Once again, I’ve forgotten to post up the links to the last BBC discussion, but in order to keep readers in the loop, here’s a quick run-down of some moonlighting side-hustles outside of the confines of the blog. I’ve been writing for The List magaine, paper and online, for nearly twenty years, and was delighted to be asked to cover the 2021 Edinburgh International Film Festival for the publication. There’s over 800 articles on The List’s website that I’ve contributed, and it was a pleasure to be able to cover a festival which came off the ropes in style with a fighting comback after a year aff wi’ the covid.
The opener this year was the Nic Cage drama Pig, which I reviewed on film-authority.com; I interviewed the creative team behind the film here (http://film.list.co.uk/article/128945-pig-director-michael-sarnoski-people-bring-a-lot-to-a-nic-cage-movie/) I also rattled through some of the programme highlights, and therefore won’t be reviewing these titles for film-authority.com. The excellent New Zealand drama The Justice of Bunny King is well worth a look (http://film.list.co.uk/article/129013-the-justice-of-bunny-king/) and hopefully represents the eclectic taste of the festival’s new director Kristy Matheson. I’d also featured fresh releases like Mad God and The Beta Test on my own website, but there was also fun to be had with the truly bizarre giant film movie Mandibles (http://film.list.co.uk/article/129031-mandibles/) and a neat closer in Billy Crystal comedy/drama Here Today (http://film.list.co.uk/article/129145-here-today/). All in all, it was great to see signs of life in a venerable festival I’ve attended since I was a teenager; 1988’s Bull Durham was my first movie at the Filmhouse, and hopefully there’ll be more to come.
My regular reader will know that I have been engaged in a daily struggle to improve the level of comments featured on this website, and in order to turbo-charge that quality, I have recently taken to banning and blocking various miscreants who cannot behave. This is partly because the number of comments was getting out of hand, and it was taking me all day to respond. Now that some kind of practical level of reality has been restored, I am now formall unblocking and unbanning those concerned, and trust that a high level of intellectual discourse will be the inevitable result.
I wonder if your trust will be misplaced. Festival had some good pictures this year and thanks for giving us the lead on many of them. I had a job there once and my job was to sit in the front row and tell the projectionists if anything went wrong. That was in the days when Film House was in a tiny building.
There’s an upturn from having good PR, and not just showcasing work that comes from the same finding pot…
“I am now formally unblocking and unbanning those concerned, and trust that a high level of intellectual discourse will be the inevitable result.”
Your threat is registered! Only insight, wit and effervescent charm from now on. Congratulations on Edinburgh!
So who will you be getting to post on your behalf? Someone with actual wit, insight and charm?
Hey, this is a two way street, pardner! If I’m going to give you my utmost respect, I expect it in return – or at least money.
But Adam Sandler would be a good backup option for the role, right? Gene Wilder is, for some reason, not getting back to my emails.
What should I be respecting?
Uh, my insight, wit and effervescent charm would be a good place to start…
Great, just give me some notice…
Sigh. You know, I think Frank Underwood once said: “kill with kindness”. I’m going to try that tactic with you.
You’re planning to kill me? Spare me the Spacey quotes if that’s where we’re going. Nick Lowe, maybe.
Kill with kindness, Dix. Kill you with kindness.
I’ll counter your Nick Lowe with Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Series 2 Episode 4…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0l3QWUXVho
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x53pjno
You stay busy! I obviously knew that because you post every day (or even sometimes twice a day) and even I can’t do that. I know the amount of work it takes. Do you have to deal with carpal tunnel at all?
Glad to see you unbend and unban. I promise to not go hogwild and start introducing a certain sky shade of woad and certain below the back body part into every conversation. I’m WAY more classy than that..
Even Psychic G would be proud of me…
Reaches to his pocket for a yellow card….I feel free to cannibalise previously posted reviews that got lost before I had a foothold to an audience. So Alex had to be banned for continually pointing that out. But once he was banned, it just became an easy way of achieving more purity in the quality of comments. But my mission is to educate, so I welcome the miscreants and will train them to be masters, much as I did with you, my little ewok…
How did you lose stuff? Data crash?
And ewoks can pilot X-Wings, so I’d be careful if you see a bunch of them aimlessly loitering around your place. Probably scoping it out.
No, I just mean they were posted before I rode the P2 wave and saw a much smaller readership. With nearly 2000 reviews, some do vanish or get garbled, so weeding and repotting is required.
Not sure how often you get on Twitter but blogger Nell Minow, mentioned you in an article about my blogathon here… added you to the tweet, but not seen you about. https://moviemom.com/no-true-scotsman-blogathon/
Cool, looks good! I’ll drop by and leave a comment! Thanks for pointing this out!
No problem.. forgot to mention that promoted your post for the blogathon on Day 1…
Thank you!
Here’s the post here… https://weegiemidget.wordpress.com/2021/09/06/no-true-scotsman-1/
Good stuff in the articles. I’m looking forward mostly to Pig. As always I will continue with my erudite, insightful comments wot have kept your blog going in the lean times and look forward to the return of the bannedaleros. Well done and carry on.
After returning I moved quickly to ban Eddie from any further commenting. He came knocking on the door but I only went to the window and said “Pfffffft! Hahahahahahaha!” I think he’s out climbing Ben Nevis now. Good for him. Give him a chance to clear his head.
Do you want a bet on how long until your re-banned?
Shouldn’t take too long. We all know about Dix’s anger management issues. He should be losing it any time now . . .
Who says I’ve got anger issues? I’ll pan your melt in!
Not sure ‘I’ll pan your melt in’ counts as the inevitable result of high level intellectual discourse.
What about if I was to smash his head like an egg?
Sigh.
Who’s side are you on?
I’m not on a side, I am a neutral observer. Sighing.
Well, I’m doing my best to cultivate informed chat. It’s not easy.