Dear Prince...

Dear Prince (Rogers Nelson)

Forgive the old open letter malarkey, but I have no other way of reaching your funky self. Let me start by stating a fact: I have loved you for 30 years. There, said it. My name is Suzanne, and I have loved you for 3/4 of my small life...  (That is older I am sure, than most of the folk at them there BRITs tonight...).

But Prince, (is it ok I call you that? I know over the years you've been a few different names and a symbol or two)... I'm a bit disappointed... Yep. I'm a bit gutted really. Because it seems that with all my devotion, all my enthusiasm for you and your various bands (the Revolution, NPG, 3rd Eye Girl etc) that I just cannot get to see you get your funk on at all these 'secret gigs' in London town. Not for want of trying - oh no, on want alone, I'd be getting down last week in Camden, shaking my booty at N1 on Friday, or rocking out at KOKO last Sunday... But life - and when I say life - I mean two small people aged 7 and 3 - my kids - got in the way. With no sitters and Husband working and all - I just couldn't physically get there and queue - which trust me, I would happily have done. I'd have sold a freakin' kidney if they'd let me exchange my offal for a side seat at Ronnie Scott's....

But so far - you have remained elusive to me - which is pretty disappointing for someone who has the responsibilities and obligations that most of your old old fans would have - unlike many of the 18 year olds who can queue all day and next....  If I sound bitter - I aint. I just want to get near your purpleness... somehow.. some way...

You first hooked me in when I heard 'Let's Go Crazy.' I'd question how anyone COULDN'T be hooked in when they hear your guitar riff at the end, or even the prayer to begin - but for me, that was a defining moment... My step-sister made mix tapes on a weekly basis - you know that old 'press play and record' trick on the tape machine? Do you miss mix tapes? Me too. Anyway, she'd gathered together some rubbish 80s music and in between the slushy ballads and the synthesized warblings - there you were. I stood stock still and fell in love. I was almost 11. Immediately (no internet in those days) I raced to the local record store and bought Purple Rain. I took to sketching the face on the album inside sleeve on my art folder and doing all the obligatory things to announce to the world that YOU were my favourite artist. That's where the love began - somewhere between 'When Doves Cry' and the naughty 'Darling Nikki.'

Fast forward to the summer of '85 and this here hick from Belfast is in the big smoke, strutting down Oxford Street to HMV. Pocket money saved, notes in sweaty hand and I buy 'Around the World in a Day.' Paisley Park is still one of my all time favourites. I practically wore out my record player needle on that record...

And so it went on.. That Xmas I rummaged in your back catalogue and bought 'Dirty Mind' - which is one of your finest albums ever - fact. Then Prince, For You, Controversy, 1999, Parade... But nothing really prepared me for the mighty tomb of 'Sign O' the Times.' I have that album on tape, record, CD and downloaded. It is without question, my favourite album of all time.

I remember being up a mountain on some awful Duke of Edinburgh award with school when I heard you'd cancelled your UK dates for the Sign O' the Times tour. I cried all the way down the hill... That was the summer of '87. You cancelled again on me in 1990 and I started to take it personally... Finally I laid eyes on you in the flesh in 1992, your Diamonds and Pearls tour... and in 1993 and of course at the O2 in 2007. Of course you didn't disappoint...

Which is why I am amping to see you. So when you and those lovely 3rdEyeGirls have rocked Manchester into next year - can you PLEASE come back to London and offer some tickets - so as us oldies - the ones that have kicked around since '84 and even before - can come and worship at your purple altar - and not miss out just because we can't stand in the rain for 9 hours?

Thanks Prince, that would be ACE. Oh and for encore, I'd love Starfish and Coffee, The Cross and When you were Mine. Thanks.

You look great by the way. You've aged way better than me.

Much love, always. Suzanne xxx

PS. You should employ @MrFunkyG in your PR team - as he has been nothing short of incredible with all his promo work on twitter. #justsayin'
 

Valentines Schmalentines

Valentine's Day sucks ass. No matter single or in love. It is just a load of rose red chocolate coated rubbish. My hate for it began as far back as 1987:

I was 14 and completely and utterly smitten with a boy called Gavin Robinson. Like all good heartthrobs, he had a fringe that bit too long, huge green-ish eyes and a lopsided (verging on smug) grin. Determined to make him notice me (how could he not, with my dishwater blonde hair, the ENORMOUS gap between my front teeth and my famine victim legs?) I set about WOWING him with my Valentine's day plan.

