Monday 20 September 2004
I'm going to miss Chris Patten
"Is the world today safer than before the overthrow of the appalling Saddam?" Patten asked in the European parliament last week. "Is global terrorism in retreat? Are we closer to building bridges between Islam and the west? Is the world's only super-power more widely respected? Have the citizens in our democracies been treated in a way that will encourage them to give governments the benefit of the doubt next time they are told that force needs to be used pre-emptively to deal with an imminent threat? I simply pose the questions. The answers are well known."
Monday 13 September 2004
Gladiator
"What we do in life echoes in eternity." Unfortunately probably not for this slightly underwhelming film. Why did it win so many Oscars? Why did Russell Crowe win an Oscar for this when he has done much better work?
I want to talk about something that bugs me with modern films. Maybe I am the only one who notices this? The fight scenes were completely spoiled by the editing and the camera work. Everything was done in close up, each shot took only a couple of frames and they seemed to shoot everything on digital camera, which means that there is no blur in each frame. This gives an extremely disjointed effect overall and for me completely destroys any flow or grace to the fight scenes. There is no impression of choreography or strategy to the fight scenes. It completely destroyed any excitement I have for the fight scenes. Nothing works or connects with this style of editing and shooting. Doesn't anyone else see this?
The special effects were pretty cheesy too in this film. It comes back to the same old gripe I always have. Previously good model work works even if you know it's a model, but so far this has never been the case for CGI effects. In fact the only place it works is in an entirely CGI film such as Shrek, where there is no mix of live and CGI action. Ancient Rome was unconvincing to me.
I like Russell Crowe a lot, especially his early work in Australia – you only have to watch two films (Romper Stomper and The Sum of Us) to understand his range, skill and humanity. But this was just a low key performance. Where the film did score full marks was the use of the three wonderful, now sadly no longer with us, great British (well, of the British Isles) actors – Richard Harris, Oliver Reed and David Hemmings. All sadly missed.
The narrative was terribly linear and doesn't stand up to the great epics of the 50s and 60s. This film was not the promised renaissance of the genre.
I want to talk about something that bugs me with modern films. Maybe I am the only one who notices this? The fight scenes were completely spoiled by the editing and the camera work. Everything was done in close up, each shot took only a couple of frames and they seemed to shoot everything on digital camera, which means that there is no blur in each frame. This gives an extremely disjointed effect overall and for me completely destroys any flow or grace to the fight scenes. There is no impression of choreography or strategy to the fight scenes. It completely destroyed any excitement I have for the fight scenes. Nothing works or connects with this style of editing and shooting. Doesn't anyone else see this?
The special effects were pretty cheesy too in this film. It comes back to the same old gripe I always have. Previously good model work works even if you know it's a model, but so far this has never been the case for CGI effects. In fact the only place it works is in an entirely CGI film such as Shrek, where there is no mix of live and CGI action. Ancient Rome was unconvincing to me.
I like Russell Crowe a lot, especially his early work in Australia – you only have to watch two films (Romper Stomper and The Sum of Us) to understand his range, skill and humanity. But this was just a low key performance. Where the film did score full marks was the use of the three wonderful, now sadly no longer with us, great British (well, of the British Isles) actors – Richard Harris, Oliver Reed and David Hemmings. All sadly missed.
The narrative was terribly linear and doesn't stand up to the great epics of the 50s and 60s. This film was not the promised renaissance of the genre.
Friday 10 September 2004
Book of Job / Talking of Pelham
The Italian Job
The archetypal cheesy cheeky cockney crime caper. I have to say finally that this film is a bit disappointing. The best section by far is the opening titles. As Matt Munro croons away at Quincy Jones' and Don Black's peerlessly cool “On days like these,” we see Rossano Brazzi (a peerlessly cool name), cigarette hanging louchely from his lips, expensive sunglasses against the glare of the snow, handling his Lamborghini through the Italian Alps. This has to be the best, coolest title sequence from the 60s, or maybe ever.
It all goes a bit downhill after this. There are some nice touches – Benny Hill's line, “if only people could be more like flowers,” is as touching as it is bizarre. Noel Coward has a wonderful jawline, shown to best effect when he is unexpectedly confronted by Michael Caine in the prison toilets. Marvellous. Caine's character shagging multiple girls at the same time is a nod to the permissive 60s, but all is left behind with London.
Special mention should go to Douglas Slocombe, the English DP who also did all the Indiana Jones films.
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three
Nice tense early 70s hijack thriller with Walter Matthau and Robert Shaw as the two opposing protagonists. Notable for its sense of realism. The New York subway is shown in realistic decline. One of the odd things I find about this movie, viewd from our early 21st Century age, is the general incomprehension by all except the hi-jackers that the subway car has in fact been hi-jacked. These days everyone would automatically and immediately assume that it was terrorists.
The demise of Robert Shaw's character is very chilling, eliciting a “Jesus” from this viewer – immediately followed by a “Christ” by Walter Matthau!
The archetypal cheesy cheeky cockney crime caper. I have to say finally that this film is a bit disappointing. The best section by far is the opening titles. As Matt Munro croons away at Quincy Jones' and Don Black's peerlessly cool “On days like these,” we see Rossano Brazzi (a peerlessly cool name), cigarette hanging louchely from his lips, expensive sunglasses against the glare of the snow, handling his Lamborghini through the Italian Alps. This has to be the best, coolest title sequence from the 60s, or maybe ever.
It all goes a bit downhill after this. There are some nice touches – Benny Hill's line, “if only people could be more like flowers,” is as touching as it is bizarre. Noel Coward has a wonderful jawline, shown to best effect when he is unexpectedly confronted by Michael Caine in the prison toilets. Marvellous. Caine's character shagging multiple girls at the same time is a nod to the permissive 60s, but all is left behind with London.
Special mention should go to Douglas Slocombe, the English DP who also did all the Indiana Jones films.
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three
Nice tense early 70s hijack thriller with Walter Matthau and Robert Shaw as the two opposing protagonists. Notable for its sense of realism. The New York subway is shown in realistic decline. One of the odd things I find about this movie, viewd from our early 21st Century age, is the general incomprehension by all except the hi-jackers that the subway car has in fact been hi-jacked. These days everyone would automatically and immediately assume that it was terrorists.
The demise of Robert Shaw's character is very chilling, eliciting a “Jesus” from this viewer – immediately followed by a “Christ” by Walter Matthau!
Thursday 2 September 2004
Monday 30 August 2004
In Vitra Veritas
Sigh! Such lovely furniture:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/magazine/story/0,11913,1291613,00.html
http://www.vitra.com/
But is my pun on Vitra better than the Observer's La Dolce Vitra? Answers on the back of a 500 Euro note please...
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/magazine/story/0,11913,1291613,00.html
http://www.vitra.com/
But is my pun on Vitra better than the Observer's La Dolce Vitra? Answers on the back of a 500 Euro note please...
Monday 23 August 2004
Den Haag
Weekend in The Hague - found this very interesting 1920s Art Deco department store:
http://www.architectuur.org/kramer01.php
http://www.goldengate.net/~mross/Reunion2003/Den%20Haag/175-7582_img.jpg
Took some photos with my cameraphone so I'll post these when I get a chance - there are not many pictures of this building on the web..
http://www.architectuur.org/kramer01.php
http://www.goldengate.net/~mross/Reunion2003/Den%20Haag/175-7582_img.jpg
Took some photos with my cameraphone so I'll post these when I get a chance - there are not many pictures of this building on the web..
Thursday 19 August 2004
Feeling a Little Behind
Oh dear! The rot starts already. Since the last review I have watched two films:
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three
The Italian Job
And I almost saw Padre Padrone, but baulked at the last minute due to mood, and not wanting to fall asleep watching an Italian film with French sub-titles, also not wanting to see a film where a boy gets relentlessly beaten.
So there, no reviews.
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three
The Italian Job
And I almost saw Padre Padrone, but baulked at the last minute due to mood, and not wanting to fall asleep watching an Italian film with French sub-titles, also not wanting to see a film where a boy gets relentlessly beaten.
So there, no reviews.
Wednesday 18 August 2004
Barroso on the USA
"There are magnificent things that exist in the US as well as some fairly horrific things," he declared in remarks which ensured he comfortably won the parliament's support. "I hate their arrogance, I hate their unilateralism."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0,7369,1282148,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0,7369,1282148,00.html
Tuesday 10 August 2004
I Ran?
The next target?
Ted Rall seems to think so in this article, which does have a certain believability after Afghanistan and Iraq.
Next there's this comment in the Guardian about US exaggerations about the international community's response to Iran's Nuclear Power programme.
All of which reminds me of the Israeli astronaut killed in the Space Shuttle Columbia in February 2003 – as one of the pilots who bombed Iran's nuclear power plants in the 1980's, he was hailed as a hero on his death. No-one seemed fit to mention the illegal bombing of another state, or how Thatcher condemned the bombing. But of course we all know international rules can be broken if you're the bully on the block or one of their protectorates.
