FILM
Comes A Bright Day
(15) 87mins
★★✩✩✩
IN A NUTSHELL
Bellboy Sam Smith follows his heart - right into the middle of a languid hostage drama.
REVIEW
There's little disguising writer-director's advertising background in this fractured vignette.
Everything is elegant, languid, poetic and, in places, artificially stage-bound - perfect for a story of soft-held love, yearning and luxury.
Unfortunately, Simon Aboud allies these impeccable qualities (and performances) to a jewellery shop heist that is executed ineptly by both armed gang and director.
Comes A Bright Day is a hostage drama, with stuttering psycho Cameron, his bumbling sidekick Clegg (Cameron and Clegg, geddit?) holding at gunpoint wistful jeweller Charlie (Timothy Spall), earnest bellboy Sam Smith (Craig Roberts) and radiant shop assistant Mary (Imogen Poots).
Sam is smitten with Mary but crippled with nerves while Mary is a romantic in a brutal world. Charlie mourns the loss of his life's grand love.
The hostage plot is without tension, despite the bloodshed, and Kevin McKidd struggles to find consistency in Cameron - part Tarantino nutter, part A Fish Called Wanda's Ken Pile.
The film works best when Charlie, Mary and Sam pass the time in agreeable and unhurried fashion swapping tales of opulent romance.
But their fragile spell is too frequently undone by clumsy intrusions.
Sunday, 15 July 2012
Saturday, 7 July 2012
Exhibition: Alan Turing out of the shadows
Mathematician and genius Alan Turing burnt bright and brilliant and briefly yet, for all that he was, he was never appreciated in his lifetime beyond the confines of his peers.
The conspiracies and circumstance set in place to ensure he remained obscure appear formidable.
Firstly, he operated in great secrecy in the (now) legendary Bletchley Park, helping to decipher the Nazi Enigma code.
There was an unbreakable bond of silence among Bletchley veterans that kept their work secret long after it needed to be so. War time leader Winston Churchill called his codebreakers "the geese that laid the golden eggs and never cackled".
So effective was this secrecy that Bletchley's (and Turing's) remarkable advances only began to emerge in the '80s and 90s. By that time, the notion that the US was the pioneer of the computer age was firmly entrenched and Turing long dead.
Secondly, he was gay at a time when to be so was illegal and, in society's eyes, shameful.
An inquest ruled he committed suicide at the age of just 41 after swallowing a bottle of cyanide - although the verdict has been called into question.
It was 1952 and he had been convicted for committing a homosexual act and, in doing so, lost his security clearance and access to his computers.
David Rooney, curator on the Science Museum's new Code Breaker exhibition, said "Turing, who had undoubted eccentricities, was regarded with affection by colleagues. His treatment at the end of his life is a source of national shame.
"The exhibition is an opportunity to present the remarkable work of a man whose influence reaches into perhaps the most widespread pastime of the 21st century, the use of the personal computing device, yet whose name is probably unfamiliar."
If the secrecy was a constant guard against recognition, there was a third obstacle: the field in which he chose to excel - maths and computational science is fiendishly complex.
Indeed, if there is a weakness in the excellent and moving exhibition marking the centenary of his birth, it is in the nature of the exhibits.
While they are authentically dented, scraped, dusty and aged, their metal carapaces, occasional flick-switches and lack of recognisable function promote the idea they are the pointless products of abstract mind games.
In fact, these were the machines that took mechanical calculating devices - the sort that Victorian Charles Babbage would recognise - and pushed them on to the utilitarianism of the computer.
Key to that journey was the philosophical and conceptual framework of the computing device - Turing wrote the rulebook. He outlined what a computer was, how it would function, what it would do.
One of his legacies is a hypothetical device called a Turing machine - a device that simulates the cold logic of a computer algorithm.
But the exhibition demonstrates that Turing was far from such a machine himself.
On show are personal letters that soften the hard reproach of his familiar dark-eyed portrait to reveal a very human soul.
He lost a friend to TB when they were very young and his letters to the boys' mother are sensitive, supportive and insightful.
Rooney said: "We are able to show a more complete portrait of the man who, far from being the lone genius of popular belief, can be seen as a character with many endearing qualities."
Such was the extraordinary and devastating impact of Christopher Morcom's death, that it incubated in Turing the thought - or maybe the wish - that the mind could survive the body, a philosophical question that took him to psychic and paranormal investigation and on to the first stirrings of artificial intelligence.
Who knows where he would have ended up had he lived to yoke the extraordinary power of modern computers to his unfettered imagination and precise humanity?
In 2009 Prime Minister Gordon Brown apologised on behalf of the nation for the "appalling way" Alan Turing was treated simply for being gay.
Fittingly, pressure for an apology arose from an online petition to No.10 - an army of binary digits rallying to redeem their first champion, perhaps?
