UK industry to create films people actually want to watch

[Freya Black]

Ah, you're in one of those rented flats where the landlord has realised he can make twelve to fourteen times the usual amount of money by giving it to games-spotters?

 

Wonderful!

 

It's illegal for them to do that, as I understand it, but you're not rich so it doesn't count.

 

Not my flat, so it's just the way it is, someone helping me out. Can't complain but...

Yup one of those flats. Beautiful views, just across the park from olympic site.

 

I'm lucky, I can come back after the worlds elite have had their wicked way with the east.

 

love

 

Freya

[John Holland]

I have a feeling people from abroad think the Games are being held in Stratford on Avon not a the dump that is Stratford in East London !!!

[Keith Walters]

No, wait, nix that - the organising committee have their ZiL lanes to run around in, so they won't have to sit in the horrendous gridlock that will most certainly affect the rest of us paupers. The combination of greed and arrogance that exists in people like Sebastian Coe is huge beyond the power of language to describe.

 

That’s what they told us before the Sydney Olympics: “If at all possible, take your annual leave now, because Sydney will be a traffic nightmare during the games”.

So everybody did, including a large chunk of the bus and other transportation drivers! The government thoughtfully shifted the school holiday period to coincide with the Olympics, but most people chose to get out of town instead.

So then they had to recruit bus drivers from other parts of the state, and a large chunk of those deserted after the first day, because they were simply shoved into buses and told to drive to such-and-such a location, many of them never having been to Sydney before in their lives. In one TV interview a "deserter" driver told how he literally had to ask the passengers where the nearest newsagent was, so he could buy a street directory! So then they had to recruit retired taxi drivers and the like, to act as navigators.

There were certainly no traffic snarls, with half the population on hols, in fact it was like driving home at 2AM. And why would there be? If you locate the Sydney Olympic Park on Google Earth and then expand the view to all of greater Sydney, it’s just a microscopic dot on the map. I think what it really about was not wanting to show the world what Sydney's traffic is normally like :rolleyes:

 

Then there was the great ticketing “Ballot”. You could apply for tickets for any of the events, but you had to nominate a second or third preference in case your favoured event was sold out. People began to get suspicious at how instantaneously the premier events sold out, and then it was revealed that the vast majority of tickets were reserved for overseas sales. Which didn’t eventuate, and so then the organizers turned around and tried the Australian market again, and, because people were rapidly realizing what an embarrassing farce the whole thing was turning into, they were basically told to get stuffed.

 

There were quite a few speculators who imagined that they could rent their houses out for ludicrous amounts of money for the two week period, a common plan being to offer a package of Accommodation and Opening Ceremony tickets (which they were then unable to get, because of the so-called “ballot"). I personally knew one person who bought into that notion, in a house about as inconveniently located as it is possible to imagine. Cloud-Cuckoo land wasn't in it :rolleyes:

[Daniel Jackson]

What a f@cking mess.

[Michael Lehnert]

@ Keith Walters

 

By the sound of that, it seems that basically London 2012 is emulating Sidney 2000 as closely as possible :rolleyes:

 

 

I have a feeling people from abroad think the Games are being held in Stratford on Avon not a the dump that is Stratford in East London !!!

 

Indeed, as with all the Shakespeare celebrations, exhibitions, Neil-MacGregor-podcasts and what not, one could easily believe that it will be the Man from Stratford that will personally open the games, and not James Bond (as is rumoured and increasingly probable... :o :blink: )

[Rex Orwell]

The best bit is this:

 

When the China Olympics were happening, and were so spectacular, the UK Olympic officialdom immediately started making excuses along the lines that we wouldn't be able to afford to spend as much money on it and not to expect so much.

 

As if we were ever expecting anything other than a grotesque international embarrassment, but anyway.

 

Since then the budget of the games as a whole has grown by over 400% the initial estimate, although they're still claiming to be under budget. You have to ask how you can possibly have the brass neck to go from 2.4 to 10 billion and still claim to be under budget, but I guess the ability to comfortably emit pathetically obvious lies is what it takes to become a member of the ruling elite in the UK.

 

The thing is, with irony that's visible from orbit, we actually are now spending something like the amount spent by the Chinese. And they're still making excuses for how crap it's going to be.

 

Clearly, the Olympics were a great idea. Even more annoyingly, I haven't been able to arrange any out-of-town work during the period they're on, so I'll have to sit here and do nothing. I certainly won't be able to actually do much by way of work, at least not work that involves going into London proper. Anyone who's actually aware of the transport situation in London - which one would naively assume would include members of the organising committee - will be fully aware of the transportation holocaust that awaits.

 

No, wait, nix that - the organising committee have their ZiL lanes to run around in, so they won't have to sit in the horrendous gridlock that will most certainly affect the rest of us paupers. The combination of greed and arrogance that exists in people like Sebastian Coe is huge beyond the power of language to describe.

 

Probably the best post I've read since I got on the board.

 

"The thing is, with irony that's visible from orbit, we actually are now spending something like the amount spent by the Chinese. And they're still making excuses for how crap it's going to be."

 

This bit was my favourite. Precisely. Where has the f'n money gone. We all know the answer is the most painful thing. Because a typical example of what this bunch of sycophantic saps can get up to (and Labour / Conservative means nothing to me. 'Political 'party' membership aside they've all sworn to protect each other) when let loose with public money is probably visible from the Olympic stadium on the skyline.

 

 

According to the UK National Audit Office, the total original cost of the Dome was £789 million.

That's build cost. Nothing there about the 5 million GBP per month it cost us to keep it going while it was sat empty for about 4 years.

 

 

The actual dome bit cost around £48m to build. The endless consultants’ fees and jobs for the boys pushed the overall cost so high.

 

But look at this (dated 2009) :

 

Trinity College, Cambridge have expressed an interest in buying the Millennium Dome. However, the thing that caught my eye was the price - £20 million (thats right twenty million pounds)

Innit marvellous. I bet they can't believe we put up with this kind of thing together with everything else they get up to. George W Bush famously said once "If the American people knew what we have done over the past 30 years, we'd be chased down the street and lynched."

 

 

Especially with the Olympics and the financial 'crisis', which of course just happened by chance, in mind, I think it's high time we pulled the purse strings a bit tighter on film makers in need of a few thousand to help them make a film. Either that or certainly make films people actually want to watch.