Ted Rall seems to think so in this article, which does have a certain believability after Afghanistan and Iraq.
Next there's this comment in the Guardian about US exaggerations about the international community's response to Iran's Nuclear Power programme.
All of which reminds me of the Israeli astronaut killed in the Space Shuttle Columbia in February 2003 – as one of the pilots who bombed Iran's nuclear power plants in the 1980's, he was hailed as a hero on his death. No-one seemed fit to mention the illegal bombing of another state, or how Thatcher condemned the bombing. But of course we all know international rules can be broken if you're the bully on the block or one of their protectorates.
Monday 9 August 2004
Frenzy
Whilst not being one of Hitchcock's more famous films, it's actually a rather tense, nihilistic, explicit and nasty piece. It reminded me a lot of Michael Powell's Peeping Tom, if not really posing the serious questions about voyeurism raised by Powell's masterpiece.
The story is set and filmed in an early 1970s London almost unidentifiable with the modern day metropolis, apart from the major landmarks. The many scenes around Covent Garden reminded me of another Powell film, the early scenes of The Red Shoes. In fact Covent Garden of 1948 appears almost unchanged to the 1972 version. Twenty-four years on from 72 and the place would be unrecognisable. The restoration of the print is absolutely wonderful – it makes the 1972 London seem absolutely real.
This film marked a turn to the more explicit and violent for Hitchcock. The rape / murder scene is genuinely distressing to watch, and to film judging by the comments of Barry Foster, the actor involved. Female nudity is also shown several times. The 70s did seem to mark a watershed in terms of screen violence. The explicit horror here is certainly on a par with A Clockwork Orange, and more overt than Peeping Tom. The meals served up by the Police Inspector's wife are also horrific, if in a different way. I was reminded strongly of Eraserhead...
Another link to Peeping Tom is the wonderful Anna Massey. Here she plays a cheeky cockney lass in a very winning way. She does not look ten years older than her performance in the Michael Powell film. Jon Finch plays the unsympathetic hero very well - when he made this he was fresh from playing Polanski's Hamlet, and the character does indeed have a few Hamlet moments. Jean Marsh plays a wonderfully plain secretary. Billie Whitelaw is in her element as a distrusting, cold friend, wife of an ex-RAF colleague of the Finch character, played by the irreplaceable Clive Swift, also known as King Arthur's surrogate father in Excalibur, and of course long-suffering husband to “that Bucket woman.” (My goodness, just found out that BBC TV celebrity gardener Joe Swift is his son with Margaret Drabble.)
Francois Truffaut, after seeing this film, said it was a young director's film. Meaning that there was considerable experimentation going on with this movie.
Two scenes stick out for me. As Anna Massey's character storms out of the pub after quitting her job, she pauses, the screen is filled with her motionless face and all the street sounds are quietened for a few seconds. When the noise returns it is the smarmy grocery trader who asks her if she has a place to go. At this point you realise she is already dead. The second scene is in the promotional trailer for the film, with what must be an effigy of Hitch floating on his back in the Thames.
The story is set and filmed in an early 1970s London almost unidentifiable with the modern day metropolis, apart from the major landmarks. The many scenes around Covent Garden reminded me of another Powell film, the early scenes of The Red Shoes. In fact Covent Garden of 1948 appears almost unchanged to the 1972 version. Twenty-four years on from 72 and the place would be unrecognisable. The restoration of the print is absolutely wonderful – it makes the 1972 London seem absolutely real.
This film marked a turn to the more explicit and violent for Hitchcock. The rape / murder scene is genuinely distressing to watch, and to film judging by the comments of Barry Foster, the actor involved. Female nudity is also shown several times. The 70s did seem to mark a watershed in terms of screen violence. The explicit horror here is certainly on a par with A Clockwork Orange, and more overt than Peeping Tom. The meals served up by the Police Inspector's wife are also horrific, if in a different way. I was reminded strongly of Eraserhead...
Another link to Peeping Tom is the wonderful Anna Massey. Here she plays a cheeky cockney lass in a very winning way. She does not look ten years older than her performance in the Michael Powell film. Jon Finch plays the unsympathetic hero very well - when he made this he was fresh from playing Polanski's Hamlet, and the character does indeed have a few Hamlet moments. Jean Marsh plays a wonderfully plain secretary. Billie Whitelaw is in her element as a distrusting, cold friend, wife of an ex-RAF colleague of the Finch character, played by the irreplaceable Clive Swift, also known as King Arthur's surrogate father in Excalibur, and of course long-suffering husband to “that Bucket woman.” (My goodness, just found out that BBC TV celebrity gardener Joe Swift is his son with Margaret Drabble.)
Francois Truffaut, after seeing this film, said it was a young director's film. Meaning that there was considerable experimentation going on with this movie.
Two scenes stick out for me. As Anna Massey's character storms out of the pub after quitting her job, she pauses, the screen is filled with her motionless face and all the street sounds are quietened for a few seconds. When the noise returns it is the smarmy grocery trader who asks her if she has a place to go. At this point you realise she is already dead. The second scene is in the promotional trailer for the film, with what must be an effigy of Hitch floating on his back in the Thames.
Embassy Court Brighton
Thursday 5 August 2004
Puss Warmerer
A few nights ago I had a dream in which someone who was apparently my cousin said I was a real 'puss warmerer.' I woke up and wrote that down in my mobile phone's calendar note function, then went back to sleep. Imagine the bemusement when I found this the next day. What could it mean?
I've got in the habit of making rambling short entries in my blog today. Does it work or is it slightly irritating and irrelevant, to hear my wibble rants?
Took a breather from the desk a few minutes ago and walked on the office building's roof catwalk. The heat made my temples throb, literally.
If you wake up at four or five in the morning (in Northern Europe) there is a wonderful display of Venus – so bright against the morning gloaming (can gloaming exist in the morning?)
I've got in the habit of making rambling short entries in my blog today. Does it work or is it slightly irritating and irrelevant, to hear my wibble rants?
Took a breather from the desk a few minutes ago and walked on the office building's roof catwalk. The heat made my temples throb, literally.
If you wake up at four or five in the morning (in Northern Europe) there is a wonderful display of Venus – so bright against the morning gloaming (can gloaming exist in the morning?)
Bits of Michael Moore
Bits of the two Michael Moore films came swimming back through my memory yesterday.
F911 – Sadly funny that you can take four books of matches or two butane lighters on a plane still, but not nail clippers. Just so the tobacco industry can ensure that smokers can light up when they arrive at their destination.
F911 - Heard that Cuba played a bootleg version of F911 on TV this week...
BfC – I forgot to mention the sanest person in the film – Marilyn Manson. What he said about the news scaring the bejesus out of the viewer and then the commercials selling safety and security is so, so true.
I've given up on watching the BBC news as I find it so patronizing and stylized – they've shifted way over to the US model since I left the UK. I hate, hate, hate the two-hander 6 o'clock news, and Fiona Bruce emoting all over t'place. Thank goodness for the RTBF news – sober and old-fashioned. Give me Fabienne Vande Meersche and François
De Brigode any day.
F911 – Sadly funny that you can take four books of matches or two butane lighters on a plane still, but not nail clippers. Just so the tobacco industry can ensure that smokers can light up when they arrive at their destination.
F911 - Heard that Cuba played a bootleg version of F911 on TV this week...
BfC – I forgot to mention the sanest person in the film – Marilyn Manson. What he said about the news scaring the bejesus out of the viewer and then the commercials selling safety and security is so, so true.
I've given up on watching the BBC news as I find it so patronizing and stylized – they've shifted way over to the US model since I left the UK. I hate, hate, hate the two-hander 6 o'clock news, and Fiona Bruce emoting all over t'place. Thank goodness for the RTBF news – sober and old-fashioned. Give me Fabienne Vande Meersche and François
De Brigode any day.
Forza Italia!
Nice editorial in the Guardian about the state of Italy:
I particularly like the idea of Italy being the first post-modern state, not run by government by by the social institutions. Poor Italy; one of the world's great nations (6th biggest economy by my reckoning) and such a wonderful mess.
I particularly like the idea of Italy being the first post-modern state, not run by government by by the social institutions. Poor Italy; one of the world's great nations (6th biggest economy by my reckoning) and such a wonderful mess.
Wednesday 4 August 2004
The Matrix
A one-off from the Wachowski brothers surely? I found Reloaded dire and didn't bother to see Revolutions. I just didn't care. It reminds me a bit of the brilliant L.A. Confidential – and how Curtis Hanson completely failed to make an interesting film out of 8 mile.
