Local Haunts is out now from @Influxpress! Thanks to everyone who has ordered or bought a copy so far! (Hagstone not included).

RT @Influxpress: Taken from a range of print and digital publications, including work published by Sight & Sound, Caught By The River & Lit….

This is especially worth a watch as it basically pits Harper against Edward Brayshaw in a Who Can Be Most Silky-Voiced competition (A Game of Murder is also worth tracking down as well).

Farewell to Gerald Harper, one of the most stylish and debonair actors to ever grace our screens. Loved him in just about everything, whether leading as in Adam Adamant and Hadleigh/Gazette, or simply supporting roles. The quintessential on-screen English gentleman.

Best TV of June was The Lotus Eaters (1972-73). I've been saving it for a while and wasn’t disappointed. Ian Hendry and Wanda Ventham are fantastic, while its multiple narratives of espionage and collapsing relationships is gripping and addictive.

Best read of June was the astonishing The Big Nowhere (1988) by James Ellroy. Utterly grim, brutal and relentless, like my previous Ellroy it left everything else in the dust. Reminded that literature can have real bite to it when allowed.

Best films of June:.Run Silent Run Deep (1958) – Robert Wise.Black Test Car (1962) – Yasuzô Masumura.The Defiant Ones (1958) – Stanley Kramer.Vincent, François, Paul and the Others (1974) – Claude Sautet.I Knew Her Well (1965) – Antonio Pietrangeli

RT @Influxpress: Adam Scovell's Local Haunts brings together a collection of essays, photographs, travelogues, and journalism that explores….

There's 30% of Local Haunts until Wednesday direct from Influx in their summer sale.

Tried that NYT 21st Century film vote thingy. Chunk of my choices weren't on there so made a graphic with the missing posters instead. Quite tricky for me as I don't generally watch a lot stuff from this side of the millenium but there we are.

RT @IanHagues: @AdamScovell Current read - recommended 👍

RT @AdamScovell: With it turning 60 this year, I followed in the footsteps of Catherine Deneuve around the West London of Repulsion (1965).….

RT @BFI: We went in search of the real locations that shaped Repulsion (1965)'s claustrophobic atmosphere.

Hartnell Greys #DoctorWho

With it turning 60 this year, I followed in the footsteps of Catherine Deneuve around the West London of Repulsion (1965).

Currently enjoying Derek Raymond's memoir The Hidden Files. Here's a tangent about his favourite Weird Fiction and favourite M.R. James stories (banned by his family for occult content, and the only positive he sees in his going to Eton where he was finally allowed to read them).

Best TV of May was Kenneth Clark’s Civilisation (1969). Aside from the refreshing, detailed and nuanced polemic of the series, its real strength is in how utterly beautiful it is to look at. Several of the rallying speeches from later in the series did also hit the mark for me.

Best May read was Barbara Comyns' Our Spoons Came from Woolworths (1950). My Virago edition's use of Stanley Spencer’s Marriage at Cana is so right for Comyns’ strange, alluring prose and eerie English urbanity; it feels the same London of Christopher Chamberlain’s paintings too.

Best films of May:.The China Syndrome (1979) – James Bridges.Scott of the Antarctic (1948) – Charles Frend.To Sir, With Love (1967) – James Clavell.Conduct Unbecoming (1975) – Michael Anderson.The Rocking Horse Winner (1949) – Anthony Pelliser

In fact, the coat has become a bit of a mystery as its particularly bright blue striped patterning has defied reverse engineering to create it exactly as was.

Spent the morning daydreaming about Gregory Peck's wardrobe from Richard Donner's The Omen (1976). It was all made by his favourites Huntsman in the Colin Hammick golden age (they'd been Peck's tailors since 1953). The coat with the raglan sleeves is especially beautiful.