About

I’ve been watching movies as long as I can remember.

Silent clowns Laurel and Hardy, Buster Keaton; classic Westerns (all of them!), visionary science fiction from Forbidden Planet to The Day the Earth Stood Still.

I thrilled at Errol Flyn as Robin Hood and the Sea Hawk; Jimmy Stewart maturing from honest everyman to gritty cowboy. I was captivated by Connery as Bond, touched by John Mills in Great Expectations.

I laughed at the sublime Gregory’s Girl and Ealing-comedy inheritor The Tall Guy.

I remember becoming aware of great directors; Kubrick, Coppola and onto International films with Kurasawa. I am not Spartacus and the thought of a Space Oddessey gives me travel sickness, but I will watch them over and over.

Now, working on the fringes of the film and TV industry, I sometimes get to be on set with some of the most Internationally renowned film-makers; Ridley Scott, Steven Spielberg, Ron Howard, Martin Scorcese. My list goes on; Mike Nichols, Ralph Fiennes, David Yates, Stephen Hopkins, onto some of the rising stars like Regan Hall and Noel Clarke. Seldom, barring one director I won’t name, a disappointment.

I still get through a lot of movies, both on the big screen and on those shiny silver discs.

I still get excited at the prospect of a new high-concept, big idea movie, a thought-provoking bit of sci-fi, the latest literary adaptation, or anything with a Western show-down in the finale.

Too many movies, not enough time. RC