Le Trappiste on Avenue de la Toison d’Or is my venue for lunch this Friday.

I’m glad I’ve got in to this quietly elegant art nouveau brasserie early, right on midday. It means I’m able to get a window table near to the beautiful art nouveau entrance door whilst the restaurant is still quiet.

Within minutes, two groups of twenty people have shown up, plus assorted other diners.

So the place is suddenly buzzing.

The waiters in their smart black waistcoats are moving around sedately but efficiently.

It’s great to be ensconced here, tucking into a plate of stoemp.

The sausage is curled under the mashed potato like a smiling mouth under an enormous bulbous nose.

A couple of bottles of very decent Ciney Blonde beer accompany the food.

On one wall of the restaurant there stands a spectacular statue on a raised base, with beautiful curving footlights illuminating it.

In the rest of the restaurant there is wood panelling and mirrors along the walls, and a handsome arched upper level.

A businessman scurries in clutching a Neuhaus bag, probably from the store across the street.

Neuhaus make the best chocolates I have ever tasted, and seeing that bag of them makes me want to go and get some myself.

Glancing out the window, I notice that the art nouveau font used on the awnings over the pavement tables is absolutely wonderful.

In the restaurant name ‘LE TRAPPISTE’, spelled in upper case, the letters ‘R’ and ‘A’ next to each other are incredibly beautiful, like two dancers’ legs.

Well fed, I leave the brasserie and head down the hill towards the Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique.

My intention today is not to visit the galleries but simply to buy a poster or two from the Magritte museum shop.

But it is a confusing layout inside and I find myself in two other museum shops, neither of which is the Magritte shop.

I don’t mind, though, because in the connecting area between the two shops I come across a fabulous curving staircase with a glass skylight at the top.

An upturned mirror has been helpfully positioned here so that you can look down at the mirror and get a good view of the staircase above without having to crane your neck to look directly upwards.

As well as the stunning staircase, I also find a great book which I wish I had come across earlier: BRUXELLES – Art nouveau Art déco by Anne-Lise Quesnel.

The photos in this book, taken by Quesnel and by Brice Franckx, are so good that I instantly want to rush round this city taking in all its art nouveau and art deco splendours.

I may not have found the Magritte museum shop, but there is a nice witty variation on Magritte’s ‘This is not a pipe’ at one of the shop cash desks, where a piece of paper stuck to the till announces ‘This is not a cash desk’.

Before the showing of today’s film, the Czech psychoanalytic comedy ‘Surviving Life’, there is plenty time for a couple more beers.

So I first quaff a somewhat disappointing Ramée Blonde. It’s not unpleasant, though it has no finish and evaporates instantly from the palate, leaving me with a slightly unsatisfied feeling.

But the second beer is much better, Affligem Tripel, an austere but imposing brew with a soft luxurious mouthfeel and a smooth texture. The flavour is almost herby. A top-notch Belgian abbey beer.

Tonight’s film is showing at Nova cinema on Rue d’Arenberg.

Nova is an independent cinema with a brilliantly radical programming policy. The stuff they show here would seldom get an airing elsewhere.

Tonight’s offering of ‘Surviving Life’ is one such example, a highly entertaining surrealist comedy directed by Jan Svankmajer.

The film is due to start at 7.30 p.m.

I hand over five euros for my ticket and go in.

At 7.20 p.m. this Friday evening, I am the only person here.

I don’t know if you could use the word ‘auditorium’ to describe the space in which Nova shows its films. It feels more like a big abandoned warehouse or factory building, an industrial chic space in which exposed brick on the walls shows through in many places where the two-inch thick plasterwork has come off.

But it doesn’t feel dingy.

The overall effect is pleasing, a suitably radical environment in which to watch Nova’s bold programming.

The screen is a good size and the seats are comfortable.

Five minutes before show time a couple come in, sit down, and start talking to each other in whispers.

No background music is playing, so we are sitting here in silence in this cavernous space.

Then a nice friendly woman, presumably the manager on duty tonight, comes in and very apologetically informs us that there will be a slight delay to the showing because the projectionist has not yet arrived.

“Il est dans le métro”, she explains.

At 7.40 p.m. there is an influx of around a dozen more people, some of whom are clutching beers from the basement bar.

I have already had four beers today so I don’t feel any desperate urge to have one during the film, though it’s good to know for future reference that it’s ok to bring your drinks in.

‘Surviving Life’ starts with a very droll personal introduction by director Jan Svankmajer.

He lugubriously reports that because they could not raise enough funding to make the film, they had to rely on techniques such as collage and ‘stop motion’ cut paper animation, together with some scenes shot with real actors.

I like Svankmajer’s melancholy self-deprecation in this introductory scene.

He warns the audience that even though the film is meant to be a comedy, there won’t be much to laugh about.

He also does not hide the fact that this introduction constitutes a couple of minutes of padding in order to make the film long enough for cinema exhibition.

The story revolves around Eugène, a bored middle-aged office worker who is visited in his dreams by a beautiful young woman.

She brings colour and excitement into his otherwise humdrum existence.

Because Eugène wants to be able to enjoy these dreams continuously, he visits a psychoanalyst, who misunderstands Eugène’s motivations.

The psychoanalyst seeks to explain the childhood origin of Eugène’s dreams in order to stop him from having the dreams, whereas Eugène has no wish to stop the dreams from happening.

Nor is Eugène in the slightest interested as to why he is having the dreams.

This leads to some funny irreverent digs at Freud and Jung, whose portraits look down upon Eugène during his sessions with the psychoanalyst.

The two main actors in ‘Surviving Life’ are both very good.

