Fake Dog at the Edinburgh International Film Festival!
Written 27 days ago by DaraThe Edinburgh Film Festival took place last month from June 16th to 27th and I was there front and centre for some serious plugging opportunities! And a I caught a few films, too!
The opening film was The Illusionist, an animated film set in 1950s Edinburgh, directed by Sylvain Chomet (Belleville Rendez-Vous (2003)). It sold out pretty sharp-ish, but I went along to the red carpet anyway!
Ben “I dispatched the blaggard with my shiv“ Miller
Ewen Bremner (yes, it’s Spud from Trainspotting!)
His name escapes me, but he was in Harry Potter, apparently!
One of the festival highlights was a special gala screening of The Man Who Would Be King (1975) in the Festival Theatre, which Sean Connery attended! That’s right, John Mason himself.
“Your besht?” Brilliant. What a legend. He was really nice, and quite funny. He’s 80 now. Mad.
I also attended a screening and Q & A by the Quay Brothers. They’re American identical twins who make stop-motion films in the classic Eastern-European style. Very weird stuff, but interesting.
One of my favourite parts of the festival was the retrospective of British films, called After the Wave. These were all films made after the landmark British new wave films of the late ’50s and ’60s, which often dominate British cinema history. My favourite film from the programme was The Hard Way (1979), which was shot in ’70s Ireland with Lee Van Cleef and Patrick McGoohan (so I’m claiming that one as Irish and not British!). And I really liked The Final Programme (1973) as well. Some of the films even had the directors in attendance.
Ken Russell was in attendance at the screening of his film, Savage Messiah (1972). He wasn’t up to saying much, but it was good to see the man in person!
Horace Ové attended the screening of his film, Pressure (1976), the first British film to be directed by a black man. It’s about the British-born son of an immigrant Trinidadian family, trying to find his place between two cultures. Some of the amateur acting lets it down, but it’s quite a powerful and interesting film.
I also bumped into a few familiar faces on my travels.
Myself and Timothy Spall. He was very sound. I gave him a Fake Dog business card and all. So there’s a very distant chance he could be reading this blog. If so: Hello, Tim. Alright mate?
And I met Brian Cox! It was very exciting.
And here I am with B.M. (he’s much bigger in real life)!
Tilda Swinton was also about. She and film critic Mark Cousins organised a big dance towards the end of the festival, as co-ordinated by Laurel & Hardy in Way Out West. Then they explained their new scheme to introduce children to cinema, called the 8 1/2 Foundation, followed by a screening of The White Balloon (1995).
Other notable screenings included the international premiere of Boy (good) and The Good Heart (not good), and the world premiere of Jackboots on Whitehall, which featured my old mucker Timothy Spall voicing a puppet of Winston Churchill. And I caught a few others screenings in there, too – you’ll see the tickets below! Now some random shots to finish off!
And there you have it! That’s my report from the red carpet. If you’ll excuse me, I must be jetting off to my next big premiere! What’s that? Crackdown 3? Moro out!
— Dara
Webby's Travel Blog - India
Written 65 days ago by PaulA few weeks back, I had a long weekend and decided to make the most of it and head to India to see the Taj Mahal. This would be my fourth wonder of the world to visit.
So we flew to Delhi. Unfortunately there was a mix up with our hotel and nobody was there to pick us up. Disaster. We got a taxi to the area we were staying in but there were barricades everywhere because of the commonwealth games. We ended up in some strange places but eventually got to our beds at about 5 in the morning.
After a bit of a lie in, we were all set to explore Delhi. What can I say about this city? It’s an intense experience. It sounds like a cliché, but from once you get there all your senses really are attacked. It’s loud, smelly and hot. There’s so much going on, you could just stick a camera anywhere and you wouldn’t know what shots you might snap.
The food here is great. I decided to go veggie for the time I was there. It’s a hindu country so they don’t really do meat. In fact there’s no beef as you can’t kill a cow. It was strange to see a McDonalds menu with only chicken burgers. You can’t even chain a cow up. As a result cows are everywhere, a bit like stray dogs. However dogs are not massive lumbering things that get in the way of everything by deciding to just stop in two foot wide alley for no reason whatsoever. So I think it’s wise to stick to the kind of food they eat there. The vegetable and paneer (a kind of cottage cheese) curries are incredible. I still got Delhi belly though.
So next it was the long, bumpy bus journey to Agra, home of the Taj Mahal. Along the way I was pleasantly woken by a monkey on a chain who was trying to climb in the window, but he turned out quite aggressive and horrible. It took us about 6 hours to get there. Not a pleasant trip.
When you finally get to see the Taj, it is all worth it. I wasn’t disappointed at all. It really is beautiful. It’s probably the prettiest man made object I’ve ever seen. You could look at it for hours.