I'd saved up my pocket money, splurged on a massive Garfield card and duly spent a good week decorating it in crude rhymes and stickers. Then I posted it, having done great detective work and found out his address (yes, I looked him up in the phone book. It was that era).

But me being me, I just couldn't wait for him to do all things according to my great 'plan': receive this anonymous card, deduce it was from me, immediately call me, declare his love and take me to Speranzas (Belfast's relatively new pizzeria for a Funghi and coke).

So on Valentine's night, I picked up the phone and nervously rang him, 'disguising' my voice to make it a few octaves lower. Clever eh? I was hoping to prompt young Gavin into action - namely, becoming my boyfriend.

He picked up.

"Hello Gavin... this is..... Linda here."
"I don't know any Lindas."
"You do. From the bus home."
"Nope."
"With erm... dark hair. I sit at the back."
"No, I really don't know any Lindas."
I cut in. "Anyway, did you get any Valentine's cards?" 

(Waits with baited breath).

"Yeah... erm... 8. Yeah, 8 and a chocolate heart."

I gulped. 8????? Feck.

"Yeah... but did you get any that were really class?" (NB 'class' meant 'great' in Belfast slang. Apparently still does).

Gavin paused for what felt like FOREVER and then said, " A few. I did get one from Suzanne though... but I burnt it."

I stopped breathing. Then remembered I wasn't meant to be Suzanne. I was Linda.

"Oh right.. yeah. I don't know er.. her. Any Suzannes. I'm Linda. Gotta go. Bye."

Then I hung up and died of shame - never admitting to anyone that my love had been so callously rebuked. This little story could sum up most of my romantic life - little did I know it. Gavin himself, (last seen in Belfast around 1996 - still hot) admitted to me when I was 16 and he 18, that he had in fact kept the card and not burnt it - he knew that it was me on the phone all along. You might think that this confession made me feel better - and momentarily it did. But for 2 years I thought the boy hated me, whilst all I did was dream of 'Robo' whisking me off to the school dance. *Sighs*

So, me and Valentines - we aren't great mates. Husband avoids it - usually is working. One Valentine's I went to the movies to see The Hours - by myself. Not the most uplifting of films, especially when you are the ONLY single person in the cinema. I wanted to scream, 'I have a boyfriend,' but just bought comfort food instead.

So in spirit of all things anti-Valentine, I thought I'd look back on all things vaguely romantic and give you single gals a guide to the 6 types of men that are out there, that you must AVOID at all costs. They usually fit into one of these categories - some maybe cross over into both. (Scary). If you find anyone outside these types - marry him.

And ladies, who needs a bloke anyway? Grab a mate and a curry and you're set.

No. 1 The HOT boy

So hot that you literally can't think of anything else but having sex with him. You don't want him to speak, you just want to rip all his clothes off and rub belly buttons. His lips are so perfect that (to quote Purple Rain) they would make a lollipop too happy. And you. There is another reason you don't want him to speak: he is as thick as champ. He is so vacant, you aren't sure he can read. But god, did I mention how hot he is? You try every which way to make him funny, interesting, witty - but actually he is only these things when you are sinking your 12th vodka tonic. Have sex with him then delete his number. Never ever go for dinner, or you'll slit your wrists before the main course.

No. 2 The NICE guy.

He is your best mate. You cried on him when FLIRT boy never called you back - because how could he NOT want you?? He is always there as your surrogate boyfriend, date for ANOTHER WEDDING and you once snogged his face off because goddammit - you are meant to be together aren't you?? He is so kind and thoughtful and all your flatmates love him and you've known him forever, since you both were on that graduate scheme... and it would just be perfect, completely PERFECT - but for the small matter that you fancy a dead frog more. He either has stubby hands/white socks/over bite/ a small chin/tiny eyes/ a stocky body and you like tall or tall and you like stocky - whatever it is, he aint your match. No matter how many times your buddies tell you it should be. Just don't lead this one on - and beware, he'll meet a girl who likes him back and will ditch you in seconds.

No. 3 The FLIRT.

