Folorn - image by Olly Denton via the Londonist Flickrpool

Around 150 independent record labels have been hit with a serious problem since their CD stocks became a casualty of the London riots, burning up with the Sony warehouse in Enfield that was the PIAS distribution centre.

Sony has implemented its emergency plans. Although it’s too soon to assess the extent of the damage, the stock is insured at cost price. So eventually, that should pay out. But the fire leaves lots of small record labels with no stock to sell in the shops and no cash to pay for more CDs to be pressed. Release schedules for the coming months are buggered. The NME thinks it’s inevitable that some labels just won’t make it through this rough patch.

London labels affected include the Arctic Monkey’s label Domino, XL Recordings whose artists include Radiohead, Vampire Weekend and Adele, Wall of Sound who have relaunched Grace Jones’ career, Sunday Best who champion Scroobius Pip and, for those of us who’ve been inexplicably been singing Travis today, Independiente. But with big names on the roster, fingers crossed.

It could be much more gloomy for the likes of Loose, who say,

It’s certainly no secret that it’s a struggle at the best of times for many of these labels to stay afloat, where it’s more about the passion for the music than any making money from it. Therefore, this could potentially affect us all quite badly.

The London riots have of course left families and businesses in need of help across the capital and there are huge social problems to be addressed as the violence and looting dies down. But if you’re a music lover you can show your support for our city’s independent music scene by buying a digital download and helping to get the cash flowing.

If you haven’t a clue about independent music, here are ten suggestions of records you could buy. If you’re stuck at home tonight because all your nice plans for a night out got cancelled, then take pot luck and discover a new tune. If such aural risk taking isn’t your thing, Lauren Laverne’s ‘People’s Playlist‘ on 6Music on Friday will be an hour long special of tracks on indies affected, so let that help you decide.

There’s also talk of a benefit gig to help the indies. Follow @label_love_ or search #piasfundraiser for more info.

Small and independent film distributors are also affected, including the BFI.

Shelf 1

We can clearly make out a couple of seasons of 24 there in the middle, but can you identify any of the others?

Shelf 2

Shelf 3

Books

Paris interiors, Arts and Artists, and the Family Cookbook are among the non-controversial titles we can make out, alongside a Brideshead Revisited box set.

So, childish but fun game of the day: can you work out any of the other items in the Cameron media library?

A new campaign promises to make London “fake free” by 2012. They’re not talking about shutting down Harley Street’s plastic surgery parlours, nor rounding up the mannequins and frogmarching them out of Madam Tussauds while a crowd jeers. No, the campaign aims to smite that scourge of modern al fresco dining society – the dodgy fella with his swag bag of hooky DVDs.

The Metropolitan Police, the Motion Picture Association of America, and the UK Film Council, are all behind the initiative which aims to rid once and for all the plague of pushers trying to flog copies of the latest Hollywood finery. They want London to be a “fake free zone”, and in the first fortnight over 90,000 discs have been seized, with 39 arrests made.

In the past, counterfeit films have been linked to terrorism, although one can’t help but detect the lingering echo of a boy crying wolf here. After all, the film industry, mugged by the Internet which pinched its long-cherished monopoly over distribution channels, has tried everything to stop people downloading their stuff, while refusing to admit that, just maybe, the decision to excrete the same tired old fillums had a nugget of responsibility for their drop in profit.

This time round authorities are citing the “impact on creative talent” that piracy causes. In other words, the ubiquity of untreated bilge like High School Musical hogging the movie charts is a direct consequence of you buying that dubbed version of Shanghai Surprise off a fellow in Seven Sisters the other month. Sounds like a convenient excuse – pump out the same pusillanimous product, and when the audience complains, blame the pirates.

Image by Eddie C via the Creative Commons Attribution license

Have we been giving you too many chances to win things of late? Seems no one – NOT A ONE OF YOU – was interested in getting a free copy of a 2 year old comedy DVD, even though it would be free, delivered to your door and make you look like you were interested in human rights as well as laughing. All you had to do was fill in a form and make a Fearne Cotton gag. Fidelius, brave commenter, we salute you.

Well, we can’t be stuck with these things. They must be had. Surely you can find a use for them? Christmas presents for people you don’t like very much? Tombola prizes? Look, they’re worth £12 on Amazon.

First 6 people to email londonist@gmail.com with their name and postal address get them. On your marks, get set…. COME ON, THEY’RE FREE!

As we mentioned briefly before, Thursday brings the East 2008 Festival. For six days, a cornucopia of performances, exhibitions, workshops, food and other events ensures entertainment with emphasis on promotion of the best of East London.

Here’s our pick of the mix:

6th March: F-EAST – artists Wiebke and Nicholas Morgan cook a meal from 12 recipes from a Nigel Slater cookbook, and serve it for visitors as an exploration into ownership and the private versus the public. Booking through the Wiebke Morgan website.

7th and 8th March: Taste East at Spitalfields. Eat your way through the food stalls, cooking demonstrations and general food-related activities and emerge wiser, more relaxed and 2 stone heavier. Oh well, we can hit the gym on Monday.

8th March: Make stuff. Barbican’s Do Something Different Weekend allows adults and children the chance to knit, make paper mobiles, and even cardboard furniture.

8th and 9th March: Adorned with glowing reviews, Rotozaza comes to the Barbican. Etiquette gives you a pair of headphones and seats you opposite another person with whom you can only communicate according to the rules you are given.

8th and 9th March: The launch of Bobby Baker’s Bumper Package (DVDs, a new book and a new-look website) is celebrated at Toynbee Studios. Baker’s events always promise nourishment, and this is no different. Apparently, “complimentary customised cakes and boxes of beverages will be provided.” Looovely!

9th March: East is Best walk. Arranged by the Museum of London, this guided tour will take you around the nooks and crannies in the City of London. Lasts for one and a half hours, meet at the Royal Exchange.

10th March: Fancy being on MTV? The Best of ILUVLIVE at Cargo is being filmed for The Lick, so you can see promising new musical talent from all over the country, as well as doing your own bumpin’ and grindin’ in the hope of being licked by Trevor Nelson.

11th March: Marta Michalowska exhibits Gdansk: Polish Lives Found in Translation, a study into her home country Poland, commissioned by the Wapping Project. While you’re there, get some of the lovely (albeit pricey) food and don’t forget to visit the loos – they are quite spectacular. Entrance to the exhibition is free.

However, this is just a drop in the sea – the programme is full of fun, interesting stuff, so check it out here.

East 2008 in various locations around East London, from 6th to 11th March.

Image © The Barbican Centre

It’s not difficult to spend money in London as just leaving the house seems to remove a fair amount of cash from the average wallet. But for those with a less than average wallet, it can be a bit of a challenge to spend in a less than average manner. Silly money deserves silly spending after all. Introducing… The Cinema Suite at the newly refurbished InterContinental Hotel, one of many super-deluxe hotels on Hyde Park Corner, available for the silly sum of £3,000 per night.

And what do you get for that? Well, a very nice room for a start, which is the main point of a hotel. Comfortable bed. A few sofas. Nice views of Hyde Park. Marble bathroom. A dining table. And… a six seat cinema with reclining chairs, buckets of Harrods popcorn, a 5ft screen, 250 films and what sounds like a light desk with controls to operate and organise lights up and lights down for those all important mid-film champagne and toilet breaks.

It’s an undeniably luxurious and self-indulgent, upscale version of ordering a pizza and arguing about what to borrow from Blockbuster when you and your friends don’t fancy going out. But we can’t help but feel it’s a very lonely and rather uninspired way to blow £3,000 as you can really only treat a maximum of five other friends, and even the most committed cinephile can’t work through 250 films in one night. Even taking into consideration all the super-duper technology, the room service and nice furnishings, you’re just staying in with some DVDs and a takeaway.

So, inspired by our altruistic friends at the Niceties campaign and the back catalogue of great film events we’ve reported on over the years, how about treating 170 friends to he best seats in the Odeon Leicester Square? Or book the Royal Box at the Curzon Mayfair 60 times in a row and enjoy lording it over the rest of the audience in the stalls. Or blow that £3,000 on comfy cushions, a fancy picnic hamper and a plush cashmere rug for the summer free screenings around London. Or save your £3,000 and await for the next Secret Cinema…

It’s the week for spooky goings on and ever more events are coming to our attention. On Halloween night itself, our favourite quiz masters the You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Boat film quiz chaps are hosting a horror special.

If you want to show off your knowledge of cinematic zombie uprisings, killer earthworms, vampires, werewolves, evil puppets and psychopathic homicidal revenge-seeking cross-dressers then get yourself along to the Boogaloo in Highgate this Wednesday night with a team, a team mascot, some beer money and a change of clean pants. These boys use high quality film clips on high-spec projectors for these quizzes so the gore, the screams, the unconvincing rubber monster outfits will all be broadcast with knicker-shredding clarity.

The prizes are pretty scary too: last year’s top prize was a life-size Chucky doll which would frankly have been left at the bar if we had won. We’ve seen the films. We know what happens when you take one of those things into your home. This year’s prize is no less terrifying and of a doll-like nature, along with some slightly less frightening things to take home on the tube like champagne and horror movie DVDs.

Good luck and if you get stuck, do what they always do horror flicks: split up and send the pretty blonde one into the basement on her own to find out exactly where the deranged mutant inbred farmer keeps his combine harvester.

You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Boat Film Quiz – Horror Special, at the Boogaloo pub, nearest tube station is Highgate. The quiz starts at 8.30pm and entry is £2.00. For more information, go to the quiz website here.

• Climate change march reaches London, after leaving Northern Ireland in July. Would have been quicker to fly.

Image courtesy of Yersinia’s flickr stream.

What with March coming in like a lion and blowing everyone all over the place it’s the ideal time to take to the water under sail power. Although there’s plenty on offer for the seasoned small boat owner in this weekend’s Dinghy Sailing Show at Alexandra Palace there’s also a determined effort to get new blood interested.

In case you have visions of a depressing afternoon mooching around clunky wooden toy boats and garish inflatables we should emphasise that this usage of the word “dinghy” is meant to denote small racing yachts in the sort of classes that get everybody terribly excited every four years as previously unheard of Britons snatch medals at the Olympic regatta. Laser, Finn, Tornado and 49er vessels will be amongst dozens of boats making an appearance alongside the show’s other main attraction, a series of presentations and coaching sessions including “Learning to Sail”, “Dinghy Cruising in Comfort” and “Tacking on the Shifts”.

If you’re already a seasoned afficionado you could certainly splash a lot of cash on the latest wetsuits, rash vests and beanies, but there’s also advice on where to find your local sailing club and what to look for in a first boat at around the £250 mark. RYA Sailability will be at the show highlighting the many sailing opportunities open to people with a disability and for those who’d like some tuition to take home with them there is a wide selection of DVDs “that you can learn from and laugh at.”