Despite the cod philosophy, the film rattles along at a great pace, with some nice breathers such as the meet the Oracle scene. Somehow it never abuses my credibility which is a very rare quality. Of course a mass suspension of disbelief is required to swallow the super-hero antics of Neo, but you feel you share his journey into understanding what is possible. Finally when he attains true karma, you feel it has been earned.
I think the actors really did earn their stripes for this film. I was surprised at the amount of physical preparation that went into the fight scenes. For me the film is really carried by the performances of Hugo Weaving and Carrie-Anne Moss. Somehow Reeves and Fishburn wander through the film playing themselves, but Weaving and Moss really create and inhabit their characters. They are indistinguishable from other characters they have played – I think specifically of Hugo Weaving in Priscilla Queen of the Desert and Moss in Chocolat. Carrie-Anne Moss reminds me of a serious public school girl and Weaving speaks in such an unnatural manner, it almost falls into some kind of parody, but he really gets away with it. It shouldn't work but it does.
A brief thought about “bullet time.” From the “making of” they really trumpet this as a great advance, but I think now the technique has become obsolete – film-makers tend to prefer pure CGI these days. Personally I think this is wrong as it is evident even on a TV screen that you are looking at a real actor in bullet time, even though many of the frames must have been digitally interpolated. CGI still looks crap in comparison – a la Spider-man 2. Actually it was probably Matrix Reloaded that started the CGI character thing in the scene where Neo fights multiple Agent Smiths. That didn't work for me either. Maybe I missed out on a CGI Monica Bellucci in Revolutions?
The fight sequences still hold up very well. Crouching Tiger has to be a future DVD purchase – I really love this wire work. Some day I need to delve into eastern cinema.
In conclusion, for me the Matrix works as an intelligent, thoughtful, exciting, ground-breaking sci-fi film. But we know it was a fluke thanks to the duff sequels. Still, it's a film to treasure.
Despite the cod philosophy, the film rattles along at a great pace, with some nice breathers such as the meet the Oracle scene. Somehow it never abuses my credibility which is a very rare quality. Of course a mass suspension of disbelief is required to swallow the super-hero antics of Neo, but you feel you share his journey into understanding what is possible. Finally when he attains true karma, you feel it has been earned.
I think the actors really did earn their stripes for this film. I was surprised at the amount of physical preparation that went into the fight scenes. For me the film is really carried by the performances of Hugo Weaving and Carrie-Anne Moss. Somehow Reeves and Fishburn wander through the film playing themselves, but Weaving and Moss really create and inhabit their characters. They are indistinguishable from other characters they have played – I think specifically of Hugo Weaving in Priscilla Queen of the Desert and Moss in Chocolat. Carrie-Anne Moss reminds me of a serious public school girl and Weaving speaks in such an unnatural manner, it almost falls into some kind of parody, but he really gets away with it. It shouldn't work but it does.
A brief thought about “bullet time.” From the “making of” they really trumpet this as a great advance, but I think now the technique has become obsolete – film-makers tend to prefer pure CGI these days. Personally I think this is wrong as it is evident even on a TV screen that you are looking at a real actor in bullet time, even though many of the frames must have been digitally interpolated. CGI still looks crap in comparison – a la Spider-man 2. Actually it was probably Matrix Reloaded that started the CGI character thing in the scene where Neo fights multiple Agent Smiths. That didn't work for me either. Maybe I missed out on a CGI Monica Bellucci in Revolutions?
The fight sequences still hold up very well. Crouching Tiger has to be a future DVD purchase – I really love this wire work. Some day I need to delve into eastern cinema.
In conclusion, for me the Matrix works as an intelligent, thoughtful, exciting, ground-breaking sci-fi film. But we know it was a fluke thanks to the duff sequels. Still, it's a film to treasure.
Tuesday 3 August 2004
Haircut 101
Had my hair cut this weekend. Hardly an inspiring event I know, but afterwards I was in the lift of my apartment wearing my Lonsdale polo shirt and without my specs. The guy who cut the hair just went on and on and on clipping and trimming till there was almost nothing left.
In the lift's mirror I was able to contort my face into a bovver boy grimace - goodness, I was shocked at how "hard" I could make myself look. I was reminded of Ray Winstone on the cover of the Scum DVD.
Later on, on the terrace of the Walvis, I reflected with my friend that I would not wear my Lonsdale / Fred Perry / Umbro tops with this haircut in England for fear of being considered a neo-nazi. The irony is that the guy who cut my hair is Moroccan, and even the cashiers at Lilleywhites in Brussels were arab.
In the lift's mirror I was able to contort my face into a bovver boy grimace - goodness, I was shocked at how "hard" I could make myself look. I was reminded of Ray Winstone on the cover of the Scum DVD.
Later on, on the terrace of the Walvis, I reflected with my friend that I would not wear my Lonsdale / Fred Perry / Umbro tops with this haircut in England for fear of being considered a neo-nazi. The irony is that the guy who cut my hair is Moroccan, and even the cashiers at Lilleywhites in Brussels were arab.
Bowling for Columbine
Another Michael Moore movie – that makes two in as many days – masochism? No, just an unexpected DVD rental.
The figure that made me gasp, even though I already knew the factoid, was the comparison of the number of gun murders in different countries. It went something like Germany 350, France 250, UK 60, USA 11500. I guess the UK is lower than France as the police do not regularly carry guns. But the US figure was the one that made me gasp. Even though I remembered from Jonathan Raban's chapter about Boston in his book Soft City that the violent death rate in metropolitan Boston in one year was more than in Northern Ireland during the troubles. Perspective, perspective, perspective.
Perspective is a major aspect of the film. Life in the USA seems to be so out of perspective. The main thrust of the film was that gun crime is so prevalent in the US because of fear of the other.
A telling contrast was shown by the interviews with the Canadian people of Sarnia, Toronto and Windsor. Many of them said that they had been burgled, but still did not lock their door (presumably during the day, such as when Moore wandered around one of the Canadian cities opening people's front doors. I guess at night the doors would be locked...) nor would they use weapons on strangers entering their property. In the interview with Charlton Heston we find that he had never been burgled, yet he keeps a loaded gun in the house.
Another contrast was between the cities of Detroit, USA and Windsor, Canada. Although the two citied face each other across the Detroit River (the Detroit and Windsor Tunnel is claimed to be “one of the great engineering wonders of the world” - at one mile long!!) the rate of gun murder is infinitely different (zero in the year of filming in Windsor.)
I enjoyed very much the brief history of American violence by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the makers of South Park.
At the end I was left confused. Where are all the gun related murders taking place? If the poor black-dominated inner cities are not where the guns are, is it just the lower middle-class whites in the suburbs who do all the shooting? What were the families like of the two students who did the shooting at Columbine High? If people are full of unjustified fear about robbers, is it just that they have loaded weapons in their households that are never used? Where is all the killing taking place?
Should Kerry win the next election or not. Will it really make any difference? Despite Clinton's strengths and ability to connect and engage in people outside of the USA, many of the criticisms of the Bush administration would still apply to any Democrat administration. If the US is on the way out as a world power, then it barely matters who is at the helm. If the rest of the world decides to divest its dollar reserves, the US economy will implode. And whoever is in the driving seat, it will be a violent implosion. By that I mean the world economy will be trashed, probably without justification, and the USA will not go down without a lot of fighting.
The figure that made me gasp, even though I already knew the factoid, was the comparison of the number of gun murders in different countries. It went something like Germany 350, France 250, UK 60, USA 11500. I guess the UK is lower than France as the police do not regularly carry guns. But the US figure was the one that made me gasp. Even though I remembered from Jonathan Raban's chapter about Boston in his book Soft City that the violent death rate in metropolitan Boston in one year was more than in Northern Ireland during the troubles. Perspective, perspective, perspective.
Perspective is a major aspect of the film. Life in the USA seems to be so out of perspective. The main thrust of the film was that gun crime is so prevalent in the US because of fear of the other.
A telling contrast was shown by the interviews with the Canadian people of Sarnia, Toronto and Windsor. Many of them said that they had been burgled, but still did not lock their door (presumably during the day, such as when Moore wandered around one of the Canadian cities opening people's front doors. I guess at night the doors would be locked...) nor would they use weapons on strangers entering their property. In the interview with Charlton Heston we find that he had never been burgled, yet he keeps a loaded gun in the house.
Another contrast was between the cities of Detroit, USA and Windsor, Canada. Although the two citied face each other across the Detroit River (the Detroit and Windsor Tunnel is claimed to be “one of the great engineering wonders of the world” - at one mile long!!) the rate of gun murder is infinitely different (zero in the year of filming in Windsor.)
I enjoyed very much the brief history of American violence by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the makers of South Park.
At the end I was left confused. Where are all the gun related murders taking place? If the poor black-dominated inner cities are not where the guns are, is it just the lower middle-class whites in the suburbs who do all the shooting? What were the families like of the two students who did the shooting at Columbine High? If people are full of unjustified fear about robbers, is it just that they have loaded weapons in their households that are never used? Where is all the killing taking place?
