I ended my day in bed watching TV. Thank God for the Christmas schedules, because they throw up all kinds of nonsense and oddities. "Tales That Witness Madness" is my favourite of these, partly beacuse it's one of those films with three or four separate stories that come together at the end and partly because the title is so clumsy, yet brilliant. It used to be on every now and again and catching it by chance was a lot of fun. Then Stew bought me the video and it just didn't seem as good as I remembered. You have to catch these things by chance in the middle of the night for them to work.
A film called "Twins of Evil" was about to start. I felt this had some potential to be my new "Tales", though I'd never heard of it. Sadly I guessed I would be too tired to stay up to watch it all, even if the title promised some possibility of some kind of lurid or titillating action (possibly identical incestuous lezzing up - the best kind of lezzing up known to man. Though if you really think about it it becomes a bit distasteful and makes one ashamed to be human - which is probably what makes it so good). But I thought I'd have a look at the opening of it to see if it would be worth tuning into another Christmas.
It was a film made by the Rank Organisation (which isn't something you'd call an Organisation these days, but maybe the derogatory meaning of rank comes partly from the poor quality of its output) and so started with that fantastic ident of the muscled, oiled man banging on a gigantic gong. It felt like years since I had seen this (though it can't be really I suppose) and brought back very evocative memories of childhood years.
The moment I saw it I was back in the Kings of Wessex school hall, watching one of the monthly movies organised by the Cheddar Valley Film Club. This was in the days before videos had taken off and if you lived in a remote village like Cheddar your only real chance of seeing any reasonably recent films was either to get the bus to Weston or Wells or come along to the school on irregular Tuesday nights. I must have liked it because I felt the same twinge of excitement seeing this ident as I must have back then (and it wasn't because of the oiled man or the prospect of identical incestuous lezzing up). This was down to the wonder of cinema, even if the evenings were usually spoiled by the projector breaking down or some unruly children (usually me and my mates) making sarcastic and unfunny comments and whistling if any portion of female flesh was exposed (all the women in Cheddar at this time were coated in a thick film of dirt/manure so our excitement was understandable).
My parents were heavily involved in the organisation of the Film Club (as they were in pretty much all community activities in the district - my dad was the one who lit the bonfire for the annual witch burning), which meant they had all the catalogues from the company that rented out the films and sometimes let me go through them and help with the decision.
I remember liking this as the catalogues were illustrated and sometimes if it was a rude or saucy film there would be a picture of a lady with no bra on. My parents also had all the sweets that would go on sale in the interval kept in the house as well and I remember being agog with wonder at this bounty (literally in some case) right under my nose. My early ambition was to run a sweet shop, as I surmised correctly that if you did this you would get free sweets.
So looking back I liked the film club because it combined my life-long twin obsessions (not obsession with twins this time) of confectionary and bare ladies. I doubt they will make a UK version of Cinema Paradiso about me. But you never know.
It's strange though how one image can conjure up such long dormant memories. I had completely forgotten about those movie brochures.
Alas I was too tired to watch much of the Hammer film that was unfolding, though it did look promising (it had a witch burning at the start, so my dad would have liked it). By the time I had drifted off the twins had not yet lezzed up, or done anything evil at all, but if anyone did see it then let me know if it's worth staying up to watch all the way through next time.
It never made it to the Cheddar Valley Film Club and I'm not sure it ever will now.
