Stagecoach

John Ford's Stagecoach (1939) is one of the greatest Westerns of all time. It made a star of John Wayne, who had been eeking out a living as a B-movie star, was Ford's first sound Western, and helped establish many of the archetypes and conventions of the Western genre - and for film in general. That it remains entertaining 71 years later is a testament to its power and importance, turning a simple story into perfectly-constructed, top-notch entertainment.

A stagecoach travelling to Lordsburg, New Mexico stops in the small Arizona town of Tonto, with Geronimo's Apaches on the warpath. Among the passengers are: jovial driver Buck (Andy Devine); Dallas (Claire Trevor), a shamed, outcast prostitute; town Marshal Curly Wilcox (George Bancroft); alcoholic Doc Boone (Thomas Mitchell); dopey whiskey salesman Peacock (Donald Meek); Hatfield (John Carradine), a dashing gambler-gunfighter; the pregnant Lucy Mallory (Louise Platt), wife of a cavalry officer; and Henry Gatewood (Berton Churchill), an unscrupulous banker. Later joining the crew is the Ringo Kid (John Wayne), an outlaw seeking vengeance on the Plummer brothers, who killed his family. This contentious, colorful group of passengers deals with Lucy's pregnancy, burned-out trading posts, rough river crossings, and an Indian attack - and that's before they get to Lordsburg. Despite his affection for Dallas, Ringo calls out the Plummers for a showdown, knowing that he faces either death or arrest at the hands of the Marshal.

Stagecoach is a wonderfully economical piece of filmmaking. It establishes its large cast with quick, simple vignettes, making them broad but distinct personages. Polite society is depicted as obnoxious hypocrites, from the pious church committee who evicts Dallas from Tonto, to the bombastic banker; the outcasts Hatfield, Ringo and Dallas are presented as the sympathetic characters, the driving force behind Western settlement and progress. One could object to the portrayal of Indians as war-whooping savages, but they're really just a plot device, another obstacle for our protagonists to overcome. Once the Indians, the elements, their personal problems and Ringo's vendetta are overcome, they've forged a makeshift community of sorts, a cornucopia of colorful characters who represent the American melting pot. Beyond the messages, though, it's a well-done action-adventure film, creating the formula for pretty much everything that followed.

Ford's direction is, of course, without peer. Even in sparse black-and-white, Monument Valley exudes a towering majesty, sheer space used to emphasize the epic nature of the story. Ford's creative use of lighting, low-angle shots and striking editing directly influenced Orson Welles' work on Citizen Kane, and the Monument Valley scenes provided an obvious influence on any number of directors. The film's big action scene, with the Apaches attacking the stagecoach, makes thrilling use of editing, long shots and creative stuntwork (especially Yakima Canutt's famed ride under the moving coach). So exciting is this scene, indeed, that the showdown between Ringo and the Plummers can only be anti-climactic; Ford acknowledges this, providing an amazingly intense set-up without showing the result.

John Wayne became a star on the basis of this film, and with good reason; from his iconic introduction (a quick zoom shot of him twirling his rifle), he shows that he's a born star, already exuding the trademark toughness that made him an American icon. Claire Trevor is perfect as Dallas, emitting the right mixture of toughness and vulnerability. John Carradine gives perhaps his best screen performance, playing the Doc Holiday-esque Hatfield as the archetypical romantic, chivalrous gunfighter. Thomas Mitchell (High Noon) gives a broad yet human performance, presaging Edmond O'Brien's newspaper editor in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and Louise Platt is sweet as the pregnant Lucy. The rest of the cast is fine if a bit broad.

Without further ado, Stagecoach is a masterpiece, brilliant in its simplicity. It's hard to criticize the film for employing so many cliches, when it is American frontier mythology at its purest: perhaps the quintessential American Western.

Felix sit annus novus

2010 looks set to be interesting! Happy new year peeps!

St Mary Magdalen Soup Run Blog

I've set up a blog for the St Mary Magdalen Soup Run to try and raise awareness of the soup run and see if it can generate some new volunteers. Only one post so far, but over time I hope to be able to interview volunteers and men and women who rely on the soup run as I would imagine they have some interesting life stories. Click here to see the progress.

Drums Along the Mohawk

To finish 2009, we'll take another visit to John Ford country, with the underrated Drums Along the Mohawk (1939), another exploration of Manifest Destiny which is not quite a Western, being set in Revolutionary War-era New York. Still, it's another fine work by Ford, his usual mixture of artistry and Americanism creating a rich, layered and entertaining film.

Frontier man Gilbert Martin (Henry Fonda) marries New York society girl Lana (Claudette Colbert) and takes her to his farmstead upstate. No sooner do they arrive then they find that the American Revolution has spread to their borders, with paramilitary forces made up of British officers, Loyalist troops - including the one-eyed Caldwell (John Carradine) - and bloodthirsty Mohawk Indians raiding settlements and farms all through the state. After Gil and Lana's estate goes up in flames, Gil joins the militia and Lana goes to work on the farm of tough frontier matron Mrs. McKlennar (Edna May Oliver). Lana is forced to take up arms alongside her husband when Caldwell and his Indians return in force.

Drums Along the Mohawk shows another populist birth of America, not in Continental Congresses debating independence and legislation, but on the frontiers, where yeoman farmers, displaced aristocrats, black slaves, and Christianized Indians forge a nation through hard work, cooperation, faith, when necessary, in blood. Life on the frontier is harsh and brutal, with rough weather, hard ground, rampaging Indians and greater political forces to contend with. The rough-hewn settlers must work together to survive, to create an Eden in an evergreen wilderness. It's obvious that Ford, the quintessential Irish immigrant, finds the story of hard-working, heroic, determined settlers creating a new country more compelling than the political dramas in Philadelphia. This is old-fashioned, populist patriotism at its purist and most appealing.

The movie couches its worldview in inclusive terms, with the males only part of the story. In this egalitarian society, the women and minorities are just as important, working the farm alongside their men and helping to fight off the wicked outsiders - the British, Indians, and traitorous Tories, elemental villains who must be destroyed for American society to progress. Lana's development is wonderful, as she overcomes initial reservations to prove herslef the equal of her husband. Mrs. McKlennar in particular is a wonderfully feminist creation, sharp-tongued, tough, and totally in control (as evidenced in the scene where she convinces the Mohawks burning her house to salvage her bed). The friendly Indian Blue Back (Chief John Bigtree) and slave Daisy (Beulah Hall Jones) are less successfully included, reduced largely to stereotype roles. The film's finale, where everyone stands in reverent awe of the American flag, is too gentle to be dismissed as jingoism; it shows Ford's vision of America as the ideal country, where everyone - including women and minorities - has a place. As Gil acknowledges, "there's a lot of work to do", but Ford has faith that his country will live up to its promise - a naive view perhaps, but an endearingly positive one.

This is Ford's first color film, and he makes full use of the rich, luscious Technicolor. The Utah countryside isn't quite convincing as New York, but as captured by Ray Rennahan, it's beautiful enough in its own right, with fine use of interiors and art direction to boot. As always, Ford handles his action scenes wonderfully, and he excells in the human element too, showing the daily travails of the farmers, the family and community tensions, and the aftermath of battle as vividly as the exciting siege at film's end. Alfred Newman contributes one of his best scores to the proceedings.

