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The Green, Green Grass of Home: Mr Jones An Aberfan Story - Finborough Theatre

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A life of hope and promise, interrupted, lies at the heart of Mr Jones: an Aberfan Story. The play follows two young people in Aberfan before and after the disaster that killed 144 people, including 116 children. It’s an emotional coming-of-age tale of intersecting lives, family, love, and the shock of tragedy. With two vivid performances and strong characterisations, you feel immersed in 1960s Welsh small-town life. It’s now running at the Finborough Theatre , after performances at the Edinburgh Festival and across Wales.  The Aberfan disaster is well known in the UK but perhaps less so elsewhere. The facts of the tragedy are confined to the programme notes rather than in the piece. On 21 October 1966, the catastrophic collapse of a colliery spoil tip on a mountain above Aberfan engulfed a local school, killing many. The play avoids the causes and negligence, instead focusing on those working and building lives in the town.  Writer-performer Liam Holmes plays Stephen Jones, a...

Movie: Lemming

As an antidote for all the theatre, travel and art I consumed over the past week (and the weekend drinking) I caught Lemming at the movies tonight. It is a French film by Dominik Moll who previously directed "Harry, he's here to help" which was a rather suspenseful drama in the style of Hitchcock. This movie again is Hitchcockian. That is to say if Hitchcock were alive, not doing crap television and making decent movies surely he would make this sort of thing. The movie also reminded me a little of Mulholland Drive with its dream sequences and surrealism of when a perfect marriage seems to fall apart when the boss and his wife come for dinner.

There is a somewhat happy ending after a murder and a suicide, but it still isn't the most pleasant of films to have on your mind while trying to get off to sleep. Oh and the neighbourhood foxes seem to be on heat tonight as well so there's that to contend with too…  

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