The hospital visits and general inability to say no to any invitation, means that we have hardly had any time to ourselves, so on Sunday we decided that we weren’t going to make any plans at all, other than to just please ourselves. So after a leisurely breakfast, we did what we do best - watched an old black and film. In fact over the weekend we had a bit of a film festival, watching first of all from 1941 Mr & Mrs Smith, which was that rarest of all films a Hitchcock comedy. Enjoyable, but hardly a classic of the screwball comedy, Hitch was defiantly better at building the tension than he was at tickling the ribs. The next film on the agenda was The man who wasn't there, the Cohen brothers do film noir and do it very well indeed. Great understated performances all round from the brilliant cast. You could almost feel the quiet desperation oozing from Billy Bob Thornton, brilliant. Then last night I watched Kikujiro by the mystery man of Japanese cinema Takeshi Kitano. Radically different in tone to his earlier films such as the marvellous Hana -Bi and Sonatine. Although his work is closely linked with extreme violence, he has always used silence and solitude as part of his strong narrative lines. Kikujiro has more in common with "A Scene at the Sea" an earlier film of his than his art house hits with western audiences. It's a most unlikely road movie, featuring a small time, foul mouthed waster and his efforts to help a young boy find his mother. Surprisingly tender and often very funny, it was a real treat.