Films on Foot: Film based walking tours of London

15 Park Street, Borough, SE1, The gang's hideout from Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

This autumn, the Ramblers, in association with Times BFI 53rd London Film Festival, will be holding an unmissable three week walking festival to celebrate London's world-class film heritage.

Timed to coincide with the Times BFI London Film Festival, the Ramblers second annual "Films on Foot" Festival (14 October-1 Novembwill er) see 9 walks focusing on different areas of London which have been stars of the big screen. The walks are free and open to everyone (new members are especially welcome). All the walks are led by volunteer members from the Metropolitan Walkers and the South Bank Ramblers Group.

The walks take place every Wednesday at 7pm, and every weekend at 1.30pm throughout the festival. There is no need to book, simply turn up at the meeting place indicated below.

An edit version of the programme is listed below:

Soho and the West End 'films on foot' walk - Wednesday 21 October 7pm
Join the Metropolitan Walkers for a 3 mile film stroll through Soho, the heart of the British film industry, and the West End with London's most famous landmarks captured on the big screen. The walk ends at a pub near Embankment tube station.

Notting Hill, Bayswater & Kensington Gardens - Saturday 24 October 1.30pm
Join the Metropolitan Walkers for a 8 mile film location walk This is a walk of contrasts taking in elegant 'Notting Hill' so popular with British romantic comedy film makers, the green space of Kensington Gardens and seedy Bayswater used in films such as 'Trainspotting'. The walk ends at a pub near Queensway tube station.

Isle of Dogs & Maritime Greenwich - Sunday 25 October 1.30pm
Join the South Bank Ramblers for a 5 mile film location walk through The Isle of Dogs - a frequent star of gangster and action films, and Maritime Greenwich - one of the most popular film locations in London. The walk ends at a pub in Greenwich.

Gangsters in the East End - Wednesday 28 October 7pm
Join the Metropolitan Walkers for a 3 mile stroll through the East End. This part of London was the play ground for real time villains, the Krays, and is a favourite film location for British gangster movies. The walk ends at a pub near Bethnal Green tube station.

Brompton Cemetery, Chelsea & Battersea Park - Saturday 31 October 1.30pm
Join the Metropolitan Walkers for a 6 mile film location walk. Brompton Cemetery and Battersea Park are two of the capital's most popular film locations, as well as being beautiful places to walk. The walk ends at a pub near Sloane Square tube station.

Westminster & the Royal Parks - Sunday 1 November 1.30pm

Join the Metropolitan Walkers for a 5 mile stroll taking film locations around Westminster and Belgravia, as well as the green spaces of St James's Park, Green Park and Hyde Park. The walk ends at a pub near Hyde Park Corner tube station.

For the full programme and information click here!

Tickets for Monday's screening of Disney's Crimson Flight & QA available

One lake, a million birds, an incredible story

In a remote and forgotten wilderness, one of nature's last great mysteries unfolds: the birth, life and survival of a million crimson-winged flamingos. Against the dramatic backdrop of unforgiving, never-before filmed landscapes, we follow the birth of a tiny flamingo hatchling, and the perils and fortunes of her life in the extraordinary 'other world' of Lake Natron in northern Tanzania.

The first title to be released under the new Disneynature label, THE CRIMSON WING will take you on a breathtaking and beautiful journey through a story that only nature itself could tell.

To download tickets simply go to www.seefilmfirst.com and enter code: 482610

The film starts at 6.30pm. Seefilmfirst tickets must be changed for cinema tickets at the cinema Box Office by 6.15pm. There will be a Q&A with the films producers and director at the end.

Where
Cineworld Haymarket
63-65 Haymarket, London, SW1Y 4RL

When
6.15 for 6:30pm, 21 September, 2009

Friday Film Location: 28 Days Later, London UK

The Days Are Numbered

28 Days Later
Stars: Cillian Murphy - Jim, Naomie Harris - Selena, Brendan Gleeson - Frank, Christopher Eccleston - Major Henry West














It has been twenty-eight days since Jim, a young bicycle courier, was knocked off his bike and injured in a car accident. When he wakes up from his coma, the world has changed. Four weeks after a mysterious, incurable virus spreads throughout the UK, a handful of survivors try to find sanctuary.

A critical and commercial success, 28 Days Later is widely recognized for images of a deserted London. It spawned the 2007 sequel, 28 Weeks Later, the graphic novel 28 Days Later: The Aftermath, and a possible third film.

28 Days Later features scenes set in normally bustling parts of London such as Westminster Bridge, Piccadilly Circus, Horse Guards Parade and Oxford Street. In order to depict these locations as desolate, police would close the roads at 4am and filming would begin immediately. It would last for one hour, and at that time the police would reopen the roads.
As well as having to deal with traffic, the producers also had to ask clubbers to find alternative routes home. In terms of the traffic, the producers correctly predicted that asking drivers to either wait for up to an hour or find another way might cause some considerable consternation. As such, they employed several extremely attractive young women (one of whom was Danny Boyle's daughter) to make the necessary requests. This plan had the desired results, as the drivers responded quite amicably to the young girls.

