde" on a higher plane than Puccini's "One Fine Day" from "Madam Butterfly"? Well, let's go one step further down the love song path, down to pop music and to Jennifer Rush singing "The Power of Love". Here we have lust posing as love: " 'Cos I'm your lady and you are my man, whenever you reach for me I'll do all that I can...." A bit on the lusty side I would have thought. Up to Puccini and here we have a woman singing about the return of her lover and husband (except that he isn't - well she thinks he is but he doesn't.... never mind); she doesn't sing of "bodies" in contact as Rush does but of lover's kisses and yearning for his return etc. But there is a good deal of sentimentality here, not just in the words but in the music too, underlining the passion. So now we reach the highest point of passionate human love with Isolde's aria in "Tristan and Isolde" - the wonderful Leibestod, surely an expression not so much of animal passion but of a higher form of spiritual love.....
Not from the accounts of how it was received when it was first performed. From a critic in 1965: "Not to mince words, it is the glorification of sensuous pleasure.... an act of indecency." Later from another critic: "the worship of animal passion"...." the passion is unholy in itself and its representation is impure." And from Clara Schumann no less: "the most repugnant thing I have ever seen or heard in my life."
So there you have it: here's me thinking that Wagner was presenting human passion as a spiritual passion and really he was down there with Jennifer Rush and Madam Butterfly. My mistake was thinking that Wagner's music conveyed something of a grander passion - I was seduced by the music - and this probably was as a result of my not understanding the German language.
Not from the accounts of how it was received when it was first performed. From a critic in 1965: "Not to mince words, it is the glorification of sensuous pleasure.... an act of indecency." Later from another critic: "the worship of animal passion"...." the passion is unholy in itself and its representation is impure." And from Clara Schumann no less: "the most repugnant thing I have ever seen or heard in my life."
So there you have it: here's me thinking that Wagner was presenting human passion as a spiritual passion and really he was down there with Jennifer Rush and Madam Butterfly. My mistake was thinking that Wagner's music conveyed something of a grander passion - I was seduced by the music - and this probably was as a result of my not understanding the German language.
Monday 12 October 2009
Albert Dekker
Off to Torquay last weekend (one of those deals for a three night stay which is "an offer you can't refuse") but wondering how to spend the time there; plenty of entertainment in the hotel itself but not really to my liking - second rate performers doing all the old favourite songs and comedians.... I won't go on..... So, I booked to see an amateur production of "All my Sons" by Arthur Millar. This was put on by Torquay's "Toad Theatre Co." and a wonderful company it is.
The acting was superb and the play was a near masterpiece (flawed I felt by Millar's tendecy to preach and to generalise - but it was an early play). What I found particularly admirable was the set: it often is one of the failings of amateur productions that the set design and construction is less than adequate; this was excellent.
The play deals with an aircraft manufacturer who has supplied faulty parts of engines thus indirectly causing the deaths of 21 pilots and the repercussions of his crime. I had seen the play before, I remembered, not as a play but as a film. With Albert Dekker. Think I can find any reference to the film? The only film I can track down is one which had Edward G, Robinsion and Burt Lancaster in it. It is definitely not the film I saw but one which I would like to see (I am a member of lovefilm.com but they don't have it).
Albert Dekker made some good films in the fifties but not many are now remembered. The two most memorable are "The Killers" and "Dr Cyclops". In "The Killers" he played the ruthless leader of a crooked gang; he set out to find the guy who had deceived him over a woman and a haul of money. Great film. From a Hemingway short story, the first twenty minutes of the film transpose the story almost word for word to the film - after that it's flashbacks.
It was remade with Albert Dekker's role taken by Ronald Reagan, his last film before he decided to solve the world's problems!
The acting was superb and the play was a near masterpiece (flawed I felt by Millar's tendecy to preach and to generalise - but it was an early play). What I found particularly admirable was the set: it often is one of the failings of amateur productions that the set design and construction is less than adequate; this was excellent.
The play deals with an aircraft manufacturer who has supplied faulty parts of engines thus indirectly causing the deaths of 21 pilots and the repercussions of his crime. I had seen the play before, I remembered, not as a play but as a film. With Albert Dekker. Think I can find any reference to the film? The only film I can track down is one which had Edward G, Robinsion and Burt Lancaster in it. It is definitely not the film I saw but one which I would like to see (I am a member of lovefilm.com but they don't have it).
Albert Dekker made some good films in the fifties but not many are now remembered. The two most memorable are "The Killers" and "Dr Cyclops". In "The Killers" he played the ruthless leader of a crooked gang; he set out to find the guy who had deceived him over a woman and a haul of money. Great film. From a Hemingway short story, the first twenty minutes of the film transpose the story almost word for word to the film - after that it's flashbacks.