The story of its creation is really interesting too. Some mad king built it for his wife who apparently was very beautiful. Alas, she died giving birth to his 12th child I think. He then wanted to build a matching Taj in black across the river. That would’ve been class, but his son thought this was crazy so he threw him in jail. Also, interestingly it changes colour at different times of the day. The marble that they use is transparent and can only be found in this area.
So that was our very interesting and enjoyable trip to the Taj. Unfortunately I didn’t fall in love India in the way I would have liked to. But apparently I did not see the ‘real’ India, so I think I will have to take a more comprehensive trip there at some stage .
— Paul
You Can Trip On My Synthesiser
Written 95 days ago by DaraI was recently at an electronic music exhibition. It featured a vast array of various devices and equipment, from all the big names, and even a few workshops and performances throughout the day. I had no idea what most of the very technical gear did, but I got to play a theremin, so I was happy! Possibly not as interesting as Webby’s travel blogs to anyone but myself, but, if you like synthesisers, then read on, my friend!
Or, look on, rather…
— Dara
Webby's Travel Blog - China
Written 149 days ago by PaulFinally I am getting around to clearing the backlog of travel blogs. Back blog if you will. I will start with my trip to Beijing, China. Back in November, my friend Paudi and I decided to go to Beijing for our next holiday. Some of his friends were going and we would meet up with them there. We had nothing planned and knew very little about the city we were going to. We organised for our hostel to pick us up at the airport, if you are going to Beijing I would recommend you do this. It can be a bit of a culture shock as nobody; especially the taxi drivers can speak English.
After recovering from our seven-hour flight, we went straight to an acrobatics show. I have to say I was really impressed by the performers. It was so well put together, and the stage and costumes were so well designed. Seeing such a large group of talented and skilled performers at work made me realise why the Olympic Games opening ceremony was such a huge success.
After this we decided to go for a few drinks, this turned into quite a few drinks. I have to give this night a special mention as it was one of the most random nights out I have ever had. There is a street called Bar Street, which has about ten bars in a row. So we bar hopped for the night, each bar stranger than the last. The first one was a trendy kind of karaoke bar. Here we all got our portraits sketched for about euro each. We then went on to the next bar, which had a female and male pole dancer onstage. That’s right a male pole dancer. However this was not really a seedy affair and I wouldn’t like you think that Beijing is full of sleazy strip bars as these are actually illegal in the country. This was just more like a small-scale acrobatics show in a bar.
When they were finished another guy and girl got up to sing some songs. The guy started rapping Hit ‘em Up by Tupac in Chinese, very strange. We met some lovely Chinese people who showed us a drinking game that involves throwing dice. A lot of the bars have dice and a cup on every table for these games. The next bar had a Michael Jackson tribute act. By this stage we were in love with the nightlife in Beijing.
This is partly due to fact that we were not expecting it. Drinking was not a big part of the culture here. However since the country has opened up to western influences, the young people have really embraced bar and club culture. There are great bars and clubs here playing brilliant music. Their beer is much lighter than ours, which meant we drank many, many Tsing Taos (the local brew), which is a lovely, light, crisp beer.
Now it was time to explore the city by day. It was very cold at this time of year so we had to wrap up warm, something we were not used to doing. To get anywhere we had to get the nice people working in the hostel to write out the address in Chinese to give to the taxi driver. Trying to learn any Chinese was very difficult because the drivers could not understand our accent. They did not even know what I meant by Tiananmen Square, which is the main landmark in the city. However the metro system is fantastic and very easy to use once you get used to it, especially since the Olympics as everything is in English now.
Tiananmen square is amazing. It is huge square in the middle of the city. There’s lots of history here as Chairman Mao is buried here and the student’s revolution of 1989 kicked off here. There are lots of universities around and students like to come up to tourists and practice their English. This was great but we were told to be wary of them as they have a reputation for bringing tourists to bars and leaving them with the bill.
Beijing is a great city to just walk around. There are so many beautiful parks and you never know what you will find. The retirement age in China is surprisingly young, 55 for women and 60 for men. The older Chinese folk seem to have a great time. They spend their days in parks, playing cards, singing and generally having a laugh. There was a craze sweeping China when we were there. Everywhere we went people were playing keepy uppy with this colourful, feathery thing. I ended up playing with this lovely old couple in the park.
Next was a trip to the Great Wall of China. I’m not going to tell you too much about this as the picture speak for them selves. We did a 10km trek along the wall. You have to be careful, as there are some steep parts with loose steps. People break their legs here all the time. It was nice to get out in to the country. The air was so fresh and clean compared to Beijing, the most polluted air in the world.
