Well, why not? Another name that popped up in my brain, although THIS time I can actually trace a reason for why it did so. You will notice that yesteryon's heading was about Baku, the capital of that most oily of states, Azerbaijan. Conrad rather sides with The Doctor on the issue of fossil fuels. Art!
 |
| Doctor! Don't underestimate the power of organic crystallography! |
Because I don't expect any of you to have seen the original series, which was way back when the Zygons were undisputedly villainous and not poor misunderstood refugees <mutters darkly> I shall give you the quote: "It's about time the people who run this planet of yours realised that to be dependent on a mineral slime just doesn't make sense."
There you go. Having alienated the Baku government and all This Sceptred Isle's energy ministers, we shall continue. Art!
 |
| Beautiful balmy Black Sea Batumi. |
Batumi (it says here) is the second-largest city in Georgia, sitting on the shores of the Black Sea. Georgia itself is one of the states that make up the Trans-Caucasus, alongside Armenia and - tah-dah! <drum roll> Azerbaijan, and hence Baku. During their time as part of the Sinister Empire, the Ruffians would quash any local trouble with an iron fist in an iron glove; since independence these states' mutual hatred of each other has led to a great deal of bloodshed.
 |
| Dreaming of Jeeves and Wooster, perhaps? |
It would be advisable to patch things up, chaps, because all that squabbling over which city that has the letters "A", "B" and "U" in it is the best might give a certain someone ideas.
Should you happen to find yourself in Georgia, try their wines, because they used to be the vintners to the whole Sinister Empire back in the day. Also, good luck learning Georgian, as their alphabet looks like a tough teach. Art!
 |
| I'm not saying Tolkein stole this, but - |
No, motley, no. If they say things like "Howdy" or "Y'all" then they are from that other Georgia, where everyone has at least two guns and a gallon of moonshine.
The Hades Of Development
Conrad is trying to be polite about this - O, and since I'm typing this at work in the office (lunchtime of course, no shirking from this alien imposter!) I can't load up any photos from my phone - but I'll stop being coy and declare that we are going to tackle Development Hell. There, said it.
I am referring, of course, to Nigel Kneale. Currently up to the point in his biography when he moved from scripting for television to scripting for films, partly because he was in demand as a writer, and partly, one assumes, because he had two small children to support and film scripting paid exceedingly well. Art!
Ol' Nige was working on film scripts for most of the Sixties, yet the two above were some of the very few that actually made it to screen. This, after all, is what 'Development Hell' is - getting stuff binned before it gets up on the big screen, for an incalculable number of reasons. Cost is one; Hammer were keen to do a film adaptation for the ground-breaking classic "Quatermass And The Pit" until they realised it was going to be a complicated and expensive shoot. They had to therefore shelve it until sufficient funds could be acquired, which is one reason it took so long to come out after QATP debuted on television.
Then there was "Brave New World", by Aldous Huxley. You may not know, and it pains me to admit it, but that title is from Shakespeare - "O brave new world, that has such wonders in it!" which is as far as I'm willing to go with the Barf Of Avon so don't ask which purulent play it's from. Art!
 |
| Don't ask me - I don't know either. |
It was planned to be made in Spain, with a big budget and big cast, and had gotten to the point where Ol' Nige and his family had rented apartments and arranged schools for the kids. What could possibly go wrong?
You had to ask. The director, Jack Cardiff, rang Nige to warn him the whole thing was off and that even the studio's cars were being seized by bailiffs - the producer had gone bankrupt as his last epic had been a colossal flop.
 |
| It felled a studio, mind |
Frank's Cranks!
Yes, we are back to that splendid source of artistic invention and borderline bonkersness that is Frank Tinsley, and today he takes a literal flight of fancy, soaring into the heavens in a flying saucer - his words not mine, so, if I can awaken Art with this red-hot pitchfork* -
If your glazzies are as weak as mine, allow a little elucidation: "Within ten years you may be commuting by plastic saucer, flying from your backyard."
Hmmmmmm well, how can I put this, Frank, except NO! Very NO! Extra NO! All the NO!
For one thing, saucer-shaped or circular aircraft have been tried, both piston enginde and jet-propelled, and their performance wasn't particularly good. Art!
 |
| I mean, you don't see many of these around, do you? |
Secondly, an aircraft made out of plastic would be so light and flimsy that t would risk breaking up on landing or with significant wind-shear. Thirdly, knowing what suicidal idiots so many drivers are when they have only two dimensions to work in, how bad would it be if they had three?
Ten out of ten for imagination, Frank, two out of ten for practicality.
Finally -
The nights are definitely drawing in, it wasn't even seven post meridian when I reached the barbed-wire barricades of The Mansion and it was pitch black. Not helped, incidentally, by a louring sky that hung over Gomorrah-in-the-Irwell like a funeral pall all day today. Plus, since I was the only one there, the motion-sensitive lighting kept going out, which is naturally un-nerving to such an utter coward as Your Humble Scribe. I had to whip around wildly to ensure that Nothing was creeping up on me, nor that some sinister hairy-handed creature had been tweaking the light-switches. It'll be quite the opposite tomorrow when all the Tuesday team arrive, chattering like magpies with a caffeine IV.
* I'm being merciful here, it was white-hot to begin with
No comments:
Post a Comment