The world from my window

We sat in our seats, the lights went down and there was not a whirr to be heard. At the opening night of our very own Lush Places cinema in the village hall, we had a few shorts, including the Happy video I made with a friend last year. And then it was the turn of Effie Gray, a beautiful film made by Emma Thompson, featuring a great, mainly British cast, and based on the true story of the ill-fated marriage of Victorian art critic John Ruskin. The ladies in the audience, in particular, were gripped by this tale, even though nothing much really happened. 'It was miserable and too long,' said one of the men. 'Aren't you glad you're not married to someone like that?' said a husband to his wife in the front row. But it was a hit as far as being the first film of our community cinema was concerned, despite the man behind the scenes (and behind the stage curtain like the Wizard of Oz)  poking his head out from the side of the roll-down screen as the st...