James Reviews 'Joy Of Painting with Bob Ross' ‘Cellar Club with Caroline Munro’ and 3 maybe films.

Hello, I’m James Brook, and welcome to the thirteenth episode of ‘I Review Freeview.’ 

There is a short intro podcast, which you can listen to if you like. But really it’s straightforward: you suggest upcoming Freeview programs and I review them. If no-one suggests anything, then I have a look and choose something myself. 

Remember: send suggestions and comments to contact@ireviewfreeview.com or go to IReviewFreeview.com.

In this episode, I will review: 

‘The Joy of Painting with Bob Ross’ on Sky Arts

‘Cellar Club with Caroline Munro’ and the film ‘Presence of Mind,’ on Talking Pictures TV

‘Experiment in Terror,’ on Talking Pictures TV

‘Murder on Campus,’ on Talking Pictures TV

Slight ‘fess up time: I messed up my recordings. There also should have been one of the ‘Amityville’ movies under the ‘Cellar Club with Caroline Munro’ umbrella, but I didn’t pay much attention, and the TV schedule display can go a bit nuts when you flip over midnight into the next day. So I recorded ‘Experiment in Terror’ and ‘Murder on Campus’ by mistake. But I’ve added them anyway, as a nod to the genre of small hours black and white viewing fodder for night watchmen and insomniacs.

I thought it would be nice to contrast what I think will be a warm celebration of colour, light and artistic skill with some old fashioned horror/thriller movies, one of which (‘Experiment in Terror’) looks horribly, horribly long and is undoubtedly talky. A decision I will face with zapper in hand. 

So, there we are.

By the way, the image for this episode was generated by a free AI image generator with the prompt:

a colourful ‘chocolate box’ painting of a snowy landscape with a mysterious woman in a black crinoline.

So, here we go.

The Joy of Painting with Bob Ross (S 8 E 3: Warm Winter Day) on Sky Arts, Friday April 19, 7:00pm 

I have little idea how to paint, and I strongly suspect my artistic ability is on the same level as my tortoise. But I am - sort of - interested: I once went on a ‘looking at pictures’ course, where we looked at a picture a week for 6 weeks. We started with a Giotto and finished on a Hockney. It was interesting, and I enjoyed it, but I’ve felt no urge to explore further: in fact I don’t think I’ve visited an art gallery since I went to the Tate on a school trip.

So ‘The joy of painting with Bob Ross’ wasn’t exactly in my comfort zone, but wasn’t completely out of it either. And anyway, it’s only 30 minutes.

Bearded Bob Ross has a relaxing voice and a calming presence. He stands, comfortably holding an enormous transparent pallet, loaded with an array of colourful paints, in front of a canvas he’s already painted white.

‘Well,’ he says, ‘let’s put the sun in.’ He picks up what looks like an enormous brush, the sort of size used to gloss a windowsill, and deftly inserts a yellow circle.

He changes brushes for an even larger one, mixes a couple of colours together and, with short flicked brush strokes, fills in the sky. He talks both to us and the painting, saying things like ‘let’s have a happy little bush here,’ and ‘if I mix in a little yellow, we can have fun suggesting a path. Maybe where an old-timer hobo looked for some shelter..’

Methodically, rapidly, the picture takes shape. A bit of landscape, trees, tree-trunks, a small hut, fence posts, more trees with leaves, a tree with bare branches, different textures of white to give the impression of snow in a dip, a brief visit to brighten up the sun and, with the addition of a couple more fence posts, the picture is complete.

I don’t think he picked up any brush smaller than 1 inch. Anything slightly fiddly, like the fence posts, he just did with a pallet knife.

He’s extremely skilled, but I imagine his repertoire is limited to landscapes, and indeed a quick Google confirms this. No portraits in this TV series, no family groups, no interiors, nothing detailed. But so what? He’s obviously happy in what he does: calling his program ‘The Joy of Painting’ is more truth than misnomer. 

I don’t know if the painting had any artistic merit (whatever that is) but it was pleasant to look at and could easily adorn a Christmas card or indeed a chocolate box. If he gave it to me, I’d hang it on my wall.

On reflection, the program is obviously targeted at people (would be artists maybe?) who have progressed past a cut price ‘painting by numbers’ kit purchased 5 years ago on impulse from a closing down art shop, but don’t quite feel ready to strike off on their own.

