Yes, dear blog reader, it's another From The North insomnia-driven bloggerisationism update from The Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House. Containing, as it does, all the usual rubbish but, again as usual, it doesn't cost much.
First up, congratulations are most definitely due to The Horns Of Fiona Nimoni (no, me neither) for breaking this breathless 'world exclusive' on the BBC News website ... a mere fourteen months after the rest of the world (including this very blog) first broke the story. Does anyone else remember, dear blog readers, when the BBC (like Radio Times) used to be run by adults?
Netflix has reportedly signed up to the UK TV ratings agency BARB, which means its audiences will be measured by an external, independent body for the first time. The move makes BARB the first industry-owned ratings service in the world that Netflix has joined. Previously, the streaming giant has only released snapshots of its viewing data, highlighting the success of its most popular shows. BARB will begin reporting Netflix's viewing figures from November. It is a significant move for the streamer, and will see the data being used by advertisers, competitors and journalists to ascertain the success or failure of Netflix properties. Netflix is not the only streamer being included - any service which accounts for more than half-of-one per cent of total identified viewing will be listed too. This means content from services such as Disney and Amazon is also likely to be included. While BARB has been reporting streaming viewing at both a service and programme level since November 2021, only its underwriting organisations and those with a special license previously had access to Netflix's data. BARB compiles audience measurement and TV ratings in the UK. The agency will report Netflix's ratings in the same way it reports viewing for more than three hundred other subscribing broadcast channels. The news comes as Netflix reportedly prepares to launch an ad-supported tier for its streaming platform. Its co-chief executive Reed Hastings said: 'Back in 2019, at the RTS conference in Cambridge, I welcomed the idea of Netflix audiences being measured independently. We've kept in touch with BARB since then and are pleased to make a commitment to its trusted measurement of how people watch television in the UK.' Justin Sampson, chief executive of BARB, said: 'Our audience measurement continuously adapts to accommodate the new platforms and devices that are being used by people to watch their favourite television shows. We took a big step forward last year when we started reporting audiences to streaming services. Netflix's commitment to Barb sends a clear signal that what we're doing is valuable to new and established players in the market.' Netflix viewing data will be available to all BARB subscribers from the morning of 2 November through its existing analysis software and other systems. The timing coincides with the launch of season five of The Crown, which could make an impact in Barb's ratings during the streamer's first weeks of inclusion.
TV drama Vigil leads the nominations for this year's BAFTA Scotland awards. The BBC serial about the death of a submarine crew member is up for five awards including best actress for From The North favourite Suranne Jones and best scripted TV series. Guilt received three nominations and the film Benediction, starring Jack Lowden and Peter Capaldi, got two. Capaldi is nominated for best actor for his performance as the older Siegfried Sassoon alongside co-star Lowden (who played the younger version of the poet) and Mark Bonner for another From The North favourite, the excellent Operation Mincemeat. The awards will take place on Sunday 12 November and will be hosted by Edith Bowman. Leading in the television category is Vigil with nominations for best actress, best scripted television, best television writer and two for best fiction director. Guilt, which follows two brothers who attempt to cover up a crime, is nominated in the best actress, best scripted and best writer categories. In the film category, Benediction, set during World War One is up for two awards along with coming-of-age comedy Our Ladies. Upcoming Doctor, Ncuti Gatwa, is nominated for best television actor for his role as Eric in Sex Education.
So, here's the deal, dear blog reader. Via Keith Telly Topping's recent essays on British post-war B-movies, The Corpse, The Yellow Teddy Bears, Saturday Night Out and The Black Torment, The Pleasure Girls, Hell Is A City, Cup Fever, Face Of A Stranger and Yield To The Night, Hell Drivers, The Day The Earth Caught Fire and Game For Three Losers and, most recently, Hammer Films, Blood Of The Vampire and Good-Time Girl, From The North has been in danger of turning into a film blog which, sometimes, discusses TV. Rather than the other way around which is, in theory, this blog's raison d'être. Mai oui. To which this blogger is happy to report that there still seems no reason to stop such movie-related malarkey. Let us, therefore, speak - at some length - about one of this blogger's favourite trashy 'yoof' epics.
