The Duke's Thoughts On Big Brother 5 Week One

It's easy to be a snob, is what The Duke has deduced about the difficultly involved in feigning snobbery. It's easy to walk into a screening of Punch Drunk Love and sneer over at the folks waiting for Anger Management to start.

Incidentally, it's just as easy to sneer at folks in the same queue, if for any reason we too find ourselves wandering into that same Nicholson - Sandler epic. Suddenly we wanna talk about the work of director Peter Segal. "I hope this is better than Tommy Boy" we say, knowing that folks are looking over, thinking about what in the hell is that motherfucker yacking about? Adam Sandler wasn't even in Tommy Boy.

When we go to see these things, it's ironic, or it's because we're interested in the work of some creative type involved behind the cameras. When other folks go, though, it's cause they're all stupid sheep who should really just lock themselves in a darkened room and put Shallow Hall on repeat, for the rest of eternity. I mean what kind of life can they have if they never even saw a Murnau? A Murnau other than Nosferatu, of course, you populist sheep motherfucker.

This behaviour is very very easy to find oneself exhibiting. But that doesn't make it any less, well, vile.

And The Duke is just as guilty of it as anyone else.

And really, what in the hell has The Duke got to be feeling superior about? A recovering alcoholic, an emotionally overwrought melodramatic nonce, and a fella what thinks Cannibal Holocaust is a damn masterpiece. None of these things would be out of place in a biography regarding The Duke And His Laughable Inadequacies, and yet when I browse the aisles in the local DVD emporium, and see someone lift a copy of Gangs Of New York, I suddenly feel superior, and instinctively make sure to lift a copy of King Of Comedy nearby, and look over, searching for that hint of recognition in their eyes. If it's not there, I also lift some silent documentary, preferably one which is less than an arms length from where this cine-illiterate buffoon now stands. If there is a glimmer of recognition, I make sure I don't read the back of the case. You don't want this cretin thinking you haven't seen King Of Comedy for Gods sakes.

Point is, I hope I have changed considerably in the last while, in so far as I like to think I no longer exude such a sickening air of pretentious twattery. I like to talk about film, write about film, yack about the latest Mattei reissue and so on, but I also like hearing other folks yack about what they like too. Most times it isn't anywhere near what I would wish to indulge in, but I give them the benefit of the doubt, I hope.