odd man out

on the weekend horsemouth finished watching spirals and watched odd man out - carol read’s proto the third man. like any british film about ireland it’s carefully framed and hedged round - a banner at the start framing it as a story, denying an interest in the politics, a nice speech (made by the protagonist) about the ballot box.

"this story is told against a background of political unrest in a city of northern ireland. it is not concerned with the struggle between the law and an illegal organisation, but only with the conflict in the hearts of the people when they become unexpectedly involved." 

william hartnoll crops up as a barman - but other than that the character actors are predominantly irish (from the dublin theatre).

like the third man it is a post war city in ruins. james mason gives it his best but it s a joycean city of characters that takes the credit, but it’s beckett as well (why here’s shel, here’s some low comedy, here are his no-good friends squatting in a disused mansion).

boris johnson has been filmed wandering round distressed in an underground bunker wearing only a soiled dressing gown. he mutters to himself about ‘a really great deal’ and ‘they said we couldn’t get it’, there is a filmcrew down there with him, but there is no phone signal, they have gone rogue and lost all perspective.


increasingly he comes to resemble the elephant man. (yes his posture really is that bad).

in fact this is not true (it only nearly happened). instead boris has been sent off on a tour of the extremities of the country to play with boats, and tractors and trains (and sad to say even mops). ‘nursie!’ bawls the big baby ‘my feet are wet’. ‘did you wet yourself again boris?’ replies nursie in solid northside.

how will boris deal with failure and rejection? will he just, in a twinkling of an eye, change their names to mufflewaffle and lambshoulder.

boris  is in fact twins. he is his own tweedledum and tweedledee.

remain boris has been tied up, gagged and hidden in a cellar by a bunch of coves, but he has escaped and is currently criss-crossing north london underclothed and underfed solliciting donations from commuters on the overground “I went to eaton.’ he blubs).

leave boris, he’s the one we know and recognise.

they flipped a coin dominic gave them back in 2016.