It does say on our tickets that “you must be able to swim
100 metres of a recognised stroke to swim in the Competition pool.” Which I was
a bit worried about obviously. I’m not too sure they’d recognise my stroke but L
assures me that Doggy paddle is a recognised, she thinks.
The swim goes well and it’s certainly an impressive pool. Although
the floats on the ropes dividing the lanes seem to be made of concrete and several
times I almost break my arm on one. I guess the Olympians had a bit more room in
the lanes and didn’t have to swim up whilst someone else was swimming down in
the opposite direction. I also don’t remember our Olympians sporting the
bright yellow locker keys, perhaps they're new.
I manage to do the full distance for my half-arsed Ironman,
1900 metres. E.g. 38 lengths.
Next we trek back across the Olympic Park to find a greasy spoon breakfast, then after we get delayed
back at the hotel we head off to find the Adidas shop on Oxford Street which was apparently the only place you could buy Team GB Winter Olympics kit. Not any more. What little they had has all gone.
The selling of GB kit for both the 2012 and 2104 Olympics has been appalling and has lost them a lot of potential sales.
Short of time now, we decide we haven’t got time to be cultural and take in a museum
as we had considered. Theatre was another possibly but L suggests a cinema on
Leicester Square instead.
The cinema on Leicester Square, an Odeon, is charging £26 a
ticket. Is that for the gold plated seats? Instead we head half a mile across
town where the Covent Garden branch is charging half that.
Indeed Theodore’s job is to write personal letters for people
because presumably they are no longer capable of doing so themselves. Theodore
is a bit of a sad case who is going through a divorce because somehow he has
managed to let the gorgeous Catherine (Rooney Mara) slip through his fingers. He
does manage to get himself a hot date but then turns down the girl’s sexual advances.
Now he fills his time playing computer games (pretty cool ones) and not much
else.
Eventually he finds solace in someone who understands him, cares
about him, flatters him and is much more considerate than real people are. It’s
also got a sexy voice and names itself Samantha. This is his new OS. Now we all
know that computers can take over your life but this is probably especially true
if they sound like Scarlett Johansson.
Anyhow Theodore and sultry Samantha ‘fall in love’ in a
world where a guy having virtual sex with his OS is absolutely normal. In fact,
even when they double date with another real couple no one bats an eyelid.
This I guess is the film’s take on modern society but the problem
is rather than being a ‘yeah this is the one’ sort of relationship it turned
out to be like any other typical bland romance that any sane person would want
no part of. Their conversations together really are banal.
More interesting for me was the interaction between Theodore
and his neighbour/friend-without-benefits Amy (Amy Adams) who is married to
another. Will Theodore cheat on his OS behind her back? Sadly Theodore isn’t
that exciting.
Of course, we all also know that sometimes computers can let
you down. One day Theodore learns just how well his OS can multitask when he
finds out that Samantha can have virtual sex with hundreds of smart phone users
simultaneously. Then she dumps him! In fact she dumps everyone.
I’m not sure if we’re supposed to be sad when this happens
but I just thought, right then, it’s Amy time and that’s how the film ends.
Sort of. We don’t really know. Do they jump off that building together or do
they jump each other. Hopefully the latter, even in this futurist world surely
the Billy Crystal rule that men and women can’t be friends still applies.
The film has some nice ideas but the overall premise is a bit
thin and gets stretched thinner throughout the two hours, meaning there are quite
a lot of dead patches in the film.
Generally though I liked it and the technology shown was all
well founded, which is a rarity in a film. Everything that the portrayed is worryingly
possible...
(Saturday 15th March)
Afterwards with the centre of London being standing room
only we get a tube out to a more remote spot. Anywhere will do really. Sticking
a pin randomly in the tube map we end up at Bethnal Green where we frequent a half decent Italian
restaurant, La Forchetta, and find a good pub too. One that bizarrely sells Old
Peculiar.
(Saturday 15th March)
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