My Top Ten UK releases from 2009 (in no particular order):
Let The Right One In
Up
Fantastic Mr Fox
Gran Torino
The Class
Looking For Eric
Moon
Fish Tank
The White Ribbon
A Serious Man
And Ten Worst:
Valkyrie
Lesbian Vampire Killers
Bronson
Crank 2: High Voltage
Slumdog Millionaire
The Firm
Jennifer’s Body
Push
Friday the 13th
My Bloody Valentine 3-D
Ten that were a let-down:
The Reader
Monsters vs Aliens 3-D
Milk
Che: Part One / Che: Part Two
State of Play
Is Anybody There?
Public Enemies
The Informant!
Watchmen
The Damned United
Ten that were better than I expected:
Defiance
The Young Victoria
Frost/Nixon
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Hush
Harry Brown
Coco Before Chanel
The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus
An Education
Nativity
And Ten I'm Fucked-Off That I Missed:
The Good, The Bad and The Weird
Religulous
In The City of Sylvia
Tony Manero
Anti-Christ
Mesrine: Killer Instinct / Mesrine: Public Enemy Number One
Broken Embraces
500 Days Of Summer
Le Donk & Scor-Zay-Zee
Ip Man
And Ten (or so) That I'm Chuffed That I Missed:
The Spirit
Sisterhood Of The Travelling Pants 2
Bride Wars
Role Models
Sex Drive
Beverly Hills Chihuahua
Seven Pounds
Rachel Getting Married
Underworld 3: Rise Of The Lycans
Revolutionary Road
Bolt (3D)
He’s Just Not That Into You
Punisher War Zone
Hotel For Dogs
Notorious
Pink Panther 2
Confessions Of A Shopaholic
Dance Flick
New In Town
The Unborn
American Teen
Marley And Me
Paul Blart: Mall Cop
Knowing
The Boat That Rocked
Dragonball Evolution
17 Again
Fast And Furious
I Love You Man
City Rats
Observe And Report
Outlander
The Uninvited
X Men Origins: Wolverine
Hannah Montana The Movie
Ghosts Of Girlfriends Past
Angels and Demons
Night At The Museum 2
Awaydays
12 Rounds
Drag Me To Hell
Jonas Bros – The 3D Concert Experience
Terminator: Salvation
Blood: The Last Vampire
Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen
Year One
Ice Age 3
Bruno
Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince
The Proposal
G Force (3D)
Land Of The Lost
The Taking Of Pelham 1 2 3
Adam
G.I. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra
Orphan
The Ugly Truth
Aliens In The Attic
Bandslam
A Perfect Getaway
The Time Traveler’s Wife
The Final Destination (3D)
Funny People
Julie & Julia
Gamer
The Crimson Wing
Fame
The Soloist
Surrogates
Halloween II
Couples Retreat
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant
The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard
Michael Jackson’s This is It
2012
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Law Abiding Citizen
The Box
The Descent: Part 2
Sunday 20 December 2009
2008 Cinema Top Tens
My Top Ten UK cinema releases from 2008 (in no partcular order):
No Country For Old Men
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Son of Rambow
Iron Man
Gomorrah
There Will Be Blood
Waltz With Bashir
Lust, Caution
Happy-Go-Lucky
Persepolis
And Ten Worst:
The Happening
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
RocknRolla
The Good Night
Wanted
Four Christmases
Made of Honour
Pineapple Express
Semi-Pro
Righteous Kill
And Ten I'm Fucked-Off That I Missed:
4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days
Flight of the Red Balloon
I've Loved You So Long
My Blueberry Nights
City of Men
Paranoid Park
Somers Town
Man On Wire
Of Time And The City
The Wave
And Ten (or so) That I'm Chuffed That I Missed:
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
You Don't Mess with the Zohan
Leatherheads
Sex And The City: The Movie
Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay
Yes Man
Fool's Gold
Rambo
Untraceable
The Spiderwick Chronicles
Drillbit Taylor
Donkey Punch
How to Lose Friends & Alienate People
Eagle Eye
Death Race
Jumper
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Hancock
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
I Am Legend
Space Chimps
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Mamma Mia!
Meet The Spartans
The Incredible Hulk
Journey To The Centre Of The Earth 3-D
Alien vs. Predator 2
Get Smart
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
The Waterhorse
27 Dresses
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Step Brothers
The Love Guru
Meet Dave
Mirrors
No Country For Old Men
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Son of Rambow
Iron Man
Gomorrah
There Will Be Blood
Waltz With Bashir
Lust, Caution
Happy-Go-Lucky
Persepolis
And Ten Worst:
The Happening
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
RocknRolla
The Good Night
Wanted
Four Christmases
Made of Honour
Pineapple Express
Semi-Pro
Righteous Kill
And Ten I'm Fucked-Off That I Missed:
4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days
Flight of the Red Balloon
I've Loved You So Long
My Blueberry Nights
City of Men
Paranoid Park
Somers Town
Man On Wire
Of Time And The City
The Wave
And Ten (or so) That I'm Chuffed That I Missed:
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
You Don't Mess with the Zohan
Leatherheads
Sex And The City: The Movie
Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay
Yes Man
Fool's Gold
Rambo
Untraceable
The Spiderwick Chronicles
Drillbit Taylor
Donkey Punch
How to Lose Friends & Alienate People
Eagle Eye
Death Race
Jumper
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Hancock
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
I Am Legend
Space Chimps
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Mamma Mia!
Meet The Spartans
The Incredible Hulk
Journey To The Centre Of The Earth 3-D
Alien vs. Predator 2
Get Smart
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
The Waterhorse
27 Dresses
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Step Brothers
The Love Guru
Meet Dave
Mirrors
The White Ribbon / Das weisse Band - Eine deutsche Kindergeschichte (2009)
The weight of expectation for a Palme d'Or winner is incredible, more so than with an Oscar winner or any other prize. The prestige attached to the Cannes prize is deserved too- would Driving Miss Daisy have won, or Crash, or Titanic, or Rocky, or My Fair Lady? The only undeserving winner I can think of is Richard Lester's 'The Knack... And How To Get It'. Forty-five years ago; I think I can forgive them that.
The reason I mention this is that the only two things I knew about the film going in was that Michael Haneke wrote and directed it and that it was a winner at Cannes. Plenty to live up to then. And it has taken me four days of reflection to collect my thoughts before noting them down.
I’m trying hard to avoid spoilers and only talk thematically and in abstract terms.
The film opens in austere monochrome (it appears almost sepia, however, which simply adds to the authentic-feeling historical context) in the year leading up to the declaration of the misleadingly-titled Great War. The film recounts a series of increasingly gruesome events in a relatively prosperous rural village but is neither whodunnit nor horror story- not in the conventional sense anyway. The film is a discourse on dependency and subservience and the breeding of resentment and of repression of dissent and the repercussions of all of these things and more. That the film is focused upon a group of children who would have been adults as the National Socialist party rose to power in Germany is, of course, pivotal to the theme. It is also crucial to bear in mind that it was made in a time when we have seen atrocities perpetrated by subservient extremists and those atrocities can be seen to have led to repression and victimisation of others in response.
The prosperity of the village I mentioned earlier is dependent upon The Baron- aside from the teenage Nanny, none of the adults are known by name only their title- and his patronage ensures that he is beyond reproach. When a farmer's wife is killed in an accident he dare not speak out against the Baron's Foreman for fear of losing his employment. His impetuous son, against the Farmer's instructions, does so leading to the ostracism of his entire family and his father's eventual suicide. The Baron acknowledges the Farmer's loyalty ("he would rather cut off his tongue than speak in defence of his son") and yet still strikes them down with ruthlessness and malice.
The same strict and unforgiving discipline is imposed by The Lutheran Pastor on his young children- and here I feel is the key relationship between the events of the film and the later events in the Germany of the 1930s. However well-intentioned or otherwise his discipline may be- and, like all else in the movie, this remains ambiguous- it breeds violent malcontent, hatred, victimisation and bullying. The scene in which he browbeats his teenage son and instils him a mortal fear in order to modify his behaviour is startling. The power he wields over the impressionistic teenager is abused in the most cruel of ways. In such circumstances, even the kind hearts of children (the tenderest moment in The White Ribbon occurs when The Pastor is touched deeply by an act of generosity from his youngest child) can and do turn sour.
In such circumstances, evil breeds. Incest, bullying, violence, emotional abuse, animal cruelty and even murder are hushed-up or accepted within the village. The corruption of the collective soul of a group of people has rarely been more starkly depicted. The deliberate, painstaking narrative and beautiful yet harrowing direction allow the Auteur to weave complex and challenging themes around a few key events. It is a masterful film with Haneke eliciting superb performances from a largely juvenile cast to tell a simple tale which builds in depth and meaning relentlessly from first to last.
The first victim of the horrifying events of the film is the Doctor and immediately he is presented as a figure evoking sympathy when he returns to the village midway through the film. Being the village’s Doctor and returning in response to his devoted infant son’s attempt to walk from the village to find him obviously strengthens the impression. But, of course, things in Haneke’s film are far from this simple and the sympathy we feel for the Doctor dissipates as we learn more about his personality, behaviours and lifestyle. Where the Pastor's cruel verbal abuse of his son can at least be understood if not accepted, the Pastor's no less abhorrent treatment of the midwife is less easily explicable. The control he wields within his household is akin to the Baron’s authoritarianism within the community, allowing him to perform the grossest acts without fear of either retribution or even mute defiance. His unchecked autonomy is treated as an invitation to test the limits of his capacity to inflict suffering- is there no limit to the things that these people will allow? And again we are compelled to reflect upon the film in relation to the grotesque human atrocities of the past century and this one.
I spoke earlier about the film being a whodunnit and that remains the case - the audience are told explicitly from the outset that these are the Schoolteacher’s recollections of events which- it transpires- are unresolved. That ambiguity paints up a very clear question which speaks for the whole moral context of the piece- who is to blame? Can we blame the Baron for acting with impunity when no-one dares challenge him? Can we blame the villagers for their subservience when he strikes with the wrath of Jehovah? These crimes could be retaliatory or acts of transferred vengeance- where does the blame lie then? For such complex moral issues there are no easy answers and Haneke offers none, he merely poses the question. The village accepts the Baron’s tyranny and this begets misplaced retribution and a kind of mass tyranny perpetrated by the children. The sins they learn in the home are repeated and amplified within the village. Which returns us to the original context of these being the future adults of 1930s Germany; where do we apportion our blame then?
Magnificent. A film of incredible power. I was gobsmacked.
The reason I mention this is that the only two things I knew about the film going in was that Michael Haneke wrote and directed it and that it was a winner at Cannes. Plenty to live up to then. And it has taken me four days of reflection to collect my thoughts before noting them down.
I’m trying hard to avoid spoilers and only talk thematically and in abstract terms.
The film opens in austere monochrome (it appears almost sepia, however, which simply adds to the authentic-feeling historical context) in the year leading up to the declaration of the misleadingly-titled Great War. The film recounts a series of increasingly gruesome events in a relatively prosperous rural village but is neither whodunnit nor horror story- not in the conventional sense anyway. The film is a discourse on dependency and subservience and the breeding of resentment and of repression of dissent and the repercussions of all of these things and more. That the film is focused upon a group of children who would have been adults as the National Socialist party rose to power in Germany is, of course, pivotal to the theme. It is also crucial to bear in mind that it was made in a time when we have seen atrocities perpetrated by subservient extremists and those atrocities can be seen to have led to repression and victimisation of others in response.
The prosperity of the village I mentioned earlier is dependent upon The Baron- aside from the teenage Nanny, none of the adults are known by name only their title- and his patronage ensures that he is beyond reproach. When a farmer's wife is killed in an accident he dare not speak out against the Baron's Foreman for fear of losing his employment. His impetuous son, against the Farmer's instructions, does so leading to the ostracism of his entire family and his father's eventual suicide. The Baron acknowledges the Farmer's loyalty ("he would rather cut off his tongue than speak in defence of his son") and yet still strikes them down with ruthlessness and malice.
The same strict and unforgiving discipline is imposed by The Lutheran Pastor on his young children- and here I feel is the key relationship between the events of the film and the later events in the Germany of the 1930s. However well-intentioned or otherwise his discipline may be- and, like all else in the movie, this remains ambiguous- it breeds violent malcontent, hatred, victimisation and bullying. The scene in which he browbeats his teenage son and instils him a mortal fear in order to modify his behaviour is startling. The power he wields over the impressionistic teenager is abused in the most cruel of ways. In such circumstances, even the kind hearts of children (the tenderest moment in The White Ribbon occurs when The Pastor is touched deeply by an act of generosity from his youngest child) can and do turn sour.
In such circumstances, evil breeds. Incest, bullying, violence, emotional abuse, animal cruelty and even murder are hushed-up or accepted within the village. The corruption of the collective soul of a group of people has rarely been more starkly depicted. The deliberate, painstaking narrative and beautiful yet harrowing direction allow the Auteur to weave complex and challenging themes around a few key events. It is a masterful film with Haneke eliciting superb performances from a largely juvenile cast to tell a simple tale which builds in depth and meaning relentlessly from first to last.
The first victim of the horrifying events of the film is the Doctor and immediately he is presented as a figure evoking sympathy when he returns to the village midway through the film. Being the village’s Doctor and returning in response to his devoted infant son’s attempt to walk from the village to find him obviously strengthens the impression. But, of course, things in Haneke’s film are far from this simple and the sympathy we feel for the Doctor dissipates as we learn more about his personality, behaviours and lifestyle. Where the Pastor's cruel verbal abuse of his son can at least be understood if not accepted, the Pastor's no less abhorrent treatment of the midwife is less easily explicable. The control he wields within his household is akin to the Baron’s authoritarianism within the community, allowing him to perform the grossest acts without fear of either retribution or even mute defiance. His unchecked autonomy is treated as an invitation to test the limits of his capacity to inflict suffering- is there no limit to the things that these people will allow? And again we are compelled to reflect upon the film in relation to the grotesque human atrocities of the past century and this one.
I spoke earlier about the film being a whodunnit and that remains the case - the audience are told explicitly from the outset that these are the Schoolteacher’s recollections of events which- it transpires- are unresolved. That ambiguity paints up a very clear question which speaks for the whole moral context of the piece- who is to blame? Can we blame the Baron for acting with impunity when no-one dares challenge him? Can we blame the villagers for their subservience when he strikes with the wrath of Jehovah? These crimes could be retaliatory or acts of transferred vengeance- where does the blame lie then? For such complex moral issues there are no easy answers and Haneke offers none, he merely poses the question. The village accepts the Baron’s tyranny and this begets misplaced retribution and a kind of mass tyranny perpetrated by the children. The sins they learn in the home are repeated and amplified within the village. Which returns us to the original context of these being the future adults of 1930s Germany; where do we apportion our blame then?
Magnificent. A film of incredible power. I was gobsmacked.
