Radiohead's Bond theme

https://soundcloud.com/radiohead/spectre

I've been waiting years for Radiohead to get asked to write a theme to a Bond film. This was rejected? For Sam Smith?

A really sad reflection of how safe cosy and predictable this film series has become since the knockout Casino Royal. I wonder which Mum's Favourite will be providing the next Bond theme?

Is it time for Bruce Forsyth?

Give me Spielberg's demented "1 9 4 1" over "It's a Wonderful Life" any Christmas Eve

Directors cut of Spielberg's 1 9 4 1 is a an unlikely but brilliant movie for Christmas - if you don't have family around.

My Christmas eve set piece movie was 3.5 hour directors cut of Spielberg's underappreciated epic comedy "1 9 4 1", flavoured with a great German cheese and a nice Riesling.

I'd actually forgotten the great directors grand folly is actually set at Christmas in LA and Hollywood (in the panicky aftermath of Pearl Harbour) making it a strangely Californian yuletide movie. I enjoyed myself so much I can't wait to repeat it  as a seasonal event next year.

I guess it depends on your sense of humour and state of mind but I find the standard, truncated version of the movie funny anyway, and the extended directors cut is definitely the way to see it. With lots more Dan Ackroyd and John Candy this makes it much more of a continuation of 1970s Saturday Night Live and Animal House and much less of the straight Spielberg film we were all expecting in the aftermath of Close Encounters and the run up to Raiders Of The Lost Ark.

Also in the extra hour of footage are more mad cameos such as John Landis and Sam Fuller (as USAF's equivalent of Battle of Britain's Hugh Dowding, here trying to coordinate an air defense against a non existent Japanese air attack). Outside in Hollywood December 1941 war fever has created civil breakdown while those who should be in charge, like Robert Stack's General Stillwell, in indoors watching the premier of "Dumbo".

"Ladies and gentlemen, every where I look... soldiers are fighting sailors, sailors are fighting Marines! Directly in front of me, I see a flying ...blond... floozy.. Everywhere I look... everywhere, pure pandemonium... pandemonium  "

There is also more music,  particulary John William's magnificent parody of a jingoistic war movie march, and more of the musical flow which sends it some way towards the ribald bad taste musical it probably should have been written as.

It still has rough edges - there is still too much coked up John Belushi and it is now even less politically correct for modern standards (what old film is?) while probably being far too correct to reflect the actual prejudices of the time.

"I'd like to thank all the GI's for helping make tonight's evening such a... a memorable occasion. Maybe in the future we can have some Negroes come in and we'll stage a race riot... right here. "

If the standard sugary tripe at this time of year is getting to you and you think you can handle something like Dad's Army on 50 mojitos try and find the version of this movie as it should have been released originally. It's a blast.



The rest of my My Hellish Solo Christmas for the benefit of John Lewis's advertising team

Chosen theme : Madagascar, all the movies, specials and tv series including new netflix "All Hail King Julien!"

Chosen music : new Eagles of Death Metal Album, specifically masterful cover of Save A Prayer For Me Now

SPECTRE REVIEW

Now I know what the fans of DR NO and FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE felt like when they saw DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER.

'Paris Vinci'

If you've seen True Detective S2 you'll know the best thing about it is the setting, Vinci, an industrial estate no-zone in the centre of LA.

​I finally got around to staying in the Paris hotel in Wes Anderson's HOTEL CHEVALIER
but I didn't, it was expensive and I got guilted into staying somewhere less ostentatious
(I'll do it next time)

Instead I find myself in a hotel so far out of town the local metro station gives only only location - 'Paris'
And I walked here from Paris Nord​. This seemed like a good idea last weekend when I walked ten miles from N1 to the Millenium Dome. Less so today.

Just read the wiki page on Syd Barret in the only open earterie in the district...
 (August means everywhere including hotel bar and restaurant in the district is closed)

...and apparently when Syd Barret moved back from his London flat to live in Cambridge with his mum he walked the whole distance. 50 miles.
I just starting to think "oh I bet that was fun" when I realised the poor guy man was totally cuckoo for coco-pops at the time.

