You stick a black-and-white filter on a bog-standard snap and it almost elevates the scene into something other than an iPhone image taken from the back of a freezing cold bus interior at 7:00 a.m.
Life hobbies.
York Place, Edinburgh.
Author Archives: Ben Gould
Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) is rather masterful.
This film is pretty much unique in its mastery of tone, a sense that you really don’t know whether it’s a drama or a comedy or where it’s going – it’s almost two or three genres in one and it’s informative to read the director’s quote about how they managed to achieve this no small feat: ‘With Grosse Pointe Blank I shot three movies simultaneously. We shot the script as written, we shot a mildly understated version, and we shot a completely over-the-top version, which usually was what was used.’
There’s a sweeping theme here of trying to recapture something that was never really there in the first place, the most thoughtful treatment of nostalgia ever to feature in what is ostensibly a comedy with gunfights. Only a peak John Cusack – the only ’80s geek to graduate to the postmodern – could carry it off. And as High School reunions go, ‘Mirror in the Bathroom’ should accompany each event:
A flawless movie. Even Dan Aykroyd is great in it and I generally cannot stand the lad.
I very rarely turn a movie off but Napoleon Dynamite (2004) had to get in the bin.
I saw this in the cinema when it came out and thought it amusing but couldn’t quite articulate why. Now I get it: you’re just laughing at these ‘characters’ and how stupid they are. I don’t find it funny to laugh at this. Almost every scene is an extended shot of our aloof protagonist doing something unusual and not being aware of it. That’s about it. Another one of these self-consciously ‘quirky’ movies about absolutely nothing – celebrating geekdom is not a subject matter – that goes quite literally nowhere. And I hate Jamiroquai.
Even the opening titles irritated me. Total pish.
Gilmore Place, Edinburgh.
Not trying to blow my own Harold Bishop, but this has to be the most flattering photograph ever taken of Gilmore Place.
Willow (1988). Why did I ever like this?
Another gem from yesteryear best stayed away from, Willow (1988) is embarrassing at times. There’s so much wrong going on, from a village of midgets to Val Kilmer in a dress to the ropy special effects to the overbearing James Horner score which he’s regurgitated for decades. It’s so lethargically paced, badly scripted and ultimately derivative that I’m even questioning the sanity of … myself for once thinking it a decent way to spend two hours.
The characters are some of the most thinly drawn I’ve seen, and so too is the realm or kingdom they inhabit. It’s just lakes and hills and a few castles. Boring. Shockingly, it’s a PG-certificated film. I find this rather beguiling as the violence on display is way too much for the little ones (kids, not midgets). There is one thing to recommend, though: Val Kilmer briefly metamorphoses into a pig.
Easter Road as lively as ever.
The title was a joke (haha). Nah, this is as dead as I’ve ever seen it, even if it’s an early morning snap. The Mash Tun over the road – not a bad wee pub that. I expect it will be rammed on a daily basis once the Epoch of Corona ends.
Always scenes here.
This place and I go way back. It’s gone through so many transformations over the years that I wish I had taken a yearly snap just to document the evolution. Highlight? I once saw a bloke in scuba gear doing backstrokes … in February.
Wanderings and ... wonderings. 