Feeling As Hoagy As A Carmichael

Another bad night's sleep but this time no drawing. For some reason, my heart hasn't been into it. For a few days (perhaps even weeks, if I'm honest) I keep starting cartoons and I find that my energy just isn't there to finish them. I blame this throat infection, which feels a little better in so far as it now feels more like a heavy cold but also makes me feel worse because it's now more like a heavy cold. The Strepsils have been working but I'm not convinced they don't give me mild insomnia. I find I'm full of energy at about 5am.

Another bad night's sleep and a lost hour due to the clocks going forward means that I'm behind with everything and especially the news.

Interesting to see the Tory infighting has already started with IDS suggesting the Cameron will be forced to quit early. I thought Cameron's 'no third term' an odd confession to make but because of one point that I've not seen mentioned in the media. If Cameron doesn't intend to stand for a third term, there's nothing to stop him promising the earth at this election. Politicians are programmed to ensure they never box themselves in. They hate to rule things in or out lest it come back to bite them when next they need the public's vote. If this really is Cameron's last election, can it be any surprise that he's already promising us a 7 day NHS when the 5 day NHS is broken to buggery?

Loved how gloomy and literate 'Spectre' is looking: 'You're like a kite dancing in a hurricane, Mr. Bond'... Great writing. Hated the media attacking Sir Roger Moore for saying something that I believe many Bond fans would say. I think it's a sign of a largely white paranoia about issues of race that nothing can be debated without immediate accusations of bigotry. It's precisely why UKIP already have such a strong hold in politics.

I'm sure the first black Bond will come and perhaps he/she will be a revelation. I've never been a fan of any Bond who looks unlike the Fleming model which was Hoagy Carmichael. Much as I love the Craig movies, the blond Bond is not really James Bond in my eyes. So, given I've watched and enjoyed movies that have moved away from the canon, would it matter if they changed his ethnicity or even his gender? Hamlet was recently being played by a woman in Manchester and it was supposedly a great success.

I feel too ill to argue otherwise. I'm too ill to argue why we should cherish our cultural icons. Would it matter if in the next adaptation of Sherlock Holmes the BBC turned him into an Eskimo woman? Perhaps not. It depends on the execution but, really, even if it were great (and, oddly, I can imagine it might be great) it wouldn't be Sherlock Holmes. It would be a pastiche of Holmes, something like Sherlock Holmes but very different to Sherlock Holmes. It I were a fan of DC Comic (I'm not) I'd probably be shocked by the New 52 relaunch of their major titles in which they've changed everything, turning Thor into a woman and Superman into an angry young man. The market will ultimately decide these things. We live in a mash-up culture and nothing is sacred except the mighty dollar.

More Stars With Old Heads On Their Younger Bodies

[caption id="attachment_4260" align="alignright" width="271" class=" "] Tom Jones[/caption]

There's an inherent cruelty to this stunt. I'm aware of that and it does make me occasionally tut and hiss when one of these mashups come out and it doesn't look particularly flattering to the subject. I know this little game is meant to be (somewhat) funny but I'm not a naturally cruel guy and, I admit, I've made a couple of these that I just didn't think it worth showing because they were simply too cruel.

The difficulty is particularly acute on photographs of actresses and the fact that I feel bad about the results for actresses I've attempted this with (but haven't published) perhaps says something about my own perceptions of beauty. The gentlemen in most of these photographs don't look too bad. In fact, I think the last few blog posts back up something I've always said about generic Hollywood actors: that they generally look better as they get older. Of course, 'better' is subjective and perhaps what I mean to say is 'more interesting'. I preferred Clint Eastwood's movies when he got older. My favourite actor, Gene Hackman, got better the more he aged. Not that he was classic film star material to begin with but that is one of the reasons I'd always watch him. The same is true of Piece Brosnan, who made better films once he was too old to play James Bond. This also happened to Sean Connery, who made some truly great films once he turned grey. Liam Neeson is an example of a star who found real fame once he got older. Walter Matthau, another of my absolute favourite actors, was old the moment he was born but that was his appeal. If you're not watching a movie to admire the looks of the actor, then there's little or no point making you lead actor good looking. Dare I say even Brad Pitt will find more interesting roles now he's hit 50? Every day I wish Connery or Hackman would come out of retirement because I'm damn sure they'd still be more compelling to watch than half the actors I've had to endure in recent films.

What I think these experiments show is that Hollywood is stupidly obsessed with bland, tediously fresh-faced youth. I know Mel Gibson has done some dumb things in his life and I know there are many people out there that still won't accept his apologies. Yet the films he's made recently are, in my humble opinion, the best of his career. He is in that perfect zone that Clint Eastwood made his own as he got older. Give me Payback (1999), We Were Soldiers (2002), Edge of Darkness (2010), or the brilliant Get the Gringo (2012) over any of the Lethal Weapon movies or even, for that matter, Mad Max 1, 2, or 3.



The deeper truth, I think, is more troublesome. It's probably a trite thing to say and now doubt it has been said countless times before, but there's such a disparity between how we think of actors when they get older and actresses. I don't know who first pointed out that as some men get older they become more distinguished yet there isn't an equivalent for women. That, I think, is where feminism has been completely powerless in facing down that deep bias in our collectively psychology. It doesn't suggest that we are wrong in the way he think about aging actresses . It suggests, instead, we have the wrong attitude to actresses in their youth. Great acting ability means little compared to their looks. If we stopped trivialising young actresses, then we might have more respect for them as get older. Only then might we stop making them feel like they need the face lifts that turn nearly all of them into rictus mannequins of our celebrity sick times.

[caption id="attachment_4256" align="aligncenter" width="432"] Michael Caine[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_4253" align="aligncenter" width="428"] Mickey Rooney[/caption]



[caption id="attachment_4262" align="aligncenter" width="421"] Felicity Kendall[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_4248" align="aligncenter" width="500"] Mel Gibson again...[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_4254" align="aligncenter" width="684" class=" "] And Tom Cruise looks exactly the same...[/caption]