Should Kerry win the next election or not. Will it really make any difference? Despite Clinton's strengths and ability to connect and engage in people outside of the USA, many of the criticisms of the Bush administration would still apply to any Democrat administration. If the US is on the way out as a world power, then it barely matters who is at the helm. If the rest of the world decides to divest its dollar reserves, the US economy will implode. And whoever is in the driving seat, it will be a violent implosion. By that I mean the world economy will be trashed, probably without justification, and the USA will not go down without a lot of fighting.
Monday 2 August 2004
Fahrenheit 9/11
The screen is black. The roar of jet engines fills the cinema through the surround sound system. We hear explosions, shouts, glass breaking. Then another roar of jets and more chaos. Were these authentic sounds of the destruction of the twin towers of the world trade center? Why go to the cinema to see a documentary? Film is about escape and fantasy, no? Why did a documentary win the Palme d'Or at Cannes? Are we being entertained or informed? Are we seeing the facts or clever editing?
There are serious questions about film-making posed by Fahrenheit 9/11. The sequence of the attack on the twin towers does succeed in surpassing a documentary by the use of the empty screen. My mind was filled with my own experiences and images of that day in September 2001 and I imagine the same thing was going through everybody's mind at the same time in the room. It thus became a truly cathartic experience – a shared moment with the other audience members. This is what makes cinema and theatre different from home entertainment, for better or for worse – though I think this time was for the better. At last I was glad to be in a cinema!
Personally I remembered my drive from Zurich to Brussels that day, the SMS message from my friend in Switzerland breaking the news while I was driving through Luxembourg. Then getting home after the long drive and pausing quietly for a few minutes before turning on the TV, knowing that the world was going to go crazy and be different for years to come.
As the screen shows images again of New Yorkers' shock at events, major points are to be awarded for the use of Arvo Part's “Cantus in Memorium Benjamin Britten,” which is an unmatched musical outpouring of grief.
Another positive item was to show that life in Baghdad before the invasion was not hell as is so often assumed. OK, Moore overdid the saccharin somewhat by showing happy smiling children and weddings. But it is something I tried to tell as many people at the time – Iraq was not the hell of Taliban Afghanistan. (The stupid sexist comment in the film of the Taliban visitor to the US was a good way of showing how dangerous the Afghan leadership was.) I remember just before the invasion reading that the Baghdad symphony orchestra were rehearsing Beethoven. This detail made me realise the error of the Iraq war. Of course Saddam Hussein was a dictator and not a credible leader of a state. It's not the fact that he was removed I object so strongly about, but how and why.
At heart, this film is a socialist polemic. The main message is not really about Iraq or the US elections in 2000 or Afghanistan, or Al-Qaeda or Saudi Arabia or Bin Laden. Fundamentally it is about the exploitation of the poor by the rich through capitalism and war, by the “military-industrial complex.” I can understand why this film is so divisive in the US. As the underlying message is so subversive to the US system, it is easy to see how anyone on the right would find the message impossible to digest. Hence the focus on accuracy and bias from the right. Accuracy is not really the point of this film.
In any case, Moore cleverly defends himself against charges of unreasonable bias by showing interviews with US TV journalists freely admitting their pro-war biases. If Fox TV can lie for the cause of freedom, why should Moore be any different. Only there are no blatant lies in Moore's work – just partiality and omission. There have definitely been lies from the neo-con right.
It was good to be able to see things that were not shown on TV news, such as the real gore of war, children with arms blown apart, cartloads of dead cadavers, the two mercenaries whose bodies were taken apart, burned and hanged in the Faluja street. Also it was instructive to see an actual Saudi public beheading, even if the quality of the image was too poor to see any detail. Other scenes that seem to have escaped the news were the images of the inauguration of George W Bush, where protesters prevented the traditional walk to the stand for the first time ever, and Bush's motorcade being pelted with eggs. It's hard to remember now the farce that was the 2000 US election. Also the scene of the congressional representatives, all from ethnic minorities, protesting at the invalid accession of president Bush and being dismissed by Al Gore as no senator would come forward to sign the objection. Their anger was very affecting.
There were a number of omissions I found strange. The main omission seemed to be the anthrax panic that ensued after the 11th of September. Moore gave a very good sequence about how panic was ratcheted up to ensure public compliance about mass erosions of civil liberties, and there were Fox News items about poison pens and internet chatter on obscure small towns. But there was nothing about how the anthrax scare was sourced to a government laboratory. Was this scare manufactured by the authorities? How many people did die from anthrax poisoning in the end? The sequence on the “Coalition of the Willing” rightly pointed out how few countries were on-side, but it was a bit specious to omit the support of the UK, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands. Also the role of Tony Blair in legitimising the occupation of Iraq was omitted.
On a comedy level, I did laugh out loud more than most films that purport to be humorous.
An interesting aside is how this film has made so much money (over $100 million from box office receipts so far) and yet Moore is amenable to downloading this film by internet. How canny to encourage piracy and show that you can still make a fortune from a low budget documentary. It was funny to see the US right initially encourage downloading as a way to cheat Moore his royalties, only later to go quiet when the right realised this was a great way to spread the message of the film, whilst also disproving that downloading films and music is “killing” the creative arts. Predictably comment is made about how this working-class socialist is now a multi-millionaire – the old champagne socialist argument. So it's OK to make money exploiting poor people then rather than by polemical film-making. And maybe as he's so rich he should get a better haircut and a clean baseball cap?
For me, the quotation from George Orwell's 1984 is the key to the film. Like Orwell, Michael Moore is socialist polemicist using mass entertainment to get his message across.
And now, please. I'm fed up with US politics. I swear people in Europe are more aware of the facts that the average US voter. If Kerry wins, it could be a bad thing as the US economy is heading for a huge debt-induced car crash. A democrat win could mean Bush presidencies for years to come. Let George W. become the John Major of US politics and destroy the credibility of free-market capitalism as the best way to manage an economic system.
There are serious questions about film-making posed by Fahrenheit 9/11. The sequence of the attack on the twin towers does succeed in surpassing a documentary by the use of the empty screen. My mind was filled with my own experiences and images of that day in September 2001 and I imagine the same thing was going through everybody's mind at the same time in the room. It thus became a truly cathartic experience – a shared moment with the other audience members. This is what makes cinema and theatre different from home entertainment, for better or for worse – though I think this time was for the better. At last I was glad to be in a cinema!
Personally I remembered my drive from Zurich to Brussels that day, the SMS message from my friend in Switzerland breaking the news while I was driving through Luxembourg. Then getting home after the long drive and pausing quietly for a few minutes before turning on the TV, knowing that the world was going to go crazy and be different for years to come.
As the screen shows images again of New Yorkers' shock at events, major points are to be awarded for the use of Arvo Part's “Cantus in Memorium Benjamin Britten,” which is an unmatched musical outpouring of grief.
Another positive item was to show that life in Baghdad before the invasion was not hell as is so often assumed. OK, Moore overdid the saccharin somewhat by showing happy smiling children and weddings. But it is something I tried to tell as many people at the time – Iraq was not the hell of Taliban Afghanistan. (The stupid sexist comment in the film of the Taliban visitor to the US was a good way of showing how dangerous the Afghan leadership was.) I remember just before the invasion reading that the Baghdad symphony orchestra were rehearsing Beethoven. This detail made me realise the error of the Iraq war. Of course Saddam Hussein was a dictator and not a credible leader of a state. It's not the fact that he was removed I object so strongly about, but how and why.
At heart, this film is a socialist polemic. The main message is not really about Iraq or the US elections in 2000 or Afghanistan, or Al-Qaeda or Saudi Arabia or Bin Laden. Fundamentally it is about the exploitation of the poor by the rich through capitalism and war, by the “military-industrial complex.” I can understand why this film is so divisive in the US. As the underlying message is so subversive to the US system, it is easy to see how anyone on the right would find the message impossible to digest. Hence the focus on accuracy and bias from the right. Accuracy is not really the point of this film.
In any case, Moore cleverly defends himself against charges of unreasonable bias by showing interviews with US TV journalists freely admitting their pro-war biases. If Fox TV can lie for the cause of freedom, why should Moore be any different. Only there are no blatant lies in Moore's work – just partiality and omission. There have definitely been lies from the neo-con right.
It was good to be able to see things that were not shown on TV news, such as the real gore of war, children with arms blown apart, cartloads of dead cadavers, the two mercenaries whose bodies were taken apart, burned and hanged in the Faluja street. Also it was instructive to see an actual Saudi public beheading, even if the quality of the image was too poor to see any detail. Other scenes that seem to have escaped the news were the images of the inauguration of George W Bush, where protesters prevented the traditional walk to the stand for the first time ever, and Bush's motorcade being pelted with eggs. It's hard to remember now the farce that was the 2000 US election. Also the scene of the congressional representatives, all from ethnic minorities, protesting at the invalid accession of president Bush and being dismissed by Al Gore as no senator would come forward to sign the objection. Their anger was very affecting.
