at the time was released "MURIEL'S WEDDING" starr'n TONI COLLETTE as the family outcast who yearned fer a bigger better life fer herself with a new name and a new location from her small minded town (which was an all too familiar theme with me since it paralleled my own life at the time)
ANNIE LENNOX was tell'n us how she had "NO MORE I LOVE YOU'S" to give out anymore
and i saved up for a full year work'n 4 jobs around the clock from 5:30 am at the Hilton to Northwest Athletic onto Tidal Wave before end'n my shift at Bruegger's Bagels by 10:30 pm just so i could jet set off on my own fer the very 1st time to my dream destination across the pond and begin my life long love affair with the likes of Big Ben...
of course i had high hopes of runn'n into BOY GEORGE somewhere on the streets of London as well...why not!
after 3 anxiety riddled days bein' held as a hostile hostage in my palatial
room at the Conrad Hilton along the Thames thanx to no cell phone service at the time (well cuz i had no cell phone) and the queen ignore’n my incessant phone calls to let me crash at Balmoral fer the next 2 week to save my credit card from a coronary cuz she was deal’n with Diana’s mechanic at the time…
binge'n on british mtv countdowns and thee most absurdly hysterical comedy series about 2 boozy broads and the House of Lacroix…
stare'n forlornly out the window at the park'n lot down below from time to time til i finally had my CHER moment and checked myself into a hostel 5 miles away
unfortunately i had checked out without check'n all my belong'ns and left
behind my cherished 90210 hearthrobber Brandon Walsh tee that i bought specifically to wear on my vaca...before bunk'n with 3 middle easterner chums in basically a large closet with 4 cots in each corner and a miniature sink against the wall...they were in London study'n english with only one of them speak'n barely there broken english to me (who knows...maybe the other 3 could'a been fake'n it like my feel'ns fer gazpacho and pickled pork rinds) in either case...
while they were in school i trotted around the cobbled streets skipp'n the usual 1st timer's tourist traps and instead discover'n all the back roads and by-ways...nooks and crannies...chumm'n it up with the local drunk dames
til one afternoon i met this very frenched fry named Raphael at a local
pub on one of my afternoon excursions who had me at "ellu" with his bedroom blue eyes and his very french savior flare'...i ended up spend'n most of the day and nite with him...he had shown me around the city to all the hidden hot spots til we ended up back at his flat (that's british fer apartment kittens) and after a few shots of chilled absinthe along with some brie on a baked slice of brioche…he showed off his "BIG BEN" and i...
and as dawn broke…my french connection so eloquently whispered to me "it's Raphael's sleep time...you will go now!" (and that is a direct quote) so i managed to figer out my way back to my hostel which didn’t make me hostile in the slightest as i felt i had lived there in a previous life and knew exactly my way around the city without any further uncomfortable incidents
the follow'n nite i ended up at The RAW Club after find'n a flyer that said
BOY GEORGE was goin to be there...so of course you know i was hyperventilate'n like a hyena all day cuz i had waited since 1982 fer this moment and after 3 hours that nite at the club with no BOY in sight...i was ready to leave devastated after i asked the bartender when BOY would be perform'n to which he replied "no mate...BOY's only DJ'n tonite" so of course my world shattered as i sucked down my shitty warm guinness and headed fer the front door until i noticed a large hat float'n thru the sea of mollied mary's on the dancefloor claw'n at the hat fer their attention...
til the hat turned around and vehemently shouted "FUCK OFF...I'M WURK'N!" it was BOY fuck'n GEORGE who i would indiscriminately dance next to him perched in the DJ booth fer most of his shift until on one of his musical breaks where he leaned in close to me and asked where i was from to which i replied excitedly "Minneapolis" to which he replied "Oh...i've bean thur before...it's a bit cold it'int it?" (i didn't have the heart to tell him i was the one who threw up all over his feet when he was there last perform'n at First Avenue)
on my last nite after 2 weeks on my own in London...i popped into some
seedy underground club that i was utterly unaware was a BDSM/M&M sorta dance club...with dark black walls wrapped in chain link fence and red halogen lights indiscriminately litter'n the ceil'n...as i made my way thru the dingy leather clad crowd slowly sipp'n on my only bottle of miller lite elephant piss...i was sad to see my european vaca was unfortunately come'n to an end so as i headed to the loo (that's british fer bathroom kittens) a figure had emerged from out of the shadows to ask fer my name...
