Daily archives: September 14, 2007

Murder In Samarkand “Celebrated” – Official!

 in The Film by | View Comments

Wow! Murder in Samarkand has graduated to be a “celebrated memoir”, according to the Guardian. Well, I certainly celebrated it, anyway.

In This World also gave Winterbottom a cause. He’s returned to it twice since then – with Road to Guant’namo and A Mighty Heart – and is planning a fourth: an adaptation of former diplomat Craig Murray’s celebrated memoir, Murder in Samarkand. But Winterbottom denies he has any special affinity for reactive, issue-based film-making. “Generally speaking, things we’ve done have been things we just thought were good ideas. We go through phases, obviously. Not all good. When we were doing Mighty Heart, we were driving through Pakistan and it felt kind of similar to In This World. This is when you have moments thinking: we’ve done this before so why are we doing this? What’s the point of doing this again?”

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/filmandmusic/story/0,,2168097,00.html

It is in fact a fascinating interview, well worth reading quite aside from my brief mention.

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Yet More Schillings Bollocks

 in Uzbekistan by | View Comments

On my article about Alisher Usmanov which so incensed his lawyers Schillings, let me ask this question. Has anybody seen an argument posted or published from any credible source to argue that what I say about Usmanov is untrue?

I ask the question because one of the edits to this log my webhost made at Schillings’ behest was to say that my claim was “regarded as false by many people”. I have altered that edit, because there is no justification for such a claim. I have yet to see evidence of anybody, not one solitary person, arguing that I am wrong about Usmanov, other than his lawyers. Who are these “Many people”, and why are they peculiarly silent?

I am very sympathetic to my webhost having to change things for Schillings, but not to the extent of altering things to become defamatory of me!!!

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Thank You, Gordon

 in Scotland by | View Comments

BrownThatcher.jpg

Is Gordon Brown a secret supporter of Scottish independence, or just crassly concentrated on getting votes in South Eastern England? Recently he has been at pains to promote the idea that he, not David Cameron, is the true heir to Maggie Thatcher. He has been assiduously putting Tories into key jobs. And now this wonderful picture.

Thank you very, very much Gordon. You are doing infinitely more to advance the cause of Scottish independence than 500 of me ever could.

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