The VS-C1 simulator sounds to us, though, like it could be the honey pot of the show:

Essentially [it's] the cockpit of a dinghy, connected to a computer and a pneumatic ram. A screen depicts the boat’s movements on water, giving a sense of reality. Difficulty settings can be adjusted so that several different boats can be sailed, to suit the experience level of the user, giving experienced sailors the chance to practice tacking and gybing manoeuvres as well as starts and mark roundings, whilst novices will be able to experience operating a dinghy without the worry of capsizing.

We’re right with them on the benefits of that. As the event’s tagline runs, then, “All the Boats. All the Bits,” at the Ally Pally on Saturday from 10am – 6pm and again on Sunday from 10 until 5pm. Tickets are £12 on both days for adults, while child admission is £6 on Saturday and free on Sunday if accompanied by an adult (under fives are free on both days).

Picture via Cabby’s Flickr stream.

This Thursday, the Oxfam book shop on Marylebone High Street will be holding another of its super foodie nights. This is the charity’s flagship London bookshop and is a treat for philanthropic bibliophiles: new and anitquarian books, CDs, vinyl, videos and DVDs can be found here and in-store events are programmed throughout the year.

Tomorrow night, the writer-chefs Mark Hix (the man behind The Ivy, Le Caprice and writer of various books including fish etc), veggie supreme Celia Brooks Brown and Ian Walker will all be talking of their culinary passions. Nibbles and wine (considering the guest speakers and venue, expect Fair Trade food and quality booze) will help to conjure a convivial atmosphere and will get you in the mood to dip in your pocket for raffle tickets to win signed books and a Borough Market hamper worth £100.

It’s a free event although everyone attending will be asked to make an £8 donation to Oxfam. So, for a foodie and philanthropic evening call 020 7487 3570 or email oxfammarylebone@hotmail.com to reserve your place.

Marylebone Cooks and Food Writers at Oxfam Marylebone, Thursday 22 February, 7.15pm. For more information about all upcoming in-store events, go to the website here.

By Clare Wilkinson

Last night Londonist put together another team for You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Boat in Highgate. By 11pm we had confirmed two things. 1. We are not as smart as we thought we were, and 2. This is the best pub quiz we’ve ever been to.

You can tell it’s a bit special from the intro:

This was our second outing and while again we managed to finish respectably enough in the top ten, this is without a doubt the toughest quiz we’ve ever been to. It’s also a lot of fun.

The setting is great. The Boogaloo on Archway Road is a very special venue – check out their mission statement:

To encourage and promote, to entertain and educate our audience in real music, to return to it’s golden era, a time when boogaloo was hip, Elvis was King, Jack Kennedy was a poster boy and vinyl was all the rage. To develop and promote this through the ideal surroundings of a ‘Juke Joint’…

Nice. The whole thing is run very professionally by Simon and Lee-Jay, but they have a special circle of hell reserved after coming up with questions like:

What was Dalton’s third rule in the 1989 Patrick Swayze movie Road House? Clue: Rule 1 – never underestimate your opponent. Expect the unexpected. Rule 2 – take it outside. Never start anything inside the bar unless it’s absolutely necessary.

That one cropped up the last time we were there and we’re still in awe of people who have that kind of thing filed away along with trivia about Dolph Lundgren. The same punters also seem to have no problem recognising the theme from Rain Man remixed as a techno track and can spot and name King Acrisius from Clash of the Titans without breaking a sweat.

The quiz itself is broken up into several rounds covering trivia (which actor was the highest ranking officer in WW2?), soundtracks (Pearl Harbor and a trance remix of Planet of the Apes for Christ’s sake!), trailers, a guest star round (Dustin Hoffman last night) and a photo section that will give you a headache. Damn good fun though.

The whole thing runs from around 8.30pm until 10.30pm depending on how many times they have to replay the cut up trailers or soundbites for idiots like us. The half way mark features a run down of the scores so far and perhaps the best bit is finding out the answers (Little Orphan Annie’s second name anyone?) and shaking your head miserably into your beer as you realise the team next to you really do take Sean Bean’s career very seriously indeed. Prizes range from big fuck-off top of the line toys (Robocop / Kill Bill) to DVDs and plonk!

The next one is on Wednesday the 7th of February and they run monthly. Full details on the website. Special thanks to Jess, Laura, Jess, Rob and Alex for helping Londonist stagger into the top ten.

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Last night Londonist put together another team for You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Boat in Highgate. By 11pm we had confirmed two things. 1. We are not as smart as we thought we were, and 2. This is the best pub quiz we’ve ever been to.

You can tell it’s a bit special from the intro:

This was our second outing and while again we managed to finish respectably enough in the top ten, this is without a doubt the toughest quiz we’ve ever been to. It’s also a lot of fun.

The setting is great. The Boogaloo on Archway Road is a very special venue – check out their mission statement:

To encourage and promote, to entertain and educate our audience in real music, to return to it’s golden era, a time when boogaloo was hip, Elvis was King, Jack Kennedy was a poster boy and vinyl was all the rage. To develop and promote this through the ideal surroundings of a ‘Juke Joint’…

Nice. The whole thing is run very professionally by Simon and Lee-Jay, but they have a special circle of hell reserved after coming up with questions like:

What was Dalton’s third rule in the 1989 Patrick Swayze movie Road House? Clue: Rule 1 – never underestimate your opponent. Expect the unexpected. Rule 2 – take it outside. Never start anything inside the bar unless it’s absolutely necessary.

That one cropped up the last time we were there and we’re still in awe of people who have that kind of thing filed away along with trivia about Dolph Lundgren. The same punters also seem to have no problem recognising the theme from Rain Man remixed as a techno track and can spot and name King Acrisius from Clash of the Titans without breaking a sweat.

The quiz itself is broken up into several rounds covering trivia (which actor was the highest ranking officer in WW2?), soundtracks (Pearl Harbor and a trance remix of Planet of the Apes for Christ’s sake!), trailers, a guest star round (Dustin Hoffman last night) and a photo section that will give you a headache. Damn good fun though.

The whole thing runs from around 8.30pm until 10.30pm depending on how many times they have to replay the cut up trailers or soundbites for idiots like us. The half way mark features a run down of the scores so far and perhaps the best bit is finding out the answers (Little Orphan Annie’s second name anyone?) and shaking your head miserably into your beer as you realise the team next to you really do take Sean Bean’s career very seriously indeed. Prizes range from big fuck-off top of the line toys (Robocop / Kill Bill) to DVDs and plonk!

The next one is on Wednesday the 7th of February and they run monthly. Full details on the website. Special thanks to Jess, Laura, Jess, Rob and Alex for helping Londonist stagger into the top ten.

]]> http://londonist.com/2007/01/londonist_loves_27.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2007/01/our_fa_cup_runn.php http://londonist.com/2007/01/our_fa_cup_runn.php#comments Tue, 09 Jan 2007 08:30:00 +0000 London_Duncan http://londonist.com/?p=5116

It might not be a vintage season in the league, where many of the capital’s football clubs are looking nervously over their shoulders at relegation, but London seems determined to have at least one finalist in the first FA Cup showpiece at the new Wembley as yesterday’s draw offered the possibility that as many as 44% of the fourth round matches (seven out of sixteen) could be played on our collective doorstep on the same weekend at the end of January.

As the Metropolitan police put locks on all the filing cabinets containing leave request forms and draw up plans for staggered kickoffs to facilitate a round London matchday marathon we know that four of those games are set in stone. Paddington should be full of Watford fans changing to the Hammersmith & City to visit West Ham while Lancashire coach firms will relish the prospect of Bolton and Preston fans fighting over their services to Arsenal and Crystal Palace respectively. Blackburn fans might be well advised to gamble on Queens Park Rangers beating Luton in their replay to stand any chance of getting a seat down to Shepherd’s Bush.

If there are any spare places those coaches could do worse than stop off in Stoke should Fulham, as expected, beat Leicester in their replay a week tomorrow, though Nottinghamshire’s operators will have to fight over the trade of wary Forest fans anticipating the kind of drubbing Chelsea dealt out to Macclesfield on Saturday. The least clear cut situation involves Barnet, who need to get past Colchester at Underhill tonight following Saturday’s postponement before extending warm hospitality to either Peterborough or Plymouth.

Whatever happens, the afternoon of Saturday 27th in particular might present an excellent opportunity to stay in watching all those DVDs you got for Christmas. The boys in blue might be a bit busy.

Picture of a pair of Bow Street Runners via Commonorgarden’s Flickr stream.

Every day this month the Londonist team will be pointing you in the direction of a Christmas present that (with a bit of luck) you won’t already have on your list. Climb up onto our collective lap and we’ll see what we can move from our sack to your stockings…

Londonist has designed the Cornershop Christmas Hamper for those who really can’t be bothered this year. Perfect for assembling on the way to a party you’re only going to because you want to get your DVDs back, this is a gift that captures the spirit of modern Christmas. Indifference to the true meaning of the festive season unites all the items; desperation adds the perfect finish to this gift of last minute panic.

The pressure of finding perfect presents for imperfect people is unbearable and inevitably, your gift will reveal too much about your inappropriate lust, contempt or unalloyed hatred for the receiver. Why bother? Wouldn’t your time and energy be better spent planning how to cop a feel of your office crush at the works Christmas party? Wouldn’t you rather be attending four drinks parties prior to the family Christmas dinner?

Though the cornershop Christmas Hamper can be compiled with any items in your local shop, aim to have between six and ten items. We recommend a mixture of household goods, foodstuffs with unidentifiable brands and no nutritional value, materials for vices and something pharmaceutical. For the Londonist Cornershop Christmas Hamper we chose the following:

(Clockwise from left) 100 cocktail sticks: There is no real reason why 100 cocktail sticks should be included in any Christmas hamper.

6 household candles: With the threat of terrorism in our country, having six household candles in the house should reassure any nervous citizens that everything will be alright in the end. Complements the blue lighter in the hamper very well.

Dr Pepper Zero: Nothing beats the wretched taste of this vile soft drink. Nothing, not paracetamol, not EU regulations, not common decency, not antibiotics. It’s like herpes in a can. Note the “Zero”, as in “Coke Zero” for people who are deterred by the word “diet”. Zero also means Loser. Dr Pepper Loser. You’re drinking Dr Pepper Loser. Loser. Happy Christmas.

Superglue: No reason why we thought this was a good addition to the hamper. We were desperate. It was a better option than the can of dog food we initially picked up. It was 11.30pm. Superglue is really useful. Merry Christmas.

Jaffa Cake Mis-Shapes: We are not making this up. Cakes only a mother could love. Why not give them to your mother? Actually, better not, think of the inheritance.

Mint Aero Family Size bar: Huge. Bubbly texture. The only case in which it is acceptable for adults to eat bright green chocolate. A bargain at £1.00 for a massive slab. Bulk-buy if necessary as this is a limited offer only. Usually kept in prominent location near the main entry to the shop or near the till as a final impulse purchase.

Cigarette lighter: For cigarettes, lighting gas stoves, arson, crack, smack or dope. An invaluable tool for all your drug abuse and vandalising needs.

Extra Ice Sugar Free Mints: Like the chewing gum but better: refreshing minty taste, sugar free with breath-freshening properties, without the inconvenience of chewing gum that requires unseemly removal and disposal. Usually located conveniently next to the cash till.

