The fat lady has sung

And so I've seen my final film at this year's London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival.


This LLGFF was, for me, book-ended by films which featured the fucked-up gay kid standing on the parapet of a bridge, ready to end it all: but whereas he plunged to his death in Prayers for Bobby, in The Man Who Loved Yngve he was saved to come out and find eternal happiness. Or something like that. Still, at least it was movement in the right direction.

The final three...

Brotherhood wasn't my choice, but my lovely friend F. insisted there was nothing else he wanted to see other than this Danish film about gay neo-Nazis.


That description tells you pretty much all you need to know: other than the vaguely shocking context (how often do we see crowds of supposedly "modern" Europeans giving synchronised "Sieg Heils"?) it was very, very run-of-the-mill.


There was, at least, a little bit of cock in it, although the film was so violent I struggled to derive much salacious pleasure.

The Man Who Loved Yngve was also from the northern reaches of the continent, this time Norway: a sweet coming-of-age/coming-out story set in a music-obsessed 1989, where the synthetic strains of David Sylvian's Japan conclusively thrashed the turgid squawkings of assorted heavy metal "bands".


There was an appalling shortage of cock on display, but otherwise this was a very witty film whose fast-pacing helped to disguise the homophobia and self-loathing.

Also desperately short of cock, but offering other consolations, was Soundless Wind Chime, a Hong Kong/China/Swiss co-production.


Featuring an assortment of more-or-less childishly needy (and probably co-dependent/enabling) adults, there was still some good stuff to be had. The evocation of Hong Kong and Beijing was delightful, while the constant time- and place-shifting around the subject of love and loss reminded me of 2000's brilliant French film Presque Rien. The two leads were lovely, including Bernhard Bulling who pulled-off a double-lead as two different characters -- and, incidentally, gave us a nice show of pulling himself off.


Though not as explicit as I might have liked given that this is, essentially, a soft porn festival, it's this film I'll probably remember for longer than the others.

It may be big but is it clever?

I had a perplexing encounter with someone who wanted to tell me about his macrophilia.


This, he said, was a fetish where he derived sexual pleasure from imagining himself to be a tiny little person, just a few inches high, at the mercy of a giant (ie, a normal size) gay man.


Being a bit of a pompous knob, I couldn't help questioning whether macrophilia could properly be defined as a fetish (since it was both unachievable and not directed at an inanimate object); rather, wasn't it a fantasy? Unsurprisingly, he wasn't very interested in the semantics.


He showed me some pictures and asked what I thought. I said they just made me think of Gulliver's Travels and, regretably, I never found that book sexually arousing.

Somehow I feel as if I failed him.

He's so dreamy

Oh alright -- I had a bunch of Daniel Robinson photos left over from the last post, so you get them.


Did I mention that Daniel is the star of The Big Gay Musical?


On the surface he seems like a nice boy. Someone you'd be happy to take home to meet your mother.


But there's more than a hint of a raunchy, dirty sort of boy lurking not too far underneath.


Now how in the world could you expect me to resist that combo?


Daniel Robinson: my shiny new pin-up for today.

Yeah, nothing else to report here.

It's Big and it's Gay

More London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival frolics, this time with The Big Gay Musical.


As you'd expect, this film is as camp as a boy scout convention. The story revolves around an off-Broadway production (all oiled bodies and sub-Pink Narcissus colour schemes), and the off-stage lives of some of the cast.


There are two principal characters:


But in true Orwellian fashion, one of them is more principal than the other (I speak of the lovely Daniel Robinson, seen above to the right).


There's a rather promising chorus but they are used disappointingly little (they evoke strongly the drag queens from Torch Song Trilogy. And that's a big compliment).


And there's a modest role for comedian Steve Hayes. Or perhaps I should have written immodest, since he's playing God:


Steve was part of the delightful ensemble in delightful gay semi-musical Trick, one of my all-time favourite gay films.

But did I mention this was hunky Daniel Robinson's film?:


It also features a cameo from gay porn "star" Brent Corrigan -- although you'll see rather more of him in this next photo than you will in this surprisingly chaste film:


Er... did I mention it was Daniel Robinson's film...?:


Bugger it -- lost my thread completely.

