Thursday, July 05, 2007
Walk Away Cherie
Cherie Blair is clearly nothing like as appalling as her enemies suggest, nor as saint-like as her friends insist. The one thing that came over in The Real Cherie Blair was that the camera doesn't like her. That's not to do with good looks. It's to do with the quality they call poise. Her eyes look cornered and defensive while her speech is invariably aggressive. It's the sort of thing that doesn't matter in a court room but it matters like hell on TV where nobody's listening to what you say so much as they way you say it. In this film you could contrast her with Hillary Clinton, who's better at talking to a camera, and Laura Bush, who's better than both of them. Why Cherie did this film at the very point in her life where she no longer had to, suggests that she still believes she can change the nation's perception of her. I don't think so.
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So wht does the woman who has been able to command £30,000 for a speech - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4685802.stm - want to maximise her profile at the time from which she will no longer be in the news? Well I'm stumped.
ReplyDeleteI must admit that I didn't see the programme - I was out seeing Sid Griffin and the Coal Porters in a tiny basement club. Agreeably smoke free, but it left me uncomfortably aware of the scents of stale beer and sweaty bluegrass fan.
She does come over as one of the most disingenious people in high public life. All this antagonism to the press based largely on her dodgy dealings with a known criminal and profiting from her husband's postion. Her final comment about "not missing the press" fell dead too, presumably she'll want coverage for her book or paid public speaking engagements or charity work or even her "high profile" court cases. To slag the press off and then make 2 or 3 docs about leaving office is poor form. One of the most telling pieces in these progs lately was a talking head who flaty told us the Tony and Cherie "really like money" more than is usual and this seems to be the entire aim for their post office years.
ReplyDeleteslight aside I saw Gordon Browns wife (Sarah?) in the street and she seemed quite nice, this is only based soley on her wearing a red duffle coat mind!
I, too, didn't see the programme - the trailers were enough to put me off. But one does have to repeat the question - why? Can this have done her any favours? The obvious question 'would anyone be interested if she wasn't married to an ex-PM?' was claimed to be irrelevant and remained unanswered in the clip I saw. This is exactly the point, isn't it? She must be intelligent to be a QC (as she says), but she does do her best to hide this the rest of the time. And surely she doesn't need the money?
ReplyDeleteGod save us from these people.
Cherie reminds me of a friend of mine (a former Labour candidate) - very smart but very coarse, and with a chip on her shoulder. Completely lacking in refinement. Doesn't make her a bad person. Given Cherie's role as a QC working on human rights issues she would probably be a hate figure for the right wing press even if she was not married to Tony. If they liked money so much he should have left office earlier - being PM does not pay that well (though 10x my salary). Her parting shot to the press was spectacularly ill judged though.
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