No Glorious Embraces

About three weeks ago, a new series began on Globo TV, Brazil's biggest national TV channel, called 'Som e Fúria' (Sound and Fury). I'd been hearing a lot about it since I arrived last October, even working with people who'd been involved with it. It'd caught my attention because of two things in particular: it was about a company of actors putting on a performance of 'Hamlet', and it was directed by Fernando Meirelles. The idea of a Brazilian theatre production of a Shakespeare play appealed to me straight off, perhaps because it married two cultures which seemed so distant; a modern, Latin American take on an Elizabethan play held a lot of potential for me. And whilst I've heard many disgruntled remarks about Meirelles from those who'd worked with him, nevertheless I have a lot of admiration for his work thus far. I made sure, then, to keep my ear to the ground and not miss an episode once it started.

The first episode begins with Dante (Felipe Camargo), a director in a run-down theatre in São Paulo, trying to unblock the toilet while being reminded by his assistant that they're several months behind on rent. He tells her not to worry because, after all, the show must go on. After his efforts prove a success, he returns to his company of actors and begins to recite the beginning of their next production, The Tempest, with added lightning and thunder effects. As Dante delivers each word of the text, we see the actual production take place in front of us, as if we are seeing his vision of the play being performed right there and then. But, due to a few technical hitches, the light and sound effects give way and everyone takes a break until it's fixed again. It's a striking opening because it captures exactly the disproportion between the aspirations and the realities of any fringe theatre in the world but particularly one in Brazil: in a space where nothing quite works the way it should, the only thing that's alive and fully functioning is the desire to perform.

On the other side on the city, Oliver (Pedro Paulo Rangel) is directing a production of 'Hamlet' at the Municipal Theatre in the heart of the centre, an ornate and luxurious space whose productions have grown hollow and artificial. Oliver and Dante used to work together there back when the theatre still had some integrity but after a tumultuous production of 'Hamlet' many years ago, Dante vowed never to return. Yet with Oliver's untimely, Dante is called upon to take up his position and direct the play he had abandoned so long ago, forcing him to face the demons of his past and lift the Municipal Theatre out of the ashes and back to its glory days.

This was all established in the first few episodes, along with a few more sub-plots including amorous relationships and a corporate takeover of the theatre. The programme balanced ironic (and sometimes black) comedy with serious drama well and I was thoroughly intrigued to see how the story would develop. I particularly enjoyed the score, the recurring theme being bouncy and whimsical which worked perfectly as a counterbalance to the show's sarcastic humour. As I watched the credits to see who'd written it, I noticed at the end that the programme was based on another series called 'Slings & Arrows' (pictured above). I'd never heard of this programme so I decided to look it up. It turns out the original programme was a Canadian show from 2003 that had won several awards but which didn't receive much airtime outside of North America. Curious to see how the Meirelles' adaptation differed from the original, I had a look around and found that the first two seasons were all on Youtube. Here's where things get interesting.

To call 'Som e Fúria' an adaptation would suggest some sort of creative input from Meirelles and his team to make the story and the characters in the small Canadian town of New Burbage in 'Slings & Arrows' applicable to the Brazilian metropolis that is São Paulo. After all, to "adapt" means to "adjust or modify fittingly to requirements or conditions". But sadly, that is not the case, because 'Som e Fúria' is not just the same story as 'Slings & Arrows', it is an exact replica in every possible way you can think except in two aspects: it's in portuguese and it's in São Paulo. Bar those, there isn't a single difference between the two shows. The shots are the same, the dialogue is the same, the costumes are the same, the music is the same, everything is exactly the same; even the characters' names! Actually, there is one exception: Dante's character is called Geoffrey in the original. That's it. Nothing has been added to offer a Brazilian twist on the story, to perhaps comment on the current state of Brazilian theatre and the federal or commercial it does/doesn't receive, or the question the relevance of Shakespeare in Brazilian society today. Nothing at all. It's basically a very expensive translation.

