#John Mackenzie

[mariocki]

The Long Good Friday (1980)

"Alan found him dying. He'd been nailed to the floor."

"When was this, then?"

"Well, it must've been just after you saw him and just before Alan saw him. Otherwise, you'd have noticed, wouldn't you? I mean, a geezer nailed to the floor. A man of your education would definitely have spotted that, wouldn't he?"

[cantsayidont]

November 1980. Bob Hoskins channels the spirit of Edward G. Robinson in this engrossing British crime drama about an ambitious Cockney gangster who's preparing to take his business international with the help of his savvy mistress (Helen Mirren), only to have his organization start to crumble beneath him at the worst possible moment, for reasons he doesn't understand until it's far too late.

Flavorful, tough, and dynamic, anchored by the charismatic performances of Hoskins and Mirren. Among the cast of familiar British character players, watch for a young Pierce Brosnan in a small but very significant supporting role. (The American gangster with whom Harold and Victoria are trying to do a deal is played by Eddie Constantine, a one-time crooner who became famous for starring as Peter Cheyney's hardboiled detective Lemmy Caution in a series of French films of the fifties and sixties, and in Godard's ALPHAVILLE.) CONTAINS LESBIANS? No, although Harold is surprisingly open-minded about his gay associates. VERDICT: Satisfyingly solid, and one of Hoskins' best.

[lobbycards]

The Fourth Protocol, German lobby card. 1987

[sinceileftyoublog]

Geordie Greep Live Show Review: 1/29, Bottom Lounge, Chicago

Cameron Campbell, Geordie Greep, & Santiago Moyano

BY JORDAN MAINZER

See former black midi lead vocalist and guitarist Geordie Greep live, and you're reminded again he's not just the person from his solo debut The New Sound (Rough Trade), fascinated by and willing to dive into the mindset of creeps. Among other things, he's an Internet age expert troll, one with a sense of both humor and reverence. Greep is equally likely to interpolate or cover classical music and Chick Corea standards as he is a viral song he saw on Instagram or an ostentatious blues guitar lick from the 70's. He's also a dynamic player and music lover, enthralled by the prospect and result of jamming with his friends. Greep's and his incredible band's show at the Bottom Lounge on Wednesday night was an expert display of prog rock and Latin jazz and an exercise in showmanship.

Moyano, Greep, & Dave Strawn

With black midi, Greep had the type of crooner's voice and tweaking stage presence that made you think he could be from another world, not just another era, a phenomenon that's carried over into his solo career. On Wednesday, the band danced on to the stage, one step at a time, to Francis Monkman's "Taken", a cut from the soundtrack to John Mackenzie's 1980 gangster film The Long Good Friday. Before launching into The New Sound's "Walk Up", Greep improvised a self-described preamble about the Bottom Lounge and Chicago, rife with references to, yes, gangsters, Al Capone, and tommy guns. On paper, it sounds theatrical and ridiculous, but it had that same type of "What the hell is going on?" Twilight Zone effect that came over me the first time I saw black midi.

Strawn & Ethan Marsh

Chalk "Terra", then, as the exact moment Greep revealed a different layer to himself and embraced that aforementioned new sound, finding time to sprinkle dance moves on stage before picking up his electric guitar, percussionist Santiago Moyano and keyboardist Cameron Campbell taking their first solos. The song broke down into different jam sections, and Greep would lock eyes with Campbell whenever the band would return to the theme, smile, and cheer triumphantly. It was as thrilling to watch as it likely was for the band to play. With The New Sound, Greep's grown stronger as a vocalist, his mighty wail elevating "As If Waltz" and the riled-up "Holy, Holy". He's also wearing his influences more explicitly. Moyano led a cover of salsa legend Willie Colón's "Cua cua ra, cua cua", engaging in call-and-response percussion with drummer Charlie Schefft. The band also played "Parabola", an avant-garde jazz song written by Campbell, Greep and guitarist Dave Strawn, donning a Slayer tank top, shredding behind their heads. Put in a blender all of these seemingly disparate purveyors of instrumental dynamism, and you get somewhere on the track to Greep.

Campbell, Greep, & Moyano

By the time Greep and company got to the end of the show, performing The New Sound's climax, the 12-plus minute "The Magician", he and other band members started doing James Brown-style spins on stage. I couldn't help but notice that members of the crowd started doing them, too. It reminded me a little bit of the "Talk About My Kids" sketch from I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson, where Robinson's character takes his joked assignment to prevent Jason Schwartzman's dad character from talking about his kids at a party, a little too literally, Robinson becoming so ridiculous in his attempts to distract Schwartzman that other similarly aged men start to copy whatever Robinson's doing. Like Robinson, Greep has proved he can obsessively inhabit characters and amassed somewhat of a cult following, and he's easy to laugh with. The combination yields something off-kilter and, ultimately, captivating.

Greep

Charlie Schefft, Strawn, & Marsh

[motionpicturelover]

"Unman, Wittering and Zigo" (1971) -

"February Film Favourites" Day 21/28

[gotham-ruaidh]

In 7x16 William goes to both of his fathers, asking them to help in the best way they can.

He goes to Lord John for some diplomacy.

When that doesn't work, he goes to Jamie Fraser for a commando raid.

