Justine's Birthday & Stuff

Well another week has flown by. Haven't done much. David came around on Thursday to watch Argento's 'Suspiria', must be the 4th or 5th time I've seen that now and it's still bloody brilliant.

Saturday night we went out with Justine's crowd to celebrate her Birthday. Went to a Turkish restaurant on Upper Street then on to The Kings Head (?) for more beer drinking. Great to see her as always, especially as she wasn't surrounded by the usual trailer trash, ooh slap my hands. Had too much to drink as always, but as I'd eaten I couldn't get totally wasted (Matt was happy!) Declined her offer to go to their local late night drinking den in Wood Green, taxi home would have been expensive and I don't think it would really be Matt's cup of tea. Oh well, hope I get to catch up with her really soon, strange we don't see that much of each other anymore as we used to live in each other's pockets. Still, it's just like yesterday when we meet and that's a great sign of friendship I think.

Managed to get through 30 Lucky Strikes at the weekend, but am now back on the roll ups again...

We are racing our way through 'The Champions' DVD boxset and I really love it. I have to try and forget just how fantastic 'The Avengers' was/is. The episodes set in London are quite similar, obviously minus whimsy. The characters do need a shot of humor though. The episode we watched last night was the best yet and starred Kate O'Mara as a drug addict who's seen shop-lifting at Selfridges, totally brilliant!

Have also watched 'Seed of Chucky' (directed by Don Mancini) which was bloody great too. Some of the hilarious dialogue could have been written by one of the stars of the film, the god known as John Waters who plays a reporter named Pete Peters. Very, very bad taste which is always a plus (namely the turkey basting impregnation scene!) and Jennifer Tilly is just adorable, love that voice. No, honestly.

Jess and the weekend just gone

Had a bloody brilliant time with my sister Jess - up to stay for the weekend (my Birthday bash). Met her at Waterloo on Friday night, came back to the flat, streaked her hair, ate noodles, watched 'A Night On Mount Edna' and two episodes of 'Jam' and drank lots of vodka. Got up early on Saturday and went to Kingston, where I bought two pairs of trainers, two pairs of jeans and a jacket. Got a bus to Worcester Park, popped in to see Matt's parents for a cuppa tea then went to the fish & chip restaurant and had large cod & chips. Got train home, got ready to go out, got taxi to pub (Alwyne Castle on St. Pauls Road) - lots of my friends turned up, with the exception on Nina, Sasha & Vincent (& Matt's work lot). Felt relatively giddy before going to the Buffalo bar by Highbury & Islington tube, well I did steal a stool from the pub that Matt discarded on route. Friend Bex was steaming and fell over at one point pulling me with her (David took her home but had to come back to the club as he'd left his coat there, fool!) Danced with Jess a bit, got taxi home and had noodles (again!), thanks to Jess. Woke up with a hangover, the horrors and a swollen eyelid, but felt better after a shower and Matt's usual big breakfast (also a couple of medicinal tablets helped). Watched two episodes of 'Grace & Favour' ('Are You Being Served Again?') and laughed myself stupid (Matt & Jess didn't, perhaps I was still drunk as most of the series has been arse cringingly awful) Anyway Jess left about 2.30 to meet her pal Tamzin in Clapham. Later watched the first two episodes of 'The Champions' which was brilliant (yes I have the boxset I was after, along with 'The Saint' - now all I need is 'Department S', 'Jason King', 'Danger Man' and 'The Protectors'). Spent Monday laughing with David about the Saturday evening, oh and have started to smoke roll ups as all of my duty free Lucky Strikes have gone - sniff.

Happy Birthday

Well, today is my birthday, been out and bought a shirt and a million pairs of socks. Got given so many fantastic things, including a voucher for Tusk Tattoo, hoorah! DVD's, astroboy stuff, sweets, a giant ashtray, a sixties tea service, an old pink finger-dial telephone, books and some great japanese toys. Spoilt, spoilt, spoilt.

Almost finished decorating the toilet, was waxing the door last night, that was energy zapping. Just need to get the vinyl flooring down now and get some shelves up. Oh and paint the pipes with 'Hammerite', maybe that'll stop the mould getting through at last.

Watched 'It Lives Again' ('It's Alive' 2) last night, have seen it before but it was still good to watch it, shame you don't get to see the babies much and having the original father killed off (John P. Ryan) was a bit rubbish. Also the police chief, who near the end admits to fathering one of the monsters himself, now come on, yuk! His poor wife, that guy must be at least seventy years old. Interestingly Laurie Johnson (The Avengers) did the incidental music, cool.