There is something electric when you are near him. He stares in your eyes, finds any excuse to touch you, send you cheeky emails/texts and leads you completely.... up the garden path. You and the other 35 million ladeez he is making feel 'special.' Signs to watch for - he will never admit to having any feelings for you - he'll let you do all the talking. Then when he has got you where he wants you, and you are putty in his hands, he'll be like, 'what? I thought we were just good mates?' All you are, is a notch on his EGO belt. Refuse to give in - no matter how sexy his eyes are, or how much blarney he'll spin you. The minute you have sex, you won't see his too-cool-for-school trainers for dust. He's on to the next conquest. This man is the wannabe George Clooney of his mates, no matter how much he tells you he wants to 'find the one.' AVOID like the plague.

No. 4 The AMBITIOUS boy

He is amazing. All you ever wanted in a man. He is just SO attentive. And funny and charming and gorgeous and.... he sees you once a month. Not because he is afraid of commitment, no, it is just he is SO busy. With work, and rugby/football and his buddies and his sick Gran and his job - did he mention that he is line for promotion? This boy is everything you want - for 24 hours and then he gone. He'll keep you hanging just enough for you to think that yes, he is your boyfriend. Isn't he? but in true Mr Big style - he'll never meet your mates, usually see you after dark and tends to have sex and then call you a cab (even offering to pay which makes you feel SO good). He does want you obvs, just completely and utterly on his terms. Run for the hills.

No. 5 The BOYF from back home.

Is he the one that got away? I mean, you gave him your virginity and every Xmas when you see him you can't help wondering, should you have dumped him second term of Uni in? What if you'd stayed together? Because he gets you - he knows you in a way that no one else ever has... And remember Stu's party when you both did that beer funnel? Or the camping trip to the Lakes where the tent caught fire? Or the time you had sex in his dad's car and got gear stick burns on your thigh? But he just looks SO good (is it the semi-beard, the tie?) and he is doing really well, bought a flat in Kilburn, still makes you laugh... Where is his number? What's that - a 'save the date' email? The fecker is only getting hitched. Oh well... Trust me - he never got away. You let him go - for a good reason. Probably plenty of them.

No. 6 The IT SHOULD WORK ON PAPER boy.

Things were going well. You've even had a mini break. He bought you flowers and met your Mum. The sex is... who cares about sex, when you have SO MUCH IN COMMON? The dates are fun. He likes art house cinema, you like art house cinema. He hates red peppers but likes green - just like you. You both love Thai food, dogs, fry ups, The Guardian, Olive magazine and onesies. Plus it is SO great because you both enjoy doing lots of exciting things all round London - biking and the London Eye, Columbia Road market, theatre, movies, clubbing, picnics, salsa lessons, mate's dinner parties etc etc etc etc - it is all really safe and NICE. So NICE. But deep down in the pit of your stomach you wish he wouldn't try and touch you in the morning and ultimately you want to pretend that you never found the ring in the drawer, and when he asks you'll have to say yes, when really you want to have sex with the photocopy boy on floor 21. But that is just relationships isn't it? NO. RUN.

Happy V day!

 

Leaving. Again.

For most folk, a job is just a job. Somewhere you go, earn your dollar, put in the hours, and then head off to your life. For lucky people, their job is their passion - something that every day inspires them or motivates them. For me, whatever I've ever done to earn a crust, it has had to have 2 things: The first being it has to be something I love, something I care about - or what is the point? Even when I folded jumpers in Gap just before I went travelling after Uni - I cared about those customers. (I remember getting a woman who was a size 22 a pair of jeans that made her feel amazing about herself - she tipped me a fiver and it made my day. I didn't win employee of the north for nothing you know!). (I didn't care so much about the jeans wall, to be fair - but anyone who did/does needs to get a life).

The second thing - equally as important - are the people. Presenting live telly for 3 hours asking brain dead viewers to 'guess the blurred green thing' on Quiz TV (one man rang up asking was it in fact a sheep - that's the kind of viewer those channels pillaged money from) was quite hideous. Not the finest moment on my chequered CV - but the crew were amazing; one cameraman massaged my pregnant wrestler like feet while I presented. I always arrived swearing I had to leave as it was so mind numbing; then I'd throw on some slap, straighten my hair and then talk rubbish for 3 hours (trying to avoid talking about the bloody inane quiz and more about my own life) - leaving in an infinitely better mood than I arrived.

Why? Because the people were so much fun.