So why do this? It doesn't really fall into the category of remakes since remakes are generally of older films that were originally successful and which will have a guaranteed success the second time round (of course, that doesn't always happen; Gus Van Sant's 'Psycho' is a good example of that). One could claim that Meirelles wanted more people to know about the story and the characters. It's been said that during the filming of 'Blindness', the Canadian producers gave him a DVD box set of the original show and he instantly fell in love with it. To be able to offer it to all Brazilian TV viewers, he selflessly worked away to "adapt" it and provide a Brazilian "version" of it so that anyone could watch it, even those who wouldn't have been able to read subtitles. Yet a TV show about a company of actors putting on a Shakespeare play is most likely going to appeal to a certain demographic, one which is most likely able to read and which would probably prefer watching the original version instead of a carbon copy (even though that last sentence sounds a bit patronising or sarcastic, it's meant to be entirely sincere; it would be naive to suggest that Meirelles and Globo TV executives thought it would have a mass appeal, especially since it's on around 11pm, not exactly primetime viewing). In the end, I can't help but think this was almost a disguised form of plagiarism. It may include a "based on 'Slings & Arrows'" credit at the end, but not many people who watch the programme are going to pay attention to that. It's been publicised and promoted as Meirelles' new mini-series, so as far as they know, it's entirely his project. I was speaking to a friend recently who worked on the show in the art department and when I mentioned it was based on a Canadian programme, he said he had no idea and that it was seldom if ever mentioned.

Of course the irony is that I would be ranting away like this were it not for Meirelles' "adaptation". I would've never heard of 'Slings & Arrows' and learnt how great a show it truly is. But that doesn't really excuse him, he could've easily worked away to get distribution for the show here in Brazil on one of the countless cable channels that show American TV shows with subtitles. At least that would've shown more integrity rather than offering a hollow and superficial version and essentially passing it off as his own. But enough bitterness for now, this post was originally intended to discuss the quality of 'Slings & Arrows', a great TV show that passed many people by. But words escape me now, so I'll leave you with the first episode and let it speak for itself. The episode is divided in six parts, all of which I'll put here, in order, to make things that much easier.

It's another film festival this week in São Paulo. This time, it's all about animation. Anima Mundi is Brazil's biggest animation festival, showing films from all around the world, from Croatia to Japan to Hollywood. The festival has a competitive selection as well as special presentations, celebrating past animators as well as contemporary ones. This edition saw French animator Michel Ocelot and two Brazilian brothers, the Latinis, among those celebrated. I originally was going to review the festival for the film magazine I had written the two previews for, but for various reasons it didn't come together in the end. Ah well, there's always next year. At least I've seen one film I really wanted to out of the 10 I'd hoped to watch: Henry Selick's 'Coraline'.

If the name Henry Selick doesn't ring a bell, his work certainly will: he's the man who directed 'James and the Giant Peach' and 'The Nightmare Before Christmas', the latter being a truly stunning work of art. With 'Coraline', he returns once again to the technique of stop motion to produce something mesmering and enchanting. 'Coraline' is the story of a little girl who moves into a new home in a new town, far away from her friends. Her parents are constantly working and pay no attention to her at all; left to her own devices, Coraline explores her new house from top to bottom until she comes across a small door that seems rather out of place. Once she opens it, she discovers a parallel world where her Other Mother and Other Father are the loving parents who give her everything she wants. But as she soon discovers, this other world is not quite the dream she'd imagined at first, and in the end she must fight to protect those who truly love her, her real parents.

As with all fairy tales, the story is simple and straightforward. But what makes 'Coraline' so fascinating is that the moral or the lesson learnt is directed towards adults as much as it is to kids. It's not a simple question of "children, be careful what you wish for", it's also a case of "parents, fulfill your roles as guardians", or perhaps less didactic than that, just be good parents. It's clear from the characterisation of Coraline's parents that they're as much to blame for what happens to them all as Coraline is: they're both portrayed as self-involved workaholics for whom their daughter seems to be more a nuisance than anything else; she's always the last priority on their list, if there at all. In that sense, it's less of kids' film than a film that appeals and reaches out to all ages.