If there is one single scene from late-Fifties and early-Sixties British cinema which told its audience that a new teen subculture was up and groovin' in England's capital, it's the opening sequence of Edmond Gréville's Soho exposé Beat Girl (1960). As a gang of energetic youths rush down a staircase from a Soho coffee bar into the club below, the audience's attention is firmly draw to the figure of wild-child Gillian Hills as she moves, provocatively, to the pagan jangly rhythms of John Barry's instrumental title tune; she gives a feral, disarmingly threatening glare straight into the camera before she joins the rest of the kids and dances - very definitely - to her own beat. Sexy. Dangerous. For that moment alone, Hills and the movie itself have a rightful place in British B-movie history.
Beat Girl was Britain's first teen-exploitation film (the previous year's Expresso Bongo has some prior claims to such a label but, really, that was a rather savage satire on the manipulation of youth trends by an older generation rather than something dealing with proper teenage conceits). Gréville's movie remains today what it was sixty years ago, a trash masterpiece. The dialogue - full of supposedly 'with-it' slang ('straight from the fridge, daddy-o!') was jarring then and it is even more jarring today, written by people who didn't seem to understand the difference between jazz kids, rock and/or rockers and beatniks. But at the same time - and this is important - it was still a film about teenagers. And unlike the numerous AIP 'yoof' films coming across the pond from America, it starred actual teenagers. Gillian Hills was fifteen when the film was made and barely sixteen when it came out. Co-star Adam Faith had just turned twenty.
The movie saw a first big-screen role for Faith and, also, for Peter McEnery, although it was not released until after later films featuring Faith (Never Let Go) and McEnery (Tunes Of Glory) had premiered (for reasons which this blogger will explain later in this piece). Beat Girl also featured two stalwarts of the British Film Industry, Christopher Lee and Nigel Green as a pair of extremely dodgy strip joint operators, Shirley Anne Field - about to achieve widespread acclaim for her performance in Saturday Night & Sunday Morning - and a terrifyingly young Oliver Reed (wearing a ghastly checked-shirt) in a small role, but noticable, as one of the gang.
The plot: Paul Linden (David Farrar), a wealthy architect, returns home to Marylebone with his new French wife, Nichole (Noëlle Adam), whom he has married in Paris after what appears to have been a whirlwind romance. Paul is anxious to introduce Nichole to his sulky teenage hellcat of a daughter, Jennifer (Hills), but Jennifer appears less-than-happy at the prospect of her father's remarriage and coldly rejects Nichole's friendly overtures. Jennifer's vitriol is aimed, sharply, at her conservative father but, also, at his new bride. Nichole seems kindly and tolerant and tries to be understanding about suddenly arriving, like an atom bomb, in Jennifer's life. But Jennifer simply isn't having it. Nichole is still her stepmother and still part of her father's dull, grey, plastic-fantastic world which she, clearly, despises. In short, Jennifer thinks Nicole is The Enemy. Nichole doesn't do anything to deserve Jennifer's wrath of course, but then, teenage rage is seldom rational. Jennifer wants to be heard and that only seems to happen when she's at her meanest and brattiest. So, that becomes her dominant form of expression, her default setting if you like, proportional in its viciousness to her father's cold, austere stoicism. It appears that she is so used to being ignored around the house that she can't even accept the possibility someone might be willing to listen to her.
After Paul and Nichole go to bed, Jennifer sneaks out of the gaff and goes to the Off-Beat café in Soho for an evening of rock and/or roll music and dancing with her friends. These include Dave (Faith), a youth from a Working-Class background who plays an Epiphone Zephyr guitar and writes his own songs. Which, apart from the songwriting bit, was pretty much Terry Nelhams's own real-life story before he changed his name and started having hit singles. There's also Tony (McEnery), an army general's son whose mother was killed during The Blitz and who has a drinking problem (in that he can't get enough of it) and Dodo (Field), Tony's well-bred girlfriend.
The next day Nichole plans to meet Jennifer at Saint Martin's Art School, where she is studying. But, arriving at the college, Nicole is told that Jennifer has gone to the Off-Beat to be with her friends. Nichole follows her to the café and confronts Jennifer in front of her friends, who are instantly impressed by Nichole's youth, good looks and her knowledge of hip modern jazz. The fact that her friends, especially Dave, seem to like Nichole, of course, pisses off Jennifer big-style. Nichole reminds Jennifer to be home in time for her father's 'important business dinner' that evening. As Nichole leaves, she passes Greta (Delphi Lawrence), the star performer at the strip joint across the street. Greta recognises Nichole and greets her by name, but Nichole blanks her, much to Greta's annoyance. Jennifer and her friends observe this odd little encounter and wonder how Greta and Nichole might be familiar with each other. Jennifer senses the opportunity for some nefarious skulduggery.