Václav Helsus gives a perfect, downbeat but humorous performance as Eugène, whilst Klára Issová exudes innocent good-hearted beauty as Eugènie, the young woman who appears in his dreams.

The supporting cast all contribute well to the surreal universe in which the story unfolds.

The Python-esque animation in ‘Surviving Life’ is funny, tender, and occasionally shocking.

The giant hands emerging from apartment windows on both sides of the street to applaud the encounters between Eugène and Eugènie down on the street below give a warm radiant glow to this bizarrely memorable Czech surrealist film.

Related Post: ‘Sightseers’, Prince Charles Cinema, London

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Just after midday I get to Actor’s Studio cinema via the lobby of the Floris Arlequin Grand Place Hotel.

The box office lights are on, but the phone is ringing unanswered.

When I try opening the door to the cinema, it is locked.

So I abandon my attempt to buy a ticket in advance for this afternoon’s 3 p.m. screening of Dany Boon’s Nothing to Declare, titled Rien à Déclarer in the film’s original French language.

To console myself, I make the two-minute walk from the cinema to La Maison de Toone at Impasse Shuddeveld to grab a beer or two.

I love the approach to Toone along a narrow cobbled medieval alley that oozes historical atmosphere.

A friendly brown cat inside Toone checks me out and miaouws as I peruse the beer list by the entrance.

The cat then comes and sits next to me on my wooden bench while I drink a refreshing Ciney Blonde beer.

I admire the fabulous interior of old wooden ceiling beams, brick walls and tiled floor.

Wonderful marionettes hang from the ceiling.

A puppet knight on a horse stands on a shelf to my right, just above the fireplace.

Faded posters from past puppet theatre performances adorn the walls. These are indications of Toone’s dual life as a puppet theatre and as a bar. When you enter the place, you go left for the puppet theatre and right for the ‘estaminet’ or bar.

A cool breeze wafts in through the open door.

It is remarkably quiet and peaceful in here, given that Toone is only five minutes walk from tourist-thronged Grand Place.

The Ciney Blonde which I am finishing off has a pleasing fruitiness without being overly sweet. It’s very refreshing.

The second beer I have here is completely different, and more of a challenge to the novice palette. It is Oud Beersel, a Flemish Brabant gueuze served in a green wine-shaped bottle.

I pour it too quickly and get a glass full of foam that takes a couple of minutes to subside.

I’m in no hurry so I don’t mind the wait.

When I finally glug it down I am struck by this drink’s tangy sharpness and similarity to wine rather than beer.

Oud Beersel has a strong distinctive flavour and a mouthfeel very different to any beer I have had before.

With this my first gueuze I get the feeling I have just unlocked the door to a parallel beer universe.

“C’est un lieu bien calme”, comments a passing French tourist who peers in to Toone but doesn’t enter.

He is right, it is a peaceful spot right now.

I have the estaminet to myself, apart from the cat who is sitting here happily and occasionally getting up for a leisurely wander round the premises.

After finishing the Oud Beersel, I leave Toone and go for a random pre-film wander.

You have got to admire Brussels’ offbeat sense of humour.

Not only does the city have as its best known icon a statue that urinates at you, in the shape of the Manneken Pis, it also has a drinking fountain on Rue de la Tête d’Or in which a sculpted figure leans forward with his arms crossed and spews water from his mouth like he’s casually throwing up after a night of heavy drinking.

I drag myself away from this bizarre vomiting statue and head towards Boulevard Anspach, where I hear some great salsa sounds emanating from El Metteko restaurant.

I’ll come here for a meal some other time.

I’m not hungry at the moment so I wander on towards Place Saint-Géry, where a very short stretch of the Senne river is visible.

The water is very clear. Coins are clearly visible on the riverbed.

Saint-Géry used to be an island, until the Senne was built over and covered during the second half of the nineteenth century.

Someone has stuck an ‘Obama 08’ poster in a nearby apartment window.

Returning back across Boulevard Anspach, I come across well known purveyor of French fries Friterie Tabora.

Tabora is one of a series of establishments clamped along the base of Église Saint Nicolas like a strip of barnacles on a ship’s hull.

For some reason I feel drawn towards Rue de la Bourse, which is how I happen upon The Collector Record Gallery.

This is a great record store.

It stocks vinyl mainly but also a good selection of Miles Davis on cd from which I buy Early Miles Vol 1, a collection of radio broadcast sessions from the period 1946 to 1953.

The recording quality is rough and almost unlistenable at points, but the music is fantastic.

Highlights include ‘Webb’s Delight’, ‘Farewell Blues’, ‘Focus’, the gorgeous intimate ‘That Old Black Magic’, and Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker’s ‘Anthropology’. Miles Davis’ trumpet soloing is very seductive.

The film is due to start shortly so I head from the record store back to Actor’s Studio cinema for ‘Nothing to Declare’, a light-hearted comedy set in the 1990s when the borders between many European countries were being opened up.

‘Nothing to Declare’ has a great opening scene. Benoît Poelvoorde as the francophobe Belgian customs officer Ruben Vandevoorde is shown a newspaper headline breaking the news that the customs post at which he works on the French/Belgian border is going to be closed as part of the European Union’s policy to reduce barriers to trade and travel within Europe.

Vandevoorde lets out a lung-bursting scream that goes on for several seconds.

He drops to his knees and vainly implores the heavens to say it isn’t so.

The camera pulls back faster and faster, with Vandevoorde becoming just a speck on the ground and then not even that as the screen fills with a map of Europe and then the earth spinning aimlessly in an indifferent universe.