Anadin Extra 12 pack: The good stuff. Normally overpriced but it’s Christmas. And you’ll need it.

The grand total of this lovely gift was £12.32 and most cornershops will offer a gift wrapping service. We chose this special presentation plastic bag – translucent and fragile. Useless over long distances or if transporting heavy goods. Perfect.

The annotated Londonist Cornershop Christmas Hamper can be found on Flickr here. With thanks to Will Wiles from This Isn’t London and to the staff at Nightspot, Warwick Way, SW1V.

Previously: Punk Rock Baby, London in a Bag, Sultan’s Elephant, Wardour to Bond, Cityscape Coathanger, Chinatown Christmas Hamper, Judge Dredd badge, London Shoes, This Isn’t London: Santa’s Crap.

We like quizzes here at Londonist, but we don’t go to nearly enough of them hence this being only our 4th ever quiz review. We’re rubbish. Have you been to any good ones recently?

Name and location of pub

The Three Kings is in fancy Clerkenwell, past Turnmills, down a fancy road opposite a fancy church. We’re being bitter as we quite fancied living in the house next door. Your nearest tube is Farringdon and it’s about a 5 minute walk. The quiz is Mondays at 9ish.

What are the drinks like?

One of us ordered a Malibu and cranberry (it’s nice – you should try it) and we got charged £2.50 ‘if you pay in cash’, which was a bit weird. There’s a fine range of beers on tap and bottle, and a nice amount of wine.

Food

This seems to be different every time we go. There’s always a menu consisting of things like Shepherd’s Pie, Nachos, Chilli etc, but whether they actually have any left is an entirely different matter. They’re nice though and let you bring your own food if you’ve run out.

Type of Quiz

This quiz is the notoriously hard Boogaloo music quiz – in a different venue. It left the Boogaloo over the summer when the landlord decreed it too hard and wanted to make it multiple choice despite people having to show up excessively early each week to get a seat. So yes, now it’s at The Three Kings and is still presented by a very knowledgable man with a completely undefinable accent.

Length of Quiz

It’s split into two rounds which both start with 5 picture questions and end with 5 audio or video questions.

Entry price

£5 per team which seem to have no maximum number of players.

How hard was it?

If you’re someone who knows your obscure facts about music then this may just be the quiz for you, but you’ll have the might of the always winning NME team to take on. Seriously, this quiz is the daddy. Do you remember what the B side to the, only released in Japan, 3rd single off Pink Floyd’s second album was? Get down here and join our team!

Prizes

These vary from week to week depending on what Richard has found in his big musical sack. It’s normally some CDs or DVDs though. This is about pride, not the prizes.

The Three Kings is located at 7, Clerkenwell Close, London, EC1R 0DY

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We like quizzes here at Londonist, but we don’t go to nearly enough of them hence this being only our 4th ever quiz review. We’re rubbish. Have you been to any good ones recently?

Name and location of pub

The Three Kings is in fancy Clerkenwell, past Turnmills, down a fancy road opposite a fancy church. We’re being bitter as we quite fancied living in the house next door. Your nearest tube is Farringdon and it’s about a 5 minute walk. The quiz is Mondays at 9ish.

What are the drinks like?

One of us ordered a Malibu and cranberry (it’s nice – you should try it) and we got charged £2.50 ‘if you pay in cash’, which was a bit weird. There’s a fine range of beers on tap and bottle, and a nice amount of wine.

Food

This seems to be different every time we go. There’s always a menu consisting of things like Shepherd’s Pie, Nachos, Chilli etc, but whether they actually have any left is an entirely different matter. They’re nice though and let you bring your own food if you’ve run out.

Type of Quiz

This quiz is the notoriously hard Boogaloo music quiz – in a different venue. It left the Boogaloo over the summer when the landlord decreed it too hard and wanted to make it multiple choice despite people having to show up excessively early each week to get a seat. So yes, now it’s at The Three Kings and is still presented by a very knowledgable man with a completely undefinable accent.

Length of Quiz

It’s split into two rounds which both start with 5 picture questions and end with 5 audio or video questions.

Entry price

£5 per team which seem to have no maximum number of players.

How hard was it?

If you’re someone who knows your obscure facts about music then this may just be the quiz for you, but you’ll have the might of the always winning NME team to take on. Seriously, this quiz is the daddy. Do you remember what the B side to the, only released in Japan, 3rd single off Pink Floyd’s second album was? Get down here and join our team!

Prizes

These vary from week to week depending on what Richard has found in his big musical sack. It’s normally some CDs or DVDs though. This is about pride, not the prizes.

The Three Kings is located at 7, Clerkenwell Close, London, EC1R 0DY

]]> http://londonist.com/2006/11/pub_quiz_patrol_3.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2006/07/coin_street_tur.php http://londonist.com/2006/07/coin_street_tur.php#comments Tue, 18 Jul 2006 15:37:03 +0000 Hazel http://londonist.com/?p=3903

The Coin Street Turkish Festival was as loud, hot and tasty as it was last year though a little smaller as it only occupied the Bernie Spain Gardens this year and did not stretch out along the river walk, making everything seem twice as crowded and three times as hot. No one in the upbeat crowd seemed to mind -

- families with dozing small children, old ladies in black head scarves and hip young things in skimpy outfits shared picnic blankets, plates of sticky baklava and cool watermelon. There was roaring trade at the kebab stands – queues wound across the grass in long, eager lines and everyone sympathised with the guys tending the white-hot smoking grills on a scorching hot Sunday such as this one.

Chaps could have a quick (and very close) shave before hitting the dance floor where all the pretty girls were dancing ecstatically to some upbeat Turkish pop from the specially-flown in live band on stage. Lots of arms went up in the air and lots of jaws hit the ground when the stunning belly dancers took the floor.

The festival turned the Thames into a little piece of the Bosphorous: festival-goers paddled in the water with the Turkish flags moving lazily in the little breeze to be had and the sand of the Thames beach looking unbelievably clean and white…

…there were beaded things and shiny things and pretty blue glass things to buy, Turkish Cola and Turkish beer and Turkish biscuits, sweets, CDs and DVDs to be bought from the market stalls. It didn’t feel like London at all and even though we love this city, that was the best thing about this festival afternoon. Looking forward to the next one already.

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The Coin Street Turkish Festival was as loud, hot and tasty as it was last year though a little smaller as it only occupied the Bernie Spain Gardens this year and did not stretch out along the river walk, making everything seem twice as crowded and three times as hot. No one in the upbeat crowd seemed to mind -

- families with dozing small children, old ladies in black head scarves and hip young things in skimpy outfits shared picnic blankets, plates of sticky baklava and cool watermelon. There was roaring trade at the kebab stands – queues wound across the grass in long, eager lines and everyone sympathised with the guys tending the white-hot smoking grills on a scorching hot Sunday such as this one.

Chaps could have a quick (and very close) shave before hitting the dance floor where all the pretty girls were dancing ecstatically to some upbeat Turkish pop from the specially-flown in live band on stage. Lots of arms went up in the air and lots of jaws hit the ground when the stunning belly dancers took the floor.

The festival turned the Thames into a little piece of the Bosphorous: festival-goers paddled in the water with the Turkish flags moving lazily in the little breeze to be had and the sand of the Thames beach looking unbelievably clean and white…

…there were beaded things and shiny things and pretty blue glass things to buy, Turkish Cola and Turkish beer and Turkish biscuits, sweets, CDs and DVDs to be bought from the market stalls. It didn’t feel like London at all and even though we love this city, that was the best thing about this festival afternoon. Looking forward to the next one already.

]]> http://londonist.com/2006/07/coin_street_tur.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2006/07/not_so_rough_gu.php http://londonist.com/2006/07/not_so_rough_gu.php#comments Thu, 06 Jul 2006 11:31:21 +0000 sizemore http://londonist.com/?p=3820

When shooting people indiscriminately results in a little bad press it’s time to do a little swatting up:

A police force is issuing its frontline officers with a guide to Islam in a bid to improve relations with the Muslim community. City of London Police is the first force in the country to issue its officers with a guide to the religion. The 86-page “Guide to Islam for non-Muslims” aims to give officers a better understanding of Islamic culture, its beliefs and traditions. The City of London force said it recognised that relations with the Muslim community were being damaged by a perception that police officers were “hostile” to Muslims and “fundamentally Islamophobic”.

Some would say that perhaps the police force should be working to educate its officers on all the communities that they serve and not simply the ones they have shot up. Maybe get them reading before handing out the side arms… Not us of course, we prefer to keep our heads down and be good little citizens. If we’ve done nothing wrong there’s nothing to worry about. Right?

The new guide, together with the purpose-built prayer facilities in our main police stations are just two examples of the ways in which we are continuing to improve the service we provide to the Muslim community.

So the purpose-built prayer facilities are for any passing Muslims who fancy dropping in? Or are they perhaps expecting to arrest so many Muslims in the future that it’s prudent to plan ahead? Or are there also purpose-built prayer facilities for Buddhists? Jews? Satanists?

On the flipside any ‘frontline’ Londoners who’d like a guide to the police should read the ‘Democracy’ story lines in Judge Dredd and rent as many Sweeney DVDs as possible.

We’ve mentioned this before in the Friday Film News, but we’re actually quite getting our hopes up for the next Mission:Impossible film.

Simon Pegg’s in it, Philip Seymour Hoffman is the baddy, and Kanye West has done the theme tune. So how bad can it be…?

…Ok, don’t answer that. But, no matter how crappy the film is we can definitely tell you that next week’s premier will be one to miss, mainly because none of the actors are going to be there either.

The Cruise is busy playing daddy to the TomKitten (selfish, selfish, selfish); PSH is going to be in Mexico apparently; and Laurence Fishburne is “somewhere else” according to a spokesman (maybe he’s trying to work out just how the Matrix trilogy went so horribly, horribly wrong).

So anyone who was thinking of attending hoping to get a few minutes of Cruise-mobile phone action should probably think again. Simon Pegg’s a funny bloke and everything but we doubt your Gran would appreciate an unsolicited phone call from him just as she’s settling down to her supper.

A spokesman for United Independent Pictures is quoted as saying that they’re “working hard to sort something out”. which probably means they’ll be somebody who used to be in Coronation Street lingering about.

Our advice: go home and watch DVDs of the original TV series instead.

Fancy taking part in a trial that won’t see you balloon up like the elephant man or see you facing terrorist charges? There’s always a catch of course… you may be subjected to football:

Four hundred and fifty volunteers in London are being sought for a six-month trial of high-definition broadcasts through digital terrestrial television. The BBC and ITV will include all of their live World Cup matches in the test, and will join with Channel 4 and Five to offer packages of other shows. This trial will be carefully controlled through the use of special frequencies and customised set top boxes.

Londonist is thinking of taking part if only to annoy Birthday boy Alex by watching Curb Your Enthusiasm DVDs every time there’s a hint of bare knee on the box.