The Parallax View (1974)
Personally, I love a conspiracy theory. And I love the paranoid thrillers of the 1970s- most notably Polanski's 'Chinatown', Coppola's 'The Conversation' and 'All The President's Men' by Alan J Pakula. This film, also by Pakula, is less epic than those classics but is still pretty strong.
Warren Beatty stars (this is the important Beatty that I've read about in 'Easy Riders, Raging Bulls' and not the joke figure he became) and is pivotal. He's probably in over 50% of the shots over the whole course of the movie. And I think that's the problem, it isn't his performance- which is excellent- but the fact that Alan Pakula builds the movie around Beatty's character so that the viewer identifies strongly with him. The downside of this is that it excludes everyone else and some strong performances, most notably from Hume Cronyn, don't get the material that they merit. This is an hour and a half movie that would have benefitted from the addition of background colour taking it up to two hours.
The cinematography is excellent, the performances are strong, the story is fine- but it's one-dimensional. It is a good movie but the director would've done better to be a little more ambitious. As he indeed would be a couple of years later with 'All The President's Men'.
Warren Beatty stars (this is the important Beatty that I've read about in 'Easy Riders, Raging Bulls' and not the joke figure he became) and is pivotal. He's probably in over 50% of the shots over the whole course of the movie. And I think that's the problem, it isn't his performance- which is excellent- but the fact that Alan Pakula builds the movie around Beatty's character so that the viewer identifies strongly with him. The downside of this is that it excludes everyone else and some strong performances, most notably from Hume Cronyn, don't get the material that they merit. This is an hour and a half movie that would have benefitted from the addition of background colour taking it up to two hours.
The cinematography is excellent, the performances are strong, the story is fine- but it's one-dimensional. It is a good movie but the director would've done better to be a little more ambitious. As he indeed would be a couple of years later with 'All The President's Men'.
Lesbian Vampire Killers (2009)
My wife, who is in most things very sussed and cool, has an unerring knack of choosing the worst films in the world. The only saving grace about her selecting this pile of abject, risible, insultingly unfunny wank is that in the week that we went to view it she had already seen Marley and Me on her own. If I'd had to see that too, it may have been too much for my barely adequate sanity to survive.
This is so bad that I feel morally offended that any of the clowns involved- the squeaky fat one, the gargoyle-faced one, the one with all of the brothers- hasn't come out and publicly apologised for it. I now hate them all. Hate. It's a comedy-horror with no comedy or horror in it. The plot, which was written on the back of a soggy beermat, is thus: 'give the film a title to get teenage boys interested and make it look like a Lynx advert with a couple of flashes of nipple'. This is so bad that even Paul Ross wouldn't like it.
I hoped that I would feel cleansed if I admitted that I'd seen it, instead I'm repulsed by the memory.
This is so bad that I feel morally offended that any of the clowns involved- the squeaky fat one, the gargoyle-faced one, the one with all of the brothers- hasn't come out and publicly apologised for it. I now hate them all. Hate. It's a comedy-horror with no comedy or horror in it. The plot, which was written on the back of a soggy beermat, is thus: 'give the film a title to get teenage boys interested and make it look like a Lynx advert with a couple of flashes of nipple'. This is so bad that even Paul Ross wouldn't like it.
I hoped that I would feel cleansed if I admitted that I'd seen it, instead I'm repulsed by the memory.
Moonraker by Ian Fleming
Fleming seems a bit lost with what he wants to do with Bond as we reach the third of his novels, perhaps it will become clear later in the series. Moonraker is a novel that tries to be a number of things but fails to satisfactorily be any of them. A quick overview of the plot will help me illustrate the unsatisfactory nature of the novel more clearly.
Moonraker begins by demonstrating Bond's humdrum usual working day, both to act as a counterpoint to his wilder adventures and to a little light to be shed upon the character. Think Harry Palmer if you deal only in celluloid spies. He is asked to accompany M to a card game with a caricature of a man who is suspected of cheating. Bond's card-playing credentials have already been established with the titanic baccarat game depicted midway through the first Bond novel Casino Royale. Perhaps mindful of the way in which everything which occurred after the card game in that novel was overshadowed and anti-climactic, Fleming here follows this largely character-based opening preamble with a complete non-sequitur of a plot twist featuring the same characters in wildly differing circumstances and, here's the rub, for the first time in the novels we see Bond in a wholly incredible plot involving recidivist Nazis, a prepostrous weapon, a mad criminal mastermind who manages to be both world-famous and entirely unsuspected and London being seconds away from total obliteration. It is as if Fleming had two personalities and they got a half of the finished novel each.
Of course, I admire the ambition of elevating the action thriller with serious character development for the protagonist but the things need to be simultaneous. Had they been, I would have been trumpeting Moonraker believe me. For there are some very good things to commend the novel. The Bond/M relationship is far more intriguing here than merely boss and servant with mutual respect. There is warmth and yet disdain, humour and defensiveness. I liked that aspect of the opening half a great deal. And the thriller section- though wildly overblown as Fleming attempted to outdo his past efforts- is genuinely gripping. Fleming lays off the depictions of Bond's high lifestyle (he doesn't even eat until chapter five and later in the novel, against all of the author's beliefs I suspect, "without noticing what he was eating Bond wolfed down some food and left") and concentrates upon giving us action and plenty of it.
Sadly, this means a greater than previous reliance upon stereotypes to move the plot along quickly. Even relatively significant characters like Krebs or Gala are reduced to little more than cardboard cutouts, whereas Dr Walter is merely "one of those highly-strung chaps with the usual German chip on the shoulder". On the other hand, Bond and Gala have little more than a dalliance which helps establish a greater credibility to the protagonist. He makes mistakes, costly mistakes, as we have seen in previous novels and now he has found a girl who proves immune to his charms and rides off into the sunset with her old boyfriend.
So I suppose that it is an important staging post. Fleming is still trying to balance exposition and characterisation and pace his novels at this stage. Hopefully, when he gets this right (as he came close to doing in Live and Let Die to be fair) he will ally it to a credible, well-paced plot and this- when allied to his undoubted talent for gripping action narratives- should produce a monster of a novel. Looking forward to it and pressing right on with the series.
One final note, the edition I read was riddled with spelling mistakes; not only of names (Tallon becoming Talon, for example) which are understandable, but of words becoming genuine spelling errors thanks to unchecked typographic slips (gyros to gryos- spell-check would've caught that one!).
Moonraker begins by demonstrating Bond's humdrum usual working day, both to act as a counterpoint to his wilder adventures and to a little light to be shed upon the character. Think Harry Palmer if you deal only in celluloid spies. He is asked to accompany M to a card game with a caricature of a man who is suspected of cheating. Bond's card-playing credentials have already been established with the titanic baccarat game depicted midway through the first Bond novel Casino Royale. Perhaps mindful of the way in which everything which occurred after the card game in that novel was overshadowed and anti-climactic, Fleming here follows this largely character-based opening preamble with a complete non-sequitur of a plot twist featuring the same characters in wildly differing circumstances and, here's the rub, for the first time in the novels we see Bond in a wholly incredible plot involving recidivist Nazis, a prepostrous weapon, a mad criminal mastermind who manages to be both world-famous and entirely unsuspected and London being seconds away from total obliteration. It is as if Fleming had two personalities and they got a half of the finished novel each.
Of course, I admire the ambition of elevating the action thriller with serious character development for the protagonist but the things need to be simultaneous. Had they been, I would have been trumpeting Moonraker believe me. For there are some very good things to commend the novel. The Bond/M relationship is far more intriguing here than merely boss and servant with mutual respect. There is warmth and yet disdain, humour and defensiveness. I liked that aspect of the opening half a great deal. And the thriller section- though wildly overblown as Fleming attempted to outdo his past efforts- is genuinely gripping. Fleming lays off the depictions of Bond's high lifestyle (he doesn't even eat until chapter five and later in the novel, against all of the author's beliefs I suspect, "without noticing what he was eating Bond wolfed down some food and left") and concentrates upon giving us action and plenty of it.
Sadly, this means a greater than previous reliance upon stereotypes to move the plot along quickly. Even relatively significant characters like Krebs or Gala are reduced to little more than cardboard cutouts, whereas Dr Walter is merely "one of those highly-strung chaps with the usual German chip on the shoulder". On the other hand, Bond and Gala have little more than a dalliance which helps establish a greater credibility to the protagonist. He makes mistakes, costly mistakes, as we have seen in previous novels and now he has found a girl who proves immune to his charms and rides off into the sunset with her old boyfriend.
So I suppose that it is an important staging post. Fleming is still trying to balance exposition and characterisation and pace his novels at this stage. Hopefully, when he gets this right (as he came close to doing in Live and Let Die to be fair) he will ally it to a credible, well-paced plot and this- when allied to his undoubted talent for gripping action narratives- should produce a monster of a novel. Looking forward to it and pressing right on with the series.
One final note, the edition I read was riddled with spelling mistakes; not only of names (Tallon becoming Talon, for example) which are understandable, but of words becoming genuine spelling errors thanks to unchecked typographic slips (gyros to gryos- spell-check would've caught that one!).
Wednesday 16 December 2009
I've Loved You So Long / Il y a longtemps que je t'aime (2008)
The absence of Kristin Scott Thomas (and Sally Hawkins for Happy-Go-Lucky) from the Best Actress nominations at this year's Oscars was a fucking farce. If anyone thinks that Angelina Jolie did a better job in Changeling, for example, then they really need to watch this again. And then if they still think it, then they're irredeemably lost. Kristin Scott Thomas, who I've never really admired before, is a revelation here. Her delicate, nuanced, progressively revealing portrayal of Juliette is everything that Jolie's unsubtle, tub-thumping, wailing banshee "look at me, I'm acting here dammit" approach is not. At least in the Best Supporting Actress category Penélope Cruz could hold her head up alongside Elsa Zylberstein who plays Léa here. And she's the only one who can because Marisa Tomei certainly fucking couldn't.
This is a powerful, moving, sad- but not depressing- and engrossing film which acts as a vehicle for the lead actress. There is a profound sorrow in her every unpunctuated silence which seems to project and unsettle the viewer. I felt like I was watching the tortuous struggle within her as she thousand-yard-stared, fidgeted and groped for something positive to cling onto in almost every scene. It is an extremely discomfiting experience. The character arc she portrays is as gentle and gradual and utterly convincing as you could really hope for.
The film as a whole, however, is not the trying experience that it would be reasonable to expect given the strength of Scott Thomas's performance and the sombre material of the film. Indeed it is, to use the most hackneyed phrase I can think of to describe it, life-affirming. I had no clear idea about what I was going to see when I began watching this, I had read no reviews and seen no trailers- all that I really knew was that it was French (I am an unashamed Francophile, so that would be reason enough) and that it had been nominated for a couple of BAFTAs- though it won none and Elsa Zylberstein was again overlooked for fuck's sake- but the storyline was clearly revealed in stages. This isn't to say that the ending would surprise anyone, you don't need to be Columbo to deduce what it is that's coming, but that the way the story moves to reach the outcome is a success.
It isn't a perfect film by any means. As is often the case where there is a towering lead performance, the film tends to be overbalanced and becomes less than the sum of its parts- There Will Be Blood is a great example of what I mean. In a first time director, Philippe Claudel, this is pretty understandable. The sub-plots which do not focus upon Kristin Scott Thomas but are instead peripheral to her (Luc coming to terms with Juliette, the storyline featuring Capitaine Fauré, Michel's growing attraction toward her) feel a little underdeveloped- as if Claudel knew he was getting something really special from the lead and was terrified of focusing anywhere else. With experience the confidence to know how and when to do that will come, I hope.
And so, a good film with a couple of great performances and a Director to keep an eye on for better things to come. Smashing.
This is a powerful, moving, sad- but not depressing- and engrossing film which acts as a vehicle for the lead actress. There is a profound sorrow in her every unpunctuated silence which seems to project and unsettle the viewer. I felt like I was watching the tortuous struggle within her as she thousand-yard-stared, fidgeted and groped for something positive to cling onto in almost every scene. It is an extremely discomfiting experience. The character arc she portrays is as gentle and gradual and utterly convincing as you could really hope for.
The film as a whole, however, is not the trying experience that it would be reasonable to expect given the strength of Scott Thomas's performance and the sombre material of the film. Indeed it is, to use the most hackneyed phrase I can think of to describe it, life-affirming. I had no clear idea about what I was going to see when I began watching this, I had read no reviews and seen no trailers- all that I really knew was that it was French (I am an unashamed Francophile, so that would be reason enough) and that it had been nominated for a couple of BAFTAs- though it won none and Elsa Zylberstein was again overlooked for fuck's sake- but the storyline was clearly revealed in stages. This isn't to say that the ending would surprise anyone, you don't need to be Columbo to deduce what it is that's coming, but that the way the story moves to reach the outcome is a success.
It isn't a perfect film by any means. As is often the case where there is a towering lead performance, the film tends to be overbalanced and becomes less than the sum of its parts- There Will Be Blood is a great example of what I mean. In a first time director, Philippe Claudel, this is pretty understandable. The sub-plots which do not focus upon Kristin Scott Thomas but are instead peripheral to her (Luc coming to terms with Juliette, the storyline featuring Capitaine Fauré, Michel's growing attraction toward her) feel a little underdeveloped- as if Claudel knew he was getting something really special from the lead and was terrified of focusing anywhere else. With experience the confidence to know how and when to do that will come, I hope.
And so, a good film with a couple of great performances and a Director to keep an eye on for better things to come. Smashing.
Dining Rooms
Is there anything more fecking stupid in a densely-populated country where housing tends to be smaller than in neighbouring countries than a tradition of reserving one room for some overpriced furniture that you hardly ever use? It's a sop to that section of the working classes who inexplicably want to appear affluent and will go in hock to their eyeballs to do so- a strange demographic that Tony Bliar did very well out of as it happens.
You have families where two kids share a bedroom or one gets a box room so small that it won't accomodate a bed and wardrobe and yet in the same house there is a fucking 'dining' room where no-one ever eats and kids aren't allowed to play in the pretence that life is as sophisticated a Gold Blend advert.
A pox on all who persist with this lunacy.
You have families where two kids share a bedroom or one gets a box room so small that it won't accomodate a bed and wardrobe and yet in the same house there is a fucking 'dining' room where no-one ever eats and kids aren't allowed to play in the pretence that life is as sophisticated a Gold Blend advert.
A pox on all who persist with this lunacy.
Elf (2003)
This is one of those films that you can really dislike if you try. But why would you?
Will Ferrell is a baby orphan who sneaks into Santa's sack one Christmas and ends up in the North Pole where he is raised by Elves. When he grows up he returns to New York to find his real father (James Caan) and- as is always the way- save Christmas. It's cute, it's schmaltzy, it's a bit slapstick, it a bit funny, it has a really heartwarming message about the spirit of Christmas and it just feels pretty good. Credit also for the fact that Will Ferrell turned down huge offers to make a sequel because it would've tainted this one. Unusual to see that kind of thing.
