Laurel & Hardy in Hog Wild (1930)

Stan and Oliver prove that quality comedy is timeless.

In this talkie short from 1930, Oliver is a henpecked husband, who is nagged into attempting to repair the radio aerial on the roof of the Hardy family home. Needless to say his best friend Stanley is happy to lend a hand.

The film opens with a great skit, involving Oliver searching for his trademark bowler hat (unaware that it is sitting on his head!). In this scene Ollie proves that he is no mere straight man, hanging on to Stan's coat tails, he can pull off comedy timing with the best of them.

Stan arrives on the scene in his car.

He is obviously a great actor. Away from the big screen, having seen interviews with him, and knowing that he wrote a great deal of the material, and directed too he is no idiot, but his ability to pull off the gormless demeanour of the character he portrays on screen is pure bliss.

Ricky Gervais commented recently that one of the reasons he loves Laurel & Hardy, is that their comedy comes from the empathy that you feel for their characters, rather than laughing at their expense.

The boys set about their task, in suitably slapstick style. No matter how many times I watch their movies, I never tire of their humour. Ollie's plaintive looks in to the camera lens when things go awry are priceless.

The final section as the car veers wildly out of control is great, Stan was way ahead of Homer Simpson with his girlish screams (not to mention Ollie using "DOH!" on numerous occasions in their movies).

And the gag at the end with the squished car is the perfect ending to a very enjoyable movie.

These guys managed in 19 minutes what many so called film makers fail to do in 120!

AFI 100 Movies #80 The Wild Bunch (1969)

Sam Peckinpah's reputation for creating violent, action packed, blood soaked movies, on the strength of this viewing is deserved.

The Wild Bunch starts out in Texas in 1913. Pike Bishop, played by William Holden, is the leader of a gang of ageing outlaws, who plan to do one more robbery before retiring.

The gang featuring, amongst others, screen legend Ernest Borgnine (Dutch Engstrom), set out to rob a railroad office, where they learn that a cache of silver is being held.

Unknown to the robbers, the railroad office is being staked out by a posse of men hired by the railroad company, lead by Bishop's former partner Deke Thornton played by Robert Ryan, who has been promised a full pardon if he apprehends the wild bunch.

After the botched robbery attempt, the outlaws make their escape across the border to Mexico, and encounter General Mapache, a corrupt dictator, who wants the outlaws to steal a large consignment of weapons being taken by locomotive to a U.S. army base in exchange for $10,000 in gold.

Angel, a member of the gang, who is opposed to Mapache's regime, makes a deal with Pike to exchange his share of the money offered for one of the cases of weapons to be smuggled to a group of rebels, who want to bring down Mapache.

As you might already have gathered, things go rather awry.

Comparing this film to fellow AFI 100 selection #96 The Searchers, although they're both westerns, The Wild Bunch has a visual style of it's own, with multiple camera angles, as well as slow motion sequences that really emphasise the grimness of the graphic shoot outs.

Although the film runs for a total of 145 minutes, it never feels like any undue padding has been added, and the pace of events keeps you wanting to know what happens next.

So overall, a good solid western.

Doctor Who: Earth Story Boxset

I bought this because of my typically nerdy completist need to own all of the classic series DVDs.

I watched The Gunfighters first as it has been championed by Steven from the Radio Free Skaro podcast and others such as Toby Hadoke (who moderates the commentary on this DVD).

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The story is quite fun, and is a light hearted take on the classic western movie genre.

The Doctor, Steven and Dodo arrive in Tombstone in the 19th century just in time to witness the events that took place prior to the famous shoot out at the OK Corral.

The show is played out as a comedy/drama with the emphasis on comedy. This could be seen as William Hartnell's last full story in the role of the Doctor, as Mr Hartnell's ill health forced the production team to find new and inventive ways to take him out of the story for the bulk of the subsequent serials of the third series.

And I have to say, he's pretty good! Often seen as a rather grumpy individual, Hartnell takes to the comic role with aplomb. Peter Purves should get a special mention also as he was increasingly required to carry the show toward the end of his stay on Doctor Who.

