Matthew Walton’s Blog

Well, time for a relocation. I just got off the phone to Accomodation Services (wonderfully helpful, although the poor woman sounded a bit stressed. Judging by the time it took me to get through to them, she’s got good reason to and it’s not even half past ten yet) who confirmed my accomodation is all sorted.

So I’m moving to Nottingham tomorrow as planned. Whew. That’s a relief. Time to pack some clothes.

Online-ness will be erratic for a while until I can get the network point in my room activated, so I might be even quieter and more boring than usual for a while. Not that you’ll notice…

Last night my family and I went to see the new film version of Pride and Prejudice, starring Matthew MacFadyen (formerly of Spooks) and Keira Knightley (who we all know to be wonderful in Pirates of the Carribean). And some other people who’s names I can’t recall, apart from Penelope Wilton (Mrs. Gardiner) and Dame Judi Dench (Lady Catherine de Bourgh).

First the disclaimer: I am a huge fan of both the book and the BBC adaptation of it, although my introduction to the joy of the book came through the BBC series. Therefore I’m biased to start with. And surely, I told myself, how well can they tell the story in so little time? One reason the BBC did so well is because they had six hours in which to do it.

Well really, the film wasn’t too bad. They got the important bits across. Mr. Collins was very well-handled indeed. A slightly difference stance on his character to the BBC version, but that’s not at all a problem, as their stance was also good. He wasn’t as slimey or odious, but he was socially useless and incredibly embarrassed by the whole thing.

And very short. There was a lot of camera work which emphasised that.

Keira Knightley giggled too much. It seemed a little out of place, for Lizzie is supposed to be one of the more sensible sisters (alongside Jane). and okay, so she was, because the sillier ones were even sillier than I would have thought necessary. Still, for a mainstream audience I suppose you have to drum things into them with a very large stick sometimes.

They changed the ending. I’m not entirely sure that was good, but it was okay. The outcome’s the same, but it’s done a little differently. They did handle Mr. Bingley proposing to Jane quite well, and Rosamund Pike looked rather lovely in that role (as Jane, not as Mr. Bingley).

They dropped Mr. and Mrs. Hirst entirely. I can’t say I blame them — including them would have wasted some valuable time and they’re not really essential to the story. But they are fun.

Umm… I liked the choice of house for Longbourn. Chatsworth doesn’t make a good Pemberley, but that’s probably because I’ve got my heart stuck on it being Lyme Park, as the BBC chose. That just seems more right.

They didn’t include the famous ‘wet shirt’ scene, but that’s not very surprising given that the BBC added that one themselves.

Mrs. Bennet was generally good, but the listening at doors things was a little too obvious and indiscreet. Many things seem to have been exaggerated in it.

The music at the assemblies and balls was good. Not so keen on the rest of the soundtrack, and also not sure that they would have necessarily had groups of musicians that large to play at that sort of gathering. It did sound good though, so I’m not too upset by that.

Oh, and the choice of house for Rosings Park… wow. That’s impressive indeed.

A lot has been going on which I needed to think about, and I’m not sure I can coherently say anything on here about some of it. The big thing of course is Hurricane Katrina, and its effects on the USA. I don’t know how to write about what I feel when I see the footage from New Orleans. Despair, hope, worry, joy, fear, relief… this and more, varying as reports have come in, both during the storm and after it. Mostly now I’m feeling relief, because it doesn’t look like it’s necessarily going to be as bad as was initially feared. It’s still bad of course, but the city’s probably not going to end up a stinking wasteland.

Although that really does remain to be seen. They’re still talking about a forced total evacuation, so we’ll see. Some are kicking up a fuss about the police confiscating guns from the citizens so they can’t resist the evacuation — personally, I don’t think they should have them in the first place so I’m really not bothered about that. I am not particularly pleased with the way the whole affair has been handled, but there’s really nothing for me to do — other than rant about it occasionally from an uninformed perspective, and give frequent thanks that I don’t have to move to America. Britain has its flaws — plenty of them — but on the whole it works out pretty well at the moment.

I have of course been preparing to go back to Nottingham to start my PhD. Sort of scary really — I’ve done this all before, to the same University, but it’s been two years and I’m really completely unprepared for the necessary organisation to get this all sorted. Oh well, it’ll come together at some point — no doubt not to Mum’s satisfaction, but I’m not very good at that lately. We do need to get out of each other’s hair, and this should sort it quite nicely. Were I not going to Uni, I’d be looking to move out I think. That’s no secret — I’ve told Mum that myself.

Just life, really. Things will get more interesting once I get back to Nottingham — although I’ve been doing some things which could turn out rather interesting. I’m just not going to talk about them right now.

Doesn’t that add a nice aura of mystery to the whole affair?

The weather wasn’t stunning, but the wedding was great. A nice (short and to the point but nonetheless meaningful) registry office ceremony followed by lots of confetti-throwing, photography and faffing. Then there was an excellent dinner, a chance for a nice relaxing bath, and the usual post-wedding drinking, dancing and merriment. On the whole it seems to have gone off rather well. But you want to see pictures, don’t you? Well, Matt’s a policeman and somehow managed to wrangle a proper tunic to get married in. Even more impressively, his mother managed to wrangle enough tunics, truncheons and gloves for a six-officer honour guard after the ceremony.

Paul and Sharinah’s baby daughter Ellie stole quite a bit of the attention though.

But it all ended with a kiss.

At the moment, Matt and Becky should be on a plane over the Atlantic on their way to Disneyland in Florida, USA. No doubt they’ll enjoy their honeymoon immensely. Here’s to many years of wedded bliss.