Peter’s Weekly Video Party

Text and pics contributed by Sam G.

In an ill-fated 2008 revival of The Prisoner, inhabitants of The Village receive the following daily announcement: “Seen the sights? See Them Again!” I have taken this as my motto in the last few weeks – perambulating frequently around my opulent bachelor pad in Upper Woodbridge, soaking it all in. However, there comes a time when one has to admit that the progress of the ants across the countertops lacks the sweeping majesty of the wildebeest migration of the Serengeti and that whilst my beer-can pyramid may become my mausoleum, King Tut wouldn’t so much as close his eyes in it. And so, to relieve the tedium, I turned to Peter’s Weekly Video Watch Party – for, dear Readers, is not an hour of cinematographic marvel worth a lifetime of travel?

Peter Edwards may be better known to Readers as Slide-Man from the Monthly Social. Such is the dedication and tenacity that Peter devotes to his slideshow, he rarely has time for walks and other merry japes. Every month, he glumly clicks through yet another gallery of other people having fun. This self-sacrifice is greatly applauded by all members, I’m sure. The Monthly Social is curiously missing from the current IOG Programme and your reviewer can only attribute this to Peter’s notorious inability to use IT. Thus spared his Sisyphean task, Peter has turned his energies to coordinating a weekly film screening instead.

I feel the best way of describing the Video Party is by analogy with Renaissance Town Square Justice. The miscreant (read film) is dragged into the square and placed behind the stocks (read streamed or downloaded from a terrestrial catch-up service). The attendees then express their opprobrium through the aerial discharge of vegetables or laud the victim with vigorous applause (read participants critique the film communicating via Facebook Messenger). Renaissance Town Square Justice was known for its erudition – after all did not Descartes expound his theory of Mind-Body Duality to Da Vinci just before pummelling a poor wretch with over-ripe aubergine? In much the same way, watching the films ( The Lost City of Z, The Place Beyond the Pines and Made in Dagenham) has provoked heated debate about whether it is right to force teenagers to wear fake moustaches to masquerade as older men, the merits of different 60s hairstyles and whether rabbits possess emotions.

Whilst initially sceptical, this reviewer is convinced of the latter and is pleased that Smokey The Rabbit has been invited to become a regular attendee at the Video Party. Smokey has many enlightening insights into life: I can reveal to you that rabbits find the bob a more approachable 60s hairstyle than the beehive (but for their tails of course).

Only one thing mars Peter’s otherwise deft and diplomatic handling: the mechanism used to determine the next film. Call your reviewer old fashioned, but he favours arcane but simple rules that, upon closer inspection, subtly benefit one of the participants. If only all elections were run in this way! But it is not to be: Peter presents the attendees with a selection of films from iPlayer and a consensus is formed after lengthy discussion. For this reason, although I think Peter’s Weekly Video Watch Party is amongst the maybe top four items currently on the IOG Programme, I can only award it three and a half stars out of five.

Peter’s Weekly Video Party 7pm Sundays. Contact samwise@bagshot-row.org