The story is paced well, which can't be said of all 1960s era episodes, the only negative thing I could say, having watched it for the first time, is the frequent use of 'The Ballad Of The Last Chance Saloon' sung well by Lynda Baron, which I found somewhat grating. In fairness this story was only ever considered by the production team to be transmitted once over a four week period, rather than watched back to back in one go.

So, it does enough to shake off it's "worst ever episode" tag (if you have any suggestions post them below), but not quite a classic.



The second DVD in this set is 1984s The Awakening, starring Peter Davison as the Doctor with Janet Fielding and Mark Strickson as Tegan and Turlough.

The story takes place in 1984, in the normally sleepy English village of Little Hodgcombe. Tegan asks the Doctor if they can go and visit her grandfather who lives in the village. It doesn't take long for them to realise that something is wrong.

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Tegan's grandfather has mysteriously disappeared, the rather unpleasant Sir George Hutchinson has sealed off the village so that no one can get in or out, while he plans a re-enactment of a battle that took place in the village during the civil war in 1643, and has plans to make Tegan "Queen of the May", which is not something you would want to be selected for.

During the course of the story, the TARDIS crew befriend Will Chandler,  a peasant from 1643, who has crossed a timeline and ended up in 1984. The Doctor investigates the strange goings on and discovers evidence of an aborted alien invasion back in Will's time, but did all the aliens leave?

I remember liking this watching it the first time around as an eleven year old (God I feel old!), but as John Nathan Turner once famously said "The memory cheats".

There are some good performances, the regular cast are all on full form, and there are some decent turns from the guest cast, particularly Polly James as Jane Hampden and Glyn Houston as Colonel Wolsey.

The problem seems to stem from the lack of time over two episodes to cover all the plot points in a satisfactory manner. In the DVD extras, it is revealed that the story was originally intended to be a four part story, which would explain what would seem to be a rather rushed ending.

As with much of the classic series DVD releases, the bonus material is excellent, with commentaries for both stories,  a retrospective look at the latter part of William Hartnell's tenure as the Doctor, a making of for The Awakening, and the usual informative and entertaining info text, to name a few.

Overall a good value set, but possibly not the one to use to introduce friends to 'Classic Who' for the first time.

Panasonic Lumix DMCG3 Review

After having seen a pre-production version at Panasonic UK last month, the waiting is over...... and it was worth the wait!

This latest addition to Panasonic's G series range is the successor to the phenomenally successful DMCG2.

The camera body is significantly smaller than the G2, but still has a good ergonomic feel, in size it sits between the G2 and the slightly slimmer GF2. Unlike the GF2, The G3 retains the 3 inch free angle touch screen and an improved electronic viewfinder.

New improvements include an amazing Light Speed 0.1 second auto focus, pin point focus mode for super accurate focusing, an incredible 20 frames per second burst shooting mode (resolution is reduced from 16 megapixels to 4 megapixels), full screen touch focusing, 1920 x 1080i resolution HD video, a new stereo microphone, and intelligent auto plus, which allows for fine tuning of colour preferences, but retaining the point and shoot simplicity of the standard intelligent auto mode.

The camera is available in a kit with a lumix 14-42mm lens or body only. The body is available in choice of black, red or white finishes.

There are eleven micro four thirds lenses currently available from Panasonic at the time of writing, with adaptors available to enable use of Leica R mount and M mount lenses, and an adaptor to allow the use of full size four thirds lenses

I have only had it a day, so I haven't had too much time to play with it, but the experience so far is great. There are some really neat touches, like the peripheral de-focus feature, which allows you to pick out an area on the touch screen to focus on, and the camera does the job of blurring the surrounding area for you, creating artistic looking shots within seconds.

I love this camera, it's small enough to be practical to carry around, but with all the creative control and quality of a bigger SLR camera.

Doctor Who Book Club Podcast

Having already extolled the virtues of Radio Free Skaro, I thought that I should also give a little mention to another entertaining Who related podcast.

Having read many of the Target novelisations and quite a few of the Virgin New Adventures, the idea of a book related podcast really appealed to me.

Your esteemed hosts, to guide you through the book chosen for each month are Sean from the fun and rather naughty Tardis Tavern podcast, and Erik, who is a contributor to Bridging The Rift.