Visually, this is a brilliantly effective way of putting the closure of the customs post into a much broader human and cosmic context.

The customs post earmarked for closure is located in a drab little border area, but the characters that people the place give it life and colour.

Benoît Poelvoorde and Dany Boon, the two lead actors, play off each other superbly.

Their initial mutual dislike evolves into a friendship of sorts that eventually just about overcomes the entrenched prejudiced mindset of the francophobe Belgian officer.

The rapport between Poelvoorde and Boon peaks during their interrogation of a hapless drug courier who tries to deny any knowledge of the packets of cocaine lodged in his own rectal cavity.

Boon and Poelvoorde’s characters take great delight in mocking the criminal’s feeble pleas of innocence, and their jokey repartee sparkles like they are a well-honed comedy duo.

The supporting cast generally don’t receive much characterization, functioning simply as comic props for the story.

One exception is Julie Bernard as the sister of Belgian officer Vandevoorde.

She falls in love with Dany Boon’s French officer, Mathias Ducatel. Julie Bernard gives a good performance as an open-minded individual who has the misfortune of being born into a xenophobic family.

Dany Boon is a great talent. Not only does he write and direct this film, he also does a great job acting alongside the equally good Benoît Poelvoorde.

Boon has a very expressive face and though he normally uses it to comic effect, he can also convincingly convey emotions of anger and frustration.

‘Nothing to Declare’ is a wonderful film, heartwarming without being cloying or naïve.

I laugh out loud several times during the film, as do the rest of the audience.

One particularly funny scene is the one where Dany Boon is down on one knee in a restaurant proposing to Julie Bernard when he realizes to his horror that everyone in the restaurant is watching him, so he quickly pretends that he is just tying his shoelace.

The comic potential of the crappy car that has been assigned to the joint Franco-Belgian police operation is fully realized.

Another funny scene that has the whole audience laughing is the one where Boon and Poelvoorde have parked their car at the side of a country road.

Both of them stick out their arms to signal to an oncoming driver that he should stop, but the driver assumes that they are just making a gesture of greeting so he returns the gesture and blissfully drives on, leaving Boon and Poelvoorde dumbstruck at the driver’s misunderstanding of their ‘stop’ command.

After watching ‘Nothing to Declare’, I quaff my final beer of the day, a Moinette Blond.

It’s a strong ale, 8.5% alcohol by volume, from Brasserie Dupont in the Walloon municipality of Leuze-en-Hainaut in the south of Belgium.

There is a satisfying pop as the cork comes out the bottle. The smell is almost smoky. It’s a delicious blond ale which goes down very nicely.

Related Post: ‘City Lights’, Pathé Tuschinski, Amsterdam

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Typical early September weather today.

Menacing clouds and light rain one minute, clear blue skies and sunshine the next.

When the sun comes out it is wonderful to be walking here in the breeze along Singel and Herengracht canals.

The bright September sun is sparkling on the water.

The leaves on the trees are a luminous late summer green.

There aren’t many tourists around on this laidback Monday morning.

Most of the people out and about seem to be locals.

One of them sits with a coffee and a cigarette on the steps leading up to her canal-side office.

On the water, coots, ducks and gulls float around contentedly, too early in the day for territorial squawking.

The elegant canal-side buildings lurch and lean at their crazy drunken angles.

My destination is the Van Gogh Museum, so I walk along Herengracht as far as Leidsegracht and saunter along Leidsegracht for a few minutes until I reach Lijnbaansgracht.

This short stretch of Leidsegracht is one of the most charming parts of Amsterdam’s canal network.

Just slightly off the beaten track, it is quiet and settled, not making any attempt to woo passers-by. It exudes understated civic pride. Here and there it has strikingly beautiful architecture that is worth pausing to admire.

I am soon at the Paulus Potterstraat entrance to the Van Gogh Museum.

Before coming here I had wondered whether it was worth buying my entry ticket to the museum online in advance, as that is recommended as the way to avoid lengthy queues to get in.

The only reason I hesitated to buy the ticket this way was that on a recent visit to Schiphol airport to catch a flight somewhere, I had forgotten to check in online the day before but when I got to the airport, for dropping off bags there was a queue of people who had checked in online whereas I, who hadn’t done so, was able to drop off my bags immediately without queueing.

I thought something similar might happen at the Van Gogh Museum – if everyone buys their supposed queue-beating ticket online in advance, then there will be a long queue of such people whereas those who just show up on the day to buy a ticket at the front desk might get in quicker.

But I decided anyway to buy my Van Gogh Museum ticket online.

As it turns out, I get in straightaway as there is no one at all in the advance purchase queue.

The queue for walk-ups is very short and seems to be moving quite steadily.

This is a promising start to the visit; none of the horrendous queues that one is always being warned about.

The Van Gogh Museum is in two parts: the main building designed by Dutch architect Gerrit Rietveld, and the exhibition wing designed by Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa.

The two buildings are joined by an underground passage.

From the outside, near the Paulus Potterstraat entrance, the main building looks underwhelming; a disappointing, unattractive grey box.

But inside, it is wonderful. It is spacious and filled with light. The geometric forms used by Rietveld give the interior of the main building an edgy modern feel that complements rather than contradicts the nineteenth-century art that it contains.

In the permanent exhibition there are numerous superb paintings by van Gogh to feast your eyes upon.

I like the brooding melancholy of ‘In the Café: Agostina Segatori in Le Tambourin’ (1887), in which the painter depicts his ex-lover sitting at an elegant tambourine-shaped table, gazing wistfully into the middle distance; the deep, vibrant, life-affirming colours of ‘The Yellow House’ (1888), where the yellow of the house contrasts vividly with the brilliant blue sky; and the idyllic southern French landscape of ‘The Harvest’ (1888).

