Captain Purplehead

So, part 1 dealt with music, so there’s no real reason to revisit it. Yes, there are things I wish I’d said and didn’t but there’s always next year.
Part 2 will deal with two parts of the Christmas formula. Movies will be discussed and ravaged later but we will start, briefly, with the dreaded Christmas work do.
If you live in Ireland you’ll know and recognise our antiquated style of management, largely built on cronyism, obsequiousness and the odd outdated American management manual. Y’know, the kind of one written by a real go-getter back in the 80’s. There are some excellent people managers whom I have worked, and continue to work with, but there are also some pitifully awful pieces of shit who have not one clue about management. They fall into two categories: Those who are still craving parental approval and those who got way too much of it. They are aloof and snotty and are thoroughly detestable human beings who will live their pointless lives and never even question if they could have actually done something constructive with them. I recently had a chat about percentages with one of them that was akin to the “small. Far away” lecture that Father Ted gave Doughal.
Believe me, I could go on ad nauseum about these little fucking arse licking idiots but the point is that every year, you are expected to go out with these people, socialise with them and, very likely, get drunk with them. How anyone thinks this is a good idea is beyond me. You will invariably have the two who drunkenly jump each other’s bones and regret it the following morning, the moronic, unrealistic and stupidly dressed woman, who starts crying about the state of her relationship and you just know that she will gravitate towards you, because you are the one person trying not to get involved, you’re trying to be invisible so you can maybe slip away and join your mates somewhere. It’s fine if you go out with the people you immediately work with. They have probably become mates but the Christmas work do should be banned. They are normally tacky and unnecessary affairs that cost too much money and are invariably disappointing and embarrassing.
Right, now that that’s out of the way, we make our way towards TV movie scheduling for Christmas. Willy Wonka, It’s a Wonderful Life, The Champ, The Great Escape, Titanic, ET, Die Hard, A plethora of James Bond movies, Little Women and, of course, Star Wars, will all feature heavily in the Christmas schedule. You will be able to see some of them more than once, should you have the urge for repeated punishment.
Most of these movies have very little to do with Christmas, yet they pick them every fucking year. Why is that? Why show the fucking squirm-fest that is Titanic at a time when we’re all supposed to be happy and getting along? This is a three hour movie about a love affair between two nauseating characters that just happens to have the Titanic as a backdrop. A Night To Remember is a far superior film and they had none of the special effects technology open to James Cameron. He had a chance to tell a powerful story about a tragedy the many of us are fascinated with but he fucked it up. What’ll he think of next, Dances With Wolves in Space… oh, wait a second…
The Great Escape is an excellent, if slightly flawed, movie about actual events and I’ll admit I look forward to seeing it when it’s on. I still don’t know why they choose Christmas to show this film but that’s fine.
Star Wars is a great trilogy. The original had everything; space, fascism, good vs evil, heroes, villains, latent incestuous longing and colouredy swords. That’s all well and good. I don’t subscribe to the belief that these are amongst the best ever made, though. As a kid I loved them. Then that fucking wanker, George Lucas decided to milk the cash cow and make prequels to the original. That’s actually ok as a concept, there were some unresolved issues. I mean, Darth Vader suddenly becomes a good guy right before he pops his clogs and they all meet up in the afterlife for a bit of a party and a natter and it never quite made sense to me. The prequels go into exhaustive detail about his fall from goodie to baddie. The problem with the prequels is that they are such unbelievable shit, I wanted to go to George Lucas’ house and bludgeon him with Spielberg’s severed arm. He basically tied me to a chair, held my eyes open with matches and made me watch as he smeared his own shit all over my childhood. As I squirmed and wailed, he laughed maniacally, scooping another handful directly from his fat, hairy hole and happily applied it to those precious memories I had held so dear. Fuck you, Lucas, you fucking knobhead!
Have we become so enslaved to formula that we actually yearn for it? I remember years ago, hearing someone complain that they weren’t showing Willy Wonka that year. WHAT? Who fucking cares about Willy fucking Wonka! Wait until next year or buy the fucking DVD!
We live in a time when originality is in criminally short supply. In music, it is beginning to show signs of life again but those signs are very faint and, if Darth Walsh finds out, he’ll wipe it out entirely. Movies, however, are dying on the vine. Everything’s a remake, a sequel, a prequel or a bad rendering of a comic book hero. Yet, we lap it up. I recently read a book by Thomas Harris called Fatherland, that would make a great movie but they won’t make it. Yes, there are some exceptions that give us hope but they are very few. In fact, the only truly reliable director these days is Clint Eastwood. He is, in fact, the only remaining superstar on the planet.
Look at what they’ve stolen from us. Vampires are now lovely people in search of true love and loveliness, for fuck’s sake. It used to be that, if you had a poster of a vampire in your bedroom, you weird. Now it’s fucking normal. How did this happen. What’s next? Derek and Peggy – a Zombie Love Story. (Love never dies, even for the undead). Sweet suffering fuck!
So, now that you’ve read this, scurry away and lap up your formula and live in the nice bubble with the message emblazoned upon it, “DON’T WORRY, NOTHING WILL EVER CHANGE”. To quote John McClane in Die Hard, “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem, buddy”.
So, to finish, I genuinely wish you all a happy and peaceful Christmas and a truly great New Year, it probably won’t happen, but I hope it does. Hey, why don’t you give yourself a real present this Christmas and try something different.