The Prisoner and true Entertainment

    Would you believe it! Last night a third screening of ‘the Prisoner’ began with ‘Arrival,’ before the second screening has even been completed! Which means the television viewer can now watch ‘the Prisoner’ weekdays Monday to Friday, one episode per night at 10pm, and then rejoin the series on Sunday at 3 in the afternoon with ‘The Schizoid Man,’ and ‘The General.’

   Certainly devotees of ‘the Prisoner,’ who like to watch “live” screenings of the series, are now being spoilt.

Be seeing you, be watching ‘The Chimes of Big Ben.’

Caught On Camera!

   What was it Number 6 once said? “The atmosphere here is very different from what it was it was elsewhere!”

Be seeing you

Whirlybirds!

     I was talking with an old friend a couple of weeks ago, and we were chatting about things ‘Prisoner,’ when he made the comment about the helicopter seen taking off outside the ‘The Schizoid Man.’

   He asked me if I'd noticed that when the helicopter takes off it doesn’t have buoyancy floats fitted to its skids. But how when fully airborne it’s suddenly fitted with the buoyancy floats, and when it lands again the buoyancy floats have gone again!

    I congratulated him upon his observation, but said he had failed to observe that these are two different helicopters! It’s a pity that this scene was spoilt by the use of sock film footage of F-BNKZ which was filmed at Portmeirion, when they should have filmed more footage of the helicopter F-BOEH at MGM film studios at Elstree Borehamwood than they did, and could have done.

Be seeing you

Thought For The Day

    Everyday life in The Village must be incredibly boring, I mean for anyone who is not otherwise employed. What do they do with prisoners who have given up all the information they have? Unless they can be turned and trusted to leave The Village, they have to remain as lifers.
    Number 6 for example, what does he do all day? Well he plots to escape, attempts to escape. Involves himself in the machinations of Number 2. He plays chess, enjoys the semi-weekly Kosho practice. Works out using his homemade gymnasium apparatus. Takes daily walks around The Village, daily climbs the Bell tower. Sits to have his portrait painted, involves himself in Arts and Crafts, and spends time drinking coffee at the Cafe. Helps out and comes to the aid of other citizens on occasion, and when he’s not busy doing all that, he drinks coffee and eats a ham sandwich whilst pacing the floor of his study! That is of course when he’s not being put to various tests and ordeals by Number 2!
    But everyday life in The Village, everyone’s a prisoner, with only a few people who are actually allowed to leave, but even then that doesn’t stop them from being life members of the Village. After all there’s nothing stopping them from bringing you back, look at Number 2’s reaction in ‘Once Upon A time’ when he’s been brought back to The Village. He was downright angry, as well as being abusive to Number 1, well at least I think it was Number 1, its so difficult to say with any real certainty!
   But chiefly everyday life is having to deal with Number 6!

Be seeing you

A B and C And Free For All

   This afternoon on ‘True Entertainment,’ ‘A B and C’ and ‘Free For All,’ I have a friend and fellow enthusiast for ‘the Prisoner,’ so it will be a pleasure to watch at least one episode with him.

 It is a surreal moment in ‘A B and C’ when Number 6 is seen entering the laboratory, in his dream, when Number 2 and his assistant Number 14 are awake, yet caught up within an imaginary scene. Number Six says to Number 2 “I forgot to give you this” holding out a white envelope. Number 2 is then reduced to yelling at himself on the screen “Open it you fool, open it” in his desperation to know what the envelope contains. He thinks it’s something the Prisoner had to sell, and then again it might have the Prisoner’s letter of resignation. And yet in reality, if it’s possible for reality to dwell within a dream, all the envelope contained were a number of holiday leaflets. So what he told Engadine was true, he really was going on holiday!

   As it happens for me it’s the leaflet for Italy that somehow stands out. I suppose it makes me think of the Italianate village of Portmeirion. A place that’s different, quiet, a place where you can think!
   Free For All
   Although shown as the fourth episode in the Prisoner series, this episode was in fact the second to be filmed back to back with Arrival. Free For All was one of two episodes to be hit by the 1960's censorship with the well staged but sadistic fight sequence in the Rover cave being deleted for the transmission in the premier UK screening. Stuntman Alf Joint choreographed the sequence and along with Peter Brace, another well known fall guy, played the motor mechanics who beat Number Six senseless. This story gives the only view of the 'Cat & Mouse' night club. And although not credited, the Supervisor in this episode is Peter Sawnwick and is seen via stock footage from Arrival. The opening credits give director as Paddy Fitz, which is a pseudonym of Patrick McGoohan, coming from his mother's maiden name of Fitzpatrick.
    In one later scene in the episode, Number Six is driven by Number fifty-Eight along the Sea front a short distance away from The Village, passed a cottage called White Horses which is seen briefly. White Horses is the cottage where McGoohan and his family stayed whilst filming was taking place at Portmeirion in September of 1966. This led to the cottage becoming a favourite cottage for fans of the series to stay in Portmeirion. But there is a drawback, White Horses cottage is not available in the winter months, as certain seasonal high tides, and the cottage being part of the sea wall at Portmeirion, causes the cottage to flood!

Be seeing you

This Evening I Am Mostly Watching Checkmate

    Checkmate – The Village is expanding as newcomers arrive. Six asks a woman where they've come from? "We just got off the bus." Six asks where she got on the bus? "The Village" the young woman replies. Six informers her that this is The Village, they've arrived. "Isn't that just the wildest thing?"

    More Village means that our way of life is becoming the very conscience of the universe. 2 exaggerates of course, but only slightly.