And none more so, than the folk I left today.. This afternoon, I said goodbye to the place I've kicked around in since 2008 (on and off). I thought I'd get through the bit where they bring you to the breakout area and give you gifts and cake and fizz and cards, without weeping. (Last time I left in 2010, I was sobbing so much I actually couldn't speak). Who was I kidding? It is a complete impossibility to stand there as people say lovely lovely things about you, to your face (because that doesn't happen that often does it? People listing your qualities...) and in front of all your colleagues, and not weep. Particularly if the person talking is also weeping. The gifts were beyond thoughtful, the cards filled with love and the cakes - the cakes! Pippa and Sue would give Mary Berry a run for her money...

It felt a bit like my birthday - but sadder. I know I'm doing the right thing - at least I hope I am, but it still isn't easy. I get such joy from seeing all these folk and hearing about their lives and (clearly from my card) telling them endless tales about everything from smear tests (replete with a demonstration) to having to be sick in my hand on a train home from one night on the razz, because the doors didn't open quick enough. (That obviously was years ago, in my youth, obviously).

I have loved loved loved my time on that show. I've had so much joy in debating stories and character traits with writers, fighting for ideas to be upheld, the struggle in getting journeys right.

Only working in tv drama, do you discuss if characters would shag on a bar top, or if they'd wear a nurse's uniform to seduce a doctor, on his desk... The intimacies you have to share to defend why a story should be a certain way - are revealing to say the least. I am sure there are things I have told writers that my husband doesn't know. Scrap that, everyone probably knows... but you get my drift.

Anyway. I picked up my son and he asked if I had been crying. I admited that I had, then carried all my gifts to the dining table and showed him my incredible bourbon, my signed script, my Selfridges' vouchers, my wonderful Clear Eyes, Full Hearts sweatshirt (and if you don't know what that is from shame on you) and my mug... He looked at the cards and said 'I'm sad and glad. Sad because you are sad to leave, but glad because I'll get more time with you.'

It is the second time I have left and it never gets easier. The show gets into your blood. The people do too. I'm missing them all already. But on to the next chapter...

At least if things go tits up, there's always Gap again, eh?

Cut off point

Firstly, thank you to all who took the time to comment on my last post. I really felt so low and sad and at the end of my tether that I just could not see the pesky wood for the big fat old trees. In those moments, it is so hard to see your problem with any kind of perspective. You just see red mist and cold fear and huge mountains that are un-climbable. (is that a word? It is now).  I started this blog because I just found motherhood so hard and lonely at times and wondered why no fecker ever talked about it... so the fact that so many people still read it and were there to send advice support - means a lot. Plus, thank gawd other folk feel the same way.

I wasn't raised in a normal family - well, no family is normal - but you know, Mum, Dad, siblings, dog, the usual... My Mum left my Dad before she discovered she was pregnant with me and made the brave decision to have me on her own - even when he told her to abort me. So I grew up with my Mum and Grandmother until I was 11 and then we moved in with my Mum's new boyfriend. He is this man. We moved out again when I was almost 15...but I continued living with him at weekends... An odd arrangement, granted - but it worked for me. Anyway, the whole 2.4 thing - I have it now... but I didn't then. Sometimes I feel like whilst my Mum did her best, I don't think I have a template of how to do the whole family thing... Sometimes I struggle... It isn't normal for me. But I am damn sure it will be normal for my kids...

This week, I hung up on my Dad. I think it may be the last time we'll talk.

I should feel sad, but I just feel relieved... If he was my mate, I would have ditched him years ago, deleted his phone numbers and moved on. There is only so much disappointment one person can take.

To explain: I moved to the big smoke aged 18, to Uni. Escape! Since then (apart from a year travelling) I've lived in and around London. My Dad, he thinks it's 'too far' to travel to, from his home, just outside Belfast. That long exhausting, one hour flight. He's never seen my home, never stayed a night under my roof. I am 40. 22 years and he has never visited me.

I forgave it. Made my own excuses. When I lived in West Hampstead: flat is too small. When we moved out to the countryside: I'm not a grown up, he is set in his ways... I conveniently forgot about the football refereeing trips he went on, the buddy holidays he attended. The Xmases he never invited me to... The birthdays he forgot.

Then I had kids.