The broadcasters taking part in this trial have chosen London because low-power HD signals on non-commercial frequencies can reach many homes without interfering with existing channels.

That’s technical speak for ‘the rest of the UK sucks arse’. Once you get past the M25, HD TV signals have to be transported via carrier pigeon apparently.

We like to think we’re as appreciative of a nice minty-fresh pit as the next person… unless the next person is this Gumtree poster:

Oxford Street flatshare, Free rent in exchange for favours…. (£1 pw)

Yes, you get your own room, free rent, in return for semi-sexual favours. Basically I’m a busy career woman, who knows what I want and always get it.

Here’s the deal. I am a busy woman, and will need you to give me your undivided attention for 2 nights a week for a maximum of 2 hours! That’s it! You will need to lie shirtless in just your boxer shorts on my bed and hand cuffed with your arms above your head. There will be no intercourse, I will simply just simply play with you, caress you, run my fingers along your body, rest my head on your chest, talk to you, etc. That’s it

Oh, that’s it? Oh well, that sounds just fine. We can see a few problems cropping up when we want to bring our mates round to have a few drinks and watch non-armpit related DVDs, but other than that, yeah: tempting.

You will need to be good looking with a luvable cute face, with an attractive muscular body. You need to be a gym goer (that’s a clue that you have a great bod). Not too much muscle like a body builder (yuck), but no skinny blokes either. You need to be fun and like to socialise. You’re also adventurous and open to new things. So if you’re an ugly antisocial, please do not apply.

Ah, problem.

To apply you will need to send me

1. A decent sized shirtless pic of you

2. Pic of you with your arms above your head

3. Close up pic of your armpits

4. And a pic with your clothes on.

We’ve actually got some photos like that, but we were six years old at the time. Does that count?

Unfortunately you can’t apply to the ad (we can tell you were tempted) as Gumtree have rejected it for being in breach of their terms and conditions. They have however left most of it up there for people to read, not for entertainment value you understand, but “as an example of innappropiate content in the hope that this will deter future sinners” (and because they know people like us will link to it).

We’ve always had somewhat of an big girly crush on Simon Pegg. We loved Shaun of the Dead, and we think we’ve nearly worn out our Spaced DVDs. He makes us so weak at the knees, that when we once saw him at a Charlotte Hatherley gig at ULU, we were starstruck and unable to move, never mind attempt to say hello.

So, it’s with great excitement that today we read that he’s finally announced plans for his next project, Hot Fuzz.

The movie is based around Pegg’s character, Nicholas Angel and his sidekick PC Butterman (Nick Frost). Once a bigshot London policeman, his colleagues decide he’s just too good and send Angel to work in a Sandford, a small rural town where nothing much happens. That is of course, until people start dying mysteriously.

Shooting starts in a couple of weeks and it’s directed by Pegg’s longterm collaberator Edgar Wright for Working Title. The supporting cast sounds rather good too, with Steve Coogan, Timothy Dalton, Martin Freeman, Edward Woodward and Jim Broadbent all taking up roles.

The only thing this leaves us wondering is what has happened to La Triviata, a sitcom about a North London music pub quiz (Boogaloo anyone) that he was supposedly penning for Channel 4. If you’ve got any gossip on this then let us know!

[In other C4 comedy news, Peep Show has been recommissioned. Hooray!]

Never one to rest on His laurels, God Almighty has instructed one of his voice boxes to move with the times and make going to Church on a Sunday less of a drag:

The Reverend Robert Harrison of St John’s Church in Hillingdon, west London, said traditional service times were out of touch. Parishioners can now attend half-hour slots between 0800 GMT and 1230 GMT.

This means you can now watch The Heaven & Earth Show and still have plenty of time to find out what Our Saviour’s been up to this week. It’s certainly a step in the right direction and we look forward to reading His blog or at least His weekly email newsletter. After that Godcasting can only be a few steps away and His MySpace page would be awesome.

Although the new flexi time services mean that committed God-botherers can now sit through ten services in a row, the 12.30 cut off point is still something of a problem for those Londoners who like to spend their Sunday mornings in bed having lots and lots of sex.

We’d recommend following the current trend of giving away DVDs that has seen newspaper sales spike. A free copy of Salo: The 120 Days of Sodom with every wafer might just do the trick. It’s got to be better that going back to the old method of smiting and planting dinosaur bones everywhere.

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Never one to rest on His laurels, God Almighty has instructed one of his voice boxes to move with the times and make going to Church on a Sunday less of a drag:

The Reverend Robert Harrison of St John’s Church in Hillingdon, west London, said traditional service times were out of touch. Parishioners can now attend half-hour slots between 0800 GMT and 1230 GMT.

This means you can now watch The Heaven & Earth Show and still have plenty of time to find out what Our Saviour’s been up to this week. It’s certainly a step in the right direction and we look forward to reading His blog or at least His weekly email newsletter. After that Godcasting can only be a few steps away and His MySpace page would be awesome.

Although the new flexi time services mean that committed God-botherers can now sit through ten services in a row, the 12.30 cut off point is still something of a problem for those Londoners who like to spend their Sunday mornings in bed having lots and lots of sex.

We’d recommend following the current trend of giving away DVDs that has seen newspaper sales spike. A free copy of Salo: The 120 Days of Sodom with every wafer might just do the trick. It’s got to be better that going back to the old method of smiting and planting dinosaur bones everywhere.

]]> http://londonist.com/2006/02/flexi_god.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2006/01/cry_god_for_har.php http://londonist.com/2006/01/cry_god_for_har.php#comments Tue, 31 Jan 2006 08:49:22 +0000 sizemore http://londonist.com/?p=2613

Time again to dip into the Newsround site for a knee level look at what’s happening in the world and what’s on the mind of news conscious tykes this morning. Mostly as you’d expect it’s Harry Potter. Outrage is the theme at the revelation that American kids will get the opportunity to own Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire weeks before the homegrown fans:

Warner Bros has confirmed the DVD will be out on 20 March in the UK, but US kids will have it from 7 March… Warner Bros said the difference in dates was a matter of “scheduling”

When illegal copies of the movie go through the roof because of the discrepancy in release dates any kids caught hammering their torrent trackers will say that that too was a matter of scheduling. These staggered releases are shortsighted as they just create demand for the movies to the extent that the fans are more than happy to circumnavigate the eventual official releases in order to enjoy the films sooner. Having a pile of American DVDs available just makes the pirate’s job that much easier.

Some things don’t change though as Londonist remembers all too well the joy of a dodgy betamax copy of The Empire Strikes Back complete with Arabic subtitles and a picture that went a bit yellow every few minutes. Kids today of course have access to pirated copies that even occasionally trump the official releases in terms of quality and extras despite what the anti-piracy ‘advertising’ tells you.

Indeed Londonist was bemused recently to sit through an advert explaining how unwatchable an illegal copy of King Kong would be only to then watch a film that we gladly paid to see on the big screen only to have the sound continually slide out of synch.

Perhaps the way forward is multiple format releases on the same day as championed by Steven Soderbergh. At least that way you have the option of grabbing the DVD for the privacy of your own home and could eventually buy a nice plasma screen with the money saved. After all If you’re particularly fertile and have a large brood then taking the family to the West End to see a flick can set you back a fair bit. If you’re foolhardy enough to stop off for popcorn as well it could have been cheaper to simply finance the movie yourself and that way ensure a few free seats at the premiere.

Congratulations to Melanie, Stephen and Jason whose thorough knowledge of killer pig movies just scored them a couple of DVDs.

The Australian horror classic directed by Russell (Highlander) Mulcahy was indeed Razorback. So nice that so many of you took time out to reminisce about the film. Maybe Peter Jackson should have a go at remaking it…

A pat on the back to the poor lost soul who answered Cujo. Killer Saint Bernard movies are very close to our hearts too, but no cigar this time (Tip – the IMDB is your friend).

The DVDs will be on their way to the winners first thing in the morning (or at least as soon as we remember which precarious pile of stuff we left the movies in).

Commiserations to everyone else and thanks for having a go, but keep an eye out for another comp coming soon.

The Fright Fest Presents DVD range continues to grow next month with the release of The Roost. The Evil Dead style horror has more killer bats than you can shake a stick at, but as we’ll only be reviewing that film closer to the late February release date we figured that in the meantime we should offer up some LOOT.

Thanks to the kind folks at Revolver we have three copies each of French prison horror Malefique and Irish zombie epic Dead Meat up for grabs. We’ll pick three winners out of the hat this time round, each one receiving a copy of both DVDs.

Although Dead Meat may be the first zombie cow movie that we’ve seen it did bring back fond memories of a certain Australian horror classic directed by Russell (Highlander) Mulcahy. All you have to do to have a chance of winning the DVDs is name that killer pig movie.

Drop your answers here. We’ll announce the winners on Friday and get the DVDs in the post over the weekend. Good luck!

Previously: Malefique, Tears of Kali & Eyes of Crystal.

Competition is now CLOSED

Our friends over at Frightfest release their latest DVDs at the end of the month so if you’ve found January to be a little low on self mutilation, skinning and human taxidermy then things are definitely looking up with Eyes of Crystal and Tears of Kali.

Now we’re huge fans of Dario Argento (the whole family really) and while we can still be found traveling on the tube iRivered up with Goblin and screaming “WITCH!” at anyone who gets too close we have to admit that Argento senior’s last couple of efforts, while still enjoyable, aren’t a patch on watching David Hemmings knock his way into hidden rooms or pretty girls pick the maggots out of their hair. It’s good to see then that younger directors such as Eros Puglielli are more than happy to pick up his torch.

Eyes of Crystal is a grand giallo movie based on a novel with a couple of nods to Seven along the way. Puglielli is an exciting discovery at a time when the scariest thing in most modern horror films is watching Paris Hilton trying to walk and speak at the same time. The plot is pure Argento – some nutjob is murdering people left right and centre, taking his or her time to stuff bullet wounds with the care of a taxidermist or replacing limbs and heads with parts of a Victorian sex doll. Enter cop-on-the-edge Giacomo Amaldi (Luigi Lo Cascio) with a Dudley Moore haircut and a knack for shooting prisoners to teach them a lesson. Amaldi has a massive problem with ladies being in danger and while trying to figure out who is stalking pretty love interest student Giuditta (Lucia Jimenez) he begins to see that the ongoing murders are anything but random. Add a colleague with a brain tumor that seems to be triggering visions of the murderer and you’ve got one excellent slice of Italian police procedural horror. The whole thing kicks off with a fantastic opening scene that has us searching high and low for other Puglielli films and while the ending doesn’t quite live up to expectations it’s a hell of a release and shows that with titles like this and Malefique that Frightfest is a label to keep an eye on.

Tears of Kali is not as sophisticated – a German low budget anthology movie that plays like Tales of the Unexpected penned by Clive Barker. All the stories are connected in some way with the Taylor-Eriksson-group (didn’t they tour with Kraftwerk?). A weird seventies self help therapy cult that somehow tapped into the dark side of the psyche with messy consequences. The first story concerns a former member recovering in an asylum whose trigger is tripped by a journalist with her own agenda. The second episode has a skinhead regretting opening his mouth as he becomes the latest subject for Taylor-Eriksson therapy. The last is the most traditional and successful story as a fake healer finds something very real in his latest group of ‘patients’. A tad predictable and suffering from an early high with a naked woman cutting off her own eyelids it’s still good to know in these days of CGI crappiness that someone is still making films the good old fashioned way – by tossing buckets of blood all over the place.