Henry Fonda is typecast as the usual noble yet tough frontiersman, investing the role with characteristic charm and dignity. However, the movie really belongs to Claudette Colbert, whose evolution from uptight society girl to tough frontierswoman is portrayed beautifully. Edna May Oliver provides an equally vivid characterization as the feisty frontier matriarch. John Carradine is an imposing bad guy but is sadly underdeveloped; Chief John Bigtree is mostly clownish comic relief. The supporting cast shows Ford's stock company already in evidence, with Arthur Shields, Eddie Collins, Ward Bond and Jack Pennick in key supporting roles.

Drums Along the Mohawk is a beautiful film which does perhaps the best job of encapsulating Ford's worldview. It may not be his best work, but in many ways it's his purest and most endearing.

Exeunt 2009. See you in the next decade!

Sherlock Holmes

Pretty much everyone's suspicions about Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes (2009) is confirmed: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's pipe-smoking, uncommonly-intuitive super-sleuth has been reimagined as a modern action hero in the mould of Batman, James Bond or Jack Sparrow, with the requisite gadgets, fight scenes, exorbitant special effects, tough gal love interest, and world domination plot to deal with. It's best to take the film on its own lightweight terms, rather than as a faithful adaptation of Doyle.

Eccentric but brilliant private eye Sherlock Holmes (Robert Downey Jr.) and his sidekick Dr. Watson (Jude Law) track down the devious Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong), a nobleman whose interest in Satanism and the occult has turned to murder. Blackwood is hanged for murder, but it soon appears that Blackwood has somehow risen from the dead, leading his shadowy, Hellfire Club-style society in a plan using magic and sleight-of-hand to take over the world. Holmes, Watson, Scotland Yard Inspector Lestrade (Eddie Marsan) and devious conwoman Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams) must team up to put a stop to Blackwood's designs - which will result in the gassing of Parliament and, theoretically, ruling the world.

Sherlock Holmes has relatively few surprises to offer, however well-executed they are. The characters are straightforwardly colorful, and the plot fairly predictable (in generalities if not specifics), the humor semi-clever pseudo-wit so often employed in this genre. Still, the film is mostly engaging, even if it digresses overmuch in its exploration of Holmes' eccentricities (boxing, training flies with a violin, poisoning Watson's dog). Director Ritchie handles the film's action scenes well, particularly Holmes' lengthy shipyard confrontation with a hulking, French-speaking muscleman (Oran Gurel), with a prominent though not overbearing use of CGI. Hans Zimmer provides a wonderfully lively, period-invoking score, and the movie certainly looks like Victorian London, making it an effective enough bit of period escapism.

Robert Downey Jr. gives a predictably colorful, hammy performance, making Sherlock out to be Jack Sparrow, PI mixed with Hugh Laurie's House. It's a fun performance and certainly carries the film well-enough but it's nothing original - especially since Downey played a similar character in 2008's Iron Man. Jude Law is fine as Watson, but Rachel McAdams (Mean Girls) is a stiff and uninteresting love interest. Mark Strong has fun chewing scenery as Holmes's nemesis, and it's always nice to see James Fox (A Passage to India), even if he shows up just long enough to get knocked off.

If you take Sherlock Holmes as a fun popcorn film, it's enjoyable enough. Just don't expect any great sophistication, artistry or wit, and you should be fine.

Crisp or Tatchell? I know who I'd rather have round for tea!

Tim Walker of The Telegraph writes in his column of Peter Tatchell's anger that Quentin Crisp's personality has been "sanitised" for ITV in a new film of his life. I guess that means there aren't enough gay sex scenes and that Crisp didn't ever publicly give a ringing endorsement to homosexuality, so therefore he should be castigated. While he never denied his sexual orientation and played to the gallery with his flamboyance and eccentricity, he was never on the 'liberation' bandwagon and for Peter Tatchell, that just isn't good enough. Walker writes...

The homosexual rights campaigner tells me that the film – a sequel to The Naked Civil Servant, dealing with Crisp's later years as a "resident alien" in America – "sanitised" him, which he considered "ill-advised" as the man himself encouraged hatred of homosexuals.

"Although astonishingly brave and defiant as an 'out' gay man in the 1930s and 40s, he was later self-obsessed, homophobic and reactionary," says Tatchell. "He denounced the gay rights movement and slammed homosexuality as 'a terrible disease' and believed that 'the world would be better without homosexuals."

Tatchell met Crisp in the 1970s in the Charing Cross Road in London when he had taken exception to a "gay liberation" badge that the campaigner had been wearing. "He was very dismissive about it," Tatchell recalls. "He asked me what it was that I wanted to be liberated from. I think he hated the fact that time had moved on and he was no longer unique – no longer the only visible queer on the block.

"For gay men, he was a terrible role model and certainly never used his celebrity status positively. He disgracefully dismissed Aids as a 'fad.' He said gay men were incapable of love and said that they had 'feminine minds' which made him a misogynist as well as a homophobe."

While Tatchell considered Hurt's performance as Crisp to have been "stunning," he didn't see why his life should be celebrated. "Along with Larry Grayson and John Inman, he confirmed rather than challenged prejudices."

My, oh my, what a terrifying list of crimes! Peter Tatchell, sorrowfully, cannot stand it when a gay man disagrees with him and doesn't believe in the 'cause'. He cannot even bring himself to accept a condemnation of the homosexual culture, steeped as it is, in narcissism, vulgarity, bad music, promiscuity and self-destruction from one who is a homosexual, as if somehow any gay man not on a Pride float calling for the age of consent for homosexuals to be lowered to 11 is part of an international conspiracy against 'the gays'. It sounds to me rather as if Crisp had a far deeper, more subtle and nuanced insight into the human condition and his own personal one than Tatchell ever will. While he may have minced he didn't mince his words on the homosexual culture which he condemned as vacuous and painfully empty. By all accounts, I can imagine his company would be much more enjoyable than Peter Tatchell's. Wit, charm, tenderness, charisma, humility and generosity of spirit. Wikipedia suggests he had time for everyone...

As he had done in London, Crisp allowed his phone number to be listed in the telephone directory and saw it as his duty to converse with anyone who called him. For the first twenty or so years of owning his own telephone he habitually answered calls with the phrase "Yes, Lord?" ("Just in case," he once said.) Later on he changed it to "Oh yes?" in a querulous tone of voice. His openness to strangers extended to accepting dinner invitations from almost anyone. While it was expected that the inviter would pay for dinner, Crisp did his best to "sing for his supper" by regaling his hosts with wonderful stories and yarns much as he did in his theatre performances. Dinner with him was said to be one of the best shows in New York.

Peter Tatchell, on the other hand, has time only for the promulgation of his own vulgar statements and shameful political motives. People like Tatchell will never 'get' Crisp, Wilde or any of the 'gay icons' who were quietly excommunicated from the 'movement' because they didn't tow the 'party line' enough.

Crisp observed, "Fashion is what you adopt when you don't know who you are." Anyone now, including a gay man who speaks against the 'gay movement' is ironically seen as an outsider, an outcast, perhaps a troublemaker and not just to the gay community but to society as a whole. Nowadays, to condemn the homosexual lifestyle is counter-cultural. Who knows, a year or two and to speak against it will be illegal. What, I ask you, could be more romantic than that!? Young men will soon be getting arrested for crimes against public indecency...

"Dear Mr Dawkins, I thank God for you everyday..."

H/T Valle Adurni

Richard Dawkins.net is a 'clear thinking oasis' or perhaps rather more of a mirage of cool fresh water in the spiritual desert that is the poor British Isles. Bathed in celestial hues of blue and white, the official Dawkins webpage is a 'site' to behold. A seemingly new addition to the website has been explored by Valle Adurni who senses a spirit of the evangelical 'testimony' about the site, where born-again non-believers stand up and proclaim their new found faith to all and sundry, while the online congregation claps and says, "Amen, brother! There ain't no Creator! Praise Dawkins!"