After enjoying the permanent collection, I wander through to the Exhibition Wing to check out the current exhibition, ‘Van Gogh in Antwerp and Paris: New Perspectives’.

The Paris segment of the exhibition shows how van Gogh’s immersion in the Parisian art scene, and in the many and varied delights of late nineteenth-century Montmartre, contributed to the artist’s evolution from realist painter of rural scenes into the modernist visionary that has assured him his artistic immortality.

The Montmartre pictures are wonderful: the surprising turquoise tones of ‘Terrace and Observation Deck at the Blute-Fin Mill, Montmartre’ (1887); the bleak muddiness of ‘The Radet Mill, on the Corner of rue Lepic and rue Girardon’ (1900); and what for me is the highlight of the exhibition, the fresh and celebratory take on daily life that is ‘Interior of the Restaurant du Chalet’ (1887), in which the foreground tables and chairs are unoccupied, awaiting diners, whilst in the background the tables are beginning to fill up with the day’s customers. A bright, light palette gives this picture its invigorating quality.

Before leaving the museum I drop into the museum shop, where two books vie for my attention.

The first is Vincent van Gogh Paintings 2: Antwerp & Paris by Ella Hendriks and Louis van Tilborgh. But that book is a 616-page doorstopper. It looks like it would need a forklift truck to prise it up off the shelf. And it comes with a price tag of equal heft – 145 euros, although it can be had for the only slightly less giddy price of 99.50 euros during the exhibition.

So I opt instead for the other book that catches my eye, Van Gogh and Montmartre by Nienke Bakker, which weighs in at a much more manageable 84 pages, for the princely sum of ten euros.

Walking around art museums always leaves me hungry and thirsty, so after this morning’s van Goghing I head off for lunch at Eetcafé ‘t Pakhuis, an unpretentious down-to-earth place on Voetboogstraat.

Service in this restaurant is friendly and efficient, but the lighting level is very low; I decide to switch tables so that I am not totally enveloped in the ambient gloom.

The background music, though, is bright and cheery Cuban salsa with a dash of Juan Luis Guerra merengue, which lightens the atmosphere.

Half-metre high figurines of Laurel and Hardy perch quirkily on the ceiling beams in the restaurant section.

In a Dutch restaurant, bar or café you have got to be ready to order a drink the instant your rear end makes contact with your chair.

Or sometimes even quicker than that: on occasion, I have been asked my order while still taking off my jacket before sitting down.

The technique I have adopted is to order some still water in this initial encounter with the waiter, because if you ask for a couple of minutes to think about your order then you won’t see the waiter again for half an hour.

Dutch waiters have a disturbing habit of vanishing, sometimes permanently, if you don’t give them an order immediately.

Another vaguely disconcerting trait among Dutch waiters is that they often give a blank look when asked a challenging question, like “What beers have you got?”

Rarely has this staple question of mine been satisfactorily answered.

You would think it would be an easy question to answer, but there are two different reactions to it: one is for a look of confusion to cloak the waiter’s face; the other is for the waiter to recite “Err…Heineken, err…Amstel, Duvel…”, a litany of drab mainstream brands that may in fact be supplemented on the establishment’s beer list by other more interesting beers which the waiter just can’t be bothered to tell you about.

So the “Some still water, please” response buys time to peruse the menu, and it also gives a far greater likelihood of the waiter returning within the next hour than if you simply ask for a couple of minutes to think about what you want.

But here at ‘t Pakhuis today the service is fine.

Having been here before, I already know what I am going to order – La Chouffe Blonde, which is served in a nice hourglass shaped glass. This delicious Belgian beer accompanies a tasty tomato soup which comes in a deep, seemingly bottomless bowl, and a very satisfying chicken satay with salad and chips.

From ‘t Pakhuis I make the short walk to Cinecenter on Lijnbaansgracht where director Lars von Trier’s ‘Melancholia’ is showing at 3.30 p.m in Screen 1.

I didn’t much like the trailer for Melancholia, but director von Trier’s dark twisted masterpiece ‘Forbrydelsens Element’ (The Element of Crime) which I saw years ago in Lisbon was amazing, so I decide to give Melancholia a chance.

From its opening seconds, ‘Melancholia’ is enthralling.

Visually, the beginning and end scenes of this film are stunning.

What comes in between may not be as spectacular, but it is just as captivating.

A moody twilight feel pervades ‘Melancholia’, a sustained brooding atmosphere both ethereal and brusquely present.

Some crabby humour and bitchiness amongst the assembled wedding party guests adds a humane dimension to a tale that may appear bleakly pessimistic but which in fact asserts the beauty and grandeur of life.

A superb cast gels well in this film: Charlotte Gainsbourg, Kiefer Sutherland, John Hurt, Charlotte Rampling, and Stellan and Alexander Skarsgård, are all excellent.

But it is Kirsten Dunst as Justine who most intensely embodies the downbeat lyricism of ‘Melancholia’.

Justine’s blend of sensuality and depression haunts me long after the film finishes.

Related Post: ‘Nocturnal Animals’, Curzon Chelsea, London

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Oude Kerk stands impassive and severe, a hulking spiritual presence unperturbed by the Red Light District activities going on in its vicinity.

I have often walked past Oude Kerk but never gone in before. This is my first visit, and this great old church turns out to be well worth a visit.

When I enter, I’m struck first by the warm golden tone of the wonderful vaulted wooden ceiling. The paintings on it are faded but still visible.

