Plug-o-rama!

Lots of brilliant people have been making so many great films and podcasts and magazines recently that I thought a little wanton pulgging was in order. On that note…

First up is Barry. A short film, written by Rupert Raby and directed by John Michell:

Ella is seven. Her best friend is the best friend a girl could have: Barry. Her rabbit. They don’t care what other girls say about them.  They like to spend days in the park, having picnics, sharing secrets and dreams of escaping. But how can she when her dad’s best friend was once her’s too?

The Barry crew are currently trying to raise funds, they’re about half way there so help them out. It’s bound to be good and if you’re generous enough you get to go to the premier!

The Invisible Tour Guide is bonkers and genuinely, rib-ticklingly hilarious, with a full complement of silly voices, crazy twisting plots and wonderful characters. Oh, I should probably say that it’s a podcast (one of the many that’s kept me going over the past month of exams/project deadlines). The first five episodes were followed up by an old timey radio play:

‘Behind the Tour Guide’ is an imaginary documentary following two weeks in the life of world renowned expert, imaginary Professor Byron Frump, as he battles a tricky conspiracy involving 11 foot tall aliens from the Bacchanalian dimension, the grand inquisitor of the Royal Society, and an Italian masquerading as a ladies unmentionables millionaire.

Catch up with episodes 1 to 5 and the Behind the Tour Guide show by subscribing.

Coming soon is EXIT Magazine. It’s very mysterious and very good. It’ll be around in the last week of May. But for now I can’t say any more. (Disclaimer: I wrote an article Exit)

Also coming soon is Pinpoint Radio, another great podcast this time by a bunch of fantastic broadcast journalism students. It will feature radio documentaries, magazine shows and more great talk radio. (Another disclaimer: I produced some of these shows)

Waveriders

If a blockbuster thriller is a large chocolate milkshake, a documentary about surfing in Ireland is a surely tall glass of orange juice. Well that was how my cinema going accomplice described it. But is Waveriders pure-pressed goodness or is it just a brackish SunnyD knock-off?

Well for the fact that it’s an Irish feature length documentary that managed to get a cinema release, and that it’s about a pretty obscure yet interesting topic, it deserves a certain amount of praise. And with that qualifier I bet your now waiting for me to now pull it apart or embark on a scathing scene by scene deconstruction of its cinematography. Or maybe not. Anyway I’ll just try to lay it out as straight as I can:

There’s really no avoiding it, Waveriders was disjointed and unfocused. It felt like a documentary in three parts. Its opening subject was George Freeth and the origins of the modern sport. It then veered into a segment about Kevin Naughton and his surfing-exploration contributions to Surfer magazine in the ’60s and ’70s. Then finally (with a small and puzzling detour into the world or professional surfing and an interview with Kelly Slater – seemingly inserted because Slater happened to be surfing in Ireland at the time the film was made) it phased into a final section about the Malloy brothers, soul surfing and big wave hunting off the west coast.

Now don’t get me wrong, I found all these different parts really interesting in themselves. Freeth’s story, the “brown Mercury” with all the power of the sea in his winged heels (Jack London’s description – not mine), is fascinating for its pioneer spirit. Naughton’s career as a travel writer and surfing explorer, which in way opened up to world to surfing, is just as interesting. And the final third section of the film which sees the Malloy brothers, Richard Fitzgerald and Gabe Davies riding some terrifyingly enormous waves off the coast of Antrim and Donegal is simply amazing.

When it’s all put together though it lacks coherency. The point it’s trying to make is that surfing, the modern sport – not the pastime of Hawaiian kings, has had an Irish connection throughout its development from the very start (Freeth, Naughton, the Malloy’s were all descendants of Irish immigrants). And that because of its recent popularity in Ireland, especially on the west coast, in recent times it has experienced a sort of homecoming. I’m still not sure of the validity of that point but I’ll concede it for now. What’s more importantly for this documentary is that the point gets obscured as the more interesting stories are developed.

The result is that Waveriders seems muddled, but despite its problems it’s worth going to see. Maybe it’s not pure orange juice, but it could be tropical juice – it’s not really sure what it’s made of, or what it’s supposed to be, but it sure is tasty and refreshing.

Yes Man

About three summers ago some strange things happened. It all began when I called round to a friend’s house to find him mailing a passport photo of himself to someone called Danny Wallace, so that he could join his cult. Considering he’s usually a pretty level headed guy, I found it a little disturbing that he was willing to send photos of himself to a total stranger, a cult-leader at that. Specifically so that he could join this cult. Very odd behaviour. Naturally I asked him what the hell was he doing. He replied “don’t worry it’s not really a cult, it’s more like a collective” and chucked a book at me called Join Me. It was written by this sinister Wallace fellow.

So while he was messing with stamps and envelopes, I humoured him and began to flick through Join Me to find out what this Wallace chap was up to. Mass-suicide? Midnight witchery? A voyage to re-connect with our extraterrestrial masters?

Not exactly…

In fact, it seemed that at first he didn’t really want to plan anything at all. He just wanted people to ‘join him’ by sending him a small photo of themselves. And this book, Join Me, wasn’t so much a call to arms or a manifesto, but more of a memoir of how Danny Wallace apparently managed to convince thousands of people to join his collective and eventually spread good karma every Friday by performing one act of random kindness towards strangers. I spent the following night and day reading Join Me. I couldn’t put it down, it was fantastically funny, suspenseful, cringe-worthy and fascinating. Sure it was no crowning achievement of the English language, but it was impossible to stop reading.

Once I’d finished it I needed more. I swiftly picked up a copy of Yes Man and also moved on to the books of his partner-in-crime Dave Gorman, Googlewack and Are You Dave Gorman? But it was Yes Man though that really rocked the boat. Disillusioned with his increasing hermit resembling existence he undertook a mission to answer yes to any yes/no question he was asked for six months. The sheer insanity of this ambition as it played out was astounding. It started with a confused cold-caller trying to sell him double glazing and ended up with Wallace hopping all across the face of the planet following his quest. His adventure exposed to him to the whims of anyone he interacted with and yet at the same time it was marvellously hilarious. Yes Man captured my imagination so much that I undertook a number boy-projects myself (boy-projects is how Wallace’s long-suffering girlfriend bitterly described them). Some remnants of these are still online, here and here.

Since then Wallace has done a number of TV shows, and just recently published a new book Friends Like These. In the meantime Yes Man has been turned into a Hollywood movie. It’s still in production but Jim Carey will play Wallace and Zooey Deschanel will play the female lead Renee Allison (since character names have been changed from the book I guess she’ll be playing Hanne, Wallace’s ex-girlfriend). I’ve liked both of these actors in the past but I can’t help feeling their going to ham it up. It fact I think as an American production the nature of this eccentric and distinctly British comedy will change, probably for the worse. Even Wallace, as he has written over on his page, seems to be in on the changes to the original story that will inevitably take place:

“I saw a first cut last month and loved it… plus, I’ve written a whole new chapter for the tie-in edition of the book that’ll be coming out in December, with Jim’s beaming face on the cover…”

Either way the film will be out on December 19th. I know I don’t really want to see it, but I probably will anyway for nostalgia’s sake. In the meantime I’m going to start reading Yes Man all over again…