Irish go home!

(the title of this post, by the way, was the answer a friend of mine gave when asked what "Erin go Bragh" meant.)

I'm going to express my feelings on St. Paddy's day with, in my mind, the best quote on the subject, from The Simpsons (in the voice of Kent Brockman).

"St Patrick's Day - when everyone's a little bit Irish, except for the gays, and the Italians."

I did completely forget to follow my usual tradition of wearing orange on the 17th, just to see if anyone knows enough to get offended (so far, just one person, and I've been doing it almost every year since 1997.)

So, as mentioned in the last post, we watched some Dr. Who this week. Yes, we are that nerdy. In our defence, it was "The Androids of Tara", one of the funny-and-not-overly-embarrassing Tom Baker series from the late 70's, and part of the larger "Key to Time" story arc (which has some genuinely awful sections.) I'd been hoping that the commentary (featuring Tom Baker, Mary Tamm [aka Romana mk.1] and the director) would be amusing and/or edifying, but, alas, it was a bit like listening to three old theatre people talk about something they were in 20 years earlier, when they were in their prime, which they now are most decidedly not. Wait, it was exactly like that. I turned it off when they started talking about how much they were impressed with the special effects in Gladiator.

As an aside, I should mention that I used to be a pretty big Dr. Who fan as a kid and up until I was 14 or so; then I discovered better, 'serious' speculative fiction films (Silent Running, Blade Runner) and writing (Harlan Ellison, Brian Aldiss, Frank Herbert, etc.) I also shoveled up a lot of crap, like Robert Heinlein (who writes a good adventure yarn but tends towards fascist politics and irritatingly self-righteous libertarian protaganists) and Piers Anthony (most of his work just makes me want to give him a solid cock-punching). I still like well-written sf now and then - I'm just enough out of touch with it that I'm not sure what to look for. Well, besides Iain M. Banks (and it appears my big post* about him has been eaten by Blogger, which upsets me slightly. Long story short: get Complicity, Against A Dark Background, Espedair Street and The Crow Road; under no circumstances get, read, or even look at the cover of Canal Dreams.)

The next film up, likely, is Jim Jarmusch's Mystery Train(s), and I nearly jumped up with glee when I saw that. I've only seen it twice now (once in film class, and once on video), but it's a film that sticks with you. Three interlocking stories are shown, in sequence (an idea lifted by Quentin Tarantino for Pulp Fiction), of two Japanese tourists, an Italian woman, and three working-class guys (one of whom is Joe Strummer) in Memphis. All three stories are, in essence: the day passes, then they stay in a seedy hotel (where the desk clerk is Screamin' Jay Hawkins), and during the night, a gunshot is heard. It's a simple enough story, like many of Jarmusch's other films - three guys get thrown in jail, and break out; a young man travels west to find work but finds trouble and death instead; a contract killer runs into problems with his boss; several people drink coffee and smoke cigarettes - but made with so few of the features of Hollywood films that it's startling, and once you get used to it, quite enjoyable.

Speaking of which: we're off to see Tristram Shandy tonight. Prepare for gushing at the geniuses that are Steve Coogan and Michael Winterbottom.

*in the spirit of which, I think I may resurrect my album buying guides, which I wrote for those few artists whose entire oevre I've heard. Everybody loves a list, right?