EXCLUSIVE: Mark Bradshaw hates Bristol bloggers!

I just thought I would see if my earlier post had earned (ex-’transport supremo’) Mark Bradshaw any more Twitter friends, only to discover that the blighter has blocked me!

Good to see a politician with such a healthy interest in engaging with local people, as ever

The Bristol Web 2.0 Careers Advice Service

Following the booting out of the Labour minority cabinet at Bristol City Council, ‘transport supremo’ Mark Bradshaw has been wondering what to do with himself.

Tweet your suggestions to @mark_bradshaw

ETA:

I see Terry Cook has also discovered the jobseeking potential of Twitter.

Discussion:

• The Bristol Blogger
• Green Bristol Blog
• Stockwood Pete

Framed Documents #044: The Boys In Company C

DO NOT KEEP ANY OF THE FOLLOWING IN YOUR POSSESSION

1. FIREARMS, AMMUNITION, EXPLOSIVES, FIREWORKS OR PYROTECHNICS.
2. LETHAL WEAPONS INCLUDING BLACKJACKS, BRASS KNUCKLES, POCKET KNIVES EQUIPPED WITH SPRING RELEASE BLADES, SCISSORS OR STRAIGHT RAZORS…

Dude – this is the Marine Corps!

Rules for new recruits from the opening to Sidney IPCRESS File Furie’s The Boys In Company C – one of the finest Vietnam films of the late seventies featuring Craig Wasson. Well, one of two, fine or otherwise.

A Week In Film #015: Stay calm, this is simply the beginning

Die Hard
John McTiernan’s top-of-its-game hijacked building actioner. Taut, well put together, witty, imaginatively shot, two thumbs all the way through.

Die Hard With A Vengeance
Not as good as the first, but definitely better than the second. Suffers from not being confined to a small space. Samuel L Jackson is good fun as Zeus, and Sam Phillips is knee wibble-inducing as mute killer Katya, but Jeremy Irons’ English-thesp-does-Euro-terrorist is not great.

How To Lose Friends And Alienate People
Simon Pegg as the English hack in New York in amusing but by no means great adaptation of Toby Young’s book.

Ghosts Of Mars
John Carpenter’s career-stopping SF actioner with Ice Cube, Jason Statham, Pam Grier and Natasha Henstridge kicking ass on the Red Planet. I actually rather like it, for all its pace-destroying wipes and odd editing choices.

Local twittocracy

I came across a project called CllrTweeps earlier today. It intends “to compile the definitive list of UK councillors on Twitter, no more, no less.”

I noticed that there were no Bristol City Council members listed, so I emailed one of my ward councillors, Jon Rogers (LibDem), with the link. I pointed out that currently I know more about Northern Irish municipal affairs via Twitter than I do about what is going on in my own city by ‘normal’ means.

Anyway, Jon has now joined Twitter, so we shall see. I have also emailed local Green councillor Charlie Bolton to see if he was interested.

Obviously neither blogging nor twittering is a substitute for actual local democracy and accountability, but having spent the best part of two months reporting the same blocked drain to the council (officers, not councillors, I hasten to add), I am game to try anything.

ETA

Local councillors, MPs and other politicos now on Twitter:

• cllr Alex Woodman: CllrAlexWoodman (Cabot ward, LibDem)
• James Barlow: JamesBarlow (Conservative constituency chairman, Bristol West)
• cllr Jon Rogers: CllrJonRogers (Ashley ward, LibDem)
• Kerry McCarthy MP: KerryMP (Bristol East constituency, Labour)
• cllr Mark Bradshaw: mark_bradshaw (Bedminster ward, Labour)
• Paul Smith: BristolWestPaul (prospective Parliamentary candidate, Bristol West, Labour)
• cllr Sean Beynon: seanbeynon (Southville ward, Labour)
• cllr Terry Cook: terryrobc (Avonmouth ward, Labour)

A Week In Film #014: This Is Not A RomCom, Darling (Happy Valentine’s Day)

Is Paris Burning?
Different French Resistance factions prepare for liberation.

The Long Riders
Walter Hill ‘does’ the Younger-James gang with high concept use of thespy brothers (the Carradines, Quaids, Keaches and Guests) to play various sets of real-life brothers and cousins.

The Happening
Insanely bad M Night Shyamalan biohorrortwistthriller watched purely for Graham Linehan’s BadMovieClub. Bees, pipes in walls, cars that appear from nowhere, a planet that fights back. Zooey Deschanel looks permanently stoned on tranquilisers, Marky Mark displays the acting chops that made him an international underwear modelling superstar. Pretty much nothing of interest happens in The Happening, BTW.