I think I still would have gone on, making up ways to justify his actions - except, he had married my step-mother when I was 14 and so became a step-father to her two daughters. They are 54 and 51 to my 40. The 54 year old has a millionaire partner and 2 sons ages 18 and 15. My Dad and Step mother had those boys to stay EVERY WEEKEND since they were toddlers. Every Sat night these kids had inner and bath time and then sleepovers at my Dad's - he lives 5 mins walk from their house. He even got BUNK BEDS to accommodate them. He talked endlessly to me about taking them to football games, school fairs (school fucking fairs!!!! He bloody well had to be DRAGGED to my parent/teacher evenings - didn't even go to my GRADUATION - and here he is going to school fairs?????). He coached their football team! He told me often how great it was, being a grandparent, with this misty eyed look, because he hadn't obviously done this before, the whole parenting lark. 
He was an absent, charismatic, charming, careless parent who tolerated me for a few hours on a Sunday at best.

I chose men just like him for a good 10 years. Then I woke up and thank god husband is NOTHING like him.

Anyway. This week - I was tired, still grumpy. Spent. On Monday he rang me to tell me that he was having some knee operation and said I sounded down. I explained that yeah, we have no help, no space, no escape and I'm leaving my job and it is all scary but we are positive and yadda yadda and then I said 'we aren't as lucky and G and P' (my step -sister and partner - the ones with the 2 boys - who could easily afford nannies etc but had my Dad and stepmother on tap).  I continued,  'We don't have the breaks you gave them... every weekend.' My Dad's reply? 'yeah... you chose to live over there.'

He makes it sound like we live in fucking Australia.

Then he said, as if to pour salt in my open wound, 'We had the kids to stay this weekend too... we still have them all the time.'

I lost it. 'We live 20 minutes from fucking Luton airport, which is an hour away from you. You know what? I don't give a shit about your fucking knee.' And I hung up.

For good.

A friend said I'd never forgive myself if he died. But is that a good enough reason to stay in touch with him? Just in case he carks it and I'm left with guilt?? I just cannot bear the man. Has he ever been to a birthday of my Sproglet's? (He is almost 8).  A football match? Taken 3 year old Sproglette to the park? Seen the pretty canal lined market town I live in?

NOPE. He is a selfish, petty immature bastard who gives me nothing - no time, no care, no attention, no.... love. But yet he expects me to care about his knee, his life, his holidays, his other family.

After all he has done to me, how much he has let me down and never measured up, I always forgave it. But I just cannot let it go where my kids are concerned. Did I mention that my other step-sister lived in London for about 4 years during which time she married - and how my Dad visited her?? She was here 4 years! Then divorced, without kids. He made time and got on that exhausting one hour flight for her - because my step-monster decreed it. But for me, for my kids? Nothing.

There comes a point in your life, when you realise you don't need anyone who doesn't enhance it. Life really is too short. Time too precious. So what that he is my Dad? Procreating doesn't make you a parent. Sticking around, being there for your kids, spending time with them - does.

And certainly he is no parent, or grandparent.

It is time to cut him off. I just can't be disappointed anymore.

I just can't do this any more....

I don't think I was meant to be a mother.

Tonight, I lost it. I dropped my basket. I just can't do this any more. I can't. I have failed where you all succeeded. I struggle, where to you, it comes naturally. I shouldn't have had kids.

I awoke at 5:30am today and just couldn't get back to sleep. Demons - that only whisper at night to scare us, to make our hearts race, our heads pound, began their chant. I've forced myself out of my job in 2 weeks - because my time there is done, I feel done. I want to make my writing a way to earn my keep and yet... where will that happen? The demons shout... YOU WILL FAIL. They remind me that some people I know want me to fail. They make me question my choices, my friendships, my life... How will the bills get paid? They holler. And... the loneliness. They remind me that I am not one to be alone for even a day. It fries my head. Plus, I will have more time with my children - which should bring me joy, but just feels me with dread. Don't kid yourself they taunt.

Tonight I lost it. I screamed at my son. He shook in terror. He shouted back and my temper raged. I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror and didn't see me any more. Just some exhausted, frustrated, lost, angry - so angry - woman who at 40 should fucking know better. Should BE better.

But I am not. I am shattered. My day time job is relentless - brilliant, fun, filled with amazing people - inspiring folk - but it saps the energy right out of you. Then I come home, do bath and bed and homework and laundry and tidy up and school prep and read a script and write a Babble article and and and... Is there time for me? Maybe to watch even an hour of shit TV? Read a book?

