Let He Who is Without Sleaze...

There's been a lot of slightly sanctimonious stuff in the Media lately about MP's expenses, when I think it's fair to say that screwing the system is an activity not just confined to politics. The principal leader of this moral crusade seems to be The Daily Telegraph - whose owner was the corrupt Conrad Black.

In many cases these politicians or ministers seem to have making the most of the perks that they thought were freely available to them. Politics is a dirty game, but it should have its compensations - or it used to. I suppose there is the view that as representatives of the people, they should be examined to scrutiny greater than for other professions. But I still wonder how much of the furore is distracting from the more important business of world affairs.

I also wonder how far this is going to spread. Just imagine how much would come out if, for instance, there was a similar expose of Hollywood stars or film producers who'd lapped up the complimentaries and over-indulged themselves for their own personal gain.

Silent Heaven

It's rare to be able to get the chance to see silent films nowadays, particularly in their original setting with live musical accompaniment. I've had the extreme good fortune to have seen two in the last seven days. Starting off with Salome, a very fragrant and curiously unique Biblical epic, starring the lesbian Russian star Alla Nazimova in the title role, directed by her homosexual husband Charles Bryant (in a "lavender marriage" as it was once dubbed by the press), and the production is very opulent to look at, if mostly intended to be in awe of the enigmatic Ms. Nazimova, who does a snappy dance when she gets round to it. It was nice to hear the splendid organ accompaniment by Donald Mackenzie, using the "The Duchess" Odeon Leicester Square instrument for its original purpose.

Then on Friday as part of the "Electric Silents" film weekend at the Electric Palace in Harwich, I managed to squeeze in A Cottage on Dartmoor, which belies the notion that Britain - and Anthony Asquith - could only make conservative dramas. A quite simple but boldly made thriller (similar in plot to later films such as Ealing's It Always Rains on Sunday), using a mostly European cast, in the days when film was a universal language. I found it powerful, beautifully photographed, and quite moving at times. On the piano of the cinema was Stephen Horne, giving it the proper atmosphere. The most amusing moment was when the musical accompaniment to a silent film (in the Electric Palace as well as on screen) stops because a "talkie" is about to start, and shows all the problems audiences had to adapt to the new medium when it was first introduced in 1927.

R.I.P. Bea Arthur: You know you're a Star Wars Fanatic when...2

... you hear about the sad loss of Beatrice Arthur this weekend; the first thing I associated her with was not The Golden Girls, but her barmaid in The Star Wars Holiday Special!

Things to do: 2.

A steam excursion.

Ideally from one of the London main termini. I'm sorry I missed the Oliver Cromwell making another nostalgic trip through Colchester yesterday, on its old East Anglian run.

Here it is departing from Colchester in 2008.

They've Fixed it for Jim

Well, another football season is mercifully almost over, but the real action seems to be taking place off the pitch. Over at Southampton their financial worries with a Partner Company going into administration have led to them being given a 10 point penalty and probable relegation (the Football Association really ought to be more in tune with this economic recession), just like for poor old Luton. And rather closer to home, there's a rough, tough new kid on the block in Town.

I remember walking with Jim Magilton into the Regent Theatre in Ipswich once, when he was taking his children to see Brian Blessed in Peter Pan. His tenure as Ipswich manager was never particularly fruitful, and the performances on the pitch were often uneven, but the standard of football that I saw was often very good, and he now may well be the last of the old guard.

It must be the first time that an Ipswich manager has been sacked only two days after WINNING a big derby game. That 3-2 win over Norwich has ultimately done no good for anybody, except I suppose the extreme wing of the "Blue Army" for whom nothing matters except beating Norwich. After witnessing the general bloodthirstiness and antipathy in East Anglia that day, I'm not sure I want to see too many more local derbies.

The overbearing influence of Ipswich's curiously reclusive new "Emperor" Marcus Evans has now made due effect, with the appointment of Britain's Olympic team manager Simon Clegg, no less, as chief executive - and as if that wasn't enough, Mr. Evans has instructed Mr. Clegg to sack Magilton and bring in Roy Keane - who has gone into his new job with typical Bull-in-a-China-Shop gusto.
There's a lot of greed around in football nowadays, but I hoped it would never extend to Ipswich Town.

RIP Alf Ramsey and the good old John Cobbold days.

Hillsborough and the Hatters

Watching the Morecambe & Wise Christmas Show from 1980 on DVD, I was reminded that Eric Morecambe's beloved Luton Town are now a non-league club, after failing to beat Chesterfield at Kenilworth Road.

Their departure from the Football League comes two days before the 20th anniversary of arguably football's greatest recent tragedy. The death of 96 Liverpool fans at the FA Cup semi-Final at Sheffield Wednesday's home ground was initially declared by the more sensationalist media as an act of hooliganism (4 years after the Heysel Stadium disaster which also involved Liverpool fans), but was later declared by the Taylor Enquiry to be a failure of the police to control the situation.

The whole deep and sorry tragedy of Hillsborough brings to my mind the sheer folly and rashness of human behaviour at times; too often the police always take the blame for being unable to control a mob, and Liverpudlians likewise were equally dismayed (and still are) by the suggestion that they alone were the cause of their own fans' deaths. I suspect both aspects were partially true that day.

A watershed in Association Football history, it led thankfully to the elimination of "anti-hooligan" perimeter fencing (the true killer at Hillsborough) and terracing (including the legendary "Kop" terrace at Anfield) and one of the more positive aspects of the aftermath of Hillsborough was the decision to stage the FA Cup Final at Wembley (which Liverpool won in emotional circumstances) against close neighbours Everton with both sets of fans mixing freely together in the stands, and none of the segregation that usually creates tribal antipathy and sometimes extreme violence.

It's a trend which sadly hasn't caught on since (and it should), but what has is the whole commercial boom that football has become with the advent of sophisticated all-seater stadia - that Hillsborough indirectly helped to bring about. The game went up-market, and has now become one of this country's biggest economies.

And poor Luton Town have had to suffer by it, with their 30-point penalty at the beginning of the season (for "financial irregularities") - too great an obstacle for them to overcome. One can't help feeling that a top flight Premiership club would never dare receive such a harsh punishment. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

Luton did at least avert financial disaster last season (despite the worst that the FA could do to them), thanks to a lucrative FA Cup Fourth Round replay against Premiership opponents: Liverpool.

You know you're a Star Wars fanatic when...

You hear news about the G20 Summit at London Excel, and your first thought is that it was also the venue for SW Celebration Europe in 2007.