Revolutionary Road
DiCaprio and Winslet, reunited at last! In a portrait of the drawn out death of a relationship in early 60s American suburbia! With added botched home-abortion ending! The Valentine’s date movie to end them all.

Lego rave

Only just seen via Facebook. Nice quality mp4 on the Adamish website from whence it originally came.

Framed Documents #043: Guns At Batasi

Prim RSM Lauderdale (Dickie Attenborough) outlines his plan of attack in Guns At Batasi, a rather well-produced little post-Empire potboiler which has its wits about it, which understands the value of not playing it too straight, and which underplays its box office-satisfying romantic subplot (involving Mia Farrow, of all people). There are excellently understated performances from the likes of Errol John, Earl Cameron, Percy Herbert, David Lodge, Bernard Horsfall, John Meillon and pornographer Graham Stark.

“I DON’T HAVE TIME TO READ THIS CRAP” – BrisTwestival

The BrisTwestival was a giggle.

£5 in, got a goodie bag and free drinks & scran, heard some nice bands & beatboxers, the LLF made fun of TwitGeeks (despite being herself a BBS addict ), and we got pleasantly toasted on £2 cocktails. A nice wedge was raised for Charity:Water, we didn’t win any of the raffle prizes, but we did make it home without incident or accidents. That is a result in my book.

Lyon under oath: BoneCast marches on!

Another episode of Ian Bone’s Anarchism In The UK radio series is up on the podcast page – this time round it’s Ed Lyon, talking about getting into anarchism via punk rock, the Situationists and the Poll Tax riot, with forays into Class War, the ACF, MA’M, J18 and much more.

» Ed Lyon interviewd by Ian Bone on Anarchism In The UK «

Framed Documents #042: The Cook The Thief His Wife And Her Lover

Least this time it’s legible:

Le Hollandais
FRIDAY
The Restaurant is closed
for a
Private Function

Genre Rider #002: UK Funky

UK Funky is a style of modern electronic dance music, heavily influenced by various styles of house and beyond, including contemporary funky house, electro house, and increasingly, broken beat, soca, and afrobeat. It mixes traditional UKG beats, bass loops and synths with latin percussion and contemporary R&B-style vocals.

Percussions such as bongos, tambourines, and drums are used to give a dark exotic african sound due to the constant rhythm of the bongos. The crazy snare which people will remember from Garage and Bassline, is non-existent in funky house.

When funky house is slow, it can sound soulful. When it’s fast, it can sound like ska.

So sayeth Wikipedia, anyhow.

It sounds thus:

UK Funky Volume 1: An Introduction mixed by DJ OneDrop

From The MashUp Show via seen (by way of Gutta or Doppelganger, can’t remember which).

#BadMovieClub is GO!!! Friday 13th, The Happening…

Graham hath spake: the BadMovieClub is go, and it shall start with The Happening!

• The time: 9pm GMT, Friday 13th February
• The place: Twitternet (use #BadMovieClub to find like-minded souls, or go direct to the source via @Glinner)

Framed Documents #041: The Cook The Thief His Wife And Her Lover

A fancy-pants menu from the restaurant that is the location for Peter Greenaway’s The Cook The Thief His Wife And Her Lover:

Le Hollandais

TUESDAY

LES SPECIALITÉ DE JOUR [sic]

It’s all a bit too fuzzy to read, sorry

Framed Documents #040: Boogie Nights

The cassette coked-up dealer Rahad Jackson (Alfred Molina) is playing when Dirk, Reed and Todd come over to rip him off in Boogie Nights:

MY AWESOME MiX TAPE #6

Piss & Vinegar #048: Shanghai Noon

Chinese imperial guard adrift in the Wild West Chon Wang (Jackie Chan) sluices up a shirt in order to break out of gaol in the not-quite-satisfying Shanghai Noon.

From Here To Shiternity #022: Unforgiven

An outhouse assault in Unforgiven.

HonkWatch #102: Battle Royale

Shuya Nanahara (Tatsuya Fujiwara) blows a few chunks after discovering his father’s suicide at the beginning of the rather disappointing Battle Royale.

Framed Documents #039: Boogie Nights

Rollergirl’s Tippex-tweaked Polaroid camera in Boogie Nights:

ROLAROID

SX-70 LAND CAMERA

I heard a particularly juicy story about a real life Bristolian Rollergirl over the weekend… O_o

The first rule of #badmovieclub is…

Graham Linehan has come up with a wizard wheeze – a cluster of Twitterers all watching the same film at the same time and tweeting about it.