The other most eye-catching feature is the huge baroque organ away to the left as you come in. This organ, built in 1724-26, is considered to be the finest of its kind in the Netherlands.

After admiring it for a few moments, I wander along to the other end of this impressively vast church. There I come across some highly entertaining wooden carvings in the choir stall misericords.

These choir stall carvings are strange and funny: a small sparrow-like bird with outstretched wings and a surreally incongruous human head, the head of a distinguished-looking gentleman; an owl’s body with the head of a disgruntled semi-human creature; a wonderfully carved man in hat and coat, walking away from a half-opened door, the sense of perspective giving this carving a dynamic liveliness; and a bizarre face with two noses, three eyes, and a huge mouth.

These carvings are quite entrancing and I linger over them for a few minutes before ambling round the rest of the church, taking in some beautiful stained glass windows and enjoying the aura of calm reflection.

My spiritual reverie is abruptly broken when three Scottish tourists walk past me at the edge of the choir stall. One of them says to the others,

“We had a big lunch so just some toast and cheese will do me.”

Overhearing this mundane snippet brings me back down to earth with a bump.

I head out the church and back to the earthly delights of central Amsterdam.

Café Schiller on Rembrandtplein is my next port of call.

The exterior of Café Schiller is unfortunately overwhelmed by the garishness of the coffee shop next door.

But inside, Café Schiller is a beautifully preserved art deco delight with clean uncluttered lines and elegant original fittings.

I go up to the bar and order a Natte draft beer, a delicious ‘dubbel’ from Amsterdam’s Brouwerij ‘t IJ.

I sit savouring this great beer at a table near the entrance, glancing across to the far wall where there stands a wonderful exotic statue with four flower-like lampshades throwing soft illumination over the seating and table below it.

After finishing my beer, I leave the atmospheric art deco environment of Café Schiller and cross back over to the other side of Rembrandtplein. Here I buy a medium-sized bag of fries from a snack bar and wolf them down as I walk along quiet untouristed Nieuwe Herengracht.

Directly underneath the Nieuwe Herengracht street sign, someone has stuck a ‘Republiek Amsterdam’ sticker.

It’s a manifestation of the civic pride that Amsterdammers have in their city being a state unto itself; a city more radical and cosmopolitan than its politically dull, conservative hinterland.

Next stop is Café Scharrebier on Rapenburgerplein.

Scharrebier is an Amsterdamse bruin café, a traditional, down-to-earth Amsterdam bar.

I sit outside at one of the streetside tables. Several locals are already sitting out here, enjoying the late afternoon sun on this early October day.

Westmalle Tripel is my tipple here, a reliably strong and tasty Trappist beer.

Off to the right, about a hundred yards away, Likeurstokerij De Druif looks well worth a visit some other time. It’s a handsome three-storey red-brick building with a very enticing bar interior.

From my bag I pull out a copy of Iain Banks’ book Raw Spirit, a wonderful account of his travels around the whisky distilleries of Scotland.

Raw Spirit is a great title, reflecting not only the book’s subject matter but also the author as a person.

I sit reading a few pages as the early evening sun begins to sink lower in the Amsterdam sky. The book’s celebration of whisky gives me the urge to make a beeline to Schiphol to jump on the first plane that will take me to a Scottish airport from where I could make my way to Islay, an island blessed with several outstanding distilleries.

On the back cover of the book there is a photo of Iain Banks standing on some seaweed-covered rocks by the sea shore. He is happily clutching a glass of single malt whisky. The background sky is a perfect blue.

The photo captures his aura of wry amusement, whilst also hinting at the hidden depths that give his novels their enduring appeal.

I still find it hard to believe that Iain Banks died earlier this year, from an untreatable illness. I am thankful that I managed to attend two of his readings in the past few years.

One was in Stirling, the other in Edinburgh. In person at those readings he was very funny, exuding a mischievous schoolboy glee as he delivered incisive observations on literature, politics, and Scotland. His passing has left a huge void in the literary world, in Scotland and beyond.

The sun has now sunk behind the Rapenburgerplein buildings.

The temperature has dropped sharply.

It’s too chilly to continue sitting outside so I pay the bill, pack the Raw Spirit book away in my bag and stroll over to nearby 16cc on Kadijksplein for the showing of tonight’s film, Greetings from Tim Buckley.

16cc is a terrific café in which the man behind it, entrepreneur Pim Hermeling, combines his passion for contemporary art, arthouse film, and fine wine.

I go in about twenty minutes before ‘Greetings from Tim Buckley’ is due to start and order a beer at the bar.

I drink it perched on a stool by the one of the walls and admire the interesting artwork.

There is a good atmosphere in here.

Ceiling beams and wood panel walls, sympathetic low lighting, and candles on tables.

I take my unfinished glass of beer with me into the screening room, which is accessed down a set of stairs near the bar.

What a cosy intimate screening room this is.

There are just three rows of seats.

As I seem to be the only person here to see the film tonight, I choose one of the centre seats in the middle row.

Usually it feels a bit creepy being the only person in an auditorium, but here it’s not so bad because the space has got such a homely feel.

The friendly barmaid from upstairs comes down to start the film. I say to her,

“It feels a bit weird being the only person here.”

“You’re lucky – you’ve got a private screening!”, she replies with a laugh. “Do you like the music of Tim Buckley?”

“Yes”, I reply.

“Enjoy the film”, she says as she retreats and shuts the door behind her, leaving me in splendid solitude to enjoy what turns out to be a superb film.

‘Greetings from Tim Buckley’ is brilliant from start to finish. Director Daniel Algrant has turned out a gem here.