For the London scene where Jim walks by the overturned double-decker bus, the film crew placed the bus on its side and removed it when the shot was finished, all within 20 minutes.


Where:
Westminster Bridge, Westminster and South Bank, London SE1 and SW1

View Larger Map
Trivia:
It's not explained in the film but the infected are attracted to the tone in human voices.
The decision to film on DV (using Canon XL1 cameras) was both an aesthetic and a logistic choice.
- Danny Boyle felt that the harshness of the DV imagery suited the post-apocalyptic urban landscape and the grittiness of the film in general.
- All the scenes of the Infected in a particular style - using a type of slow motion feature on the Canon XL1 DV cameras with which the film was shot. Shooting at that speed on a film camera gives basic slow motion, but doing so on a DV camera produces the kind of staccato effect seen in scenes involving the Infected.
- "The police and the local authorities were quite happy to assist us because we could set up scenes so quickly. We could literally be ready to shoot with a six-camera set-up within minutes - something we would not realistically have been able to do if shooting under the restrictions of 35mm which takes a good deal more time to set up a single shot."

Westminster Bridge can also be seen in; Doctor Who (1964 & 2005), Monty Python's Flying Circus, 102 Dalmatians, Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix

BFI & Empire's Movie Con 2 : Day 2

The full schedule for Movie Con 2 can be found over here on Empire's website. Below are my highlights from day 2:

Day 2 started with a flash of fury, explosions and red metal, that's right! Some seriously awesome clips from Iron Man 2 were on display introduced by Robert (I'm in town to shoot some additional scenes for Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes) Downey Jr. Unfortunately I was late and missed what was a highlight of day 2.


The legendary Kim Newman ran his now infamous Movie Quiz with the precision of a T800 which was loads of fun. One of the prizes was for a winner's name to be used in Mr. Newman's next novel.

Next up was a clip from the super tense Hurt Locker and Q&A with Director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal. Loosely based on Boal's experiences in Baghdad. Hurt Locker is refreshingly direct and will keep you on the edge of your seat. It could be seen as a natural progression to Point Break.

Optimum rolled out a hilarious and heartwarming presentation for Bunny And The Bull. Hosted by Director Paul King and Star Simon Farnaby. If you are looking for something that lands somewhere between a holiday, run by The Mighty Boosh filmed by Michel Gondry.

"Bunny & the Bull is a road movie set entirely in a flat. Stephen Turnbull hasn't been outside in months. Living with a painfully restrictive routine, he refuses to interact with the world or think about the past. When a sudden infestation of mice forces him to change his ways, he finds his mind hurtling back to the disastrous trek around Europe he undertook with his friend Bunny, a womanising, gambling-addicted booze-hound. Unable to stem the flood of memories, Stephen’s flat becomes the springboard for an extraordinary odyssey through landscapes made up of snapshots and souvenirs, from the industrial wastelands of Silesia to the bull fields of Andalusia. A story of love, disillusionment, stuffed bears and globalised seafood, Bunny & the Bull is an offbeat and heartfelt journey to the end of the room."

Next Director/Writer Stuart Hazeldine introduced Exam.


"Eight talented candidates have reached the final stage of selection to join the ranks of a mysterious and powerful corporation. Entering a windowless room, an Invigilator gives them eighty minutes to answer one simple question. He outlines three rules they must obey or be disqualified: don't talk to him or the armed guard by the door, don't spoil their papers and don't leave the room. He starts the clock and leaves. The candidates turn over their question papers, only to find they're completely blank. After the initial confusion has subsided, one frustrated candidate writes 'I believe you should hire me because...,' and is promptly ejected for spoiling. The remaining candidates soon figure out they're permitted to talk to each other, and they agree to cooperate in order to figure out the question: then they can compete to answer it. At first they suspect the question may be hidden in their papers like a security marker in a credit card, and they figure out ways to change their environment to expose the hidden words. But light, liquids and other plans all come to naught. Soon enough, the candidates begin to uncover each other's background, prejudices and hidden agendas. Tensions rise as the clock steadily descends towards zero, and each candidate must decide how far they are willing to go to secure the ultimate job." Tense stuff.

The end of the day closed with a 3D spectacular! You should know that I love 3D! Even the crappiest film in the world can become wonderful by either showing it in IMAX or 3D format. I have never seen a bad 3D film at the IMAX. Even the big screen 3D trailers are Worth the entry alone. So what if this new push towards 3D was engineered by Hollywood marketeers to revitalise the industry and shaft Movie piracy. I love it. The final hour and a half of of Movie Con was spectacular. In order:

Disney presented; The trailer & loads of footage from the mind boggling A Christmas Carol, the trailer for Toy Story 3, and footage from the much talked about Up.

