Paper Monitor
A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.
One of the strange processes in the UK is the way controversial figures are eligible to become universally loved if they can keep hanging around long enough.
Ken Russell fits the bill.
The Sun delights in his track record of filming naked wrestling and topless nuns. They call him an "old devil" in . Warning: Needless to say, the Sun story features images of naked wrestling and topless nuns.
The Daily Mail does a . They call him an "old devil" in their story.
The authors show restraint, only allowing themselves one use each of "incorrigible" and "priapic". The piece does blot its copybook by going a little over the top about The Devils.
"To this day, the film has never been shown in its full uncut version because some of the scenes of sex and violence are so depraved."
Some Mail readers acidly point out that the film has not been released in its full version only because of the studio's lack of desire. The cut scenes would probably not shift the eyebrows of the man on the Clapham Omnibus these days.
In matters un-Russell related, Paper Monitor must tip its hat to a piece in the Times' 2 section about strokes making people take up art or change their sexual preferences. All rather interesting.
And with the same paper, Times 2 has for people shamed by their otherwise well-behaved pets (see Fenton etc).
They have a marvellous example:
"A colleague remains haunted by the memory of competing in the 200m final at a regional schools championship. The family dog bolted at the starting gun and the race became a sideshow to the spectacle of her father crashing through the undergrowth alongside the track bellowing for 'Muff!'"