In many ways, it barely seems like a kids' film at all. The dark, gothic feel of the film doesn't exactly offer a child-friendly atmosphere, and many characters and scenes in the film would put off a 30-year old adult let alone a 7-year old kid; one character in particular is the Other Father, whose transformation later in the film is something truly unsettling. Many people comment on how Hollywood only knows how to make animation for kids and doesn't treat it with the seriousness that Europe or Asia does; 'Coraline' is proof that not every big-budget American animated film has to be saccharine-sweet or bright and fluffy to win audiences.

Aside from these issues of demographics or intended viewers, 'Coraline' is a visually arresting work of animation. The sets, the costumes, the puppets, the colours, they're all so delicately and precisely arranged and treated with such care and attention. Prior to the screening, we were lucky enough to have two animators from the film talk about the production process and, as always with stop motion, you see how pain-stakingly slow and large it all is. Yet they both stressed on how important it was to stray from stop motion as little as possible. This is clearly evident in the film since you can see that it doesn't have that sheen or perfection that CGI has, something that makes it look hyperreal. These characters we see onscreen exist in real life, we can feel and touch and see them, they are not just computer code. Perhaps it's an exaggeration to reduce CGI to simply code, but there's something about stop motion that makes it much more impressive, especially in scenes where intricate movements are appear so fluid and lifelike that you can't imagine how they could've done it. As one of the animators said during the talk, whenever you ask yourself that question, the answer is always "the hard way".

It's inevitable that when someone mentions the word "gothic" in cinema, the name Tim Burton suddenly lights up. But this isn't the gothic look of 'The Corpse Bride' or 'Sleepy Hollow', it's Selick's own brand of gothic, perhaps something more akin to Poe though adapted to the fairy tale world. Rooms are drowned in such expressive lighting, casting looming shadows on walls while only small corners are lit; objects seem massively out of proportion at times; choir-led music morphs from gleeful to foreboding within the same scenes; it all adds to the ominous feeling that pervades throughout the film. Selick also employs an array of colours that strays from the more monochromatic 'Nightmare Before Christmas' that gives a vibrancy to the whole film, from Coraline's blue hair to her pink house, and yet it remains firmly rooted in this dark world he creates.

What surprised me most of all is how self-aware the film was, though in a discreet way. The film's opening credit sequence is accompanied by a mechanical hand making a doll. The very essence of stop motion is captured in that one sequence; evidently, the doll is the puppet the animator creates and moves in the film, and yet the mechanical hand which makes the doll is created by is the very skeleton the animators. One of the animators during the talk described how their job isn't simply to move the puppet but to represent the character that puppet embodies onscreen by guiding him and being guided by him. The character exists outside of the film in that puppet. In the end, puppet and animator are both master and slave, both of them creator and creation, both dependant on each other. The mechanical hand making the doll captures this idea, showing it is itself as creator as much as it is a creation.*

It's unfortunate that I didn't come across this film before since 'Coraline' came out in Brazil in February and in the UK in May, so there's little chance to see the film in the cinema now. And this is certainly a film that deserves to be seen in the cinema. Nevertheless, it's a film I'd thoroughly recommend grabbing on DVD and watching to see it in the best possible available format. It's a film that captures your imagination and which you simply cannot turn away from. Watch out for a reference to 'Being John Malkovich'. If you've seen that film, you won't miss it.

*That's what 3 years of film theory does to you.

I decided to take my camera for a stroll round the neighbourhood yesterday since it was such a beautiful day. When you're one month into winter and it's 20 degrees with the sun shining above you, there's really no excuse to stay inside. I live near an area called Vila Madalena, a place full of artists from every field imaginable; you can find an atelier on nearly every corner, working with a variety of materials, from clay all the way to gold; there are lots of jazz bars as well, playing everything from cuban jazz to dixieland; and you can also find some of the best restaurants in São Paulo. On top of all this, Vila Madalena houses a lot of graffiti, or street art, as is the more modern term. Through little streets and alleyways, one can find entire walls covered; and I don't mean just tagging or graffing like the pixação movement here, I mean colourful, vibrant, expressive murals. Some of them really do demonstrate why street art should be taken seriously (and fortunately, in recent times this has been happening much more). So off I went in search of these modern urban frescos.

