Author Archives: Houyhnhnm

Rebecca; Middlemarch

Posted on December 6, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

It’s been a while since I watched these two (yes, sorry, watched, not read): the 1940 Hitchcock film and the 1994 BBC Middlemarch.

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Scrapper; Not That Radical

Posted on November 21, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

Charlotte Regan’s film and Mikaela Loach’s book seem, as so often, rather different kinds of thing, put together here, by, as Sting has it, the sacred geometry of chance. A quirky magic-realist film about a bereaved 12-year-old meeting her hitherto … Continue reading →

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My Name is Alfred Hitchcock; Drive Your Plow over the Bones of the Dead

Posted on November 14, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

{Welcome back double-blog!} Two great pieces to start: seemingly unrelated, but then on closer inspection…

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rodin and the ancient greeks, & the iliad

Posted on November 8, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

rodin and the ancient greeks i didn’t realise that rodin was in london a lot, and kept visiting the british museum to see the elgin marbles and other greek sculpture; seems (at least according to the bm’s materials) that this … Continue reading →

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Review of Carl Safina: Beyond Words: What animals think and feel

Posted on November 8, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

The Quaker Green politician Rupert Read once told me that he gets through boring meetings by imagining the participants stark naked and preening each other like apes. After reading Carl Safina’s book (available in many editions; first published in 2015) … Continue reading →

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macbeth (streamed from the olivier to picturehouse central, may 10th) & the lene lovich band (at the lexington, islington, may 20th)

Posted on November 8, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

macbeth live-streaming is in many ways so much better than #beingthere: better view, cheaper, and a filmed interview with the director before curtain-up; which helped me notice the feel – ‘britain in a few years, after a civil war’ – … Continue reading →

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Ada Salter and the Beautification of Bermondsey; Dance First

Posted on November 3, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

Ada Salter and the Beautification of Bermondsey This was a guided walk by Sue McCarthy, organised for Wanstead Quakers. I can’t claim to remember much of the history at this remove from the event itself (October to January is a … Continue reading →

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The Old Oak; Killers of the Flower Moon

Posted on October 20, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

Now watched both of these twice; let’s see what comes of that. The Old Oak An earnest and often moving account of how white working-class people react to the moving in of refugee families from Syria. After initially rejecting the … Continue reading →

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Merkel; The Great Escaper

Posted on October 11, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

Merkel I think this was my first Curzon film watched at home. A pretty straightforward documentary about Merkel’s life and career, broadly uncritical/hagiographic. The Great Escaper A pretty straightforward biopic telling the true story of a D-Day veteran who missed … Continue reading →

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Fremont; Dumb Money

Posted on October 4, 2023 by Houyhnhnm

Fremont In many ways a straightforward love story in the manner of many films (see Fallen Leaves), in which two separate working-class people, shat on by the system in different ways, meet each other by chance and begin to make … Continue reading →

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