Both movies are £19.99 on DVD and are released on January 30th. Details and ordering info are here and here.

As Cherie Blair and whoever the hell is in the final of I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here (Mon 9pm ITV1 – we don’t have a clue, as we really couldn’t give a broken biro who wins the bloody thing) would probably tell you, it isn’t easy being famous. Once you’ve been in the public eye, slipping back into obscurity must be dreadfully depressing. What do you say to interviewers? “My experience lazing around all day doing gak and giving revealing interviews to the papers in which I moan about how the press intrudes on my life has really prepared me for a job in HR”? Poor things. See what Cherie has to say about the whole shebang in Married To The Prime Minister (Mon 9pm C4), as, with the help of all the extant prime ministerial spouses, she goes behind the “most famous door in Britain” with a camera crew in tow. We won’t ask – although Private Eye certainly will – how much she’s getting paid for the privilege, and what brilliant publicity this is for her book about, um, being the Prime Minister’s wife; we’ll just switch over to More4 and watch the amazing Downfall (Mon 9pm More4), one of TV Troll’s favourite films of 2004. Then, to cheer ourselves up, we’ll switch over for the last bit of Nathan Barley (Mon 11.30pm C4) – we know everyone else hated it, but after spending hours with the DVDs we can report that it improves about a million percent on repeated viewings. There’s always the stuff on Cook’d And Bomb’d to keep us occupied, too.

In other news, Donal MacIntyre must be going for a secret Guinness world record for number of times he can get his stupid name stuck in front of the title of a crappy ‘investigation’ on Five. This time, he’s not getting eaten by sharks or beaten up by chavs, sadly, but rather checking out the conditions within one of London’s most notorious prisons, in Inside Wandsworth Prison: A MacIntyre Investigation. What a twat. Surely the subject of treatment of the people in the UK’s prisons deserves better than this self-aggrandising gimp? Far better to watch another programme named after its creator, Brian Sewell’s Grand Tour (Tue 7.15pm Five), as the bitchy old snob potters around Italy. If he comes out with the kind of gems he manages in this Guardian interview froma few weeks ago, we’ll be happy. Even if his attitude towards women could do with being a little less, ah, prehistoric.

The big news of the week? Why, that would have to be Space Cadets (daily starting Wed 9pm C4) – oh come on, you must have seen the trailer for this by now. For those who have been living on the Moon without a decent TV signal, don’t worry, there’s no way these wannabe astronauts will be joining you there; you can have the Sea of Tranquility to yourselves for a little longer. Billed as “the biggest hoax in television history” (surely that would be Jim Davidson’s career?), the contestants will be staying resolutely earthbound. Will the state-of-the-art IMAX screens and wobbling floors and so on convice them that they are escaping Terra’s cosy blue bosom? Well, it worked for us whenever we went on the simulators at the Museum of Science and Technology in Manchester, so we’re guessing that yes, they’ll be fooled. We can all have a good therapeutic point and laugh when they come out, too; there’s nothing the British public likes better.

On the subject of the British public, why oh why were Zoe and Ian in the bottom two on last week’s Strictly Come Dancing (Sat 6.25pm BBC1)? She’s better than that, and you know it. Get potato-face James out – if he’s in the final instead of Zoe, Colin or Darren, it will be a travesty. Also, he dumped Camilla and now she’s back in Brendan’s arms (but still dancing with Ian?) – the poor woman must be utterly devastated to consider such a thing. Not half as devastated, alas, as TV Troll was when Chico was voted off X Factor (Sat 6.45 ITV1). OK, that was a lie – but we reckon the show will be a staider and more oatmealy affair without him. Could Journey South be any more vanilla? Shayne, we love you, but please, please grow a personality. And bang Zoe Lucker – she’s hawt.

More charter-renewing pseudo-educational programming from the Beeb with Walking With Monsters: Life Before Dinosaurs (Thur 8.30pm BBC1). It’s all very well doing lots of research and using the best CGI and consulting world experts, but going and calling it Walking With Monsters really gives the game away. Prehistoric animals in the Cambrian era yada yada yada – wait, monsters, you say? Awesome.

What is it with the name Jack? In American TV, it’s impossible for a character called Jack to be anything other than heroic, chisel-jawed and good in a crisis. Exhibit A: Jack Bauer. Exhibit B: Jack in Lost (Wed 10pm C4). Exhibit C: Jack Hale, hero of Killer Instinct (Thur 10pm Five), yet ANOTHER Five American import cop show. KI‘s killer hook is that it focuses on especially nasty and twisted murdering psychopaths – woo hoo! December needed to be made a bit gloomier. In other name news, Brat Camp USA (Fri 9pm E4) features a camper called … Glacier. Yes, like the mint. We will say no more. Nor will mention be made of The Record Of The Year (Sat 5.35pm/7.45pm ITV1), nor that the egregious Vernon Kay is hosting it, nor that the list of previous winners on Wikipedia is enough to make you sick. And if your partner/housemate/live-in gimp/aged mother tries to watch Bring Back … The Christmas Number One (Sat 10pm C4), then it is your noble and patriotic duty to wrest the TV remote out of their hands, then beat them to death with it. By all rights, any programme featuring David Essex, Showaddywaddy and Slade ought to contain enough distilled evil to open up a wormhole to the ninth dimension, where reside all the horrors of hell. With a bit of luck, all the horrors of hell will take one look at David Essex, Showaddywaddy and Slade and decide to leave us well alone.

After a few laps, I would head back home for a shower and change of clothes before catching a black cab to the Phoenix restaurant for the best dim sum in Zone 1, noodles and noisy gossip with family.

I would then abandon the family and the part of the day spent taking care of the body and move on to fulfilling the mind and soul. Next on the “to do” list would be to collect some friends to do some squirrel fishing in St James Park and to feed the ducks. The weather would be warm and sunny enough to lie around on the grass with the Sunday papers. There should a game or two of frisbee with more adorable, over-excited waggy tailed dogs.

Once the novelty of the park wears off, we pile into the ICA bar to drink gin and tonics over a game of Cluedo followed by Monopoly. Once I have won all the games (and this is my perfect Sunday so my “deduction by probability” theory for Cluedo WILL work) we part ways and I get another cab across town to an intimate and cosy dinner at Kazan with my fiance. Five or six courses later, we saunter along to the Boisdale for whisky nightcaps and some live jazz then… we’d wander back to our fabulous riverside penthouse home to watch Seinfeld DVDs, cuddled together on the sofa under a big fluffy blanket.

My perfect Sunday in London would not involve it turning into Monday.

]]> First of all, I’d do something for the body: a gentle mid-morning run around Hyde Park with preferably no interference from the speakers at Speakers’ Corner and lots of interaction with adorable over-excited, waggy-tailed dogs. These dogs do not leave poo on the park paths and do not chase to bite; they only chase in a friendly, playful fashion. And I find exactly the right volume level for my mp3 player so that I’m not oblivious to everything around me – including imminent danger – but at the same time, I’ve blocked out traffic noise and aeroplanes going over head.

After a few laps, I would head back home for a shower and change of clothes before catching a black cab to the Phoenix restaurant for the best dim sum in Zone 1, noodles and noisy gossip with family.

I would then abandon the family and the part of the day spent taking care of the body and move on to fulfilling the mind and soul. Next on the “to do” list would be to collect some friends to do some squirrel fishing in St James Park and to feed the ducks. The weather would be warm and sunny enough to lie around on the grass with the Sunday papers. There should a game or two of frisbee with more adorable, over-excited waggy tailed dogs.

Once the novelty of the park wears off, we pile into the ICA bar to drink gin and tonics over a game of Cluedo followed by Monopoly. Once I have won all the games (and this is my perfect Sunday so my “deduction by probability” theory for Cluedo WILL work) we part ways and I get another cab across town to an intimate and cosy dinner at Kazan with my fiance. Five or six courses later, we saunter along to the Boisdale for whisky nightcaps and some live jazz then… we’d wander back to our fabulous riverside penthouse home to watch Seinfeld DVDs, cuddled together on the sofa under a big fluffy blanket.

My perfect Sunday in London would not involve it turning into Monday.

]]> http://londonist.com/2005/11/hazel_running_f.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2005/10/londonist_first.php http://londonist.com/2005/10/londonist_first.php#comments Thu, 27 Oct 2005 13:56:50 +0000 Rob http://londonist.com/?p=1959

Just a quick reminder that the Londonist First Birthday Party will be happening just one week from today in the fabulous surroundings of the Offside Bar in Islington.

It’s absolutely free to get in (just tell the big bloke on the door you’re there for the Londonist party) and there’ll be DJs all night as well as additional treats like images from the London photoblogging community displayed on the big screens and the now infamous Londonist birthday raffle.

To enter the raffle and be within of a chance of winning armloads of swag (mini iPod, signed books, cinema vouchers, DVDs etc) just email us with ‘Londonist Raffle’ in the subject field and then come along on the night to see if your name comes out the hat.

This is our first Londonist event, and if it’s a success we’ll definitely be looking to put on more next year (happy hours, new band showcases, comedy nights…stuff like that), so do come along and have a drink with us if you’re free.

The Londonist First Birthday Party: Thursday 3 November, 8 until late at the Offside Bar, 273 City Road, Islington (map here). Free entry, and DJs all night.

Londonist is as addicted to buying DVDs as everyone else, so it made sense that we should start a regular column to highlight the little laser-etched treats coming your way over the next week or so. Let us know what you think in the comments.

Well folks, it’s getting to the time of year when the likes of Chegwin, Biggins and Daniels descend begrudgingly upon [enter the name of your hometown here] to switch on the Christmas lights.

How do we know? Well, apart from the shorter days and longer trousers, there’s the glut of upcoming DVD releases cynically aimed at exploiting the fact that your Aunt Beryl won’t have a clue what to get you. So over the coming weeks you can expect to see fewer ‘normal’ releases (i.e. things you might buy for yourself), and more ‘crap’ releases (i.e. things Aunt Beryl might buy you), all aimed at making you part with those well earned Choice Vouchers your boss gave you because he/she’s too tight to give you a proper Christmas bonus.

Kicking things off next week is the second series of Little Britain. Personally we have a problem with any comedy our father-in-law knows all the catchphrases to, especially when he insists on screaming them at us all the time. He’s a lady you know…

On the other hand some of the characters are dark and twisted enough to provoke the odd giggle. We particularly like the Walliams character who fancies his mate’s Gran (we’ve all been there, after all) and you can’t help but like Lou and Andy (especially once you know they’re based on Lou Reed and Andy Warhol). Is it just us, or is David Walliams the campest heterosexual male in the history of histories ever?

