Very bad movie
THIS international spat over cyber-hacking is like a bad movie. The script so far:
This fellow Kim Jong-un ("The Young 'Un") has a bad haircut and runs a tinpot
Stalinist dictatorship in North Korea. He is dabbling in nuclear weaponry but has
delivery problems. Sometimes his rockets self-destruct on take-off. Sometimes they
don't and they go "whoosh!" over neighbouring countries.
He is considered a dangerous loony but very much a backstreet loony. His people
live in miserable poverty, many of them in prison camps. There is something kind of
funny about Kim's brutal regime but mainly something sad and frightening.
An American film company decides it would be fun to make a comedy about Kim.
Something really light and funny like getting him assassinated.
The film, The Interview, is made. As it's about to be released, somebody hacks into
the computer system of the film-makers and puts bits of the film on the internet. It
turns to be somewhat banal and unfunny.
North Korea is blamed for this sophisticated piece of cyber-hacking, until now
believed to have been beyond its capacity. It denies the accusation but heaps praise
anyway on whoever did it. The CIA says North Korea was indeed the hacker.
The hackers (whoever they are) threaten to bomb cinemas showing the movie. It
gets withdrawn from circulation. The president of the US gets involved, saying the
movie should never have been withdrawn.
North Korea demands a joint investigation of the hacking, North Korea and the US, a
tinpot, bankrupt Stalinist dictatorship teamed up with the world's greatest democracy.
The murderous kid with a bad haircut meets Barack Obama.
No, this is a very bad movie. Don't watch this space!
Taste?
HOLLYWOOD doesn't come out of the thing very well either.
Is it within the bounds of good taste and acceptability to make a film – no matter how
side-splittingly funny – about the assassination of any real, living person?
Now Hollywood figures are condemning the withdrawal of the movie as an
infringement of freedom of expression.
But did Hollywood make any funny movies in the 1930s about assassination of Adolf
Hitler? Did they make them about Josef Stalin, Kruschev, Brezhnev and the other
ogres that followed? About Mao-tse-tung?
Er, no. Pass the sickbag, Alice.
Arrogance?
FOR most of us, I'm sure, Kim runs a pretty loathsome regime. But the Chinese
newspaper, Global Times, seems to get to the nub of the matter when it describes
The Interview as "senseless cultural arrogance".
I'm afraid they could be right.
Eccentric outcomes
"HANG the monkey!" This jibe is often directed at people who come from the small
harbour town of Hartlepool, in County Durham, England.
It comes from an incident in the Napoleonic wars when a French warship was
wrecked near Hartlepool and a half-drowned monkey was found clinging to the rocks
next day, dressed in French naval uniform. He was the ship's mascot.
The monkey was arrested as a French spy and taken to Hartlepool where he was put
on trial, found guilty then hanged in the town square.
Now Ched Evans, the footballer who served prison time for rape, is looking to
Hartlepool Football Club to continue his career. His old club, first division Sheffield
United, seemed about to sign him again but backed down in the face of a storm of
protest.
Now second division Hartlepool have expressed an interest, saying Evans has
"served his time". But the local Labour MP – himself a fervent Hartlepool supporter –
has come out vehemently against.
Evans has always maintained his innocence and is attempting to appeal against his
conviction.
Who knows what will happen? Hartlepool has a history of eccentric judicial
outcomes. Hang the monkey!
Toad in the hole
OVERHEARD in the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties: ""Eat one live toad first thing
in the morning. Nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day."
Tailpiece
TWO teenagers are arrested for smoking a joint in the park. They're taken to the
town lock-up. The desk sergeant tells them they're entitled to one phone call.
Next thing a man comes in through the door.
"Are you their lawyer?"
"Heck no, I'm delivering a pizza."
Last word
Humour is always based on a modicum of truth. Have you ever heard a joke
about a father-in-law?
Dick Clark
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