....Kelly told me about this, as a friend of hers, Timothy Foster, directed it. It is a 30minute short documentary film, based around Romford's A1 mini cab service and the nightly passengers they carry. It is hugely engaging - particularly when it could have slipped in to drunken, puking passengers only.
Six-zero and some friendly passengers.
The split screen device allows us to watch how the cab driver interacts with their customers - which vary from first internet dates, post wedding journeys, a forlorn widower and of course, the obligatory snogging couple. Despite cameras being set up in numerous cabs, most of the action is captured from within the car of 'six zero'. The driver, (known only to the viewer as six zero), is able to conduct an almost inquisition of his passengers, managing to do so in an inoffensive way. As a result, guards are let down and real people are captured in natural moments. I found it sweet, funny and shocking in equal measure. Channel 4 describe it here, and you can watch the full episode here. (Which I urge you to do).
....Footage of the first of the trapped Chileanminers to be brought back to the surface and to his family. Watch it without getting a lump in your throat. (And I'm pretty sureSpielberg'll have a keen interest too.....)
....The only politically minded post that I'll make ahead of the forthcoming General Election. Just so you know, I'm going to vote Labour. I'd probably rather vote Lib Dem, but I'm so worried that the Tories might actually get in to power, I feel obliged to vote for their closet rival. Please, no Tory Government. With that in mind, I thought this was rather good:
...I got the opportunity to go and see the Adam Buxton hosted, Bug, for only the second time tonight. Like the first, it was a rambling, funny, cringe worthy and altogether learned evening, trawling music videos, ads and internet phenomena for all the wrong and right reasons.
There was also a live interview with Sean Pecknold, that whilst interesting, was somewhat stifled by the music director's inability to maintain a decent conversation. He seemed so introverted that it was only Buxton who could draw any fact and humour from it.
There are many videos from tonight's show that I liked. This for example. And this. And this. But I am going to end this post on one that I seem to have gained a particular dislike for:
OK GO, 'This too shall pass'
Now this video has got my back up a bit. Watch it all and you might be amazed, joyous, wonder struck, tickled pink. Find out that it was, (more or less), shot in one take, then you might be more so. This music video has proved an internet phenomenon, passing from email to email, screen to screen. But what gets me is not it's artistic merit - for there is a lot of hard work in this. Not it's undoubted positivity, because many will watch with a smile. But it is the hugely unoriginal idea behind this video. It is a well trodden one too and it seems to me they haven't been so gracious as to acknowledge it. Preceding this, was in 2003, the Honda 'Cog' ad from creatives at Wieden + Kennedy.
This ad won a host of awards. Perhaps rightly so, (for its execution), but I was annoyed even then, as I had seen this idea before. It was stolen. A fraud. My art school education had paid off in one small way - I had been shown a video of artist duo Fischli & Weiss, from 1987 called 'The way things go'. In one take, household parts, flora & fauna were set up to create one larger, sprawling continuous machine. It was a less polished 'Cog' - but only because it didn't exist in adland.
Anyone who watched the Honda ad, and new about the above video would be lying if they didn't admit the incredible similarities. But then, Fischli & Weiss weren't entirely original themselves. Whilst they were the first to create such a chain reaction for real and in a live setting, they based their work of art on the American cartoonist Rube Golderg. His cartoons depicted the accomplishment of something simple through a complex means. In fact his name became a dictionary based adjective for exactly that.
Maybe, all this proves something that I already knew, but daren't admit in my fury. Nothing is original. But the best works of art, the best ads, films, music and so on, succeed by using an existing, celebrated idea and putting a new twist on it. OK GO's video only scrapes in to this category in my view, the uplifting nature securing it a place. But, I guess that's enough. Now just watch the awards roll in.
His straight delivery, dark humour and surreal take on observations lead him to vitriolic and hilarious condemnation of Richard Hammond, those who emigrate, (abroad or to the countryside), for a 'better quality of life', the Michael McIntyre / Frankie Boyle / Paddy McGuinness comedy trio and many more.
Yet amongst all this, he comes across as a guy you'd have a beer with, a family man, but ultimately and most importantly, an incredibly funny one. His rambling story of how his family used the phrase, "I'll give it to you straight. Like pear cider, made from 100% pears," only for it to be ruined by a certain Magners ad, is a case in point of surreal fiction, sourced from contemporary culture that has the audience in the palm of his hands.
Moon on a stick! (back in the day)
To end the show, Lee descends in to and amongst the audience, mic left on stage to rant and rave, to keep us on our toes. Then on re-entry to the spotlight, he decides to pick up a guitar and sing, (very well), Steve Earl's 'Galway Girl'. Of course it is his favourite song....until good old Mr. Magner went and ruined it in one of his ads. Genius.
....James's blog has alerted me to the arrival of series 3 of Mad Men. I'm sure it will take a little while longer to get over this side of the pond, but it will be worth the wait. Mad Men is one of the most beautifully cast, styled, written and shot TV programmes in a long time - the opening credits alone are a thing of wonder:
....The first in this series aired on Monday, with the autopsy of an elephant. Rather than just employing shock tactics, this programme was genuinely insightful, educational and as a result truly absorbing. The basic premise is that by dissecting some of the worlds largest animals we can discover their evolutionary secrets. I advise you to catch the next installment, when a fin whale gets the treatment whilst washed up on shore. Heck, even the oft acerbic Charlie Brooker likes it!