There were a number of omissions I found strange. The main omission seemed to be the anthrax panic that ensued after the 11th of September. Moore gave a very good sequence about how panic was ratcheted up to ensure public compliance about mass erosions of civil liberties, and there were Fox News items about poison pens and internet chatter on obscure small towns. But there was nothing about how the anthrax scare was sourced to a government laboratory. Was this scare manufactured by the authorities? How many people did die from anthrax poisoning in the end? The sequence on the “Coalition of the Willing” rightly pointed out how few countries were on-side, but it was a bit specious to omit the support of the UK, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands. Also the role of Tony Blair in legitimising the occupation of Iraq was omitted.
On a comedy level, I did laugh out loud more than most films that purport to be humorous.
An interesting aside is how this film has made so much money (over $100 million from box office receipts so far) and yet Moore is amenable to downloading this film by internet. How canny to encourage piracy and show that you can still make a fortune from a low budget documentary. It was funny to see the US right initially encourage downloading as a way to cheat Moore his royalties, only later to go quiet when the right realised this was a great way to spread the message of the film, whilst also disproving that downloading films and music is “killing” the creative arts. Predictably comment is made about how this working-class socialist is now a multi-millionaire – the old champagne socialist argument. So it's OK to make money exploiting poor people then rather than by polemical film-making. And maybe as he's so rich he should get a better haircut and a clean baseball cap?
For me, the quotation from George Orwell's 1984 is the key to the film. Like Orwell, Michael Moore is socialist polemicist using mass entertainment to get his message across.
And now, please. I'm fed up with US politics. I swear people in Europe are more aware of the facts that the average US voter. If Kerry wins, it could be a bad thing as the US economy is heading for a huge debt-induced car crash. A democrat win could mean Bush presidencies for years to come. Let George W. become the John Major of US politics and destroy the credibility of free-market capitalism as the best way to manage an economic system.
Wednesday 28 July 2004
My big plans criticized on CNN
Don't know how long this link will work, but my plans have been criticized on CNN here . Naturally I'm in a bit of a huff about this...
Tuesday 27 July 2004
¡Oye Esteban!
First some extra comments about the last few films.
Last Orders - Surely some of the best in-car filming ever?
Spidey II - Another great shot was of Tobey running up to the edge of the building - just before the "I'm back / my back!" joke - his face as he was running in slow-mo was very good!!
Not really a film review, but watched Morrissey's DVD ¡Oye Esteban! last night. Was very pleased to spot the sportswear brand references were exactly the brands I've bought into (sold out to?) recently in my new sporty-fashion phase - namely Fred Perry (Moz wearing it in "Boxers",) Lonsdale (the band in "We hate it when our friends become successful") and Umbro (kit bag in "Sunny") On reflection I realise these are the main all-British brands so it's probably no surprise I went for these. Surely it wasn't a subliminal effect of the DVD?
The world of Morrissey is really about English masculinity. I guess this is partly the reason behind my Perry/Lonsdale/Umbro obsession. How does it sit with my rejection of things British? With irony. It's the juxtapositions that wearing a Lonsdale polo shirt makes that are interesting - sporty/sport-hating, skinhead/gay, British / anti-British. It's all a mass of conflicting images. Who would have thought wearing sportswear would do all that? I guess Morrissey is on the same territory.
The DVD ¡Oye Esteban! is maybe the only "pop video" collection that I can watch over and over. There are some real stand out tracks. The opener is “Everyday is Like Sunday” shot in Morecambe maybe? Surreally it incorporates Billie Whitelaw and the Cheryl Campbell from Coronation Street – the one who shared with Gail (later) Tilsley in Elsie Tanner's house – back in the 70s when Corrie was great. The final shot of Morrissey through a telescope has his hair at possibly its most vertiginous... “Suedehead” takes us on a moving trip to Fairmount Indiana and a hommage to the life of James Dean. Still hard to believe he was just 24 when he died. "Too fast to live, too young to die."
“Interesting Drug,” featuring the backing vocals of the late Kirsty MacColl, camps it up with cross dressing schoolboys, Diana Dors on the NME cover and Hawtry High School for Boys.
"Will Never Marry" is a touching song about Morrissey's written proposals from his (female?) fanbase. "I'm writing this to say in a gentle way, thank you but no / I will live my life as I will undoubtedly die, alone..." The video is a sequence of clips of fans climbing the stage to show their devotion to Moz in the traitional manner. It only gets a bit ugh when the girls and long-haired blokes are doing the kissing.
The black and white shot vidz are really more beautiful than should be allowed for a pop video. “My Love Life,” is achingly melancholic – Morrissey and the band in a Rolls driving through Phoenix. Wonderful stuff. But Morrissey obviously is not driving. The looks of longing on Morrissey's face are quite unbearably poignant. “Tomorrow” is a video I remember seeing in Boston on MTV back in the summer of 1992. The continuous tracking shot through the back streets of Nice is really memorable, the band members wandering along in the background horsing around. Morrissey almost breaks into laughter at one point as the guys mess about... “Seasick yet still Docked” is again more poignant that a pop video deserves to be. Who are the people in the home movie? It is definitely the US in the 1950s. You can read so much family history in these short clips. The older guy who is obviously the patriarch of the family – he is clearly a strong personality but I wonder about the darker controlling sides of his character.
Later we get the full on deconstruction of the British male - “Boxers” featuring the haunting music from Britten's Peter Grimes Moonlight interlude, and the wonderful Cornelius Carr who formed the backdrop to the stage in Morrissey's 1995 tour. And yes this is where you see Morrissey in a Fred Perry polo! Dagenham Dave must be totally incomprehensible to anyone outside of England. I know this part of Essex slightly more than I want to. As ever with Morrissey, Essex man is given a twist with the line “He'd like to touch but he's afraid that he might self-combust / I could say more but you get the general idea,” and Dave / Moz in the windscreen of the XR3. How drole! Boy racer features Jason Rush from the “Last of the International Playboys” video looking a bit older and fuller as the eponymous anti-hero of the song in his Sierra Cosworth. He also makes off with Dag Dave's girl at the end of the previous video. Surely it's Martine Escutcheon as one of the girls with chips? Again Morrissey homoeroticises the thing - “He's got the whole world in his hands / standing at the urinal..” and at the end of the song Moz repeats “He's just too good looking, and, and, and, and....” Oh Steven!
Last Orders - Surely some of the best in-car filming ever?
Spidey II - Another great shot was of Tobey running up to the edge of the building - just before the "I'm back / my back!" joke - his face as he was running in slow-mo was very good!!
Not really a film review, but watched Morrissey's DVD ¡Oye Esteban! last night. Was very pleased to spot the sportswear brand references were exactly the brands I've bought into (sold out to?) recently in my new sporty-fashion phase - namely Fred Perry (Moz wearing it in "Boxers",) Lonsdale (the band in "We hate it when our friends become successful") and Umbro (kit bag in "Sunny") On reflection I realise these are the main all-British brands so it's probably no surprise I went for these. Surely it wasn't a subliminal effect of the DVD?
The world of Morrissey is really about English masculinity. I guess this is partly the reason behind my Perry/Lonsdale/Umbro obsession. How does it sit with my rejection of things British? With irony. It's the juxtapositions that wearing a Lonsdale polo shirt makes that are interesting - sporty/sport-hating, skinhead/gay, British / anti-British. It's all a mass of conflicting images. Who would have thought wearing sportswear would do all that? I guess Morrissey is on the same territory.
The DVD ¡Oye Esteban! is maybe the only "pop video" collection that I can watch over and over. There are some real stand out tracks. The opener is “Everyday is Like Sunday” shot in Morecambe maybe? Surreally it incorporates Billie Whitelaw and the Cheryl Campbell from Coronation Street – the one who shared with Gail (later) Tilsley in Elsie Tanner's house – back in the 70s when Corrie was great. The final shot of Morrissey through a telescope has his hair at possibly its most vertiginous... “Suedehead” takes us on a moving trip to Fairmount Indiana and a hommage to the life of James Dean. Still hard to believe he was just 24 when he died. "Too fast to live, too young to die."
“Interesting Drug,” featuring the backing vocals of the late Kirsty MacColl, camps it up with cross dressing schoolboys, Diana Dors on the NME cover and Hawtry High School for Boys.
"Will Never Marry" is a touching song about Morrissey's written proposals from his (female?) fanbase. "I'm writing this to say in a gentle way, thank you but no / I will live my life as I will undoubtedly die, alone..." The video is a sequence of clips of fans climbing the stage to show their devotion to Moz in the traitional manner. It only gets a bit ugh when the girls and long-haired blokes are doing the kissing.