Strikingly anti-Catholic, rather than being merely anti-religion, the 'Converts' Corner' has stories of former Christians, who it appears are ignorant of their own Faith, who have finally allowed the pure bright light of reason to dawn upon them like a shaft of sunshine streaming into a gothic Cathedral...The experience of the discovery of God's non-existence brings new believers in 'Atheism' great joy, an experience which is followed not too long after by a personal breakdown as the enthusiasm of the initial 'faith experience' dissipates and the new non-believer has to undergo a course of counselling in order to explore deep and complex personal issues related to their upbringing. Often their experience is akin to an unspiritual spiritual high. It goes something like this...

New non-believer's 'testimony'...

Dear Mr Dawkins,

"Oh, Mr Dawkins! I was blind, but now I see! I remember so well the day I invited you into my life as my personal scientist, my teacher and guide! When I read your book, it were as if Jesus, or someone like Jesus (though obviously not Jesus because He is not God since I no longer believe in His Divinity, for behold, God ceases to exist when I lose my faith) came along and spat on some clay and rubbed it over my eyes just like in the Holy Gospel which isn't Holy because it wasn't based on science or empirical evidence and none of it took place in the lab!

And when I opened my eyes, you, Mr Dawkins alerted me to the truth. We are genomes! There is no God, nor are our souls like unto Him, made as they aren't, in His Image! We don't have souls, we only have genes! There is only oblivion at the end of our lives! We shall not be judged according to our deeds, words, thoughts or omissions! Oh, happy day! When Mr Dawkins showed me the way! Now I can have as many abortions as I like and be guilt-free! I can have as many sexual partners as I like and there is no moral impediment nor recourse to God's inexhaustible mercy since it ran out since there is no God since you chased Him away with your Reason stick! You big God fighter, you! You man of steel! Reason has thought Him out of existence with a mere cursory glance over a Guardian article highlighting 150 years since the publication of The Origin of Species! Not that I've read the actual book, mind! Now, I can abuse the poor and not think ill of it, since the old law of love has given way to the new law of the survival of the fittest! Some friends think I'm a bit full on and call me a 'The God Delusion' basher, but I don't care what they think...

Now thanks to you, Mr Dawkins, I can wake in the morning and dedicate myself to nothingness, futility and an abyss of nihilistic despair and spiritual desolation, comforting myself only with take-aways and a string of unfulfilling sexual affairs! Oh, Mr Dawkins, you have shown me Reason! And Reason is like God even though He doesn't exist nor deserves a capital! I mean, He's not Paris is He!?

O my Richard, let us make you king and you can lead us in the worship of the goddess Reason, although she is not a goddess since we don't discriminate anymore gender-wise and God doesn't exist anyway! Leave discrimination to those evil Catholics! Oh boy, this is exciting...this is how it must have felt if you were on the winning side during the French Revolution! I'm ripping up my Rosary and using the beads to make an abacus or a model of human DNA to keep pinned to the wall below my picture of you! I hope one day we can meet and urinate through the letterboxes of those foolish priests and you can tell me all about your interest in eugenics. It's high time society persecuted the 'unfit'! I thank God for you everyday! Or at least I would if I believed in Him!

In the absence of an All-loving Redeemer, Richard, you will just have to do! I love you Richard and I am yours! You've changed my life! I'm going to volunteer for you and spread your contrived, half-baked bullsh*t in every pub in the land! O Richard! I'm your biggest fan! If we don't meet in this life, I just know we'll meet in the one which is not to come, since there is nothing, just deadness!

Yours lovingly

Miss Richelle Dawkins (formerly Mrs Perpetua Immaculata Catholicam but changed name by deed poll...)'

The Searchers

One of the most influential and acclaimed films (let alone Westerns) of all time, John Ford's The Searchers (1956) is, like Citizen Kane, Gone With the Wind and The Godfather, one of the untouchable Hollywood classics whose appeal and acclaim protects it from criticism and analysis. Despite flaws in story structure and its obnoxious supporting cast, Ford's magnum opus holds up well as a work of cinematic art. Technically it's without peer, and its thematic and moral ambiguities rank it far above most any other Western, American or otherwise. In many ways, the film's flaws enhance its stature: if nothing else, it epitomizes John Ford, for better or worse, with a conflicted, layered and thoughtful view of America's Westward expansion, mixing progressivism and hope with bloodshed and racism.

Ethan Edwards (John Wayne) returns to his brother Aaron (Martin Coy)'s Texas homestead three years after the Civil War. When Ethan joins a posse of Texas Rangers led by the Reverend Captain Clayton (Ward Bond) tracking cattle rustlers, Aaron and his family are slaughtered by a tribe of Comanches led by Chief Scar (Henry Brandon), who take daughters Lucy (Pippa Scott) and Debbie (Natalie Wood) hostage. Accompanied by adoptive "half-breed" nephew Martin (Jeffrey Hunter) and Lucy's fiancee Brad Jorgenson (Harry Carey Jr.), Ethan obsessively tracks Scar across Texas, even as changes in season and climate delay his pursuit. Even though his marriage to Laurie (Vera Miles) is jeopardized by his absence, Marty keeps along with Ethan, increasingly convinced that Ethan's intent is not to rescue his nieces, but to kill them.

The Searchers is usually taken as a mediation on racism, and that's fair on one level. Perhaps more importantly, however, it's a depiction of Manifest Destiny and the American character. The film's sympathies obviously lie with the white settlers, who for all their foibles represent Ford's hopeful progressivism about America's future, but Ethan is depicted as a violent, anti-social loner, outcast from this rough-hewn but friendly community. Ford approaches the subject matter with great care and ambiguity, his poetic subtlety more effective than the obvious, noble posturing in Sergeant Rutledge and Cheyenne Autumn. Essentially the question posed by the film is: Is Ethan's violent racism an aberration, or the very core of the American character? Ford seems to hope the former, but on the basis of evidence persented, it seems the latter is more likely.

Ethan Edwards is one of the most fascinating, complex protagonists in Hollywood cinema, representing the dark side of Manifest Destiny. At first glance, he's simply another Fordian "dark horse" like Doc Holiday in My Darling Clementine or Tom Doniphon in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, a rough hewn frontiersman necessary for the settling of the West. However, Ford and Wayne portray him in a much darker light than those romantic heroes. He's a veteran of the Confederate army, who apparently fought for Maximillian's army in Mexico, and the Reverend Clayton implies engaged in outlaw behavior on the side. He's not only a racist, but a murderer too, shooting wounded Indians in the back, massacring buffalo, and shooting out the eyes of a dead Comanche, dooming him to Purgatory. Given this, it's not at all surprising when he tries to kill Debbie later in the film. Many critics have read further subtleties into the character - his probable affair with his brother's wife (Dorothy Jordan), the possibility that he is Martin or even Debbie's father. Motivated by a twisted combination of racism, revenge, and other assorted neuroses, Ethan is a destructive character; even his redemptive act at the climax leaves him excluded from society, without the acknowledgment or heroic death afforded to most such characters, the door irrevocably shut on him.