Er... The Big Gay Musical is a low-budget, jolly, camp-as-Christmas, gay musical.

Yeah, I think that about sums it up.

Taking a line for a walk

I swear to you, when I first started putting together the images for this post I had a clear theme in mind.


But within seconds I got distracted.


And then I found all manner of unrelated stuff being shoved into the e-store.


Before I knew it, any idea of coherence had long since fled the scene.


But I figured you'd probably enjoy these half a dozen images anyway.


After all, it's not as if anyone actually reads the words I put between the cocks.


So now I rest easy, knowing that you will have derived as much pleasure from that post as I have done.

Dressed in nothing but a smile

No winkie on display here, I'm afraid, but I was rather taken with that sardonic smile.


Yes, that must be what attracted my attention.

A model day out

A sunny Sunday saw me leaving the King's Cross suburban platforms by this train:


...(no, I've no idea who the bald bloke is, either), in order to go here:


...(the hilltop delights of Alexandra Palace, in case you were wondering), for the annual London Festival of Railway Modelling:


Don't worry, I'm not going to swamp you with images of model railways (no matter how delightful I might consider that), but you do get to see a couple.

First up is something called Crumley & Little Wickhill.


This is an extraordinary creation, built as a triangle. It takes the form of a valley and is viewed from either end.


The modelling is exquisite, especially when you consider the scale -- 1:76 (so a little human figure will be less than 2cm tall), in a variant technically known as 009 (which means narrow gauge railways).


It's a model of an imaginary place, where a light railway/tramway has been built hugging the steep valley sides.


Originally a mineral tramway, it has grown over the years and now carries passengers and freight, its tracks crossing or running alongside roadways.


The attention-to-detail on here is staggering, and I can't begin to imagine the level of skill required to make it work.


The second layout to grab my attention (and the last one from Alexandra Palace that I'm going to post about -- promise!) was Minories (GN), almost at the opposite end of the spectrum with its deceptively simple layout and traditional approach.


"Minories" is possibly the most famous design in British railway modelling: designed by the late Cyril Freezer, it was intended to represent a terminus buried deep in brick-lined cuttings in the heart of the City of London.


Freezer published it in 1957, but it is most often imagined in the 1970s, the diesel era. Freezer's idea was that the station was run-down but operated an intensive commuter service from the City via the "Widened Lines" to Moorgate, Farringdon, King's Cross and, thence, to Hertford and the north.


The partially-built model on display here is in EM, a variant of the most popular "00" scale in British modelling, 1:76.


While the huge size of Crumley & Little Wickhill lets you see the railway in the sweep of the landscape, models like Minories are much better if you're more interested in the detailed operation of the railway itself.


"Operating potential" is, of course, just a fancy phrase for "play potential", and the complicated (but entirely plausible) arrangement of points at the station throat allows for interesting puzzles as you try to get locomotive A from behind train B and onto the front of C, while enabling diesel multiple units D and E to come and go to their schedule.


This version of Minories is delightful, but there have been many others over the years: here's Moor Street, which has particularly successful detailing and is set in Great Western Railway territory in the heart of Birmingham.


Freezer stated that he believed Minories would work as well on a viaduct as buried in a cutting, and the viaduct option is used here.


I have to say, I don't think it's quite as successful -- your attention is drawn to the photographic backdrop which always, to me, looks like a stage set and, therefore, detracts a little from the realism, even on a model as exquisite as this one.


The final version of Minories I'm going to share with you is the most successful I have seen -- Ripper Street, a variant again set in a cutting in the heart of London, but here the barrel-vaulted terminus is hugely evocative.


This one features electric multiple units rather than the more usual diesel operation, but it's 3rd rail rather than overhead which, to me, avoids unsightly wires and support structures.


That means you can focus on the details of the structure, and the run-down, weathered feel of the place.


For me, this model has the feel of the old London (Broad Street) station, long-since demolished.


Utterly delightful. Makes me want to get one of my own.



PS: Someone's posted this delightful video footage on Youtube.



Minories (GN) and Crumley & Little Wickhill can be seen in action, at 2'17"-2'38" and at 2'53"-4'28" respectively.