Author Archives: Ben Gould
The Empire Strikes Back (1980) is perfection.
Back to the cinema.
I first purchased this bad boy in ‘Alps Second Hand Shop’ on Dalry Road in the scorching summer of ’99, which remains to this day the greatest era of recent cinema and probably my life. The VHS was a battered, well-worn pan and scan number that cost less than today’s fare for a single bus journey on one of our ghastly maroon peasant wagons. It suffices to say that the following two hours were a religious experience. The video, if you are curious to know, looked exactly like this:
Ocean Terminal’s Vue Cinema reopened yesterday after a lengthy hibernation, the new ‘distancing epoch’ peppered with PPE and anti-bacterial spray flying everywhere. They are showing some classics, presumably because studios are unsure as to how to proceed with their new releases. £5.99 a ticket for this cinematic baptism? Yes, yes, yes.
What a BELTER it is, magically flawless, deep escapism imbued with universal themes, a compendium of genre tropes and technique. PhDs have been written about this motion picture, and I cannot pinpoint even a single thing in it that should not … be in it. One could deem the experience Citizen Kane (1941) in space. There is no point me highlighting the highlights, as we all know what those are.
“NOOOOOOOOOO, NOOOOOOOOO!”
I would just like to say that 99.9% of cinema today is fucking gash, total tripe. Pure shite.
This isn’t.
How Better Call Saul got great.
This show took a LONG time to get going but bloody hell once it did … oaft!
It finally shrugged off the tedious, totally unnecessary and frankly plodding shite with Saul’s brother, and now Saul is firmly in the criminal underworld (rather than dipping in and out) things have been much more tasty. There is also another reason for its current awesomeness: Lalo Salamanca.
He is by far the most charismatic ‘villain’ from both Saul and Breaking Bad, and the proof that moustaches aren’t just for novelty value. The bloke needs a spin-off show from this spin-off show. It’s an obvious statement, but characters make shows. And the lack of them in their dimensions is why most of the stuff out there is garbage. Stringer Bell in The Wire, Ralph Cifaretto in The Sopranos, Lalo is up there.
I think I am in love.
Düsseldorf 2011.
Another wee throwback to the good ol’ days.
No masks, gloves, or hand sanitiser were harmed during the production of this photograph, though a wasp did sadly meet its demise in my glass of … whatever concoction that is.
Like almost every item from the travelogue, I cared little for this place when I was there. Nostalgia is a powerful thing.
The St. James Centre was an architectural crime.
One of the very few cases (I wasn’t alive during the bombing of Dresden circa 1945) of rubble being more aesthetically pleasing than the shopping centre that was previously stood there … gawking at folk. It was Medusa in building form.
A horrible thing.
Gorgie is back in business. Edinburgh lives.
Nothing much to see here, just a Gorgie bar that has been resurrected. Sat in the pishing rain guzzling warm beer the price of your local hourly wage – #LifeGoals and all that.
I have never been in here but denizens of the ‘hood inform me that it is okay. Perhaps the backdrop puts me off; it reminds me of the Soviet Union circa 1991. Not that I ever saw it.
Bye for now.