That he is asking them to help a whore who killed a man, does not matter. For both of William's fathers love him dearly.

Though, to quote his sister in "Go Tell The Bees That I Am Gone":

“Poor William. He’s such a good guy, but my God! How does anyone that young manage to have such a complicated life?"

[bitching-barista]

Rip to the people having a fit over queer and racial diversity in Bridgerton, you could never have handled Anne with an E

[outlander-online]

UHQ stills from Outlander 7B

📸: FFAway

[sleepynegress]

VANITY FAIR SALEM'S LOT FIRST LOOK...

[userkayjay]

#confused frasers

OUTLANDER 3.04 | 4.11

for @saltybenchday ♡

[fernvehx]

new Season 7 bts y'all! 🍃

[mr-culper]

In general, the brothel scene was brilliantly film. I especially liked the shooting angle from above, because Aemond looks like death there.

I really like how they did it. Although for me this whole scene was, as it's said, too much, a bit thick. Well, I don't know, but it was hard for me, I felt uncomfortable watching the brothel scene from the beginning to the end. And yet milk. Oh, Christ.

But then I thought maybe it should be uncomfortable.

We had grown accustomed to watching someone being killed, tortured, maimed in TV series. Game of Thrones has rape scenes. Outlander has rape scenes, and they are filmed in remarkable way. Several women were raped there, at least one child, – on top of that then his hand was cut off after some time, – and one man. And the scene with the male character, oddly enough, is the worst of all: he was in prison at that time, he was tortured, abused and raped. The scene is truly monstrous, awful and nightmarish, but I watched it, and you know what, it didn't really scratch me. I mean, I was like: well, ahh, that was terrifyingly, what next? let's continue to watch next. And my gut tells me that I wasn't the only one who thought so.

That is, now, for some reason, we – humanity – take a calmly view of very scary things. Or very indecent ones. In TV series, there are explicit scenes of torture, explicit scenes of sexual content, which are also generally inappropriate to show, yes, some other 'too much' moments... and that passes for normal. However, as soon as one shows a scene where a character is just lying on someone's soft lap, trying to abstract their mind, and all this is so vulnerable, tender and fragile, that people say: we feel uncomfortable!

So, watching someone being raped or murdered, or how captain Flint struck Singleton across the face with a cannonball and beat him to a bloody mess – this is normal for us, but watching a person who is vulnerable, open and seeks solace – is no.

We, the audience, are so unprepared to face our own vulnerability that we feel uncomfortable seeing it in someone else.

We are ready to meet with any expressions of violence against other people, against ourselves, because life is dark and full of terrors. One reads the news items every morning, there is an endless chain of murders, explosions, riots, arson attacks, terroristic acts, and some other villainies happen all the time. It has even start to wear thin! We have become so accustomed to it that at some point one sits and says: ah, someone was blown up here again, something fell there, something was burned out, someone was shot, those built a trebuchet and bomb their neighbors across the border, someone was flayed alive. In general, nothing new. You just sit and think: okay, things are getting worse every minute, but overall, it's possible to live, just live on, we are constantly faced with all this, so, darling, just keep yourself alive, please...

And then they show us Aemond in a brothel, and we are not ready for it. We feel uncomfortable, because we begin to feel vulnerable ourselves.

In Black Sails, in Season 3, John Silver says an absolutely wonderful phrase: I cannot look weak, I cannot feel weak, I cannot be weak.

I totally agree.

We are all obsessed with... well, not all of us, but many of us, I know people like that, I am that person myself... with not being weak, not looking or feeling weak, with being strong in any situation. I'm obsessed with self-control as well. Maybe that is why Aemond is so like-minded for me, not only because of fierce embitterment contained in both of us, but also because of the idea of controlling our own feelings.

I used to be very wishy-washy in my previous life. Now I'm a kind of reasonable person, but before... I'm very ashamed of who I had once been, because I complained about my life, I was spineless, weak, neither fish nor fowl. It really pissed me off, I hated and despised myself for it. At some point, I realized: I must to grab myself by the balls (figuratively speaking), clench my fists and jaw, stand out the cords of my neck and become a strong person or do something of that kind to stop despising myself. So yes, I'm obsessed with the idea of ​​self-control, with being someone who solves problems, neither creates ones nor suffers from them.

And maybe for me, and maybe for many others, it was uncomfortable to watch the scene with Aemond and Sylvi for this very reason, because all of that is such an exposure of the human soul that you just unable to bear it.

I really like the House of the Dragon screenwriter's innovation in this regard. The brothel scene hit us where it hurts the most. Well done. I'm delighted. They did this scene so great. I love it showed Aemond from his vulnerable side, from the side of a person who is also worried, being emotional over, but is trying to somehow solve all this in other ways. It doesn't mean Aemond does nothing. He does what no one else does – he thinks. He takes a break and reflects.

That's an excerpt from the new episode of the Tea & Rum podcast about Aemond's first brothel scene.

To find more episodes go to Boosty.

Other posts about that.

[lobbycards]

The Fourth Protocol, German lobby card. 1987

[haveyouseenthismovie-poll]

[andasignificantbreakfast]

THE NEWSROOM 2.09 Election Night, Part II