You record it, then set up your easel and your canvas, get your paints ready, clean your brushes, rewind, press ‘play’ and follow along.

Yep: it’s the first cousin to those ‘cook along with a famous chef’ videos. 

And Bob does make it look so very, very easy, creating a snowy hillside with a casual flick of a wrist or fashioning a tree with dobbed on green/brown. 

And I thought, ‘y’know what? If I had any desire to paint, yeah - I’d start with Bob.’ There are worse ways of learning how things work than following an expert.

After all, as Bob said, ‘Painting is better for frustration than kicking your dog.’

Although - after he said that - I rather went off him.

And now, to switch gears:

Cellar Club with Caroline Munro on Talking Pictures TV, Friday April 19, 9:00pm

Getting Caroline Munro - probably best known for making a certain generation of young men and boys wet below the waist - to introduce movies of the horror genre is a great idea.

She’s both relaxed and informative, outlining plots, naming names, showing a trailer or two and generally demonstrating how it’s done.

This time she didn’t shove in any anecdotes, but I bet she often does. 

She speaks for about five minutes, popping up between films and right at the end to give a preview of what’s on next week.

Exactly what a legend should do.

Good stuff!

And now, the cellar club film: there should have been two, but I made a mistake.

Presence of Mind, on Talking Pictures TV, Friday April 19, 9:05pm

I asked an AI chatbot ‘how many films/TV/Stage adaptations have there been of Henry James’s ‘the turn of the screw?’’

In short, the answer was ‘at least 27, which is remarkable.’

And, knowing how often this particular ‘bot gets it wrong, there’s probably more.

On the evidence of this film, I’m not really sure why there are so many. Maybe it’s the continuing search for excellence: every few years someone comes along and thinks, ‘I know how to get this right.’

And here it’s attempted with groans, candlelight, visions of dead people, bonnets and crinolines. Which could be a tasty mix in the right hands, but, unfortunately, not this time.

It starts with Miss Giddens - Sadie Frost - watching her father dying then posing with his propped up corpse for a photo - a common occurrence in Victorian England. Then she’s off to meet Harvey Keitel, phoning in a cameo performance as a slightly creepy reluctant guardian of two young children on a Mediterranean Island. 

Having secured her post as governess, off she goes, all dressed in black to meet the housekeeper, sportingly played by Lauren Bacall courageously fighting an accent complete with what I think are glottal stops.

The children are Flora and Miles, and all seems splendid. At first.

Now I’m pretty sure the intention was to build slowly a feeling of unease and oppressive menace through small incidents and occurrences. It’s a good approach, and if done right, the viewer is left hardly daring to breathe. 

But it’s very hard to do, and equally hard to put your finger on why it doesn’t work as intended.

As we all know, the road to true creepiness is paved with good intentions.

For in ‘presence of mind’ all the elements seem to be in place. The children become progressively more alien and slyly difficult. The housekeeper is increasingly hostile. A face appears suddenly at a window. A dead servant makes his evil presence felt. There are visions of the previous governess hanging by the neck…

And you can also add in some dream sequences, complete with groaning. But..

(Sigh)

… I’m shrugging my shoulders here ..…. it never really works. You watch because usually there’s something going on and the story is strong, but if someone had wandered in wanting a cup of tea, I’d have switched off gone in search of Lidl’s finest.

And the ending is confusing, particularly for me, as I’d more or less given up paying attention. The boy faints - in fact, I think he dies - the governess - who has been having kittens for the past 10 minutes or so - looks distraught and then she and the boy vanish into the shadows.

Did she kill herself? Is the house now infested with two more spirits? Does Lauren Bacall finally conquer her accent?

I don’t know, and to tell true, I hardly care.

So, we move swiftly on to:

Experiment in Terror, on Talking Pictures TV, Saturday April 20,01:15 am. 

This American drama goes on for two and a half hours. Maybe just over two if you zap through the commercials. It’s a 1962 thriller in black and white.

I enjoyed it far more than I thought I would. I was sure it would be talky and lacking in action, filled up with tedious back story and unconvincing people doing stupid things.

OK, so people did stupid things, but that’s about par for the course, and as long as they’re only seen in retrospect, it doesn’t worry me too much. 