The black and white shot vidz are really more beautiful than should be allowed for a pop video. “My Love Life,” is achingly melancholic – Morrissey and the band in a Rolls driving through Phoenix. Wonderful stuff. But Morrissey obviously is not driving. The looks of longing on Morrissey's face are quite unbearably poignant. “Tomorrow” is a video I remember seeing in Boston on MTV back in the summer of 1992. The continuous tracking shot through the back streets of Nice is really memorable, the band members wandering along in the background horsing around. Morrissey almost breaks into laughter at one point as the guys mess about... “Seasick yet still Docked” is again more poignant that a pop video deserves to be. Who are the people in the home movie? It is definitely the US in the 1950s. You can read so much family history in these short clips. The older guy who is obviously the patriarch of the family – he is clearly a strong personality but I wonder about the darker controlling sides of his character.
Later we get the full on deconstruction of the British male - “Boxers” featuring the haunting music from Britten's Peter Grimes Moonlight interlude, and the wonderful Cornelius Carr who formed the backdrop to the stage in Morrissey's 1995 tour. And yes this is where you see Morrissey in a Fred Perry polo! Dagenham Dave must be totally incomprehensible to anyone outside of England. I know this part of Essex slightly more than I want to. As ever with Morrissey, Essex man is given a twist with the line “He'd like to touch but he's afraid that he might self-combust / I could say more but you get the general idea,” and Dave / Moz in the windscreen of the XR3. How drole! Boy racer features Jason Rush from the “Last of the International Playboys” video looking a bit older and fuller as the eponymous anti-hero of the song in his Sierra Cosworth. He also makes off with Dag Dave's girl at the end of the previous video. Surely it's Martine Escutcheon as one of the girls with chips? Again Morrissey homoeroticises the thing - “He's got the whole world in his hands / standing at the urinal..” and at the end of the song Moz repeats “He's just too good looking, and, and, and, and....” Oh Steven!
Monday 26 July 2004
Spider-Man 2
Oh dear, my first venture to the cinema in, what, over a year. Always a disappointment, always. I admit not to having seen the first instalment of this franchise, though frankly if you see the trailer and making of then you've pretty much seen the film, so everything made sense to me. But what appalling CGI. How could they blow $54 million on making it look like a second rate PlayStation game? When will they realise that you can't yet substitute real actors with these avatars without looking stupid. Why bother to have the actors at all? And when will someone in the FX community get round to reading about Newton's laws of motion? Especially the third which may as well never have been invented. No you can't rip off a vault door with superhuman AI arms without ripping your spine out, crushing your torso and bending your legs in two. Really these things irritate me beyond anything.
And the false science stuff was too far from believability. Creating a fusion sun in a warehouse room without any heat protection? Come on. And then dousing the sun in the Hudson? Right. And then these AI appendages – where did they get their power? And if they are impervious to any heat, why did they fizzle and splutter in water? Stupid, stupid stupid!!
Tobey Maguire was disappointing too. Maybe it was not his fault. I didn't really feel the loneliness and isolation of the character which I would have thought is essential to the character's feelings of being different. And how come he is so poor yet his best friends are an actress model and the son of a very rich industrialist?
The dialogue was pretty bad, especially the love scenes, but does one expect anything better these days? The photography was flat and uninteresting, and as for the special effects... Why so bad?
Let's try and find some good things. The scene in the launderette was sly and funny, when Spidey's suit runs in the wash and streaks his underwear red and blue. Where the film did work emotionally was after Spidey stops the elevated train and loses his mask – the moment where the common people carry him to safely and notice it's just a boy. But by far the best and most joyful scene was the Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head sequence. Yes they actually used the original recording from Butch Cassidy! And yes it was very funny and touching, almost a hommage to Tobey. The freeze frame of Maguire's bespectacled face at the end was really very good. Yet this two minute sequence was the only part I actively enjoyed out of the whole film. And none of the reviews I've read have mentioned this sequence. Am I somehow different from all the rest?
And the false science stuff was too far from believability. Creating a fusion sun in a warehouse room without any heat protection? Come on. And then dousing the sun in the Hudson? Right. And then these AI appendages – where did they get their power? And if they are impervious to any heat, why did they fizzle and splutter in water? Stupid, stupid stupid!!
Tobey Maguire was disappointing too. Maybe it was not his fault. I didn't really feel the loneliness and isolation of the character which I would have thought is essential to the character's feelings of being different. And how come he is so poor yet his best friends are an actress model and the son of a very rich industrialist?
The dialogue was pretty bad, especially the love scenes, but does one expect anything better these days? The photography was flat and uninteresting, and as for the special effects... Why so bad?
Let's try and find some good things. The scene in the launderette was sly and funny, when Spidey's suit runs in the wash and streaks his underwear red and blue. Where the film did work emotionally was after Spidey stops the elevated train and loses his mask – the moment where the common people carry him to safely and notice it's just a boy. But by far the best and most joyful scene was the Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head sequence. Yes they actually used the original recording from Butch Cassidy! And yes it was very funny and touching, almost a hommage to Tobey. The freeze frame of Maguire's bespectacled face at the end was really very good. Yet this two minute sequence was the only part I actively enjoyed out of the whole film. And none of the reviews I've read have mentioned this sequence. Am I somehow different from all the rest?
Last Orders
Once again this is a film by a director that can do no wrong. Fred Schepisi's other films such as the Russia House and Six Degrees of Separation are among my top movies.
The first thing to mention is the composition – Schepisi always uses a very wide aspect ratio (just checked it to be 2.35:1.) In this film it allows him to show all four of the characters on the journey to Margate at once in beautiful almost painterly detail. I'm thinking of the stop over in the Rochester pub. In the trailer this is cut to just three of the characters and you lose more than a quarter of the effect. After the glamorous locations of the previous films, such as New York, Moscow and St Petersburg, North Kent looks pretty good too. Somehow this is a great achievement.
What to say about the principal actors? Either you can say it a distillation of England's finest or a collection of old (East?) Hams. Michael Caine probably has it in the acting stakes as he literally plays his old man dying of cancer. David Hemmings almost has it for, well, being David Hemmings. It's such a shame he will not appear again in anything new. What a wonderful career he had from working with Britten, Antonioni and finally this film. Tom Courtney gets points for being the most restrained. Bob Hoskins gains for not going too over the top. Ray Winstone is thankfully unobtrusive. Helen Mirren finishes off the main cast acting against type as a very plain woman, a sort of ageing DI Tennison without the glamorous job.
The young actors are also very good, especially Michael Caine's double. But the biggest shock goes to Hemmings' younger self, who looks incredibly like the Blow Up era Hemmings, especially in the after-fight scene where he has a steak over the eye. Astonishing... (Should have checked IMDB first, the young actor is Hemmings' real son Nolan, with Gayle Hunnicut...)
A slow sad piece, but with a lot of laughter then.
The first thing to mention is the composition – Schepisi always uses a very wide aspect ratio (just checked it to be 2.35:1.) In this film it allows him to show all four of the characters on the journey to Margate at once in beautiful almost painterly detail. I'm thinking of the stop over in the Rochester pub. In the trailer this is cut to just three of the characters and you lose more than a quarter of the effect. After the glamorous locations of the previous films, such as New York, Moscow and St Petersburg, North Kent looks pretty good too. Somehow this is a great achievement.
What to say about the principal actors? Either you can say it a distillation of England's finest or a collection of old (East?) Hams. Michael Caine probably has it in the acting stakes as he literally plays his old man dying of cancer. David Hemmings almost has it for, well, being David Hemmings. It's such a shame he will not appear again in anything new. What a wonderful career he had from working with Britten, Antonioni and finally this film. Tom Courtney gets points for being the most restrained. Bob Hoskins gains for not going too over the top. Ray Winstone is thankfully unobtrusive. Helen Mirren finishes off the main cast acting against type as a very plain woman, a sort of ageing DI Tennison without the glamorous job.
The young actors are also very good, especially Michael Caine's double. But the biggest shock goes to Hemmings' younger self, who looks incredibly like the Blow Up era Hemmings, especially in the after-fight scene where he has a steak over the eye. Astonishing... (Should have checked IMDB first, the young actor is Hemmings' real son Nolan, with Gayle Hunnicut...)
A slow sad piece, but with a lot of laughter then.
Afterglow
Alan Rudolph's films have a strange hold over me. Ever since I saw what I still think is his best film, Trouble In Mind, in the 1980s, I have not found another film maker that creates such a unique look and builds such off-centre stories. Another plus point is his use of the city and architecture to create the feelings of alienation for the characters. His films are always grounded in a real place, Seattle as Rain City in Trouble In Mind, and this time for Afterglow we are very much in Montreal.