Out of all the places I have been to, I would probably recommend Beijing the most to other people. It is such a great city. There is so much history, the people are brilliant, food is delicious (dumplings especially) and there is so much to do. I can’t wait to go back to China and see some of the other cities.
— Paul
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Fake Dog Loves #6: The Rock
Written 160 days ago by DaraIt’s been a while since I’ve written a blog under the Fake Dog Loves banner. Then, it’s been a while since I’ve written a blog in general. How the time flies when it’s measured in days. Looking back on the old Fake Dog Loves chapters, it’s hardly the comprehensive list of Fake Dog’s favourite things it was meant to be, though The Sweeney and Peep Show are still relevant to our collective interests. In any case, I thought I’d update the series with one of Fake Dog’s definitive, old favourites, The Rock.
I love The Rock. I do not refer to Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson (not in this case anyway), but rather his filmic namesake. My first recollection of The Rock (1996) is staying up to watch it on television one Sunday night at Nine O’ Clock on TV3 (a notable high point for the broadcaster). It was quite entertaining and, apart from Bond, is probably one of the first action films I remember seeing. I watched it a good many times in school, and added the script to my repertoire of quotes, without which I could scantily express myself. In later years, I was surprised to find that others, too, had been influenced by The Rock, and, indeed, the Cage Trinity of ’96/‘97 [see also: Face/ Off (1997), Con Air (1997)]. Things jumped up a notch when I learned Webby was a fan of The Rock. This led to many repeated viewings of the trinity within our house, and assured complete assimilation of the scripts into our everyday dialect. Foremost among them being The Rock.
The Rock was scripted by three writers with few other films to their IMDb names. They presumably put everything they had into this one – and it shows. It’s packed full of ridiculous plot, stereotyped characters, over-the-top action, and every line sounds suspiciously crafted to be a quote (nice work, lads). Nicolas Cage lets loose after his Oscar win and turns himself into an action hero, and Sean Connery essentially returns as James Bond Sr., much cooler and silvery than he was before. Yes, there are countless reasons to love The Rock. Gearoid and I made a video to convey but a slight few of them:
— Dara
Webby's Travel Blog - Sri Lanka
Written 284 days ago by PaulFirstly, apologies for my lack of activity on the site over the last two months. I’ve been doing some travelling and working as an English Teacher, as a result I’ve had limited access to the internet.
However, I’ve finally put up a little blog about my travels in Sri Lanka. Hope you enjoy. Sorry for all the pictures, there were just so many. It’s an amazing country with beautiful scenery and really nice people.After a four hour flight from Dubai, we were in Colombo, the capital. There’s not too much to see here so we drove in to the middle of the country to Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage. I couldn’t get over how green the countryside is. This is actually near where The Bridge over the River Kwai was shot.
Here we got to get really close to the elephants. There were hundreds of them.
From here, we went to Siguriya where we went on an elephant safari. This is a really beautiful part of the country, there’s so much history here.
This is Siguriya Rock, where the King of Sri Lanka lived. The rock is shaped to look like a lion. The king had 500 wives and he had pictures of them all painted on the walls. Some man!
We were staying in a nice hotel place but they wanted our rooms for other tourists so they offered us a jungle bungalow for the night. We weren’t sure at first, but it turned out be really cool. It was massive and it was right in the middle of the jungle. It also had a tree house to scout elephants and buffalo. Didn’t see any though. Here we had one of the maddest, most random nights ever. I consumed lots of Lion Lager (the local brew) and the spiciest food you could imagine. In Sri Lanka every thing is spicy, even ketchup. They have curry for breakfast, which is surprisingly quite refreshing in the morning.
After that, we went to Adam’s Peak, a big mountain in the middle of the country. It’s twice the size of Carrantuohill (the biggest mountain in Ireland.) We climbed it at night, in the rain, fighting off leaches. They’re horrible you have to burn them off or put salt on them or they’ll leave their teeth in you and they can get infected. I really can’t stress how horrible they are. You’re supposed to climb through the night and reach the top to see the sunrise over Sri Lanka. Apparently it’s breathtaking. For us though it was lashing rain. So we could barely see our hands in front of out faces. But this Buddhist monk made me the best cup of tea I’ve ever had and I rang a bell to signify the achievement.
It was tough but it was worth it for the views on the way down.
Finally after 4 days of heavy travelling and sightseeing, we went to Hikkaduwa to chill out on the beach. This was as laid back as you could get. Great food and surf (not that I did any). I did swim with massive turtles though. It was quite sad though because this area was devestated by the tsunami in 2004.
I would have loved to have spent more time here. It was such a nice end to a pure class holiday. Stay tuned for more travel blogs in the future.
— Paul
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