[Closed] Danny Boyle risking embarrassing the nation... the opening ceremony thread

Well I enjoyed that. Apart from sir thumbsaloft, of course.

G'night all

tallie - Member
Why were Team GB dressed as Gary Glitter impersonators?

East 17 Reunion more like..

Mind, they where sponsored by JJB...

Hey Jude, because an Old Bloke can get the audience to do the work when the Alzheimers kicks in.

I thought that was outstanding. 🙂

Fantastic! Well, bar the ex beatle at the end. Great event

All but the Beatle was great. With luck the first British gold medal is tomorrow on the Mall.

Agrees with stevewhite - i'd have paid a bit for that.

Haven't read the 23 pages to here but I thought the opening cermony was fantastic and worthy of a British production.

I am Australian and recall my bitter disappointment at the 2000 Sydney opening ceremony.
Great Britain stood proud tonight.

Dizzy Rascal - Bonkers - being played at the Olympics in front of the Queen = Highlight of my day.

it was indeed Great.. 😀

Glad to see Mr Bean there.

Brilliant.
and were there bits of The Orb playing while the athletes were coming on?

I heard Underworld

Also the Americans won the most militaristic parade uniform, managing to look like something out of Starship Troopers. Yeah that's the right outfit for an event that celebrates peace....you window licking septics.

And I also caught a German doing a rather suspicious wave that looked a bit like a certain salute....

Ace. Just ace!

I heard Underworld

that was it, but I think there was another as well

am just watching the repeat of it now (damn you insomnia 😡
i must say it looks/sounds most impressive 😀

Danny Boyle for a knighthood, Gary Barlow for the tower

I'm 4 hours ahead of UK time so I missed this last night. Just watched the highlights piece on the bbc web site, interestingly Macca wasn't included.

Brilliant, although I did nod off for a couple of hours as the atheltes filed in.

Well done Sir Danny.

Just caught the ceremony down under (not live). Loved it.

Well done all the thousands of volunteers - you did Great Britain proud.

edit: and Underworld... really pleased they were involved: my Italian and Australian mates were impressed that we could include Born Slippy, the Sex Pistols, Bowie, Prodigy and all the other tunes. But not Macca.

Brilliant I was sceptic when I got home about 8.30 and seen Teletubby hill but when it started from 9 all that changed. Excellent stuff entertainging, funny and pride too. Well done Danny Boyle.

Sadly I was wrecked from nights so crashed before they lit the flame. I can only just remember Team GB entering the arena.

the flame was.... well look it up, probably on youtube by now 😀

Phillyc +1

don't even try to describe it, we won't do it justice.

I do like that they trusted artic monkeys to do a Beatles song, but not paul!

Also love the fact they kept away all the x-factor Simon Cowell driven contribution to music.

If there was any debate in the "who'd buy a gun" thread about members of the public being armed then Paul McCartney has silenced it. At least one would have done the decent thing.

Well Done Danny!! We loved it.....

Highlights.....Bond and the Queen sky diving, Mr Bean (didnt expect that) Muhammad Ali......

And the lighting of the cauldron.....that something else, very special....

All in all, I think they did the British proud!!!

What would really get the games going.....a win from Mark Cav of course!!! 🙂

Let the games begin...

Loads to love about last night - my favourites were the opening sequence of rural life to industrial chaos with the forging of the rings and the wonderful ideology of passing on the mantle to the next generation with the lighting of the torch, especially with the symbology of the torch being constructed from an element from each participating nation. Both brilliant.

The NHS and children's literature bit - meh
The popular culture and social networking revolution bit - underwhelmed
Mr Bean - ruined one of my favourite sport oriented tunes. Never found a way to think of him as funny.
Choice of music generally - own much artic monkeys music but struggling to see the relevance of song choice at that point, in this context. And Hey Jude, no matter what you thought of Macca's performance - why that song, why were the lyrics relevant? The only reason I can think of is that most people know it around the world and its easy to sing along to.

Can't please all of the people all of the time etc etc but the good still outweighed the mediocre for me by some margin. There must have been lots of folk around the world turning their tellies off after that saying WTF,those British are crazy - and that's good too!

the only thing good about the mccartny slot was that it emptied the stadium fast.

Curate's egg for me: great start, humour/parody, Branagh, the rings. Then seemed to lose its way, dogged by inclusivity and pandering to PC. The longest music? A funeral hymn. The longest section, the NHS? Ali's cameo (my US friend didn't even understand that) and my guards friend fumed at the soldiers inability to march! Musical choice bizarre and we take our greatest conductor and sideline him in the name of comedy and in preference to Artic Monkeys and the sex pistols. But the flame saved the ending - inspired design there.

But lasting impression was slightly odd, especially the German salute. What was that about?

I'm still seething at that Macca clown, ruined what was a really good night

Dizzy Rascal - Bonkers - being played at the Olympics in front of the Queen = Highlight of my day.

Indeed! 🙂

Given the massive 70s rock stage show feel to the night, I will never understand why it wasn't pink floyd. Everything else was awesome though...

As a few have said, thought the show was overall amazing, however, why Mccartney at the end, really disappointed with that, he's been rubbish since the beatles split but other than that well done Danny Boyle, did Britain proud last night

I liked it that Team GB all wore Tim Westwood fancy dress outfits. Yo DOG.

woke up this morning proud to be British. 😀

Who was the girl who lost her phone in the music bit? Be still my fluttering heart 😛 chuffing gorgeous.

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Really enjoyed the first third or so, the forging of the rings was impressive and the whole thing looked fantastic.

Wasn't impressed by the Rowan Atkinson bit at all and the 'music through the decades' bit didn't need that phone-loss sequence

McCartney bit was rubbish, lazy and turned into a football chant-along, in a toss up between his performance and his daughters golden tracksuits I'm going out on a limb and suggest she had the better night.