Film and time TBC (Glinner should be announcing his choice in the morning).

Check the hashtag #badmovieclub for more info.

A Week In Film #013: Unlucky for some

Detour
Classic early film noir, with pretty much the greatest femme fatale ever!

The Dead Zone
David Cronenberg tackles a Stephen King story about a New England (where else?) school teacher put into a five-year coma who comes back to consciousness with the power of foresight; Chris Walken does an early version of the Chris Walken panto turn, and Martin Sheen gives good creepy politician.

Harsh Times
Christian Bale as a whacked-out, fucked-up military veteran failing to adjust to civvie life in South Central LA. Written and directed by David Ayer, the Training Day script dude.

Plunkett & Macleane
Class conscious highway robbery anachro-action comedy. Critics hated it, I enjoyed it. “Surrender’s for wankers!”

‘National Squat Meet’ to take place in Bristol in March

NOW IS A PERFECT TIME TO SQUAT
Now is a perfect time to come together to share our collective creativity, rage, and pride in our cultural identity; to come together for ourselves and look to our future with solidarity and passion. Let’s meet and empower ourselves in our common struggle!

CRACKS ARE APPEARING…
We feel it necessary to meet at a time when those at the top are losing their grip to discuss ways we can work together to change our world from the bottom up. New spaces and opportunities are opening all around us and there is a growing potential for more widespread recognition of the need for autonomous housing action. The threat of eviction and homelessness hangs over more people every day. There are over a billion squatters in the world. Now is the time to build a stronger network of resistance.

THIS IS A CALLOUT
This is a callout for all those involved in securing and maintaining squats and autonomous spaces across the UK, and beyond, to meet and discuss issues that affect us all as a community. Following on from the hugely successful national meeting in Leeds last year, and many smaller local gatherings, that have happened throughout the year, this year’s meet up will be in the Bristol area. Please bring your positive energy, enthusiasm and thoughts to share skills and engage in open dialogue.

WE CAN CONSTRUCT A POSITIVE VISION OF THE WORLD
We hope to discuss ways of strengthening our network in defence of autonomous spaces, share success stories from last year’s day of action and formulate future plans and schemes for creative chaos! The agenda will be decided between us all on Friday evening. Please arrive early if possible to help us create the space. Any comments/ suggestions/ mad ideas please contact squatmeetup@googlemail.com

Squat Meet 09 blog

Framed Documents #038: Second Sight (S1E2)

The gruff old school murder detectives mock a Cracker-style profiler in Second Sight:

FINCH’S BOOK

MORRISON EVENS

NANNY 4-1

PROWLER 8-1

KENWORTHY 14-1

THE BUTLER 20-1

ELVIS 200-1?

Bonecast update

The Ian Bone Anarchism In The UK podcast is bubbling along nicely as the back catalogue is slowly added to the archive.

Currently available to download or stream are:

• #3 Ray Hulm (28th September)
• #6 Si Mitchell (19th October)
• #9 Seth Wheeler (9th November)
• #10 Ian Bone’s Anarchist Half Hour (16th November)
• #11 Ray ‘Roughler’ Jones (23rd November)
• #12 Robb Johnson (30th November)
• #13 Alessio (7th December)
• #15 Andy Meinke (4th January)
• #16 Paul Stott (11th January)
• #17 Sandy Hale (18th January)
• #18 Ellenor Hutson (25th January)

Links:

• Anarchism In The UK podcast page
• Ian Bone’s blog
• Resonance FM

Snow skidding

Twas snowing heavily last night. Heard a noise, looked out the window, saw a 4WD skidding all over the road outside.

Framed Documents #037: The Year Of Living Dangerously

Shady MI6 teletype business in Peter Weir’s Indonesian coup-set journalist-in-peril potboiler The Year Of Living Dangerously:

TOP SECRET FILE ONLY

D9W N9S3T L7EU5

O noez teh Communists is sendingz gun!!!11!!

From Here To Shiternity #021: The Quick And The Dead

A small Redemption boy amuses himself with dung in Sam Raimi’s The Quick And The Dead.

HonkWatch #101: Reds

Louise Bryant (Diane Keaton) gets the seasick stowaway blues whilst stashed aboard a tramp steamer heading out to FInland in pursuit of John Reed in Reds.

Piss & Vinegar #047: Reds

That doesn’t look good… John Reed (Warren Beatty) passes blood whilst in the cells in Reds.

Framed Documents #036: Dead Set (E1)

Watching rolling news from the Big Brother gallery in Dead Set:

BREAKING NEWS

‘4 DEAD’ IN S. LONDON RIOT