The portrayal of Native Americans is strictly from a white point-of-view, from Scar's savages to the passive reservation Cheyenne, but this is hardly a flaw excusive to this film. Whatever their justification, frontier warfare between whites and Indians - especially tribes like the Comanche - was bloody and brutal, with both sides guilty of atrocity, and denying this for reasons of political correctness is badly misguided. Ford takes care to balance the ledger (if imperfectly), with his sympathetic (if broad) portrayal of Martin's Indian bride Look (Beulah Archuletta), a massacre of an Indian village, Indians being force-morched through an icey landscape by cavalry (presaging a key scene in Cheyenne Autumn). Even the final battle is less-than-heroic, showing Texas Rangers charging, guns blazing, through a camp made up mostly of women, children and old men. If he isn't entirely fair in depicting Indians, Ford at least acknowledges that frontier violence and mayhem weren't one-sided.

Ford is much less successful with his supporting cast, far-too-often stopping the film cold for awkward, obnoxious bits of broad comic relief. The travails of the crack-brained Mose Harper (Hank Worden), the dopey guitar-playing Charley McCory (Ken Curtis) and the bumptious Jorgensons inevitable draw groans and eye-rollings from modern audiences (especially my Film Analysis class). These scenes slow the film to a crawl, particularly the wedding sequence, and except as a very broad depiction of frontier life and the more positive, hopeful side of Western settlement, it's hard to justify their inclusion. The film is Ford at his most schizophrenic: as beautiful as the images as are, as insightful the message and well-drawn the protagonist, we still have to sit through a great deal of bumptious Ford comedy which only weakens the film.

The film is unquestionably a work of art, with directors from David Lean and Sergio Leone to Steven Spielberg and George Lucas finding inspiration from Ford's use of landscape and filming of action scenes. Monument Valley has never been better used, with Ford using the landscape with remarkable results; rarely has there been a more visually striking, beautiful film, with the massive butes and canyons setting a truly epic stage. The quick-edited, exciting action scenes - especially the first skirmish with the Comanche and the final attack on Scar's village - directly inspired the exciting horse charges of Lawrence of Arabia and have provided inspiration for many more, while the tense build-up to the opening massacre, with fluttering sage hens, barking dogs and menacing bird calls, inspired a key scene in Once Upon a Time in the West. Most of the violence occurs offscreen, with words, gestures and facial expressions adequate to infer the horror of an Indian massacre or rape. Max Steiner contributes a violent, rousing score perfectly appropriate to the film, heightening the tension and emotion.

John Wayne has never been better than Ethan Edwards. Perhaps delving into his own psyche, Wayne perfectly conveys Ethan's conflicted nature, driven by demons even he can't fully understand. There's no difficulty in channelling his usual persona into this borderline evil character. Wayne uses his familiar voice and figure to make an impression, but also engages in subtle uses of body language and facial gestures: his horrified reaction to seeing his brother's burning homestead is perhaps the finest moment in his career, as is the scene where he disgustedly stares at a group of rescued Cheyenne captives: "They ain't white - anymore!" Anyone who thinks Wayne can't act after seeing this film or Red River is just plain ignorant.

The supporting cast is more hit-and-miss. Jeffrey Hunter (Sergeant Rutledge) gives a fine star-making turn as Martin, serving as a perfect foil to Ethan's unspooling madness. The reliable Ward Bond acquits himself well as the Reverend Captain, Olive Carrey brings dignity and grace to her part, and Natalie Wood does well with her brief screen time. Henry Brandon (Vera Cruz) is an imposing presence as Scar but lacks the screen time to become a truly menacing villain. The rest of Ford's stock company is generally obnoxious, with John Qualen (sporting the same Swedish chef accent as in Liberty Valance), Vera Miles and Hank Worden being the worst offenders. Ken Curtis at least has the amusing moment where he switches from addle-brained cowpoke to skilled singer, but the others are just a nuisance.

For all its flaws, The Searchers is a wonderfully rich, textured and fascinating film. It is not a flawless film, nor is it Ford's best, but it remains a masterpiece whose depths and complexities can only be revealed by repeat viewings.

BBC 'Ethical Man' Muses on Population and Climate Change

"Who will deliver babies if all the storks die due to global warming?"

Check out the BBC's 'having children is bad for the environment' column! Blasted BBC! Shamelessly promoting the Optimum Population Trust and their brand of neo-Nazism! I hope people can see through this garbage. The BBC's 'Ethical Man' is Justin Rowlatt...

'Normally the birth of a child is a moment of pure celebration. Not for me. When my lovely daughter Elsa was born (our third child) I had to justify her very existence. Her birth came half-way through my year of carbon cutting as the BBC's Ethical Man so my family life was under intense scrutiny.

I discovered that lots of people (who I am sure are very pleasant in their everyday lives) believe very strongly that the world is already full, and new Elsas are simply not welcome. So is the burgeoning human population really the cause of our climate crisis?(...)The distinctly lacklustre deal at Copenhagen suggests that the world isn't going to reduce greenhouse gas emissions anywhere near as quickly as the science says is necessary.

And the population is rising. You'll find no shortage of frightening statistics at the website of the new Malthusians at the Optimum Population Trust, which campaigns to reduce population. It details how world population is expected to swell from 6.8 billion this year to 9.1 billion in 2050...For full debacle click here...

Brighton Pavillion

Royal Pavillion, Brighton by 'Mister P', my friend. Very atmospheric!

Silent Night, with Susan Boyle

I'm a bit late on the Susan Boyle phenomenom...

Happy St Stephen's Day!

Peter's Fence

Thanks be to God, the Holy Father emerged unscathed and unharmed.

The 82-year-old pontiff was knocked to the floor as he proceeded down the main aisle for the Christmas Eve Mass. Although shaken, the Pope got to his feet and continued with the late night service. French Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, 87, fractured his hip as he tried to stop the woman reaching the Pope.

So say a prayer for him and for the Holy Father! There are growing concerns that the female attacker, described as an 'unbalanced individual' tried the same stunt last Midnight Mass. Looks like a case of forgiving seven times seventy-seven times. Still, while those of us who love the Holy Father might wish security could be better, in as much as it was the same lady as last time, there is quite some merit in that! Who knows!? Maybe they'll let her into Midnight Mass next year and it'll be third time lucky and she won't lunge at His Holiness! The Holy Father lives to fight another day and we pray, years to come! Long may he reign!

"Happy Holidays" from Google!

Christmas is snowmen, CND-style-lefty-peace, space exploration, fireworks and a happy holiday. Funny that, I could have sworn it was commemorating the birth of Our Lord...Must have missed something there!



There...that's more like it.

A Christmas Story

Bob Clark's A Christmas Story (1983) is a wonderful holiday film. A pleasant, believable depiction of childhood through the eyes of a precocious little boy, its charm is its simplicity: it's an unpretentious bit of entertainment, depicting childhood wonder without any pretension or thematic baggage. A story of family in simpler times, it has a universal appeal and charm that makes it compulsively watchable.

Based on writings by Jean Shepherd, the film's episodic narrative follows the adventures of Ralphie (Peter Billingsley), a bespectacled, daydreaming little boy who wants nothing more than to get a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas. The problem is convincing his parents (Melinda Dillon and Darren McGavin) that the gun is a suitable toy for an eight-year-old, and that he won't "shoot his eye out". Ralphie also deals with his parents' war over an electric leg lamp, a crabby Santa Claus (Jeff Gillen), problems with school bully Scut Farkis (Zack Ward), the neighbor's mischevious dogs, and a Little Orphan Annie contest.

