While not exactly a film buff, Gordon Brown was touched when Barack Obama gave him a set of 25 classic American movies -- including Psycho, starring Anthony Perkins on his recent visit to Washington.
| The Brits signal clearly that they are not amused ... |
Alas, when the PM settled down to begin watching them the other night, he found there was a problem. The films only worked in DVD players made in North America and the words "wrong region" came up on his screen.
| Funny how Walmart in DC doesn't have DVDs for Britain in stock ... |
| There is no Wal-Mart in DC. We're not zoned for that sort of thing. You have to drive to (egad!) Germantown to hang with the hicks. |
| So it's even worse than I thought: Barry had someone buy the disks from a street vendor ... |
Although he mournfully had to put the popcorn away, he is unlikely to jeopardise the special relationship -- or "special partnership", as we are now supposed to call it -- by registering a complaint.
| He will instead make sure the Brit papers hear about it. |
A Downing Street spokesman said he was "confident" that any gift Obama gave Brown would have been "well thought through," but referred me to the White House for assistance on the "technical aspects".
| Blame it on the staff. That's an old Hildebeast trick ... |
A White House spokesman sniggered when I put the story to him and he was still looking into the matter when my deadline came last night.
| Yup, he was 'Gibb'ering wildly ... |
By the way, when Obama's unlikely gift was disclosed, a reader emailed me to ask if Clueless was among the films. Funnily enough, it was not.
Brown, on the other hand, presented a rather more thoughtful gift to the American President in the form of a penholder carved from the timbers of an anti-slavery ship. The sister ship, in fact, of the one that was broken up and turned into the desk in the Oval Office.
| Barack Obama proclaimed during the campaign that he was for 'smart diplomacy'. What kind of smart guy is disrespectful of one of our closest allies? You don't have to like them, Barack, but you'd better recognize that at some point you're going to need them. |
| When Barry goes over, maybe Brown can reciprocate and present him with the Complete Benny Hill Collection that won't work in the White House DVDs... |
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