That night, at Paul's business dinner, Jennifer tries to embarrass Nichole in front of their guests by bringing up the encounter with Greta, making sure to emphasise that Greta is, gasp, a striptease artiste. After the guests leave, Paul questions Nichole, who says that she knew Greta in Paris when that they were 'in ballet together' (a likely story) but, thereafter, Greta pursued a different path and Nichole lost touch with her. Paul accepts this explanation, but Jennifer goes to the strip club to ask Greta directly about her stepmother's potentially shady past. Greta at first claims that she made a mistake and doesn't really know Nichole at all. But, under pressure from her boyfriend, the club's manager Kenny King (Chris Lee, in excellent slimy form), she reveals that she and Nichole once worked together as strippers (and, it is heavily hinted, prostitutes) dans les Rues du Quartier Latin, s'il vous plaît?
Oooh, la, la. Sorry, but French is highly contagious. Armed with this information Jennifer, encouraged by Kenny, becomes enamoured with the notion of becoming a stripper herself. Later, she is caught by Paul and Nichole coming home from the club at 3am and an angry confrontation ensues. Jennifer taunts Nichole by telling her she has spoken with Greta and threatens that if Nichole doesn't stay out of her life, Jennifer will tell Paul about Nichole's former topless (and, indeed, bottomless) ways. Nichole visits the club to tells Kenny and Greta to stay-the-Hell-away from her stepdaughter, but Kenny says that Jennifer is welcome at the club any time she likes and that if Nichole interferes, he will tell Paul about her past.
Jennifer's fury pebble-dashes everyone around her. It may seem her rage is unjustified but then, that's puberty for you. The sort of incomprehensible, nihilistic, furious reaction to being a teenager that we have all probably felt at some stage when we were growing up. While Beat Girl is a difficult sell as a movie with a feminist agenda, it does at least hint at the imbalance between how society at this time regarded angry young men (as the Working Class heroes of the British New Wave) and angry young women (calm down, dear and find yourself a nice boyfriend). The often directionless rage of angry young men was taken and analysed seriously. But that same rebellion in a girl was usually branded as petulant and childish. It's probably, therefore, not a coincidence that Beat Girl was written by Dail Ambler (Betty Mabel Lilian Uelmen), a female journalist with a history of writing for pulp magazines (often using the male nom de plume Danny Spade).
Jennifer and her friends have a wild night including dancing at Chislehurst Caves, a dangerous drag race in their cars and a game of 'chicken' on railway tracks where the last person to exit the rails before the train arrives, wins. Jennifer, needless to say, is the victor. Throughout the evening, Jennifer and Dave dare each other to increasingly dangerous behaviours as a way of flirting. Jennifer invites everyone to continue the party at her house, as her father is out of town and Nichole presumably won't interfere for fear that Jennifer will reveal her sordid past. At the house, Jennifer accepts a dare to 'strip like a Frenchie' and begins to, if you will, get 'em off to music. But, just as she gets down to her underwear, Nichole bursts in and stops her. Then Paul arrives home and breaks up the party, throwing all of the gang from his house. Jennifer angrily tells her father about Nichole's activities in Paris. Nichole, crying, admits it is true and explains she only did it because she was broke and hungry. Paul and Nichole profess their love for each other and reconcile, much to Jennifer's abject disgust.
Jennifer goes to the café again but, now, seemingly finds it boring. She walks out on her friends and meets Kenny at the strip club. Kenny invites her to go to Paris with him for a dirty weekend during which he will train her to be his new star stripper. Greta, performing onstage, is told by the stage manager, Simon (Nigel Green) that Kenny plans to leave her and go off with Jennifer. Just as Kenny makes a pass at Jennifer, a woman's hand is shown stabbing Kenny in the back with a letter opener. The club staff, thinking Jennifer has killed Kenny, lock her in the room and call Plod. Jennifer screams that she didn't do it and the real culprit, jealous Greta, emerges from behind a curtain. Meanwhile, Dave, Tony and Dodo confront some Teddy Boys who have vandalised Tony's car and smashed his guitar. The rotters. But Dave will not rumble with them because 'fighting's for squares.' Paul and Nichole arrive at the club searching for Jennifer just as the police drag her out, in hysterics.
