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The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society

I had this DVD of this 2018 Mike Powell film lying around in my to-be-watched pile for some time. I was persuaded to watch it as its star Lily James features in the Sky Mobile ad and I like her smile, vivacity and vitality. The film is set in occupied Guernsey. There a book club was formed and the [...]

September 22, 2022 // 0 Comments

The terminal decline of customer service

One of the features of modern life that drives me to distraction more than any other is the degree to which the standard of customer service in all sectors of industry and commerce has plummeted since we … er… all “came into the 21st Century at last”. By this means we all acquired our [...]

September 21, 2022 // 0 Comments

The Queen’s last journey

Yesterday I joined hundreds of millions around the world watching television coverage of Her Majesty the late Queen’s funeral service despite having decided several times over the past ten days that this was close to the last thing I intended to do. I’m an atheist when it comes to God and, when [...]

September 20, 2022 // 0 Comments

Le Mepris (Contempt)/1962

Partly out of respect to the recently passed Jean Luc Godard – and partly as there was little else to do or watch on Sunday afternoon – I took from the French section of my DVD library his Le Mepris starring Michel Piccoli, Brigitte Bardot, Fritz Lang, Jack Palance and Georgia Moll. [...]

September 19, 2022 // 0 Comments

Tribute to Ted Dexter

Yesterday I attended a MCC tribute in the Long Room at Lords to Ted Dexter. I felt honoured to be invited as – although I had got to know Ted well these past few years and his charming wife Sue too  in Nice-  I had not expected to be invited to such a gathering of cricketing luminaries. I [...]

September 17, 2022 // 0 Comments

Rugby’s Premiership – a commercial head-case?

When it comes to one’s specialist subjects, interests and hobbies (not least favourite sports) over the course of decades one’s perceptions of the pertinent issues of any specific moment, as formed by one’s personal impressions and attitudes – taken together with media reports, [...]

September 17, 2022 // 0 Comments

Reflections upon the death of HM The Queen

I suspect like many Rusters over the past week, I have taken the news of the Queen’s death last Thursday – and watched all the resulting consequences, including the carefully-rehearsed-down-to-the-last-detail administrative and ancient (and some not so ancient) preparations, traditions, [...]

September 15, 2022 // 0 Comments

Claude Chabrol and Jean Luc Godard

For me, the two directors that are truly Masters of Suspense are Claude Chabrol and Alfred Hitchcock. Chabrol, from the New Wave of the 1950s, was avowedly French whilst Hitchcock, a master of British realism, studied under Fritz Lang at the UFA studio, Britain and Hollywood. Yesterday I watched [...]

September 15, 2022 // 0 Comments

Ken Howard (1932-2022)

I was more than saddened to hear my old friend Ken Howard has passed away. A brilliant painter of light with an ebullient personality, Ken was the son of a Kilburn carpenter. He got his breakthrough as an artist covering ‘The Troubles’, commissioned by the Imperial War Museum, though not [...]

September 13, 2022 // 0 Comments

Act of Oblivion/Robert Harris

Critics have hailed Robert Harris’ latest novel as his best since Fatherland.   It’s historical fiction. Charles II, on being restored to the throne, issued a blanket pardon to all who fought for Parliament except those responsible for his father’s death known as the Regicides. Two such [...]

September 13, 2022 // 0 Comments

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