No geek
is an island

Apropos of nothing, I thought I’d mention one of those passing (and very tenuous) Doctor Who/Liberal Party connections that one comes across from time to time.

Henry Ainley was well known on the London stage at the beginning of the twentieth century. He made a few early ilms, including a silent version of The Prisoner of Zenda and As You Like It in 1936 (pictured right), his final film, which starred a young Laurence Olivier (with whom, it’s been claimed, Ainley had a brief fling) and John Laurie, who would later join Dad’s Army. Ainley grew up in Morley, Leeds and had several children, one of whom was Anthony Ainley, best known as the Master in 1980s Doctor Who (and was the first panellist I ever saw at a Who convention).

Also from Morley was sometime Liberal Prime Minister Herbert Asquith. Asquith lost his East Fife seat in the 1918 General Election but returned to the Commons in a 1920 by-election in Paisley. After that victory, Ainley sent him the following note:

This letter needs no acknowledgment please; it is merely a thanksgiving of congratulation from one Morley man to another; “the Lord hath wrought great glory.”

Google tells me the quote is from Ecclesiasticus, chapter 44. Ainley also performed a poem by Asquith’s son Herbert on BBC Radio in 1931.

Today, I am mostly channelling Jonathan Calder.

I was flicking through one of our journals at work - Computing, I think - and noticed a reference on the contents page to an article about the IT implications of police force mergers was accompanied by a photo of John Nettles captioned “Mergerac”.

When I got to the article in question, the same photo had been used again - captioned “Midsomer Mergers”.

You, er, probably had to be there…

Another smoking-related incident, which I omitted to mention in my previous post. On the way in to Haymarket station, I was handed a card advertising a “smoking cessation” service. This card apparently entitles me to £20 off my first session, which made me wonder how expensive a session must be if they can afford to knock £20 quid off the price. A check on the website tells me that the usual price is £220! Maybe that’s a good deal if you’re currently buying several packets of fags a week. We can add quit smoking services to signwriters as an industry that will benefit from the ban.

I also received an email yesterday advertising a sports centre and telling me that:

New legislation requires everyone to stop smoking in enclosed places.
As an alternative to smoking why not try exercise.

Yes, instead of stepping outside for five minutes to have a ciggie, why not travel across the city to the sports centre for some circuit training. In other news:

New legislation requires everyone to stop glorifying terrorism.
As an alternative to glorifying terrorism why not try knitting.

One of my concerns about the smoking ban in Scotland, which comes in force on Sunday, is the prescriptive regulations being placed on businesses. They are required to display non-smoking signs meeting statute-set criteria for size and content. Given that the vast majority of workplaces will be non-smoking, it might have been less burdensome to require smoking areas to be signposted. This regulation requires employers to be aware of the new law; why can’t the same requirement be placed on members of the public? Shops don’t, after all, have to put up signs saying, “No stealing” - some do, of course (”Shoplifters will be prosecuted”, etc.), but that’s their choice. Workplaces like my own, which were already non-smoking, will now have to display signs even though their status hasn’t changed. This applies to all workplaces that are covered by the legislation - so if you’re a partnership, neither of you smoke and you’re the only people using your office, you’re still required to display these signs (and needless to say that even if both of you smoke, you have to go outside your office to do it).

I spotted one such No Smoking sign outside a shop on Dalry Road as I walked to the station this evening. It was a signwriter’s, showing off their wares. At least that’s one type of business that will benefit from the ban.

As usual when I arrived on the platform at Haymarket I had to walk through the smoke of the two women who insist on standing at the end of the bridge smoking. I wonder I’ll find the law being enforced at the same time on Monday.

Finally, and apologies for being lavatorial, but there has been one positive change at Haymarket already. The gents toilets, which were pretty rank, have had the floor resurfaced. They’re still not that pleasant, but it’s an improvement at least. First Scotrail - for I assume it was them - do at least seem to be making an effort.

The answers to my Star Wars/Doctor Who puzzler then.