The Police Sergeant tells Paul, 'If it weren't for my pension, I'd wallop her. You'd better take over.' Contemporary publicity photos do, indeed, show David Farrar taking Gillian across his knee to supply a spot of parental chastisement (presumably in the name of selling a few more tickets to those who were into that sort of thing) though the film ends with far less domestic violence than some of the audience may have been led to expect. The police release Jennifer to Paul and Nichole and they head home, arms around each other, as Dave throws his broken guitar in a bin and proclaims 'Funny, only squares know where to go.' Right on, cat.
Minor, interesting footnote. Adam Faith's mum, Ellen, was a cleaner and charwoman who worked at an office block in London along with another lady called Ellen who was the mother of a soon-to-be-quite-famous chap. Michael Caine later loved to tell the story of how the two ladies, between their sweeping, hoovering and tea making would regale each other with stories about their sons various activities - 'my son's a famous rock and roll singer', 'really? My son's a famous actor.' 'What's his name?' 'Maurice Micklewhite. And yours?' 'Terry Nelhams.' Michael would sometimes conclude the story by recalling that a few years later he bumped into Adam at a showbiz-type do and pair both exclaimed, simultaenously, 'my mum works with your mum!'
Back to Beat Girl. The movie was shot at MGM-British Studios at Borehamwood, with exteriors filmed in Soho - specifically Old Compton Street, Digswell Park near Welwyn Garden City and at Chislehurst in Kent. Pascaline, the Haitian exotic dancer who appears in a sequence performing with a scarf, had worked in real-life as a dancer at the famous Crazy Horse Saloon in Paris. When Nichole had to slap Jennifer at one point, Gillian Hills kept anticipating the slap and turning her head prematurely, so on the final take Noëlle Adam reportedly really went for it and caught Gillian with a stinging blow across the chops. Her socked - and stunned - reaction in the movie is, therefore, genuine. 'Like a fourteen-year-old Shelley Winters' was how Gillian would, self-depacatingly, describe some of her behaviour on-set.
The circumstances which brought Gillian at such a tender age to the role of Jennifer involved the breakdown of her parents' marriage when her adventurer father, Denis Hills, left her Polish actress mother, Dunia Lesmian a few years earlier. This took mother and daughter to France and, subsequently, led to Gillian's discovery by Roger Vadim, who cast her in his 1959 version of Les Liaisons Dangereuses. As Hills herself subsequently explained, that fragmented, nomadic background made its contribution to the forthright, credibly stroppy performance she delivered on-screen. 'Everything in that part was incredibly real to me,' Hills said in an interview with Sight & Sound. 'I wasn't acting at all, that's why there's a constant flow of fury. She so wants to express herself but when you're young you don't know how to do things like that, so she's constantly pushing all the wrong buttons. I recognised so many things about Jennifer, because there was a large part of myself which was so frustrated and annoyed. I'd lived in so many countries by that point and spoken so many languages, it was as if I was just a piece of baggage. I saw the film again just recently for the first time since I was sixteen and it was actually quite upsetting. What comes through is all that emotion, the truth that's underneath the words she's saying.'
In the same interview, Gillian was incredibly complimentary about her co-stars: 'They all brought their own history with them. Adam was from quite humble beginnings, but you could tell he was terribly ambitious, especially where music was concerned and he was often huddled in conversation with John Barry. He was also terribly in love with Shirley Anne. He would end up in her dressing room next to mine and my mother had to make excuses for the squeaking noises we'd hear coming through the walls. Oliver Reed was very ambitious too: he told me his uncle, Carol Reed, had gotten him the part, but he was really determined to make the most of it. He made sure you were looking at him, the way he moved.' Her main memory of acting with Christopher Lee was that he had really cold hands during the scene in which Kenny strokes Jennifer's neck.
When the original script, then titled Striptease Girl, was submitted to the BBFC in March 1959, the censors took one look at it, shat in their pants and ran a mile. The reviewer said it was 'machine-made dirt,' 'the product of squalid and illiterate minds' and 'the worst script I have read for some years.' The project was then renamed and the scripted nudity was somewhat reduced, but the censors still objected to depictions of striptease, juvenile delinquency, teenagers playing 'chicken' on the railway tracks and, in all seriousness, a young girl being rude and disrespectful to her parents. Ultimately, the film received an X certificate, causing its release to be delayed by a few months because it found itself in a queue behind a glut of other X-rated films. When it was finally released, at the end of October 1960, it performed far beyond expectations at the box office in UK, despite receiving an avalanche of 'ban this sick filth' type reviews.