Another big TV release that you can expect to see on many a girl’s “Dear Santa” letter this year is Desperate Housewives Series 1.

How, we wondered, could Channel 4 fill the horrible void that the demise of Sex and the City opened in our meaningless little lives? With a cross between Knots Landing and The Golden Girls, that’s how. Still, there’s enough intrigue brewing behind the twitching lace curtains of Wisteria Lane to keep most people entertained, and if you get bored you can always check out the extras, which include the top ten backstage cat fights (probably), plus commentary in which the rest of the cast discuss how much they love Teri Hatcher (unlikely).

Next week also sees the release of CSI: Grave Danger. These are the episodes directed by Quentin “I used to be good” Tarantino and make up the climactic season finale of the mega-successful police procedural.

If you haven’t seen CSI, then all we can assume is that the cave you live in does not pick up Channel 5. What with CSI: New York, CSI: Miami, CSI: Las Vegas and now CSI: Milton Keynes in the pipeline, it seems we’re all going CSI doolally.

Turning to films, it’s a very poor week for the cinephiles among us.

Getting the Special Edition treatment next week are The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, in which Catherine Deneuve sings a bit and looks saucy, and Flash Gordon in which Brian Blessed shouts a lot and looks not so saucy (no change there then).

Also making its way on to DVD for the first time is Vincent Gallo’s Brown Bunny, and after the mauling it received at Cannes two years ago, we’re surprised this bunny’s not roadkill.

The version Gallo premiered at Cannes was a work in progress, however, and this newer, slicker bunny purports to be a different kind of beast. Expect mumbled dialogue, motorcycles… Oh, and Gallo being piped off (well, if you were a film maker, wouldn’t you give yourself the best part while also demanding maximum realism from your co-stars?).

Finally, although not a new release, Peter Fonda’s dazzlingly poetic western The Hired Hand gets reissued at the bargain price of £5.99 on Monday. Starring Fonda himself, alongside the late great Warren Oates, this slow-paced, hypnotic slice of Americana couldn’t be further removed from Easy Rider (although drugs obviously played a part in the conception of both), and it manages to be both surreal and affecting at the same time – and all for the price of a London lager. Highly recommended.

]]>

Londonist is as addicted to buying DVDs as everyone else, so it made sense that we should start a regular column to highlight the little laser-etched treats coming your way over the next week or so. Let us know what you think in the comments.

Well folks, it’s getting to the time of year when the likes of Chegwin, Biggins and Daniels descend begrudgingly upon [enter the name of your hometown here] to switch on the Christmas lights.

How do we know? Well, apart from the shorter days and longer trousers, there’s the glut of upcoming DVD releases cynically aimed at exploiting the fact that your Aunt Beryl won’t have a clue what to get you. So over the coming weeks you can expect to see fewer ‘normal’ releases (i.e. things you might buy for yourself), and more ‘crap’ releases (i.e. things Aunt Beryl might buy you), all aimed at making you part with those well earned Choice Vouchers your boss gave you because he/she’s too tight to give you a proper Christmas bonus.

Kicking things off next week is the second series of Little Britain. Personally we have a problem with any comedy our father-in-law knows all the catchphrases to, especially when he insists on screaming them at us all the time. He’s a lady you know…

On the other hand some of the characters are dark and twisted enough to provoke the odd giggle. We particularly like the Walliams character who fancies his mate’s Gran (we’ve all been there, after all) and you can’t help but like Lou and Andy (especially once you know they’re based on Lou Reed and Andy Warhol). Is it just us, or is David Walliams the campest heterosexual male in the history of histories ever?

Another big TV release that you can expect to see on many a girl’s “Dear Santa” letter this year is Desperate Housewives Series 1.

How, we wondered, could Channel 4 fill the horrible void that the demise of Sex and the City opened in our meaningless little lives? With a cross between Knots Landing and The Golden Girls, that’s how. Still, there’s enough intrigue brewing behind the twitching lace curtains of Wisteria Lane to keep most people entertained, and if you get bored you can always check out the extras, which include the top ten backstage cat fights (probably), plus commentary in which the rest of the cast discuss how much they love Teri Hatcher (unlikely).

Next week also sees the release of CSI: Grave Danger. These are the episodes directed by Quentin “I used to be good” Tarantino and make up the climactic season finale of the mega-successful police procedural.

If you haven’t seen CSI, then all we can assume is that the cave you live in does not pick up Channel 5. What with CSI: New York, CSI: Miami, CSI: Las Vegas and now CSI: Milton Keynes in the pipeline, it seems we’re all going CSI doolally.

Turning to films, it’s a very poor week for the cinephiles among us.

Getting the Special Edition treatment next week are The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, in which Catherine Deneuve sings a bit and looks saucy, and Flash Gordon in which Brian Blessed shouts a lot and looks not so saucy (no change there then).

Also making its way on to DVD for the first time is Vincent Gallo’s Brown Bunny, and after the mauling it received at Cannes two years ago, we’re surprised this bunny’s not roadkill.

The version Gallo premiered at Cannes was a work in progress, however, and this newer, slicker bunny purports to be a different kind of beast. Expect mumbled dialogue, motorcycles… Oh, and Gallo being piped off (well, if you were a film maker, wouldn’t you give yourself the best part while also demanding maximum realism from your co-stars?).

Finally, although not a new release, Peter Fonda’s dazzlingly poetic western The Hired Hand gets reissued at the bargain price of £5.99 on Monday. Starring Fonda himself, alongside the late great Warren Oates, this slow-paced, hypnotic slice of Americana couldn’t be further removed from Easy Rider (although drugs obviously played a part in the conception of both), and it manages to be both surreal and affecting at the same time – and all for the price of a London lager. Highly recommended.

]]> http://londonist.com/2005/10/dvd_delights.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2005/08/whitechapel_lib.php http://londonist.com/2005/08/whitechapel_lib.php#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2005 12:12:50 +0000 Rob http://londonist.com/?p=1488

This past weekend saw the doors close for the final time at the 113-year-old Whitechapel Library.

The library was founded 1892 by the Liberal MP J Passmore Edwards (there’s a nice picture of the man himself here) and quickly garnered a reputation as “the university of the ghetto”.

Saturday’s Guardan reported on the closure, reminding us of the scores of notable men and women who have perused the lbrary’s shelves:

Jacob Bronowski, scientist and historian, learned his English there, and went on to become internationally famous for his television series The Ascent of Man. The artist Mark Gertler borrowed books on art and drew on sheets of notepaper in the reading room.

Playwright Arnold Wesker, brought there first as a child, spurned the Beatrix Potter shelf but wept over repeated readings of The Wind in the Willows.

An equally informative article in last week’s Telegraph only adds to the list:

Isaac Rosenberg met future artists such as Mark Gertler and David Bomberg. It was here that the novelists Simon Blumenfeld and Willy Goldman, historian Jacob Bronowski, and playwrights Arnold Wesker and Bernard Kops educated themselves. Kops wrote a poem about the place in which he confessed: ‘The door of the library was the door into me’.

The library’s place in the community is to be taken up by the planned Whitechapel Idea Store which will contain (among other things) “more books, CDs and DVDs – over 17,000 new items as well as stock from the existing libraries, free internet access, a range of state-of-the-art learning spaces and classrooms, a creche for the children of learners, specialist spaces for teaching dance and complementary therapies…”

And the library’s space is being taken over by the Whitechapel Gallery, which sits next door (another Passmore project). The gallery will restore the building (which is in a pretty bad state by all accounts) in order to increase their gallery space, and build an education centre.

Theres a nice quote in the Guardian article from one of the library’s staff members:

“It’s good to know the building has at least found a good new home. The old Limehouse branch is just sitting there derelict. Sometimes you do feel these poor old libraries are as forlorn and redundant as socialism in New Labour.”

If you want to read a bit more, there’s also this excellent article about the library by Michael Kustow from The Jewish Quarterly.

We haven’t mentioned Doctor Who for a while so thought we’d get a quick word in following the fantastic ARE YOU MY MUMMY? episodes and before it all gets mundane again with another trip to Cardiff (Time and Relative Dimensions in Space… in SPACE – that means they can fly further than Wales and the South Bank, Russell).

SPOLIERS AHEAD! GO BACK! STOP READING!

So while those of little brain are watching Big Brother 6 the rest of us can settle down for… erm… is that a BB logo behind the Doctor? Crap.

Yep – it looks like the season finale of Doctor Who is going to get all reality televisionised. And with a special guest star in the shape of Anne Robinson… playing ‘Anne Droid’. Damn. Please someone take the word processor away from Russell T Davis NOW.

The two parter (entitled ‘Bad Wolf’ and ‘The Parting of the Ways’) is already causing metal fatigue in anorak zippers across the Internet, and rumours abound. More Daleks? Will Eccleston regenerate and if so how come he’s in the Christmas special? Will The Master be making an appearance despite the Beeb saying the opposite? Have we already seen The Master? Is he the dashing time travelling Captain Jack? Or could it be that… The Doctor isn’t quite who he seems?

We have no idea. But it’s fun arguing about it via email when we should be working.

There’s also a couple of odd images floating around the Internet showing Captain Jack being stripped down by some kind of robotic Trinny and Susannah… please stop, Russell. We’ll buy the overpriced DVDs and crappy hardback spin offs, but please for the love of god… stop being a twat.

Oh how we hope that the second season is filmed in a quarry as far away from Wales and 21st Century London as possible. With Brian Blessed.

]]>

We haven’t mentioned Doctor Who for a while so thought we’d get a quick word in following the fantastic ARE YOU MY MUMMY? episodes and before it all gets mundane again with another trip to Cardiff (Time and Relative Dimensions in Space… in SPACE – that means they can fly further than Wales and the South Bank, Russell).

SPOLIERS AHEAD! GO BACK! STOP READING!

So while those of little brain are watching Big Brother 6 the rest of us can settle down for… erm… is that a BB logo behind the Doctor? Crap.

Yep – it looks like the season finale of Doctor Who is going to get all reality televisionised. And with a special guest star in the shape of Anne Robinson… playing ‘Anne Droid’. Damn. Please someone take the word processor away from Russell T Davis NOW.

The two parter (entitled ‘Bad Wolf’ and ‘The Parting of the Ways’) is already causing metal fatigue in anorak zippers across the Internet, and rumours abound. More Daleks? Will Eccleston regenerate and if so how come he’s in the Christmas special? Will The Master be making an appearance despite the Beeb saying the opposite? Have we already seen The Master? Is he the dashing time travelling Captain Jack? Or could it be that… The Doctor isn’t quite who he seems?

We have no idea. But it’s fun arguing about it via email when we should be working.

There’s also a couple of odd images floating around the Internet showing Captain Jack being stripped down by some kind of robotic Trinny and Susannah… please stop, Russell. We’ll buy the overpriced DVDs and crappy hardback spin offs, but please for the love of god… stop being a twat.

Oh how we hope that the second season is filmed in a quarry as far away from Wales and 21st Century London as possible. With Brian Blessed.