Cauldron was fantastic, really really good.

Due to circumstances beyond my control (being at work...) I only saw up to the bit with the rings being forged. What I saw was fab, and quite splendid.

It's on the PVR at home, so I hope the rest will be just as brill.

+1 Mr Boyle.

Who was the girl who lost her phone in the music bit? Be still my fluttering heart chuffing gorgeous.

Just turned 14 I believe.

And I also caught a German doing a rather suspicious wave that looked a bit like a certain salute....

This one 😆

We loved it. We let the 8 yr old stay up and watch it, she was so excited - she's still asleep now - a record!

Highlights for me were definitely the opening sequence with the change from rural countryside to the industrial revolution. Also seeing Ali brought a lump to my throat as did the GB team walking in to Heroes. The mr Bean bit at the start of Chariots of Fire was funny for the the first 30 secs but dragged on for far too long.

The music was superb (especially the Arctic Monkeys) right up until Macca who I honestly think is only wheeled out for these events because everybody in the world can join in the chorus of Hey Jude. Top night all round though.

Right Im settling down for the Road Race now.

There will always finally be Paul McCartney. When the world ends, he will be there, fit as ever, for a last 50 choruses of Hey Jude. “OK now,” “just the men, just the fellas.…..................................... OK now, just the women, just the girls.”

Well she should not of been up so late cavorting around, I blame the parents.

Well she should not of been up so late cavorting around, I blame the parents.

I have no idea how old she is to be honest, but I agree she was very pretty.

fervouredimage - Member
Well she should not of been up so late cavorting around, I blame the parents.
I have no idea how old she is to be honest, but I agree she was very pretty.

According to the Telegraph, her name is jasmine breinburg and she is 18 years old.

phew

Thanks for all of this, I have read all 25 pages and feel like i havnt missed a thing... good job to as we both overachieved on the schnaps and passed out when the athletes started to arrive....

No mention of spazzed out exploding sheep after page 1. Were they made into kebabs or something... ?

Not sure where they went, probably got bundled into the furnaces...

I watched it and the most irritating was french tv comments. To be honest I loved it 😀

That Olympic cauldron sequence was probably the most spellbindingly beautiful piece of moving art I've ever seen.

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The forging of the rings bit was pretty good but I thought the rest was cheesy as **** and pretty cringeworthy. Apart from the Daniel Craig and Queen bit which was awesome 😀

Day after thoughts. Patchy. Brilliant in parts. Occasionally strangely moving. And funny. I think he pulled it off. Only really wrong step for me was Macca but see why he did it.

Can't imagine what non Brits will have made of it, though. That was weapons grade weirdness at times and references will be way off piste. Good luck to the rest of the world getting their heads around it!

Well done Sir Danny. A shoe in, surely?

In a strange sort of way Macca was a master stroke of genius .. At least for those of us there and who have seen him close shows before...
The Hey Jude sing a long is a clear signal that the show is over .....
Some folks realise this and head off out of the stadium, others hang on to watch him

Either way it helps spread they crowd out once outside and was ( IMHO ) a clever way to start managing the queues for the tube.

I loved the whole thing, totally magnificent to see in the flesh from Child catchers, to vlilage green cricket , Shakespeare to the Sex Pistols,

Well done to all who took part,

#proudtobebritish

The only missing thing for me in retrospect was Roald Dahl. But the whole thing was very Dahl in tone, like a mash-up between Pink Floyd's The Wall, and the complete works of RD. I think the insanity worked as it made it captivating.

I'm assuming Macca was at the end as he knew once the flame was lit all the brits would go to bed, so no harm done.

I thought it was ace! 😀 agree with the Macca comments though,..

can't remember of Macca, but as a non brit with some extensive knowledge of the british culture, I loved it, except the NHS bit. I can see why you're proud of it, however with dave wanting to cut it I felt it was a bit hypocrite. Only bit i didn't get was the queen stuff, but to be honest I never get it.

That was Sir Danny Boyle telling CMD and GO to get their tanks off our lawn.

That was Sir Danny Boyle telling CMD and GO to get their tanks off our lawn.

Both Mrs Busydog and I thought it was well done and highly entertaining. Not sure how long the program was in it's entirety, but what was televised here in the US was 4 1/2 hours, with the first 30 minutes of NBC talking heads. I watched about 3 hours and recorded the rest to watch today.
As an aside, the Mr. Bean and the orchestra bit was classic.
Again, well done Britain.

I love the Beatles but there songs were murdered IMHO by a beatle and by the Arctic monkeys [ who were better than Macca]but yes they had to be there.

I thought Mr bean ruined a rousing piece of music but I a not a fan of Mr Bean which i found as funny as if they had done a Carry on pastiche ...did they?

ancientandloyal - Member
Could be an age thing, but that singer on the right's bang tidy

[url= http://www.elizabeth-roberts.com/ ]Elizabeth Roberts, soprano[/url]

And since I know it's the music you are interested in...

I love the Beatles but there songs were murdered IMHO by a beatle and by the Arctic monkeys [ who were better than Macca]but yes they had to be there.

I actually thought the AM version of Come Together was pretty damn good

....Apparently its not on US telly.

what was televised here in the US was 4 1/2 hours, with the first 30 minutes of NBC talking heads.

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Don't believe everything that bloke in the pub tells you 😉

I actually thought the AM version of Come Together was pretty damn good

It was better than that awful racket they made before that.

It was never going to live up to the hype, but it wasn't as awful as it could have been. I was half terrified that Chas n Dave were going to turn up.

Yes it was good but no one can really cover the beatles not even Maccaa any more 😕