Christmas trappings aside, A Christmas Story is a wonderful little slice-of-life film seen through the eyes of an eight-year old. The movie remains believable throughout, even in its occasionally bizarre and outlandish moments; the characters are wonderfully sketched, loveable even in their eccentricities. Director Clark handles most scenes as self-contained set-pieces - the encounters with the bully, friend Flick (Scott Schwarz) licking a frozen flag poll, the arguments over the lamp, Ralphie's disastrous experiment with cursing, dinner at a Chinese place - which stand alone as wonderful comic gems in their own right. Added together, they create a wonderful patchwork of small-town Americana, both funny and relatable. Although Ralphie becomes disillusioned with certain childhood tropes - Santa Claus, the Little Orphan Annie decoder pin, and even his present - the movie is not a coming-of-age film with the usual trappings about lost innocence. Rather, it's a celebration of childhood and a by-gone era, and works wonderfully as both.

Peter Billingsley is perfect as Ralphie, likeable, precocious, funny and just self-aware enough without seeming snarky. The rest of the kid cast - Ian Petrella, R.D. Robb, Scott Schwarz, Zack Ward - handle themselves equally well, creating unusually authentic child characters. Darren McGavin and Melinda Dillon are hysterical as Ralphie's parents; Tedde Moore and Jeff Gillen standout in smaller parts. Jean Shepherd's hysterical narration adds immeasuribly to the film, putting us in the properly cynical yet nostalgic frame of mind.

A Christmas Story remains a charming little film, and with the possible exception of It's a Wonderful Life, is the greatest Christmas film of all time.

Some People Are Tiny-Brained Pillocks

I have not yet seen James Cameron's Avatar, although I remain leery of a movie that consists of computer-generated Blue Kitties fighting Space Marines on a Dinosaur Planet. But quite a bit has already been written about this film, some of it interesting and insightful, some of it predictably insipid. Which brings us handily to our main topic...

Brett Michael Dykes of Yahoo provides us with an article with the shocking fact that Avatar has - gasp! - anti-war and pro-environment themes! This is one of the most useless, air-headed observational pieces I've come across, and the idea that it constitutes any form of journalism is frankly insulting.

Since it opened last week, James Cameron's much-anticipated film "Avatar" has won praise from movie critics and been a juggernaut at the box office. But some who have seen the film say that it contains hidden messages that are anti-war, pro-environment, and perhaps even racist.

Ooh, look at the big brain on Brett!

These messages are not "hidden". Just a quick glimpse at the plot summary or trailer makes it clear that these "messages" are in fact the very basis for the film's story. You really think that a movie with this plot - think Pocahontas in Space - is not going to have messages about ecology and imperialism? The only thing missing is Colors in the Wind and a talking willow tree. But I kid shitty mid-'90s Disney flicks.

Indeed, Brett provides a lengthy, in-depth plot summary of the film, with the helpful observation afterwards that:

Are you beginning to get a sense of why some viewers noticed what they believe are underlying messages in the film?

A poorly-written sentence for a start ("Are you beginning to get a sense"? Really?), a completely banal bit of weasel journalism for another, refusing to admit a pretty obvious fact for fear of offending someone. Nor are these messages in any way hidden when, as Brett himself goes on to say:

But are these hidden messages really all that hidden? James Cameron himself hasn't been shy in publicly proclaiming the fact that he's an environmental activist who believes that humans and "industrial society" are "causing a global climate change" and "destroying species faster than we can classify them." In a recent interview with PBS' Tavis Smiley, Cameron admitted that he made "obvious" references in the film to Iraq, Vietnam and the American colonial period to emphasize the fact that humans have a "terrible history" of "entitlement" in which we "take what we need" from nature and indigenous peoples "and don't give back."

Further, one of the film's stars Stephen Lang told CNN that he is "not surprised at all" that some people have taken note of the film's political messages, mainly because the central theme of humans "destroying" a "pristine world" out of "blindness and greed" is so "overt."

Gee, thanks for undermining the whole premise of your pointless article, buddy. Now why are we reading you again?

I guess what I'm saying is that could not be more obvious in a film with Earth Marines invading a planet to plunder its resources and slaughter the peaceful, environmentally-conscious natives, that some sort of Dances With Wolves Meets Fahrenheit 9/11 As Enacted By Blue Cat People "message" is intentional. And yet we need 602-word article by a tiny-brained pillock who probably flunked his Intro to Journalism course to reveal this. Nice work, Brett.

Happy Christmas...Deo Gratias!

No more blogging for a couple of days...Happy Christmas, all!

Jingle All the Way

Let's get into the Christmas spirit by reviewing Groggy's family favorite Jingle All the Way (1996). It's a silly bit of holiday fluff that can't be considered a good movie as such, but it's loads of silly fun, with Arnold Schwarzenegger at his cheesiest mixed with some genuinely funny jokes.

Howard Langston (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is a workaholic dad who is always letting down his son Jamie (Jake Lloyd) and wife Liz (Rita Wilson). To make up for it, he tries to track down a Turbo Man toy for Jamie, oblivious to the doll's Furby-esque popularity. On the arduous road to find a doll, Howard fights off hordes of shoppers, including the psychotic mailman Myron (Sinbad), deals with a bumbling cop (Robert Conrad) and a crooked Santa (James Belushi). Meanwhile, Howard's sleazy neighbor Ted (Phil Hartman) puts the moves on Liz, much to everyone's consternation. It leads to a denouement at the Christmas parade where Howard is able to show Jamie how much he really loves him - and show him there are more important things than presents.

Jingle All the Way would be a guilty pleasure if I believed in such an idiotic concept; if I enjoy a movie I'm going to unashamedly like it, dammit. It's a ridiculous movie with a lot of silly humor and cartoonishness that shouldn't be funny, but it's damned entertaining regardless. The film has a good amount of satire of consumerism; Howard's desperate plight to join the mindless craze of the month is certainly relatable to any parent who's bought a Smurf, Furby, Pokemon or Tickle Me Elmo for their kid. There's a lot of slapstick and silliness of mixed quality, and some predictably mawkish sentiment, but it holds together as a silly bit of entertainment regardless.

Arnold Schwarzenegger isn't believable for a moment as an all-American Everydad, but he pulls it off with wonderfully self-deprecating humor and comic timing, much better than the unfunny Kindergarten Cop, which seemed like a typical Arnie film masquerading as children's fare. Sinbad provides most of the film's laughs with his amusing incoherent, stream-of-consciousness rants. Rita Wilson, Phil Hartman and Robert Conrad have rather thankless supporting roles, as Jake Lloyd is just as obnoxious as he'd infamously be in Star Wars: Episode I. James Belushi and Martin Mull handle themselves much better in brief cameos.

What more can be said? For cheesy holiday cheer, Jingle All the Way is hard to beat. It's no A Christmas Story or It's a Wonderful Life, but it is pleasant in its own slight, silly way.

Marriage Becoming Preserve of Middle Class, Says Tory

I'm not in the habit of quoting Tories but this Guardian article is quite interesting...

Marriage in Britain is in danger of becoming an exclusive middle-class institution unless action is taken to bolster it, David Willetts, the shadow cabinet member responsible for the family, says today.

Speaking to the Guardian, Willetts said it would be "extremely dangerous if marriage became something only for the affluent elite" and that the rate of family break-ups was a disaster for children.

The Conservatives are due to publish their ideas on the family in a discussion paper arguing the state and the voluntary sector can do more to help fathers in relationships, especially at the birth of the first child, frequently a point where couples drift apart and separate.

