Scene Unseen: Jerry Maguire: Homage

Cameron Crowe: This is a homage to My So-Called Life which is one of my favourite TV shows. I love the feeling of it. And I later met Claire Danes and said: "Did you see Jerry Maguire?" And she said: "Yeah..." And I said: "You know there's a homage to My So-Called Life in there." And she's like: "Uh - yeah..."
[Everyone laughs]
Tom Cruise: Is that true?
Cameron Crowe: That's me doing a bad imitation .. She caught it! She caught it!
-- From the video commentary track for the dvd featuring Crowe, Cruise and Renee Zellweger

TV Yet more proof of the idiocy of the general public (or rather people who watch Big Brother) as the one person who's created the upturn in interest is booted out on here ear ... and with a healthy contempt for the audience ... "Davina raised the Judas Kiss provoking a negative reaction from the crowd. Davina told Becki that Michelle was popular. Becki denied watching much of the show before entering saying she had "a busy life unlike.." then her voice trailed off."

Film Watching The Day After Tomorrow the other week a glimmer of a thought flashed through the back of my mind. I put it away as quickly as I could, because I knew it was wrong and that terrible things could only ensue if I gave it full reign on my sensibilities. For the purposes of this post I will reveal it to you as long as you too promise that as soon as you've read it you can forget it was even on the screen in front of you. I'm going to paragraphing it just for that purpose...

"Hmm ... those tornadoes look cool. I should watch Twister again."

Isn't it amazing the unspeakable evil which can be summoned up by a fleeting thought. Imagine if that had been my next move -- the forces which might come into play. But luckily I contented myself with the spectacle which played out on the screen in front of me instead.

But what draws us to continually keep watching these horrible films. I mean I know Coyote Ugly is drek, and yet there it sits on my dvd shelf nestled between Plunkett and Macleane and Love Actually, both equally dubious. In a new column for Movie Poop Shoot, Patrick Keller is going out of his way to watch cruddy Hollywood films in an attempt to understand why we continue to watch them to the extent that they continue to be made:

"Yes, bad movies are everywhere these days, and they're flourishing. Kids practically have to be tied to the furniture to stop them from going to see their "Junior Freddie Prinzes" and their "The Rocks" in the latest The Fast and the Furious ripoff or Agent Cody Banks epic. Adults are just as guilty. Someone's going to see all those Costner movies, and I suspect a lot of AARP discounts are involved. Hell, Oprah has even started her own "bad movie club." Every year, the famed talk-show host seeks out that one film she believes to be the worst of the worst. Then she produces it and sometimes even stars in it ... Why is this happening? Where did everyone's taste go? Are they putting something in the Coke served at theaters that causes spontaneous temporary retardation?

Co-incidentally his first film is the tornado epic but I'll let him speak for himself on that epic. I think the answer is that these films are easy to watch. Having sat through Mississippi Mermaid yesterday morning which amounts to (and excuse the potty-mouth) Catherine Denerve prick-teasing the bloke from Godard's Breathless out of his money for two hours (somehow proving that there is a reason these film disappeared for three decades until DVD came along), all we want sometimes is to be entertained in the most non-threatening manner, without the spectre of an ambiguous ending involving snow, hitch-hiking, poverty and suicide.

Film matches reality matching fiction matching reality:

"Orson Welles went on the run from film producers in Europe to try to get more money out of them for his role in The Third Man, a new documentary reveals. Welles was chased from Paris to Rome and back when he was supposed to be filming the classic in Vienna in 1948, according to Shadowing The Third Man. Producers even hired a magician in Rome to coax him, according to one story."

It's all rather meta really.

Life It's just been one of those weeks frankly. Apart from the late shifts (which have dissipated tonight for seven weeks thank goodness), yesterday I woke up for no apparent reason with a splitting headache, sweating and shaking. I managed to calm everything down long enough to watch a movie (the ponderous Traffaut movie Mississippi Mermain) but I still didn't feel right. But given my week off at the start of last month I didn't want to call in sick.

It was still relatively warm up here in the clouds, so when I dragged myself out to work I threw on a shirt over nothing. The street level was like Siberia. So now the cold is exacerbating whatever is wrong with me and I shiver all the way into work. My head feels like its going to explode as I sit through the two important meetings I had yesterday, monosyllabically trying to make contributions. By nine o'clock in the evening I'm starting to shiver uncontrollably. As I'm walking to the taxi home, it's cold, it's wet and it feels like its going to go on for the rest of my life. I'm in bed twenty minutes after I trip through the front door.

