Cruising the Cut
By Dan Clendenin
Cruising the Cut (2019–)
This isn’t a movie or even a television show, it’s a “video blog” or, as IMDB puts it, a “web series” that you can watch on YouTube, Twitter, or Amazon Prime. I watched it upon the recommendation of a friend, and I’m glad that I did. It’s fun and quirky, partly because of the extremely simple production techniques, and a good example of the expanding range of genres far beyond movies or TV. Back in 2015, the UK television news reporter David Johns was very unhappy with his personal and professional life. It was a dark period of personal crisis. So, he quit the rat race. He chucked his job, sold his house, bought an old school, live-aboard fifty-six foot “narrow boat,” and started chugging along the extensive network of bucolic British canals at two miles an hour. A boater’s term for the canals is a “cut,” because long ago they were literally cut out of the land. He reflects on his former life. He relishes a simple cheese sandwich. He stops at pubs and villages. He navigates the many tunnels and locks. There are the occasional repairs, and in one episode he ads solar panels to his boat. There’s something retro, hypnotic, and relaxing about all this, which partly explains its popularity. Johns calls his 239 videos the “diary of my life afloat. So get the kettle on, and settle down.” See here for his own website:
And his Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/CruisingTheCut?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
Dan Clendenin: dan@journeywithjesus.net
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