Nick correctly identified Leslie Schofield (Caleb in The Face of Evil and Leroy in The War Games), Don Henderson (Gavrok in Delta and the Bannermen), Dave Prowse (the Minotaur in The Time Monster) in the Vader costume, and Peter Cushing, who played Dr. Who in the two 1960s Dalek films.

The other Who actor in the scene - which I only discovered while checking my facts before putting this up - is Cy Town, who plays one of the guards (”Imperial Trooper Guard Tajis Durmin”, apparently) and has an absolutely massive list of Doctor Who credits, albeit many of them uncredited. He was a Dalek operator in every Dalek story from Frontier in Space to Remembrance of the Daleks, and was also in Spearhead from Space, The Silurians, Inferno, The Three Doctors, Invasion of the Dinosaurs, The Android Invasion, Revenge of the Cybermen, The Masque of Mandragora, The Invisible Enemy, The Sun Makers, Castrovalva, Enlightenment, Attack of the Cybermen, The Happiness Patrol, and The Curse of Fenric. And he gets extra points for playing, uncredited, a technician in the last episode of Blake’s 7.

Went to see V for Vendetta last night, which was good fun. I almost didn’t go, after reading a slagging of it by Peter Bradshaw in theguardian. Then I remembered that Bradshaw also gave Revenge of the Sith a preposterous one star and decided to ignore him - and I’m glad I did.

Some of V’s core message - which is equally critical of authoritarian government and a population that allows it - is less than subtle, but it is well-timed.

There are some minor quibbles: the backstory isn’t well explained, leaving us watching the police investigate an apparently crucial mass murder we’ve been told little about; having John Hurt - who is typically good as the High Chancellor - also play an actor who is lampooning the High Chancellor is a recipe for audience confusion; and the Underground station used to illustrate mass Tube closures is Strand, which has been shut for donkeys years. Oh, and a very minor complaint: V’s Wurlitzer jukebox clearly doesn’t hold the 872 songs he claims - it looks like it takes around two to three hundred at most. I was concerned that V’s mask would make it hard for his personality to come across, but Hugo Weaving (previously Elrond in The Lord of the Rings and a drag queen in Priscilla, Queen of the Desert) does an excellent job of carrying the character in his voice.

Typically for Hollywood, while the villains are English, the actors playing the heroes are not: Weaving is Australian, Natalie Portman is American, and Stephen Rea, who plays the chief inspector (who, for unexplained reasons, appears to be part of the High Chancellor’s kitchen cabinet) is Irish, as is Sinéad Cusack, the only sympathetic one of V’s tormentors. Portman just about manages to pass herself off as English, although her accent, while not a Thurman or a Van Dyke, leaves a little to be desired; Rea seems to be playing his character as a Yorkshireman, but this accent comes and goes. Given that the dialogue states that his mother was Irish, perhaps he should’ve stuck with his natural voice.

It was great to see such a range of British acting talent though. Hurt’s number two is played by Tim Piggott-Smith (I didn’t recognise him at first), who is best known for The Jewel in the Crown, but was also in the Doctor Who story The Masque of Mandragora. Ben Miles from Coupling (with a really bad haircut), Rupert Graves (last seen as a far right MP in Spooks) and John Standing, whose many roles include in the Avengers episode School for Traitors.

Rea is good, and much better than in the last thing I saw him, an episode of 1970s Brian Clemens anthology series Thriller calling K is for Killing (Cusack appeared, incidentally, in the episode The Eyes Have It). The man of the match award, though, goes to Stephen Fry, whose performance as Gordon Dietrich was charismatic, nuanced and thoroughly winning.

The use of familiar London locations for the finale makes it all the more powerful. I must confess to a guilty enjoyment of the pyrotechnics when V attacks establishment landmarks - I’ll put it down to an appreciation of the spectacular effects.

It’s not a great film, and I’m not familiar with the comic so I can’t comment on the truthfulness of the adaptation, but it is enjoyable and effectively directed with no major flaws. Its message, that handing power to governments in response to fear is not a good idea, is summed up in V’s motto:

People should not be afraid of their governments, governments should be afraid of their people.

Those in favour of ID cards and authoritarian terror laws would do well to see it.