Christmas Prize Competition 2013

As you see, young Bonaparte is not looking very festive, despite his fancy party hat. What do you think the message in the cracker said? Send it to me as a comment to this post (which I won’t publish), or email it to the address in my Blogger profile. The sender of the entry which I find most amusing will win a couple of Napoleonic DVDs – one is Ridley Scott’s noted “The Duellists”, featuring Harvey Keitel and David Carradine, the other is the more recent “Lines of Wellington”*, starring John Malkovich. These are both Region 2 – please note – so if you are outside Europe please check that they will play on your equipment.

Please get entries to me by 3^rd January – I’ll publish results shortly after that date. If you wish to have a shot but are not interested in the prize, please say so and I’ll pick a separate List B winner – for glory only.

The splendid artwork for this year’s competition was very kindly contributed by a good friend of mine, the award winning cartoonist and caricaturist PaK, whose work appears in Private Eye, Reader's Digest, The Oldie and elsewhere. PaK’s website is very entertaining and you can link to it here – he is always delighted to get commissions for caricatures and custom greeting cards.


* Late Edit: the only version of "Lines of Wellington" which is currently available is not (as advertised by Amazon) in English. I got my copies from Germany and from Austria. The language choices are a little confusing - it is a Portuguese production, and it's very nicely done, if you can handle Malkovich as Wellington; the Portuguese speak Portuguese, the French speak French and the English speak English, and the narration is in Portuguese. Subtitles are available in a choice of Dutch or French - if you don't understand Dutch but have some French, switch on the French subtitles and you'll be fine. It's an enjoyable film, and the dialogue is not complex. Authentic uniforms on the 1st Cacadores...