We are just back from another 2 week visit to London and vicinity. While I had expected to be in Vienna in October, I gladly settled for London in late August and early September. One of the reasons for the early travel (it was still high tourist season when we arrived) was because a film of Deb's was showing at a film festival that she has always wanted to visit. The Women Over 50 had selected a film of hers for the fifth time, so we finally made the journey to Lewes to experience the event. We had visited The Depot Cinema informally in May. Deb came home with a runner up certificate for She Makes a Moving Picture, which received high praise from the judges. The festival was a full one day affair, divided into blocks. I attended the first block, where Deb's film screened, then literally headed into the hills for some spectacular downs walking. Deb spent the entire day at the festival.
Another reason for our London trip was to continue our walking segments of the London Loop and the Capital Ring. As in May, we completed one Loop segment and two Ring segments. While only two Ring segments remain to complete, we still have four more of the longer Loop segments to do. We also increased our cultural doings quite a bit this time, after a very slack attempt last May. We visited the National Gallery, Apsley House, Courthauld Gallery, Guildhall, Temple and three Roman ruins within London. In Eynsford we visited a Roman ruin and a castle ruin, while in Lewes I visited the ruins of a large priory. We even saw several Banksy works of art, one of them in situ still and the others on pub walls. Of course we managed to squeeze in a few pub visits as well, even discovering a new fabulous oasis for craft real ales.
It was an exhausting trip with no days off, though a few times we returned early to the hotel for a quiet evening lying on a bed, feeling our feet tingling from much walking. We flew with Air Canada from Windsor, leaving on a Wednesday and returning exactly two weeks later. All flights went well except our final journey home from Toronto to Windsor, which ran just over two hours late. Our final day was a 22 hour marathon of a very long bus ride and the two flights home. Much more about the trip will be forthcoming over the next two weeks on the Travels Abroad blog, link in upper left margin. We managed to meet with Caroline once; our second visit was cancelled due to bad weather and some transport problems for Caroline.
One of our relaxing evenings at the hotel we managed to watch a Criterion movie offering via Deb's phone and tablet. She made it magically appear on the hotel TV and we lay in bed and watched the remarkable Ashes and Diamonds, a Polish film from 1958 directed by Andrzej Wadja. Somehow,this masterpiece had slipped past us until now. It is a totally amazing film from start to finish, with many moments of brilliance and genius. The plot has to do with the assassination attempt on a pro-Russian (communist) speaker coming to a small town to try and convince the workers to join the communist party. Opposition party members first fail in their attempt, killing two innocent men instead by mistake. The film has plenty of tension and release, as the main assassin character falls in love with a barmaid at his hotel and nearly pulls out of the attempt. This is a riveting film from start to finish, with superb writing and excellent photography supporting the good acting. Highly recommended!
an upside down Christ on the cross.
Thursday night, amidst loads of laundry, we watched an oddball film, deemed a "sunshine noir" by Criterion. Violent Saturday is a 1955 film directed by Richard Fleischer and starring Victor Mature, Richard Egan, Ernest Borgnine, Lee Marvin and several other recognizable character actors. The action takes place in a small Arizona town (filmed in Bisbee, AZ, a place we have visited a few times). The film is ostensibly about a bank heist to be undertaken by three out-of-town criminals, but it also partly a Douglas Sirk melodrama about various inhabitants of the mining town. So, a film that is a cross between a soap opera and crime drama. Results are mixed, but as it is filmed in Cinemascope with De Luxe colour, the film is always great to watch. Mature plays the hero who stands up to the criminals, getting shot himself and rescued at the last moment by Borgnine, who plays a pitchfork wielding peace loving Amish farmer who is pushed over the edge by the criminals. Definitely worth watching, especially on a 50" TV screen in a small room.
I'll be back with trip updates soon. Check back in a few days.
Mapman Mike