It’s noticing plot faults and inconsistencies when they occur that can sound the death knell for any film, let alone one that is as plot-driven as this. 

Take for instance, the shark in ‘jaws.’ It’s scarey as long you don’t get as good look at it. But once you see it clearly, eating Robert Shaw for lunch, you realise it’s probably made of rubber. But with Jaws the momentum and pace is such you immediately shovel the thought aside and let the action ram itself into your brain.

By a very very long shot ‘Experiment in terror’ is no Jaws, but it does generate a fair bit of momentum, which carries it over the occasional misstep.

The plot is straightforward. A bank clerk (Lee Remick) is threatened by a man with an asthmatic voice. Steal $100,000 or I’ll kill you and/or your 16 year old sister. The police get involved and from then on it’s a case of do they catch the wheezing villain in time to stop the dastardly plot?

There’s a few side paths and misdirections, but on the whole it commendably stays on track, focussing on the business of detection. And - with considerable restraint - it avoids the usual cliche of the hunky he-man G-man and the attractive bank clerk having a romance, even though Glenn Ford, at a well preserved 45 was a mere 19 years older than Lee Remick at 26. In film leading man, leading lady terms, an age gap of 19 hardly counts.

The only beefs I really have are 

The film noir style is half-hearted, limited to some strong shadows and conversations filmed from floor level. If you’re going to do it, be consistent. And:

A reality check: would there really be endless numbers of policemen and agents all ready, on the flimsiest of suspicions, to drop everything for this one case? At one point, a minion casually remarks ‘there are 45 exits! I have a man on each one!’ Ha! C’mon now: are police budgets unlimited?

Anyway, it all builds to a final confrontation in a baseball park, with the wheezing bad guy trapped on the playing field by a small army of policemen and agents. There’s even a helicopter!

And - but of course - the bad guy is shot by the good guy and all is right in the world.

Run credits, that’s a wrap.

Well done.

A year before this film, in 1961, there was a Brit produced and set ‘B’ feature: 

Murder on Campus, on Talking Pictures TV, Saturday April 20, 3:45 am.

This is a black and white film by Micheal Winner of no discernable merit whatsoever.

The plot is simple in the extreme, the characters badly drawn and - although barely an hour long - there are lengthy stretches where nothing more compelling happens than a man walking down a street.

And whenever there is a gap in the dialogue, background jazz attempts to make it more interesting.

It starts with a reporter, newly back from the states, going to Cambridge to investigate the death of his student brother. The police aren’t any help, so off he goes blundering about asking questions with all the finesse of a jam donut. 

He meets a couple who are going to help, but one of them is found dead. Then, to make sure he knows he’s on the right track, the reporter is beaten up. A waitress rings him up but is murdered before she can say anything useful. A dead professor is found. For a while it’s corpse whack-a-mole and - well I never! - The police are beginning to think there might be something suspicious going on!

Not that they do anything much, of course.

It’s left to the reporter, face now adorned with a tasteful strip of Elastoplast, to go off and get drugged. Why he wasn’t killed - after all, they’ve been cheerfully murdering people all over the place - is even more of a mystery than how this film was ever made. Anyway, back in the shonky plot, the professor’s adopted daughter has come by a letter that explains all! Wow. Hooray. It should be finished soon. Yes! The murderers are arrested just in the nick of time. Well, who would have thought?

The budget for the film looks to be about sixpence with a production schedule of a couple of hours. There is, for instance, a scene where the hero drives a convertible sports car with the hood down while it’s raining. I expect the director said “Rain? Poof! Let him get wet.”

I feel exhausted trying to remember it all.

The difference between this film and the previous one - reviewed five minutes ago - is stark.

‘Murder on Campus’ is cheap, stupid and short. In comparison, ‘Experiment in Terror’ looks like a masterpiece, although in reality it’s nothing more than a fairly run-of-the-mill police procedural and not particularly thrilling at that. 

But, well… here I am and here I stand. I can do no other.

And that somewhat odd misquote from Martin Luther concludes the reviews for this episode of ‘I Review Freeview.’

Don’t forget, contact me through the website Ireviewfreeview.com or email contact@ireviewfreeview.com.

Thank you for listening, and goodbye for now.