My 28mm Lieutenant Colonel Fremantle of the Coldstream Guards....

....who in 1863 toured the Confederate states for 3 months and is seen here in the movie Gettysburg and played by the actor James Lancaster, he viewed most of the battle from a tree, met Longstreet and Lee amongst other Confederacy officers and wrote a very interesting diary of his travels through the south which I have just read and liked, my copy was from 1956 sans dust jacket.

So anyway you're wondering why am I harping on about him, well I wanted to represent Fremantle with a figure for my ACW forces as a possible scenario involving him (his journey) was uneventful and relatively safe until he crossed over in to the Union lines (some townsfolk handed him over to union military forces with a note that said basically in nice words to hang him as a spy).....

....so after much searching through Victorian and Crimean miniature sites I either found nothing or nothing cheap (part of a larger set) but surprisingly Ray found and bought for a £1 a suitable figure at the Foundry stand at Salute in their singles pile (what a nice guy, it's hard to believe some people say such terrible things about him).

I present Lt Col Arthur James Lyon Fremantle (1835-1901), he is described as wearing a grey hunting suit with a cowboy hat at one stage but I could only find this version which is more like the movie version below........

James Lancaster in a scene from the movie..........

....the man himself and you can read more here.

.....and the book is well worth a read!

....and that great girl Tamsin is giving away five lots of goodness and today is the last day so go visit here and the links for the other 4 are there also!

Pimping the Wargaming Girl Day 3........

.....and a bit of humour!

Tamsin the lovely Wargaming Girl is giving away more free stuff over on her blog and this picture made me actually laugh the other day!

I've also won some GZG 15mm tanks from Seb and 5 historical painted minis of my choice from Andrew but the nice man has agreed to 5 non historical minis (I've never painted them as I could not do them justice) and they are on their way to the poor unsuspecting fool (well he's a very talented painter and these minis will end up in my display cabinet).

This picture made my day.......

Best or Worst Movie Remake Blogfest.......

........and Tamsin is giving away free stuff!

Anyway Alex is hosting along with others a blogfest asking what are the best and worst movie remakes ever made, I've done 10 of each (you have to set a limit) that I believe are good candidates but everyone will not agree......maybe and there's one or two that may even be controversial!

I give you my lists........and don't forget Tamsin is giving away free stuff (that must be worth 10 extra Tamsin as I mentioned it twice!).

Hosted by:

Alex J. Cavanaugh  http://alexjcavanaugh.blogspot.com/

Stephen Tremp  http://authorstephentremp.blogspot.com/

Father Dragon Al  http://fatherdragon.blogspot.com/

Livia Peterson  http://leaveittolivia.blogspot.com/

The Best Remakes in no particular order...............

A clever reworking of the original...........

There was nothing wrong with the original Infernal Affairs but this was an epic collaboration of  great performances.......

A remake of Yojimbo by Kurosawa which is in it's own right a masterpiece but this was a relaunch of the western genre and the epic rise of Mr.Eastwood........

Very enjoyable remake of the slightly dated original, great performance from Colin Farrell.........

Good update of the Charles Bronson original with maybe a different ending.........

No question here, far better than the original..........

Not that there's anything wrong with the original L.A Takedown but this is slicker than goose faeces....

Speaking of slicker than Ray's hairdo...........

This is a good reinvention of the slightly dated original.............

Enough said, blots the stain that was Stallone's abomination...........

.....many others out there obviously!

Now the worst remakes...........

James Caan would be horrified, this is shocking.........

Now before we start the ranting I prefer the original, there's nothing really wrong with the new one but the old one had a better story and the slow zombies still get my vote...........

Very foggy fecking remake, the original scared the faeces right out of me...........

The originals ending still annoys the faeces out of me but Stallone should apologise for this....just after he apologises for Judge Dredd

The original is dated but not compared to this................

The original Nikita is leaps ahead of this wooden remake, it also goes under the title The Assassin..........

There is only one Willy Wonka and that's Gene...........

Fecking merde...............

Alec Guinness would be upset, along with Herbert Lom, Peter Sellers etc.........

Shocking descent of a once great actor..............

....and don't forget Tamsin's give away (that's 15 extra Tamsin!)