Weekends we spend entertaining kids, yet when I grew up my Mum left me every single one as she raced off to her tennis club... I watched black and white movies on a flickering tv with my Granny as her old buddies who smelt of piss and cats came for tea. Maybe that is what gave me my love of films? When I watch a film even now, I prefer to do it alone... Back then, I made up my own stories - so much so that the kids that wandered down my lane on route to the huge park at the top of my street, would stop by gate and sing 'tell us a story...' An only child - who hated to be alone. My other favourite game was to make up problems for 'Cathy and Claire' in Jackie magazine and then answer them. I could answer every problem under the sun... except of course my own...

Saturdays and Sundays are frantic as we prepare for the week and do food shops and all the mundane bollocks that comes with life - and there are no grandparents to say 'hey, have an hour off - have a coffee, read a paper, be YOU.'

It gets to you. No it doesn't. It gets to me. Kids were meant to be raised by a tribe - not two fucking stressed out parents doing full time jobs in wet weather indoors... I can't do this any more.

What do I miss? I miss head space, and Soho and being a Samaritan and lie ins and reading papers and spontaneous decisions and time to write and chatting to friends for an hour on the phone and kissing my husband over cocktails and London and most of all I miss not feeling guilty all the time because I just don't find parenthood as joyful as all you lot do.

I find it tedious and tiring and endless and thankless. I love my children, I kiss their heads and cheeks and toes and love every inch of them but I never for a second imagined I would be this spent.

My son is such a sweet sensitive boy and yet there I was - being awful to him - being the scary shouty mother that my mother was to me - that I SWORE to Christ I would never be. Awful. I'm so ashamed. Then I went to him in his bed and cuddled him and kissed his soft hair and told him I loved him and cried for being so angry and tired and horrible.

Now I am here. Typing. Weeping. Sorry. I didn't know who else to tell... You can't really ring friends sobbing, saying 'I'm a shit parent.'

I'm leaving my job because I want to be a better parent and a less exhausted stressed out version of myself and yet I am scared of what is next and how it will all pan out. I am fucking feeling that fear and doing it anyway. I wonder if you're there Keenie Beanie and Daycare Lady and Serena from Italy and JKelso Farrell and The Girl who and Chaos and all my old readers, the fab 8 who told me my truck load of chicken would arrive, in one of my dark hours may years ago. Did I lose you along the way?

It's funny because I feel I lost myself too.

 

Wolf of Wall Street, 12 years a Slave and American Hustle.

You can see why DiCaprio would have jumped at the chance to play Jordan Belfort, in Scorsese's latest offering. Rumour has it that Leo found Belfort's book and talked ole buddy Marty into making it. Just imagine the rip-roaring, heart-attack inducing joy he must have had going 'method' on this one....

In short it is a 3 hour drugs and fuck fest. If Belfort can't snort it or screw it, then unless it is green, he has no interest in it. This man makes a puddle look deep. He begins the film supping water at lunch, agreeing to jerk off as many times as his coke-addicted hairprayed boss tells him to and ends it... well, not a million miles away from here... Maybe this is the point - and I have wildly missed it. The point being Belfort doesn't need to grow or learn or change. Fine - but without the above, why are we watching exactly?

DiCaprio acts his expensive loafers off, and yet, we don't give a toss about him. Henry Hill he aint. No matter how much he bawls and brays, he lacks the charm, the charisma, the vulnerability of Henry... or any of his relationships. The POV shots that illustrated Henry's ascent into the bosom of his mafia family here are used to show Belfort's ascent into a coke-addled, hooker sprawling jet plane, depositing him and his mates in the most soulless of all places - Vegas.

Watching The Wolf on Wall Street you feel like you have ingested several lines of marching powder - racing you through shag after shag, deal after deal, bump after bump. The frenetic pace momentarily makes you forget that there is NO story. No obstacles, no jeopardy, no journey, no resolution. Just one man on a mission because... nope, I don't even know why money is all that mattered to this hollow man.

Occasionally there are brilliant flashes of humour - watching Belfort crawl on his stomach to his car after he has necked a handful of lemon Quaaludes is hysterical - but it isn't enough to warrant giving up 3 hours of your life to view. Everyone around Belfort is as fake and as smooth as a hooker's tits: his buddies, his stunning wife, his lawyers, his reflection. The thought as I exited the cinema: not, what a film! I must tell everyone to see it. Rather, shit, I need a bikini wax.

Marty, you are better than this....

