Watchification » 1979 http://watchification.com Sun, 31 May 2009 21:50:27 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.4 The Knowledge http://watchification.com/2008/07/28/the-knowledge/ http://watchification.com/2008/07/28/the-knowledge/#comments Mon, 28 Jul 2008 10:30:39 +0000 jemstone http://watchification.com/?p=142 Repeated on BBC4 as part of “Cab Night” and now nearly 30 years old ; I saw this when it was first shown on Thames in 1979. Everyone did. I think it appealed at the time because it played to my nerdy 13 year old fantasies of having to  learn over 15,000 streets and thousands of buildings just to be even given the chance of driving a black taxi for a job. Ii think i just liked the displacement idea of it. The idea that you had to do ‘research’ before even starting a job. Something i kid myself with every time i pick up the paper or read a book.

Anyway its a brilliant drama, with a heartbreaking ending that well, er stay with you for thirty years. Nigel Hawthorne is especially good as a sadistic army officer tester and Michael Elphick looking (pre Boon, pre Booze) very young and chirpy. The theme tune is hilarious. The best thing Jack Rosenthal and Euston Films ever did.

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