Credit: Chally and Nirmukta
Can this really be the end?
So, Utopia is no more, at least for the time being.
The DVD release (out on 11th March) labels the Channel 4 drama as Series 1 so there is almost certainly more to come.
Part of me thinks that there is nothing more to say but as I’m already suffering from withdrawal symptoms I would certainly be tuning in enthusiastically.
With many of the main characters dead, maimed or gravely ill the whole mind fuck trip will need to be reinvented anew. Call me an eternal optimist but I hope that, if there is a follow-up, it is done for reasons other than merely to cash in on its success. Continue reading
“Liberty, far from putting man in possession of himself, ceaselessly alienates him from his essence and his world” – Michel Foucault, Madness & Civilisation
This movie is adapted from director Roberto Andò’s own novel which bore the more Shakespearean title ‘Il Trono Vuoto’ (Literally, ‘The Empty Throne’ or a looser translation could be The Hollow Crown). This association is no coincidence since, as in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night and The Comedy of Errors, the two protagonists are twins.
It stars the consistently excellent Toni Servillo who reminds me of the great Scottish character actor Alastair Sim because he has the same droll melancholy that lends itself well to drama or farce. In this film he is able to show both faces.
The first is as a tired, disillusioned politician Enrico Olivieri. As leader of an opposition party, his support is dwindling and his standing even among his own members is on the wane.
Weary of the rituals and close to a nervous breakdown, he takes an impromptu leave of absence leaving his party in a quandary. In desperation they opt for a high-risk strategy of using his estranged twin brother Giovanni Ernani as a stopgap solution.
Continue readingOne of the participants in the E-Learning & Digital Cultures online course invited people to post the first word they think of to describe Facebook. This is my Wordle of the first replies:
What word do you think of?
There’s a song by Anthony Hamilton called ‘Freedom’ on the official soundtrack album to Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained but one notable absence from the disc is the song with the same title by Richie Havens.
This was performed at Woodstock in 1969 and, so the story goes, was a spontaneous, unrehearsed outpouring of passion and inspiration.
Havens was the first on the bill and as the other acts were late arriving he was asked to keep going to keep the crowd entertained. They say that necessity if the mother of invention, Havens was doubtless also helped by some chemical substances – whatever inspired the song it worked….. in spades.
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