    More Village means The Village is expanding with newcomers arriving by bus. But from where do all the newcomers to The Village come?
    “What do you think kids? Isn’t it beautiful? Where do you think the clinic is? That’s where Two will be.”
   Six approaches a young woman with her two children who have just got off the bus.
    “Who are you people?”
    “Newcomers” the woman tells him.
    “So where have you come from?” Six asks her.
    “We just got off the bus.”
    “Where did you get on the bus?”
    “Well the Village.”
    “No, this is the Village. You've arrived.'”
    “'Well isn't that just the wildest thing” the woman laughs.
    More Village, as Two informs us, means that the way of life in The Village is becoming the very consciousness of the universe. He exaggerates, but only slightly.
    Six isn't at all well. He received an appointment at the Clinic from the postman, who didn't ask Six to sign his number! He appears to be dying, and confronts Two on a building site.
   “What’s this?” he asks Two, holding out his Clinic appointment card.
   “Is it perhaps your certificate of dying?”
   “Why now? You could have killed me a thousand times.”
   “I’ve tried every way I know to help you belong, but you still refuse. You choose. This life….or no life.”
   “Assimilate or die.”
    “That is the great gift of Village death, clarity of choice.”
    The newcomers are good people. Look at them. They choose life. But you…..Six swears he’ll find a way out before he dies. But Two feels sorry for Six, and so gives him the very secret of life…….breathe in…..breathe out…..more Village! Two will watch Six die…one breath at a time, Six. One tick of the clock at a time, tic tic, tic tic!
   But Six doesn’t die, he is the answer to the future of The Village. Because as more and more holes open up, The Village being in danger of slipping into oblivion 147 can see that Six is the one, “We want Six, Six is the one. We want Six, Six is the one.” However back in ‘Anvil’ when a schoolgirl, 1,100, has something to say about One, when asked the oldest question in Village history, who is Number 1? She replies “There is no Number One, and there never has been and there never will be. The concept of the number Two is an act of humility. The title reminds us all that we are all pubic servants, even Number Two. No-one is Number One.” So perhaps 1,100 got it wrong, that Six is the first Number 1, seeing as he’s the one. Because Number 1 is the boss, and while Six sits in the sand with 313, dreaming of doing it the right way, to make a good Village. He thinks he could do it. He thinks he has to try, with the help of 313, whatever the cost. 313 sheds a tear because it’s her counterpart, Sarah in New York who will have to dream The Village. Sarah has mental problems, because she was abused as a child. So is 313 shedding a tear for herself, or for Six, or The Village that is to come? Because his hopes of making a better Village will be dashed because of the mental material he will have to work with in Sarah’s subconscious!
   And so another screening of this series comes to an end all too soon. I’m always left with the feeling of wanting more…….More Village! Well I can always put the DVD discs into the machine again!

 Don't forget, breathe in......breathe out..........more......Village.
Be seeing you

A Village Day

    It was a day much as any other day, sunny but with the warning of intermittent showers later in the day. Ice cream was on sale, the flavour of the day strawberry. I sat where I usually sat in the late afternoon, on a bench in the Piazza. Other citizens were promenading around the pool and fountain. A couple of taxis were driving round, and an old gentleman was riding a tricycle, while another wheeled a Penny Farthing about. The ex-Admiral and his flag officer were sailing plastic boats in the water of the Free Sea. Then there came the loud engine noise of the helicopter as it circled overhead. Who was it bringing to The Village now?
    Village activities are widely encouraged, human chess matches, Kosho, fencing, shooting, Arts and Crafts exhibitions, painting competitions, Village festivals, Appreciation Day it being a Wednesday so that’s not today. Educational lessons, local elections, and carnival, all to keep the citizens busy both in mind and body to stop them thinking of and putting into practice plans for escape!
    I got up to make my way back to the Old People’s Home when a young man approached me and asked if he could walk with me.
    “That could be your way out of here.”
    I looked at the man and smiled.
    “You don’t believe me?”
    “Don’t toy with an old man, there’s nothing to be gained by that.”
    “Don’t you want your freedom?”
    “Freedom, what’s the good of that?”
    “You don’t want to leave?”
    “Where should I go?”
    “You’ve settled for life here........in The Village.”
    “Village is enough for me.”
    “It’s more than enough for me!”
    “Meaning?”
    “I want to get out!”
    “To escape you mean?”
    “What else is there?”
    “But you are...........”
    “Number Two.”
    “Yes, you can leave any time you like.”
    “Who told you that?”
    “That’s what they told me.”
    “You mean you.........”
    “I was once in your canvas shoes. But they held me back for a second term in office.”
    “You’re still here, after all these years!”
    “Years, decades.....before the war, since the war.....I’ve forgotten which war!”
    “A long time.”
    “You can fly a helicopter?”
    “Yes.”
    “Its seems that everyone can fly a helicopter, even our friend the diminutive Butler. He made me feel quite inadequate!”
    “Inadequate?”
    “Yes.”
    “You would take an old man with you?”
    “Yes.”
    “Why?”
    “I’m feeling generous.”
    “I’m too old.”
    “For what?”
    “Escape.”
    “You won’t come with me?”
    “You don’t need me. Besides Village life suits me, I’m resigned to it.”
    At the Old people’s Home I watched the man they call Number 2 walk away across the lawn, and down the slope towards a green triangular lawn where the helicopter stood. I never knew why he wanted me along. A few moments later the helicopter lifted off and took to the air. I watched it fly out across the estuary towards the far hills. I watched it begin to turn back. Suddenly a door of the cabin opened, and a man fell from the helicopter into the water below. The helicopter flew back and landed on the triangular lawn, while Number 2 floundered in the water. Then there came a surge in the water, water spouted into the air as the white membranic mass of the Guardian burst through the surface of the water, and skimmed across the waves towards the figure in the water. There was nothing I could do, there was nothing anyone could do, it was just another Village Day.

Be seeing you