Welcome back Flynn!
Then we were shown the 3D trailer/footage from Tron Legacy ! This was the same bootleg footage that haunted the net after Comic Con last year and was recently released onto the net in high def. Except that this was in 3D on a BIG screen! Tron Legacy looks like it will be worth the 27 year wait.



Finally we were treated to footage from Jim Cameron's 4 years in the making AVATAR. Stolen from Empire's blog:

"James Cameron recorded a short introduction, just for Movie-Con II, to two scenes of footage from Avatar, due out in December. We wouldn’t be exaggerating too far if we say that jaws hit the floor. The first, short scene gave a flavour to the threat in the film: Stephen Lang’s Colonel Quaritch explaining to newcomers just how dangerous the world of Pandora is, and telling them frankly that they won’t all make it out alive. Then we saw Jake Sully’s (Sam Worthington) Avatar alive and working in the jungles of the planet. Having faced off one rhino*/hammerhead shark added by me:)*-looking beastie, he’s surprised by the much more dangerous spider-lynx looking monster, and a spectacular chase scene occurs. We also get a glimpse there of Sigourney Weaver’s Grace in action: check the next issue of Empire for more on that.

Naturally, we had to see that again, so we rewound and went for a second go." The team also let us know that there would be more & different footage shown on AVATAR day this Friday. Info here!

All that is left for me to say is thank you Empire & BFI. I had a wonderful time. Next year please bring some display cases and props with you. I'm just saying.

Stephen Fry talks about his travels to America at the V&A, London

A conversation with the celebrated author, wit and comic genius Stephen Fry about his long-held fascination with America and its people, cultures, and landscapes. Questions cover some of the high points of the recent epic journey in which he travelled across 50 states in a black cab and explore a country that is at times magnificent, eccentric, beautiful and strange. The event coincides with the publication of his new book, Stephen Fry in America (HarperCollins 2008) and the television series of the same name.

Our Friday night Lecture Theatre programme features big names from the world of design, art and culture. All talks take place in the Lecture Theatre from 19.00-20.00 unless otherwise stated.

Stephen Fry - In America
Wednesday 26 November 2008
Lecture Theatre
19.00-20.00

Scrambled Eggs James Bond

Scrambled Eggs James Bond

The recipe for Scrambled Eggs James Bond appears in 007 in New York, a short story that was published in the US edition of Ian Fleming's Thrilling Cities.

For four individualists:
12 fresh eggs
Salt and pepper
5-6 oz. of fresh butter.

Break the eggs into a bowl. Beat thoroughly with a fork and season well. In a small copper (or heavy bottomed saucepan) melt four oz. of the butter. When melted, pour in the eggs and cook over a very low heat, whisking continuously with a small egg whisk.

While the eggs are slightly more moist than you would wish for eating, remove the pan from heat, add rest of butter and continue whisking for half a minute, adding the while finely chopped chives or fines herbs.

Serve on hot buttered toast in individual copper dishes (for appearance only) with pink champagne (Taittinger) and low music.

London Eye, Waterloo, London

The London Eye (Millenium Wheel)

London Eye, Waterloo, London, originally uploaded by Craig Grobler.

The London Eye (Millenium Wheel) at a height of 135 metres (443 ft) [1], is the biggest Ferris wheel in Europe, and has become the most popular paid tourist attraction in the United Kingdom, visited by over 3 million people a year.[2]

At the time it was erected it was the tallest Ferris wheel in the world, until it was surpassed by the Star of Nanchang (160m) in May 2006, and then the Singapore Flyer (165m) on February 11, 2008. However, it is still described by its operators as "the world's tallest cantilevered observation wheel" (because the entire structure is supported by an A-frame on one side only).[3]

Honourable Artillery Company, Old Street, London

Honourable Artillery Company, Old Street, London, originally uploaded by Craig Grobler.

This historic 18th century mansion, home to Honourable Artillery Company, is set in a six acre garden and close to the heart of the City of London, with Moorgate nearby. Several rooms are available for hire, including the oak-panelled Long Room, Artillery Garden and the Prince Consort Rooms. In addition, the HAC runs a Corporate Diners scheme which allows a limited number of City-based companies the opportunity to use the Long Room restaurant weekday lunch times. Previously it housed a museum open to the public displaying the Company's collection of uniforms, medals and weapons however this is now closed.

The Honourable Artillery Company has 7 function rooms; the largest can hold a maximum of 350 guests.

