WEEK 18 - BEND OF THE RIVER

With the November shuttage of pubbage, #WWWSI was brought forward from the traditional Sunday evening slot to the more anti-social yet less 'hangover consequential' Saturday 9:30pm slot.

It was time for our lowliest ranked film to date, in #96 out of 100, despite a perfect 100% audience review rating on Rotten Tomatoes, the Cask Marque of film scoring systems (make of that what you will).

Note the authentic printing problems

This week's Wotsit dice roll weighed heavy on my mind, as they often do on my stomach the following morning. I'd rolled a '5' for the last three weeks. Surely not again ...... it was you know!

Wotsit all about? (Alfie)

I'm started to think this dice is weighted. I've now had to eat a total of 41 bags of Wotsits out of a possible 48 over the past eight weeks and as you can imagine, I ain't got a CHEESY grin on my face at the thought. The Sainsbury's delivery man must be wondering why I order so many multipacks. Fetishes take on all forms.

Happier news on the wine front, as we tried one from a new country, Romania, which would have been perfect for last week's vampiric Hallowe'en special ......

Look how big and juicy those grapes are! Feteasca Neagra was the grape variety, it means 'black maiden' or 'young black girl; which makes it the least woke grape since that one called Loony in week 7. It was a real 'fruit bomb' of a wine (fruit bomb, fruit bomb you're my fruit bomb) though other more winey flavours I can't describe came through later on.

I've ordered the next three too, to get us to the end of lockdown

At 14% it was my strongest one since we watched High Noon in week 9, and I didn't wake up til high noon the next day funnily enough, so good job I didn't have it on a 'school night'.

My work colleagues who follow this asked why my new bucket hat has cannabis leaves on it. Now call me naïve, but I just thought it was a pretty floral pattern. If they wanna immerse themselves in a seedy drug culture, fine with me.

My book said grilled meat and stew pairs well with this wine, so I made a saddos beef stew dinner for one, with some crusty bread & butter, and olives.

After a quick boogie to some Western music (can you boogie to that style?), I went through to the other room, turned off some 'Strictly' catch up nonsense, and popped on the DVD for once again, I'd had to buy this one in.

The dumplings were abysmal but gave good stodge

So onto the film then, 1952 release date, and nice to see James Stewart in his prime rather than a deaf ailing doctor in his only other #WWWSI appearance to date 'The Shootist'.

The film storyline was decent, but what actually made the film so gripping was that you couldn't tell if the other main character, some dude called Arthur Kennedy, would betray him or stay loyal babes.

Basically, James Stewart had been a bit of a naughty boy and had decided to help these settlers get to Oregon for a change of pace. He stopped our Arthur from being hanged for also being a naughty boy, so they became pals. Arthur saved Jimmy's life on so many occasions early on, you were sure he was a goodie despite this old dude called Jeremy saying 'a leopard never changes it's spots'.

Jeremy's daughter, Julia Adams (wasn't she a Relationship Manager at Birmingham Financial Solutions Centre?) got shot in the shoulder by a Red Indian arrow which was good cos she was in danger of becoming annoying .....

Make -up is 'on point' considering the difficult circumstances

But she and Arthur got together and they decided to stay in Oregon which meant James Stewart had to go off with the other settlers who wanna make a home for themselves in a 'settlers settle down' kind of way, but then they came back as there was a big piss up on the final night which became a bit messy .....

Outdoor Wetherspoons style start to the night

So hard to get served in these Covid times

There's always one isn't there?

The lads on the shots before they hit the Doom Bar & Ruddles

Anyway, James Stewart confronts this guy who is supposed to be paying him in food supplies but has lied to them. There's a big shoot out, and all the goodies including Arthur and Julie Adams get on this paddle steamer and go with James Stewart and co.

Joining them is Rock Hudson who randomly 'rocks' up, tells everyone he definitely isn't gay a few times, flashes his white teeth, and just hangs around doing nowt useful for the rest of the film.

Arthur then DOES betray James Stewart. I was shook, as the kids say. But James Stewart hides behind a mountain, and rescues Jezza and Julie Adams who got kind of caught in a hostage situation, I can't really remember, wine was quite strong and it all ended pretty abruptly but satisfactorily, which was a nice change from some of these long lingering films we've had in recent weeks like Giant and Dances with Wolves.

Well done everyone concerned, a film I would recommend, see you at the slightly earlier time of 6pm on Thursday as I now have a Saturday commitment meaning Thursday will probably become the new WWWSI day for the foreseeable future.

Sweet dreams, Si