■ Code Breaker: Alan Turing's Life And Legacy, FREE, Science Museum, until June 2013, sciencemuseum.org.uk.
Science Museum conservator Bryony Finn inspects the Pilot ACE computer - formerly the fastest computer in the world in the 1950s and fundamentally designed by Alan Turing
The conspiracies and circumstance set in place to ensure he remained obscure appear formidable.
Firstly, he operated in great secrecy in the (now) legendary Bletchley Park, helping to decipher the Nazi Enigma code.
There was an unbreakable bond of silence among Bletchley veterans that kept their work secret long after it needed to be so. War time leader Winston Churchill called his codebreakers "the geese that laid the golden eggs and never cackled".
So effective was this secrecy that Bletchley's (and Turing's) remarkable advances only began to emerge in the '80s and 90s. By that time, the notion that the US was the pioneer of the computer age was firmly entrenched and Turing long dead.
Secondly, he was gay at a time when to be so was illegal and, in society's eyes, shameful.
An inquest ruled he committed suicide at the age of just 41 after swallowing a bottle of cyanide - although the verdict has been called into question.
It was 1952 and he had been convicted for committing a homosexual act and, in doing so, lost his security clearance and access to his computers.
David Rooney, curator on the Science Museum's new Code Breaker exhibition, said "Turing, who had undoubted eccentricities, was regarded with affection by colleagues. His treatment at the end of his life is a source of national shame.
"The exhibition is an opportunity to present the remarkable work of a man whose influence reaches into perhaps the most widespread pastime of the 21st century, the use of the personal computing device, yet whose name is probably unfamiliar."
If the secrecy was a constant guard against recognition, there was a third obstacle: the field in which he chose to excel - maths and computational science is fiendishly complex.
Indeed, if there is a weakness in the excellent and moving exhibition marking the centenary of his birth, it is in the nature of the exhibits.
While they are authentically dented, scraped, dusty and aged, their metal carapaces, occasional flick-switches and lack of recognisable function promote the idea they are the pointless products of abstract mind games.
In fact, these were the machines that took mechanical calculating devices - the sort that Victorian Charles Babbage would recognise - and pushed them on to the utilitarianism of the computer.
Key to that journey was the philosophical and conceptual framework of the computing device - Turing wrote the rulebook. He outlined what a computer was, how it would function, what it would do.
One of his legacies is a hypothetical device called a Turing machine - a device that simulates the cold logic of a computer algorithm.
But the exhibition demonstrates that Turing was far from such a machine himself.
On show are personal letters that soften the hard reproach of his familiar dark-eyed portrait to reveal a very human soul.
He lost a friend to TB when they were very young and his letters to the boys' mother are sensitive, supportive and insightful.
Rooney said: "We are able to show a more complete portrait of the man who, far from being the lone genius of popular belief, can be seen as a character with many endearing qualities."
Such was the extraordinary and devastating impact of Christopher Morcom's death, that it incubated in Turing the thought - or maybe the wish - that the mind could survive the body, a philosophical question that took him to psychic and paranormal investigation and on to the first stirrings of artificial intelligence.
Who knows where he would have ended up had he lived to yoke the extraordinary power of modern computers to his unfettered imagination and precise humanity?
In 2009 Prime Minister Gordon Brown apologised on behalf of the nation for the "appalling way" Alan Turing was treated simply for being gay.
Fittingly, pressure for an apology arose from an online petition to No.10 - an army of binary digits rallying to redeem their first champion, perhaps?
■ Code Breaker: Alan Turing's Life And Legacy, FREE, Science Museum, until June 2013, sciencemuseum.org.uk.
Science Museum conservator Bryony Finn inspects the Pilot ACE computer - formerly the fastest computer in the world in the 1950s and fundamentally designed by Alan Turing
Upwardly mobile at The O2
Here's the easy option: The O2 could have built a vast Stannah stairlift that took all-comers to the peak of its iconic roof. In a steady drone, rising to the heavens, the elderly, frail and obese could have ascended, strapped in but comfortable, conveyed and cowed.
There could be flask breaks and oxygen stops and chuntering counterweights descending to keep the balance, like a Welsh mountainside funicular.
That would be a way to go. Boring, yes, but inclusive and beige and all those things that modern life likes but you don't want in an attraction that takes you 52m into the sky onto a roof.
(Something magical about rooftops, isn't there? Dick Van Dyke and all that.)
No, here, in Up At The O2, (too many prepositions for a title) you want a taste of adventure, if only a tingle on the tongue from a pipette shot of adrenalin.
And if you want to see the vast panorama of east London - Canary Wharf, the Orbit, the Royal Docks, the Thames Barrier - well, remember what Debbie Allen said in Fame: "You want views? Well, views cost and right here is where you start paying - in sweat."