It was remade with Albert Dekker's role taken by Ronald Reagan, his last film before he decided to solve the world's problems!
Saturday 3 October 2009
Robert Wise
Robert Wise's output was so varying in content and style that he is not easy to categorise: he made critically acclaimed films like "The Set Up", horror films in his early years and, of course the immensely popular "The Sound of Music". David Thomson, the American critic, is not a fan: "he wandered easily into mediocrity or worse...." "he brought to the screen the appalling but grotesqely successful 'The Sound of Music' ". I get the feeling that as a young director of horror films like "The Curse of the Cat People" he showed great promise which, later, was dissipated in a materialistic union with Hollywood values.
Robert Wise returned to his horror genre later when he directed an immensely scary film called "The Haunting". Whenever I walk under trees in the wind, as I did today, that first scene of "The Haunting" comes to mind as the heroine, maybe a bit deranged, walks towards the house that is the scene of the haunting. Makes me shiver now. I don't think I can watch the film again. When it's put on now, on TCM or Film 4, it's always late at night; you can't watch that and hope for a good night's sleep.
The remake, I am told, is poor in comparision.
The "appalling" "The Sound of Music" ran in Cardiff for ages and I avoided seeing it then (I have since seen it on TV) not wishing to drown in syrupy sentimentality. There was a woman who attended every performance of the film, afternoon and evening. Eventually the manager of the cinema decided to let her in for nothing (maybe with the idea that if the sound track broke down she'd be able to supply the vocals to the "miming" on the screen!).
I don't suppose he was one of the great directors but it seems to me he was an artisan who did his best to make what he was given to direct entertaining.
But surely, if you want to talk of"classic Horrors", "The Haunting" is up there with the scariest of them.
Robert Wise returned to his horror genre later when he directed an immensely scary film called "The Haunting". Whenever I walk under trees in the wind, as I did today, that first scene of "The Haunting" comes to mind as the heroine, maybe a bit deranged, walks towards the house that is the scene of the haunting. Makes me shiver now. I don't think I can watch the film again. When it's put on now, on TCM or Film 4, it's always late at night; you can't watch that and hope for a good night's sleep.
The remake, I am told, is poor in comparision.
The "appalling" "The Sound of Music" ran in Cardiff for ages and I avoided seeing it then (I have since seen it on TV) not wishing to drown in syrupy sentimentality. There was a woman who attended every performance of the film, afternoon and evening. Eventually the manager of the cinema decided to let her in for nothing (maybe with the idea that if the sound track broke down she'd be able to supply the vocals to the "miming" on the screen!).
I don't suppose he was one of the great directors but it seems to me he was an artisan who did his best to make what he was given to direct entertaining.
But surely, if you want to talk of"classic Horrors", "The Haunting" is up there with the scariest of them.
Thursday 1 October 2009
WNO
The Welsh National Opera's production of Alban Berg's opera "Wozzeck" was stupendous. Though the opera is, as Geoff Brown in The Times put it, "still a prickly customer after 84 years", the performance was excellent in every respect: the singing, the design, the production by Richard Jones, everything.
For me the feature that makes me not go completely overboard is the music itself: Alban Berg was a student of Schonberg's and it shows. The twelve tone scale stuff is, to my ears, still difficult to enjoy and though Berg's music seems to be a mixture of 12 tone with more tonal music, it still jars.
However, it was an enjoyable experience since it is a dramatic opera with elements that are pathetic, horrifying, tragic and at times quite scary and the acting of the principals was superb.
Quite frankly I never thought the WNO capable of such wonderful work. I have been disappointed in the past by many operas they have staged - "Salome" recently was a big disappointment, and "Hansel and Gretel" though musically thrilling was, I thought, rather dull in performance and design - I had formed the opinion that everything they did was rather second rate. This performance of "Wozzeck" dispelled all such thoughts. Now they can stand tall with the best in the country, if not the world.
Next year Wagner. Something to be looked forward to now.
For me the feature that makes me not go completely overboard is the music itself: Alban Berg was a student of Schonberg's and it shows. The twelve tone scale stuff is, to my ears, still difficult to enjoy and though Berg's music seems to be a mixture of 12 tone with more tonal music, it still jars.
However, it was an enjoyable experience since it is a dramatic opera with elements that are pathetic, horrifying, tragic and at times quite scary and the acting of the principals was superb.
Quite frankly I never thought the WNO capable of such wonderful work. I have been disappointed in the past by many operas they have staged - "Salome" recently was a big disappointment, and "Hansel and Gretel" though musically thrilling was, I thought, rather dull in performance and design - I had formed the opinion that everything they did was rather second rate. This performance of "Wozzeck" dispelled all such thoughts. Now they can stand tall with the best in the country, if not the world.
Next year Wagner. Something to be looked forward to now.
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