Tom Hodgkinson wrote an interesting Country Diary entry the other day appealing to Britons to wake up and rebel against the banality of modern life. His specific targets were the mindless routine of drinking lager in front of the television every night, shopping for everything in soulless Tescos, and squandering your life on the internet.
Life is getting progressively worse it sometimes seems. All those things that we valued in the past — like community spirit, book reading, local produce, small-scale events in the local alehouse — are being replaced by gimcrack corporate tat. (But were things much better in the past. Didn’t people used to read rubbish books, watch crap telly and drink themselves to death?)
What do we want? Why are we all so scared of getting it? there are so many people all trying to make a living. The national population is too big for any common culture. That is why everything feels so fake.
Last night we went to see the very forgettable Forgetting Sarah Marshall. I went because I have a small obsession with the comedian Russell Brand, whose radio show streams of consciousness are endlessly fascinating. Brand wasn’t in it very much and dropped out of the film in a quite perfunctory way. Instead we saw the relationship traumas of some annoying everyman American. The film was most reminiscent of the abysmal Heart-Break Kid and had a similar streak of misogyny running through it. Though not quite as strong — insofar as it lacked any kind of edge.
If I were inclined to write a review I would probably talk about its depthless mediocrity, bemoaning and bewailing a culture that allows such bland fare to be released. In short, I would be echoing Tom Hodgkinson’s rant against these terrible days. How long before it all collapses?
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