Best Of

BTW for all Colonel Blimp fans/detractors, I saw today that it’s on iPlayer.

It is a brilliant film, well worth a watch, not just in its technique but also for its positive depiction of the Germans in a wartime film. General Winstanley comes over as out dated, but always as likeable, loyal and kind hearted.

It’s definitely one of my all time top films. “Blimp” always reminds me of one of my grandfathers and old school headmasters with the combination of discipline, good heart and no-nonsense.

It’s actually quite a sad film when you think about the evolution of the characters, youth to age, superiority to being broken, useful to mocked as useless.

Blimp is a great film, but isn’t the end quite philosophical, the arc of a life with all that entails, and some wisdom gained?

Absolutely. It touches on the disdain for experience where he is seen as a crackpot and mocked by the younger soldiers but it’s sad in how it compresses the life of a young thrusting chap with all ahead of him and friendships and relationships damaged or disrupted by war and time. The arc of his German adversary, friend is particularly profound in his change from utter Prussian confidence to being broken and relying on the kindness and hospitality of former enemies is wonderful but tragic.

https://x.com/johnrentoul/status/2035323538601636006

British politics in a nutshell, by @mrianleslie ian-leslie.com/p/against-intr…

I’m quite confident Sir Keir will outlast May.

You're more likely to be right than wrong, but only because a leadership election called in May would not be decided until June or July depending on the timetable, and Starmer's political instincts are so lousy that he might choose to contest the election rather than stand down in the face of the inevitable. He needs zero nominations from MPs to be on the ballot paper.

My view of things is:

He won’t be challenged at all. And he’ll quit of his own accord in 2027/2028.

But if he is challenged, he will quit.

BTW for all Colonel Blimp fans/detractors, I saw today that it’s on iPlayer.

It is a brilliant film, well worth a watch, not just in its technique but also for its positive depiction of the Germans in a wartime film. General Winstanley comes over as out dated, but always as likeable, loyal and kind hearted.

It’s definitely one of my all time top films. “Blimp” always reminds me of one of my grandfathers and old school headmasters with the combination of discipline, good heart and no-nonsense.

It’s actually quite a sad film when you think about the evolution of the characters, youth to age, superiority to being broken, useful to mocked as useless.

Blimp is a great film, but isn’t the end quite philosophical, the arc of a life with all that entails, and some wisdom gained?