]]> http://londonist.com/2005/06/is_there_a_doct.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2005/05/hey_teacher_lea.php http://londonist.com/2005/05/hey_teacher_lea.php#comments Wed, 25 May 2005 15:50:56 +0000 london_will http://londonist.com/?p=1082

London’s Institute of Education is to issue lesson plans based on – this is difficult to type – soap operas, adverts and Grange Hill. The packs will be distributed to 1000 schools and contain lesson ideas and DVDs – which just goes to show that things have changed since Londonist was at school, and the “wheeling in of the huge video player” was a ceremonial event on the scale of the Trooping of the Colour.

Anyway, if you’re stuck in an office and reading Londonist to get over those midweek blues, have a good read of that BBC story and get thoroughly angried up.

We don’t mean to come over all reactionary, and think that cultural relativism is to be applauded in many circumstances. Sure, if pointing out the similarities between EastEnders and the Iliad, or Coronation Street and Shakespeare, makes children better able to appreciate the latter works as living and lively parts of our cultural framework, then bring it on. But school should be a process of exploration, not a re-hashing of what kids already know from their home lives. It should be an introduction of new experiences, not a glossing of the old.

]]>

London’s Institute of Education is to issue lesson plans based on – this is difficult to type – soap operas, adverts and Grange Hill. The packs will be distributed to 1000 schools and contain lesson ideas and DVDs – which just goes to show that things have changed since Londonist was at school, and the “wheeling in of the huge video player” was a ceremonial event on the scale of the Trooping of the Colour.

Anyway, if you’re stuck in an office and reading Londonist to get over those midweek blues, have a good read of that BBC story and get thoroughly angried up.

We don’t mean to come over all reactionary, and think that cultural relativism is to be applauded in many circumstances. Sure, if pointing out the similarities between EastEnders and the Iliad, or Coronation Street and Shakespeare, makes children better able to appreciate the latter works as living and lively parts of our cultural framework, then bring it on. But school should be a process of exploration, not a re-hashing of what kids already know from their home lives. It should be an introduction of new experiences, not a glossing of the old.

]]> http://londonist.com/2005/05/hey_teacher_lea.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2005/04/take_me_out_to_1.php http://londonist.com/2005/04/take_me_out_to_1.php#comments Wed, 27 Apr 2005 00:32:33 +0000 sizemore http://londonist.com/?p=921

Brace yourselves… The trailer for Serenity is online.

It’s ok. We’ll still be here when you get back. Go and see a few snippets of what we’re expecting to be the best film of 2005.

Joss Whedon may have been gone from the Londonist TV screen for a while now, and although the Buffy and Angel DVDs are fun to dip into, it’s only his cancelled Sci-Fi show, Firefly, that we ever intend to watch a single episode of only to end up not moving for the rest of the day.

We can’t even imagine that a single Londonist reader won’t already have the boxset, but just in case anyone out there has a friend that needs educating about what makes good Sci Fi as opposed to that Jedi crap we are always running down then you can always point them over here.

Serenity opens here in the UK on the 4th of November, but take a tip from us – flights to New York are cheap right now and it opens there at the end of September…

Update: You can watch the ‘fullscreen’ version of the trailer without needing to have crappy iTunes installed by clicking here.

]]>

Brace yourselves… The trailer for Serenity is online.

It’s ok. We’ll still be here when you get back. Go and see a few snippets of what we’re expecting to be the best film of 2005.

Joss Whedon may have been gone from the Londonist TV screen for a while now, and although the Buffy and Angel DVDs are fun to dip into, it’s only his cancelled Sci-Fi show, Firefly, that we ever intend to watch a single episode of only to end up not moving for the rest of the day.

We can’t even imagine that a single Londonist reader won’t already have the boxset, but just in case anyone out there has a friend that needs educating about what makes good Sci Fi as opposed to that Jedi crap we are always running down then you can always point them over here.

Serenity opens here in the UK on the 4th of November, but take a tip from us – flights to New York are cheap right now and it opens there at the end of September…

Update: You can watch the ‘fullscreen’ version of the trailer without needing to have crappy iTunes installed by clicking here.

]]> http://londonist.com/2005/04/take_me_out_to_1.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2005/03/londonist_loves_3.php http://londonist.com/2005/03/londonist_loves_3.php#comments Mon, 21 Mar 2005 23:34:49 +0000 sizemore http://londonist.com/?p=730

We’ve been watching SFist‘s coverage of the Spring Asian Film Series with growing jealousy until we realised that we could put on our own best of Asia line-up on by simply harvesting the shops in Chinatown. Sometimes you just get tired of waiting for distributors to get their act together (Hero was finally released by Miramax in the States and the UK years after its completion) and simply have to take matters into your own hands. This is where multicultural London come into its own – as long as you have the right kit.

To pick up and enjoy some of the movies that follow you’ll need a multi-regional DVD player, but if you can find one that plays VCDs too then that’s even better. Don’t bother with Dixons and the like – wander along Tottenham Court Road and you’ll be spoiled for choice in chipped players under £100 that bypass the pesky regional nonsense that enslaves your regular high street machine. A little spare cash and the ability to work out the occasionally tricky DVD menu is the only other thing you’ll need.

Price-wise the newer DVDs in Chinatown start off around the £25 mark, but you can get some great older stuff for a tenner and usually find three VCDs for about £15 which is fantastic if you don’t mind a slight loss in quality and maybe having to flip or switch a disc halfway through a movie.

We had a wander around the stores this weekend to see what was new and after the jump we’ll give you the low down on some of the best new Asian movies that we’ve seen recently.

KUNG FU HUSTLE (Gong fu)

If you were lucky enough to see Shaolin Soccer last year then you already know what Stephen Chow can do when it comes to the reinvention of martial arts movies. Kung Fu Hustle is much more of a traditional affair, but with imagery pulled from comic books and cartoons it adds up to a deeply satisfying jawdropper of a movie. Simple plot – small village hassled by gangsters (the Tarantinoesque Axe Gang) in 1940′s Shanghai. The twist here is that the village is home to a group of retired Kung fu masters who put paid to the gang’s attempts to save face no matter how many times they up the ante. Wandering around while all this is going on is wannabe Axe Gang member Sing and his equally inept buddy who find themselves in the midst of a face off that results in an unlikely hero finally finding his true calling. Highlights include just about every fight sequence, riddled as they are with traditional moves, wire work and a lot of cheeky CGI that makes this more fun than a Jackie Chan flick, but still respectful of the genre. Filled with great gags like the way one character uses the knife embedded into his shoulder as a rear view mirror to keep an eye on the landlady from hell that is chasing him. Comedy is first and foremost and while this can sometimes miss the mark in much Eastern cinema watched from a Western perspective the slapstick and sight gags here are universal. It’d be a crime if this doesn’t get a decent cinema release, but if you want to be ahead of the curve you know where to go. (IMDB details)

QUILL

This is the one that had Londonist blubbing out loud by the end. Normally it wouldn’t be a big deal, but we happened to be at 30,000 feet at the time and the noise we made trying to contain our hacking sobs made the flight crew worried we were either attempting to join the mile high club or set light to shoe fuses. Seriously, this film goes straight for the heart strings and tears them to pieces without remorse, but despite that we feel a NEED to let others share the heartache. It’s the (true) life story of a guide-dog named Quill who we follow from puppyhood to retirement getting to see the mark he leaves behind on those he helps along the way. Sure, it sounds sappy and it is, but we double dare even the strongest cynical film fan to watch this without falling to pieces at the end. Those last ten minutes are BRUTAL. We would hate to see Quill get lost in favour of the usual Disney crap that gets shuffled out as family fare and have been pushing this movie on anyone who would listen for a few months now. The Japanese loved this so much that the whole thing has recently been extended into a TV series that will undoubtedly bring the whole nation to its knees. As soon as that version gets released we’ll be back in Chinatown like a shot to track it down. (IMDB details)

THE UNINVITED (4 Inyong shiktak)

A strange Korean piece of creepiness. Not the fright fest of the Ju-on movies (The Grudge originals) but rather a psychological thriller with a hint of horror. Shin-yang Park plays a successful young architect who one night falls asleep on the train and awakes alone with two dead children. The children begin to haunt him and overnight his perfect life begins to fall apart. Through a series of coincidences he meets a young woman who also has the ability to see the children and much more. Park sets out to unravel why he is seeing the ghosts, but soon finds a deeper mystery about his own childhood and the tragedy that has befallen his new friend. Filled with disturbing imagery and reveling in fixing the camera on scenes that other films for years have pulled away from, this is a first class ghost story although we felt in places that perhaps a little something was lost in the translation. (IMDB details)

CUTIE HONEY (Kyûtî Hanî)

Think Power Rangers crossed with the 60′s Batman TV show and you have Cutie Honey. We’ll simply link to the SFist review as Eve always knows what she’s talking about. All we can add is that we were easily distracted by the lack of coherence in the plot by the fanboy fantasy costumes and cotton candy special effects. And it was much more watchable than the Charlie’s Angels flicks.

If you haven’t seen Cashern, House of Flying Daggers or 2046 yet then all are readily available in beautiful looking editions in Chinatown, but are all going to hit the HMV shelves pretty soon. You may wish to wait as the extra features will undoubtedly be more accessible. In the mean time if you want to go back further then check out the Kung fu classic Fong Sai-Yuk movies with Jet Li or the very un-Buffy like Mr. Vampire series as occasionally rolled out in the early hours by Channel Four. These (along with Jackie Chan’s entire back catalogue) are cheap and remarkably rewatchable.

Alongside the Chinese, Japanese and Korean titles in Chinatown you’ll also find a wealth of American movies in unfamiliar packaging. Sometimes this stuff is far better than the regular region two releases and in the case of Kill Bill actually has a slightly different cut. Well worth looking into, especially for the serious movie buffs.

So don’t disregard Chinatown as simply a tourist trap or a good place to eat your weight in dumplings. You can easily keep abreast of the latest Asian releases by checking out websites such as Asian DB or HK Flix, make a few notes and head out to Gerrard Street to make with the plundering.

The image at the top of this post is taken from Kung Fu Hustle.

]]>

We’ve been watching SFist‘s coverage of the Spring Asian Film Series with growing jealousy until we realised that we could put on our own best of Asia line-up on by simply harvesting the shops in Chinatown. Sometimes you just get tired of waiting for distributors to get their act together (Hero was finally released by Miramax in the States and the UK years after its completion) and simply have to take matters into your own hands. This is where multicultural London come into its own – as long as you have the right kit.

To pick up and enjoy some of the movies that follow you’ll need a multi-regional DVD player, but if you can find one that plays VCDs too then that’s even better. Don’t bother with Dixons and the like – wander along Tottenham Court Road and you’ll be spoiled for choice in chipped players under £100 that bypass the pesky regional nonsense that enslaves your regular high street machine. A little spare cash and the ability to work out the occasionally tricky DVD menu is the only other thing you’ll need.

Price-wise the newer DVDs in Chinatown start off around the £25 mark, but you can get some great older stuff for a tenner and usually find three VCDs for about £15 which is fantastic if you don’t mind a slight loss in quality and maybe having to flip or switch a disc halfway through a movie.