In short, it aims to do a job and it works! Ferrell should be irritating not endearing, but you just warm to him. And it is his movie. He carries it wonderfully well bringing a patchy script to life with his sheer enthusiasm at times. I'd also like to mention James Caan's bouffant which appears to have been dyed to match his coat and is hilarious and kind of sad at the same time.
Will Ferrell is a baby orphan who sneaks into Santa's sack one Christmas and ends up in the North Pole where he is raised by Elves. When he grows up he returns to New York to find his real father (James Caan) and- as is always the way- save Christmas. It's cute, it's schmaltzy, it's a bit slapstick, it a bit funny, it has a really heartwarming message about the spirit of Christmas and it just feels pretty good. Credit also for the fact that Will Ferrell turned down huge offers to make a sequel because it would've tainted this one. Unusual to see that kind of thing.
In short, it aims to do a job and it works! Ferrell should be irritating not endearing, but you just warm to him. And it is his movie. He carries it wonderfully well bringing a patchy script to life with his sheer enthusiasm at times. I'd also like to mention James Caan's bouffant which appears to have been dyed to match his coat and is hilarious and kind of sad at the same time.
Tuesday 15 December 2009
Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht (1979)
I am on such a run of great films that it's in danger of getting a little tiresome to record my thoughts on here. Another wonderful film, how predictable!
But this IS a wonderful film. Being a retelling of F.W. Murnau's 1922 classic, this film has to be special simply to avoid being a failure and is. Herzog brings to the film a visual intelligence and a mastery of atmosphere which never wavers. From the bright and airy opening in the Harkers' home to the run down, austere isolation of Dracula's castle, Herzog controls the viewer experience down to the nearest detail. These are not images which are obvious or border upon self-parody, they are real and ground the viewing experience. For stretches of the film, there is an almost dreamy mysticism about what we are seeing (at one point Harker states that he feels as though he was in a nightmare from which he cannot awake) but this is never achieved through simplistic, surreal imagery. The film is built upon the atmosphere which Herzog creates through simple visual storytelling, with minimal but timely support from the soundtrack. The meeting between Renfield and Harker is unsettling visually and disturbs all the more as a result, the scenes within the castle are claustrophobic and oppressive, the handheld footage of Harker's journey takes us with him through breathtaking but ominous scenery and when finally we arrive at the castle the introduction of the vampire is sudden when film-watching conditioning prepares us for a tension-building, drawn-out wait.
When Harker (Bruno Ganz, a fine actor) first encounters Dracula (Klaus Kinski) the viewer is thus taken aback. Suddenly, from trepidation we are confronted with the stark, cold presence of Count Dracula. There is a chilliness which emanates from the screen and- though he looks very similar to Max Schreck in the original- Kinski's appearance at the door retains the power to shock.
A word about Kinski at this point. Having recently seen his seething, unhinged portrayal Aguirre it would not have been a stretch to imagine his Dracula being equally malevolent in tone. It is not. Neither does he settle for Christopher Lee and Bela Lugosi's more urbane and charming depiction of the vampire. Kinski's Dracula is racked with remorse at his condition, he is soft-voiced and almost effeminate but teeming with self-loathing- his stealthy movements and bat-like countenance are at odds with his awkward stance and almost pitiful reluctance to act like the monster that he is. His inner torment is present in every anguished movement, every syllable is tormented- when he is rejected by Lucy Harker (an impressive, and almost vampiric-looking Isabelle Adjani) he responds not with fury or force but with the anguished whimper of a whipped cur and a sorrowful retreat into the night. To portray a grotesque fantasy figure of such widespread fame as real and believable, is both courageous and unexpected. Kinski, again, proves himself to be a preconception-shattering actor of depth and resourcefulness.
Every scene here is shot through with a thorough attention to detail, the work that has been done to achieve this has been painstaking, there are scenes which would today be achieved through CGI and would look impotent but here are authentic and hard-hitting (most notably the rat-infested feast of the plagued). Every aspect of the film has been tightly controlled, it is shot through with a purposefulness and an intent of supporting the whole which is monumental. Herzog intended every second of footage to have precisely the effect that it does. This is masterful scrupulous direction.
And it is in this way that Herzog is able to frame his film as a faithful but nevertheless non-derivative retelling of Murnau's tale. Kinski's almost feral movements allow the key scenes featuring him to work in near-silence, his ghostly pallor allows the footage to become almost monochrome. A tremendous achievement.
But this IS a wonderful film. Being a retelling of F.W. Murnau's 1922 classic, this film has to be special simply to avoid being a failure and is. Herzog brings to the film a visual intelligence and a mastery of atmosphere which never wavers. From the bright and airy opening in the Harkers' home to the run down, austere isolation of Dracula's castle, Herzog controls the viewer experience down to the nearest detail. These are not images which are obvious or border upon self-parody, they are real and ground the viewing experience. For stretches of the film, there is an almost dreamy mysticism about what we are seeing (at one point Harker states that he feels as though he was in a nightmare from which he cannot awake) but this is never achieved through simplistic, surreal imagery. The film is built upon the atmosphere which Herzog creates through simple visual storytelling, with minimal but timely support from the soundtrack. The meeting between Renfield and Harker is unsettling visually and disturbs all the more as a result, the scenes within the castle are claustrophobic and oppressive, the handheld footage of Harker's journey takes us with him through breathtaking but ominous scenery and when finally we arrive at the castle the introduction of the vampire is sudden when film-watching conditioning prepares us for a tension-building, drawn-out wait.
When Harker (Bruno Ganz, a fine actor) first encounters Dracula (Klaus Kinski) the viewer is thus taken aback. Suddenly, from trepidation we are confronted with the stark, cold presence of Count Dracula. There is a chilliness which emanates from the screen and- though he looks very similar to Max Schreck in the original- Kinski's appearance at the door retains the power to shock.
A word about Kinski at this point. Having recently seen his seething, unhinged portrayal Aguirre it would not have been a stretch to imagine his Dracula being equally malevolent in tone. It is not. Neither does he settle for Christopher Lee and Bela Lugosi's more urbane and charming depiction of the vampire. Kinski's Dracula is racked with remorse at his condition, he is soft-voiced and almost effeminate but teeming with self-loathing- his stealthy movements and bat-like countenance are at odds with his awkward stance and almost pitiful reluctance to act like the monster that he is. His inner torment is present in every anguished movement, every syllable is tormented- when he is rejected by Lucy Harker (an impressive, and almost vampiric-looking Isabelle Adjani) he responds not with fury or force but with the anguished whimper of a whipped cur and a sorrowful retreat into the night. To portray a grotesque fantasy figure of such widespread fame as real and believable, is both courageous and unexpected. Kinski, again, proves himself to be a preconception-shattering actor of depth and resourcefulness.
Every scene here is shot through with a thorough attention to detail, the work that has been done to achieve this has been painstaking, there are scenes which would today be achieved through CGI and would look impotent but here are authentic and hard-hitting (most notably the rat-infested feast of the plagued). Every aspect of the film has been tightly controlled, it is shot through with a purposefulness and an intent of supporting the whole which is monumental. Herzog intended every second of footage to have precisely the effect that it does. This is masterful scrupulous direction.
And it is in this way that Herzog is able to frame his film as a faithful but nevertheless non-derivative retelling of Murnau's tale. Kinski's almost feral movements allow the key scenes featuring him to work in near-silence, his ghostly pallor allows the footage to become almost monochrome. A tremendous achievement.
Monday 14 December 2009
2001-2: What a season that was!
This has been a rollercoaster of a decade to be a Baggie; a decade summed up by the greatest Baggies season I’ve ever witnessed.
The 2001-2 season really did have everything. The most memorable promotion of this or any other decade came at the expense of our embittered local rivals Wolverhampton Wanderers. The fortunes of the teams have reversed somewhat in recent years- indeed this season was a major factor in that turnaround- but back then the Baggies were the poor relations whilst Wolves were still being bankrolled by the self-titled ‘Golden Tit’ Jack Hayward. Whilst the financial gap stacked the odds in favour of Wolverhampton, early season results had exacerbated the gap. Seven straight wins from the turn of the year had left Wolves eight points clear of Manchester City in the race for the title. My beloved Baggies trailed them in third place, eleven points behind. That day- so legend has it- Wolves instructed their suppliers to begin printing “Premiership 2002-3″ on their club stationery and registered ex-player and folk hero Steve Bull as a player to allow him to make a crowd-pleasing appearance on the final day of the season. You should never tempt providence, should you?
The West Bromwich Albion team was built on strength of character and defensive resilience. On the eve of the season top scorer Lee Hughes moved to relegated Coventry City for the galling sum of £5,000,001 (thus invoking a £5m+ release clause) and star striker Jason Roberts broke his foot. Roberts returned for our 4-0 home thrashing of Manchester City and broke his foot again. In the same game his strike partner Danny Dichio also broke his foot. When Roberts returned again, he broke his foot shortly after for the third time in the season on the day that Wolves established their eleven point lead.
From the day that Wolves moved into their eleven point lead, the Baggies played ten games and won eight drawing the other two including a game where a disallowed goal was shown to be well over the line (a refereeing mistake which, incidentally, rescued Rotherham from relegation at the expense of unlucky Crewe).
The most crucial result in that run came in the penultimate game of the season as West Brom travelled to Bradford’s Valley Parade the day before Wolves hosted Wimbledon (now AFC Wimbledon). We were a point ahead with two to play and an inferior goal difference. The Baggies dominated the game but could not manage to find the breakthrough until we were awarded a penalty in the 93rd minute. That season we had already been awarded ten penalties. Sadly, though, we had missed nine of them and our penalty hoodoo looked likely to strike again. It had emerged, though, in the week preceeding the Bradford game that our non-English speaking Slovakian right back Igor Balis was a regular penalty taker for his country. He just hadn’t known how to tell anyone! Only in West Bromwich could that happen.
Nerves jangled from all parts of the stadium as the Slovakian lined up to take the kick. The award of the spot kick had been met with jubilant celebrations in all four stands as it became clear that the Baggies’ fans- having long since sold out our official allocation- had infiltrated the three home stands wherever tickets were available.
The despatch of the penalty was cool and confident, the ball nestling in the bottom corner of the net as the ground erupted in celebration. Balis, meanwhile, looked bemused. Perhaps he didn’t understand what it meant to the fans until that point- would he have beaten the keeper so comprehensively if he had?
Wolves defeated Wimbledon the following day, but their hearts had truly been broken by the Balis penalty. In order to secure promotion, we simply had to equal their result in our home match with Crystal Palace. Pre-match mindgames from the Wolves camp included the Golden Tit telling the local media that a fortune teller had told him that Palace’s former Wolves striker Ade Akinbiyi would score a hat-trick against us and Wolves winger Mark Kennedy stating that his international team-mate Palace’s other striker Clinton Morrison had assured him that Palace would win as “all the Irish lads hate West Brom” (a fallacy, as it happens). Morrison was conspicuously less forthcoming during the game after a pre-match conversation with two of our centre-backs who assured him that if he scored, he would not be joining the Republic of Ireland squad for that summer’s World Cup in Japan and South Korea. He limped off with a mystery injury early in the game.
The Palace game was played in a carnival atmosphere and glorious sunshine and- aside from the club’s clean-sheet-record breaking keeper Russell Hoult palming over a long-distance drive- entirely as the Baggies would have wished. A Wolves goal in their match at Hillsborough failed to set the nerves jangling, in fact the crowd became even louder in response. Partway through the first half a goal by cult hero centre-half (and largest man on earth) Darren “Big Dave” Moore was swiftly followed by a Sheffield Wednesday equaliser. We were playing out time waiting to celebrate the final whistle and not worrying how long it took to arrive.
Fittingly, the second half gave us a memory to cherish forever. Legendary striker Bob Taylor scored a typical poacher’s goal in front of the main home stand to seal the victory. He came, he set a season scoring record to win promotion, he was forced out by a manager and became a legend at Bolton, then returned to save us from relegation and finally scored the goal that took us back to the top tier for the first time in 16 years. At Hillsborough, Wolves’ capitulation was complete as they failed to beat a Sheffield Wednesday side with nothing to play for but it didn’t matter as we won 2-0 to secure promotion with the most dramatic comeback in our history. An eleven point lead for Wolves- the rich team with the Premiership stationery- turned into a three point deficit in the final nine games by the underdogs, the paupers, the pre-season relegation favourites: West Bromwich Albion
What a season that was! And just look at how the Wolves fans saw it all:
The 2001-2 season really did have everything. The most memorable promotion of this or any other decade came at the expense of our embittered local rivals Wolverhampton Wanderers. The fortunes of the teams have reversed somewhat in recent years- indeed this season was a major factor in that turnaround- but back then the Baggies were the poor relations whilst Wolves were still being bankrolled by the self-titled ‘Golden Tit’ Jack Hayward. Whilst the financial gap stacked the odds in favour of Wolverhampton, early season results had exacerbated the gap. Seven straight wins from the turn of the year had left Wolves eight points clear of Manchester City in the race for the title. My beloved Baggies trailed them in third place, eleven points behind. That day- so legend has it- Wolves instructed their suppliers to begin printing “Premiership 2002-3″ on their club stationery and registered ex-player and folk hero Steve Bull as a player to allow him to make a crowd-pleasing appearance on the final day of the season. You should never tempt providence, should you?
The West Bromwich Albion team was built on strength of character and defensive resilience. On the eve of the season top scorer Lee Hughes moved to relegated Coventry City for the galling sum of £5,000,001 (thus invoking a £5m+ release clause) and star striker Jason Roberts broke his foot. Roberts returned for our 4-0 home thrashing of Manchester City and broke his foot again. In the same game his strike partner Danny Dichio also broke his foot. When Roberts returned again, he broke his foot shortly after for the third time in the season on the day that Wolves established their eleven point lead.
From the day that Wolves moved into their eleven point lead, the Baggies played ten games and won eight drawing the other two including a game where a disallowed goal was shown to be well over the line (a refereeing mistake which, incidentally, rescued Rotherham from relegation at the expense of unlucky Crewe).
The most crucial result in that run came in the penultimate game of the season as West Brom travelled to Bradford’s Valley Parade the day before Wolves hosted Wimbledon (now AFC Wimbledon). We were a point ahead with two to play and an inferior goal difference. The Baggies dominated the game but could not manage to find the breakthrough until we were awarded a penalty in the 93rd minute. That season we had already been awarded ten penalties. Sadly, though, we had missed nine of them and our penalty hoodoo looked likely to strike again. It had emerged, though, in the week preceeding the Bradford game that our non-English speaking Slovakian right back Igor Balis was a regular penalty taker for his country. He just hadn’t known how to tell anyone! Only in West Bromwich could that happen.
