Tuesday, January 22, 2008

The Mike Leigh mark-recapture experiment II

The discovery of Neptune. Gauss's calculations of the orbits of asteroids. The 1919 solar eclipse that caught light bending. Science is filled with masterly predictions, triumphantly confirmed.

Add a new one to the list.

In Sept 2006, I wrote, in a quite poorly punctuated post, of my repeat sightings of film director Mike Leigh around London. I suggested that Leigh could be a model for measuring the bumping-into-frquency of any two Londonders. And, based on three sightings, I ended the post with
if you're reading this, Mr Leigh, I'll see you in 2008.

Well, we were in the NFT on Sunday afternoon, queuing up to get tickets for The Lady Vanishes, and there he was, right in front of us in the queue!

Imagine my pleasure. Conclusive proof that any two Londoners (of similar cultural interests/socioeconomic level) can expect to cross paths just under every 18 months. I released the director back into the wild, to go on making his finely observed portraits of lower-middle-class desperation, secure in the knowledge of another encounter in summer 2009.

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