Monday night we watched Dario Argento's 'Opera' and to be brutally honest I didn't think it was that brilliant. True, it had some great scenes, particularly the bit where the ravens (?) are released and swoop into the audience. But I didn't think it was that cool, some of the acting was questionable and as for the english dub... who the hell did the voice for that nosey child? She sounded like that killer girl from Christopher Morris's 'Jam' and why on earth was the main girl called Betty? Made her sound like an old woman. I did, however like the death scenes, the needles under the eyes and of course it's always good to see Daria Nicolodi.

Saturday the 15th

It's three days 'til my birthday, yippee! I'm taking the day off - but don't know what I'll be doing, probably still decorating the toilet! (how many coats of paint do those bloody walls need?). Matt is paying for me to have a tattoo, which I need to get organized - it has been months since I last had one - I have a particular un-inked area on my left arm that need serious filling in.

It's saturday morning right now. I've just got up - late again. Want to go out and buy some new trainers and jeans.

Last night we had a curry and watched Michelangelo Antonioni's 'Blow Up' - which was brilliant but nothing like I was expecting and was so quiet in parts - didn't know Veruschka was in the film, that was cool - love David Hemmings too.

Jackie Stallone was booted out of 'No Celebrity Big Brother' - shame, I liked looking at her face - cant believe she gets such bad publicity.

Hope to get 'The Champions', 'The Saint' and 'The Protectors' boxsets for my birthday!

Going for breakfast now, be seeing you.

More DVD's!

Watched 'It's Alive!' (Larry Cohen's) on tuesday and it was just as brilliant as I had remembered. John P. Ryan who plays the main character (father of fanged and clawed baby) has a strange style of acting, cant think of anything I've seen him in before. Anyway this film is a great monster baby film that should be watched with friends and beer. We have decided to have a baby-horror season ourselves, starting with the 'It's Alive!' trilogy followed by one of my all time favourite movies 'The Baby' (Ruth Roman looking like Joan Crawford) and ending with the trashy beyond belief 'I Don't Want to Be Born' with my favourite horror queen Joan Collins - I don't care what anybody says or thinks, that woman made some great horrors in the 70's.

Moving on to something completely different... I've also watched 'The Wild Women of Wongo' (directed by James L. Wolcott) and starring muscle hunk Ed Fury, who did a handful of peplums in the 60's. This DVD was from the '50 Movie Sci-Fi Films' box and was one of the first ones that I've managed to sit through - quality wise, I mean it's still shitty but watchable, wonder what the 'Something Weird Video' print is like. However, this has everything someone like me wants in a film and is SO 'bad' it's brilliant. The story is about two warring tribes, Goona is a beach village populated by supposedly ugly women (fat & skinny) and handsome and buff, blond men, while Wongo is the reverse, having brutish ugly men and gorgeous women (styled and set hair and printed bikini's), anyway there's lots of fun to be had, ridiculous dialogue, a dragon god (crocodile), apemen (hi!), the native dance the Wongo women do is brilliant - the leggy brunette Priestess joins in wearing an especially rubbish outfit made of cardboard and sticky-backed-plastic and the tribes people have names like Omoo, Engor, Ahtee, Gahbo and Wana. It looks like it was filmed in a large garden centre and on a beach. Nice to see muscly Ed Fury too - don't think I've ever seen him in a movie before.

'The Bloodsucker Leads the Dance' DVD

This film was hysterically bad and hysterically funny too. I'd been led to believe this was some sort of giallo hybrid but I disagree - it's plain old Italian celluloid trash! My sister had picked up the DVD for me in the States and I'm so glad she did...

Directed by Alfredo Rizzo ('The Beast in Heat') in 1975 it stars a few eurocult and giallo regulars (Giacomo Rossi-Stuart, Krista Nell, Femi Benussi etc.)
The setting is Ireland in 1902 (not really though is it?) where a theatre troupe of sexy gals is disbanding. Along comes a 'Count Marnac' (or something) who invites the posse to stay at his castle on an island nearby, he's in love with one of them you see. Here they meet the creepy butler, a stern house-keeper, two giggling maids and a deranged gardener. Anyway to cut a long story short, it's not long before the girls start to get beheaded - who is doing it? Who cares?