Nerves jangled from all parts of the stadium as the Slovakian lined up to take the kick. The award of the spot kick had been met with jubilant celebrations in all four stands as it became clear that the Baggies’ fans- having long since sold out our official allocation- had infiltrated the three home stands wherever tickets were available.
The despatch of the penalty was cool and confident, the ball nestling in the bottom corner of the net as the ground erupted in celebration. Balis, meanwhile, looked bemused. Perhaps he didn’t understand what it meant to the fans until that point- would he have beaten the keeper so comprehensively if he had?
Wolves defeated Wimbledon the following day, but their hearts had truly been broken by the Balis penalty. In order to secure promotion, we simply had to equal their result in our home match with Crystal Palace. Pre-match mindgames from the Wolves camp included the Golden Tit telling the local media that a fortune teller had told him that Palace’s former Wolves striker Ade Akinbiyi would score a hat-trick against us and Wolves winger Mark Kennedy stating that his international team-mate Palace’s other striker Clinton Morrison had assured him that Palace would win as “all the Irish lads hate West Brom” (a fallacy, as it happens). Morrison was conspicuously less forthcoming during the game after a pre-match conversation with two of our centre-backs who assured him that if he scored, he would not be joining the Republic of Ireland squad for that summer’s World Cup in Japan and South Korea. He limped off with a mystery injury early in the game.
The Palace game was played in a carnival atmosphere and glorious sunshine and- aside from the club’s clean-sheet-record breaking keeper Russell Hoult palming over a long-distance drive- entirely as the Baggies would have wished. A Wolves goal in their match at Hillsborough failed to set the nerves jangling, in fact the crowd became even louder in response. Partway through the first half a goal by cult hero centre-half (and largest man on earth) Darren “Big Dave” Moore was swiftly followed by a Sheffield Wednesday equaliser. We were playing out time waiting to celebrate the final whistle and not worrying how long it took to arrive.
Fittingly, the second half gave us a memory to cherish forever. Legendary striker Bob Taylor scored a typical poacher’s goal in front of the main home stand to seal the victory. He came, he set a season scoring record to win promotion, he was forced out by a manager and became a legend at Bolton, then returned to save us from relegation and finally scored the goal that took us back to the top tier for the first time in 16 years. At Hillsborough, Wolves’ capitulation was complete as they failed to beat a Sheffield Wednesday side with nothing to play for but it didn’t matter as we won 2-0 to secure promotion with the most dramatic comeback in our history. An eleven point lead for Wolves- the rich team with the Premiership stationery- turned into a three point deficit in the final nine games by the underdogs, the paupers, the pre-season relegation favourites: West Bromwich Albion
What a season that was! And just look at how the Wolves fans saw it all:
Performance (1970)
For a long time during my teens I nurtured a probably unhealthy obsession with Brian Jones the result of which has been a weaning-off process causing me to lock away my library of 'was Brian murdered?' books (of course he was) and avoid seeing this for the better part of two decades. Seeing Mick play- to all intents and purposes- Brian opposite the girl Keith stole from Brian was always going to be a bit weird. That the film is an almost total headfuck anyway, didn't help matters.
Performance could be the ultimate Emperor's New Clothes movie. It could be a trippy, surreal but ultimately vacuous exercise in style over content from which unintended layers of meaning and allusion can be divined. It could be Chauncey Gardiner as a film, I'm absolutely aware of that. But I'm going to follow my instinct that it isn't. And, furthermore, even if it is I'm going to say that the allegorical nature of the film is no less valid if it is unintentional anyway. Why should it be?
The film opens in the brutal world of London gangsters with Chas (an utterly fantastic James Fox performance) and we get about half an hour of a fast-paced gritty crime drama in the vein of Get Carter or Villain but then suddenly lurches head-first into a psychedelic acid nightmare full of "long-hairs, druggers, beatniks and foreigners" blurring the lines between reality and surreality. In exactly the same way that Chas gets discombobulated by what he experiences, so does the viewer. The resulting confusion is deliberate as the two worlds are shown as more similar than they are different. The integration of the two worlds occurs by allusion during the magnificent 'Memo From Turner' sequence and then in actuality.
The blending of identities and merging of entities is a recurrent theme. Chas and Turner, the hedonistic rock star in seclusion played by Mick Jagger, are increasingly shown as similar below their surface differences, they could almost be a masculine and feminine version of the same person. That duality is expressed in many ways; both literally (swapping styles of dress, superimposed faces etc) and by suggestion ("there's nothing wrong with me...I'm normal"). In fact the whole film investigates this identity confusion: there are mirrors and juxtaposed faces, picture disappear from frames between shots, sexual confusion, androgyny, altered perceptions, sanity and insanity, domination and submission, appearance changes and role swapping. Throughout the gangland scenes the phrase "it's not a takeover, it's a merger" is repeated and, in the end, we are presented with the surreal merging of people- Turner becomes Lucy, Chas becomes Turner, Turner becomes Chas. This bizarre distillation of Borgesian confusion is both challenging and illuminating.
As a film, as a piece of entertainment, I would imagine that Performance might be considered a failure. There is no obvious hero or villain, no linear narrative, no clear outcome and the performances range from Fox's coruscating portrayal of Chas to Pallenberg's patchy and uneven Pherber. As a work of art, however, it is outstanding. And the soundtrack is incredible.
And- finally- everyone should own a copy of Happy Mondays' Bummed which samples this film's dialogue heavily.
Performance could be the ultimate Emperor's New Clothes movie. It could be a trippy, surreal but ultimately vacuous exercise in style over content from which unintended layers of meaning and allusion can be divined. It could be Chauncey Gardiner as a film, I'm absolutely aware of that. But I'm going to follow my instinct that it isn't. And, furthermore, even if it is I'm going to say that the allegorical nature of the film is no less valid if it is unintentional anyway. Why should it be?
The film opens in the brutal world of London gangsters with Chas (an utterly fantastic James Fox performance) and we get about half an hour of a fast-paced gritty crime drama in the vein of Get Carter or Villain but then suddenly lurches head-first into a psychedelic acid nightmare full of "long-hairs, druggers, beatniks and foreigners" blurring the lines between reality and surreality. In exactly the same way that Chas gets discombobulated by what he experiences, so does the viewer. The resulting confusion is deliberate as the two worlds are shown as more similar than they are different. The integration of the two worlds occurs by allusion during the magnificent 'Memo From Turner' sequence and then in actuality.
The blending of identities and merging of entities is a recurrent theme. Chas and Turner, the hedonistic rock star in seclusion played by Mick Jagger, are increasingly shown as similar below their surface differences, they could almost be a masculine and feminine version of the same person. That duality is expressed in many ways; both literally (swapping styles of dress, superimposed faces etc) and by suggestion ("there's nothing wrong with me...I'm normal"). In fact the whole film investigates this identity confusion: there are mirrors and juxtaposed faces, picture disappear from frames between shots, sexual confusion, androgyny, altered perceptions, sanity and insanity, domination and submission, appearance changes and role swapping. Throughout the gangland scenes the phrase "it's not a takeover, it's a merger" is repeated and, in the end, we are presented with the surreal merging of people- Turner becomes Lucy, Chas becomes Turner, Turner becomes Chas. This bizarre distillation of Borgesian confusion is both challenging and illuminating.
As a film, as a piece of entertainment, I would imagine that Performance might be considered a failure. There is no obvious hero or villain, no linear narrative, no clear outcome and the performances range from Fox's coruscating portrayal of Chas to Pallenberg's patchy and uneven Pherber. As a work of art, however, it is outstanding. And the soundtrack is incredible.
And- finally- everyone should own a copy of Happy Mondays' Bummed which samples this film's dialogue heavily.
Sunday 13 December 2009
Death in Venice / Morte a Venezia (1971)
After a few popcorn movies in a row, I felt that I owed it to my brain to give it a little workout and Visconti’s meditation on mortality and beauty and decay is designed for exactly that purpose. This film is beautifully shot and artfully constructed, languorous and melancholic- the deliberate pace compels the viewer to consider the subtext carefully. The first five minutes, more or less, is dedicated to wordless shots of Dirk Bogarde sat uncomfortably and clearly troubled on a steamboat. Five minutes! It is a beautiful, elegiac composition and to see Bogarde in the condition that he is already opens up the suggestion of the withering influence of time. My first thought upon seeing him looks more like Ronnie Corbett dressed as a rather shabby Hercule Poirot than the handsome movie star I’m accustomed to seeing. The fact that, at this point, my only knowledge of the film was its title did serve to disconcert me a little- for all I knew I may be about to watch a broad farce in the vein of Without A Clue. Of course, broad farces do not tend to begin with a contemplative stretches of silence and so the misapprehension was pretty swiftly dismissed.
In fact, I worked through several theories during the watching of this film. Following this opening, Bogarde is taken on to his final destination by a gondolier who refuses all requests and instructions to change course and is later described as a criminal who only goes one way. Immediately I was put in mind of Charon, the mythological ferryman who transports the newly deceased from the world of the living unto the world of the dead (again, the title Death in Veniceis resonant here). The film also appears to show Bogarde developing a homo-erotic infatuation with a pretty long-haired boy, Tadzio (Björn Andrésen), who is dressed throughout in sailor outfits or period- 1912- swimming outfits. Through flashbacks we gradually learn of the circumstances leading to Bogarde’s arrival. What I liked about this- and had never actually occurred to me until I considered it watching this film- is that the memories are haphazardly presented, jumbled in order almost non-sequiturs in themselves until the context is revealed during the course of the film. Isn’t that exactly what memories are like? Where else but in the movies do your inner reflections follow a chronological pattern?
And so we come to understand that Bogarde’s character Professor Gustav von Aschenbach (I’m not typing all that again!) arrives in Venice in failing health for rehabilitation. He has been married with a child who died. His reputation as a composer is tarnished by recent failings and his creative and personal standing is at a low ebb. A broken man who appears lost in the world of his choosing as he questions the validity of his existence of his works. He dissects his art and the nature of creativity (is beauty the result of labour or inspiration? Is it discovered or developed?) without conclusion. He seems unconvinced by his own assertion that “reality distracts and degrades us” and unconvinced by the counter-arguments in equal measure.
With this in mind the film is revealed to not be about homo-erotic, generation-defying infatuation but about a deeper admiration for , actually an infatuation with, youth itself and with pure beauty. And then I return to the idea of Charon the Ferryman, transferring the dead from the world of the living. As Bogarde feels the crushing realisation that his vapid emotionless world of intellect is dead he moves on to a world of natural beauty which renders everything else contrived and worthless. Bogarde’s infatuation is not so much with Tadzio himself but with that which he represents. The inspired beauty that Bogarde longed to create but could not is natural and real, neither the product of inspiration nor perspiration. Dirk Bogarde conveys this beautifully. His performance, increasing in intensity and overt angst is measured and balanced. His flappable frustration giving way to confusion, then to fear, then realisation and finally to impotent surrender are rendered with very few words and no grand physical gestures but with, for example, an expression of horror as he learns the truth about the cholera epidemic or the way in which he grabs his arms around himself to chastise himself for daring to smile as Tadzio. Tremendous performance
Even more than Bogarde who dominates the film to the extent that he is in every scene and almost every shot, however, the film is a magnificent achievement by the director/cinematographer team of Luchino Visconti and Pasqualino De Santis. The slow and largely wordless nature of the film place a heavy burden upon the pair. The use of Mahler’s music (is there meant to be a link between Gustav Mahler and Gustav von Aschenbach? I don’t know anything about the composer and may be clutching a very tenuous straw) beautifully complements the stunning visual feast of the film- and it is a feast. One of the themes running through the film is of decay and the corrupting effect of time and this is beautifully demonstrated in a city which is presented as a deteriorating before our eyes. The whole thing is quite stunning and nothing is left unsaid.
This is a marvellous picture, high art indeed. And, while I would prefer to watch Carry On Don’t Lose Your Head nine times out of ten, when I feel the need to challenge myself then Death In Venice would be an excellent choice.
In fact, I worked through several theories during the watching of this film. Following this opening, Bogarde is taken on to his final destination by a gondolier who refuses all requests and instructions to change course and is later described as a criminal who only goes one way. Immediately I was put in mind of Charon, the mythological ferryman who transports the newly deceased from the world of the living unto the world of the dead (again, the title Death in Veniceis resonant here). The film also appears to show Bogarde developing a homo-erotic infatuation with a pretty long-haired boy, Tadzio (Björn Andrésen), who is dressed throughout in sailor outfits or period- 1912- swimming outfits. Through flashbacks we gradually learn of the circumstances leading to Bogarde’s arrival. What I liked about this- and had never actually occurred to me until I considered it watching this film- is that the memories are haphazardly presented, jumbled in order almost non-sequiturs in themselves until the context is revealed during the course of the film. Isn’t that exactly what memories are like? Where else but in the movies do your inner reflections follow a chronological pattern?
And so we come to understand that Bogarde’s character Professor Gustav von Aschenbach (I’m not typing all that again!) arrives in Venice in failing health for rehabilitation. He has been married with a child who died. His reputation as a composer is tarnished by recent failings and his creative and personal standing is at a low ebb. A broken man who appears lost in the world of his choosing as he questions the validity of his existence of his works. He dissects his art and the nature of creativity (is beauty the result of labour or inspiration? Is it discovered or developed?) without conclusion. He seems unconvinced by his own assertion that “reality distracts and degrades us” and unconvinced by the counter-arguments in equal measure.
With this in mind the film is revealed to not be about homo-erotic, generation-defying infatuation but about a deeper admiration for , actually an infatuation with, youth itself and with pure beauty. And then I return to the idea of Charon the Ferryman, transferring the dead from the world of the living. As Bogarde feels the crushing realisation that his vapid emotionless world of intellect is dead he moves on to a world of natural beauty which renders everything else contrived and worthless. Bogarde’s infatuation is not so much with Tadzio himself but with that which he represents. The inspired beauty that Bogarde longed to create but could not is natural and real, neither the product of inspiration nor perspiration. Dirk Bogarde conveys this beautifully. His performance, increasing in intensity and overt angst is measured and balanced. His flappable frustration giving way to confusion, then to fear, then realisation and finally to impotent surrender are rendered with very few words and no grand physical gestures but with, for example, an expression of horror as he learns the truth about the cholera epidemic or the way in which he grabs his arms around himself to chastise himself for daring to smile as Tadzio. Tremendous performance
Even more than Bogarde who dominates the film to the extent that he is in every scene and almost every shot, however, the film is a magnificent achievement by the director/cinematographer team of Luchino Visconti and Pasqualino De Santis. The slow and largely wordless nature of the film place a heavy burden upon the pair. The use of Mahler’s music (is there meant to be a link between Gustav Mahler and Gustav von Aschenbach? I don’t know anything about the composer and may be clutching a very tenuous straw) beautifully complements the stunning visual feast of the film- and it is a feast. One of the themes running through the film is of decay and the corrupting effect of time and this is beautifully demonstrated in a city which is presented as a deteriorating before our eyes. The whole thing is quite stunning and nothing is left unsaid.