In a way it's a hommage to four actors. Julie Christie gets the full on star treatment by the camera. There are some wonderful glamour static shots of her waiting at a table, sitting behind dark glasses and so on. But also there are honest scenes of her with no makeup, sitting in nightclothes watching her younger self on VHS in what looks like a hammer horror movie – though in the credits it says that the film was The Pit and the Pendulum I cannot find a reference to this in IMDB, nor could I see an appropriate film in Christie's filmography. The final scene of her character crying in bed I found quite disturbing, as the actor is evidently trying so hard to cry her guts out. It's a bit uncomfortable and also a bit false. Anyway, it was a deserved Oscar nomination.
Nick Nolte I just find irritating. I guess the character was not likeable but showed some redeeming features, I just wish it had been a different actor.
Lara Flynn Boyle was equally irritating (so hurruagh for the English actors!) but this suited the role. The character was really just a little girl in a big bad world type thing.
Jonny Lee Miller is a very strange person indeed. It shouldn't work – his face is so impassive and the acting is on the surface extremely wooden. Yet somehow it does work. I don't know what he does, but it is some kind of gift. I remember feeling the same in Regeneration. Somehow he shows a real rounded character underneath the mask. It's no coincidence I'm sure that the softly spoken English actor was married to Angelina Jolie at the time of the film, who described him as wild.
But mostly with Alan Rudolph's films it's about the setting and mood. And it's all very well captured.
In a way it's a hommage to four actors. Julie Christie gets the full on star treatment by the camera. There are some wonderful glamour static shots of her waiting at a table, sitting behind dark glasses and so on. But also there are honest scenes of her with no makeup, sitting in nightclothes watching her younger self on VHS in what looks like a hammer horror movie – though in the credits it says that the film was The Pit and the Pendulum I cannot find a reference to this in IMDB, nor could I see an appropriate film in Christie's filmography. The final scene of her character crying in bed I found quite disturbing, as the actor is evidently trying so hard to cry her guts out. It's a bit uncomfortable and also a bit false. Anyway, it was a deserved Oscar nomination.
Nick Nolte I just find irritating. I guess the character was not likeable but showed some redeeming features, I just wish it had been a different actor.
Lara Flynn Boyle was equally irritating (so hurruagh for the English actors!) but this suited the role. The character was really just a little girl in a big bad world type thing.
Jonny Lee Miller is a very strange person indeed. It shouldn't work – his face is so impassive and the acting is on the surface extremely wooden. Yet somehow it does work. I don't know what he does, but it is some kind of gift. I remember feeling the same in Regeneration. Somehow he shows a real rounded character underneath the mask. It's no coincidence I'm sure that the softly spoken English actor was married to Angelina Jolie at the time of the film, who described him as wild.
But mostly with Alan Rudolph's films it's about the setting and mood. And it's all very well captured.
Monday 19 July 2004
Psycho
This film held such big expectations for me. I don't know how I managed not to see it for so many years. I suppose it was inevitable that it would be a let-down. For how long have I known the story? I remember my best friend at school saying it was his favourite movie. Then there was the song by 80s electro-pop band Landscape, with the repeated line, “My name is Norman Bates, I'm just a normal guy.” Not great art, though it did contain some lines from the film, “Mother, oh my god!”, “Norman Bates no longer exists,” and “He wouldn't even hurt a fly.” On top of this it is just part of western cultural history, the shower scene and the cross-dressing as mother. It was a shame that although I was watching the film for the first time, I knew the plot, and this reduced the experience for me.
In essence the film appears to be about apportion of guilt, who the viewer sympathises with and how everyone believes the motive for murder is money, but in the end it's just psychological disturbance. I guess the $40000 is the classic Hitchcock McGuffin. Not providing a moral hero must have been quite daring in the 50s, though having said that I can think of other films with big moral ambiguity from that era, such as Maltese Falcon, Kiss Me Deadly, Casablanca. Actually the more I think about it, the more moral ambiguity seems to be more prevalent in the immediate post-war era than today. Of course I always forget how conservative the times we live in are today.
Ebert's review mentioned “Detour” which I haven't seen for ages and would love to “own.”
The Herrmann score really impressed me in its simplicity. I could detect three basic elements in the small string orchestra score. The title theme, the slow rocking music first used in the slow pan across the Phoenix skyline, and the stabbing slashing music. I read that Herrmann studied with Percy Grainger in New York. I cannot think of two more different musical styles than these two.
Anthony Perkins' performance is very nicely nuanced. The stutter only starts when he is under duress. When the '57 Ford is sinking in the swamp he bites his finger nervously and this created sympathy with this viewer. I almost wanted the car to sink. During the film I got the feeling that this was the work of an accomplished stage actor.
Ultimately the film is about confounding viewer's expectations. The heroine dies at the end of act 1. We are led to feel compassion for the murderer. We are lead to identify with the criminal activity, knowing that we might do the same thing in the same situation.
In essence the film appears to be about apportion of guilt, who the viewer sympathises with and how everyone believes the motive for murder is money, but in the end it's just psychological disturbance. I guess the $40000 is the classic Hitchcock McGuffin. Not providing a moral hero must have been quite daring in the 50s, though having said that I can think of other films with big moral ambiguity from that era, such as Maltese Falcon, Kiss Me Deadly, Casablanca. Actually the more I think about it, the more moral ambiguity seems to be more prevalent in the immediate post-war era than today. Of course I always forget how conservative the times we live in are today.
Ebert's review mentioned “Detour” which I haven't seen for ages and would love to “own.”
The Herrmann score really impressed me in its simplicity. I could detect three basic elements in the small string orchestra score. The title theme, the slow rocking music first used in the slow pan across the Phoenix skyline, and the stabbing slashing music. I read that Herrmann studied with Percy Grainger in New York. I cannot think of two more different musical styles than these two.
Anthony Perkins' performance is very nicely nuanced. The stutter only starts when he is under duress. When the '57 Ford is sinking in the swamp he bites his finger nervously and this created sympathy with this viewer. I almost wanted the car to sink. During the film I got the feeling that this was the work of an accomplished stage actor.
Ultimately the film is about confounding viewer's expectations. The heroine dies at the end of act 1. We are led to feel compassion for the murderer. We are lead to identify with the criminal activity, knowing that we might do the same thing in the same situation.
Friday 16 July 2004
The Last of England
Poly Toynbee's essay in today's Guardian neatly encapsulates all my vague feelings of distaste at the state of my native land, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Thursday 15 July 2004
Alternative Car Park
...is the name of the mime artist played by Rowan Atkinson in the 1980's "satirical" comedy sketch show Not the Nine O'Clock News. It just came into my head.
Found a blogger not one million miles away from chez moi - Have a Look. This blog onepointzero is another Brussels based one.
No new films to report, though I did watch the alternative musical soundtrack to Battle of Britain and the commentary track to Vertigo.
The original soundtrack by Sir William Walton for Battle of Britain appears to have been lost for a long time. It's nice that the age of DVD can reunite things in this way. However I can understand why his music was junked for Roy Goodwin's version. The Walton track is too classical, whereas Goodwin's is much more cinematic which I guess in 1968 was important for a mass market film. One positive of the Walton version is that there is much less musical melodramatic emoting in certain scenes, such as Suzannah York's reaction to the dead WAAF's after the first bombing of the airfield, and Ian McShane's reaction to the Rest Centre where his wife and kids were sheltering being flattened. As an aside the McShane character appears to take the loss of his family very well, as in the next scene we see him not entirely traumatised. I guess later at the end of the film as the Spitfire pilots wait for the scramble that finally never comes, the Ian McShane character looks pretty stressed out... One positive about the Roy Goodwin version, apart from being more suitable for a mass market film, is that when the Walton section “Battle in the Air” does come along the music sounds very special and really makes the montage scene.
The commentary for Vertigo doesn't add much to the documentary already seen on the DVD. Still it's was a good reminder of the amount of work that went in to the restoration. I didn't realise they had used a separate original recording of the soundtrack which meant they had to remake all the foley effects – this was a little obvious as things like rustling paper sounded too false.
Found a blogger not one million miles away from chez moi - Have a Look. This blog onepointzero is another Brussels based one.
No new films to report, though I did watch the alternative musical soundtrack to Battle of Britain and the commentary track to Vertigo.
The original soundtrack by Sir William Walton for Battle of Britain appears to have been lost for a long time. It's nice that the age of DVD can reunite things in this way. However I can understand why his music was junked for Roy Goodwin's version. The Walton track is too classical, whereas Goodwin's is much more cinematic which I guess in 1968 was important for a mass market film. One positive of the Walton version is that there is much less musical melodramatic emoting in certain scenes, such as Suzannah York's reaction to the dead WAAF's after the first bombing of the airfield, and Ian McShane's reaction to the Rest Centre where his wife and kids were sheltering being flattened. As an aside the McShane character appears to take the loss of his family very well, as in the next scene we see him not entirely traumatised. I guess later at the end of the film as the Spitfire pilots wait for the scramble that finally never comes, the Ian McShane character looks pretty stressed out... One positive about the Roy Goodwin version, apart from being more suitable for a mass market film, is that when the Walton section “Battle in the Air” does come along the music sounds very special and really makes the montage scene.