Anyhoo
Some of these these out of town, out of time, out of this world hotels on the outskirts are more interesting than staying in a tourist trap in town. My week long stay at the Jerry Anderson-esque Hesperia Hotel "in" Barcelona at the start of my 2010 roadtrip was so good I'm planning to drive back next year.

This 'business hotel' in a half abandoned industrial estate would probably be really depressing in say.. Slough.. but the French never allow anything to get that boring.

Just wish the bar was open.

A lesson in film production and man management : ANT-MAN vs FANTASTIC FOUR (2015)

There is actually a great conversation to be had about Ant-Man and Fantastic Four which is actually about competent/incompetent movie production and basic man management skills.

Film director starts work on a singular, perhaps risky, vision of an existing property. Studio backs him initially.

• Marvel Studious with Edgar Wright
• Josh Trank with Fantastic Four (2015)

Movie/movies are released during production which makes the studio hesitate;

• Iron Man and Avengers create a connected world which doesn't fit with Edgar Wrights vision
• Guardian of the Galaxy proves bright and cheery space opera and superheroes is a valid mix after all

Studio has to make a decision;

• Marvel amicably splits with Edgar Wright but salvages most of his vision for another director to complete. Result - Ant-Man is somewhat faithful to Edgar Wright and pretty much everyone is happy.
• Fox lets Josh Trank complete the majority of his movie, then spreads rumours about his onset behaviour, then sacks him and reshoots it. Result - a complete car crash.

And lets not forget this is Fox's second disaster of this kind with this iconic comic property. In their previous failed attempt to adapt the most famous plotline from this set of characters Fox executives similarly got cold feet during production and slashed the budget, resulting in one of the most famous and recognisable characters in comics being portrayed onscreen as a cloud.

UPDATED Hank and Janet Pym make Marvel's 1980s look very interesting (ANT-MAN review)

Marvel's Edgar Wright  'disaster' is actually the most Pixar of Marvel movies, great for a pre-teen audience, and rich in fascinating alt-history for Marvel's already rich alt-Universe. I'm going to list how much has now changed.
This has now been updated to show the original Ant-Man opening scene.

****LOTS OF SPOILERS******

In the very first scene we have a flashback to Marvel's 1989. It has a Hank Pym, played by Michael Douglas - amazingly de-aged to look as it he's just walked off  Oliver Stone's Wall Street, quitting SHIELD before Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell aged to look in her 70s) and Howard Stark (John Slattery).

After this we can make a few assumptions

WHAT WE KNOW SO FAR

1972
Arnim Zola, HYDRA survivor and corruptor of SHIELD dies and is digitised
Tech note : presumably digitised on IBMs ...which would be appropriate for IBMs links to he Nazis pre WW2.

1974
Stark Expo flasback in Iron Man 2 has Howard Stark neglecting Tony.

Late 1970s
SHIELD ANT-MAN propaganda movie made (shown in another Ant-Man flashback)
Hank Pym refuses to hand suit over or the technology and becomes Ant Man himself.

1984
Natasha Romanov (Black Widow) is born in USSR,

Mid-80s
Pym and Van Dyne active as Ant Man and the Wasp.

1987
Janet Van Dyne becomes lost in Quantum Realm after disarming a Soviet ICBM by shrinking to sub atomic size.

1988 ?
Pym active as Ant-Man solo? The original Ant-Man opening scene apparently has Pym stealing microfilm from a Panamanian general. (In the first Edgar Wright draft this is set in the 1960s which would have put it outside the continuity listed here).

1989 
Pym quits because SHIELD (HYDRA?) is trying to replicate his work
Alexander Pierce secretly joins HYDRA

1991
Howard Stark and wife assassinated by HYDRA

Early 1990s (?)
Alexander Pierce (Robert Redford in Winter Solidier) has his life saved by up and coming SHIELD agent Nick Fury in Bogota.
Alexander Pierce gives up Directorship of SHIELD to Fury.


