 "…but as I told Olivier at the time, if Gielguid wants to wear a pink taffeta ball gown to the Oscars then let him. He’s got the legs to carry it off and lets face it, it looks better on him then it does on Liz Taylor. Hmm. I don’t think much of this soup. It’s like drinking dishwater. Japanese dishwater at that. Take it away. Bring me a Guinness instead. The last time I was presented with slop like that Olly Reed had just had one of his periodic bouts of projectile vomiting. In fact he’d got it down to such a fine art he could write words on the ground with it. Two days before he died he puked the words, ‘Ridley’s finished’ on the floor of a Majorcan bistro. Judging by the mess that was ‘Hannibal’, I can see his point. Word reaches me that the Yanks have pulled out of shooting a new reality television series in Scotland in the wake of the September 11th attack. Now much as I consider the reality series to be the lowest point of television’s history, lower even then the fact that it regularly gives Ainsley Harriot work, I just cannot work out why they are so worried. They say it’s because Americans are afraid to fly in case the plane ends up being turned into a weapon of mass destruction and flown directly at the nearest populated area. But this is a country with the highest murder rate in the entire western world. They’ve got more chance of being killed walking down the street then they ever have of being involved in a major terrorist attack. In fact, I’ve got more chance of choking to death on this Cumberland. Judging by the taste I’d say the chances were actually quite high. Yuck! So Steven Soderberg, David Fincher and Spike Jonze are to get more creative control of their films and stop being dictated to by film companies by er, creating their own film company. I tried that. It worked for a while but unfortunately it never made enough of a profit to pay the Inland Revenue my tax bill. Ah well, money never was my strong point. Well, I’m quite good at spending it. Just not at holding on to it. It does seem a bit odd that the only way young, talented directors can gain a bit of clout with the studios is to set up a mini-studio of their own. I’m probably just old fashioned. Another bottle of champagne, my boy! Told you I was good at spending money. While at a lose end this week I stopped off at my local video rental boutique. Among the endless shelves of rubbish blockbusters and soft porn, I did notice one film I think they may have some difficulty shifting. It was called ‘Sonic Impact’ and deals with a group of terrorists who hijack a plane and threaten to crash it onto the city of New York. While I was there it was about as popular with the customers as Hitler at a barmitzvah. Good luck pushing that one boys…" | 