The original music was John Barry's first film commission and was performed by the John Barry Seven & Orchestra with vocal contributions from both Faith and Field (on the outrageously flirty song 'It's Legal'). Following Faith's casting, Barry was asked to compose the soundtrack as he had already collaborated with the singer as an arranger on Faith's early Parlophone hits. Barry was subsequently hired to score Faith's next films, Never Let Go (1960) and Mix Me A Person (1962), leading to Barry's successful career as a composer and arranger of film music. In addition to the Beat Girl soundtrack LP reaching the album charts, the song 'Made You', composed by Barry with lyrics by Trevor Peacock and performed in the film by Faith, managed to get itself banned by the BBC for its, supposedly 'suggestive', lyrics. The single still got to number five in the UK charts after its b-side, a version of 'When Johnny Comes Marching Home', got the airplay instead. Beat Girl was probably the first British soundtrack to be released on LP, its unexpected success paving the way for the release of other film soundtracks. The movie was later released in the United States under the rather hysterical title Wild For Kicks - 'the vivid and shocking portrayal of modern youth who grew up too soon and live-it-up too fast!' Blimey. Let's watch that then!
Field and Reed, of course, would go and to play brother and sister in another highly acclaimed British 'yoof' movie, Hammer's science-fiction drama, The Damned (1962) recently reviewed on this very blog. The Damned was clearly a better movie, but Beat Girl was edgier and it was also tougher and more 'sexy and dangerous' than most contemporary AIP 'yoof' movies coming out of the US. Those, for all their hot rod races and finger snapping delinquents calling everyone over the age of twenty three 'daddy-o' remained relatively tame and demure. Beat Girl, on the other hand, gleefully delved into the sleazier, wilder side of life. If AIP was willing to show young girls in tight sweaters and Capri pants, Beat Girl was willing to show them out of those things entirely. In that regard, Beat Girl is, metaphorically speaking, Hot Rod Girl or High School Hellcats with its bra and its knickers off.
Critics, of course, hated this torrid little tale of a 'hop-head schoolgirl' lashing out at authority figures, drinking and smoking, hanging out in clubs, listening to jazz music and taking (most of) her clothes off. The reviewer at the Daily Scum Express must have had wax exploding in his or her ears when they called it 'a film which no one could like.' Parents reportedly loathed it, too. Which meant, not-particularly-with-it slang notwithstanding, it must have been doing something right. British youth may not have seen a totally accurate reflection of themselves in Beat Girl, but at least they didn't see a reflection of their parents. It did not matter about the details, or if the movie got the street-slang wrong, y'dig? What mattered was that it acknowledged there was a street-slang in the first place. That the city's coffee bars and dance clubs was full of jazz kids, beatniks, Teddy Boys and Girls, rockers and the emergent Modernists who favoured Italian and French fashions to go with the American R&B they frugged to. Moral guardians demanded that teens not go and see Beat Girl. You can probably guess how that worked out by the fact that the film made its producers a handsome profit!
Hills forged an interesting career after Beat Girl. Though she appeared sporadically in mostly made-for-television movies throughout the early 1960s, her focus was on becoming a pop star in France, a career at which she succeeded admirably. Her spasmodic acting career continued with her cropping up in many interesting places: as a model having a saucy ménage-à-trois with David Hemmings in Michelangelo Antonioni's Blowup (1966) and as a record store customer who has a saucy ménage-à-trois with Malcolm McDowell in Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange (1971). So, no typecasting there, then. She also appeared in the hypnotic folk-horror TV series The Owl Service, featured in Dennis Potter's controversial adaptation of Casanova opposite Frank Finlay and starred in Hammer's psychological 1972 chiller Demons Of The Mind. She then launched a successful career as a book illustrator.
All of which malarkey brings us skidding like a cat on a wet floor towards Memorably Daft Lines from Blockbuster War & Espionage Movies of the 1960s and 70s: Number Thirty Five: Orson Welles: 'I know you loved this man.' Dan O'Herlihy: 'I did, once. But I promise you, that I will bring him back to Paris in an iron cage.' Orson Welles: 'How they exaggerate, these soldiers. "In an iron cage"? Nobody asked for that.' Waterloo. One of the ten best films ever made. In This blogger's opinion, of course. But, since this blogger's opinion is the only one that counts round these parts, just take that as read.
Memorably Daft Lines from Blockbuster War & Espionage Movies of the 1960s and 70s: Number Thirty Six: Yul Brynner: 'Morning. I'm a friend of Harry Luck's. He tells me that you're broke.' Charles Bronson: 'Nah. I'm doing this because I'm an eccentric millionaire!' The Magnificent Seven.