We had a wander around the stores this weekend to see what was new and after the jump we’ll give you the low down on some of the best new Asian movies that we’ve seen recently.

KUNG FU HUSTLE (Gong fu)

If you were lucky enough to see Shaolin Soccer last year then you already know what Stephen Chow can do when it comes to the reinvention of martial arts movies. Kung Fu Hustle is much more of a traditional affair, but with imagery pulled from comic books and cartoons it adds up to a deeply satisfying jawdropper of a movie. Simple plot – small village hassled by gangsters (the Tarantinoesque Axe Gang) in 1940′s Shanghai. The twist here is that the village is home to a group of retired Kung fu masters who put paid to the gang’s attempts to save face no matter how many times they up the ante. Wandering around while all this is going on is wannabe Axe Gang member Sing and his equally inept buddy who find themselves in the midst of a face off that results in an unlikely hero finally finding his true calling. Highlights include just about every fight sequence, riddled as they are with traditional moves, wire work and a lot of cheeky CGI that makes this more fun than a Jackie Chan flick, but still respectful of the genre. Filled with great gags like the way one character uses the knife embedded into his shoulder as a rear view mirror to keep an eye on the landlady from hell that is chasing him. Comedy is first and foremost and while this can sometimes miss the mark in much Eastern cinema watched from a Western perspective the slapstick and sight gags here are universal. It’d be a crime if this doesn’t get a decent cinema release, but if you want to be ahead of the curve you know where to go. (IMDB details)

QUILL

This is the one that had Londonist blubbing out loud by the end. Normally it wouldn’t be a big deal, but we happened to be at 30,000 feet at the time and the noise we made trying to contain our hacking sobs made the flight crew worried we were either attempting to join the mile high club or set light to shoe fuses. Seriously, this film goes straight for the heart strings and tears them to pieces without remorse, but despite that we feel a NEED to let others share the heartache. It’s the (true) life story of a guide-dog named Quill who we follow from puppyhood to retirement getting to see the mark he leaves behind on those he helps along the way. Sure, it sounds sappy and it is, but we double dare even the strongest cynical film fan to watch this without falling to pieces at the end. Those last ten minutes are BRUTAL. We would hate to see Quill get lost in favour of the usual Disney crap that gets shuffled out as family fare and have been pushing this movie on anyone who would listen for a few months now. The Japanese loved this so much that the whole thing has recently been extended into a TV series that will undoubtedly bring the whole nation to its knees. As soon as that version gets released we’ll be back in Chinatown like a shot to track it down. (IMDB details)

THE UNINVITED (4 Inyong shiktak)

A strange Korean piece of creepiness. Not the fright fest of the Ju-on movies (The Grudge originals) but rather a psychological thriller with a hint of horror. Shin-yang Park plays a successful young architect who one night falls asleep on the train and awakes alone with two dead children. The children begin to haunt him and overnight his perfect life begins to fall apart. Through a series of coincidences he meets a young woman who also has the ability to see the children and much more. Park sets out to unravel why he is seeing the ghosts, but soon finds a deeper mystery about his own childhood and the tragedy that has befallen his new friend. Filled with disturbing imagery and reveling in fixing the camera on scenes that other films for years have pulled away from, this is a first class ghost story although we felt in places that perhaps a little something was lost in the translation. (IMDB details)

CUTIE HONEY (Kyûtî Hanî)

Think Power Rangers crossed with the 60′s Batman TV show and you have Cutie Honey. We’ll simply link to the SFist review as Eve always knows what she’s talking about. All we can add is that we were easily distracted by the lack of coherence in the plot by the fanboy fantasy costumes and cotton candy special effects. And it was much more watchable than the Charlie’s Angels flicks.

If you haven’t seen Cashern, House of Flying Daggers or 2046 yet then all are readily available in beautiful looking editions in Chinatown, but are all going to hit the HMV shelves pretty soon. You may wish to wait as the extra features will undoubtedly be more accessible. In the mean time if you want to go back further then check out the Kung fu classic Fong Sai-Yuk movies with Jet Li or the very un-Buffy like Mr. Vampire series as occasionally rolled out in the early hours by Channel Four. These (along with Jackie Chan’s entire back catalogue) are cheap and remarkably rewatchable.

Alongside the Chinese, Japanese and Korean titles in Chinatown you’ll also find a wealth of American movies in unfamiliar packaging. Sometimes this stuff is far better than the regular region two releases and in the case of Kill Bill actually has a slightly different cut. Well worth looking into, especially for the serious movie buffs.

So don’t disregard Chinatown as simply a tourist trap or a good place to eat your weight in dumplings. You can easily keep abreast of the latest Asian releases by checking out websites such as Asian DB or HK Flix, make a few notes and head out to Gerrard Street to make with the plundering.

The image at the top of this post is taken from Kung Fu Hustle.

]]> http://londonist.com/2005/03/londonist_loves_3.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2005/01/romzomcom_makes.php http://londonist.com/2005/01/romzomcom_makes.php#comments Wed, 19 Jan 2005 21:49:16 +0000 london_luke http://londonist.com/?p=394

We know that some of you were lucky enough to play small roles in last year’s sleeper hit comedy Shaun of the Dead, and we know that like us you’ve watched its various successes with barely restrained glee.

Some of the Londonist folks were involved too, and got treated to some very fine entertainment in the bowels of Crouch End and New Cross. We were thusly thrilled to see the cheeky chappies Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright (star and director, respectively) coming to terms with the concept of “Yes, they get it!” when the film stole the hearts of untold millions.

Well there’s a double-header of good news this week for the zombie mavens; first off none other than John Lequizamo (wow, where’s he been?) has confirmed a little rumour that’s been flying around, namely that Mr George Romero himself has seen fit to offer zombie cameos to both of the aforementioned chappies in his return-to-form zombie update Land of the Dead. Horror films are replete with wink-wink in-jokes, and this should prove no different.

Secondly, and let’s face it somewhat more significantly, SOTD has been honoured with not one but two BAFTA nominations, one for “Best British Film of the Year” and one for, er, best new director apparently, for Edgar Wright.

We say, hear hear, it couldn’t have happened to a nicer film/bloke. All of which should help ensure that this gem continues to grow in cult stature and make them lots of money, as it seems to be doing (number 4 on the Amazon Hot 100 DVDs list ain’t too shabby, and as we all know the DVDs are where the money’s at now). Attaboy!

]]>

We know that some of you were lucky enough to play small roles in last year’s sleeper hit comedy Shaun of the Dead, and we know that like us you’ve watched its various successes with barely restrained glee.

Some of the Londonist folks were involved too, and got treated to some very fine entertainment in the bowels of Crouch End and New Cross. We were thusly thrilled to see the cheeky chappies Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright (star and director, respectively) coming to terms with the concept of “Yes, they get it!” when the film stole the hearts of untold millions.

Well there’s a double-header of good news this week for the zombie mavens; first off none other than John Lequizamo (wow, where’s he been?) has confirmed a little rumour that’s been flying around, namely that Mr George Romero himself has seen fit to offer zombie cameos to both of the aforementioned chappies in his return-to-form zombie update Land of the Dead. Horror films are replete with wink-wink in-jokes, and this should prove no different.

Secondly, and let’s face it somewhat more significantly, SOTD has been honoured with not one but two BAFTA nominations, one for “Best British Film of the Year” and one for, er, best new director apparently, for Edgar Wright.

We say, hear hear, it couldn’t have happened to a nicer film/bloke. All of which should help ensure that this gem continues to grow in cult stature and make them lots of money, as it seems to be doing (number 4 on the Amazon Hot 100 DVDs list ain’t too shabby, and as we all know the DVDs are where the money’s at now). Attaboy!

]]> http://londonist.com/2005/01/romzomcom_makes.php/feed 0 http://londonist.com/2004/11/friday_film_new_2.php http://londonist.com/2004/11/friday_film_new_2.php#comments Fri, 12 Nov 2004 15:13:54 +0000 london_euan http://londonist.com/?p=96

So this week the biggest release isn’t even a film, it’s the teaser trailer for the latest Star Wars installment, Revenge of the Sith, or as we at Londonist Mews like to refer to it: Star Wars III – Please god, make it stop and Lucas, quit going back through time and raping our favourite childhood memories to sell some more DVDs.

Still, it has lots of wookies in it.

On release this week Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason gives journalists another reaosn to talk about Rene Zellweger gaining and losing weight, but even another Firth-Grant bust up can’t save it from two stars in the Times, two stars in the Guardian, and a kick in her fat arse by the Independent with one star.

Not a lot else of note being released this week, unless you count Anacondas: the Hunt for the Blood Orchid , or Ladies in Lavender, which we don’t.

Maybe if you combined the two, and Dames Maggie Smith and Judi Dench travelled deep into the amazon to battle giant snakes amongst a backdrop of corporate bio-harvesting of the thirld world, and seducing young polish boys, then just maybe.

Elsewhere, theres a trailer for Phantom of the Opera, and Dreamworks, who don’t appear (on paper at least) to be a particularly stupid studio pay A SEVEN FIGURE SUM for the movie rights to Baywatch.

Also there’s a first look at the poster for Tim Burtons take on Willy Wonka, with Johnny Depp looking the right mix of dapper and creepy.

And lastly, the Londonist caught Big Wednesday on telly the other night (narrated by Freddy Kruger, trivia fans) and had completely forgotten what an ace coming-of-age-man-tames-nature kind of film it was.

Come back Jan-Michael Vincent, all is forgiven.

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So this week the biggest release isn’t even a film, it’s the teaser trailer for the latest Star Wars installment, Revenge of the Sith, or as we at Londonist Mews like to refer to it: Star Wars III – Please god, make it stop and Lucas, quit going back through time and raping our favourite childhood memories to sell some more DVDs.

Still, it has lots of wookies in it.

On release this week Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason gives journalists another reaosn to talk about Rene Zellweger gaining and losing weight, but even another Firth-Grant bust up can’t save it from two stars in the Times, two stars in the Guardian, and a kick in her fat arse by the Independent with one star.

Not a lot else of note being released this week, unless you count Anacondas: the Hunt for the Blood Orchid , or Ladies in Lavender, which we don’t.

Maybe if you combined the two, and Dames Maggie Smith and Judi Dench travelled deep into the amazon to battle giant snakes amongst a backdrop of corporate bio-harvesting of the thirld world, and seducing young polish boys, then just maybe.

Elsewhere, theres a trailer for Phantom of the Opera, and Dreamworks, who don’t appear (on paper at least) to be a particularly stupid studio pay A SEVEN FIGURE SUM for the movie rights to Baywatch.

Also there’s a first look at the poster for Tim Burtons take on Willy Wonka, with Johnny Depp looking the right mix of dapper and creepy.

And lastly, the Londonist caught Big Wednesday on telly the other night (narrated by Freddy Kruger, trivia fans) and had completely forgotten what an ace coming-of-age-man-tames-nature kind of film it was.

Come back Jan-Michael Vincent, all is forgiven.

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