The party will also back recognition of marriage in the tax system, as well as providing relationship advice at civil marriage ceremonies.

The green paper will propose changes in the law to make it easier for grandparents and fathers to stay in contact with children when marriages break up.

Willetts insisted there was measurable evidence to show that married couples with children, as opposed to cohabiting couples, stayed together longer to the benefit of children.

"The aspiration of marriage is becoming harder to achieve. Instead of it becoming just what you do in your 20s, it has become like scaling Mount Everest, a sort of great moral endeavour – and something that requires a lot of time and money. We think we need to ease some of the pressures," he said.

"There is quite a lot of evidence coming from America about how we are in danger of heading towards a society where middle-class people get married and people on low and erratic incomes don't get married, and that in turn leads to a divergence of a whole host of other outcomes...

Full article click here.

The Nativity: Would It Be Any Different Today?

Giotto's The Flight Into Egypt

This is going to sound a little heretical so gird your loins. I was wondering the other evening whether a modern Nativity scene would be much different to the Gospel and came to the conclusion that, although the West believes itself to have moved out of 'biblical times', the 'dark ages' and into a bright post-enlightenment modernity, the same conditions of the Nativity story apply, even in the UK. You don't have to go to Africa to witness extreme poverty, misery, hunger, destitution and refugees.

In the Gospel we are told that the Holy Family, our Blessed Lord having just been born, were in the gravest danger. We are told that they experience at first hand, poverty and hardship. The Christ Child is under threat from Herod who orders the massacre of the Holy Innocents. The Holy Family become refugees, seeking asylum. When they return to Bethlehem, the Blessed Virgin and St Joseph become as beggars looking for somewhere, anywhere for the Virgin must lay her head down to give birth to Christ, not in luxury, but in the poor, dark, stinking, humble surroundings of a stable. The Son of God is about to be born and the Virgin and St Joseph are homeless!

Would it be different today? It is certainly possible that it would not be...

If the Blessed Virgin were to give birth to Our Lord nowadays in the UK, she and St Joseph would still be poor. Being poor, perhaps, the couple would come under unwanted attention from social services. The rumours and situation of the Holy Family would be known to the mental health division of social services who would seek to locate Blessed Mary and St Joseph, for it is said that she is a Virgin and this is beyond human atheistic comprehension, beyond the comprehension indeed of Christians.

They would be hounded by social services and mental health division. Mental health might want to section the Blessed Virgin Mary and her spouse most chaste, her mental health having been called into question. Social services would have tried to counsel the Virgin to consider abortion, making her and St Joseph take flight to another country or town where the poor are not urged to consider aborting or abortion is rare. So Herod is still alive! Fleeing their persecutors they could have fallen into homelessness and destitution and become refugees. Perhaps in bad economic times, the carpenting trade would dry and St Joseph would be unemployed. Perhaps they would end up in a queue for bread and soup on a soup run, having little money with which to buy food for themselves. The 'wise men' or Magi would knock on the door of a council flat or council estate garage where someone has let the Virgin give birth, since they still had so long to wait to get onto a council house waiting list. Then, once she had given birth to the Son of God, social services, seeing their poverty would try and take the Child into care, so that the Child could be handed over to either a middle-class family for fostering or adoption, or a wealthier gay couple, for they would be deemed to be unsuitable parents, so they may have to flee and get on a National Express somewhere, anywhere but where they were and live incognito, hidden lives away from the eyes and ears of the State!

We think we have come so far from 'biblical times' but that is far from the truth! Grinding poverty and misery still exists in this country, so often hidden from the eyes of the rich! The poor are still persecuted and bullied, shunted from pillar to post. Like the Holy Family, poor and exiled from the society of the wealthy, the very poor are given few 'choices' and are often left dispossessed and excluded.

Our Heavenly Mother and Queen, the Blessed Virgin Mary

The Mother of the Earth, the Mother of God, the Mother of all Christians is cloaked in blue and white just like the Earth. She is patroness and protectress of all who dwell here. It is she who is the great source of grace to the Church and the Faithful. Through her, the World is redeemed by Her Divine Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. By merit of her holy and Immaculate Conception, having been spared from the stain of the sin of our first parents, she inherits the World and all of its children who now belong to her. She intercedes for us, for the World and draws us to her Son. If World leaders truly want to 'save the planet' then they should turn to her.

Do They Know Its Christmas?

Obligatory Christmas songs...Go on, Georgie-baby!

Was Shakespeare a Secret Catholic?

In Shakespeares's time you had to be a 'closet' Catholic, otherwise you 'd get your head lopped off...

The Telegraph reports that...

The Venerable English College has claimed that England's leading playwright was a secret Catholic who spent "lost years" in Rome.

Father Andrew Headon, the vice-rector of the college, said that college records correspond with a previously undocumented period in Shakespeare's life after he left Stratford in 1585 and before he emerged as a playwright in London in 1592. "There are several years which are unaccounted for in Shakespeare's life," said Father Headon.

A leather parchment kept by the college is signed by "Arthurus Stratfordus Wigomniensis" in 1585, "Shfordus Cestriensis" in 1587 and "Gulielmus Clerkue Stratfordiensis" in 1589.

The college believes these signatures are: "(King) Arthur's (compatriot) from Stratford (in the diocese) of Worcester," "Sh(akespeare from Strat)ford (in the diocese) of Chester" and "William the Clerk from Stratford".

Shakespeare's family was Catholic and he had many friends who where loyal to Rome.

That's settled then! Another literary genius for the Church! Hurrah! Doubts still remain over Dante though...

Pope Says Nope to Flagrant Use of Image for Brands

Buy Daz 'Divine' Washing Powder...It gets your vestments holy and white...everytime!

Courtesy of The Telegraph

The Holy See has declared that anyone wishing to use the face or name of the Holy Father must gain approval from the Vatican. In recent years, several attempts have been made to use the Pope’s name on products and include it in the name of buildings or universities. To try and prevent this, the Vatican said: “Recent years have witnessed a great increase of affection and esteem for the person of the Holy Father.

“There has also been a desire to use the Pope’s name in the title of universities, schools or cultural institutions, as well as associations, foundations and other groups.

“In light of this fact, the Holy See hereby declares that it alone has the right to ensure the respect due to the Successors of Peter, and, therefore, to protect the figure and personal identify of the Pope from the unauthorised use of his name and/or the papal coat of arms for ends and activities which have little or nothing to do with the Catholic Church.”

However, a copyright lawyer said that a simple warning may not be enough. Robin Fry, from the firm Beachcrofts, told The Times: “Popes throughout history have been plagued by their image being reproduced, whether as little trinkets, or, recently, mechanical dolls.

"There has even been a Pope soap on a rope. This declaration is a brave attempt to control use of the imprimatur and image of His Holy Father, but this can only realistically be done through registration of trademarks. Without this, the Vatican’s jurisdiction extends legally only to the 110 acres of the Vatican City and any new laws it announces cannot be enforced elsewhere, unless other countries adopt the same rules.”

The Furies

Anthony Mann's second Western after Winchester '73, The Furies (1950) is a stark, character-driven Western that looks and feels like a film noir crossed with Shakespeare. Its complicated plot, strong female protagonist and complex characters and create a truly unique film. It isn't a complete masterpiece like The Man From Laramie, but it's a fine Western in its own right, one of the landmark "adult Westerns" of the early '50s.