This is a marvellous picture, high art indeed. And, while I would prefer to watch Carry On Don’t Lose Your Head nine times out of ten, when I feel the need to challenge myself then Death In Venice would be an excellent choice.
Top 5 German Things
Krautrock
The birth of the Reformation
That funny B sign that means "ss"
And, I suppose, the SS
Expressionist cinema
The birth of the Reformation
That funny B sign that means "ss"
And, I suppose, the SS
Expressionist cinema
Live and Let Die by Ian Fleming
Following the disappointment of reading the unfulfilling Casino Royale, this is much much better. Having seen Fleming give his misogyny free reign in the opening book of the series, it was with some trepidation that I read this tale of a big black underworld crime-lord and the attitudes of the time do shine through again, though to nowhere near the same extent. Alongside the tacit assumption of honky superiority is the expressed feeling that, as M says, "the negro races are just beginning to throw up geniuses in all the professions- scientists, doctors, writers. It's about time they turned out a great criminal". Thank Heaven that evolution is finally dealing the black races a fair hand. I'm being churlish of course, but it is a theme that Fleming was quite keen on as the book's black arch-villain repeats the sentiment at the opposite end of the novel: "In the history of negro emancipation... there have already appeared great athletes, great musicians, great doctors and scientists... It is unfortunate for you Mister Bond, and for this girl, that you have encountered the first of the great negro criminals". Nice to see the British spymaster and the Soviet-backed American ganglord singing from the same hymn sheet there. In truth, though, (and digressing from the novel itself for just a little longer to pursue this theme) it would have been things like this book (published in 1954) where black men are shown to be clever and cunning and successful that would have played a small but significant part in mending the attitudes of the time. No, whether I was right or not about Fleming's sexism shining through, I think there's no doubt that he's writing from a pretty solid moral place her.
Enough cod-sociology and on with the action.
The only thing to commend the movie version of Live and Let Die above the novel is the theme song. The novel is more gritty, more ambitious, more realistic, more gripping, better executed and more authentic by far. It benefits from Fleming's increasing realisation of his own strength as a thriller writer and relative weakness as a teller of romantic tales- there is a lull when he has a bash at eulogising about his beloved Jamaican islands and one particularly shocking piece of prose will live long in the memory for all the wrong reasons ("The whole scene was macabre and livid, as if El Greco had done a painting by moonlight of an exhumed graveyard in a burning town")- but overall this a taut, pacy thriller.
Being a Bond novel, the premise is, of course, fantastical. A Soviet-trained American crime boss controls the whole of black America by masquerading as the zombie of a voodoo demon and is funding his commie-infiltration operations using a haul of buried pirate's treasure from the seventeenth century. But the execution of the plot is efficient and realistic. Bond blunders in thoughtlessly, makes mistakes, puts his friend Leiter and the crimelord's sweet and innocent concubine in mortal danger but by being tough and resolute and risking everything for the greater good saves the day and gets the girl. It's also interesting to note that the Bond of the novels relies heavily on the amphetimine benzedrine when he is called into action and also foregoes cigarettes and alcohol as he trains himself for the assault on the centre of the crimelord's operations. I never knew he was human! Either way he finds it impossible to make love with a broken little finger and I like to think I have one up on him there.
Anyway, the book moves at pace from London to Harlem to Florida and finally to the Caribbean with Bond leaving behind a trail of bodies (five, not counting the final scene) that cause a stink with the US authorities. He gets involved with Solitaire (an unconvincing distraction when he keeps his feelings "in a compartment which had no communicating door with his professional life") and then sees her recaptured by Mr Big who then keeps her alive to no great purpose other than to join Bond in what Dr Evil once called "an easily escapable situation involving an overly elaborate and exotic death"- it's not quite that bad, to be honest. Bond eats well, very well and regularly. Fleming must have been on a diet when he wrote this because his discussion of Bond's meals probably takes more space in the novel than dialogue! Leiter suffers an agonising near-death experience (replicated in the very underrated movie Licence To Kill) leaving him with half an arm and one and a half legs missing.
It's an entertaining read. More intense than Casino Royale was, as if Fleming has really got the hang of it now. Moonraker next, I suspect that this too will be different from the movie. I bloody hope so anyway!
Enough cod-sociology and on with the action.
The only thing to commend the movie version of Live and Let Die above the novel is the theme song. The novel is more gritty, more ambitious, more realistic, more gripping, better executed and more authentic by far. It benefits from Fleming's increasing realisation of his own strength as a thriller writer and relative weakness as a teller of romantic tales- there is a lull when he has a bash at eulogising about his beloved Jamaican islands and one particularly shocking piece of prose will live long in the memory for all the wrong reasons ("The whole scene was macabre and livid, as if El Greco had done a painting by moonlight of an exhumed graveyard in a burning town")- but overall this a taut, pacy thriller.
Being a Bond novel, the premise is, of course, fantastical. A Soviet-trained American crime boss controls the whole of black America by masquerading as the zombie of a voodoo demon and is funding his commie-infiltration operations using a haul of buried pirate's treasure from the seventeenth century. But the execution of the plot is efficient and realistic. Bond blunders in thoughtlessly, makes mistakes, puts his friend Leiter and the crimelord's sweet and innocent concubine in mortal danger but by being tough and resolute and risking everything for the greater good saves the day and gets the girl. It's also interesting to note that the Bond of the novels relies heavily on the amphetimine benzedrine when he is called into action and also foregoes cigarettes and alcohol as he trains himself for the assault on the centre of the crimelord's operations. I never knew he was human! Either way he finds it impossible to make love with a broken little finger and I like to think I have one up on him there.
Anyway, the book moves at pace from London to Harlem to Florida and finally to the Caribbean with Bond leaving behind a trail of bodies (five, not counting the final scene) that cause a stink with the US authorities. He gets involved with Solitaire (an unconvincing distraction when he keeps his feelings "in a compartment which had no communicating door with his professional life") and then sees her recaptured by Mr Big who then keeps her alive to no great purpose other than to join Bond in what Dr Evil once called "an easily escapable situation involving an overly elaborate and exotic death"- it's not quite that bad, to be honest. Bond eats well, very well and regularly. Fleming must have been on a diet when he wrote this because his discussion of Bond's meals probably takes more space in the novel than dialogue! Leiter suffers an agonising near-death experience (replicated in the very underrated movie Licence To Kill) leaving him with half an arm and one and a half legs missing.
It's an entertaining read. More intense than Casino Royale was, as if Fleming has really got the hang of it now. Moonraker next, I suspect that this too will be different from the movie. I bloody hope so anyway!
Saturday 12 December 2009
Spellbound (1945)
Hitchcock was such an 'of-the-moment' film-maker that there aren't many who compare with him today in terms of using or risking their status to try and push the audience into new and uncomfortable territory. Some of his work ends up being timeless as a result (Vertigo is a great example, North By NorthWest being another) and some is pretty badly dated. Spellbound with its then novel and now well-worn themes of psychoanalysis and Freudian guilt falls into the latter category sadly.
I'm not sure that it's really fair to judge a film on the basis of how well the basic premise has stood the passing of over six decades, how was Hitch to know that daytime TV would be filled wall-to-wall with cod-psychology and blithe misreadings of Freud and Jung reducing everyone to the role of pseudo-shrink? That said, I am really only interested in how the film entertains or informs or affects me and so, fair or not, I'll judge it on its merits in my opinion. There's probably a deep psychological meaning behind that too.
And Spellbound is very good, especially when it gets going. The opening has been a little too successfully aped by Mel Brooks' High Anxiety for me to be really swayed by it, sadly (High Anxiety by the way, is the opposite of Spellbound as it falters after a promising start). Opening with Ingrid Bergman analysing the neurotic, misanthropic Mary Carmichael (played with relish as a latter day Countess Dracula by Rhonda Fleming) we learn about Bergman's emotionless professionalism and you just know that her icy exterior is long overdue for being thawed by the right man. At this point Gregory Peck enters the fray- it is a wonderful set-up, the only disappointment being that the on-screen chemistry between them doesn't match that between her and Bogey or her and Cary Grant. Now, you can be churlish and criticise the idea of them falling in love in less time than it takes me to choose what socks to wear on a given day, but what's the point? I just consider that you accept it and see where the movie takes you and- if it is a flop- use it as a stick to beat with later. And so the scene where Peck and Bergman first meet sees them both in close-up; her in soft-focus him depicted with the hard lines of a real man, Miklós Rózsa strikes up the string section and the whole thing is sorted in the minds of the audience. I would usually hate this but what I find forgivable about it- praiseworthy even- is that Hitchcock is simply getting the romantic interlude out of the way as efficiently as possible in order to get on with the thriller. The scene proceeds to do just that as a neurotic and agitated Peck- who has already been depicted as "much younger than I imagined" and being very vague on the subject of his most recently published book- overreacts furiously to Bergman drawing a picture by tracing her fork upon the table linen. There you go in one scene Bergman and Peck have fallen in love and Hitchcock has flattered the audience that they're so smart knowing that he isn't who he says he is. Brilliant.
The plot proceeds apace, frosty analyst turned giddy schoolgirl Bergman is enraptured by Peck (has anyone in celluloid history attempted to say the word 'liverwurst' seductively before?) and they kiss in his room. Now, I'm a little uncomfortable with one of Hitchcock's conceits here- close-ups of his eyes and then her eyes are followed by a graphic of doors opening. It's all just a little too literal, or is because of the intervening years? Have I been conditioned to demand more subtlety when that kind of pellucidity was precisely what contemporary audiences needed? I'll let it slide.
Right, so it becomes clear that not only is Gregory Peck not Dr Edwardes (odd spelling that) but that he may even have murdered Dr Edwardes and taken his place. Peck disappears but leaves a note under Bergman's door leading to a brilliant scene where several policemen and psychiatrists are standing just inside her doorway on the note which she can see but they haven't yet noticed. The tension is maintained superbly for what seems like an age before Bergman is able to retrieve the note- unbearably it is handed to her by Dr Murchison (Leo G. Carroll)- and follow Peck to a hotel in New York. From there, in typical Hitchcock fashion, the chase is on. Peck and Bergman are always- by design or by good fortune- half a step ahead of the police as she tries to break through his psychological blockages and prove his undoubted innocence ("I couldn't love a man who is capable of such crimes" she says, well that's all there is to it then). At the same time Peck has no real belief in his innocence and while the audience can't really believe he did it- he's the hero for crying out loud- it is the most obvious and likely explanation for it all. And to amplify that doubt Hitchcock shows us flashes of Peck's temper, frames him with a cut-throat razor and a zombie-like stare and casts doubt upon his story left, right and centre.
Bergman takes Peck to the home of her psychoanalytical mentor Dr Brulov (Michael Checkov, the best performer on show by a country mile) and while they wait for him to return with two strangers it becomes apparent that the men are policemen investigating the death of Edwardes. Trapped, unable to even communicate both are struck dumb with terror as the policemen chat affably throwing their unease into even sharper contrast- it is the best sequence of the film- and the tension continues until Dr Brulov returns. The policemen, it transpires, are unaware of Peck and Bergman's supposed implication in the murder and are merely there to investigate the professional tension between Brulov and Edwardes which had almost escalated ino violence recently. Now this is really clever, if this was a whodunnit the smart money would be straight on Brulov- especially when it becomes clear that he knows far more about Peck and Bergman's arrival than he had initially indicated. Seeing Peck with the razor Dr Brulov talks to him calmly and offers him a glass of milk. He's drugged him- with milk! As if he was B.A. Baracus or something. Brilliant. "I ain't getting on no psychoanalyst's couch fool!".
When Peck awakes, he recounts his dreams for the two Doctors to analyse and here we enter the most famous (and most unaccountably derided) sequence of the film- the Hitchcock/Dali dream sequence. Okay, so a four year old could analyse the 'hidden' meanings (whoever could the mysterious 'Proprieter' be?) it doesn't matter- what is important is the beauty of the sequence and, most importantly of all, the sheer chutzpah of its inclusion. I'd defend this until my dying breath- if only more filmmakers had Hitchcock's balls!
The climactic sequence of the film is filmed dramatically as Bergman desperately tries to undo her act of inadvertently convincing Peck and the policemen of his guilt- she is shown in stark monochrome uplit against dark backgrounds frenzied and hopeless. And then, when all hope is lost, the truth falls into her lap by chance. Agatha Christie once said "if you want to know who the murderer is in any crime novel, pick the most unlikely character. He did it" and that holds true here. Admittedly it isn't the most unlikely person on screen, the fat cockney feller getting out of a lift in a brief cameo has absolutely no chance of reappearing, it is a convincing and plausible ending which gives Hitchcock an excuse for one last piece of bravura film-making, the big hand.
Oh it isn't a perfect film, the ski-ing sequence (for example) is dreadfully executed and a lot of the great things here- especially the framing of Gregory Peck as a did-he didn't-he murderer would be far better realised in Psycho but for the tension, for Rózsa's great score (love that theremin work), for the brief-but-brilliant childhood memory sequence and for the breathless and intriguing narrative I loved it.
I'm not sure that it's really fair to judge a film on the basis of how well the basic premise has stood the passing of over six decades, how was Hitch to know that daytime TV would be filled wall-to-wall with cod-psychology and blithe misreadings of Freud and Jung reducing everyone to the role of pseudo-shrink? That said, I am really only interested in how the film entertains or informs or affects me and so, fair or not, I'll judge it on its merits in my opinion. There's probably a deep psychological meaning behind that too.
And Spellbound is very good, especially when it gets going. The opening has been a little too successfully aped by Mel Brooks' High Anxiety for me to be really swayed by it, sadly (High Anxiety by the way, is the opposite of Spellbound as it falters after a promising start). Opening with Ingrid Bergman analysing the neurotic, misanthropic Mary Carmichael (played with relish as a latter day Countess Dracula by Rhonda Fleming) we learn about Bergman's emotionless professionalism and you just know that her icy exterior is long overdue for being thawed by the right man. At this point Gregory Peck enters the fray- it is a wonderful set-up, the only disappointment being that the on-screen chemistry between them doesn't match that between her and Bogey or her and Cary Grant. Now, you can be churlish and criticise the idea of them falling in love in less time than it takes me to choose what socks to wear on a given day, but what's the point? I just consider that you accept it and see where the movie takes you and- if it is a flop- use it as a stick to beat with later. And so the scene where Peck and Bergman first meet sees them both in close-up; her in soft-focus him depicted with the hard lines of a real man, Miklós Rózsa strikes up the string section and the whole thing is sorted in the minds of the audience. I would usually hate this but what I find forgivable about it- praiseworthy even- is that Hitchcock is simply getting the romantic interlude out of the way as efficiently as possible in order to get on with the thriller. The scene proceeds to do just that as a neurotic and agitated Peck- who has already been depicted as "much younger than I imagined" and being very vague on the subject of his most recently published book- overreacts furiously to Bergman drawing a picture by tracing her fork upon the table linen. There you go in one scene Bergman and Peck have fallen in love and Hitchcock has flattered the audience that they're so smart knowing that he isn't who he says he is. Brilliant.
