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movies
British Geraldo Meets British Tony Soprano
Can there ever be too many British gangster movies? The answer is no. So we fully support the new documentary A Very British Gangster, which is being released in the US today. Not only has the filmmaker, Donal McIntyre, been described as "the British answer to Geraldo Rivera," but the subject of the film, Manchester crime boss Dominic Noonan (pictured), has been compared to Tony Soprano, and his English thugs are accused of having bad teeth and being reminiscent of Trainspotting. It's satisfying to see every single English crime journalism cliche in one place. But the film itself sounds entertaining; anything starring a guy who gets his point across by chopping off the heads of rivals' pets can't be all boring. The trailer is after the jump. More »
lawsuits
Nazi Orgy Lawsuit May Kill UK Gossip Industry
UK privacy laws continue to get stricter and stricter, and it's all thanks to Nazis. Or in this case, high-profile sons of prominent Nazi-sympathizers who may or may not get some sort of sexual satisfaction out of Nazi roleplay. Max Mosley is in charge of Formula One racing and some other gay European motorsports. He is the son of Oswald Mosley, the "Mr. Oswald with the Swastika tattoo" from that one Elvis Costello song. Oswald was a famous British fascist who hung out with Hitler all the time. Max claims he isn't a Nazi though he's now forced to admit in court that he loves sado-masochism. He's forced to admit this because of a lawsuit he brought which threatens the very industry of celebrity gossip in the UK. More »
media
BBC: Get Those Minorities Off The Shows, Into Boardroom
Samir Shah, who sits on the BBC's board of directors, gave a speech last night that may not go over well, because he referred to the numbers of minorities on TV shows in the UK as a misguided act of "over-compensation." He also bemoaned TV as "a world of deracinated coloured people flickering across our screens - to the irritation of many viewers and the embarrassment of the very people such actions are meant to appease." But if you see scandal-tinged headlines all over the place like the Guardian's "Too many black and Asian faces on TV, says BBC director Samir Shah," just remember that that's only half the story. Shah doesn't just want fewer minorities on the screen; he wants to switch them out with the "metropolitan, largely liberal, white, middle-class, cultural elite" in the broadcasting boardroom. Fair trade? Excerpts from Shah's speech, below: More »
Crime
Martha Stewart Barred From UK; English Cutesy Merchants May Suffer
The UK does not want Martha Stewart no matter how many lines of crockery she's designed for Wedgwood! The UK Border Agency has barred the felonious lifestyle queen from entering the country, presumably because of her criminal ways here in America. It's admirable consistency for the agency—famous star criminals must be kept out along with the common scum. But it may turn out to be a crippling blow for England's Toad-in-the-hole industry: More »
lawsuits
Worst Player In Tennis Sues Media Over Name-Calling
The UK's stupid libel laws allow people to successfully sue the media for making fun of them. So Robert Dee, a 21-year-old British guy who is the world's Worst Professional Tennis Player, is suing three newspapers there for pointing out that he is, in fact, the Worst Professional Tennis Player. Mainly, this makes us glad to be in America, where we're free to tell you that Robert Dee is the Worst Professional Tennis Player. But also, the facts aren't even on his side; it sure sounds like he really is the Worst Professional Tennis Player!: More »
ominous doings
Murdoch Proclaims Obama 'The Real American Idol'
The UK Sun is perhaps the paper that gives the best indication of Rupert Murdoch's schemes and aspirations. It's based almost entirely on unrepentant nativism, anti-Continental prejudice, breathless violent crime reportage, immigrant/pedophile fear-mongering, celebrity abuse, royal family adoration, and T&A. It has the highest circulation of any daily English-language newspaper in the world. And it loves Barack Obama! In a rapturous story published today under the header "The REAL American Idol," the Sun's political team all but deifies the Illinois Senator. More »
ominous doings
Obama Will Be Rupert Murdoch's Next Tony Blair
Lovable media mogul Rupert Murdoch, owner of News Corp, has been going around predicting a landslide victory for the Democrats this November and also big-upping Senator Barack Obama—he called Obama a "superstar" and a "complete phenomenon" at a conference yesterday. He apparently nudged his pet tabloid the New York Post toward an Obama endorsement in the New York primaries (despite his early attempts at making friendly with the Clintons). And as the Post goes, so goes, well, other News Corp holdings. So maybe Fox News will let up on Barry a bit? They've never been terribly friendly to McCain anyhow. But why would this noted conservative tyrant endorse Mr. Liberal Hope? He's done it before—with a friendly little weasel named Tony Blair. More »
anonymous
London Police Protect Scientology From Teen's Sign
The Brits are rather less enthusiastic about the whole "free speech" concept than the US is. A 15-year-old kid was holding a sign that said "Cult" at one of the Anonymous protests against Scientology in London. The precocious young scalawag had even memorized a 1984 UK court ruling in which a judge called the science fiction-based religion a "cult." But the police gave him a summons and confiscated his dangerous slogan-bearing poster, and now he has to go to court to defend himself. More »
advertising
England Bans Loud Ads; "Don't You Touch That Volume," Says Government