I thought that I'd be hunting around for quite a while for the graffiti, imagining that they would be more isolated an scattered across the whole neighbourhood. After about 15 minutes, I saw a small alley with an entire wall covered with characters, shapes, and patterns. As I walked further along the weaving road, I came across a graffiti artist working right there and then. It really couldn't have been more perfect.

So I clicked away while she carried on working, occasionally giving me the odd glance but no more than that. I continued on walking and found that entire street was covered with graffiti; all the walls had become canvases for these artists, even the house fronts and garage doors.

As I carried on taking pictures, a girl came up to me and said that she was a journalist in Argentina doing a short piece on Brazilian graffiti and asked if I was willing to answer a few questions. She then went on to mention that she was also a ballerina (!) and was working on a piece inspired by the lines and shapes and curves in Brazilian graffiti and asked if I would take some pictures of her. So I did, no reason to say no really. It was all a bit of sudden and surreal experience, but then it sort of made sense in a strange way, considering I was surrounded by all these colourful characters inhabiting a different world, a world that shouldn't really exist, a world I had simply chanced upon but which I will come back to again and again as it changes and evolves.

To see the rest of the photos, just click here.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/32980285@N04/sets/72157621472460517/

2 years ago, I remember picking up a copy of Time Out and reading about a documentary called 'Helvetica', a film entirely concerned with the eponymous font. It was on at the ICA and I remember asking all my friends if they wanted to come see it with me. I got the same reply from every person I asked: "Why would you want to see a film about a font?" I really should've just gone by myself but I think that as a result of everyone's disinterest of it, it must've rubbed off on me as well. So I didn't end up watching it and forgot about it. It wasn't until last week that I was reminded of the film when I saw that director Gary Hustwit has a new film out called 'Objectified', all about the everyday objects we use without giving them a second thought and the power and ingenuity the design of each one possesses. Of course, you only ever seem to find out about these things a little too late, and so I discovered I'd missed a screening of the new film in Sao Paulo, along with a Q & A with Hustwit himself. Typical. Anyway, I decided to seek out 'Helvetica' and finally got round to watching it yesterday.

Now, I'd say it's hard enough for even the most avid of cinephiles to be attracted to the idea of a documentary about a font, let alone your average punter. But I have to say that 'Helvetica' is a startlingly fascinating insight into a visual world that most of us will completely take for granted despite living within it every single day of our lives. It's truly astounding to see how omnipresent Helvetica is, from obvious examples like company names such as American Apparel or Orange to more subtle ones like street signs or the word 'Ambulance' on an ambulance in London. Hustwit offers a series of interviews with graphic designers and design writers who account for this proliferation, some suggesting that it's because Helvetica represents a finality in typeface, a font that can't be improved on, whilst others see it as something more bland that companies can, perhaps lazily, always rely on. Whatever the case may be, all of them can agree on one thing: its effectiveness. This is almost unanimously attributed to its neutrality, having no expression or emotion itself. As one designer notes, its neutrality means that the expression is entirely in the content and not the typeface, thereby making it a more genuine than other fonts which may try to convince the reader of its the legitimacy of its content. Another designer in the film, Michael Bierut, illustrates this with a direct comparison between two Coke adverts, one from '53 and one from '69. The '53 one has picture of a family happily drinking coke with a wedding style font underneath reading "Almost everyone appreciates the best!". 16 years later, and things have completely changed: all you have is a big picture of a large, icy coke on platter with the slogan "It's the real thing. Coke." in Helvetica underneath. The modernist transformation that the design world underwent is captured perfectly here, with Helvetica leading the way.