The plot proceeds apace, frosty analyst turned giddy schoolgirl Bergman is enraptured by Peck (has anyone in celluloid history attempted to say the word 'liverwurst' seductively before?) and they kiss in his room. Now, I'm a little uncomfortable with one of Hitchcock's conceits here- close-ups of his eyes and then her eyes are followed by a graphic of doors opening. It's all just a little too literal, or is because of the intervening years? Have I been conditioned to demand more subtlety when that kind of pellucidity was precisely what contemporary audiences needed? I'll let it slide.
Right, so it becomes clear that not only is Gregory Peck not Dr Edwardes (odd spelling that) but that he may even have murdered Dr Edwardes and taken his place. Peck disappears but leaves a note under Bergman's door leading to a brilliant scene where several policemen and psychiatrists are standing just inside her doorway on the note which she can see but they haven't yet noticed. The tension is maintained superbly for what seems like an age before Bergman is able to retrieve the note- unbearably it is handed to her by Dr Murchison (Leo G. Carroll)- and follow Peck to a hotel in New York. From there, in typical Hitchcock fashion, the chase is on. Peck and Bergman are always- by design or by good fortune- half a step ahead of the police as she tries to break through his psychological blockages and prove his undoubted innocence ("I couldn't love a man who is capable of such crimes" she says, well that's all there is to it then). At the same time Peck has no real belief in his innocence and while the audience can't really believe he did it- he's the hero for crying out loud- it is the most obvious and likely explanation for it all. And to amplify that doubt Hitchcock shows us flashes of Peck's temper, frames him with a cut-throat razor and a zombie-like stare and casts doubt upon his story left, right and centre.
Bergman takes Peck to the home of her psychoanalytical mentor Dr Brulov (Michael Checkov, the best performer on show by a country mile) and while they wait for him to return with two strangers it becomes apparent that the men are policemen investigating the death of Edwardes. Trapped, unable to even communicate both are struck dumb with terror as the policemen chat affably throwing their unease into even sharper contrast- it is the best sequence of the film- and the tension continues until Dr Brulov returns. The policemen, it transpires, are unaware of Peck and Bergman's supposed implication in the murder and are merely there to investigate the professional tension between Brulov and Edwardes which had almost escalated ino violence recently. Now this is really clever, if this was a whodunnit the smart money would be straight on Brulov- especially when it becomes clear that he knows far more about Peck and Bergman's arrival than he had initially indicated. Seeing Peck with the razor Dr Brulov talks to him calmly and offers him a glass of milk. He's drugged him- with milk! As if he was B.A. Baracus or something. Brilliant. "I ain't getting on no psychoanalyst's couch fool!".
When Peck awakes, he recounts his dreams for the two Doctors to analyse and here we enter the most famous (and most unaccountably derided) sequence of the film- the Hitchcock/Dali dream sequence. Okay, so a four year old could analyse the 'hidden' meanings (whoever could the mysterious 'Proprieter' be?) it doesn't matter- what is important is the beauty of the sequence and, most importantly of all, the sheer chutzpah of its inclusion. I'd defend this until my dying breath- if only more filmmakers had Hitchcock's balls!
The climactic sequence of the film is filmed dramatically as Bergman desperately tries to undo her act of inadvertently convincing Peck and the policemen of his guilt- she is shown in stark monochrome uplit against dark backgrounds frenzied and hopeless. And then, when all hope is lost, the truth falls into her lap by chance. Agatha Christie once said "if you want to know who the murderer is in any crime novel, pick the most unlikely character. He did it" and that holds true here. Admittedly it isn't the most unlikely person on screen, the fat cockney feller getting out of a lift in a brief cameo has absolutely no chance of reappearing, it is a convincing and plausible ending which gives Hitchcock an excuse for one last piece of bravura film-making, the big hand.
Oh it isn't a perfect film, the ski-ing sequence (for example) is dreadfully executed and a lot of the great things here- especially the framing of Gregory Peck as a did-he didn't-he murderer would be far better realised in Psycho but for the tension, for Rózsa's great score (love that theremin work), for the brief-but-brilliant childhood memory sequence and for the breathless and intriguing narrative I loved it.
Mickey’s Christmas Carol (1983)
I watch this with my wife every year. It’s a fun and seasonal way to pass a half an hour. It’s neither as good or as poor as Disney is capable of. Scrooge McDuck is an obvious choice for Ebeneezer Scrooge (at one point he is referred to as ‘an Englishman’ which won’t go down well in Caledonia), Mickey Mouse is Bob Cratchit and Jiminy Cricket, Willie the Giant and that strange evil dog thing are the three Ghosts.
The best bit is when Willie the Giant (The Ghost of Christmas Present) takes Ebeneezer stomping through the streets to Bob Cratchitt’s house, removing the top of a lamppost to make a torch and lifting rooftops to check inside. It’s the only bit of creativity and stands out a mile.
The best bit is when Willie the Giant (The Ghost of Christmas Present) takes Ebeneezer stomping through the streets to Bob Cratchitt’s house, removing the top of a lamppost to make a torch and lifting rooftops to check inside. It’s the only bit of creativity and stands out a mile.
Scrooge (1951)
It was up against it this one.
I’ve been Christmas shopping all day and have had the festive spirit bashed out of me by the elbows of people keen to get the last remaining items at WHSmiths. On top of that I’ve already seen one version of the story today. The only copy of this film I own is a bizarrely colourised version (underpaid clerk Bob Cratchitt has a sky blue top hat!) with appalling sound quality. And it is probably the most well-known modern story of them all, so surprises are out of the question.
But it delivered wonderfully. Alastair Sim gives a career-best performance as Ebeneezer Scrooge. The difficulty of the part is in getting the balance right between the malevolent and the joyful, pacing the change in Scrooge’s demeanour (so often Scrooge seems to have changed as soon as he sees Marley’s ghost). Sim does this wonderfully and the pathos with which he delivers the key scene- “I fear you more than any spectre I have met tonight! But even in my fear, I must say that I am too old! I cannot change! I cannot! It’s not that I’m inpenitent, it’s just… Wouldn’t it be better if I just went home to bed?”- is truly memorable.
And yet, though, he carries the weight of the film there is far more here to enjoy than Sim’s bravura performance. There is a wonderful scene where Tiny Tim elicits great joy from watching the Victorian-era clockwork toys through the window of a toyshop (Tim’s teeth, by the way, are possibly the maddest set of movie gnashers since Max Schreck’s). The much-underrated Michael Hordern gives a melodramatic turn as Marley’s ghost- and a very subtle Jacob Marley in the flashback scene. George Cole is believable as the embittered young Ebeneezer. Kathleen Harrison (as Mrs Dilber, the Housekeeper) leads a fine supporting cast of alienated acquaintances eager to exploit Scrooge’s death- you simply don’t feel any anger at their ghoulish acts.
The closing of the story- where Scrooge finds redemption- is conveyed by a dizzyingly excitable Sim dancing, singing and (failing in his attempt at) doing a handstand and is a scene of unrestricted joy. It even contains a great goof with a member of the crew poking his head into shot via a mirror. Several times.
There are faults- Scrooge’s nephew Fred (Brian Worth) is like a hypnotised Keanu Reeves, for instance- but they are minor. Overall, it’s a hugely enjoyable film, a Christmas great and Alastair Sim is the definitive cinematic Scrooge.
I’ve been Christmas shopping all day and have had the festive spirit bashed out of me by the elbows of people keen to get the last remaining items at WHSmiths. On top of that I’ve already seen one version of the story today. The only copy of this film I own is a bizarrely colourised version (underpaid clerk Bob Cratchitt has a sky blue top hat!) with appalling sound quality. And it is probably the most well-known modern story of them all, so surprises are out of the question.
But it delivered wonderfully. Alastair Sim gives a career-best performance as Ebeneezer Scrooge. The difficulty of the part is in getting the balance right between the malevolent and the joyful, pacing the change in Scrooge’s demeanour (so often Scrooge seems to have changed as soon as he sees Marley’s ghost). Sim does this wonderfully and the pathos with which he delivers the key scene- “I fear you more than any spectre I have met tonight! But even in my fear, I must say that I am too old! I cannot change! I cannot! It’s not that I’m inpenitent, it’s just… Wouldn’t it be better if I just went home to bed?”- is truly memorable.
And yet, though, he carries the weight of the film there is far more here to enjoy than Sim’s bravura performance. There is a wonderful scene where Tiny Tim elicits great joy from watching the Victorian-era clockwork toys through the window of a toyshop (Tim’s teeth, by the way, are possibly the maddest set of movie gnashers since Max Schreck’s). The much-underrated Michael Hordern gives a melodramatic turn as Marley’s ghost- and a very subtle Jacob Marley in the flashback scene. George Cole is believable as the embittered young Ebeneezer. Kathleen Harrison (as Mrs Dilber, the Housekeeper) leads a fine supporting cast of alienated acquaintances eager to exploit Scrooge’s death- you simply don’t feel any anger at their ghoulish acts.
The closing of the story- where Scrooge finds redemption- is conveyed by a dizzyingly excitable Sim dancing, singing and (failing in his attempt at) doing a handstand and is a scene of unrestricted joy. It even contains a great goof with a member of the crew poking his head into shot via a mirror. Several times.
There are faults- Scrooge’s nephew Fred (Brian Worth) is like a hypnotised Keanu Reeves, for instance- but they are minor. Overall, it’s a hugely enjoyable film, a Christmas great and Alastair Sim is the definitive cinematic Scrooge.
Wednesday 9 December 2009
Top 5 Famous Person Anagrams
Caster Semenya – Yes! A secret man
Virginia Bottomley – I’m an evil Tory bigot
Nigel Lawson – We all sign-on
Michael Barrymore – I’m a merry bachelor
Eric Clapton – Narcoleptic
Virginia Bottomley – I’m an evil Tory bigot
Nigel Lawson – We all sign-on
Michael Barrymore – I’m a merry bachelor
Eric Clapton – Narcoleptic
Tuesday 8 December 2009
Jules et Jim (1962)
I think I can understand why Jules et Jim is revered by some and reviled by others. It is a film which doesn’t make a great deal of sense rationally and, in many ways, I can imagine its modernist extra-contextual content could be construed as pretentious. Truffaut’s film centres on three flawed characters and proceeds to examine the nature and shift of their relationships. So, yes, I can also imagine people thinking that it is conceptually arid. And some of the dialogue is barmy- “Your breasts are the only grenades I love” being a particularly fine example of that. There is plenty here that critics can get their teeth into. But they’re missing the beauty of the film. It is high art, no doubt. But it is also- and this is something I feel that the main film-makers of the Nouvelle Vague usually got spot on- breezy and whimsical and entertaining and pacy and endearing.
If I was to examine the film as a purely intellectual piece, I would focus upon its exploration of conflicting love: when romantic and fraternal love come into conflict; when a person loves two people or two people love a single person; when a person loves another so much that he will endure any heartbreak not to lose her; when being in love becomes fraternal love, etc. I would also look at the film in the context of the time it was made rather than the setting, to see Catherine’s matriarchal dominance as a reflection of the French feminist movement and read her impulsive free spiritedness as a signifier of liberation from male dominance in a wider context. I would consider the way in which Truffaut objectifies Catherine as an ideal woman- and how that idealism includes the capacity for great cruelty and selfishness. I might also consider what the film has to say about the affection between Jules (the German) and Jim (the Frenchman) which is their overriding concern during the war and whether this speaks of a deeper humanist disdain for national identity and patriotism- or is simply a commentary upon the fractious state of Europe during the preceding half a century. I would also wonder about the significance of the breezy nostalgic mood which is interrupted by the harsh realities of a stupid and futile war.
On the other hand, if I was to consider the film technically I would be looking at Truffaut’s choice of camera angles and the fluid style he utilises- which would certainly have been innovative at the time. I would consider the lighting and how this impacts upon the mood of the film- enhancing the breeziness I spoke of earlier. I would be interested to understand more about the decision to move the films narrative (successfully, I may add) at such breathtaking pace and the exclusion of all details not pertaining to the main thrust of the story. I would discuss the success of the narrator as a device to achieve these aims. I would focus upon some of Truffaut’s little conceits- the intermittent freeze-frames which say to the viewer “I want you to remember this just as it is now” and especially the visual objectification of Jeanne Moreau.
But you know what, pretentious little twat though I may tend to be, I ignore all of these things and just focus on the beautiful whimsical representation of deep affectionate relationships centred around impulsiveness and the desire to be happy. And I really enjoy Jules et Jim on that basis.
If I was to examine the film as a purely intellectual piece, I would focus upon its exploration of conflicting love: when romantic and fraternal love come into conflict; when a person loves two people or two people love a single person; when a person loves another so much that he will endure any heartbreak not to lose her; when being in love becomes fraternal love, etc. I would also look at the film in the context of the time it was made rather than the setting, to see Catherine’s matriarchal dominance as a reflection of the French feminist movement and read her impulsive free spiritedness as a signifier of liberation from male dominance in a wider context. I would consider the way in which Truffaut objectifies Catherine as an ideal woman- and how that idealism includes the capacity for great cruelty and selfishness. I might also consider what the film has to say about the affection between Jules (the German) and Jim (the Frenchman) which is their overriding concern during the war and whether this speaks of a deeper humanist disdain for national identity and patriotism- or is simply a commentary upon the fractious state of Europe during the preceding half a century. I would also wonder about the significance of the breezy nostalgic mood which is interrupted by the harsh realities of a stupid and futile war.
On the other hand, if I was to consider the film technically I would be looking at Truffaut’s choice of camera angles and the fluid style he utilises- which would certainly have been innovative at the time. I would consider the lighting and how this impacts upon the mood of the film- enhancing the breeziness I spoke of earlier. I would be interested to understand more about the decision to move the films narrative (successfully, I may add) at such breathtaking pace and the exclusion of all details not pertaining to the main thrust of the story. I would discuss the success of the narrator as a device to achieve these aims. I would focus upon some of Truffaut’s little conceits- the intermittent freeze-frames which say to the viewer “I want you to remember this just as it is now” and especially the visual objectification of Jeanne Moreau.
But you know what, pretentious little twat though I may tend to be, I ignore all of these things and just focus on the beautiful whimsical representation of deep affectionate relationships centred around impulsiveness and the desire to be happy. And I really enjoy Jules et Jim on that basis.
Monday 7 December 2009
Stranger than Paradise (1984)
What I absolutely love about Jarmusch films is the fact that he shows bored people doing nothing and it looks so fucking appealing. Way before the Richard Linklater/Kurt Cobain/Grunge slacker fad of the 1990s, Jarmusch was filling the screen with slacker icons. Only in way cooler threads.
