Get a Bloomin’ Move-On

Twitter can distract. Time I would have given to reviewing Is there anybody there? which Lucy and I went to see at the flix last night, went instead on a hugely enjoyable silly conversation with fellow twits, conducted largely through the medium of quotes from The Italian Job (and Educating Rita).

This was the day I helped Catherine and Tim move into their new flat in Reading (with Anna’s help). There was no spare time for being silly. I will review Mr Caine’s latest Screen Gem tomorrow, but was intrigued to come across the following information from Wikipedia about our all-time favourite Caper movie:

In 2008 the Royal Society of Chemistry held a competition for members of the public to propose solutions to how the cliffhanger was solved, insisting that the solution had to have a plausible basis in science, and was to take not more than 30 minutes and not use a helicopter...

The winning solution: Break and remove two large side windows just aft of the pivot point and let the glass fall away outside to lose its weight. Break two windows over the two front axles; keep the broken glass onboard to keep its weight for balance. Let a man out on a rope through the front broken windows (not to rest his weight on the ground) and he deflates all the bus's front tyres, to reduce the bus's rocking movement about its pivot point. Drain the fuel tank, which was aft of the pivot point; that changes the balance enough to let a man get out and gather heavy rocks to load the front of the bus. Unload the bus. Wait until a suitable vehicle passes on the road, and hijack it and carry the gold away in it.

So there you have it. remember where you first heard it...

In the Loop: Fake Hawk Down

Imagine, if you can, a world of soundbite politics where the machinery of power is operated by vacillating professional politicians, out of their depth, jumping to the whims of ruthless, feral spin doctors. Everyone is trying to use everyone else, but they don’t quite know what for, making it up as they go along, riding the tiger of inter-departmental politics, sending the whole world to smash in vain attempts to save their faces.

Armando Iannucci’s comedy presents history as pure cockup rather than conspiracy. Imagine Burn after Reading writ large & lurid across UK/US corridors of power, a blow-up version of AI’s The Thick of It. It easily translates to world stage and big screen.

The Big Plot of the film may not actually quite convince, perhaps because the Blair/Bush figures are a bit too far behind the curtain, but the tactical delivery system is absolutely first rate. Brace yourself for some of the foulest-mouthed comments ever committed to celluloid, remembering they are only just a little bit North of the way some among our burgeoning class of political special advisers seem to express themselves.

Peter Capaldi’s Alistair Campbell character is a riot of egotism, obscenity and ambition. Not-so-steadycam shots and quick pans add pace and a well-judged smidgin of documentary atmosphere to the whole absurd business, in a non-annoying way. Laugh at the ludicrous, but remember that penning a tale about sexing up information to order with entire disregard for truth, morality, or the human beings involved, did not call for much invention from Mr Iannucci.


It’s good to see a movie driven by a sharp script, not CGI. Lines are delivered pretty much perfectly, although some may wonder how someone as gormless as Tom Hollander’s Minister of Overseas Development made it anywhere beyond kindergarten. There are visual gags too, including a memorable moment when Mimi Kennedy (no relation) accidentally transforms herself in the Ladies’ rest room from jaded State Department senior into a Frankenstein monster. James Gandolfini richly deserves a chestful of medals for his portrayal of a big chunky but dove-ish five star general — “When you’ve been to war once you don’t want to go there again — like France...”

Perhaps we’re just a sarcastic bunch in High Wycombe, but the belly laughs rolled around the auditorium in a way I haven’t seen them do in a long while. It’s strange to live in a place where such a portrayal of our politicians and their advisers inspires knowing looks rather than depair, but if Mr Campbell & his chums really didn’t want to go down in history this way, as they are doing, their obvious remedy at the time would have been to stop behaving in ways that inspired it. Sleep tight tonight.

The Compleat (Secret) Dick

After the dark psychotic loonery of No Country for Old Men, the Coen Bros Get Smart in Burn after Reading:

OK, here’s the skinny. The Busted Baldy is John Malkovich. The Blithering Bastard is George Clooney. The Bewildered Bimbo is Frances McDormand. The Bitch is Tilda Swinton, alongside Brad Pitt, the Butch. Playing at the top of their games, in this movie everyone plays the complete bloody fool. The dense fog of secret war surrounds the lot, and all you can make out through the Coen brothers’ stylish and spicy farrago of idiocy are ignorant armies clashing by night, but in broad daylight, like drunken fairground bumper car drivers who wouldn’t stop just because the sun had come up.

This is both a terrrible and a brilliant film. It's a complete and total mess, but somehow the Bros pull it off, and Catherine, Tim and I were vastly entertained. I think we learnt something, too. Although there are laughs aplenty to be had, the most powerful well-equipped outfit in the world is as incapable of working out what the hell’s going on as the rest of us. This is the stuff whereof crises are made, friends. Sleep tight tonight.