I'm positive that a graphic designer will have a much larger appreciation for the design elements of Helvetica which are occasionally touched upon in the documentary, but I think Hustwit's intention is to make the subject as accessible as possible and to pay tribute to the 50-year old font (though it's no 52). As a result of 'Helvetica', I'm probably going to pay a little more attention to all the words that surround me. It's hard not to really, even looking around my own, it's simply everywhere. And to give you an idea of what I mean, here's the trailer for the film.

For a while now, I've been doing some work for Red Bull here in Brazil. It's pretty simple work really, they have a programme called Cliptomaniacs which is a clipshow in English of all the extreme sports events they organise around the world. Since there's such a variety of different accents one comes across which makes it very difficult for Brazilian translators to understand what's being said, I write a transcription of each show so they can then translate it. Which basically means I just have to write down what's being said. Easy stuff.

Anyway, Red Bull seems to have a complete monopoly on the world of extreme sports, from cliff-diving to snowmobiling to BASE jumping; the most extreme one I've come across is ski-BASE jumping, which is when people ski down a mountain, off a cliff, and then open up a parachute. Normally, these mountains are completely inaccesible unless you're dropped in by helicopter, so once you're there, there's no turning back. I know that most people that practice extreme sports love the thrill of the adrenaline, but I'm pretty sure that anyone who does ski-BASE jumping just has a death wish. Red Bull also like doing more zany events, like the Flug Tag, where people make homemade flying machines and try to fly as far as possible from a platform above water. Most machines fall straight in, but the point of the contest seems more about the absurdity of the design and the team than anything else really, and just a fun day out for all the spectators. However, working through a transcription of a programme now, I came across a clip that really pushes the limits of the downright ridiculous: Red Bull Paper Wings.

This is the annual Worldwide Paper Aeroplane Contest, where you can go head to head with fellow aviators to see whose paper aeroplane can fly the furthest or can stay the longest in the air. Now if people want to practice as a "sport", that's fine with me; after all, I've heard of much more ridiculous sports (extreme ironing, anyone?). But what this clip that promotes it. Just watch and you'll see what I mean.

Is it all the slow motion really necessary? Did the director really think that it would make the "sport" look more majestic and therefore convince me of its legitimacy as a demonstration of athleticism in any form whatsoever? The girl at 0:37 clearly seems to think so, as well as everyone else in that hangar (yes, a hangar; how appropriate). I mean you could talk about aerodynamics and aeronautical engineering or that's in the skill of the wrist-action, but really this is just a guy throwing a paper aeroplane and seeing how far it goes. And I'm cautious not to use the expression "boils down to" since you could apply that to football and say that's just 22 men on a pitch kicking a ball around for 90 minutes. But there's no boiling down here, that's all there is to it: folding a piece of A4 and throwing it in the air. Ultimately, I don't what actually annoys me more: the clip or the "sport" itself. I'd say it's probably a tie.

Sports have always offered a fountain of inspiration for filmmakers around the world. Just think of the countless American football and basketball films Hollywood has produced, or even bobsleigh films (I'm sure you know exactly which film I'm talking about). On the other side of the pond, we have slightly more woeful efforts from the UK, such as 'Wimbledon' and 'Mean Machine', although any film with Vinnie Jones is always a winner in my book. The man's made an acting career out of being a violent thug, it's simply amazes me. And who could forget the 1981 football epic 'Escape to Victory', with its stellar cast including Michael Caine, Sylvester Stallone, and Pelé.

