The Canons of Culture (NEW CONCEPTS)

[Mick Harper]

Jane Austen: No Ice in Weymouth (BBC R4)

Anyone who's spent the morning posting off copies of their new book to all and sundry will be charmed by this imaginative account based on the maestro's books and letters. This one's the day Pride and Prejudice came out. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002n6k9

Not that I think she's a maestro, I've never read any of her books. So that makes two of us.

[Grant]

She's much better than John Fowles

[Mick Harper]

Stop showing off.

[Mick Harper]

Ever since I first saw The Godfather I wondered what James Caan was doing in it. He has sat ill in every re-viewing since. Everybody else was part-perfect but this Irish (red hair), WASP (looks and diction), something or other (name) actor seemed to have wandered in from some movie far removed from Sicily.

In the end I decided it was the last touch of genius, removing any lingering distrust of the audience about stereotyping.

Watching a fictionalised but apparently authentic series on the making of the film, I discovered it was all to do with sudio politics and a casting decision made over the strenuous objections of director and producer.

But it also reinforced my own good sense in never undertaking a creative project that required collaboration.

[Boreades]

[Mick Harper]

Vair amusing. Could you produce a list of cars in the British automobile canon? It's not as easy as you think. You must keep your personal (or family) preferences (or dispreferences) out of it.

[Boreades]

What kind of list?

Assuming the gold standard would be British-owned and made in Britain. But that immediately gets complicated because so many British firms have merged, gone bust, disappeared in various ways.

Logic demands that we at least acknowledge the other potential combinations,

- British-owned but not made in Britain (sounds exotically rare).
- Not-British-owned but made in Britain (sounds depressingly familiar).
- Not-British-owned and not made in Britain (sounds like too big to bother with)

[Mick Harper]

You're on your own, sunshine, I can't drive. But I know all about canons.

[Mick Harper]

Did you know my favourite song is Can't Help Falling in Love with You by Elvis Presley? Probably not. I only found out myself at Christmas. But at least I've got one, which is more than can be said of you.

[Mick Harper]

Spot The Clue No 203: The political leaning of the New Yorker

[Boreades]

[Mick Harper]

After watching The Offer, an account of the making of The Godfather on ITVX, I thought I had better check out the original. It was, I realised, sufficiently long ago that I might enjoy doing so in its own right but looking out for the bits that featured in the TV series was my primary goal.

I did enjoy the gangster stuff. I flicked through the soap opera parts (e.g. whenever Diane Keaton was on screen). But the bit that surprised me was that the villain of The Offer--a studio philistine obsessed with saving money--was completely correct.

1. The film was too long by half
2. The Sicilian intermezzo was totally unnecessary.

In fact the entire structure was faulty. The move to Las Vegas, for instance, was thoroughly confusing, it seemed to have strayed in from quite a different film, possibly a Godfather II sequel. It made a nonsense of the settling of New York scores in the last reel of this one.

The only thing that saved the film was it being a masterpiece.

[Hatty]

The interviewee on this week's 'Cultural Life' (BBC Radio 4), the film maker Guillermo del Torres (Pan's Labyrinth, etc), said one of his main influencers was Hitchcock, a 'fat Catholic' like Guillermo, as well as several great artists, Goya in particular.

I hadn't known Hitch was Catholic but somehow it wasn't surprising as Catholics, lapsed or practising, are often creative. That might be expected statistically, there's a lot of them about, though I wondered if a Catholic environment could perhaps be a factor in generating genius.

[Mick Harper]

Guilt, I'm told is the wellspring of a Catholic upbringing. That leads--and now I'm speaking from personal observation--to a double life. The one you're supposed to lead and the one you do lead. That's kind of cinematic, isn't it?

PS I keep trying to watch Hitchcock's masterpieces and find I cannot.

[Mick Harper]

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