Christchurch with Talking Pictures TV

Saturday 14 October 2023. We motored down to Dorset for a fascinating and enjoyable weekend with Talking Pictures TV at one of their fabulous Festivals of Film.

This was being held at the art deco cinema on Christchurch's High Street, The Regent Cinema.

We had a bit of a walk down into the town centre but there was still a while before the doors officially opened so we had a wander around to take in the centre of Christchurch.

It is well served with tea shops and cafeterias, both large chains and of the family owned variety. I do prefer the family owned shops really. Give someone a posh title such as barista and it seems to result in coffee taking ten times as long to make as it should really need. I never thought there was anything wrong with a spoon of instant coffee and hot water (or preferably hot milk) being poured over the granules.

The High Street again looking up towards the Regent which is well up on the left.

We took a side street turning, seeing a signpost that read "The Castle". It brought us to this thatched building and then, peeking from behind, a Norman castle on a high motte mound.

A set of steps led up to the somewhat scant remains. I didn't attmpt the steps, doddery old chap that I now seem to have become...

Walking past the mound brought us to another set of steps that were just as easy to ignore!

On a green opposite the castle and on the banks of a narrow offshoot of the River Avon were the remains of a Norman house. That must have impressed the locals a bit when it was first built!

And finally I'll get around to the TPTV event. It was quite simply fabulous. Our lovely friend Caroline Munro was unable to be there which was a disappointment but the equally lovely Madeline Smith stepped in to co-host the event with Mike Reid. I hadn't met up with Maddy since 2006 so quite a long while, but she took one look and said "Oh, I do remember you!" which was very nice, or as Miss Franny would say: Once seen, never forgotten... I've no idea what she meant... Good to see and speak to the TPTV regulars, Noel and Sarah Cronin, comedian Mel Byron and I got to chat and exchange a bit of banter with glamourous singer Lola Lamour which earned me a flurry of blown kisses from the stage towards the end of the event. Gratefully received Lola and the black eye Miss Franny gave me is already fading...

Blackpool Town Centre Regeneration

A few photos from earlier this morning. We went into Blackpool for breakfast with Gill and Eddie and David and Jeannie and I took the camera along with me to capture the current chaos, hopefully to be short-lived and worth it!

The main road in front of St John's church, Church Street has been fenced off and the road itself and the area in front of the church which had a couple of grassed areas and a wide pavement has been taken up for re-design and relaying as part of Blackpool's town centre regeneration.

The area once had the graveyard of St John's which is Blackpool's main parish church, before the graves were moved with the creation of Layton Cemetary a mile or two out of the town centre.

Even so there had been a few graves remaining around the side of the church in Cedar Square and as workmen dug down they found an extra unexpected burial. They are trying to identify the remains, of a young woman, before reburial at Layton.

New street lighting has already been erected down Church Street with some rather strange lamp posts, that lean over so much I wonder how many non-concentrating folk will crack their heads or shoulders on them as they walk past... The lights themselves are the projection kind that I would have thought more suited to a disco than a main street and even more worrying I'm sure I read something about a "sound system" too... I may be in danger of becoming a fuddy-duddy but there's enough shops blasting music out without the town council doing it as well...!

I also took the opportunity to go down with the camera to Clifton Street to take a photo of the devastation left by the fire that destroyed Yates Wine Lodge and the surrounding shops a few weeks ago. They reckon it will take 18 months before the buildings will finally be replaced and the street back to normal.

I well remember the old Tivoli Cinema above Yates Wine Lodge. My Dad and I went to see a horror film there once - Ernest Borgnine in "The Devil's Rain" which had a superb twist at the end and a really scary part in the middle - a rat ran over my foot!

Return to Blackpool Town Index Page

Memories of Home Movies

The other day Mum rang up and after the usual family news and so on, said she had been doing a rummage and had found Dad's old cine camera.

My thoughts went at first to our Super 8 zoom camera but when I went round a couple of days later it turned out to be the old Standard 8 camera he had and made films of me as a baby!

It was a Dekko camera with a clockwork mechanism and he had both telephoto and wide-angle lenses for it besides the standard one. The telephoto lens is shown with here.

The real surprise came when I opened the back of the camera only to find there was an exposed film in it. The camera took a 25 foot spool of 16mm film but only exposed half the width. When the spool had been used up you reversed it to expose the other half. After the film was processed it was split centrally along its length and the two halves joined to form 50 feet of film lasting approx 4 minutes at 18 frames per second.

Now my problem is - were both sides of the film exposed or just one? And will I be able to get it processed as the odds are for it having been a pre-paid processed film and of course the envelope to send it away has long since been lost! Well, that's my challenge for this next week!

Return to Technology Index Page

Mark Redfield - Cold Harbor

A while ago, you may remember I bumped into actor and director Mark Redfield in Manchester at the Festival of Fantastic Films.

Mark is currently involved in a film project The Tell Tale Heart, an Edgar Allan Poe tale.