The fact is that sports can offer such fully-formed narratives that the films pratically write themselves: the classic underdog story of a bunch of misfits strung together by a disillusioned coach who struggle to triumph over adversity; you just can't help but root for them. Sort of like West Ham. What's even more intriguing is how actual sporting events are televised with a very similar cinematic language. Take a football match, for example: rather than always concentrating on the ball, which is what a spectator at the stadium is more likely to do, TV coverage provides us with a wide range of points of view that can create multiple stories within a game. Think of moments when a fight breaks out as a result of a foul; we see close-ups of players' faces as they taunt each other or defend their teammate's honour by hurting one of the opposition, not unlike a scene you might find in a film about rival gangs. This might as well be the Sharks and the Jets, only without the dancing. Or the way that the camera hones in on a player and captures his reactions throughout the match. He ceases to be another member of the team or even a football superstar and becomes an individual character with his own storyline, full of moments of glory and of failure. These examples aren't necessarily explicit in the coverage but you can certainly find them there. One documentary which highlights this cinematic aspect in sport is Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait; a film by video artist Douglas Gordon, it shows a match between Real Madrid and Villareal except filmed by Gordon's own cameras focusing solely on Zidane. It's a fascinating reinterpretation of how we watch the game, and for any football fan out there, it's a must-see.

I was reminded of this genre of films by an email a friend of mine sent me about a short film contest in which all the films were inspired by the Olympics. It's called the Olympic Short Film Contest, unsurprisingly, and consists of films from 4 different countries, 2 from each: Brazil, China, Spain and Switzerland. Via internet voting, one film from each country will be chosen for the final where there will be Jury Prizes and Popular Prizes to won. Each film is only 5 minutes long so you could very easily watch them all in no time at all. So far, I've only seen a few but one of Brazil's entries is a brilliant little story, well-executed, and demonstrates how cinematic sports really are, no matter what you're watching; even if it's bowls.

To watch the other films, just visit http://www.courtcircuit.ch/osfc/index.php/movies-and-votes/first-round/films-first-round

I've said this too many times before but I'll say it again, it's simply astounding how many film festivals happen here in São Paulo throughout the year. More astounding is how specific some of them are. This week just gone was In-Edit, a film festival comprised only of musical documentaries. And yet the festival schedule is jam-packed with new films, shorts and feature-lengths, as well as a few special screenings of slightly older musical documentaries (e.g. 'End of the Century: the Story of the Ramones'). Originally started in Barcelona 7 years ago, it now has editions in Santiago, Buenos Aires, and now São Paulo too. There were many films I wish I could've seen, such as 'Favela on Blast', a documentary about the roots of baile funk in Rio, or 'Godfather of Disco', which told the story of Mel Cheren who, together with Larry Levan, transformed Disco in New York into a cultural movement during the 70s and 80s. As ever, time constraints meant I didn't get to see either of these (this is in fact the second time I've missed out on 'Favela on Blast' as it was screened at the São Paulo International Film Festival last year as well). The only film I did get to see was a documentary about Nina Simone, entitled 'Nina Simone: Love Sorceress...Forever'

I've never really known much about Nina Simone. Apart from the more famous hits such as 'My Baby Just Cares For Me', 'Sinnerman', or 'Mood Indigo', I couldn't say I knew much about her style. I didn't know of her impassioned nature and her captivating stage presence. I didn't even that she spoke with such a strong African accent, or at least that she started to after spending some time in Liberia. It would be great to say that I found this all out from the well-structured and insightful documentary I saw. Unfortunately, that's far from the case.

The documentary was based around three alternating sections: an interview with a French friend of Nina Simone (whose name escapes me now), shots of a girl driving around Paris in a taxi, and footage from Nina Simone's performance at the 1976 Montreux Jazz Festival. The French friend waxes lyrical about Simone's forceful personality as we are indulged with entire songs from the performance, occasionally interrupted by the girl sightseeing from the back of a car. In the end, it's revealed that girl in the car is a jazz singer on her way to a concert and was listening to a radio show about Nina Simone (presumably, the audio version of the film we've just watched). After being reminded of how important and inspiring Nina Simone was in her life, the singer performs 'Feeling Good' to her audience. And on that meta-note, the film ends.