There will now be a short intermission whilst seven of us (any seven, it doesn't matter) will act out that scene in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet series two where they're all (except Barry) sitting in a Motorway Service café staking claims as to which one of the Magnificent Seven they are. You know the one ... ('I'll be Horst Buchholz cos he was the youngest and best-looking.' 'He was also the most boring bastard ... the one the other six had to keep telling to piss off! James Coburn, that's me. Cos he was cool and laconic!' 'Well, since the situation's vacant, I'll be Steve McQueen', 'Oh, hang on, I forgot about him!' 'Nah, nah, you wanted to be The Kraut, you're stuck with him!') Et cetera.
Memorably Daft Lines from Blockbuster War & Espionage Movies of the 1960s and 70s (or, In This Case, 1956): Number Thirty Seven: Clifton Webb: 'I can assure you that this is an opportunity for your son to do a great thing for England.' Moultrie Kelsall: 'My son, sir, was a Scotsman. Very proud of it!' Clifton Webb: 'I beg your pardon.' The Man Who Never Was. The same - true - story covered in the recent Operation Mincemeat. This one is less historically accurate (and, doesn't have hello to Jason Isaacs in it) but it's beautifully acted and, considering it didn't have a huge budget, it still looks great.
Memorably Daft Lines from Blockbuster War & Espionage Movies of the 1960s and 70s: Number Thirty Eight: Peter O'Toole: 'I killed two people. One was yesterday. He was just a boy and I led him into quicksand. The other was, well, before Aqaba. I had to execute him with my pistol and there was something about it that I didn't like.' Jack Hawkins: 'That's to be expected.' Peter O'Toole: 'No, something else.' Jack Hawkins: 'Well, then let it be a lesson.' Peter O'Toole: 'No. Something else.' Jack Hawkins: 'What then?' Peter O'Toole: 'I enjoyed it.' Lawrence Of Arabia.
Memorably Daft Lines from Blockbuster War & Espionage Movies of the 1960s and 70s: Number Thirty Nine: Martin Sheen: 'Are you crazy, Goddammit? Don't you think its a little risky for some R&R?' Robert Duvall: 'If I say its safe to surf this beach, Captain, then its safe to surf this beach!' Apocalypse Now.
Which, with the possible exception of The Godfather, Part II, is the greatest film ever made by anyone. Ever. Bar none.[*] That's not in this blogger opinion, it's just a fact. In whatever version you chose to watch it. This blogger personally prefers Redux. Other views may differ. Just so long as they all realise that, in this regard, this blogger is right and everyone else is wrong.
[*] Well, okay, maybe Dracula AD 1972 as well. Maybe.
Memorably Daft Lines from Blockbuster War & Espionage Movies of the 1960s and 70s: Number Forty: John Gielgud: 'It will be a sad day for England when her armies are officered by men who know too well what they are doing - it smacks of murder.' The Charge Of The Light Brigade.
Another one that looms large in Keith Telly Topping's legend, especially Trevor Howard's brilliantly shouty performance. Like the bit in the famous Black Bottle scene where he tells David Hemmings 'I shall have you arrested. You are arrested! Go to your quarters, sir and be arrested!
Plus, of course, that remarkable opening narration. 'I do not propose to recount my life in any detail, what-is-what! No damned business of anyone, what-is-what! I am Lord Cardigan, that is what. Them cherrybums, you see 'em tight. My cherrybums, I keep 'em tight. Ten thousand a year out me own pocket I spend to clothe 'em! A master cutler sharps their swords and I keep 'em tight stitched, cut to a shadow! Good! If they can't fornicate they can't fight, and if they don't fight hard I'll flog their backs raw, for all their fine looks!' This blogger remembers Charles Wood - who wrote the script after John Osborne's first draft proved unacceptable to Tony Richardson - once explaining that, since he had no idea what 1850s cavalry officers actually sounded like, he made up his own syntax for them and then got highly praised by critics for being historically accurate!
Memorably Daft Lines from Blockbuster War & Espionage Movies of the 1960s and 70s: Number Forty One: Sean Connery: 'Exceptionally fine shot.' Marc Lawrence: 'I didn't know there was a pool down there!' Diamonds Are Forever.
Alas, poor Plenty. Named after her father, no doubt.
