Saturday, February 11, 2006
What's going on?Normally the trains that trundle past the window a piddling little things of two carriages or so. Occasionally there'll be a freight/gravel/EWS* grinding along. Basically, if in the Rev. Awdry books there was a branch line off Thomas's branch line then this would be it. Nothing ever happens, at least nothing ever happens above 20 miles per hour.
* Stands for something like Environmental Waste Services. Does the same job as all those Cory's barges moored downstream of Battersea.
Until just now. Was it a bird? Was it a plane? Was it Eurostar whooshing past? Nope. It was something straight out of an Agatha Christie book, or possibly something by Hornby (and I don't mean Nick). I didn't see the engine, although there wasn't any smoke or steam lingering, so it probably didn't match the coaches. But they were proper, proper coaches, complete with compartments, individual lights and even a dining car. The entire thing was so long it was probably going through two stations at the same time (this line is fairly ridiculous though, as it takes longer to find the nearest station than it does to walk to the end of the line).
Yet despite all this splendour, it was being taken up at the rear by apparently the same engines which top and tail the rubbish trains (and I don't mean any run by South West Trains. I mean actual rubbish trains). Somehow it doesn't seem right.
I've forgotten where this post was going, just like I've forgotten to lots of things recently (maybe not so much forgotten, merely "realigned" thought processes). I'm dreadful (actually really rather good at) doing something like just putting a DVD in see if it works. West Side Story this time.
What can I say? Somehow I had one of the songs in my head while passing a Virgin, and then I sort of might have slightly gone in to buy things in the there 5 for £30 pounds sale (which is exactly the same as Play.com's 3 for £18 pounds sale, except Play say normal price is £6.99 while Virgin say it's £8.99). It's quite odd browsing DVDs and slowly coming to realise I already have most of the good ones in their sale.
Anyway, it's finger clicking good (I've said that before, haven't I?). But it is. And it's still incredible how simple, lithe movements can become aggressive and powerful.
Although if you watch it, do make sure you haven't left any lemons on the floor.
So what else did I end up buying?
- Spartacus (special edition no less), because, er, it's a Stanley Kubrick film, and er, they'd sold out of One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Or maybe I just bought it because it reminded me of someone being silly and of someone else being serious and...
- 21 Grams. Because it's supposed to be good, and I missed seeing it, and because it's described as "multi-layered" and baffling is always good, right? And also because the weight of the soul turned up somewhere else recently.
- Amores Perros. Ditto above (except the multi-layered bit, but it's in a different language, which fulfils the baffling quota. Thinking of which, has David Lynch ever done a foreign language film?). And yes I've only just realised both films are directed by the same guy (yet somehow I knew they were connected).
- Fame. Because... It was a toss up between The Graduate, The Italian Job and Short-Circuit/Flight of the Navigator (although the same shop were selling just FOTN for the same price). ITJ I've seen umpteen times, and it's always going to be repeated (even if I don't currently have a television to watch it on). The Graduate nearly came through, but I thought I might be able to find it cheaper elsewhere, whereas... I don't know. I think my logic was that Fame was more recent and so depreciated less (hmm, let's not look at that logic too hard shall we?). And the children's films are children's films. I never liked Short Circuit anyway, but I couldn't buy something which had less in than the one next door, so I'm stuck between getting something I don't want and getting something which is worse value. So I didn't get either.
And anyway, as I've just discovered, it's got the Feringhee from ER in it (and no, I haven't watched enough of whichever Star Trek it is to know how to spell that). Plus I was already buying men prancing about and men without tights, so if ever there was a time to buy potentially shameful films...
"To buy" list:
- The Graduate*
- The Italian Job
- The Flight of the Navigator
- Monty Python films (Play do a much cheaper boxset. But I've just used up all my unnecessary spending guilt credits).
- Bullitt*
- The Great Escape*
- Flight of the Navigator
- The Goonies
- Any other blatently children's film (preferably from my childhood)
- Blade Runner (yes, via purple pants). Play don't stock it.
- Whichever Stanley Kubrick films I don't already have*.
- Pixar stuff
- Classics (preferably if they're £2.99 like Brief Encounter was. It's now apparently £3.99 if one spends over £20 in Virgin, or £11.99 from Play).
- Copies of what belongs to my brother's flatmate (Saturday Night Fever, Shaft and all the other ones I didn't get a chance to see).
- Any other film I've heard people making a fuss about (e.g. Clerks, except if I've seen it and know it to be rubbish, for example, Labyrinth. Oh, and IF/IAF, you didn't mention that Forrest Gump is the name of a character in the Princess Bride. Not that you should have done, I just read the back of the DVD. It probably makes more sense if one has seen either film). I wonder if people know that I judge them by what films they talk about and whether or not I'm disappointed when I buy them on the back of their comments.
* Never quite got round to seeing it.
So what have I missed? Ok, so this might turn into people guessing what I've already got, but I was after films you think are good, whether or not I might already have them. I probably should have just left it as one question and not brought doubt into the concept.
Anyway, it's cold and I need some food (and huzzah, the heating's working again. That only took a week. And still my room's cold).
And drat, I've just remembered I wanted to go and see Chris Addisson tonight, and assumed I'd go with my brother, only he's in somewhere snowy (I honestly don't know where), and I forget to arrange to go with anyone else (and I can't remember where it is, how much it is, or when it is, and I don't really feel like going on my own).
I need to plan more.
Anyhoo,
