the plebians' Christmas-New Year Message

Saw this Mandy Patinkin interview on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert: clearly freedom of speech is not dead. Clearly voices of dissent from the promulgated hierarchy are heard. CLEARLY our brothers and sisters and children in whatever religion they believe, will listen. Who in their right mind would not wish to have said what Mr Patinkin said:

Children Will Listen

Joy the movie is on general release Jan 1


If Joy isn’t your cup of tea, fair do’s. Then what about Danny Boyle’s Steve Jobs? He’s on record stating he doesn’t much care for bio-pics. The weird thing about this movie-where you would think factual accuracy would be paramount (not that it isn’t)- is that THAT doesn’t seem to matter so much. Writer Aaron Sorkin and Boyle have created a stupendous film about an individual human seeing the future and the cost of that to those surrounding/aiding/abetting him. The Steve Jobs film project was kicked around so much acting talent in Hollywood it became almost a joke. Less so its director helmers, David Fincher being one. It is a classic Hollywood story that Boyle’s final cast seem so so perfect after so much tumult.

A spoiler really to say too much. Except, after seeing Steve Jobs it would be hard to say no to anything Boyle was involved with: such is his consummate ‘Jobs’ like hands on presence. Did I mention the great editing/cinematography/the entire production team! The genius of Michael Fassbender acting Steve Jobs. [PS- anyone see Fassbender in the brilliantly horrific Eden Lake?]

As for Jobs the man? Well, it’s not way off the truth in any way. And most of the truth is all there on the internet for the curious. Those who remember will remember how very maligned by many non-believers Apple was back in the mid 90s. It’s a scary film. Scary because it delves into the human, the very thing Steve Jobs wanted for his computers. The very thing he wanted for the world if somewhat unattainable for himself. It’s not binary. You can be decent and gifted at the same time. Steve Wozniak

Happy Wolf Day

Fable - Janos Pilinszky

Once upon a time
there was a lonely wolf
lonelier than the angels.
He happened to come to a village.
He fell in love with the first house he saw.
Already he loved its walls
the caresses of its bricklayers.
But the windows stopped him.
In the room sat people.
Apart from God nobody ever
found them so beautiful
as this child-like beast.
So at night he went into the house.
He stopped in the middle of the room
and never moved from there any more.
He stood all through the night, with wide eyes
and on into the morning when he was beaten to death.

..

....

The September 2015 BBC Prom: Elgar - The Dream of Gerontius
(Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by 
Sir Simon Rattle). Re-broadcast Dec 30th and available thereafter)

PS: The streets of Manhattan (34-60th) ground to a halt this morning (Dec 30) due to the funeral of Joseph Lemm: an NYPD officer who was killed in Afghanistan. Daily Mail. In no way diminishing the respect and loss for this American, but so so SO SO many have others have 'fallen' in nations throughout the world. Their names rarely ever EVER are mentioned. All: another statistic in wars that arguably with better management should never have offered up such casualties, or indeed been fought in the first place. THE FALLEN

It might interest those who read my wee blog to know that the United States of America still considers itself to be or soon to be or ever was thus the ruler of the world in all but name (that is THEIR view clearly secretly promulgated through their 'patches'-watch link at end-- not mine own absinthe paranoia;). A very VERY hard working investigative SOMEONE named Trevor Paglen (contributed cinematography of surveillance bases to the 2015 Oscar-winning documentary Citizenfour) did a 'Chomsky' ie he never broke official secrets acts or released confidential documents he should not have: he very simply is/was a Dashiell Hammett private dick who put the pieces of the pie together and found the hidden agenda of a missing chunk. He's very much in Mark Thomas vein (but when I asked Trevor he'd never heard of him). Totally believe that. Who in the wider world has ever heard or listened to Trevor Paglen? Loved the $5 Macy's Santa Claus this year.

[The Metropolitan Police's Crime Museum is usually closed to the public. For the first time ever The Museum of London has a temporary exhibition showing 600 of the 2000 items it contains.]

Art/activism or comics live forever foreplay?
Simon Denny

remember that dude George Orwell...they mad(e) him up, yo?!
In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

Trumbo opens Feb 5- it may be a bio-pic but the performances are outstanding. And if that man's story is not a story that needs telling and re-telling...
an extra-ordinary man Mr Dalton Trumbo.

...how passé - pass the butter s'il vous plaît...

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Every night...

Actor Warren Mitchell died. Playwright Arthur Miller, on his 80th birthday, is on record saying to friend/playwright Bernard Kops that Mitchell was "the best..the best Willy Loman I ever had". 'His' Death of a Salesman I saw almost every night for an entire theatrical run. You have to crane your neck to see a star...

All My Sons: Every man does have a star. The star of one's honesty. And you spend your life groping for it, but once it's out it never lights again. 





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Dustin Hoffman in Volker Schlöndorff's film was great (and the rest of THAT cast!). Of course. What Warren Mitchell gave that role (and I say this with a very long term memory and a very short (yet very visceral) memory of the movie I’ve seen several times (the ads in the link are a problem but then so is all always are). PLEASE watch Death of a Salesman. Hoffman (not Phil Seymour- though I'm sure he was fantastic too..) : but what Mitchell birthed in that role was WAS the American salesman. So SO much maligned. Perhaps a guy who way way no longer exists/existed on the planet. Let alone America. Willy Loman WAS the birth of America. Perhaps a new post-WW2 America that believed in old-fashioned values- though equally skeptical of such and craved for the NEW. Understandably: they (birth old and new) worked. For everyone. The working man wanted that. They WANTED a Willy Loman. A salesman who needed to sell but who had honesty. Unbelievable but true. But the NEW was always so irresistible, and Willy just couldn't keep pace. He averaged in 1928. Long time go. Is/was time irrelevant? They were real. All the ‘actors’ on the planet were real. Weird, but it took the non-American Warren Mitchell to really ‘nail’ that role of Willy Loman. NOT that Dustin Hoffman has an iota of cynicism in his performance. BUT: maybe it is just in the American DNA that can’t see itself for what it is. Good and bad. Warren Mitchell birthed and inhabited THAT belief. A belief in the common man and his potential. Which was fine up until a point. Hence Arthur Miller’s play.

Who liked J.P. Morgan? Was he impressive? In a Turkish bath he'd look like a butcher. But with his pockets on he was very well liked.

Biff re his Dad Willy: You've just seen a prince walk by. A fine, troubled prince. A hard-working, unappreciated prince. A pal, you understand? A good companion. Always for his boys.

Life (though) (really) has no heroes...

it will always ...have stars so big and yet so so small. The internet will always catch you. It's a yin/yang 'ding'. . . . .  blessed b the internet. Awe.......some....welles......howdy do d.....