Tag Archives: In Bruges

Oct 23 2022
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Art, Cinema, Film, Movie, Movies, Uncategorized

The Banshees of Inisherin (2022).

Funny, indeed hilarious at times, sad, melancholic, and rather quite depressing, this is one grand odyssey into loneliness, boredom, and existential crisis that just isn’t spontaneous or … watchable enough to be up there with In Bruges (2008) or The Guard (2011), but it’s certainly something different. It takes so long to get going, though, and there’s only so much material you can draw from the Craggy Island setting.

Still, it’s better than most, and has the best performance by a donkey since Au Hasard Balthazar (1966).

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May 25 2019
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Architecture, Building, Construction, Edinburgh, Film, Movie, Movies, Photography, Scotland, Tourism, Uncategorized

Scott Monument, Edinburgh.

Monument final Image with adjusted curves

Took this snap with a Tesco Hudl tablet hoisted on a wee micro tripod, crawling on the floor as some tourists stood bemused at my ‘antics’. It was during this moment that I recalled a troupe of Americans got stuck in the monument’s staircase on their attempted ascent to the top. It was Edinburgh’s own version of In Bruges (2008). What a hoot.

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Feb 12 2019
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Architecture, Britain, Edinburgh, Photography, Tourism, Travel, Uncategorized, United Kingdom

Princes Street wasn’t always a toilet.

I fucking hate Princes Street. It’s dire, chock-full of stores that appear designed exclusively for desperate housewives. There are also mobile phone shops and a budget book place – this curious number sells no novels, the only items on display autobiographies of pointless celebrities and road maps of Denmark published in 2004. All very bizarre. Added to this is the plethora of American tourists crawling about with their bumbags on, elephants in the In Bruges (2008) sense.

Princes Street looked decent in 1858, though. No spackers to be seen here.

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Jun 17 2016
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Uncategorized

In Bruges.

in-bruges-opening-walk

I spent two weeks in Belgium back in December 2010. Britain had denuded back to the Ice Age and all flights were grounded. What began as a cheeky booze-fuelled weekend in Brussels turned out to be one long, cold, depressing nightmare of manky hostels and an overload of waffles. It was dirty, dull, and overwhelmingly boring. I despised the place by my departure, a 35-hour bus journey back to Edinburgh the cherry on the cake (or waffle). Considering recent developments in Belgium, however, it wasn’t that bad in retrospect.

There was one sort of magical vignette – a day in Bruges, inspired by the movie … In Bruges (2008). A character in the film describes it as a “fairytale” place, and he’s spot on. A strange otherworldliness permeates the streets, the town an eerie remnant, it seems, of the Middle Ages.

The brilliance of the movie is in its transposing of a contemporary comedy thriller into this antiquated dwelling where time briefly stands still. Perhaps being *in* Bruges is modern-day purgatory. A belter of a movie.

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