To Moving Image! Or rather not to Moving Image on Tuesday evening. We did have plans to go along to the village cinema to catch the screening of The Essex Ways film. A quick shifty with the online trailer, and you can actually watch the whole film at home via YouTube. It would be rude not to.

Never say that I am keen on saving money, plus various household bits and bobs got in the way of a trip out to the village cinema. We made sure we had a clear path, so to speak, and then fired up the YouTube video with a strict rule of no phones or other distractions.

It’s more of an online film to watch, tbh than paying to watch it at a semi-pro village cinema. It follows the footsteps of James, a young man who decides to walk the Essex Way and record his adventures on camera.

I thought that we had walked the Essex Way a couple of months ago. My lack of local knowledge puts me to shame. We walked about a tenth of the Essex Way as we made our way from Manningtree over towards Harwich.

James completes the real serious business, pretty much circumnavigating the entire county, starting in Epping and then being washed up in Tilbury.

In between, he takes in many locations that are on the edge of our patch. The nearest he comes to us is Brightlingsea. Hesomehow manages to skirt away from Colchester. Walton, Frinton and Mersey Island all feature.

The film is a homage towards nature. There’s a very powerful message that is superbly told by James as he weaves in his personal narrative connected to the county, and a wider picture of declining nature and global warming.

We debated at first what time of year their film was shot. He mentions St. George’s Day midway through, which is the dead giveaway. It seems a perfect time of year to capture this county. Spring is pretty much in full bloom, and he seemed to have picked a favourable time when it comes to the weather.

It left me feeling that we have so much more to explore around these estuary wilds parts. He makes it to the other side of the Blackwater Estuary, something which, to my shame, I have yet to do.

He also addresses many of the Essex stereotypes. This is the great misunderstood county. I was surprised, and also very pleased, to hear him address class snobbery.

Within that, he also identified a north-south Essex divide. He came out with the conclusion of there being one Essex. He also managed to drop in the Crass slogan of the only war is the class war. Later in the credits, we see how Crass members were involved with the film.

His final destination of Tilbury seemed to symbolise what the whole film has been about. He describes being on the edges of London, with Tilbury being a mix of nature as well as something of a dumping ground. This is illustrated quite literally in the form of Tilbury being once a dumping ground for London.

There is optimism in the final scenes from Tilbury. Nature has reclaimed the slag heaps and is managing to work its wonders in disguising what London has done to the outer edges of the county. It was a very optimistic message in which to end.

I still have much more walking around these parts to do.

To Moving Image!

…on Tuesday evening. On the big (ish) screen at the Loveless Hall was The Penguin Lessons, another Steve Coogan film from last year.

Coogan is working at a prolific rate right now. He seems to be everywhere - on the telly, in your podcast feed, erm, on the Loveless Hall big (ish) screen.

He always seems to play himself - or even an iteration of Partridge; but he also always seems to get away with it. That’s the sign of a good actor.

His character in The Penguin Lessons is an English teacher moving to Argentina in the Junta era of 1976 to teach a private school. A penguin is picked up along the way.

You could quite easily swap the teacher role for Coogan’s Tony Wilson in Twenty Four Hour Party People. But probably not the creepy Coogan with his incredible portrayal of Jimmy Saville.

The Penguin Lessons is shot beautifully, capturing the 1970’s landscape of Argentina. The scenes have a light touch hue about them. The screen radiates with South American warmness.

And so does the film. Not the nasty right wing Military Junta part, obvs, but the developing love story between an awkward English teacher and a penguin that is rescued from an oil spill.

This is a truly lovely film laced with metaphors. With one of the main character not being able to hold down a speaking role, the relationship between teacher and penguin somehow manages to develop along with the plot.

The soundtrack is great as well. The use of Nick Drake fits the time period and location.

There were genuine tears at the end. Nothing ever lasts forever, etc. Coogan even manages to evoke some accidental Partridge into the funeral eulogy.

What a wonderful film.

To Moving Image!

…on Tuesday evening. Tuesday evening is DATE NIGHT, right? I do bloody love sharing my Tuesday evenings in a musty old village hall with the local coffin dodgers.

Oh - and Wifey as well.

The film up for grabs was Holy Cow, a French language film, natch.

Wifey tried to tell me beforehand that it was a flick all about a French yoof living in the countryside who liked shagging.

Job’s a good ‘un, etc.

I was the smart arse who watched the trailer shortly before leaving. I pulled her up on the finer details.

“Actually, luv, it’s a film about making cheese. Plus some shagging in a rural French setting.”

So there.

Erectile dysfunctions also featured. It was a French film, after all.

Plus it was short - the film, not the erectile sub-plot. I do like a short film that means that I’m back at base for the second half of the football.

Date Nights ROCK in our household, Comrades.

The plot was simple: a family death on a rural cheese making farm leads to some rapid growing up for a young French yoof. His quest then becomes to manufacture some award winning cheese.

You’d have problems pitching that one at the major film studios.

There was a delightful sense of innocence throughout. It was accompanied by a charming rural soundtrack. It reminded me in parts of the fantastic Detectorists.

It made me want to experiment and make some cheese.

No prizes for guessing that the French yoof didn’t land the big cheese prize. But there was a happy ending, of sorts.

Ce la vie.