The film makers clearly have a real love for music and musicians.

The film is not simply a homage to Tim and Jeff Buckley, it’s also a celebration of songwriting, live performances, and the people behind the scenes without whose efforts there would be no live music for audiences to enjoy.

The cinematography by Andrij Parekh is extremely accomplished and contributes hugely to the success of the film.

Every scene is beautifully lit and composed, across a range of different settings: the church where the concert takes place, Tim (Ben Rosenfield) and his lover in the desert, Jeff (Penn Badgley) and Allie (Imogen Poots) travelling by train to the town where his father used to live and wandering around there, having a drink in a local bar.

The acting is great, particularly by the two leads, Penn Badgley and Imogen Poots.

Badgley is perfect as the talented singer-songwriter reluctantly dragooned into the tribute concert to the father he never really knew.

Imogen Poots is excellent too as Allie, one of the concert organizers, finely blending equal measures of wariness and affection towards the unpredictable and temperamental Jeff.

The romance between Jeff and Allie is beautifully handled in a way that is subtle, moving, and understated.

Usually I try to make my notes on a film as soon as possible after seeing it.

But ‘Greetings from Tim Buckley’ is so enchanting that after the film ends I just bask in its warm glow and savour the good feelings that it has created, and I put off scribbling my notes till a couple of days later.

Related Post: ‘Joan Baez: I Am a Noise’, Cinéma Aventure, Brussels

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A La Mort Subite on Rue Montagne aux Herbes Potagères is a Brussels institution, a wonderful café brasserie that retains its original 1928 decor.

Its glorious interior is a little faded in a warm, lived-in way.

The place has a marble floor, high ceiling, long wooden tables, sturdy old radiators, and elegantly arched mirrors along the light yellow walls.

The waiting staff are good-humoured and friendly, unlike in some other Brussels establishments, and they patrol the premises attentively, smartly turned out in white shirts and black waistcoats.

When I drop in to A La Mort Subite just after midday for a salad and a couple of beers, no background music is playing, which in this case is a good thing.

Some venues don’t need music to create an atmosphere. This is one such place.

The volume of ambient noise gradually rises as more people turn up and there is soon a contented hum from the day’s customers. Maybe they have background music playing later in the day but for this laidback Sunday lunchtime none is needed.

I wash down my salad with beer of the month Arend Tripel from Brouwerij de Ryck, a family-run brewery located between Ghent and Brussels.

Described on the menu as a gold-blond top fermented beer, the Arend Tripel is very good. It’s refreshing, with a strong deep flavour.

After the Arend Tripel I move on to another Belgian blond beer, Hopus Blond from Brasserie Lefebvre.

This beer has a very nice dry bitterness.

It is served in a spectacular vase-shaped glass that is big enough to house a bunch of flowers.

Well fuelled by these terrific beers, I leave A La Mort Subite and head in the direction of the Belgian Comic Strip Center at Rue des Sables 20, just a few minutes walk away.

Before I get there I wonder if it will be full of Big Bang Theory geeks.

But it isn’t crawling with Sheldons at all.

In fact, it has attracted a very diverse range of visitors today: students, parents with young kids, some arty types, a few couples, all ages represented.

Rather than the comics, it is the building that houses them that has lured me here.

The Belgian Comic Strip Center occupies a superb 1906 art nouveau building designed by architect Victor Horta.

The elegance and splendour hit you straightaway when you enter.

There is a curved stained glass ceiling, tiny floor tiles arranged in flowing interlocking circles, and an elegant lamp post standing surprisingly in the middle of the ground floor, anchoring the whole scene.

As I wander around this wonderful interior, I see that even ironwork which would conventionally be merely functional, such as the buttress supports by the street-facing first floor window, is executed in intricate and aesthetically pleasing fluid curves.

Belgium has produced an extraordinary number of successful comic strip heroes, such as Spirou, Lucky Luke, Bob and Bobette, and Tintin, amongst many others, and their spirit suffuses this building.

Although the building holds my attention more than the comics, one exhibit is particularly engaging: a brilliant two-page comic strip on the process of creating a comic strip, ‘Le coloriste et le lettreur vus par André Geerts’. The visual imagination of this exhibit brings to life the creative process far more effectively than just the written word could.

Opposite the Belgian Comic Strip Center stands the Fondation Marc Sleen, housed in an old newspaper building with an attractive tiled facade that still carries traces of its newspaper origins.

Above the door entrance there is elegant lettering for ‘Abonnements’, ‘Publicité’ and ‘Photogrammes’, whilst higher up there is a sign for La Presse Socialiste Cooperative.

It looks well worth a visit some other occasion, but today’s film time is approaching so I make my way uphill towards Cinemathek on Rue Baron Horta for the 4 p.m. showing of director Frank Borzage’s 1939 film Disputed Passage.

This film is part of a Frank Borzage retrospective.

Borzage is reckoned by some to be an underrated director, less widely revered than his better known contemporaries Howard Hawks, King Vidor and John Ford.

Borzage’s most popular film is probably his 1932 version of Ernest Hemingway’s ‘A Farewell To Arms’, starring Gary Cooper and Helen Hayes.

In ‘Disputed Passage’ I can see why Borzage is regarded highly enough to be the subject of a retrospective such as the one currently running here at Cinemathek in Brussels.

His shots are beautifully composed and he gets the pacing of the action just right, driving the story forward with a light touch underpinned by great authority.

‘Disputed Passage’ is showing in Salle Plateau, a tiny auditorium comprising just four steeply sloped rows of seats, twenty-nine seats in total.