No faint-hearts. No-one weak of limb or soft of resolve. No lily-livered, muffin topped, state-coddled idlers welcome.
While the attraction doesn't exactly take you to the extreme, it does nudge you to the outer perimeter of the bit before the edge of your comfort zone.
I'm not suggesting roller-coaster thrill or a pilot-has-fainted thunderclap but it does leave you a little puffed and, maybe, disconcerted. For example, if you drop stuff over the side, it's gone - so that's like The Poseidon Adventure isn't it?
In fact, there's something very Disneyland about the experience from the outset. Waiting is not a pleasure, more an endurance leavened by a sense of impending adventure. Inform, entertain, get the paperwork done.
So we have Rupert briefing us on screen. A rather excitable Englishman, he calls on our heritage of derring-do, our sense of pride and patriotism to get us to the top, with all those pesky health and safety lessons tucked in between for good measure.
We know our purpose, our birthright our destiny - and where the toilets are, just in case.
An hour and a half for a complete trip, we were told. Seemed excessive.
But then there were the checks, the straps, the harnesses, the nervy banter between newly-bonded brothers and the lessons in clamping on to the wire so you don't tumble down, Jack and Jill style.
Part of it was probably prescribed by the HSE, but it did add to the drama - as though we really were steeplejacks, or mountaineers, or Chinese engineers in some Channel Five documentary.
Either way, the ascent was overseen by a Sherpa Tensing - ours was Adam, generous with his time and eager to please - and our excursion jellied the legs for the unfit (me) and curdled the lunch of the lesser folk (so not me).
If heights are not your thing, you wouldn't be here but if steep slopes that appear to lead to an eternal void stir the butterflies, or a route march on a trampoline ungirds your loins, then you'll be glad of the umbilical link to the sturdy wires.
At the top, the viewing platform and plenty of time for panoramic shots, for picking out buildings and cooing at cityscapes.
Pity the panorama is downbeat - too much industrial plant and not enough sky piercing drama - but for those of us who live and work round here, at ground-level mostly, there is enough to excite.
The empty cable car slung to and fro dejectedly, the planes rose from City Airport, the sun hit the Thames and the playful Shard hid behind the skirts of One Canada Square, a perspective that flatters the latter.
Then it was down the other side, marching sideways like crabs and both ruing and grateful for the benevolent weather (for the rain would have made the descent slippery and heart-pumping).
In our gear - jumpsuits, harnesses, climbing shoes - we were swashbuckling outsiders in an attraction busy with diners and gawpers and somnambulists.
But if there were any doubt that we were back down to earth then - well, we exited through the gift shop. Did Edmund Hillary? Did Chris Bonington? Did James Bond after his skiddy descent down the iconic parabola.
Oh, forget it. The moment's gone.
FACTFILE
■ Climbs take place every 30 minutes and run noon to 8pm weekdays in the summer and 10am to 6pm at weekends.
■ Tickets cost £22 for adults and children (over 10) and all the gear is provided. Stringent health guidelines apply.
■ Pre-booking is recommended, online at o2.co.uk/upattheo2
There could be flask breaks and oxygen stops and chuntering counterweights descending to keep the balance, like a Welsh mountainside funicular.
That would be a way to go. Boring, yes, but inclusive and beige and all those things that modern life likes but you don't want in an attraction that takes you 52m into the sky onto a roof.
(Something magical about rooftops, isn't there? Dick Van Dyke and all that.)
No, here, in Up At The O2, (too many prepositions for a title) you want a taste of adventure, if only a tingle on the tongue from a pipette shot of adrenalin.
And if you want to see the vast panorama of east London - Canary Wharf, the Orbit, the Royal Docks, the Thames Barrier - well, remember what Debbie Allen said in Fame: "You want views? Well, views cost and right here is where you start paying - in sweat."
No faint-hearts. No-one weak of limb or soft of resolve. No lily-livered, muffin topped, state-coddled idlers welcome.
While the attraction doesn't exactly take you to the extreme, it does nudge you to the outer perimeter of the bit before the edge of your comfort zone.
I'm not suggesting roller-coaster thrill or a pilot-has-fainted thunderclap but it does leave you a little puffed and, maybe, disconcerted. For example, if you drop stuff over the side, it's gone - so that's like The Poseidon Adventure isn't it?
In fact, there's something very Disneyland about the experience from the outset. Waiting is not a pleasure, more an endurance leavened by a sense of impending adventure. Inform, entertain, get the paperwork done.
So we have Rupert briefing us on screen. A rather excitable Englishman, he calls on our heritage of derring-do, our sense of pride and patriotism to get us to the top, with all those pesky health and safety lessons tucked in between for good measure.
We know our purpose, our birthright our destiny - and where the toilets are, just in case.
An hour and a half for a complete trip, we were told. Seemed excessive.