Whilst we were chatting in Manchester he very kindly gave me a copy of a Tom Brandau film, Cold Harbor, which he not only starred in but also produced.

I watched this quite late one night and this turned out to be an excellent move as the film draws you in. It deals with four brothers who have just lost their father through suicide, as they journey to the quiet seaside community where he lived and set about emptying his house.

As they do so they must each come to terms with their relationships to each other and their different recollections and relationships to their father. This is most certainly a reflective drama not a gung-ho action blast and it just suited my mood as I watched.

The film has a realistic gritty feel to it too. There are some quite atmospheric moments where I thought I was being set up for a "horror moment", but then in real life things like that don't happen too often. Even in the scene where the brothers decide to symbolically burn their father's boat, the temptation to go over the top with pyrotechnics is resisted, leaving a far more realistic scene and probably my favourite moment in the film as each of the brothers reflects and you can't help but be there with them, sharing - even helping create - what is going through their minds.

There are moments of humour and tension particularly as the second brother determines to steal the suicide note from the police station and the others create a diversion.

Described as "intense and moody" this film won't have you on the edge of your seat throughout, but you will be involved!

Harry Potter 6 Filming

I see that filming for the 6th Harry Potter film has started in Laycock. I was close by in 2006 and went to have a look. The village in Wiltshire is wonderful. Although there were a few cars parked when I went, there are no yellow lines, street lamp posts, television aerials so it has the look and feel of an olde English village - which of course it is.

At Laycock Abbey, Fox Talbot was one of the pioneers inventing photographic processes - anyone who takes photos today does it because of the work of men like him. The National Trust own the place now.

There's plenty of action in the 6th book, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, so much information came out in that book that we wonder whether the film will be about 5 hours long if it's going to have a chance of being understandable to people who haven't read the book.

But then again I thought that was one of the faults with the 5th film, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. There was so much information to get across it ended up being full of dialogue and not enough action.

Before IMAX came Cinema USA

It was a busy day yesterday for people leaving comments against my Blackpool photos at Flickr. (no longer online) Someone mentioned the old Cinema USA on the Pleasure Beach and, although I haven't any photos of it there I knew there was one of it on the Central Pier somewhere.

A bit of rooting through the computer came up with this. Taken in 1981 this shows the Cinema USA dome. Inside, a film was shown with the normal eye-line way above the normal horizon. There were no seats so you stood looking upwards which threw you off balance a bit to start with. The films were of the fast motion variety - a ride in a Porsche, a roller coaster ride, a helicopter over a gorge etc. People would sway or even lurch sideways watching the film. I seem to remember the odd one in 3D too. They were a pre-cursor to Imax.

It is now the site of a Big Wheel. Almost immediately after uploading the photo to Flickr (still no longer online), a comment appeared against it from "Yorkie", an ex-pat living in America.

"There's a similar attraction still operating in Canobie Lake Park in New Hampshire, and though the film has definitely faded over the years they're still showing the same footage you describe ..."http://www.flickr.com/photos/yorkie/tags/cinema180/ "Love your old shots of Blackpool, John!"

Cheers, Yorkie! The link in Yorkie's message is to his photograph taken inside the dome he mentions showing a film that has decidedly yellowed with age!

Return to Blackpool Central Pier Index Page

The Tell-Tale Heart

I was talking to the two ladies featured on the previous post when a familiar figure thrust a hand out to shake mine and said "Is it John?"

It was the American actor and director Mark Redfield, one of whose latest and current projects is a film called "The Tell-Tale Heart" which I have mentioned before as it stars Ingrid Pitt, pairing this great horror film actress with none other than Count Yorga himself, Robert Quarry.

Whilst we had only ever met online before, we were soon happily engrossed in a conversation about the new movie which is set in the dark times just after America's Civil War. Ingrid is set to head off to America for filming in October, then she has a very important birthday coming up. It sounds like there will be lots of famous people at that party! Then it's back to the USA for a bit more work on the film and with fingers crossed we should be able to watch it some time next year!

More as I get to hear it!

Festival of Fantastic Films

I'm sorry - I can't help the grin!

But, be honest, if you were sitting with two famous movie stars from both Hammer Horrors and James Bond then I rather think a grin might come over your face too! On the left is Martine Beswick, one of the fighting gypsies from "From Russia With Love", a helping agent in "Thunderball", star of "Prehistoric Women", "Dr Jeckyl and Sister Hyde", Raquel Welch's rival in "One Million Years BC" and many more.

On the right is Caroline Munro, a friend for an incredible ten years, the helicopter girl from "The Spy Who Loved Me", star of "The Golden Voyage of Sinbad", "Captain Kronus, Vampire Hunter", "Starcrash", Dracula victim from "Dracula AD 1972", the model from the Lamb's Navy Rum posters of the 1970s and 80s, and though she looks far too young, the "Face of 1966", the competition that started her career.

It has been a rather wonderful day...!

What? What do you talk about with such people? Er... dreaming of flying was one of the topics... Oh come on - yes you do...!

