h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hey there Mr Pen-ding

As promised, here's a quiet corner where we can talk film and stuff (By stuff, I mean things like "American TV Drama and Sit-coms of the 1990s and 2000s are superior to their British counterparts. Discuss" Things like that)

I thought you could start things off by listing some of your favourite films, genres and the like, and I can go away for a while and have a thunk about some of mine and then we can see where that takes us.

How does that sound?



Peter

Morning Peter,

I hope you don't think I've been ignoring you: I'm just a week dayer, not a weekender by and large.

Favourite films heh? Not easy, but I can put out the following guidelines:

1. Favourite director is Greenaway, by a long way.
2. Like David Lynch as well, and consider Wild At Heart to be magnificent.
3. Which takes me on to Nick Cage, who I can watch in just about anything, but particularly Leaving Las Vegas.
4. And, as you know, one of my all time favourite films is Another Country [Note for Brad: film staring Rupert Everett, Colin Firth, attempting to tie in the "treachery" of Burgess and Maclean with their unhappy schooldays: not a great concept, but wonderful performances, especially from Everett].

My film knowledge is considerably thinner than yours Peter, but the above might be a start. Oh, and I love Nicole Kidman and Julianne Moore (thought The End of the Affair was wonderful).

Your turn: but please keep it relatively simple for a film thicko.

hi pat and pete,

can i join in or are you two cross with me for some really SILLY reason

no one i have met yet has ever seen my favourite film.

i will tell you if i am allowed to join in

kris


p.s. pat i havent seen a huge amount of films but another country was one of them and i thought it was superb.

Hi Kris,

Of course you can join in: tell us your stuff.....now!

oh good pat , (.....are you cross peter?)

right well the film is "is slottet" subtitled "the ice palace", a norwegian film based on a book written by a norwegian named tarjei vesaas. amazing he could write this story. per blom directed it and did the screen play and it was released in 1987

for a little bit about the story go to

w's.kirjasto.scifi/vesaas.htm

i have never been hit so hard and vast before. it had me sobbing uncontrollably but my mind was so extended as well. cant describe this one perfect realisation. always recommend the film though.

kris

Hi guys

No, not cross, Kris, just out of circulation a bit. I started a conversation and then buggered off to my sick bed, about that.

I haven't seen The Ice Palace, but I've heard of it. I can't think of many Norwegian films that I have seen. Strange when you think of the number of Danish (Dogme) and Swedish (Bergman on Film Four at the moment) films are about.

I'm going off to think about what to put on my favourites list for a while. I posted on one of the R4 film sites that the best definition of a personal favourites (as opposed to an objective "Sight and Sound" style list) was the ones you watched the most often. That made an easy list for me to make out which could include Blade Runner, Moulin Rouge, Citizen Kane, Les Amants du Pont Neuf, Pulp Fiction, Sleepy Hollow, La Reine Margot, The Seven Samurai, Fight Club, Leon, The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, The Wild Bunch, Once Upon A Time In The West, The Godfather Trilogy, Indochine, Throne Of Blood, Brannagh's Henry V, Fire Walk With Me - that's just off the top of my head!


Ah well back to the telly!



Peter

Hello Pete, Pat, Kris

Kris tipped me off about this (blame her !!)- mind if I throw my tupporthworth in ?

Are you back on your feet, Peet ? helping at all ?

While searching for this, found some very literate convos with Kris, Bushy et al. Lots of long words Feel I am being left behind in the cerebral stakes - always helps though, so I am confident I shall cross the Rubicon of Cosmological Interdependency sometime this year

Now.. where was I ?

O yes, fave films. Have to think about that.

be seeing you

hi p.k. sweet pert one,

i did get my names all mixed up yesterday didnt i? still i am glad you are here.

it is as many favourite films as you care to list i think, but my list is so short i am doing it one at a time. (dare i mention blood sport i wonder )so i still havent met anyone who has seen the film. i will have to go to norway i suppose.

a recently enjoyed film, girl interrupted but only because of angelina jolie's performance. (not a fave though). another fave is
michael palin's ripping yarns, the one where he went to sea and discovered to his amazement that all his sailors had breasts !!

i thought i heard your hounds howling at the big whiteface last night p.k. tell them to knock for me next time so i can come too. i love joining in with a good old howl.

kris

Peter's mention of Sleepy Hollow has reminded me of 2 further people in film I revere:

(1)Tim Burton (including Batman, and especially A Nightmare Before Christmas);
(2) Johnny Depp (including From Hell).

Oh, and I also fancy Heather Graham something chronic.

hi pat, pete and peek,

i thought sleepy hollow was beautifully portrayed and i like johnny depp as an actor too. i loved the surreal quality held in so much of it.

i think one flew over the cuckoo's nest was supreme in it's era.

juicy fruit.

kris

Hey young Pat

You keep your hands of Heather Graham! I've been madly in lust with her since Twin Peaks .

Since Boogie Nights and Austin Powers I've decided she is the perfect woman. (Sorry, Charisma!)

Too late evil Dr Lovegrove: the Graham is mine (she must be: she's both my wallpaper and screensaver).

Can someone remind me of the Steve Martin/Eddie Murphy film she appeared in: I keep thinking "Bushwhack'd", but that can't be right!

Hi Kris,

Totally agree with you about Sleepy Hollow: the Depp/Burton combination seems to work so well.

What did you like particularly about "Cuckoo's"?

What ho Pat

"Bowfinger" - and the lovely Ms Graham played Daisy, a girl who exuded innocence but would sleep with anyone to get what she wanted.

That's my gal!

On the subject of Tim Burton. I'm a bit ambivalent about him. As I say; "Sleepy Hollow" - brilliant, I've watched it over and over (Depp and Ricci help of course), "Mars Attacks" - great film, dark and very funny; "Planet of the Apes" - story didn't work, Wahlberg miscast; "Batman" films - didn't like at all, don't have any good reason, just didn't appeal; "Edward Scissorhands" - see Batman.

hi pat

well everything really. i had read the book and loved it. the first time i saw the film i didnt think the changes were necessary. however, the whole film was a breakthrough at that time in exposing the dark world of american psychiatirc institutions and the american system and portrayed mental illness sympathetically. the film hit powerfully. (loved chief at the end.)

frances farmer - a famous case and made into a film with jessica lange. i had read the book before the film. it was a pity that the full truth couldnt be shown. the book is a very interesting read.

another of my faves ever, boxing helena

kris

whoa, peter, this is fascinating stuff for a voyeuristically positioned female like me...

kris

Peter,

Thanks for Bowfinger: it was bugging me.

re Burton:

I agree with you about Planet of the Apes, Sleepy Hollow and Mars Attacks!, but I thought Batman was, well, great really. I loved the return to the comic book style and the darkness of Gotham and Batman himself and thought the cinematography, particularly in the cityscapes was wonderful.

Have you seen A Nightmare Before Christmas (which I count as a Burton film)?

Kris,

Boxing Helena? I'm up for as much weirdness as the next man (Lynch and Greenaway are testament to that), but I just didn't "get" it I suppose.

Evenin chaps and chapette

Cuckoos Nest is definitely one of my all-time faves. I love the part where they all go out fishing. Sad too. Do you think that Nurse Ratchett has a change of heart after Billy Bibbitt dies ? She seems much mellower at the end of the film.

Has anyone seen Magnolia ?

P.S. if no-one wants Charisma Carpenter anymore, can I have her ???

Evening PK,

Peter may have surrendered CC, but just because I fancy Nicole and Heather doesn't mean I've given up dibs on her. Play conkers for it? Round the back of the bike shed after school tomorrow.

Pat.