The UK government body that regulates advertising passed new rules this month banning TV commercials that are too loud. That's right; ads shouldn't be "excessively noisy or strident." Nor should they be excessively blaring, deafening, roaring, or stentorian, if the thesaurus has anything to say about it. The ostensible reason for the rule is to prevent your neighbors from hearing commercials on your television. "This might sound straightforward," says the New York Times. Um, no it doesn't. Has the British government come up with a magic volume button-disabling law? More »
crime
Facebook Update Leads To Murder-Suicide
Tracey Grinhaff, a 42-year-old mother of two in Sheffield, England, was murdered by her angry husband after she posted a message on her Facebook page saying that she was leaving him. Cops found her body in a shed in the back yard of the couple's house, and her 41-year-old husband Gary's body was found in the woods nearby. She died of head wounds, and so did he, although his were self-inflicted. Apparently the message made him extremely angry: More »
foreign affairs
Ungrateful English Demand Apology From Eccentric American Blogger
Earlier this year, Matt Drudge saved the life of Prince Harry, the UK's adorable ginger-haired lunkheaded Nazi ruler. Harry, you see, had been deployed to Afghanistan, where there are lots of people who'd like to blow him up. But Drudge revealed the deployment, breaking a media embargo, and then they were forced to send Harry back home, where he's more or less safe. For some reason this enrages the English. So the Mayor of Windsor and Maidenhead, whose name is probably spelled "Higginbobotham" but pronounced "Higgins", has demanded an apology from Drudge. The apology is probably not forthcoming. [UPI]
this is england
Brits Win Scandal Title With 'Mr. Gay UK' As Flesh-Eating Psycho Killer
Once again, American scandals hang their heads in shame. News comes from jolly old England that a former "Mr. Gay UK" has been arrested for murdering an ad executive from a gay magazine, and then eating some of him [Telegraph via Queerty]. Don't get any untoward ideas, though; they were just "friends." The killer also had some flesh from the man's right leg diced up, cooked, and ready to season when the cops came in. That does seem incriminating. Eat your heart out, Jeffrey Dahmer—you never won any pageants at all. A full beefcake photo (pretty much NSFW) of the award-garnering cannibal, Anthony Morley, from the time of his glorious 1993 title win, is after the jump: More »
astroturf
Fake Bloggers, Go Directly To Jail!
Wow! As a nerd on the PR and marketing beat I find this to be absolutely astounding and heartening: the UK is about to make it a crime for companies to misrepresent themselves as consumers in their online marketing. That means, for example, that a company setting up a fake blog to hype its own products could be prosecuted, fined, and jailed. Free speech? Whatever. This is an awesome development. And bloggers can be locked up, too! More »
usa! usa! usa!
UK Man Wins Lawsuit Against Website That Was Mean to Him
Peter Walls is the chief executive of a "social housing firm" in the UK. John Finn owns a rival housing firm. One day, Finn started a website called dadsplace.co.uk, and on that website, many anonymous people said many mean, mean things about Walls. They accused Walls of nepotism and sleeping with underlings and other sorts of things like that. Then Walls sued Finn for libel. He just won! He won one hundred thousand pounds, which is around eleventy-billion dollars. Injunctions were filed against two of the anonymous commenters who said these mean things! In other words, being anonymously bitchy on the internet is quite dangerous in England. Which is why there is not really so much of a market for "gossip blogs" there, you see. As Denton just told us, this case "serves as a reminder that the abuse that we take as our god-given right to inflict, or duty to tolerate, is illegal in many places." God bless the U.S.A.. [Guardian]
advertising
BMW, Mercedes Embarrassed By Nazi Orgy
If you've been following the real news, you'll recall that Max Mosley is the British Formula 1 racing president who is currently involved in a slight tiff over a video of him having an hours-long Nazi-themed orgy with five hookers. A bit embarrassing for him personally, yes. It's also caused some grumbling among the Formula 1 teams. And now, this sex scandal is reaching its absurd logical conclusion, as its ripples extend into the highest reaches of the world's corporations: BMW and Mercedes-Benz have jointly condemned Mosley's sexual taste as "disgraceful." [BBC]. Because they are the arbiters of morality in sexuality! They're also a bit sensitive about the whole Nazi angle, because, you know, they're from Germany themselves. More »
natasha collins
Kids TV Star Died Coked Up In Hot Bath
Natasha Collins, a former model who starred in a British children's TV show called "See It, Saw It," was found dead in a bathtub in January. Today, a coroner's report said that she died by being scalded to death in the hot bathwater, and that she had "Five times the potentially fatal amount of cocaine" in her system at the time. She and her fiancee—whom she met while he was working on another kids show—had been partying at home alone when she died. Collins wasn't always in costume; after the jump, a few of her normal modeling shots. More »
A Good Any Time Gift
Somebody in Britain (God?) is now mass marketing a $1,600 injection that women can get to triple the sensitivity of their G-spot, and increase its area "to the size of a 10p coin and a quarter of an inch high." I don't know British money, that's like, the size of a CD? "Woman sex drug | For female multiple orgasms | Makes G spot swell," summarizes The Sun. Nice. [The Sun UK]