And so, with the awful inevitability of the awfully terribly, we come to the part of From The North dedicated to this blogger's on-going medical doings. For those dear blog readers who haven't been following this on-going fiasco which appears to have been on-going longer than someone saying 'Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch', it goes like this: Keith Telly Topping spent some weeks around New Year feeling rotten; experienced five days in hospital; was discharged; received B12 injections; then more injections; somewhat recovered his missing appetite; got a diagnosis; had a consultant's meeting; continued to suffer fatigue and insomnia; endured a second endoscopy; had another consultation; got (unrelated) toothache; had an extraction; which took ages to heal; had another consultation; spent a week where nothing remotely health-related occurred; was given further - painful - B-12 injections; had an echocardiogram; received more blood extractions; did another hospital visit; saw the insomnia and torpor continue; returned to the hospital for more blood-letting; had a rearranged appointment to get a sick note from his doctor; suffered probably his worst period yet of the fatigue. Until the following week. And, the one after that. Oh, the fatigue. The depressing, ceaseless fatigue. Then, this blogger returned to hospital to have a go on the Blood-Letting Machine; was back at the doctor's for another sickie and was back at the hospital for another assessment.
On Monday, ten months - to the day - after his last Covid vaccination, down at the local pharmacy (a mere two minute limp from The Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House), this blogger received a booster. Keith telly Topping now has a full set of vaccine stabs (albeit, worryingly, this time with a doctor who, seemingly, couldn't spell Pfizer correctly!)
Though, in view of this blogger's sore arm, this was really deserved.
Now, dear blog reader, the first of a new (extremely) semi-regular From The North feature, 'Christ, Said Keith Telly Topping, I Haven't Played That One In 'Kin Years!' Number One: Living Ornaments 79/80. 別れよう.
Eddie Howe praised the 'outstanding' Bruno Guimarães as this blogger's beloved Magpies marked a year since their takeover with a crushing win over Brentford. Guimarães put Newcastle ahead with a flying header before Jacob Murphy doubled the advantage shortly afterwards following an error from David Raya. Former Magpie Ivan Toney scored against his old club via a penalty, but Guimarães netted again less than two minutes later with a rasping drive from the edge of the box. Miguel Almirón and an Ethan Pinnock own goal completed the scoring. Newcastle took the lead with Kieran Trippier brilliantly curling in a far-post cross from deep after a short corner with Guimarães heading home. Th' Toon boss Howe, speaking to Match Of The Day, said of Guimarães: 'He was outstanding. We really missed him when he was out [as he is] a quality player who helps us in every phase.' United doubled their lead thanks to a rank howler from Brentford keeper Raya, who passed straight to Callum Wilson when uder pressure from United's forward line. Wilson played the ball square for Murphy to strike past covering defender Ben Mee. Toney made it two-one from the spot after Aaron Hickey headed against Dan Burn's arm, but one minute and fifty seven seconds later Guimaraes restored the two-goal advantage as he won the ball from Hickey near the halfway line, drove forward and struck to Raya's right from twenty five yards. Brentford were their own worst enemies as they were caught playing out from the back again, Pinnock selling Raya short with an under-hit back pass that Miggy Almirón burst on to and slammed home his fourth goal of the season. Pinnock was again at fault for number five, sticking a boot out right in front of Raya to deflect Joelinton's low cross from the left past his own goalkeeper. One year and a day since a Saudi-led consortium took over their club, Newcastle's fans were in celebratory mood at St James' Park. And, as a bonus, a few Middle Class hippy Communist Gruniad Morning Star had a nice excuse for a whinge and a gurn. They really are quite a sight. A tifo covered the Gallowgate End before kick-off, based on the takeover announcement and listing the signings made in the past twelve months. Two of the players signed by the current owners are Trippier and Guimarães and both were in stellar form. Trippier's crossing was a constant menace, as he left a timely reminder as to why he may go to the World Cup with England ahead of Trent Alexander-Arnold. Guimarães was the driving force from midfield for Howe's side, his goals ending a run of three successive home draws for the Tynesiders. Almirón was also excellent - signed during the Ashley reign of terror and often maligned (particularly by that over-rated, full-of-his-own-importance arsehole Grealish), Miggy was an endlessly energetic attacking presence, forcing a great save from Raya after five minutes and carrying on that form throughout. He only got one goal last season but already has four this campaign and after scoring was presented with a Paraguay flag from the crowd - a sign of the esteem in which he is held by fans. Of Almirón, Howe said: 'It is all about building consistency to his game but he has performed brilliantly off the ball and now he is adding goals to that.' The return of Allan Saint-Maximin as a late substitute capped a terrific day for Newcastle, the forward having not played since August because of a worrying hamstring injury.