There's lots of breasts on show, one spectacular scene has a maid disturbing a pair of lesbians making out in bed, she leaves their drinks on a bed side table while they get it on hardly noticing her - later the maid is playing with her own titties in front of a mirror before asking the other maid to touch her up, then all of a sudden she says 'night' and gets into bed on her own - fanny teaser or what? One of the theatre girls (Cora) is a right slut and treks across the island for some action with the fisherman, she was my favourite character as she didn't care what anybody thought of her. It all ends rather bizarrely like some sort of 'Murder She Rubbish', but hey-ho I enjoyed it - It's filmed in a cool castle, I'm sure I've seen before and the soundtrack is great too.

I'm very grateful to Redemption films for some of their releases (especially the giallo's) but hate that stupid bitch in latex that has to introduce the film (I always skip straight past her boring and passe intro by using the scene selection). Wish they'd start to release some of the stuff they had on VHS to DVD.

Blah blah blah

So what's new?

God! It was bloody tough today at work. I was so bored and couldn't wait to get home. Got two DVD's in the post (It's Alive, It Lives Again & It's Alive III: Island Of The Alive) which I'm looking forward to seeing. Watched 'Return of the Jedi' on sunday, which seemed to go on for hours & I hate those ewoks. Also saw two episodes of 'Grace & Favour' ('Are You Being Served Again?') which was a bit rubbish to be honest but did have me laughing in some places & watched a Dame Edna Christmas special with Roger Moore.

Saturday we went to Richmond & Chiswick during the day (taking in a fish and chip lunch) wandered around the shops then came home knackered. Mustered up enough strength to go out in the evening, went to the JCubed in Angel first - sadly they still have guest DJ's so we left after one pint and headed to the old man's favourite 'The Red Lion', but that was closed as a load of scaffolding was about to collapse, due to the extreme winds we've been getting. Anyway ended up at some gastro-pub near Clarkenwell for a few more beers, before finally going to 'The Three Kings'. Taxi home and watched the end of 'Jackie Brown' (yawn) with more beer and some stilton. I did have a funny five minutes and pulled down everything on the walls in the toilet and all the hanging fish, after smashing one of the frames and getting glass everywhere, it was time for bed.

Still listening to those 'Mood Mosaic' CD's, they're the best thing music-wise I've bought in ages. I Love the stuff by Stefano Torossi, must look out for other CD's with his work. On a trashier note, I'm loving the Pete Burns & Pet Shop Boys collaboration 'Jack & Jill Party', well I'd love anything Mr Burns would do - he could be singing 'Humpty Dumpty' and I'd think it was fantastic.

'Africa Express' DVD

This should have been in the last blog, stupid me, anyway we have watched the action/comedy 'Africa Express' (Directed by Michele Lupo 1975). This was one of the DVD's I'd found in a market in Naples on the last day of our holiday, back in November. I've been trying to catch movies starring Giuliano Gemma and it was an added bonus that Ursula Andress and Jack Palance were in it.

Set somewhere in Africa, where clips of all kinds of safari animals are speeded-up - Gemma plays John Baxter - a delivery guy loved by the native tribe, a Convent/School and an annoying chimpanzee called Biba (I think). He gets mixed up with bad guy Robert Preston (Palance) and his gang of thugs/smugglers after trying to cheat them at poker, with the help of his chimp. Meanwhile Madeleine Cooper (Andress) - an agent against corruption or something, escapes near death from a train, held up by Preston's gang disguised as a nun. She runs into Baxter in the woods and beats the shit out of him (nice moves, Ursula!) Anyway they make up and drive off in his truck, the 'Africa Express', where romance between the pair blossoms. Baxter drops her off at the Convent and goes about his deliveries. The pair are soon reunited (she tells him she isn't a real nun) and spend the next hour or so outwitting Preston (who owns a crocodile farm) and getting into all kinds of scrapes.

This kind of film wouldn't usually interest me, but it was good Sunday afternoon fodder and I love the cast, also the print was fantastic, which makes a change. There's a talking statue of a saint (reminded me of Memama's 'full of grace' statue in John Waters 'Pecker'), two 'ladies of size' who dance to entertain some sexually frustrated dam-builders, lots of fight scenes, a very large cast of tribes folk, who for a change are not portrayed as cliched fools and a really great soundtrack by Guido & Maurizio De Angelis.

More Peplum watching

Hello, just had to mention more films I've watched, the first up is 'Devil of the Desert Against the Son of Hercules' ('Anthar l'invincibile' directed by Antonio Margheriti, who's done some great movies) starring pretty muscleman Kirk Morris. This DVD came from the Boxset '50 Movie Pack - SciFi Classics - DVD Collection', of which I am yet to find a film with a decent picture, quality-wise. God! I know the box-set is really cheap but I don't think it's worth more than a fiver as most of the films look like they were recorded via camcorder under the Thames. I can't really moan too much, as for me, it's the only way of seeing some of these 'classics'. Because of the quality of the picture (including a line that flickers through the entire film on the right hand side of the screen) I find my mind wandering, but will try to remember most of it...

