The Irishman - 2019

About ten minutes into the movie I realised it was not going to satisfy me, but as I wasn't alone I thought I'd let it run and see if I could make it interesting. At first I concentrated on the sets, cars and costumes, but about 2/3 into the movie I could see it was an historically interesting movie given the mobs' involvement in JFK, Nixon and general affairs of the USA from the early forties through till the early 80's when mobster and Union chief Jimmy Hoffa went missing (murdered by the Irishman)

The film is populated with all the old stars of previous mobster movies, including Pacino, Keitel, Pesci and the degenerate scum Robert de Niro who wont be remembered fondly by the end of Trump's presidency. 

You can take that to the bank.

It does coalesce into and interesting narrative towards the end but in my view, this is the swan song to Italian mob movies as the informed researcher will already understand that Hollywood is largely responsible for portraying the mafia as Italian when the real handlers were the likes of Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, The Bronfmans, Mossad, Sayanim and associated Israeli Terrorist Gangs and Politicians.

Jack Hargreaves & Southern Television

By "us", I mean my siblings. A younger brother Alexander, and my older sister Maria (Marie-Elaine). 

I think they have both personalised their monikers now, so don't let me define how they like to be called. 

We children ("us") were born before the internet, and as kids if you wish, were often bored at the available options on Sunday for example, but even the weekdays and evenings could be tedious from a child's perspective. Uneventful if housebound.

Sunday was largely commerce-free (shops including supermarkets were closed), which isn't the same as commercial-free. 

The local TV station (Southern TV, TVS (subsequently Meridian) often broadcast perplexing Television content like Jack Hargreaves' Out of Town program about the countryside. 

Internally, we knew it wasn't designed to be boring but it does take aging to appreciate how "slow", can be imbued with more value than fast.

Unexpectedly, a nine-year-old or even an eleven-year-old wouldn't ordinarily be interested in fly fishing, or agrarian seasonal activity. 

It pleases me that I can revisit the "Out of Town" content on the internet, and reassess my somewhat immature, youthful reaction.

I'm still working on the 11:11, 555, 333, etc post. 

Update: Barry at the Waterloo Arms tells me Jack was a complete wanker.

Marie

 

Marie was a good sport on my last night in California and we had a terrific meal on Huntington Beach before I caught my flight back to Beijing. It was however a real insight into what it means for aging populations and I learnt a heap of stuff I should have known about anyway to put into context for my work. I see here today that there's another contribution to playful elderly that is definitely worth a read. Marie is a bit scared of emails but I've opened up the playing field by sending her video mails through Eyejot.