Dawid Malan and Sam Curran starred as England edged world champions Australia by eight runs to take an unassailable two-nil lead in their three-match Twenty20 series. Malan smashed eighty two from forty nine deliveries to lead the recovery after England were reduced to fifty four for four in Canberra. He was ably supported by Moeen Ali (forty four) as they put on ninety two for the fifth wicket to help England reach one hundred and seventy eight for seven from their twenty overs. Curran was then the pick of the bowlers, taking three for twenty five, including the wicket of Tim David for forty in a critical eighteenth over that tipped the game in the tourists' favour. The Surrey all-rounder also held onto a smart catch to remove Mitch Marsh, who was looking well set on forty five from twenty nine balls, as England's superior fielding proved the difference, with Australia only able to reach one hundred and seventy for six. What made the win more impressive was the fact this was close to a full-strength Australia side, with Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Adam Zampa and Josh Hazlewood restored to the bowling attack and dangerous all-rounder Glenn Maxwell back in the middle order. It was far from the complete performance, though. Ben Stokes once again struggled with the bat while Chris Jordan and Adil Rashid were expensive with the ball. But the ability of some players to step up to the crease when others struggle is an invaluable commodity to have with the World Cup approaching. The final game of the three-match series takes place on Friday, again in Canberra. England then play Pakistan in a warm-up match on Monday, before opening their World Cup campaign against Afghanistan in Perth on 22 October.
Mike Batt, the writer behind those woefully shat Wombles hits, has told the NME that he has destroyed all the master tapes to avoid The Be-Atles-style remasters. So, it would seem that there is a God after all. 'The Wombles aren't The Be-Atles (a popular beat combo of the 1960s, you might've heard of them),' added Batt. No, indeed. We would probably have noticed if they were, Mister Batt - who once wrote wrote an erection song for the Tories, remember. Insert you own punchline here.
The nominees for the From The North Headline Of The Week Award's include Mum Sees Face Of Shrek In Takeaway Green Curry which, believe it or not is from Wales Online and not, as this blogger assumed, the Book of Revelation (what with seeing the face of Shrek in a green curry being the fourth sign of The Apocalypse and all that).
Still on a culinary theme, Cheshire Live are sad to inform everyone that The Charlatans' Favourite Chippy To Close After Fifty Years In Business. When asked if, perhaps, they could find themselves another favourite chippy that, you know, isn't closed, a spokesperson for the band replied 'it's the only one they know.' This blogger is here all week, dear blog reader. Remember to tip your waitress and try the fish. Though, not from the chippy that's closed down, obviously.
It must've been a slow news day in the North West as, according to Lancs Live, Blackpool Man Waits Four Hours For Chinese Takeaway Only To Be Told Order Was Never Placed. One trusts The Law have been informed about this dreadful happenstance. Mind you, mate, could be worse, you could have tried placing an order with The Charlatans favourite chippy.
We have two - yes two - entries this week from the Metro (so, not a real newspaper, then). Firstly, Disaster For Record-Breaking Pumpkin After It Falls Off Trailer. Oh, the humanity. Though, the motor insurance claim form will, presumably, be a comedy masterpiece.
The Metro's second effort is, in anything, even more disturbing. Princess Margaret Once Chopped Up 'Unflushable' Turd With Silver Cake Slice. Well, come on, we've all done it. Those of us born with a silver cake slice in our mouths, anyway. There's also a joke in there somewhere about The Royal Wee if anyone wishes to go searching for it.
From The North whatever the opposite of favourite is, the Daily Mirra has also been active this week. Man's Torment As Mystery Stranger Keeps Yelling 'Porridge' Through His Letterbox. That'll be The Breakfast Police, no doubt.
According to Dorset Live, West Howe Football Ground Facing Closure Due To Donutting Youths. Well, this may be a wild stab in the dark but had no one given any consideration to, you know, taking the donuts off them? Just a thought.
And, there's Kent Online's Pensioner Takes To Streets To Protest Flats Plan For Walderslade, which opens with the line: 'A placard-waving pensioner is taking to the streets to protest plans to build thirty six flats in two five-storey blocks. Alan Ellis has spent the last week taking his one-man campaign around Walderslade to make his concerns known and urge his neighbour to object to the proposal.' His neighbours, it would seem, have more important shit than this to worry about. Ah, prophets are always subject to ridicule in their time, Alan.
And finally, dear blog reader, photographic evidence that Reginald Molehusband has been attempting the reverse parking procedure again, this week.