Get Well Soon!

That's the message going to my lovely friend Ingrid Pitt, star of numerous films including Where Eagles Dare, The Vampire Lovers, Countess Dracula, The Whicker Man etc.

Ingrid has endured yet more surgery and is trying her best to get up and about whether the doctors want her to or not ...

Be a patient patient, Flower and we'll come down and see you soon!

Sunday in London

Well I got to London on time - Virgin Trains actually got in a little early although it was a long journey compared to the more usual weekday one! We went via Coventry and all round the houses it seemed.

Met up with Fran and Gill on Trafalgar Square where they were resting their feet and getting splashed by the spray from the fountain every time the wind blew their way. They didn't have a great deal of time with me as they have to get over to Stansted for their flight back. Why oh why are Ryanair stopping their Blackpool/Stansted flights? Doesn't seem to make sense, every time I've been on them they have been very nearly full and over the past few years I've used them quite a bit!

When you consider the cost of train fares if you have to book close to the date of travelling, being able to get a flight and then be in London by 10:00am was brilliant! Even considering the train to and from Stansted-Liverpool St station, it was still less than half the price of Virgin's fare.

We had a trundle up Regent Street and into the big HMV on Oxford Street where I was delighted to find at last a DVD of "Prehistoric Women", a Hammer film starring the lovely Martine Beswick as a queen of a tribe of women stumbled upon by Michael Latimer. I've met Martine several times over the last few years, she was a Miss Jamaica, a stunning beauty in the 1960s (and not at all hard on the eyes now!) who starred in several of Hammer's films and a couple of Bond films; "From Russia With Love" as a fighting gypsy girl and "Thunderball" as one of Bond's doomed helpers! Anyway, I've never watched this film before so I will enjoy that once I get home again!

A relaxing night in store I think - chance to finish my book, the 10th in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. And yes... I did bring No.11 with me!

New Film for Ingrid Pitt?

The American horror magazine Fangoria has announced a new film planned for Ingrid Pitt which would team her with Count Yorga's Robert Quarry. Count Yorga and our own Countess Dracula - now that's a horror team-up!

The film is a new version of Edgar Allan Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart and is due to film in Baltimore and Los Angeles in July under the direction of Mark Redfield who will also star in the film.

The Fangoria article is available online in full.

Ingrid Pitt's Newsletter

Ingrid's Spring Newsletter has just dropped through the letterbox today.

It has some news of a few events coming up - seems some Americans are coming over for a tour of our haunted mansions and manors sometime in September and want to fete our heroine! Hopefully not a fete worse than death... indeed not as they are dedicating their final night party to Ingrid! Ingrid's managed to get the ok for fan club members to attend! You'll need to ask her about it though, not me.

November's Fright Night event in Sheffield looks like being a two day night this year with a fancy dress parade, a dinner and a dealers' room.

Ingrid gives the horror story about her recent change of computer and there's an article about Memorabilia written by moi. She also mentions introducing me to Hazel O'Connor so we could "natter about music". She says "I think John enjoyed it." Yes he did actually!

April Memorabilia Show, 2007

Hazel O'Connor and Ingrid Pitt

Actress and singer, Hazel O'Connor (the film "Breaking Glass" gave her punk rock status and hits such as "Eighth Day" and "Will You") catches up with actress and writer Ingrid Pitt. Ingrid is best known for Hammer Horror roles in "The Vampire Lovers" and "Countess Dracula" but has an impressive string of movies including a debut in mainstream movies as the lovely Heidi in "Where Eagles Dare" starring Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood.

I met up with them at the Memorabilia Show, held this weekend at the NEC in Birmingham. I've been friends with Ingrid for ten years but it was the first time I've met Hazel, whose first Memorabilia appearance this was. I've always said I don't have favourite artistes, as every song has to stand on its own merits, but Hazel's "Will You" would be in my top ten of best ever musical recordings!

I also caught up again with Toyah Willcox and owe her a debt of thanks. Fran took a photo as we were talking and she said "Take it again - I probably look all gobby!" Anyway Toyah, you looked fine but I look like a complete prat in it... The second one has been added to the Celebrities set at my Flickr site (no longer available) along with others of Dr Who, Colin Baker, helper Deborah Watling, and me with Hazel and Ingrid. The first one will never see the light of day!

Ah, and thanks to Ingrid who enthusiastically told all these successful singing artistes that I was a "fabulous singer"... Yep - 35 years on now so it can't be long before I become an overnight success...

Hobnobbing with Celebrities

I've added an album of photos of myself with some celebrity friends to my Picasa site.

Bond Girls Caroline Munro, Martine Beswick, Tanya Roberts, Britt Ekland, Carole Ashby and more, Hammer Horror stars Ingrid Pitt, Madeline Smith, singers Toyah Wilcox and John Leyton and a few other assorted people!

Since this post was originally published the album has been taken down, sorry! There's several of the photos elsewhere on the blog though - click the link below for topic "Celebrity"