Notes
* In Ant -Man HYDRA sure is interested in the Pym's technology - and weirdly during the Project Insight revelations in Winter Soldier neither Hank, either of the Van Dynes (or Darren 'Yellowjacket' Cross) is listed as a threat to HYDRA. Hank quits only shortly before Howard Stark is killed and from what we know HYDRA must be aware of him. Does Pym know a lot more about the workings on SHIELD at that time than the others? Did he quit at HYDRA's insistence or was he tipped off?

* Hank Pym - an actual agent for SHIELD is not listed as a threat by HYDRA but Dr Steven Strange is on that list. So Steven Strange is known to HYDRA but not apparently to SHIELD. How long? Ant Man treated us to 1980s flashbacks - how far back could Dr Strange go? Anything is possible.... 1960s Greenwich village is my vote.

* Pym worked with Stark - did he work with Anton Vanko? Anton was father of Ivan from Iron Man 2, now revealed to have with a very similar grudge to Pym, in that convinced Howard was stealing his work.The reputation of the Stark's in starting to look less glorious with every movie.

* Unlike Howard Stark, Pym's treatment of daughter Hope looks like that an obsessive parent - what did he think of Howard Stark's neglect of young Tony? With similarly obsessive busy parents did Tony and Hope Van Dyne grow up together?

* When Pym revolts he refuses to hand suit over and becomes Ant Man. This is very reminiscent of Tony Stark's later behaviour with Iron Man suit. Was a young Tony a witness to some of that debate? How much of Tony's behaviour is actually inspired by Pym? <cough> Ultron

* The suited up Janet Van Dyne really looked the part as the original Wasp in another brief flashback. Her daughter, Hope, with her marital arts skills  and gun collection, hardly looks science material - can we assume she takes from her mother in this regard? Put it this way - would SHIELD allow a scientific asset as valuable as Pym go on tactical missions without backup? Suddenly Janet Van Dyne looks more likely to be a tactical field agent than Hank's lab partner and if a field agent she is most likely a protege of Peggy Carter,  This would make Janet Van Dyne Peggy Olsen to Peggy Carter's Joan, with Roger Sterling as Howard Stark of course. (Sorry - just watched the end of Mad Men).

* If so Janet's disappearance would be doubly traumatic for Carter who similarly lost Steve Rogers without trace. When did Carter retire? After Howard Stark's death in 1991? If so these few years, roughly contemporary to the fall of the Berlin wall and the end of the Cold War, look almost like a sudden coup by HYDRA, perhaps prompted by their failure of their Soviet project, LEVIATHAN (seen in Agent Carter).

* Van Dyne would also probably the same generation as Jenny Agutta's Councilwoman Hawley of the World Security Council (from Avengers, Winter Soldier), who is British and likely another Carter protege.

* Possibly Van Dyne (as Wasp?) recruited Romanov from the clutches of the KGB to make another generation of Carter protege's along with Maria Hill and Agent 13, Susan Carter (Winter Soldier again).

* Perhaps more likely - did Pym and Van Dyne ever cross swords with the Winter Soldier?.. I guess we might find out next year.

Finally - we all know who is going to be cast as Janet Van Dyne, so stop haggling over money and give her a call!

CZJ in Entrapment

TrailerParkLife : Blur's THE MAGIC WHIP as a soundtrack to THE PERIPHERAL

I've been enjoying the new William Gibson novel, The Peripheral.

Blur's THE MAGIC WHIP, starts like a Blur Album, but isn't.
The first four track, Street", "New World Towers", "Go Out" and "Ice Cream Man" are playfull and fun - like a good lost Gorillaz album with Graham Coxon adding some  previously missing gravitas.
It has the tragic playfulness of trailerParklife in Clanton 2030.

From the Bowie-esque "Thought I Was a Spaceman"  however the mood changes into
something more resembling the latter Blur of Albarn James and Rowntree, but with quite a bit more pomp, power and effect.

"I Broadcast"  "My Terracotta Heart", "There Are Too Many of Us", "Ghost Ship", "Pyongyang" are all 3D tunes of late 21st C melancholy.
Magic Whip ends like a Blur album but isn't - it is a sequel to Albarn's The Good The Bad and the Queen but with added Blur.
It neatly fits the mournful doom of London 2100.