But then there were the checks, the straps, the harnesses, the nervy banter between newly-bonded brothers and the lessons in clamping on to the wire so you don't tumble down, Jack and Jill style.
Part of it was probably prescribed by the HSE, but it did add to the drama - as though we really were steeplejacks, or mountaineers, or Chinese engineers in some Channel Five documentary.
Either way, the ascent was overseen by a Sherpa Tensing - ours was Adam, generous with his time and eager to please - and our excursion jellied the legs for the unfit (me) and curdled the lunch of the lesser folk (so not me).
If heights are not your thing, you wouldn't be here but if steep slopes that appear to lead to an eternal void stir the butterflies, or a route march on a trampoline ungirds your loins, then you'll be glad of the umbilical link to the sturdy wires.
At the top, the viewing platform and plenty of time for panoramic shots, for picking out buildings and cooing at cityscapes.
Pity the panorama is downbeat - too much industrial plant and not enough sky piercing drama - but for those of us who live and work round here, at ground-level mostly, there is enough to excite.
The empty cable car slung to and fro dejectedly, the planes rose from City Airport, the sun hit the Thames and the playful Shard hid behind the skirts of One Canada Square, a perspective that flatters the latter.
Then it was down the other side, marching sideways like crabs and both ruing and grateful for the benevolent weather (for the rain would have made the descent slippery and heart-pumping).
In our gear - jumpsuits, harnesses, climbing shoes - we were swashbuckling outsiders in an attraction busy with diners and gawpers and somnambulists.
But if there were any doubt that we were back down to earth then - well, we exited through the gift shop. Did Edmund Hillary? Did Chris Bonington? Did James Bond after his skiddy descent down the iconic parabola.
Oh, forget it. The moment's gone.
FACTFILE
■ Climbs take place every 30 minutes and run noon to 8pm weekdays in the summer and 10am to 6pm at weekends.
■ Tickets cost £22 for adults and children (over 10) and all the gear is provided. Stringent health guidelines apply.
■ Pre-booking is recommended, online at o2.co.uk/upattheo2
Book review: Tubes, by Andrew Blum
BOOK
Tubes, by Andrew Blum
Penguin
★★★✩✩
IN A NUTSHELL
There is no cloud - there are just lots and lots of wires leading to lots and lots of data centres. Andrew Blum follows his emails down the pipes.
REVIEW
There should be a word for it - there probably is - but I'm going to plump for a phrase instead - total immersive reading.
The book is Tubes: Behind The Scenes At The Internet and author Andrew Blum is in Britain.
He started his journey looking for the physical aspects of the net - the exchanges, the cables, data warehouses - in his homeland of America and now he's over here to examine the European connections.
And he talks about this place, this hub, "the Heathrow of the internet" that is a crossroads - maybe a spaghetti junction - of the internet that is like a worldwide pinch point for the entire structure. Seemingly, it all goes through this exchange centre, he says.
The company is Telehouse and it is sited in the Docklands. I look up from the book to check my station. We're at East India DLR. So is the author. He's off to Telehouse, this Mecca, this icon. I see it, right next the Tower Hamlets Town Hall.
So that's what that is. Who would have guessed? Did you?
In the book, Blum satisfactorily kills off the notion that there's a cloud. I'm e-mailing this story - and there's a physical link to the receiver.
There has to be although we tend to characterise the net in more nebulous terms. Blum shows us behind the curtain where there's lots and lots of yellow cable.
Revelatory stuff if a bit dry. Catnip for network nerds.
Tubes, by Andrew Blum
Penguin
★★★✩✩
IN A NUTSHELL
There is no cloud - there are just lots and lots of wires leading to lots and lots of data centres. Andrew Blum follows his emails down the pipes.
REVIEW
There should be a word for it - there probably is - but I'm going to plump for a phrase instead - total immersive reading.
The book is Tubes: Behind The Scenes At The Internet and author Andrew Blum is in Britain.
He started his journey looking for the physical aspects of the net - the exchanges, the cables, data warehouses - in his homeland of America and now he's over here to examine the European connections.
And he talks about this place, this hub, "the Heathrow of the internet" that is a crossroads - maybe a spaghetti junction - of the internet that is like a worldwide pinch point for the entire structure. Seemingly, it all goes through this exchange centre, he says.
The company is Telehouse and it is sited in the Docklands. I look up from the book to check my station. We're at East India DLR. So is the author. He's off to Telehouse, this Mecca, this icon. I see it, right next the Tower Hamlets Town Hall.
So that's what that is. Who would have guessed? Did you?
In the book, Blum satisfactorily kills off the notion that there's a cloud. I'm e-mailing this story - and there's a physical link to the receiver.
There has to be although we tend to characterise the net in more nebulous terms. Blum shows us behind the curtain where there's lots and lots of yellow cable.
Revelatory stuff if a bit dry. Catnip for network nerds.
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