The Films of Jon

This blog is diverse, which is unsurprising, since Jon's tastes were, shall we say, eclectic. This, among other things, makes me feel uncertain when talking about the man himself. Other than the lenses in his glasses the only thing I’m even halfway sure of was his taste in films. Jon had no favourites, so here they are.

Werner Hertzog: I watched Stroszek last month and it made me sad, as did Ikiru [Kurosawa], they are too close. However, if you ever wondered why Jon had a thing about the little people, you should watch ‘Even Dwarfs Started Small’, a unique film for a unique man.

Alfred Hitchcock: Jon liked Uncle Alf and appropriately the last film I watched before he died was ‘The Lady Vanishes’. It contains this quote, “I've no regrets. I've been everywhere and done everything. I've eaten caviar at Cannes, sausage rolls at the dogs.” Also he would have wanted you to rent ‘The Lodger’.

Stanley Kubric: He had an unsubtitled, colour copy of ‘A Clockwork Orange’, long before the ban was lifted. His first phone had “Good morning Dave” as its welcome message. He was thrown out of a pub for reading Lolita and he even had a copy of ‘Flying Padre’.

The Wicker Man: The wicker coffin, the picnic basket come suitcase, hell, his mother use to call him the wicker man, what more do you want? It pleases me to report that we gazed on the Summer Isle on a recent holiday. Laughing, Jon had to flee the post office; the assistant’s accent was too good.

Gunhed: This is the film the phrase “baffling ordeal” was invented for. We giggled at it for 90 minutes, eventually it went away. It is a terrible film and I merely mention it because doing anything was more fun if you were doing it with Jon.

Duncan
Semper Firefighter [Genuine JF humour]