The Week in Entertainment

DVD: Absolute Power - a British series about PR/media relations starring Stephen Fry and John Bird. I admit I'd watch Fry in anything, but this is rather savage and extremely funny. (eg, the rising young comedian is filmed in an Ikea parking lot hitting his pregnant wife with a table leg. Charles (Fry) is furious; he's been working so hard and had just gotten the guy a pilot for the BBC and a gig as spokesman for a Danish furniture store. Martin, his partner, says, "Which rather begs the question: what was he doing at Ikea in the first place?")* I enjoyed seeing Gareth David-Lloyd as the Welsh footballer wanting to play for England... Also the Extras series finale - and thanks, HBO, I love your idiot notion that I know before I start whether I want the subtitles to be enabled (not on, necessarily, but able to be on). It was cool to see David Tennant - and lucky man, he didn't have to send himself up; Clive Owen was a real bastard, and a great sport. And that hard truth: "Which do you want: fame and fortune, or integrity or respect?" "Both." "There are only a handful of people in the world who have both, and you - will never be one of them." Very good ending to a very good series. The first disc of Quatermass, which was very good considering when it was made. A good '70s dystopia, with an interesting choice of a young mostly secular Jew for the second lead (see this post for my thoughts on that), accompanied by some good lines about the use of science as a home and bulwark for the otherwise outcast. And (o frabjous day!) Me and the Colonel, a Danny Kaye - Curt Jurgens film I saw years ago and loved and have never been able to find on DVD. I finally did - a Spanish one called Yo y el Coronel, but the great thing about DVDs is, they can package it up in Spanish and dub it into Spanish (and Italian and German), but the English track is still there... "Less and less I like this Jacobowsky!"

TV: The Mentalist - I do love Jane. "How dare you?!" "How dare I? Did I do something daring?" Eleventh Hour - they're pushing the original series, giving Hood a Nemesis in Gepetto; I was glad she died at the end. Caught up on Psych (their Friday the 13th episode was funny) and Leverage, both still enjoyable.

Read: Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies; this woman can certainly write. The Namesake (I enjoyed the movie) is on my 'to-read' pile and I'm going to bump it up. A Baroness Orczy collection called The Old Man in the Corner. Finished Out Stealing Horses, which was excellent, just excellent.

* no complaints about the 'incorrect' use of "begs the question", please. I didn't write the line, and anyway, that was always a crappy translation for petitio principi. kthxbai!