This auditorium is a black box. The walls are black, the ceiling is black, the carpet is black and the piano down on the stage is, guess what, black.

But rather than being bleakly oppressive, the auditorium has a chic, arty aura.

Before the film begins there is no background music, no advertisements, no trailers.

As almost everyone in the audience has come here on their own, nobody is speaking.

We are all sitting in total silence, broken only by the sound of me turning the pages of my Cinematek programme.

It is amazing how loud a turning page can sound in the midst of utter silence.

The opening credits show Lloyd C. Douglas, author of the Disputed Passage novel upon which the film is based, writing a letter of thanks to Paramount Pictures for making a film that is so faithful to the book.

It makes me wonder if nowadays authors have to sign some kind of non-disclosure agreement for movie adaptations of their books, to prevent authors from denigrating a film if they believe it is a poor rendition of their original work.

It wouldn’t help a film’s promotional campaign if the author gave interviews telling everyone that the film version of his or her book stinks.

But Lloyd C. Douglas was clearly happy to endorse Frank Borzage’s film of the Disputed Passage book, and I can understand his satisfaction with the film version as it really is quite captivating.

The main theme of ‘Disputed Passage’ is the same as in ‘The Red Shoes’, namely the need imposed by a charismatic despot figure for one of the heroes to choose between total dedication to their vocation or sacrificing their career to be with the one that they love.

In ‘The Red Shoes’ the despot was Anton Walbrook in the role of Boris Lermontov, whilst in ‘Disputed Passage’ the equivalent role is played by Akim Tamiroff as Dr Forster.

Tamiroff gives a terrific performance as the tyrannical Dr Forster, starting with a superbly delivered derogatory speech to the newly enrolled medical students who have gathered to observe his anatomy class.

There might not have been any Sheldon lookalikes at the Belgian Comic Strip Center earlier today, but Tamiroff’s opening gambit to his students is very similar to Sheldon’s habitual condescension to what he considers to be the lesser mortals with inferior minds that attend his university lectures.

Akim Tamiroff was trained by Stanislavsky at the Moscow Art Theatre School.

This illustrious background may explain Tamiroff’s seemingly effortless ability to command an audience’s attention. He doesn’t overact or use gimmicky affectations.

He just projects so well that you hang on his every word.

John Howard and Dorothy Lamour are the other two main members of the cast.

John Howard is very good as John Beaven, blending cool professional detachment with a late dawning realization that in his relentless pursuit of perfection in his work, he has sacrificed too much.

Dorothy Lamour in her role radiates old-style Hollywood glamour. There is a wryness to Lamour’s phrasing that prevents her lines from degenerating into faux naïf soppiness.

In a small supporting role, Judith Barrett gives a memorable performance as Winifred Bane, the only female student in the medical class.

Winifred stands up to Dr Forster’s patronizing comments, but she is less successful in her efforts to tempt the workaholic Beaven to take a break from his studies and come out and party with her.

The scene between Beaven and Bane is played perfectly. Judith Barrett is funny and vivacious and as I’m watching that scene I feel like yelling to the Beaven character, “What are you waiting for, you fool? Go with her!”

The final scene of ‘Disputed Passage’ is done quite subtly. It is simple and strong, and doesn’t resort to exaggerated melodrama.

Today’s film print is jumpy, which makes watching the film a bit of an effort on the eyes.

But that doesn’t detract from the pleasure of seeing such a good film projected in a cinema to an appreciative audience, as it was intended to be.

Related Post: ‘One Summer of Happiness’, Cinemathek Brussels

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A passing thunderstorm wakes me just before 5 a.m.

Heavy rain batters against my bedroom window.

There are occasional flashes of lightning that I can sense through my still-closed eyes, and the long drawn out rumble of thunder.

By the time I leave the apartment a couple of hours later the storm has passed and a pale blue sky is emerging from behind the clouds.

The reason I’m dragging myself out of bed so early this Sunday morning is to catch the 10.30 a.m. showing of Charlie Chaplin’s 1931 film City Lights at Pathé Tuschinski, a cinema which is widely considered to be the most beautiful in Amsterdam.

Avoiding the tourist tackiness of Damrak, I have to scurry quickly along Oudezijds Voorburgwal, the oldest canal in Amsterdam, to make sure that I can find the cinema in time for the start of the film.

As I round the corner into Reguliersbreestraat and see Tuschinski cinema up ahead, it is disappointing to see that the much admired facade is obscured by scaffolding and tarpaulin covers.

But my disappointment evaporates as soon as I enter the cinema.

Its interior is quite magical.

Art deco reds and golds abound in the foyer areas, with plush Moroccan carpet underfoot and paintings of exotic birds on the walls.

“C’est magnifique”, a French-speaking cyclist says about the cinema to her companions as they cycle past the cinema entrance while I am going in.

Now that I am inside the cinema, I have to agree with her – this cinema truly is magnificent.

Normally I would seize the opportunity to grab a beer from the cinema bar and take it in to the auditorium with me.

As pointed out by Vincent (John Travolta) to Jules (Samuel L. Jackson) in Quentin Tarantino’s ‘Pulp Fiction’, being allowed to bring a beer into a movie showing is one of the many good things about Amsterdam.

But at 10.15 a.m. it’s a tad early in the day to face a beer.

Inside the historic main auditorium, the ‘Groote Zaal’, I feel like an extra in a Cecil B. DeMille production, such is the extravagance of the decor and architecture.

I could sit here for half an hour marvelling at the surroundings and then leave without even seeing the film and I would still have got my money’s worth.

It is the most amazing cinema auditorium I have ever been in.