T.C. Jeffords (Walter Huston) is a powerful New Mexico rancher who owns a large expanse of territory - The Furies. A widower, he finds himself henpecked by his bold, strong-willed daughter Vance (Barbara Stanwyck), who manipulates him at every turn. She's grimly determined to inherit T.C.'s land, but T.C. agrees only on the condition that she marry. Vance is torn between two undesirable suitors: Rip (Wendell Corey), a tough-minded gambler, and Juan Herrera (Gilbert Roland), a Mexican rancher whose family is squatting on The Furies. Father and daughter's battle of wills comes to a head, as T.C. engages scheming widow Flo Burnett (Judith Anderson), and tries to forcibly evict the Herreras. Vance launches a complicated scheme to get revenge and take control of the Furies for good.

Perhaps what's most immediately noticeable about The Furies is its female protagonist, a rarity in the Western genre. Women were largely backgrounded as passive wives or sutiors, glorified mother figures or dirty whores, with an occasional tomboy character thrown in; the West (or at least Hollywood's traditional West) was a man's world, with little place for nice domesticities.

Vance is a wonderfully drawn character, alternately sympathetic and repulsive. T.C.'s impotent son Clay (John Bromfield) can't compete; he's left hanging there, a potential conflict that's quickly dropped. Vance is a domineering yet neurotic personality, which she undoubtedly inherited from her father; she simmers with resentment towards T.C., an awkward mixture of love and hate tinged with hints of incest. When she's betrayed by her father, she won't take it lying down, and gets back at him not with guns, but by using T.C.'s own arrogance against him. Vance is among the strongest female characters ever portrayed in a Western, and certainly the most interesting.

T.C. is a sheer megalomaniac who issues his own currency, keeps a bust of Napoleon in his study, manipulates seedy bankers (including Albert Dekker of The Wild Bunch) and keeps a private army led by El Tigre (Thomas Gomez), a semi-retired bandit. He loves his daughter, though he sees her as paling in comparison to his hallowed late wife, and ignores his hapless son. He uses brute force to deal with most of his problems, especially the Herreras - after a bloody siege, he convinces the Herreras to surrender, only to coldly lynch Juan afterwards. An old-fashioned brute, he finds himself unable to keep up with his scheming daughter, and is left out to dry in the abrupt climax.

The film is full of moral ambiguities: no character, except perhaps Juan, emerges as really sympathetic, and all are constantly scheming against one another. Rip, a proud man determined to come out on top, matches wits with Vance in a love-hate relationship throughout the film. Juan is a fairly good man but his friendship (and unrequited love) comes with a price, as his family and T.C. are sworn enemies. Most amusing of all is Flo, who flatly admits to Vance that her only interest in T.C. is his money - leading to a rather ghastly disfigurement at Vance's hands. Except for Juan, who hangs out with a grotesque, gun-toting family anyway, the only nice characters are completely backgrounded; The Furies is a moral vacuum where only the most devious survive.

As usual, Mann's direction is wonderful. It has a distinct noir feel, with dark, moody cinematography by Victor Milner that seems to place the film's action at dusk; what might otherwise have been beauty post-card images of blue skies and beautiful ranges becomes foreboding, desolate, almost nightmarish. The large-scale shootout at the halfway point is rough, gritty, and visceral - one of the most intense and nasty scenes in any Western. Charles Schnee writes a script that is well-constructed but contains its share of groaner dialogue. The movie's biggest flaw is its climax, which begins on a reconcillatory note and ends with abrupt tragedy, both of which ring false. Franz Waxman's score is fairly rote and not always appropriate, but that's a minor flaw.

Barbara Stanwyck (Double Indemnity) is one of my favorite actresses. I don't find her physically attractive as such, but she has an alluring je ne sais que in her best roles - and so it is here. Her Vance has some precedent in the femme fatales Stanwyck played in the '40s, but she emerges a distinct personage in her own right, warped into a neurotic, headstrong woman resentful at being out of step with her place and time. Stanwyck invests Vance with her usual fire, intelligence, wit and subtlety, making her a fascinating, believable character, even if she never quite becomes sympathetic.

Walter Huston, who won an Oscar and cinematic immortality for his hammy prospector in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), gives his final performance here, and it's a wonderfully restrained yet energetic turn. Gilbert Roland (Cheyenne Autumn) gives a sympathetic performance as the doomed Juan, who manages to avoid the expected Latin lover stereotypes; Wendell Corey is a handsome but fairly wooden blank slate. Judith Anderson (Rebecca) has relatively little screen time but makes a strong impression; her character's amusing amorality and frankness make her very much deserving of the freakish violence visited upon her.

The Furies is an interesting film and a solid Western, despite its third-act improbabilities and inconsistencies, and is another fine piece of work from Anthony Mann. I've seen The Tin Star enough to dismiss it as pap, but maybe I'd ought to take another look at Winchester '73 and The Naked Spur. And Fall of the Roman Empire... well, maybe not that one.

RIP Brittany Murphy

Oh, happy day!

Actress Brittany Murphy was found dead on Sunday, TMZ and other media outlets have confirmed. The 'Clueless' and 'Girl, Interrupted' actress went into full cardiac arrest, and paramedics were unable to revive her. She was pronounced dead upon arrival at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.

I am just numb by now.

More Monumental Marxist Miliband Madness...

More Stone Roses...'How Do You Sleep?'

Ed Miliband, Climate Change Secretary, is brother of David Miliband, Foreign Secretary, another Labour apparatchick intent on dissolving UK sovereignty like crumbly disprin in a glass of water. So, Ed, Sudan rejected it and compared the deal to the Holocaust! Oh well! Carry on regardless, eh?! What do they know?! A Telegraph blogger says Ed Miliband didn't sleep well at all at the Copenhagen Summit...With an attitute like that to the concerns of Sudan, I'm not surprised!

The UK's climate change secretary has said the UN Copenhagen summit was the "most chaotic show on earth" and arguments "strangled" negotiations [or is that impositions]. Ed Miliband said he was disappointed China and India did not want legally binding targets, and Sudan and Venezuela almost overturned the accord. Delegates largely backed a US-led climate deal which included limiting temperature rises to less than 2C. But the 193-nation summit ended with delegates taking "note" of the deal.

The accord, reached between the US, China and a small group of other countries, was recognised by delegates on Saturday afternoon. The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said the agreement must be made legally binding next year. The pact did not win unanimous support, amid opposition from some developing nations. Mr Miliband said "sticking points" had led four or five countries to almost "dump the agreement completely" at 4am on Saturday morning. He said he had been in his hotel room, "in his underwear", when he was called back for "hours of wrangling" to stop a deal being blocked.

"The whole accord was in danger of being overturned by some countries, including Sudan and Venezuela. I was told that actually the deal looked like it might be just blocked. The Sudanese delegate in particular had compared the deal to the holocaust and was trying to whip up anger against it. Luckily we found a way round the issue, but it highlights the complexity of a deal when it needs unanimity," he said.

He said some developing countries, such as China, did not want targets to be under international legally-binding obligations. "They have doubts about whether we should, as a world, commit to a kind of bigger target, to say, for example - as the scientists say - we should cut our carbon emissions by 50% by 2050."

But he said talks had not been "a waste of time" because it was the first time both developed and developing countries wanted to tackle the problem. There was also "importantly, finance in the deal", he said.

The agreement outlined a goal of providing $100bn a year by 2020 to help poorer countries and also promised to deliver $30bn (£18.5bn) of aid for developing nations over the next three years. Mr Miliband said there would be more transparency in about six weeks, when countries had agreed to put forward their targets. He said he had "absolutely not given up hope, but it was important to move forward urgently" and a legal agreement "was still necessary".