Somerset House Edmond J. Safra Fountain Court, London

Somerset House Edmond J. Safra Fountain Court

Somerset House Edmond J. Safra Fountain Court, London, originally uploaded by Craig Grobler.

The Edmond J. Safra Fountain Court is at the heart of Somerset House - a dignified courtyard with a mischievous streak.

Somerset House Edmond J. Safra Fountain Court, London, originally uploaded by Craig Grobler.

The array of jets dance in an orchestrated sequence, with added coloured lighting at night - a refreshing surprise on a warm spring day.

The fountains run from 10.00 to 23.00 daily.

Please note: the fountains will be switched off from Sunday 28 September 2008, while the courtyard plays host to Origin: The London Craft Fair and the Ice Rink. They will return to their normal programme in Spring 2009.

Somerset House Edmond J. Safra Fountain Court, London, originally uploaded by Craig Grobler.

Goldeneye location: The ‘St Petersburg’ square: Somerset House, The Strand (before its renovation), London

Somerset House as a film location
The 'St Petersburg' square, where Wade uses a sledgehammer to fix his motor, is the courtyard of the recently restored Somerset House on the Strand – which later became the ‘Ministry of Defence’ in Tomorrow Never Dies. This popular filming location can also be seen in Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow (as turn-of-the-century Manhattan), Billy Wilder’s superb The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (as the ‘Diogenes Club’ where Holmes meets his older brother Mycroft (Christopher Lee) and in Shanghai Knights (where Jackie Chan invents the kung fu movie at the end of the film).

The 2008/2009 Global cost of living by country

Every year Mercer releases Worldwide Ranking country ranking based on the cost of living. The 2008 top 50 countries are listed below with a comparison to their 2007 ranking.

From www.finfacts.com:
Mercer Cost of Living Survey – Worldwide Rankings, 2008
The indices are based on Mercer's cost of living database and are modified to include rental accommodation costs and to reflect constant weighting and basket items. We do not recommend that expatriates use the figures represented here to compare their own compensation packages.

Rankings		City	Country	COL Index
March 2008	March 2007	March 2008	March 2007
1	1	Moscow	Russia	142.4	134.4
2	4	Tokyo	Japan	127.0	122.1
3	2	London	UK	125.0	126.3
4	10	Oslo	Norway	118.3	105.8
5	3	Seoul	South Korea	117.7	122.4
6	5	Hong Kong	China	117.6	119.4
7	6	Copenhagen	Denmark	117.2	110.2
8	7	Geneva	Switzerland	115.8	109.8
9	9	Zurich	Switzerland	112.7	107.6
10	11	Milan	Italy	111.3	104.4
11	8	Osaka	Japan	110.0	108.4
12	13	Paris	France	109.4	101.4
13	14	Singapore	Singapore	109.1	100.4
14	17	Tel Aviv	Israel	105.0	97.7
15	21	Sydney	Australia	104.1	94.9
16	16	Dublin	Ireland	103.9	99.6
16	18	Rome	Italy	103.9	97.6
18	12	St. Petersburg	Russia	103.1	103.0
19	19	Vienna	Austria	102.3	96.9
20	20	Beijing	China	101.9	95.9
21	22	Helsinki	Finland	101.1	93.3
22	15	New York City	US	100.0	100.0
23	38	Istanbul	Turkey	99.4	87.7
24	26	Shanghai	China	98.3	92.1
25	25	Amsterdam	Netherlands	97.0	92.2
25	29	Athens	Greece	97.0	90.6
25	62	São Paulo	Brazil	97.0	82.8
28	26	Madrid	Spain	96.7	92.1
29	49	Prague	Czech Rep.	96.0	85.6
30	37	Lagos	Nigeria	95.9	88.0
31	31	Barcelona	Spain	95.2	89.2
31	64	Rio de Janeiro	Brazil	95.2	82.5
31	23	Stockholm	Sweden	95.2	93.1
34	24	Douala	Cameroon	95.1	92.9
35	67	Warsaw	Poland	95.0	82.4
36	64	Melbourne	Australia	94.2	82.5
37	39	Munich	Germany	93.1	87.6
38	45	Berlin	Germany	93.0	85.9
39	44	Brussels	Belgium	92.9	86.5
40	40	Frankfurt	Germany	92.5	87.4
41	33	Dakar	Senegal	92.2	89.0
42	28	Kiev	Ukraine	91.7	91.4
43	43	Luxembourg	Luxembourg	91.3	87.0
44	30	Almaty	Kazakhstan	90.7	89.6
45	31	Bratislava	Slovakia	90.6	89.2
46	45	Düsseldorf	Germany	90.4	85.9
46	72	Riga	Latvia	90.4	81.5
48	52	Mumbai	India	90.3	84.9
49	59	Zagreb	Croatia	90.0	83.5
50	57	Hamburg	Germany	89.9	84.2