I wake up this morning absolutely fine, as though the illness of the day before never happened. As I sit typing now feeling another slight headache arrive (which I attribute to end of working week-itis) I can only guess as to what happened yesterday. My thought is that because my window was open in my bedroom overnight I caught some kind of chill. I didn't think that kind of thing happened anymore.

Also...

The Scottish village of Tongue: "Tongue really takes your breath away. The inky sea mellows into sapphire then powdery blue like a Dulux paint swatch; all bordered by gorgeous beaches, pale and honey gold. I was so excited to be in a town called Tongue that I neglected to take any photos of the actual scenery. Instead I concentrated my efforts on signage and sniggering like a ten-year-old." [related: Undiscovered Scotland]


Paul Robinson returns to Neighbours. Which is a bit of a random character choice. A bit like bringing Annie Wilkes back to Emerdale...

The Sun tries to apologise for their Hillsborough coverage. Fails. Makes people even more angry. Digs even bigger grave: ""Fifteen years is a long time. It is 11 years longer than the first world war, nine years longer than the second world war. We cannot believe these protests properly represent the opinions of the majority of men and women in Liverpool," it said." Not from Liverpool are you? [related: Manchester United sniffing around Wayne Rooney.]


Plotlines for the three Ninth Doctor Who novels due for publications next year. A hint at the mood of the new show? "In 1920s London the Doctor and Rose find themselves caught up in the hunt for a murderer. But not everyone or everything is what they seem. Secrets lie behind locked doors and inhuman killers roam the streets. Who is the Painted Lady and why is she so interested in the Doctor? How can a cat return from the dead? Can anyone be trusted to tell - or even to know - the truth? With faceless killers closing in, the Doctor and Rose must solve the mystery of the Clockwise Man before London itself is destroyed..."

Who Killed Saturday Night? - goes out on Channel 4 on 10 July at 9.30pm. Jack Kibble-White from Off The Telly interviews Christopher Bruce and Martin Cunning about making the show: "We were conscious of the look and feel of clip shows generally, hence my desire (as far as possible) to achieve something different. As as result the TV's invariably in the background of our interview set-ups, with the incoming or outgoing clips still playing on them - and the lighting for all the interviewees is generally dark and moody because, after all, TV is something best viewed in a darkened room. Also important is our inclusion of (informed) TV viewers who speak their mind and relay (often) fundamental truths about various aspects of Saturday night TV. Finally, our visual emphasis on the TV itself - after all it has gone from a much-loved three- dimensional piece of furniture to a rather cold and untouchable two-dimensional (largely empty) picture frame, ie. the plasma screen."

Classic Gamer's second issue is online.


Erm ... isn't this Starship Troopers? "The cunningly-named Ten O'Clock News Extra aims to provide a "tell-me-more" service for viewers by featuring longer interviews, extra footage and background information on the day's stories. "The BBC News audience consistently tell us that they want even more information on the day's events," said the BBC's head of news, Richard Sambrook. "Ten O'Clock News Extra will provide that platform for added depth and context to the bulletin and will help drive a new audience towards our interactive services."

Life The long dark late shift of the soul continues; but here past the midpoint of the week I'm feeling OK -- not quite as tired tonight, but I am eating cheese of toast, which I suspect might lead to wierd dreams tonight. ANd I watched Rosemary's Baby this morning. I really should think these things through. As predicted, the most predictable set of housemates in Big Brother ever have nominated Ahemd and Becky this week. Keep the newbee in will you. She'll be the one keeping interesting in the ninth week...

Life Because of my late shift at work, things may be a bit threadbare around here. A few updates though. I'm not looking so tired -- apparently after a shave and a haircut I can look lot more healthy, much less like a hobo. In a related topic, I'm holding off buying a new mattress for now -- I've turned this one over and it seems OK so far, with proper nights sleep returning. I've discovered the joys of Firefox -- really its the Google of browsers and you should go and download now. The magazine sold at ebay; when I saw the selling price I cheered and ran up and down. This could get addictive. Shaznay Lewis' new single is an unforseen trip into early Nelly Furtado via late Natalie Imbruglia. Who knew that would happen? And finally, doesn't Casablanca improve with every viewing? And really, finally, really, my friend Chris now has a weblog.