I must admit that I thoroughly enjoyed watching the documentary, but that's not to merit the filmmaker at all. What was so thrilling to watch was Nina Simone performing, each word she sings carrying her grace, her frustration and her sadness simultaneously. The interview was far from dull or pointless, unlike the inclusion of the other jazz singer, yet they both distracted from the concert footage which was simply incomparable. Perhaps it was from watching it on a big screen and loud speakers, but the energy she conveyed was so powerful that at times, one felt like applauding her at the end of a song. Incidentally, several people did do that a couple of times during the screening. But evidently, the filmmaker shouldn't receive any credit for this type of audience reaction since he had nothing to do with that footage. And it's not hard to find at all, one can very easily buy the Live at Montreux DVD. It feels as if calling this film a documentary undermines the work of countless other documentary filmmakers who've worked hard to research material, facts, find out things that even the avid fan might not know. If it was meant to be an ode to Simone and specifically that performance, why not show more around the show, about her time in Africa that she mentions and the effect that had on her and her music? Instead, we simply saw her concert with a few bits and bobs in between. As one person said as I was leaving the cinema, "They should've just shown the whole concert, it would've been much better". I couldn't have agreed more.

Having said that, I highly recommend finding a copy of the DVD. She truly is an enigmatic performer, as this clip from the concert will show. It's 10 minutes long but it's worth every second of it.

Success! My first articles for a magazine have now been published! And no editing either, mind you. As I mentioned last month, I had got in contact with an online British film magazine called Film & Festivals right when they were doing an edition on Latin American Cinema, and so after a few emails back and forth with the editor, I was writing two film festival previews. And now they're on display for the whole wide world to see (or at least anyone who visits the site). Hopefully I'll be able to go the festivals themselves as well and review them, though that still remains to be seen. I've also got some ideas for articles that aren't just simple film reviews, but that needs some work too. Still, it's a start. Mark Kermode, you better watch out...

You can find the magazine at www.filmandfestivals.com My articles are on page 10. Any feedback much appreciated.

So the festival season has kicked off again and this weekend just gone saw 100,000 people head to a farm in Somerset, put up with rain, mud and cold with only a flimsy, paper-thin shelter to protect them, all for a 3-day bender and a week-long hangover. Oh, and some bands played as well.

I'm talking, of course, about Glastonbury, the UK's biggest festival (and probably the world's too), still going strong after 39 years of musical revelry. After last year's controversial decision to give a Jay-Z a headline slot, a move that proved to be a huge success, Glastonbury went back to basics this time around, choosing classic rock icons in the form of Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen. Yet every year, people have something to complain about: if it's not the commercialisation of the festival, it's that a hip hop artist like Jay-Z doesn't belong at Glastonbury. In 2009, it was that there was too much dad rock, with the average age of the Pyramid Stage performers being forty something. Be that as it may, it's too big a festival for something like that to be an issue; there's literally hundreds of things going on at the same if you'd rather not listen to 'Born in the USA', most of which you won't have a clue about and you'll end up delightfully discovering.

Another hot topic was the return of a recently-reformed Blur. Closing the festival on Sunday night, everyone was eager with anticipation to see whether the Britpop heroes could deliver. From every single review I've read, they more than delivered a performance to rival those unforgettable musical experiences that only Glastonbury can offer. 5000 miles away, sitting in front of my computer and watching the BBC coverage on Youtube, I can feel the sheer energy of the crowd as every punter left, right, and centre belts out the chorus yelps in 'Song 2'. I remember seeing Blur at Reading Festival in 1999 but it was without Graham Coxon and was in support of their album 'Think Tank'. 10 years on and they give the festival-goers what they really wanted: a greatest hits set full of sing along moments. I can honestly say that watching the videos from this weekend alone in my room has much more impact than that Reading gig did. You can see the smiles on the faces of the four of them and of every single person in the sea of people. It's proof that in no situation other than a festival, more specifically this festival, could a shared experience between so many people be so powerful. Divisions between performer and spectator disappear as everyone sings and celebrates together, with a touch of nostalgia and a teary eye. It's a gig like this that reminds me how incomparable Glastonbury is and how there's simply no excuse to miss out on 2010. I'm packing my wellies already...

Here's Blur's set closer, after two encores. Simply astounding.