I look upwards and admire the extraordinary art deco ceiling light, just before the screen curtains open at a snail’s pace, slower than I have seen at other cinemas.

This teasingly slow unveiling of the screen heightens the sense of anticipation before the film starts.

No trailers or adverts are shown before this morning’s film.

We plunge straight into ‘City Lights’.

Charlie Chaplin gets my vote as the greatest genius in the history of cinema, and ‘City Lights’ is one of his several masterpieces.

In the opening scene Chaplin’s Tramp character is fast asleep, high up on a statue that unknown to him is being inaugurated by some civic bigwigs.

This funny scene very effectively deflates the pomposity of society’s upper echelons. The speakers’ voices are rendered as ridiculous squeaks, reflecting the inane quality of most official speeches by ‘important’ people.

I have sat through such speeches myself at various conferences, where an allegedly important figure opens proceedings with a series of platitudes (invariably written by some underling) and then leaves without listening to any of the other speakers. Chaplin skewers this phenomenon very nicely.

‘City Lights’ has a perfect fusion of music and action, slapstick and pathos.

The scene where The Tramp meets the blind flower-seller (Virginia Cherrill) for the first time flows beautifully. It is poignant for the most part then funny at the end.

Perfectionist that he was, Chaplin – who wrote and directed the film as well as composing the music for it – insisted on endless takes of the girl holding out the flower before he was satisfied.

All the set pieces are done superbly.

The scene that gets the biggest laughs from today’s audience is the boxing fight, in which The Tramp hides from his opponent behind the referee, darting out now and again to land a quick punch on his exasperated opponent.

Even in quieter, less dramatic scenes, Chaplin’s facial expressions keep your attention riveted.

The supporting cast of Florence Lee, Harry Myers, Al Ernest Garcia and Hank Mann are all excellent too.

After ‘City Lights’ finishes, I head out of the cinema in the direction of nearby Rembrandtplein, which is looking tatty right now.

Grassy areas have been dug up but nothing done with them.

I walk on.

The sound of James Taylor singing ‘You’ve Got A Friend’ drifts out from the open window of an apartment on Amstelstraat, a perfect song for this laidback Sunday.

De Sluyswacht café, leaning dramatically to one side due to lack of underlying support, is unfortunately closed so I am beer-deprived as I step into the Rembrandt House Museum on the other side of Jodenbreestraat from De Sluyswacht.

The Rembrandt House Museum is a very impressive building, although not very well lit.

For many of the exhibits, I have to try viewing them from various angles to avoid the glare caused by lighting hitting the canvas.

But it’s fun to clamber up the narrow winding staircases from one floor of the house to the next.

For a brief moment I have to myself the room that Rembrandt used as his studio.

Other visitors soon appear, but for a moment I am able to visualize Rembrandt there painting. This room is north-facing, which apparently provided the right kind of consistent light for his work.

Another interesting part of the house is the anteroom in which Rembrandt conducted the business of selling his own work and the work of other artists.

Rembrandt used to welcome buyers to this room with a glass of chilled wine, which was probably a very effective sales technique.

In his lifetime Rembrandt painted dozens of self-portraits.

One of these, titled ‘Self-portrait with open mouth’ (1630), is particularly striking for its gormless facial expression. The original Dutch title is ‘Zelfportret met verbaasde blik’, which translates as ‘Self-portrait with surprised look’ rather than the less flattering official translation of ‘Self-portrait with open mouth’.

The shop in the Rembrandt House Museum is well stocked but so cramped that even with only half a dozen visitors in it, I cannot physically get to the book that I was intending to buy.

So I give up on that purchase and head back outside again where it is now a fresh and sunny Sunday afternoon.

I find a bench overlooking a nearby canal and sit for a while reading Amsterdam Stories, a collection of short stories written by Jan Hendrik Frederik Grönloh under the pseudonym ‘Nescio’.

His writing has a wry melancholy feel that is quite addictive.

Grönloh wrote under an assumed name because it could have threatened his reputation as a serious businessman if it became known that he was the author of these short stories.

The stories have nothing scandalous or shocking about them; their social satire seems gentle by today’s standards.

It’s not the content that could have been damaging for Grönloh, simply the fact that in the conservative milieu of early twentieth-century Dutch business, the writing of fiction would have been considered a frivolous activity.

‘Nescio’ means ‘I don’t know’, which immediately gives an insight into the author’s self-deprecating style.

He was not a prolific writer, but the little that he did write has become established as some of the most highly regarded writing in Dutch literature.

In Amsterdam Stories some of his best known short stories appear in an English translation by Damion Searls, including ‘Young Titans’, ‘Out Along the IJ’, ‘The Writing on the Wall’, and probably Nescio’s most famous story, ‘The Freeloader’.

Although it is titled Amsterdam Stories, the stories are not entirely limited to Amsterdam.

Some of the stories feature scenes set in other parts of the Netherlands, including rural areas as well as towns and cities. In ‘The Freeloader’, for example, the character Bavink first sees Japi the eponymous freeloader whilst they are both down in the southern coastal province of Zeeland; Bavink is doing some painting, whilst Japi is doing as little as possible, as is his wont.

But Japi the freeloader is not portrayed simply as a hanger-on. He is keenly tuned in, much more so than others are, to the beauty and elemental forces of nature and weather.

Japi is a complex and ultimately tragic character.

‘The Freeloader’ story is a haunting lyrical evocation of him and the group of friends he latches on to.

Related Posts: ‘Nothing to Declare’, Actor’s Studio, Brussels; ‘An Italian Straw Hat’, Barbican Cinema, London

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