nine

At the best cinema in London this evening - The Electric in Portobello Road - to see Rob Marshall's 'Nine'. We'd booked armchairs with footstools and grabbed some suitably Italian drinks before the show started. It's the movie musical that parallels Fellini's 8 1/2 about the trials and tribulations of a director with writer's block attempting the ninth movie.

Stylishly 60's Italian, with little Alfa sports cars, perpetual sun-glasses and glamour the Sartorialist would envy, this was a cinema spectacle. I didn't know what I was getting in advance, and about a third of the way through realised it was a series of cameos by the women connected with Daniel Day-Lewis as the enigmatic and conflicted maestro Guido. At around the same moment I decided it wasn't so much a musical as a modern-day opera. Art house opera marketed as big screen musical, maybe?

All new songs (I think) and flashily sassily directed choreography which sometimes tips more than a wink to Bob Fosse. My sense was that the songs need to be heard a couple of times to really sink in, maybe because they are new rather than Moulin Rouge or Mamma Mia style implants of existing pop.

I'll be one of the people who enjoyed this show, although my sense is it will be divided. I liked the homage to 60's cinema, the graininess of some of the film, the wide open lenses with liquid backgrounds. The way that Daniel Day-Lewis played the director without a script or any ideas, but who could function charmingly on auto-pilot through the press calls.

There's a roll call of well-known actresses as the women in his life, from Marion Cotillard as his wife, Penelope Cruz his mistress, Nicole Kidman as his muse, Sophia Loren as his mother, through Fergie, Kate Hudson and even Judy Dench as the wardrobe person.

This may have been a simple storyline, modest dialogue and some flashy set pieces. I'd put it closer to art house homage than the way it seems to have been marketed. On that level I think it works well.

Trailer here

iSlate

We received some secret samples of the still in development handheld graphically enabled PDA with built in memory, text and reader support. They appeared from within innovative packaging akin to tinsel covered crackers. Along with a supply of apples and peppermints, we took them for a test run today.

There were a few teething troubles, mainly because of the ability to fold the device, and then to find new lines appearing in the text.

This would be okay for a mystery novel, but less so for a more factual account. It may rekindle writing ideas for some, but we wondered if a more permanent form of memory might be better, perhaps supplied in larger quantities. We hear the code name for these under development memory units is 'Pages'.

ring out, wild bells

We didn't start the first day of 2010 too early. I think the previous evening had slowed us down somewhat.

We did make it to the pub in the afternoon, though, and changed our dining plans to ones involving pub food. The previous evening we'd rang out the wild bells, to the wild sky.

There'd been flying cloud and frosty light. We'd seen the year going and decided to let him go. Then the new, happy bells, beckoned the nobler modes of life, with sweeter manners and purer laws.

We've decided to make the fresh, new sparkling 2010 excellent.

Happy New Year.

rashbre central rehearses auld lang syne

Okay, maybe the Buck's Fizz was a trifle strong and maybe we do have cloth ears, but we accidentally leaned on the iPhone record button during the practice session for Auld Lang Syne. We'll need to download the words if we are to sing more than the first verse later.

Of course, its also a fine full moon to enter the new decade, which may explain some of the madness.

Press here for our bad singing. It will be worse by midnight.

Triffids

Something of dilemma about whether to watch the second part of the new Day of the Triffids show, having missed Part 1.

Normally I'd be iPlayering my way through the first episode, but I was sort of intrigued to see what they'd done with the plotline and London scenes, so shamefully I skipped straight into Part 2.

I noticed the opening credits said 'Written by' someone that wasn't John Wyndham, and then referenced his book a little later. I did think that was a little bit 'the wrong way around' for something so iconic. But then the plot modernisation was a bit odd too.

Wyndham (to my recollection) doesn't explain how the plants originated, except that it could have been some form of off world experimentation. A good device.

In this one, we have scientists (I assume in Part 1) creating plants to be used as bio-fuel. Except they are carnivorous. Oops. A bit of a blooper there. Wouldn't it be better to use the plants to do what they are good at? Use sunlight and CO2 to grow? No, let's chuck them a few cows to eat before we turn them into fuel.