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The joy in a Steve McQueen film is also a paradox: so harrowing you cannot look, so mesmerising you cannot tear your eyes away. What other director can make you shift so uncomfortably in your seat, as your eyes flicker upwards, hungry for more?

12 Years a Slave has been accused of showing nothing new, and yet, name me another film that captures the horrors of slavery so magnificently? Hollywood would rather focus on any other tragedy than awaken it's own demons - so it has taken a British director to remind the world of the slavery that existed in America (and still exists worldwide) in the 1800s.

The story is bleak: Soloman Northup, a free man - carpenter and musician, is tricked, kidnapped and sold into a life of slavery. The brutality and inhumanity of his captors is extraordinary - and yet this is just the beginning. To survive he must pretend he cannot read or write, accept his captivity and relinquish all thoughts of escape. Eventually he ends up working for Edwin Epps - a man whose cruelty knows no bounds. Michael Fassbender is chilling in this role. We cannot loathe his character more than he loathes himself - yet he is incapable of showing empathy of any kind.

No easy watch... this film sure is difficult to swallow. But amidst this despair, is unparalleled beauty - in the burning embers of a letter, the dip of a southern tree, in the stillness of a moment. McQueen bravely shows us a man being strung up and left to hang, as around him the world carries on... not just for a fleeting glance, but for a ridiculously tense, torturous minute. If there is any sense of what is right, it should be McQueen clutching a little gold man on March 2nd, but I fear the Academy will be too afraid to applaud such a challenging watch. Shame. (Which by the way, is another extraordinary McQueen film).

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Perhaps I am alone in thinking Silver Linings Playbook was good, but a fraction off 'great.' That fraction for me, was down to the fact that Bradley Cooper's character had no turning point - he went from cray cray to non cray cray in about a day. But let's not pick hairs - it is a brilliant, poignant movie - a love story to rival that of Drive.

But, for the LOVE OF GOD, why so much Hustle love?????

No.1 It was an act too long - wrap it up at the party scene - you know what I'm sayin'.
No. 2. Jenn Lawrence (inevitable I'm sure) steals every scene she is in and shows up just how one note Amy Adams's performance is. Sorry, I love her and wish she had won an Oscar for Junebug, but this is NOT her finest hour.
No. 3 I got bored of her cleavage - I swear to god I did. Put them away love...
No. 4 The plot is bumbling - at best.
No. 5 It all gets so neatly sewn up in the end it feels massively contrived.
No. 6 Jeremy Renner is amazing, as is Christian Bale - but the story - forgeddaboutit.

Fun - sure. A great date movie - you betcha. But hang my Oscars on it and call it a classic - NEVER! It feels like a watered down Casino... Which brings me back to where I started... wishing for Scorsese at his best. (After Hours anyone?)

Still on my to watch list: Her, Dallas Buyer's Club and Nebraska. Oh and if you wanna have a gander at my Oscar predictions: fill yer boots here.

But, for the record, this is one of my fav times of year - when you have a list of movies you want to check out, when the multiplexes aren't filled with re-make crap and superhero bollox, when you sit in the darkness and emerge, a little different than when you went in. When a movie actually takes you somewhere...

 

Sexy Back

What is sexy?

It is a question I pondered over the other week with some friends. Who is sexy? What does it mean to feel sexy? Is it at odds with feminism, to want to be sexy? What makes a person sexy? Is it in the eyes? The smile? The clothes? The attitude? Or all of the above? Are we at our sexiest in our youth; is it a word applicable to a woman over 35? Or a mother? Or is it a word for the young?

Feeling confident isn't the same as feeling sexy. they are not mutually exclusive either... A discussion at work about who or what is sexy provoked all kinds of blushes and stuttered conversation - not least because sexy is in the eye of the beholder - and what one person thinks is HOT another will find repulsive. I don't really know any women who deliberately try to be sexy - to dress provocatively, to hoist their cleavage to the masses - or raise their skirts to knicker grazing level. I find displays of overt 'sexiness' crass and obvious - on women and men. Women in a T-shirt and jeans look infinitely hotter than a woman squeezed into some binding dress threatening to cut off their circulation. Therefore, is sexiness in the person, rather than what they wear?

