A Damned Book and A Damned Film redux

There's that line from a Noel Coward song that lives forever, "Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun." When I hear the line, I think of the advertising agency and the late Brian Clough.

If I'm up to speed in English football history it's with Liverpool and Arsenal. David Peace's novel, The Damned Utd, as lent to me by CK Chua, is an introduction to the man who denied my Liverpool a win in the FA Cup. The book is a fictionalized account of true events (sort of like Sebastian Junger's The Perfect Storm) on Brian Clough's doomed 44-day tenure as manager of Leeds United.

If you're not a fan of football, go watch the excellent film adaptation by director Tom Hopper (John Adams and Elizabeth I), who did an excellent job in recreating 1970's Britain. Penny Marshall's A League of Their Own came to mind. So if you liked that then you shouldn't miss out on this. And if you love the game of football, go read David Peace's excellent excellent book. It's the sort of book that became a best-seller simply by word-of-mouth.

The DVD has excellent Special Features: The Making of The Damned United, Football in theSeventies featurette, and actor Michael Sheen's recreation of Brian Clough. I don't think they produced a lot of copies of the DVD locally as I hardly see it. The damned sales girls at Odyssey or even Astrovision look at me as if I asked someone at a book store if they stocked HP Lovecraft's Necronomicon (the book of the dead that is bleeping creepy). I see some VCDs around but not much. Go to the bigger outlets. I think they have one DVD left at Odyssey Gateway. Make sure you write down the title because they thought that I said, "Dumb United." Now we all know that it's those jokers in Old Trafford but that is clearly not the case here.

For football fans, if you're into these sort of books, pick up Alex Flynn's The Glorious Game. The story of the Arsenal era under Arsene Wenger. They've got that on sale at National Bookstore for a cheap cheap price. Get it while it lasts. They've also got George Best's autobiography.