Dedications: My four late friends Rory, Stan, Bryan, Jeff - shine on you crazy diamonds, they would have blogged too. Then theres Garry from Brisbane, Franco in Milan, Mike now in S.F. / my '60s-'80s gang: Ned & Joseph in Ireland; in England: Frank, Des, Guy, Clive, Joe & Joe, Ian, Ivan, Nick, David, Les, Stewart, the 3 Michaels / Catriona, Sally, Monica, Jean, Ella, Anne, Candie / and now: Daryl in N.Y., Jerry, John, Colin, Martin and Donal.

Saturday 7 September 2013

"Summer's lease hath too short a date" ....

So sayeth The Bard - Shakespeare - and verily it is true once again, as here in England we have gone from late summer into autumn literally overnight.

Thursday was billed as The Last Day of Summer, with increased temperatures up to 30 degrees - it was so hot and sweaty at midnight the fans were still on here. Next day was supposed to be cooler and wet - it was. Suddenly beaches were deserted and one had to go out in heavy rain, with that big umbrella - its been cool and windy ever since and looks set to continue.
Adding to that, the new autumn season is about to unveil on television:-

STRICTLY COME DANCING (England's DANCING WITH THE STARS) has its introductory show, the juggernaut gets underway in a couple of weeks - thats Sunday nights taken care of until Christmas. Flavia and Louis (last year's winners) reprised their sensational Charleston. Rugby boy Ben Cohen (paired with Kristina!) and pop minx Sophie Ellis-Bextor may be the ones to watch this year, as well as Bond girl & property tycoon Fiona Fullerton .... and fashion designer Julian McDonald should get into some nice bitchy spats with the judges, like Craig. Flavia and Vincent may have departed, but Pavel, Artem and the other professionals should keep things jumping. 

X FACTOR (England's AMERICAN IDOL) is already underway, with the auditions. Its all about the judges of course, not the "talent". It was annoying last year that some terrific auditionees (like Joseph Whelan) did not even get to the live shows. Sharon Osborne looking more plastic than ever is back. Who now remembers Cheryl or Kelly or Tulisa ... ? as Nicole Scherzinger continues to fascinate.

DOWNTON ABBEY comes back for its 4th season too .... starting in a week or two.   Lots of new talent there too ... Bring them on!

and the new BFI London Film Festival has unveiled its next programme, starting in October.


The programme is out for the British Film Institute's annual London Film Festival in October. As usual its a very full programme over a couple of weeks.

Among the forthcoming big hitters having galas (those two new Tom Hanks films, Judi Dench as PHILOMENA and others) I am pleased to see a section titled "Treasures" featuring films revived and restored from the world's archives, some not seen for a long time. This is good news for film fans generally as it will lead to these being seen more, often with new dvd releases.

Among those included are Nick Ray's THE LUSTY MEN (right), Daves' COWBOY, LA BELLE ET LA BETE, the original GASLIGHT, Shirley Clark's engrosssing PORTRAIT OF JASON, Visconti's SANDRA that operatic melodrama from 1965, a Projector favourite here - too long unseen; Demy's MODEL SHOP, Welles' THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI, Bogarde's VICTIM, and that Hammer oddity from 1966: Joan Fontaine's last feature THE WITCHES.- We shall be reporting on some of these (the Nick Ray, Demy, the Hammer WITCHES) before too long ...

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