I watched Down By Law for the first time the other day and, reviewing the storyline on here, used seven words. This film takes nine: three people drift together, drift around then drift apart. The narrative idea- to take a staple dramatic device (chancing upon a stash of criminals’ cash and taking it) and place it at the climax rather than the outset- is interesting but downplayed. Plot is not important here.
There are lots of still, silent shots of people sat doing nothing. It is a beautiful film of dull subjects. The mundanity of the protaganists’ lives, their lack of direction or aspiration is writ large. If I could have anyone make the film of my ridiculous, nondescript life I’d want a Jim Jarmusch film. His style and vision would make the rundown, grime of West Bromwich look like the place it still is in my head.
The main character of the three Bela/Willie is played beautifully by John Lurie. He looks great, like Belmondo in ‘À Bout de Souffle’, but his hipster style is betrayed by his bemoaning the repeated airings of Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ ‘I Put A Spell On You’. The style is superficial, it doesn’t matter to him. Nothing does. This is reinforced by the aping of his style by Eddie (Richard Edson) he wants the look to be like Willie, but he’s not like Willie. The third main player is Eva, a recently arrived Hungarian emigree, played by Eszter Balint. She is the coolest of the three, but that’s no great praise really. She looks square but is a bit more self-assured (though this is only once acknowledged, by Willie when she’s- presumably- shoplifted some groceries) while the other two protagonists look cool but lack any verve or drive.
Stylistically, thematically, visually this is a classic. The character arc I’d have hoped for doesn’t happen though- a fucking shame.
I watched Down By Law for the first time the other day and, reviewing the storyline on here, used seven words. This film takes nine: three people drift together, drift around then drift apart. The narrative idea- to take a staple dramatic device (chancing upon a stash of criminals’ cash and taking it) and place it at the climax rather than the outset- is interesting but downplayed. Plot is not important here.
There are lots of still, silent shots of people sat doing nothing. It is a beautiful film of dull subjects. The mundanity of the protaganists’ lives, their lack of direction or aspiration is writ large. If I could have anyone make the film of my ridiculous, nondescript life I’d want a Jim Jarmusch film. His style and vision would make the rundown, grime of West Bromwich look like the place it still is in my head.
The main character of the three Bela/Willie is played beautifully by John Lurie. He looks great, like Belmondo in ‘À Bout de Souffle’, but his hipster style is betrayed by his bemoaning the repeated airings of Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ ‘I Put A Spell On You’. The style is superficial, it doesn’t matter to him. Nothing does. This is reinforced by the aping of his style by Eddie (Richard Edson) he wants the look to be like Willie, but he’s not like Willie. The third main player is Eva, a recently arrived Hungarian emigree, played by Eszter Balint. She is the coolest of the three, but that’s no great praise really. She looks square but is a bit more self-assured (though this is only once acknowledged, by Willie when she’s- presumably- shoplifted some groceries) while the other two protagonists look cool but lack any verve or drive.
Stylistically, thematically, visually this is a classic. The character arc I’d have hoped for doesn’t happen though- a fucking shame.
Damien: Omen II (1978)
Whoo-hoo! An overblown horror sequel, I haven’t watched one of these since I started recording my thoughts on here. I love and hate these in equal measure because they tend to be entertainingly and depressingly mindless. Again in equal measure. All of the ingredients are in place- a Hollywood great in a lead role (in this case William Holden), an over-the-top musical score by Jerry Goldsmith and a ludicrous plot which touches only occasionally on plausibility and is designed to facilitate increasingly garish and lurid deaths- the Omen series seems to specialise in decapitations.
Okay, on with the ludicrous plot. Damien- the devil’s son- has killed everyone who came to suspect his true identity and is being raised by his wealthy uncle. In the first film a black dog appeared whenever someone was about to die, I think the dog must’ve already had filming commitments for another movie as this most pivotal of roles has now been taken by a crow. It works like this- a scene looks normal, the crow appears, bombastic music begins playing, someone who suspects Damien’s true identity dies. In fact, one bloke dies just for trying to stop one of Damien’s acolytes (a bloke off Falcon Crest) from restricting the supply of foods to starving nations.
The deaths are the reason that people go to see these things and they range from the sublime (a Doctor finds that Damien has the cell structure of a jackal and takes a lift pressing to go down but the elevator has other ideas and takes the doctor to the top floor before plummeting at great speed causing the Doctor to be chopped in half as he lies on the floor) to the ridiculous (A reporter in a fabulous red coat tries to warn Damien’s adopted parents after seeing his face in a painting by a thirteenth century prophet- she is blinded by the crow in a fantastically unrealistic scene and staggers in front of a huge juggernaut which she seemingly can’t hear and which doesn’t stop after turning her into roadkill).
My favourite, though, is the opening scene where Rumpole of the Bailey and the bloke who Michael Caine chases down by the slagheaps in Get Carter are crushed by a falling roof after seeing a painting of the devil that supposedly looks like Damien. It doesn't really, this is Damien:
and this is the painting:
Come on, it looks far more like Juliette Lewis!
Anyway, the best part of the film is when a growing number of people learn of Damien’s secret identity. William Holden is already having serious doubts- I expect being told that your adopted son has the same cell structure as a jackal would do that to you- and an employee of Holden’s gets hold of Rumpole’s evidence (dug out of the collapsed archaeological site) and rushes to tell him. Holden refuses to listen but his son Mark- Damien’s closest friend- overhears and is convinced. Damien’s adopted mother is told by Holden what has gone on but doesn’t believe it.
Now that there are at least three possible candidates for the morgue, the pressure is really cranking up – it’s like eviction night in the Big Brother house. Who will get offed first? And how? The deaths have been increasingly elaborate and exciting, can it get any better than being bisected on an elevator floor? No. Of course it can’t. It was silly to even hope for it.
Mark goes out for a walk in the snow and is followed by Damien (and an ominous orchestra). They argue when Mark refuses to join The Devil’s gang and then the music stops while Damien tortures him by looking at him till his ears hurt and he falls down dead. A-ha I was right, they blew the budget on the lift scene as there are no special effects at all- not even music- just a kid clasping his hands to his ears and then falling over. Wank. Total wank.
Anyway, they all have to go now that they know- William Holden goes to visit his employee wearing a Burberry scarf and together they look at the thirteenth century painting which has been loaded onto a train. As he waits outside, the employee is crushed between a runaway train and a stationary one. William has seen the painting and seen the dead man. He knows that Damien is the son of The Devil and rushes back to meet his wife and Damien at the museum where the knives that Gregory Peck tried to kill Damien with in the original are held. Now I’d have fucking legged it sharpish but that’s why William Holden is a matinee idol and I’m a movie freak- he’s got king-sized balls and he doesn’t sweat killing Beelzebub in front of the devil’s adopted mother. But she stabs him dead first with the sarcastic words “there are your daggers”. She’d make a good James Bond. if she wasn’t in league with the devil- who also happens to be her son. Anyway, in gratitude Damien burns her and the museum to the ground. So now that everyone bar Damien is dead, the evidence is destroyed and the only weapons that can kill him are gone up in flames the film ends. Good.
It’s preposterous and it’s supposed to be but it’s just not unsettling and it’s supposed to be. The original combined both with aplomb. Getting it half-right isn't good enough. Getting the wrong half right is worse.
Okay, on with the ludicrous plot. Damien- the devil’s son- has killed everyone who came to suspect his true identity and is being raised by his wealthy uncle. In the first film a black dog appeared whenever someone was about to die, I think the dog must’ve already had filming commitments for another movie as this most pivotal of roles has now been taken by a crow. It works like this- a scene looks normal, the crow appears, bombastic music begins playing, someone who suspects Damien’s true identity dies. In fact, one bloke dies just for trying to stop one of Damien’s acolytes (a bloke off Falcon Crest) from restricting the supply of foods to starving nations.
The deaths are the reason that people go to see these things and they range from the sublime (a Doctor finds that Damien has the cell structure of a jackal and takes a lift pressing to go down but the elevator has other ideas and takes the doctor to the top floor before plummeting at great speed causing the Doctor to be chopped in half as he lies on the floor) to the ridiculous (A reporter in a fabulous red coat tries to warn Damien’s adopted parents after seeing his face in a painting by a thirteenth century prophet- she is blinded by the crow in a fantastically unrealistic scene and staggers in front of a huge juggernaut which she seemingly can’t hear and which doesn’t stop after turning her into roadkill).
My favourite, though, is the opening scene where Rumpole of the Bailey and the bloke who Michael Caine chases down by the slagheaps in Get Carter are crushed by a falling roof after seeing a painting of the devil that supposedly looks like Damien. It doesn't really, this is Damien:
and this is the painting:
Come on, it looks far more like Juliette Lewis!
Anyway, the best part of the film is when a growing number of people learn of Damien’s secret identity. William Holden is already having serious doubts- I expect being told that your adopted son has the same cell structure as a jackal would do that to you- and an employee of Holden’s gets hold of Rumpole’s evidence (dug out of the collapsed archaeological site) and rushes to tell him. Holden refuses to listen but his son Mark- Damien’s closest friend- overhears and is convinced. Damien’s adopted mother is told by Holden what has gone on but doesn’t believe it.
Now that there are at least three possible candidates for the morgue, the pressure is really cranking up – it’s like eviction night in the Big Brother house. Who will get offed first? And how? The deaths have been increasingly elaborate and exciting, can it get any better than being bisected on an elevator floor? No. Of course it can’t. It was silly to even hope for it.
Mark goes out for a walk in the snow and is followed by Damien (and an ominous orchestra). They argue when Mark refuses to join The Devil’s gang and then the music stops while Damien tortures him by looking at him till his ears hurt and he falls down dead. A-ha I was right, they blew the budget on the lift scene as there are no special effects at all- not even music- just a kid clasping his hands to his ears and then falling over. Wank. Total wank.
Anyway, they all have to go now that they know- William Holden goes to visit his employee wearing a Burberry scarf and together they look at the thirteenth century painting which has been loaded onto a train. As he waits outside, the employee is crushed between a runaway train and a stationary one. William has seen the painting and seen the dead man. He knows that Damien is the son of The Devil and rushes back to meet his wife and Damien at the museum where the knives that Gregory Peck tried to kill Damien with in the original are held. Now I’d have fucking legged it sharpish but that’s why William Holden is a matinee idol and I’m a movie freak- he’s got king-sized balls and he doesn’t sweat killing Beelzebub in front of the devil’s adopted mother. But she stabs him dead first with the sarcastic words “there are your daggers”. She’d make a good James Bond. if she wasn’t in league with the devil- who also happens to be her son. Anyway, in gratitude Damien burns her and the museum to the ground. So now that everyone bar Damien is dead, the evidence is destroyed and the only weapons that can kill him are gone up in flames the film ends. Good.
It’s preposterous and it’s supposed to be but it’s just not unsettling and it’s supposed to be. The original combined both with aplomb. Getting it half-right isn't good enough. Getting the wrong half right is worse.
A Night at the Opera (1935)
A quick note for my memory because it’s late and I’m tired and I’m all giggled out. I’ve always found the Marx Brothers to be horribly overrated- Groucho is hilarious but Harpo’s cute goofball act irritated me and Chico always struck me as superfluous. Admittedly, I’d only seen bits of their movies but they didn’t leave me wanting more.
Tonight during the semi-serious musical interlude scene, after Chico’s gleeful piano recital, with Harpo sat at the, ahem, harp I suddenly got it. Without my consent and by some devious and insidious double-dealing I realised that I had been and was being entertained. Somewhere, somehow I must have had preconceptions of the Marx Brothers holding me back and they had been shattered. It’s funny but that’s human nature, no doubt some offhand comment at an impressionable age left its indelible mark upon me- like the scar from a childhood tree-climbing mishap- and I’d had my guard up all of this time. ¡Sono un idiota!
Like all great comedy films, this is cleverly paced-out- a breathlessly funny scene like the Groucho/Chico contract negotiation (“That’s what they call a sanity clause.” “You can’t fool me! There ain’t no Sanity Claus!”) being followed by a the liner boarding scene and Allen Jones and Kitty Carlisle’s rendition of the song ‘Alone’. It also features some great second-string performances from Margaret Dumont and Sig Ruman.
The gags come in all forms from slapstick to the very subtle, both verbally and visually, some side-splitting and some excruciating but all funny in their own way. I enjoyed it, I really enjoyed it.
Tonight during the semi-serious musical interlude scene, after Chico’s gleeful piano recital, with Harpo sat at the, ahem, harp I suddenly got it. Without my consent and by some devious and insidious double-dealing I realised that I had been and was being entertained. Somewhere, somehow I must have had preconceptions of the Marx Brothers holding me back and they had been shattered. It’s funny but that’s human nature, no doubt some offhand comment at an impressionable age left its indelible mark upon me- like the scar from a childhood tree-climbing mishap- and I’d had my guard up all of this time. ¡Sono un idiota!
Like all great comedy films, this is cleverly paced-out- a breathlessly funny scene like the Groucho/Chico contract negotiation (“That’s what they call a sanity clause.” “You can’t fool me! There ain’t no Sanity Claus!”) being followed by a the liner boarding scene and Allen Jones and Kitty Carlisle’s rendition of the song ‘Alone’. It also features some great second-string performances from Margaret Dumont and Sig Ruman.
The gags come in all forms from slapstick to the very subtle, both verbally and visually, some side-splitting and some excruciating but all funny in their own way. I enjoyed it, I really enjoyed it.
Saturday 5 December 2009
Thursday 3 December 2009
A Serious Man (2009)
"Receive everything that happens to you with simplicity"
I've seen this twice in three days. It's entertaining and intriguing in equal measure and as its bafflingly short run at my local cinema ended tonight I had to see it again. I'm not Jewish. I don't know much about the faith. It didn't really matter the way that I was worried at points that it would.
This harks back to the Coen's equally layered Barton Fink and is a refreshing improvement on the relatively weak Burn After Reading, if not near the standard of that film's predecessor No Country For Old Men. The plot is deceptively simple; set in 1967 it addresses a middle-aged man faced with tumultuous changes in his life and in the wider world, seeking the answer to the eternal question- what's it all about? Here's where the spoilers come in if you haven't seen it.
For me, the whole point of the film is that there is no hope of knowing what it's all about and, therefore, no point wondering about it. Life is to be lived and not analysed. The message is related again and again. The pre-credits story sets the mood- it is cryptic and unresolved. Was the visitor really a Dybbuk? Was the wife's belief in the supernatural misplaced or her husband's rationality? We don't know, how could we? It is a matter of faith; or of an absence of faith.