Crackin'! Ed Miliband, another Marxist ideologue in a conference full of Marxist ideologues...

Holy Elephants Stampede Upon Orisson Persecutors!

You can't say they didn't have it coming...Go on Holy Elephants and smite them! That'll learn 'em! I mean, let us pray for the victims of the elephant stampede in Orissa...

I'm Dreaming of...

...an Anthropogenic Global Warming Sceptics' Christmas? 15 inches of snow in NYC!

Thalidomide and the Abortion Act (1967)

The thalidomide scandal rocked the UK and bolstered the pro-abortion arguments in the abortion debate in the 1960s. Was it really an 'accident'?

The Telegraph today reports that...

Under a deal to be announced soon, the Department of Health will pay a grant of £20 million over three years to the Thalidomide Trust, which dispenses aid to people disabled by the drug. The deal follows a campaign backed by the Sunday Times to secure financial support for the UK's 463 surviving "thalidomiders", many of whom are unable to work and require adapted homes and cars.

Pregnant women were prescribed thalidomide in the 1950s and 1960s to treat morning sickness or insomnia, but it was withdrawn from sale in 1961 after babies were born with limb deformities and other damage.

The drug's UK manufacturer, Distillers Biochemicals, paid around £28 million compensation in the 1970s following a legal battle by the families of those affected. Under the new settlement, the grant will be reviewed after three years but it is expected to be continued for the lifetimes of those damaged by the drug. It is also hoped a further £5 million could be provided if the devolved governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland contribute, according to campaigners.

Thalidomide campaigner Guy Tweedy, 47, from Harrogate, said health minister Mike O'Brien had agreed to the deal following negotiations. He said: "This is a significant day in the long-running battle to get a fair and just settlement for the victims of this wicked drug. Our campaign, which was fought with dignity and determination, has always been about justice and not entitlement. For more than 50 years we have had to live with the consequences of our mothers taking this 'wonder drug'. Little did they know the damage it would do to the unborn child in the womb. We estimate at least 1,000 babies were born with deformities brought about directly by this drug, and more than half of them died within their first year. An unknown number also died in the womb."

Over the last seven years, Mr Tweedy, with fellow thalidomider Nick Dobrik, has met 150 MPs, including Mr O'Brien and Alan Johnson, the former health secretary. The drug was developed in the mid 1950s in Germany and in 1958 it was described by the British government's Cohen Committee as a "great drug with proven value".

Mr Tweedy said the money and apology would make a "big difference" to surviving thalidomiders and parents who cared for the most seriously disabled. "This ruling will now help ease the lives of many who, for more than half a century, have struggled daily with the terrible deformities they suffered as a direct result of thalidomide," he said. A Department of Health spokesman said: "We will make an announcement in due course."

Interesting? In the clear light of day it is, since decades have passed since the Abortion Act (1967) came into being. The Wellcome Trust 'human genome' website states that...

1960s: Thalidomide and rubella: In the words of Simms and Hindell (1971): "In the spring of 1961, Britain witnessed the birth of an 'epidemic' of deformed children" due to the taking of the drug thalidomide by pregnant women. Anxiety among parents about the risk of having a 'deformed' child was augmented by a simultaneous outbreak of rubella in Britain in 1962. This had a "major impact on public opinion regarding legalised abortion for handicap".

Co-incidence...? That could depend on how many members of the Eugenics Society had gone on to high-level positions of authority in the pharmaceutical industry, Parliament and the family planning groups who so advocated the abortion bill and how much such vested interests wanted the legislation of the Abortion Bill to pass. Given the advocates wanted to kill babies anyway, why would that surprise us?

UK Christmas Number 1 Outrage

Come back, Cliff! All is forgiven! If you don't like swearing, don't listen. What's happened to this country?! Tenuously, it could be a pro-life song, or an anti-government song, or both, but it doesn't exactly say, 'Merry Christmas one un' all'. Neither does this, but it should have got to number 1 at some stage. I don't know! Where is the justice!?

Drive-Thru Sainthoods

To those who are concerned that the road to Sainthood appears to fast-track some men and women who only relatively recently passed from this life to the next, it is worthwhile remembering that both St Francis and St Anthony were canonised the following year after their holy deaths had ended their holy lives! May God be praised for all of His Saints! Even St John of the Cross, one of thirty-three Doctors of the Church had to wait a full 135 years. Ironic, really, because 33 is a perfect number of Doctors, since this was the age at which our Blessed Lord died. To have any more Doctors would be a bit rubbish now since the number of them is perfect, so if any more come along, they should be ignored. If they are genuinely interested in the good of Holy Mother Church, they will understand and keep schtum, so if there are any Doctors out there, shhhh...

Quiz

To which warmongering former British Prime Minister turned pathologically power-crazed millionaire philanthropist is the following quote attributable?

“I’m a social engineer now. I can engineer social change on my own terms, outside of a big government buraucracy.”

Answers in the comments box...I know it is the season of goodwill and all, but...Anyway, since when did 'social engineering' become acceptable again?

Politicians Christmas Cards...Where is Christmas?

Gordon and Sarah Brown's Number 10 Downing Street Card...So surreal that only gnostics understand the hidden meaning. Maybe Gordon's saying, '...and narrow is the door to Number 10 and few be those who find it. But broad is the road out of Number 10 and and the majority of people hope I find it soon...'



Boris Johnson's mayoral card...dangerously Christmassy, depicting a star and 'wise men'.


Liberal Democrat Cleggy Christmas card...cute and festive if more than a little cheesy, having shamelessly exploited their own child to design it.



Tony and Cherie Blair's card...So scandalously narcisstic, they can't even bring themselves to say 'Merry Christmas' nor bear for their divine image not to be replaced, just for one day, by that of the Holy Family. Worthy only of burning. The only Christmas card that makes you want to punch strangers while saying, "Someone will answer for this atrocity!".



Speaker John Bercow card...Festive family based japes and laughs, but where's the holly? Also I hope you've all got CRB checks, including you children. Get their DNAs and put them onto the database, just in case, because they might just have the gene that makes you a criminal type.



The Conservative's David Cameron Christmas card...Outrageously bland and meaningless, unless Cameron is saying that Parliament is appears to be less corrupt when it is covered in snow. Impressive only in as much as it reflects the strength of personality of the leader perfectly.

Rome is Where the Heart Is

The Catholic should, while remaining conscious of his own unworthiness, stand in opposition to the moral vicissitudes of his time. He should be a sign of contradiction to the World. He should astonish unbelievers not in the performance of great works but by his simplicity of heart. He should delight in the truth. His life should bear witness to truths Eternal, Timeless and Divine. He should expose the errors of the World cheerfully and with charity, knowing that in Christ alone is true joy, that man's vocation without Him is bereft of true meaning and that without Him the foundations on which stand even the loftiest of human principles will whither, decay and fall, built as they have been, upon falsehood.

Conscious of his weakness and his dependence on God alone, he should take comfort in the knowledge that nothing is impossible for God. In discovering that God is Truth and Love, he should proclaim it in word and deed and lead others to know that only in the fiery abyss of love, dwelling in the Heart of Jesus, can man find his true vocation and joy. He should not fear the desolation of the Cross, nor the insults of men, nor their ridicule, nor any form of suffering. He should fear no man, for the truth that he has found drives him on and this truth he should defend, even unto his dying breath, even unto the shedding of his own blood for the sake of Christ and His Gospel, for in return for so honouring God, God will surely honour him.