For the record, for me, the sexiest woman of all time:

The beauty, the tousled hair, the feline eyes, the perfect pout. Bardot never looks like she starves herself of all of life's joys: food, wine, sex, sunshine. Like Liz Taylor, she oozed glamour and yes, that word, sexiness, in her attitude, her walk, her voice. Even patting a dog she looks hot:

Is there a time in life where you discover your sexiness? Or embrace it? There seems a general consensus between women I know that this word, 'sexy' demeans them in some way - better to be thought of as brainy or funny, or beautiful. Perhaps because lads mags and bimbo filled reality shows have dumbed down the meaning of the word; made sexy something so blatant and in your face that it no longer has any appeal.

Men have told me they found their girlfriends and wives sexiest when the are wearing their old Xmas PJs and are curled up in bed with no make up and a book. My Husband hates women plastered in make-up, he likes a more natural look; elegance, or simplicity in what women wear.

Being no looker in my teens, the boys passed me by - in favour of my infinitely more glamorous best friend. I took a job glass collecting at a local tennis club, working to 2am at the late license discos. I vividly remember the night some men in their 20s tried to pull me onto the dancefloor. They put their numbers into my hands, curled their arms inappropriately around my waist, individually asked me on dates - all as they bought their girlfriends drinks. I was 16 and it was the first time anyone had ever found me attractive. I was stunned. I was used to taunts at school, abuse, being called a 'dog'and much worse. For a teenage virgin who had barely been kissed, it was utterly intoxicating.

Still I struggled with my looks, my confidence. I don't know if I ever really shook off the feeling of being 'not good enough' that those boys imprinted upon me. It meant the thought of feeling sexy was about as foreign to me in sunny Belfast as Thai food... I think my first love was the beginning of a change in how I viewed by body, myself. He cherished me in a way that made me I was worth being wanted. When he left for university, with it went my confidence, my newly discovered sense of self.

All through my 20s, in the vicious world of TV, I let myself be rejected for my looks. Let myself be passed over time and again for presenting jobs - being told 'But you aren't a model. More, you know,' Girl next door.' They stopped short of saying, 'you aren't sexy enough.' It was the 90s,and the boom of lads mags had begun - you couldn't move for wonderbras and women stripping to 'empower themselves.' I didn't fit the mould - nor did I really want to. Why have to strip to prove my worth? I struggled with it all - my boy/work rejection, my self esteem - my view of myself. Outwardly confident, inwardly convinced that no wonder the jobs passed me by - I just wasn't that attractive. Mind you, show me a woman alive who hasn't struggled with her looks? Even Kate Moss admitted hating her flat chest, replete with a mole on one breast. Where do we grow with this sense of what is beauty and what is not? What ideals do we think we should live up to?

I digress. This is about sexiness. Not beauty. Let's not confuse the two. The most beautiful women in the world can be sex-less. Do woman only really feel sexy when they enter womanhood - and when is that? I know one friend who said he found his wife at her sexiest, not on their wedding day - but when she was 8 months pregnant. I'm amazed - I felt at my LEAST sexy when I was waddling around with bump the size of Britain.

Maybe feeling sexy isn't anything to do with what we wear, or how we see ourselves, but who we are with? Do they make us feel that way about ourselves - in the way they see us, the way they look us in the eye? Is it in the our voice, our smile, our laugh? The way Julia Roberts was at her most sexy not striding around in PVC thigh high boots, but laughing loudly when a jewellery case clamps briefly on her fingers?

Another man told me once that the sexiest thing a woman has done for him is to go out for dinner and actually eat! Which proves really that sexiness means one thing to one person and another to another. It isn't something to fear, or to be ashamed of, or to even try and achieve: you are sexy if you feel it. It is probably that simple. The difficulty, in talking to female friends, comes with the 'feeling' it. Will a high heel do it? A breast job? A diet? There seems to be sense of striving for this elusive sexiness. Yet, rarely if ever have I known a man to chase it in the way women do.

The sexiest men to me are usually the funniest, the smartest, the ones that have great eyes or smile. It isn't about the rock hard abs and the dancing pecs. It starts with the brain - their smell, their wit.... Which is why as HOT as a man may be - without the above, there is no sexiness. Looks do not equate to sexiness...

I don't know if I've ever really got the bottom of what makes one person sexy and another not... What defines that word. Jennifer Aniston, (she who has been sexiest woman in the world) summed it up , 'Nobody thinks of themselves as sexy, really. some days you go 'I'm not going too bad today. but if you try to be sexy, you'll never be sexy.'

So know you know.