Princess Soraya, who's father has been killed by an evil tyrant is sold as a slave for lots of cash, only to be rescued by 'Anthar of Athena' (Kirk Morris) and his mute side-kick/friend called Mute (nice touch, that). Morris gets to wear an Ali Baba style outfit, there's loads of horseback riding across deserts and Sahara style locales, gaudy sets, belly dancers and a mirrored room called 'The Chamber of Death!' (the slave seller is stabbed to death here, by the bad-guy tyrant). At one point Anthar gets caught in a large pool in a harem, then later is thrown into an outdoor pit where he has to fight with a giant rhinoceros (shots taken by a camera behind a dodgy looking fake rhino that looks more like a rubbish dinosaur). It all ends very happily with Anthar reunited with Soraya and more horses. This film was obviously cut to fit US TV slots but at 90 odd minutes that was enough for me because, as I've said before the picture quality was appalling.

Next up is 'Hercules and the Tyrants of Babylon' ('Ercole contro i tiranni di Babilonia' directed by Domenico Paolella, who also did 'Diary of a Cloistered Nun', 1964) starring Peter Lupus of TV's Mission Impossible fame. The quality of this one was marginally better, but not much. Lupus's Hercules looks really greasy and not unlike a basted turkey, maybe he had lots of sun lotion on? Anyway Hercules comes to reclaim the Queen of the Hellenes, taken as a Babylonian slave by the army of the three bickering palace dwellers of Babylon (the ruler of Babylon, the King of Assyria and a Queen, played by gorgeous Helga Liné, star of loads of great Eurocult movies). This was the first time I have seen a film with tall looking Peter Lupus and sadly I can't really remember much of it. I do, however remember much whipping of slaves and a huge underground wheel chained to buildings in Babylon, which when turned by the mighty Hercules causes the collapse of the city, hoorah!

Twas the week after Christmas

Phew, too much to tell. Had a great Christmas and received loads of fantastic gifts. Spent Christmas eve and Christmas day at Matt's parents in Surrey, came home on Boxing day, cooked a massive roast (minus meat) and got down to opening our presents. Spent the days in between then and New Years watching masses of TV & DVD's, most notably the 'Dame Edna Experience' boxset, which has had us in hysterics.

Visited my sister Pip and JP in Camden on Tuesday evening. Watched 'A Tale of Two Sisters' ('Janghwa, Hongryeon' Directed by Ji-woon Kim, 2003) it was really cool, but odd and confusing and very slow going. Also in almost every scene there are flowers, be it in floral fabrics, wonder why? Good to see Pip and we exchanged gifts, I'm sure she'll feel short changed! As it looks like she spent a fortune on me and I only bought her Dead Can Dance's 'The Serpent's Egg', well that album is priceless in my opinion.

Our very special friend Peter came over on New Years eve and we went to the local for beers, until other people's merriment was too much for us and we came home for more boozing. Sadly I had an accident after one of my knees gave in and I landed on the radiator with a big crash, the TV was just about to land on my head when Peter & Max saved me from death-by-enormous-heavy-telly-on head-symptoms. The next day we nursed hangovers and watched more Edna. Peter left and I cooked another meatless roast dinner.

That was yesterday, today I woke up with excruciating stomach pains and had to retire to my bed for a couple of hours to sleep it off (damn annoying too because I wanted to watch 'Smallville') Anyway felt totally recovered after my snooze, however I have an enormous black bruise on my arse thanks to falling over. Had taped 'Smallville', so watched that, the first episode was rubbish but the second one was great. I wish Chloe was in it more, I desperately want her to shag Lex. And sniff, sniff, they killed off Adam.

This evening I got a phone call from my Father saying he was going to pop around for five minutes with my stepmother. When they left I asked if they would take some bags I'd filled with junk to a charity shop for me. It was only after they'd gone I realized that one of the gifts they'd given me was in the bag, oh what a complete tit, have I no shame?

Cannot believe it's going to be my birthday in 16 days, bloody hell. I am so old. Must get something organized for my night out. Might go to the Three Kings again as it was so cool last year when we managed to get a whole room to ourselves with a dukebox too. I Fancy a change though but better make up my mind soon or it'll be too late to invite anyone...

Well that's it for now, am's getting bored.