The guys do a great job in their roles as hosts, not only giving a critique of each book, but also deconstructing some of the more complex plot points that aren't always completely clear on first reading.

One such example is Erik's explanation of the climax of Russell T Davies' Damaged Goods, which is a little tricky to follow, but he describes it well in a very concise and engaging way.

I also like the way that the guys chat about their thoughts on each story, and they don't always agree on everything which makes for entertaining listening.

They obviously put a lot of thought into their show, and you can tell that these two know their subject well. I like that they mix it up a little from month to month, by choosing stories that are different in tone, which helps to keep the show sounding fresh.

If you would like to hear this great show for your self, it's available to download from this link: Doctor Who Book Club at the iTunes Store

AFI 100 Movies #92 A Place In The Sun (1951)

Montgomery Clift stars as George Eastman, a young man from a humble background, who goes to work for his wealthy uncle.

He doesn't exactly get the warmest of welcomes, everything is kept very business like, with George referring to his uncle as Mr Eastman, and he starts out at the very bottom of the company in the packing department.

His attempts to fit in at parties held by the wealthy Eastmans and their circle of friends are fruitless. George is an outsider.

While working at the factory he becomes close to his co-worker Alice Trip (Shelley Winters). The company has a strict policy forbidding employees to get involved in relationships with each other, this however doesn't stop them from secretly dating.

Things get complicated when George gets a promotion and starts mixing in more glamorous social circles, he meets Angela (Elizabeth Taylor) and they soon become very close.

George starts to get a taste for the lifestyle enjoyed by his wealthy relatives, and he seems to care little for the feelings of Alice, who has discovered that she is pregnant with George's child.

So does George do the decent thing and marry Alice? Remember this was the 1950s and people would get married to someone they didn't love to spare the shame of everyone knowing that they had a child out of wedlock. Or does he abandon Alice, and go off and live the high life with Angela?

Montgomery Clift was made to play the outsider, which he did in numerous other roles, to the point of being typecast. Elizabeth Taylor is beautiful and charismatic (not much acting required really!).

As the film progresses, you start to get the feeling that things are going to turn sour, and boy they really do!

As dramas go, if you like the characters to go through twists and turns and turmoil to make it through to a happy ending, you might be disappointed.

A solid drama but not quite up there with the very best in the genre.

Queen: Days Of Our Lives BBC HD

I fully intended to only watch part one last night, but I was so engrossed that I ended up going to bed late having watched both parts, back to back.

It was a very moving documentary, tracing the band's history from the early days of Brian May and Roger Taylor's group Smile, through to the live shows featuring Paul Rodgers.

Queen were never really cool, and they happily admit this, but they built up a dedicated following from their early days in the 1970s, which seemed to spur the music press on to criticise them even more. One of the things that most people would agree on, even if they weren't particularly fans, was the band's (and particularly Freddie Mercury's) ability to get the crowd involved at their live gigs.

The interaction between the band and their fans was Queen's attempt to create a unique show while touring the United States, which, considering the number of high profile rock bands touring the U.S.A. at the time was a shrewd move. And because of the need to play huge stadiums the band wanted to try and retain the connection with the audience that they developed when playing to crowds in smaller venues.

Unlike a lot of similar documentaries the programme makers weren't afraid to address some of the groups low moments, including albums that didn't quite hit the mark, and most notably, the bands decision to play Sun City in South Africa during the reign of the apartheid regime in the 1980s, which the surviving members agreed had been done with good intentions at the time, but in retrospect had been a huge mistake.

The final section covered the demise of Freddie Mercury, who in the archive interview footage comes across as a very charismatic and intelligent person. Seeing the remaining band members talking about the dawning realisation that something was very wrong, and hearing them tell of Freddie's initial reticence to tell his fellow bandmates about his illness was very moving.

I would like to think that in this day and age, that the stigma attached to HIV and AIDS in the 1980's is a distant memory, but for Freddie back then, it must have been terrifying. I can't imagine how distressing it must have been trying to come to terms with having a terminal disease without the added pressure of the paparazzi scum loitering in the streets hoping to get a picture of you looking ill.

I was never a huge fan, but every now and then they would come along with a song that would really leave an impression on me, and I think that's why their music has endured for so long.

Poignant, entertaining viewing.