I get the idea of modernising the story, but not if the end result has a flaw that makes the rest of the story like a few Survivors offcuts.

I did like the scenes in the Abbey, with Vanessa Redgrave dispatching various sacrifices to the woods. There was enough creepiness around this to create some proper darkness. Eddie Izzard made a suitably insane villain and I suppose reminded us that this was wholesome ensemble Sci-Fi rather than a dark tale of apocalypse.

A circular reference here could be that this was the planet that first messed with the plants. After they have taken over they could shoot off to invade somewhere else where Wyndham's original story can play with greater authenticity.

In which Petite France offers festive delights

There's a subtle sales role within La Cure Gourmande. They ever so gently offer you a modest bon-bon or biscuit and maybe a basket to make carrying things easier.

Let's just say we now have enough biscuits for any amount of New Year celebrations. Oh, and chocolate.

Strasbourg's old town has many small alleys, twists and turns and knows how to decorate stylishly for Noel. In one area, the lighting across the middle of the cobbled street was chandeliers.

We visited the Russian Market, the various Christmas fairs and even the local co-op for those last few wine bottles to supplement a planned festive fondue during the New Year season.

twisting the day away

Back along the twisty roads on the North side of Lake Thun. Complete with those tunnels like the ones on the Corniche in Italy and made famous by various James Bond movies.

Later we'd be going through some of the urban tunnels cutting through Basel. They remind me of some kind of club lighting scene, with their lime green verticals and pulsing white lights.

Our destination is the old part of Strasbourg, as a stopping off point on the way back to the UK.

mountains, snow, lakes, sunshine

Early morning drinking on the side balcony as the sun begins to rise from behind the mountains. Our day filled with joys of the slopes rounded off as we see the sun setting behind the Jungfrau.

We'll be heading to the lakes next, where there will still be sights of the mountains although no snow on the ground, but hopefully sunshine. Then we will plot our course across to Strasbourg for some time in Petite France, before beginning the journey back to the UK.

Boxing Day on a Glacier

Well, we managed to get ourselves up in amongst the mountains today. This is around Jungfrau, Monch and Eiger and there's part of the Eigergletscher in the foreground.

As predicted, today had mainly sunshine, so although the temperature was minus 12 degrees Centigrade, it really didn't feel cold. Maybe the schnapps in the coffee helped later on.

The pictures are pretty random at the moment, as I don't have any of my usual technology to sort and sift, instead making do with a USB cable and an iPhone.

Christmas sunshine

Most people I've spoken to during Christmas seem to be having a pretty good time. We're mainly out of electronic contact this year, with hastily uploaded picture and a post 'prepared earlier' on a word processor against the off-chance of a few minutes bandwidth.

We are in amongst the Alps at the moment, but rather eyeing the higher peaks, subject to sufficient good weather. I managed to catch the Christmas Day snap above in between a couple of snow flurries. Tomorrow promises more sustained sunshine.

festive good wishes

And when we decided to make sure our Christmas was snowy, we couldn’t have predicted the weather back home. Nonetheless, the pristine snow here, around half a metre deep, is just about right for the full-on effect.

Add a few mountain ranges and some gluhwein and it all begins to make sense. Santa was around during the evening too, and dropped a few peanuts, oranges and -er- Diam bars.

Wishing any passing readers the very best for the season. I'm mainly 'off the air' at the moment until the reindeer have passed by.

gratuitous Christmas morning piste scene

The cake shop detour

We have rule of thumb when we drive around in Europe that if we are within around 100 miles of Stuttgart, then we’ll drop into Böblingen. I lived there for a couple of years and its good to visit some old haunts.

A ritual is a visit to Cafe Frech, for a coffee and a cake. I lived next door to this cake shop and several of us would meet there informally on a Saturday morning to plan the weekend’s mischief.


We also still know a fair number of the surprisingly many cafes, bars and restaurants in the town and usually take advantage of one or two during a fly-by. And true to form, the roads were clear as we arrived, it then snowed overnight and gave us what amounted to a ‘before’ and ‘after’ view of the town.

I’ll have to save Böblingen for a proper post another day.