Wolves 0 - 3 Manchester United

Kieron Richardson celebrates with other members of the Manchester United team as he helps secure them a place in the 5th round of the FA Cup.

This week I'm.............

Listening to:
Steven Bishop Kovacevich playing Beethoven concertos and sonatas.

Watching on DVD:
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind - Jim Carrey

Going to hear at the Bridgewater Hall, Manchester:
Bach - Contrapunctus (The Art of Fugue)
Mahler - Ruckert Lieder
Offenbach - Suite, Gaiete parisienne
Shostakovich - Symphony No.2, 'To The October Revolution'
Halle Orchestra - Mark Elder Conductor
Sarah Connolly - mezzo soprano
Halle Choir & RNCM Chorus

Munich

'Munich' is Steven Spielberg's latest film, and is based on the true life kidnapping and murder of the Israeli Olympic team by palestinian terrorists at the Munich games in 1972 and the bloody aftermath in which Mossad (the Israeli Secret Service) track down and murder the killers. So much is true; the rest of the film is at best conjecture and at worst gruesome fiction.

Spielberg is one of my favourite directors and I always look forward to seeing his latest films; Munich is no exception. This new film has all the ingredients of great thriller, but somehow for me it doesn't work. Frankly I felt uninvolved throughout the film and worst of all, bored throughout most of it. One of the problems is the length. A film that is over two and a half hours long has to have something to sustain me. This film had very little going for it. Usually good photography can, for me, compensate for a lot of a film's shortcomings, but alas there was little to please the eye. There were some interesting locations: Paris, London etc but all were photographed in such poor colour that they looked drab and characterless; Spielbergs colour pallette being limited to blues, greys and dun.

There is much gratuitous violence too. Spielberg doesn't spare the viewer any of the gory details of the numerous murders, which frankly after the first two lose their effectiveness. I found it tiresome having to watch one murder after another in such graphic detail. If Spielberg wanted to shock me, he failed, because after an hour I had become inured to the violence.

Frankly I couldn't wait till the end of the film. Had I rented it on DVD I would not have bothered watching it after the first hour.

I'm sure the film will find an audience - Spielberg's name will guarantee that, but I'm afraid this viewer won't be recommending it to anybody.

Manchester United 1 - 0 Liverpool

Who put the ball in Liverpool's net yesterday? Rio ferdinand!

Happy Birthday Mozart

This Friday 27th January 2006 sees the 250th birthday of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

This Week's Listening

Piano Sonatas 19 & 14 by Franz Schubert: Paul Lewis
Noriko Ogawa Plays Schubert
Symphony No.7 'Leningrad by Shostakovich: Mark Wigglesworth conducts the BBC Orchestra of Wales

In the Concert Hall This Week

Thursday 26th January Bridgewater Hall Manchester: Beethoven Egmont Overture & Piano Concerto No. 2 - Soloist Christian Blackshaw; Shostakovich Symphony No.10 - Stanislav Skrowaczewski conducting the Halle Orchestra.

Brokeback Mountain

One day back in 1998 wandering through Waterstones in Manchester looking for something quick to read, I was struck by the cover of a new title by an unknown writer (to me at any rate) called Annie Proulx. She was also the author, so the jacket of the book said, of 'Shipping News'. It was only sixty-four pages long and had an intriguing plot. I bought it. I later read it in all of an hour. It is an irony that the book on which a film is made should take less time to read than the movie is to watch! However, whether one reads it or views it, Brokeback Mountain is a story that lingers long in the mind.

The movie arrives with a lot of ballyhoo: gay western, gay love story, Venice Film Festival winner, Golden Globe nominations, expectations of Oscars, best film of the year etc. This kind of hyperbole leads to very high expectations with the result that audiences sometimes come out of the cinema asking what all the fuss was about. I'm no exception. My critical facilities sharpen and almost dare the director and actors to prove it!

Well what of the film? What's it about? To start with it most definitely (in my book at least) is not a western. There are no guns and no cows; though I admit a lot of westerns often feature close male relationships, and to label it a gay love story would, I feel, trivialise it. This is a story about some very complex and deep emotions experienced by two men alone on a mountain in Wyoming. What these two men discover about themselves is (to them) at once both shameful and intoxicating. It is also ultimately destructive. It is in fact, a tragedy; a story of a doomed relationship.

In my view this is Ang Lee’s greatest piece of directing to date. He manages to obtain some truly great performances from Heath Ledger as the taciturn Ennis and Jake Ghyllenhaal as Jack Twist, who having been unsuccessful on the rodeo circuits is trying his hand at looking after sheep.

Lee handles the issues sensitively and at no time could one regard the film as salacious. Indeed I was at times genuinely moved by the intensity of the relationship of the two men.

This is a great film and one destined to become a classic. It deserves the praise heaped upon it.

This Weeks Listening,Reading & Viewing

• Whisky Galore (DVD)
• Bette & Joan; The Divine Feud by Shaun Considine (Still reading)
• Early Beethoven Quartets - Takacs Quartet
• Brokeback Mountain
• Symphony No.5 - Shostakovich - Concertgebou Orchestra conducted by Bernard Haitink

King Kong Review

My interest in King Kong was first generated way back last summer when I saw a trailer advertising the release of the film the following December. I was stunned at the recreation of 1930s New York and full of expectancy at the promise of further spectacle. In short I couldn't wait.

Well I have now seen it. Was it worth the wait? Well yes and no.
The film follows the basic outline of the original 1930s movie starring Fay Wray, but develops further the scenes in New York and on the island where Kong is captured. And this is for me the chief problem with the film: we sit waiting one full hour before we get a glimpse of Kong and then another hour before he is caught and taken off the island. Admittedly one sits in awe at the incredible realism created by the films digital artists, but I couldn't help but feel that much of it was self indulgent. The philosopy being: I can do it so I will.

I have to say though the cast were splendid. Joe Black and Naomi Watts had much competition from the special effects but in my view conceded nothing and both gave excellent performances.

Its a shame that someone at Universal couldn't persuade Peter Jackson, the films director, to lop off at least an hour of footage; preferably the jungle episode when one feels that the projectionist during reel change mistakenly inserted one from Jurassic Park! Jackson could quite easily have reinserted the deleted scenes later in a Director's cut DVD.

Judging by audience numbers at the cinema where I saw it, I rather suspect that King Kong will not recoup its huge cost.

In this month's The Gramophone magazine.

There's a good article in this month's issue of The Gramophone about George Szell, the much esteemed hungarian conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra known for his often unreasonable demands of players and management, and as a consequence the enemies that he made. Richard Osborne, the writer of the article tells of a remark made by Rudolf Bing, the General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera House in New York: "Szell is his own worst enemy," said a sympathiser. "Not while I'm alive!" replied Bing.

A New Year Resolution

I can’t believe it, but it is eight months since I last posted anything on this blog! One of my New Year Resolutions is to remedy this unacceptable situation.

Thought For The Day

There's no future in the past.

This Week's Listening,Reading and Viewing

• Bette & Joan; The Divine Feud by Shaun Considine
• Electric Edwardians: The Films of Mitchell & Kenyon
• Symphonies 88 & 99 by Haydn; Symphony No.1 - BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Colin Davis
• Symphony No.5 by Anton Bruckner - Vienna Philharmonic conducted bt Nikolaus Harnoncourt
• Viola Voncerto in C Minor York Bowen; Viola Concerto in G Minor by Cecil Forsyth - Lawrence Power viola, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra conducted by Martin Brabbins