Tribute to John Peel

This is just a brief tribute to the late great broadcaster, John Peel - always enjoyable to listen to or to watch, whether it was on Radio 1, Radio 4 or the TV - one of the few British greats.

Wedding Photos (First batch) - Thanks Kim!

I have finally got around to posting a few photos of our wedding in August. First of all, huge thanks must go to Kim for all his photographic efforts, skill, and dare I say sartorial elegance. All the photographs (of which this is only a small selection) bring back memories of a very happy (and sunny!) day. Click on the photos to view a bigger version, and click on Comments to leave a comment!

In the church - look to the right for Romain's big grin!







David signs the register with my Dad (John) and us watching him on



I think the pastor (Graham Beeston) must have said something funny here...?

Kill Bill...Why?...I like David Carradine.

I finally got around to watching Kill Bill Vol. 1 (I went about the whole Kill Bill thing back-to-front) after having been intrigued, but a bit disappointed by the second volume. I know it's a bit weird to watch them backwards as it were, but I'm glad I did, as I appreciated the fun, hack n'slash homages to Asian chopsocky and samurai cinema in vol 1 all the more for the languid pace of the second. The plot is obvious revenge - and let's face it, this 2-parter film never reaches the heights of the divine Jackie Brown or the shocking debut of Reservoir Dogs (owing more style-wise to the over-rated Pulp Fiction) - but if you sit back and relax to the Manga, Lady Snowblood, Babycart and Zatoichi strains, it's much more fun. In many ways, the loose plotting is all part and parcel of the homage - who remembers the plot of any Bruce Lee film apart from Enter the Dragon? I'm not sure that the whole film will stay in the mind, but much of the criticism I've read on imdb seems to be attacking Tarantino for having fun - why should we expect him to make a masterpiece every time? Scorcese doesn't, Lucas doesn't, Kurosawa didn't and neither did Godard (does anyone understand why Bande a Part is a classic?). Anyway, this is mindless fun for the martial arts enthusiast - think more John Woo, less Ang Lee.

As an NB: I went to see Wimbledon last weekend, expecting it be pants, but it was actually a charming, unpretentious little film - I just wish they hadn't tried to Hugh-Grantify Paul Bettany (who was great in Gangster No 1. and Master and Commander).

See(n) Saw

We went to see Saw at the weekend, and it was entertaining in a Seven way with a bit of added gore. It was fun seeing Cary Elwes not in tights - but I'm not sure I really understand why the killer was so obsessed with knocking off (or in one [maybe two] case(s) not knocking off) his particular victims, nor do I understand why the "jigsaw" aspect was so abruptly dropped. Anyway, it was fun and pretty well done, and kept you going mostly to the end (even if you had spotted the likely twist at the very beginning of the film).

Gus van Sant's Elephant was more interesting (we watched it on video), in a very straightforward, let's represent a Columbine situation, way. The end sequences managed to be both beautifully shot in an almost prosaic style (althought the careful attention to light showed this to be anything but cinema verite) as well as punching home in a generally scary manner.