Long drive to freedom - Microdiscectomy +20

The obligatory recovery stuff
By the early afternoon I was both bored and fed up. So I decided to drive to the shops. Then I thought 'sod it' and decided to drive to Milton Keynes. Pleasingly, the drive itself was a comfortable and unproblematic experience. Unfortunately my walking was rather laboured and painful after the drive. A consequence perhaps more related to watching two movies that morning than the drive itself. At least I hope so. Nonetheless the drive holds out some hope of freedom from these four walls. With a queue of people wanting to visit me showing no signs of forming, I now at least see a light at the end of the tunnel in terms of being able broaden my surroundings and see different faces.

Apart from that I watched films and tv and stuff (see below)


Midnight in Paris 4.25/5
You know what it's like...Woody Allen doesn't make a decent film for years and then twice in the space of 5 years he comes up with a corker (the other being Vicky Cristina Barcelona). Ok so there were three duff films in between, but nobody's perfect.

What's more surprising is that this is a rom com that defies the standard formula and works (albeit there is more rom than com).

What is even more surprising is that it stars Owen Wilson and by the end, far from wanting to pummel his face into a mush I quite liked him.

The plot is kind of hard to explain, but it goes a bit like this. Wilson plays a writer visiting Paris with his fiance (Rachel McAdams playing pretty much the only role in her acting repertoire) and his future in-laws. One night he gets drunk and lost, when a 1920s vintage car pulls up and offers him a lift. He finds himself back in time in the 1920s and taken to a party for Jean Cocteau. Ernest Hemmingway promises to show Wilson's draft novel to Gertrude Stein.Wilson returns again and again, and comes to realise he doesn't love his fiance and has instead fallen for Picasso's mistress. He confides in Dali and Bunuel and...(to quote Kenny Everett's Cupid Stunt) "but I'm telling you the plot.

Suffice to say the film has a nice and unpredictable resolution (apart from the fact that he splits from his fiance - that's entirely predictable).

I liked it. there I said it. I liked a modern Woody Allen film and an Owen Wilson film. Two for the price of one.


Contagion 3.5/5
So what would happen if a global flu pandemic occurred? Well according to this film millions of people will die. But it's not all bad, Gwyneth Paltrow sucombs within the first 10 minutes.

This film has the feel of one of those docu-dramas you get from time to time. There isn't really enough...what's it called...plot. Bug spreads, people die, society is pushed to the brink of collapse, doctor discovers a vaccine, hooray. But having said that it is a compelling film. It's one to watch once, but not when you have a sniffle.

Oh and Jude Law's Aussie accent? Purrrlease!!!


Duran Duran live
Sky Arts showed a Duran Duran concert from 1987 and for some reason I was drawn in to watching it. I wasn't a fan back in the 80s. I'm not sure many guys were. Girls tended to fall into either the camp of Duran Duran or Spandau Ballet (a bit like 1 Direction and JLS nowadays). But over time I have grown to appreciate the fact that DD actually wrote some damn good songs.

This performance, if not showing Duran Duran quite at the peak of their popularity was not far off. Le Bon was a surprisingly charismatic front man.And curiously for a band whose other members seemed intent on covering themselves in glue and then rolling around in the worst fashion excesses of the decade, Le Bon's look holds up pretty well.

Which is curious because not too long ago he was seen looking like this

Now who does he remind me of?

Two Kenny Everett references in one blog GTFI!

In my next blog (unless something interesting happens) I will indulge my inner geek. Be afraid. Be very afraid.