turns out his name was Neal and he was on his way out as well so we exchanged a few more pleasantries at the stalls til he asked me to accompany him back to his friends place which was right around the corner…he said i could stay over since his friend was spend'n the weekend in Provence...i thought EH! why not!
well if you ever been to London unlike myself at the time...i learned that
nothing is just right around the corner since most of the streets were in circles that seemed to never end and after roughly 20 minutes into our midnite walk i started to really think maybe i was on the guest list fer a descendant of Jack the Ripper
by the time we finally reached his friends flat 45 minutes later i had felt a
bit more at ease with Neal until he unlocked the front door to his mate's flat and all we both could hear was a loud and passionate "oh oui baise moi plus fort" echo'n down the long hallway (you can do yer own translation work there kittens) so i simply said "lemme guess...yer friend ain't in Provence?" needless to say...Neal was the perfect gentlemen that even'n as we both crashed on his friends unpolished hard wood floor as neither of us polished off ours and ended up bein great friends who would let me crash at his place in Muswell Hill in the suburbs of London fer the next 5 times i visited...exchange'n xmas cards up until 2005 fer some reason...oh how i miss London
BUTT anyways...
after sett'n up my very merry jingle jangles thru-out my humble lil shitbox
along with a candle opera represent’n my ghosts of fabulous past present and future encounters...i reminisced about my obsessional love affair into the foreign film genre…
when i seen my 1st foreign movie poster plastered all over the tiled walls of the London Underground which was “MURIEL’S WEDDING” and though that movie was filmed down unda…i started to rekindle about my many times cross'n the pond many moons ago which fer 4 of them were durin' the holiglazed season and though i only expanded my horizons outside of London once...
to see the 2nd incarnation of BANANARAMA open fer BELINDA CARLISLE who opened fer CULTURE CLUB down by the sea in Brighton in '98…i decided to marinate my love affair with the United Kingdom once again by visit'n outside the confines of BIG BEN's backyard via a mini movie marathon last week start'n with the UK's answer to Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger's love affair of 2005...
with 2017's "GOD'S OWN COUNTRY" starr'n european heart throbbers JOSH O'CONNOR and ALEC SECAREANU set roughly 4 hours north of London in the town of Yorkshire and though i loved "BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN" fer it's scenery and storyline...just add a foreign accent to it and my knees pads instantly go weak
next up was filmed mostly around Hastings, East Sussex that is a very 
dark thriller from 2017 starr'n PAUL MCGANN and SEAN TEAL as 2 non heterosexual biscuit biters who pay the price fer bait'n a bigoted CASPER crusade'n owner of a modest country inn only to find misconception...mayhem and murder is on the menu in "B&B"
in order to lighten the mood...i stumbled across the movie "CONNECT"
from 2019 only cuz of the stunn'n scottish star all of 5'7 inches tall KEVIN GUTHRIE on the poster who deeply struggles with deep despair and a voice that haunts him no matter where he goes
and just so you don't think that my list is all about beards and ball sacs...
if yer a merry maxi padder...yer either gonna feel totally empowered or absolutely terrified by this 2022 british folk-arty horror flick "MEN" starr'n JESSIE BUCKLEY as a widowed women who decides to take a holiday in the countryside after her hubby passes...only to be terrified and tormented by the local nut scratchers
last up i finished off with 2019's "THE DIG" filmed in the irish countryside
starr'n beefy manwich MOE DUNFORD as RONAN CALLAHAN (which is all so gravy train whichever name he wants to go by) anywho'zll'ding...RONAN gets released from prison after 15 years fer the murder of Niamh that he can't remember commit'n and her father becomes obsessed with find'n her body on his land where he believes it's buried so RONAN decides to help out to prove his innocence until he goes on a bender one nite out in hopes it'll jar his memory as to the events of that fateful nite unfold
well there ya have it...my picks fer a lil european vacation from all the tired
sappy crappy kringy kringley lifetime holiglazed flicks out there...now GET OFF MY DRESS!
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