Charlie Brooker, you're my Hero!

Charlie Brooker's Screen Wipe & Screen Burn are literally about the only things that make me laugh until I feel sick. His BBC4 show was on irritatingly late, but I would wait up, sitting there looking like a dog being shown a card trick, hanging on to his every word, laughing like a school boy who just heard his first fart joke. Long live Charlie Brooker....

Some may know that he was in part responsible for "Brass Eye" "TV Go Home" & "Nathan Barley" this may be a decent link to some of his stuff : His wit is extremely acerbic and not to everyone's taste admittedly, but Genius is so rarely well received isn't it? (pompous arse)



TV Ideas that we'll never see:

Don’t you point at me!
Channel 4 funds a new documentary experience: Would-be TV presenter hopefuls are given a film crew for 1 day . Their task: to point at random members of the public until a fight erupts, possibly with more than one recipient, and hopefully in a 24 hour convenience store just off the Muswell Hill roundabout

Llama's On Ice:
Watch in awe as Llama’s ice skate & then occasionally spit at two year old children in the audience: presented by Natasha Kaplinsky

Women are from Mars, Men Don't Care
“It’s a Knockout” style survival game show. The Female Vs Male eternal “battle” is played out: Each week there is a different theme (Medieval, Biblical, Watts Riots…) the end inevitably involves a death by bludgeoning with a tyre iron. – presented by Jeremy Kyle.

Mark Kermode’s 50’s throw back Cook Off:
50’s style throwback Mark Kermode presents late night bed-sit cooking show. C-list Celebrities stagger onto the set half cut, after drinking Czechoslovakian wines in the green room. They reminisce about their first flat shares & embarrassing sexual experience at Stage School , whilst microwaving a baked potato – Kermode shouts at them, and discusses European Cinema, making C-Lister's and audience alike feel inadequate. (BBC4, possibly)

Tim Burton's Gothic Makeovers
Tim Burton does Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen makeovers of inner city housing Projects. Watch as Hooded A.S.B.O gun runners come home to find their flats have been painted opaque black from floor to ceiling, and decorated with figurines of Edward Scissor Hands, displayed in glass cabinets…

Cat Mangler!
Woozy – experimental visual hijacking: Ray Winston literally mangles cats through a Victorian Landry Mangle, whilst shouting things like “Shut it you scroat” Music by Lemon Jelly.

"Sometimes I worry about being a success in a mediocre world"

The quote is from Actress & Comedienne Lily Tomlin; and it's (almost) my sentiments exactly!

Looking back on previous posts of the last few days, it's clear that there is already a pattern emerging in terms of content: So, what we're looking at is a film/TV/Music/Pop culture reference blog. Damn it all!, I thought I was making this slightly quirky-original-kooky-unique-please-like-me!-blog- blog.....

Now I realise there's a bit of a problem with that intention; there are something like 50 Million Blogs out there in the wilderness - all I can hope that the odd passer by looks at something here & doesn't think it's shit!

The things people will do to get attention

TV Journalist Christine Chubbuck , July 15, 1974 shot herself in the noggin on live telly!. I mean, SHE WAS ALREADY ON TELLY, how much attention do you need. She was probably just a bit tired.

It's not unusual for young children to do a runner, in the vain attempt at punishing their parents for not giving them enough chips for tea or something, adults should just know better - this story just takes it to a whole other level;

In Hollywood the normal rules don't apply: Attention seeking can go too far, often resulting in deaths that are always intriguing, and sometimes a little weird;

• Peter Finch: died of massive heart attack while promoting the film Network . He was first and only actor to ever receive an Oscar posthumously; "I'm as mad as Hell, & I'm not gonna take it anymore!"
• Montgomery Clift: 1957 Smashed his car into a telephone pole after leaving a jolly at the home Elizabeth Taylor. Clift needed plastic surgery, his handsome appearance permanently disfigured. The "before and after" face of Clift was obvious. Clift became ever so slightly hooked on booze and pills (well, you would...), and his health deteriorated. Clift died in 1966 at aged 45 , of complications brought on by his "slight" fags/booze/pills addictions
• Judy Garland: (The Wizard of Oz.). Official cause of death: barbiturate poisoning "incautious self-over dosage", otherwise translated as, Utter madness made her think that 1 bottle of pills was a reasonable amount to take. Gay men still weep.
• Elizabeth Short: AKA "The Black Dahlia" - Most disturbing of them all! Aspiring film actress found in a vacant lot in downtown L.A. her body had been "savagely mutilated" and "hacked in half at the waist." No one has ever been arrested in connection with the murder. But hey, it's OK, Coz they made a film about it
• But for my money, one of the best "Look at me, I'm mad, me" attention seekers of the last 50 years just has to be Mr Evel Knievel: on his official website there is this absolute classic paragraph:

Some career highlights include:

1) Jan. 1968 - Crashed in an attempt to clear the fountains at Caesar's Palace in Los Vegas

2) May 1971 - Crashed in an attempt to clear 13 Pepsi Cola trucks in Yakima

3) March 1972 - Suffered serious injury in San Francisco's Cow Palace when his motorcycle crashed in a very difficult landing area.

4) September 1974 - After two unsuccessful unmanned test flights Evel decided to keep his word to his fans and risked his life in a specially constructed rocket powered "Skycycle" in an attempt to clear the Snake River Canyon in Idaho. Even though he made it across the quarter mile wide chasm, strong winds blew the malfunctioning parachute back into the canyon, landing just a few feet from the swirling river in which he would have surely drowned.

5) May 1975 A record crowd of over 90,000 at Wembley Stadium in London, England watched as Evel crashed upon landing, breaking his pelvis after clearing 13 double-tiered buses.

Watch this crazed hero of my childhood fall off bikes here. Call me cynical, but that's 5 career highlights I can live without!. Better still, buy one of your own.

Bless Evel, that crazy ol' drunken wife beater is still alive and suing the shit out of Kanye West for adopting a "certain likeness" in a recent Music Video ; Raise a glass to the maddest redneck on a motorbike you'll ever see jumping over stuff, needlessly (sensible people drive around...)

That's not even the tip of the iceberg - I'll save that for another day:

And in Other News:

My Girlfriend has had a continuing battle with the banality and bureaucracy of our local Council in Brighton regarding parking permits; (I don't drive so it's not really my rant...) I'll have to add a point or too here when I've spoken to her about the actual facts of the matter - rather than make unsubstantiated remarks that amount to rumour & conjecture - after all, I wouldn't want to get sued by the council - imagine that...

We live in a fairly nice part of Brighton: But the Council are total Mung Bean eaters. I mean, only in Brighton could a City Council take years to decide what should happen to this until this finally happens: Bloody shameful, the only A-listed Pier left in the UK, now stuck out there like a discarded Turkey Carcass. So, if they can't sort out a stationary structure in the sea, what chance have you got with a parking permit!.

Plug of The Day:

Red Nose Day is Friday 16th March here is the website to contribute. I will no doubt drop some coins into a bucket at my local pub