The film progresses in the same vein. The protagonist, played with a lightness that belies his earnestness, Michael Stuhlbarg faces a series of life-events that confound and damage him with great dignity and stoicism. Only once does he lose his temper at all, and that is in the privacy of his own car. He simply wants to know why he is being pushed and tested and harmed- what does God want from him? His search takes him to visit three Rabbis of increasing seniority and each, in their own way, conveys the message that there may not be a reason and if there is anyway, it will be beyond his understanding. Okay, so that isn't the most profound message any film has ever related, but it is funny and telling and probabbly true. Sy Abelman was a serious man, well he's dead; Lawrence Gopnik is- or has always tried to be- a serious man (in his own words) and where has that got him? Bobby McFerrin got the same message across in three minutes or so, but he didn't make you laugh and he didn't look as wonderful as this film does- props for Roger Deakins are, of course, compulsory in a Coens review.
The story of the goy's teeth, Schrodinger's cat, the dream where Gopnik intones "you may not understand it but you'll be responsible for it", Marshak repeating the Jeffersen Airplane lyrics, the opening scene, the quote which opens the film ("Receive everything that happens to you with simplicity"), dammit even the car park Larry. All the clues are there, if only you'll look for them. I've even forgotten a couple of lines I wanted to quote.
Maybe if I read the book of Job I wouldn't be convinced that Jefferson Airplane are the key to the whole thing. But I am.
"When the truth is found to be lies, and all the joy within you dies..."
I've seen this twice in three days. It's entertaining and intriguing in equal measure and as its bafflingly short run at my local cinema ended tonight I had to see it again. I'm not Jewish. I don't know much about the faith. It didn't really matter the way that I was worried at points that it would.
This harks back to the Coen's equally layered Barton Fink and is a refreshing improvement on the relatively weak Burn After Reading, if not near the standard of that film's predecessor No Country For Old Men. The plot is deceptively simple; set in 1967 it addresses a middle-aged man faced with tumultuous changes in his life and in the wider world, seeking the answer to the eternal question- what's it all about? Here's where the spoilers come in if you haven't seen it.
For me, the whole point of the film is that there is no hope of knowing what it's all about and, therefore, no point wondering about it. Life is to be lived and not analysed. The message is related again and again. The pre-credits story sets the mood- it is cryptic and unresolved. Was the visitor really a Dybbuk? Was the wife's belief in the supernatural misplaced or her husband's rationality? We don't know, how could we? It is a matter of faith; or of an absence of faith.
The film progresses in the same vein. The protagonist, played with a lightness that belies his earnestness, Michael Stuhlbarg faces a series of life-events that confound and damage him with great dignity and stoicism. Only once does he lose his temper at all, and that is in the privacy of his own car. He simply wants to know why he is being pushed and tested and harmed- what does God want from him? His search takes him to visit three Rabbis of increasing seniority and each, in their own way, conveys the message that there may not be a reason and if there is anyway, it will be beyond his understanding. Okay, so that isn't the most profound message any film has ever related, but it is funny and telling and probabbly true. Sy Abelman was a serious man, well he's dead; Lawrence Gopnik is- or has always tried to be- a serious man (in his own words) and where has that got him? Bobby McFerrin got the same message across in three minutes or so, but he didn't make you laugh and he didn't look as wonderful as this film does- props for Roger Deakins are, of course, compulsory in a Coens review.
The story of the goy's teeth, Schrodinger's cat, the dream where Gopnik intones "you may not understand it but you'll be responsible for it", Marshak repeating the Jeffersen Airplane lyrics, the opening scene, the quote which opens the film ("Receive everything that happens to you with simplicity"), dammit even the car park Larry. All the clues are there, if only you'll look for them. I've even forgotten a couple of lines I wanted to quote.
Maybe if I read the book of Job I wouldn't be convinced that Jefferson Airplane are the key to the whole thing. But I am.
"When the truth is found to be lies, and all the joy within you dies..."
Wednesday 2 December 2009
The Informant! (2009)
The world needs more films with exclamation marks in the title. What it doesn't need is another Catch Me If You Can/Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind/The Men Who Stare At Goats crazy-but-true recent history piece. Not for a while anyway. The Informant! isn't a disaster by any means, in fact it has a lot going for it, but it isn't actually very good.
Matt Damon, bulked up to look like John Candy's little brother doing a biopic of Sam Allardyce, gives it his all in the main role. Sadly giving it his all involves a lot of bemused standing around with his mouth gaping wide open like a Sesame Street puppet. But I can forgive anyone who tries.
Soderbergh, the director, doesn't pace the film well at all. Though a lot of story is necessarily kept for the fall-out in the last half an hour, that doesn't mean it has to drag for the first hour. The Informant! needed to be altogether more zippy. Added to that, the last half hour with its constant further revelations and mini-twists was little short of confused and that didn't work either. But there was a spell about three quarters of the way in that the film really got going and for a while it was great.
There's not a lot else to say really. It's mediocre but with promise. It probably suffers from being the last of a run of similar films. The best thing about the whole thing is sitcom regular Tony Hale's cameo as Damon's first lawyer. That's him below with Matt Damon. Aside from that, Scott Bakula is quietly capable as the lead FBI agent but his resemblence to the latter-years Mr Spock is off-putting, it's nice to see Back To The Future's Biff Tannen back in a big film (he's good actually) and the score has some nice nods to other spy capers in parts. Sadly the constant Matt Damon voice-over, which was actually one of the cleverest things about the script, is nonetheless irritating in the extreme. The word I used earlier was mediocre. And it is.
Matt Damon, bulked up to look like John Candy's little brother doing a biopic of Sam Allardyce, gives it his all in the main role. Sadly giving it his all involves a lot of bemused standing around with his mouth gaping wide open like a Sesame Street puppet. But I can forgive anyone who tries.
Soderbergh, the director, doesn't pace the film well at all. Though a lot of story is necessarily kept for the fall-out in the last half an hour, that doesn't mean it has to drag for the first hour. The Informant! needed to be altogether more zippy. Added to that, the last half hour with its constant further revelations and mini-twists was little short of confused and that didn't work either. But there was a spell about three quarters of the way in that the film really got going and for a while it was great.
There's not a lot else to say really. It's mediocre but with promise. It probably suffers from being the last of a run of similar films. The best thing about the whole thing is sitcom regular Tony Hale's cameo as Damon's first lawyer. That's him below with Matt Damon. Aside from that, Scott Bakula is quietly capable as the lead FBI agent but his resemblence to the latter-years Mr Spock is off-putting, it's nice to see Back To The Future's Biff Tannen back in a big film (he's good actually) and the score has some nice nods to other spy capers in parts. Sadly the constant Matt Damon voice-over, which was actually one of the cleverest things about the script, is nonetheless irritating in the extreme. The word I used earlier was mediocre. And it is.
Tuesday 1 December 2009
Bananas (1971)
It's funny, last week I was sulking because Topkapi is 'just entertainment'and tonight I got in from the gym exhausted and only wanted entertainment. LoveFilm again came up trumps with Bananas. I laughed my lungs up at times and was never less than entertained throughout the whole eighty-odd minutes.
I do tend to like short films, you know. I've spoken before about my admiration for economy and brutal editing and this film is a great example of that. The sheer number and variety of gags employed is staggering. At this point in his career, Allen was still very much in the thrall of the Marx Brothers- this film could be a homage to Duck Soup- and any serious points made here about the corrupting effect of power are purely incidental to the story.
Woody Allen's career followed a strange path from making madcap laugh-out loud comedies to cerebral wry smile comedies to bored expression films about dysfunctional people in dysfunctional relationships doing dysfunctional things- a bit simplistic maybe, but not too misleading. Here he's at his zany best. The storyline involves a sexually inept, bookish and neurotic Jewish New Yorker rebounding from a failed relationship (Allen, obviously) winding up leading a revolution in the South American republic of San Marcos and being named President there. So far, so dumb. This set-up allows Allen's imagination free-reign as we see sports reporter Howard Cosell commentating live on a Presidential assassination, Woody testing 'the Execusiser' a desk-based gym for people too busy to exercise, an incognito J. Edgar Hoover, a dream sequence involving a crucified Woody being reverse-parked by Nuns, a Battleship Potemkin skit, an advert where a Priest pushes New Testament cigarettes, the CIA sending US troops to fight on both sides of a revolution because they are afraid of being on the wrong side, Woody learning to be a guerrilla and pulling the pin from a grenade and throwing it (the pin!), Woody in the world's least convincing Castro beard. The characters involved, 2-D though they are, are hilarious- the charming despot, madcap revolutionary, paranoid FBI men, cause-of-the-month protester- they all provide great colour.
The range of humour, as I said, is important to the movie- it could have been a tedious series of prat-falls or of witty exchanges that grate. It is nicely balanced. My favourite gag of all was when Woody, trying to impress the activist Nancy says "for me the greatest crimes are the crimes against human dignity" and then falling down a manhole. Or the typically Woody exchange: "how am I immature?" "emotionally, sexually and intellectually" "yeah but in what other ways?". Even the music is great.
I think I'm rambling incoherently. I only make these notes so that I can look back and remember how I felt and this gibberish won't help at all. Suffice to say I really, really enjoyed it.
I do tend to like short films, you know. I've spoken before about my admiration for economy and brutal editing and this film is a great example of that. The sheer number and variety of gags employed is staggering. At this point in his career, Allen was still very much in the thrall of the Marx Brothers- this film could be a homage to Duck Soup- and any serious points made here about the corrupting effect of power are purely incidental to the story.
Woody Allen's career followed a strange path from making madcap laugh-out loud comedies to cerebral wry smile comedies to bored expression films about dysfunctional people in dysfunctional relationships doing dysfunctional things- a bit simplistic maybe, but not too misleading. Here he's at his zany best. The storyline involves a sexually inept, bookish and neurotic Jewish New Yorker rebounding from a failed relationship (Allen, obviously) winding up leading a revolution in the South American republic of San Marcos and being named President there. So far, so dumb. This set-up allows Allen's imagination free-reign as we see sports reporter Howard Cosell commentating live on a Presidential assassination, Woody testing 'the Execusiser' a desk-based gym for people too busy to exercise, an incognito J. Edgar Hoover, a dream sequence involving a crucified Woody being reverse-parked by Nuns, a Battleship Potemkin skit, an advert where a Priest pushes New Testament cigarettes, the CIA sending US troops to fight on both sides of a revolution because they are afraid of being on the wrong side, Woody learning to be a guerrilla and pulling the pin from a grenade and throwing it (the pin!), Woody in the world's least convincing Castro beard. The characters involved, 2-D though they are, are hilarious- the charming despot, madcap revolutionary, paranoid FBI men, cause-of-the-month protester- they all provide great colour.
The range of humour, as I said, is important to the movie- it could have been a tedious series of prat-falls or of witty exchanges that grate. It is nicely balanced. My favourite gag of all was when Woody, trying to impress the activist Nancy says "for me the greatest crimes are the crimes against human dignity" and then falling down a manhole. Or the typically Woody exchange: "how am I immature?" "emotionally, sexually and intellectually" "yeah but in what other ways?". Even the music is great.
I think I'm rambling incoherently. I only make these notes so that I can look back and remember how I felt and this gibberish won't help at all. Suffice to say I really, really enjoyed it.
Casino Royale by Ian Fleming
I have a smashing collection of Fleming's Bond novels that I picked up a couple of years ago for purely ornamental reasons which, due to the carnage that is our ongoing home renovations, ended up temporarily on my bedside table as I was looking for a new book to read. And so, I'm embarking upon reading the set and- if they're all like Casino Royale- that won't take long at all.
Casino Royale is barely more than a novella in truth and seems to act as a planned precursor to greater adventures yet to come, in the same way that the film of Dr No went to great lengths to introduce peripheral characters who were expected to recur in the planned film series. The action opens in medias res and grabs the attention immediately. The writing style is spare and indeed sparse; descriptive without a flourish. The novel moves through a little backstory and then back to the action. The centre-piece of the whole thing is the casino showdown between Bond and Le Chiffre and this is gripping stuff indeed. Sadly, far more so than the dramatic events which follow and seem hugely anti-climactic and ill-conceived.
It is impossible, for me at least, to separate the books from the films and so in my mind's eye I see and hear Sean Connery as I read. But the Bond of this novel has none of Connery's self-assurance or wit (let's not discuss Roger fucking Moore, eh?). Here Bond is driven and dark, then haunted by the events of the book and finally steely and poised. It's not much of a character arc, and what there is of it is unconvincing- romance really isn't Fleming's bag- but that's hardly the point of the novel.
It is a page-turner, it is thrilling in parts, Bond is an engaging anti-hero (his fallibility is of far more interest than efficiency) but his chauvinism is supported and, indeed, reinforced by the author and it grates. In fact the poor section which follows the epic casino battle appears designed to do so. Apparently Fleming wrote this as he planned his own wedding; lucky girl. When Bond thinks aloud "These blithering women who thought they could do a man's work. Why the hell couldn't they stay at home and mind their pots and pans and stick to their frocks and gossip and leave men's work to the men?" the action plays out in support of this. The girl is the cause of the problem, she does inerfere, is out of her depth and does lead to tragic (though sadly all-too-predictable) consequences. And there's the rub; to lend Bond a humanity and reality, Fleming resorts to flabby cliché. A shame.
I hope that now we've got through the preamble, Fleming can concentrate on what he's good at. When he's good, he's enjoyable and disposable; when he's bad, he's insulting.
Casino Royale is barely more than a novella in truth and seems to act as a planned precursor to greater adventures yet to come, in the same way that the film of Dr No went to great lengths to introduce peripheral characters who were expected to recur in the planned film series. The action opens in medias res and grabs the attention immediately. The writing style is spare and indeed sparse; descriptive without a flourish. The novel moves through a little backstory and then back to the action. The centre-piece of the whole thing is the casino showdown between Bond and Le Chiffre and this is gripping stuff indeed. Sadly, far more so than the dramatic events which follow and seem hugely anti-climactic and ill-conceived.
It is impossible, for me at least, to separate the books from the films and so in my mind's eye I see and hear Sean Connery as I read. But the Bond of this novel has none of Connery's self-assurance or wit (let's not discuss Roger fucking Moore, eh?). Here Bond is driven and dark, then haunted by the events of the book and finally steely and poised. It's not much of a character arc, and what there is of it is unconvincing- romance really isn't Fleming's bag- but that's hardly the point of the novel.
It is a page-turner, it is thrilling in parts, Bond is an engaging anti-hero (his fallibility is of far more interest than efficiency) but his chauvinism is supported and, indeed, reinforced by the author and it grates. In fact the poor section which follows the epic casino battle appears designed to do so. Apparently Fleming wrote this as he planned his own wedding; lucky girl. When Bond thinks aloud "These blithering women who thought they could do a man's work. Why the hell couldn't they stay at home and mind their pots and pans and stick to their frocks and gossip and leave men's work to the men?" the action plays out in support of this. The girl is the cause of the problem, she does inerfere, is out of her depth and does lead to tragic (though sadly all-too-predictable) consequences. And there's the rub; to lend Bond a humanity and reality, Fleming resorts to flabby cliché. A shame.
I hope that now we've got through the preamble, Fleming can concentrate on what he's good at. When he's good, he's enjoyable and disposable; when he's bad, he's insulting.
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