NEW YEAR, OLD FILMS: WE DANCED THE DANCE BABUSHKA!

Happy New Year Readers!

Well, after a quiet New Year's Eve, where the Missus and me saw in 2021 watching a drone display in the Highlands on TV, the New Year calendar can be pinned up at last. Not much going on it yet though except birthdays. Can't really plan anything can we!

Still, its a new beginning. And the start of fresh luck.

Yet as things begin, so too things finish. We've commiserated the ending of our EU membership this morning with a candle-lit continental breakfast at the table, which also seemed like a good way to bring in the New Year. Cheeses, meats, eggs and buns and hot coffee. I think we'll do it again tomorrow and remember our European friends, some of whom read this blog. But enough of politics. This is a nostalgia blog.

New Year, new nostalgia!

Its also a cold wet Bank Holiday here in England, which means nothing much is going on. We are in Tier 3 in Yorkshire, which means that shops are remarkably still open. Most of the country is in Tier 4 so it'll be really quiet there.

I haven't looked at the TV schedules for today but despite moaning about Christmas telly I did catch a few films in its dying embers.

Matilda is a flick I've always enjoyed since reading the book with my daughter in the late Eighties and then watching the film as a family when it came out. Like all those Roald Dahl stories - BFG, The Twits, The Witches - Matilda is a timeless tale and his ability to caricature the grotesque is what is so very appealing. Who can forget Miss. Trunchbowl, the shot-putting, javelin chucking headmistress of Matilda's school, who loves to throw kids in the 'chokey'! Danny Devito starred and directed and for me its his best role since Cobblepot in Batman Returns. What do you think?

The Addams Family from 1991 is another film I adore, especially the first one where Fester 'returns' from the Bermuda Triangle. Everyone plays their part brilliantly and I have always been especially enthralled by the Raul Julia's inspired portrayal of Gomez. Garamia. Babushka. So many memorable lines and scenes. The fencing dance with Fester was just wonderful, where they list the places where the Addams' have danced the Babushka. Gomez names his parents as Mommy and Daddums, which always makes me laugh. Sadly Raul Julia made Addams Family Values in 1993 and died aged just 54 a year later. A fine actor and for me he stole the show.

Deep Impact is a film of two halves and its the first half I've always like a lot. The conspiracy, the journos, the admission by the President, the revelation of the comet, Wulf-Beiderman. For me though the stand-out scene and one I could watch over and over is when Dr. Wulf first sees the comet on his pc screen, the coordinates having been emailed by one young Frodo Baggins from the stargazing club. Dr. Wulf is scoffing a huge slice of sloppy pizza and says something like 'Well hello there little fella, where are you going in such a hurry' before dropping his pizza and rifling through his workstation for an envelope and a floppy disk. Its just one of those little movie moments which I love. The second half of the film is too schmalzy and depressing so I usually watch something else. Do you like Deep Impact?

Actually, thinking about it, it reminds me of a book I read over the summer called Meteor, a movie tie-in. The film starred Sean Connery and Natalie Wood and described a meteor heading for Earth. Its destruction is a novel joint effort between the US and the USSR, who both have to admit to having built Star Wars type space-weapons pointing at each other! Like Deep Impact's Messiah and the ICBM's, it doesn't work and all hell breaks loose. Have you seen Meteor readers?

There was one film I had hoped to catch on New Years Eve, Dead of Night, from 1945. Arguably the first horror anthology and possibly the best, Dead of Night is a black and white gothic gem made in the fading moments of World War II. You will know the short tales because they've been copied ever since, but none so well as the original: the child trapped in the wooden chest at Christmas and the mad ventriloquist plagued by his evil dummy. If you haven't seen Dead of Night then catch it sometime. I was miffed yesterday as it's very seldom on TV and just as it started some friends called by for a New Year rum snifter on the doorstep. Half a bottle of rum later and some very cold but red cheeks, I knew I'd missed most of the film. Ah well, till next time. Have you seen Dead of Night readers?

Which films did you like over the holidays? Maybe even a TV or radio show? Maybe even a book? Tell all.

Oh and, Happy New Year readers! Here's to a much much better one. Good luck to you and yours.