The commentary for Vertigo doesn't add much to the documentary already seen on the DVD. Still it's was a good reminder of the amount of work that went in to the restoration. I didn't realise they had used a separate original recording of the soundtrack which meant they had to remake all the foley effects – this was a little obvious as things like rustling paper sounded too false.
Monday 12 July 2004
Le Mans
The first dialogue in this film comes at 37 minutes after the first glimpse of Steve McQueen's Porsche 911. That about sums up the priorities of this unique film. Apart from McQueen, the actors are not terribly well known, it's the cars that are stars – the Porsche 917 and the Ferrari 312P.
For someone who has fallen out of love with motor racing this movie really involved me. I wasn't aware that it was the British Grand Prix this weekend, though I could have easily predicted the winner. Ferrari is no longer a romantic name for me. There is no plot in the film, and the action is episodic. Yet again, this is a film that cannot be made today, and a part of it is a big chunk of nostalgia. The atmosphere of rural France in 1970 is really palpable, and the dirt and danger of the racing is apparent in every frame. Also the use of lenses and focus and film grain is very beautiful.
The on track scenes are really fantastic. The two major crash sequences are beautifully filmed in slow motion and somewhat horrifically beautiful. The way the cars bounce between the rails is almost balletic. The knowledge that one of the stunt drivers lost a leg in the making of the crash sequences adds to the poignancy. This was a real film, a quasi-documentary, shot with real cars on the real track with real drivers like Jacky Ickx and Steve McQueen himself
The acting, what little of it there is, works very well as it is so restrained. The melodrama is kept to an absolute minimum. The off track story never lasts more than a few minutes and usefully breaks up the on track action. The Michel Legrand score is lovely and complements the film without distracting from the raison d'etre – the cars and the race.
Again I am watching films from the late 60s / early 70s. This period really feels like the end of an era, after which films started getting more commercially oriented, more marketing driven. Another film of the same ilk is of course Grand Prix. From what I remember this has much more melodrama off track, but as the main leads are Yves Montand and Eva Maria Saint, that's OK by me. Of course Grand Prix has the benefit of being able to see on screen the racing starts of the day, memorably spoofed by Robbie Williams in Love Supreme. And the split screen racing shots stick in my mind too. These days racing is just not dangerous enough.
For someone who has fallen out of love with motor racing this movie really involved me. I wasn't aware that it was the British Grand Prix this weekend, though I could have easily predicted the winner. Ferrari is no longer a romantic name for me. There is no plot in the film, and the action is episodic. Yet again, this is a film that cannot be made today, and a part of it is a big chunk of nostalgia. The atmosphere of rural France in 1970 is really palpable, and the dirt and danger of the racing is apparent in every frame. Also the use of lenses and focus and film grain is very beautiful.
The on track scenes are really fantastic. The two major crash sequences are beautifully filmed in slow motion and somewhat horrifically beautiful. The way the cars bounce between the rails is almost balletic. The knowledge that one of the stunt drivers lost a leg in the making of the crash sequences adds to the poignancy. This was a real film, a quasi-documentary, shot with real cars on the real track with real drivers like Jacky Ickx and Steve McQueen himself
The acting, what little of it there is, works very well as it is so restrained. The melodrama is kept to an absolute minimum. The off track story never lasts more than a few minutes and usefully breaks up the on track action. The Michel Legrand score is lovely and complements the film without distracting from the raison d'etre – the cars and the race.
Again I am watching films from the late 60s / early 70s. This period really feels like the end of an era, after which films started getting more commercially oriented, more marketing driven. Another film of the same ilk is of course Grand Prix. From what I remember this has much more melodrama off track, but as the main leads are Yves Montand and Eva Maria Saint, that's OK by me. Of course Grand Prix has the benefit of being able to see on screen the racing starts of the day, memorably spoofed by Robbie Williams in Love Supreme. And the split screen racing shots stick in my mind too. These days racing is just not dangerous enough.
Friday 9 July 2004
Where Eagles Dare
“This is Broadsword calling Danny Boy, Broadsword calling Danny Boy.” I just wanted to get that out of the way.
Another nostalgia trip to the 1960's view of the 1940's. Just like The Battle of Britain, this is a favourite film from childhood. I wonder if this film, and BoB were remade today scene for scene with modern actors and modern production values, whether the film would still be as enjoyable? I think not. Is it nostalgia getting in the way again? Unashamedly so. The teaming of Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood is really delightful, if a bit wooden. Well the woodenness adds to the charm of course. Watching these actors I know that there will never be the likes of these again. Richard Burton's character in particular is completely beyond realism, yet I can sympathise with him in a way it is impossible with a James Bond. This guy is tired and weary, he shows fallibility under fire, yet still unmasks all the moles in MI6 by the last reel. Still there is nothing about his life, apart from his wife who he covertly brings along for the mission. The twists and turns are all beyond belief and the script is pretty bad. But Burton hams his way thorough the frequently glorious Austrian Alps scenery and all is forgiven.
What can't be forgiven is how many German troops Clint Eastwood wastes in this film without even an over quaffed hair out of place. The hair is as un-1940's as Mary Ure's shoulder length mascara... The same apples to Mary Ure's shooting skills, but again all is forgiven as her character is obviously a very capable and deadly woman. Even by today's standards she is remarkably un-weak, never mustering anything close to a scream and doing all the derring-do that the men do too.
The minor characters are a bit of a waste of acting talent – Peter Barkworth, Donald Houston and William Squire (Khachaturian in Palmer's wonderful Testimony) do nothing after they are unmasked except looking scared and remorseful. The cable-car-top fight with Burton vs Barkworth and Houston is fantastically memorable though... Derren Nesbitt makes a memorable Gestapo officer. A big contrast to his other role I have seen him in Room at the Top. What a shock it was to see this ueber-mensch as a jealous Yorkshireman! Ingrid Pitt was a joy to see again – the only other film I can think of with her in it is The Wicker Man.
The final star is the Alpine landscape. It really is joyful to behold, and chilling to imagine this part of the world in the early 1940's. For Alpine atmosphere this one is up there with On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Why can't people make wonderful Alpine films anymore?
Another nostalgia trip to the 1960's view of the 1940's. Just like The Battle of Britain, this is a favourite film from childhood. I wonder if this film, and BoB were remade today scene for scene with modern actors and modern production values, whether the film would still be as enjoyable? I think not. Is it nostalgia getting in the way again? Unashamedly so. The teaming of Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood is really delightful, if a bit wooden. Well the woodenness adds to the charm of course. Watching these actors I know that there will never be the likes of these again. Richard Burton's character in particular is completely beyond realism, yet I can sympathise with him in a way it is impossible with a James Bond. This guy is tired and weary, he shows fallibility under fire, yet still unmasks all the moles in MI6 by the last reel. Still there is nothing about his life, apart from his wife who he covertly brings along for the mission. The twists and turns are all beyond belief and the script is pretty bad. But Burton hams his way thorough the frequently glorious Austrian Alps scenery and all is forgiven.
What can't be forgiven is how many German troops Clint Eastwood wastes in this film without even an over quaffed hair out of place. The hair is as un-1940's as Mary Ure's shoulder length mascara... The same apples to Mary Ure's shooting skills, but again all is forgiven as her character is obviously a very capable and deadly woman. Even by today's standards she is remarkably un-weak, never mustering anything close to a scream and doing all the derring-do that the men do too.
The minor characters are a bit of a waste of acting talent – Peter Barkworth, Donald Houston and William Squire (Khachaturian in Palmer's wonderful Testimony) do nothing after they are unmasked except looking scared and remorseful. The cable-car-top fight with Burton vs Barkworth and Houston is fantastically memorable though... Derren Nesbitt makes a memorable Gestapo officer. A big contrast to his other role I have seen him in Room at the Top. What a shock it was to see this ueber-mensch as a jealous Yorkshireman! Ingrid Pitt was a joy to see again – the only other film I can think of with her in it is The Wicker Man.
The final star is the Alpine landscape. It really is joyful to behold, and chilling to imagine this part of the world in the early 1940's. For Alpine atmosphere this one is up there with On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Why can't people make wonderful Alpine films anymore?
Monday 5 July 2004
Vertigo
What a strange, strange film. This viewing was my second – I must have seen it before in the cinema when it was re-released in restored format in the mid 1990’s. The strangest thing is that I had forgotten the twist in the tale that happens two-thirds of the way through. That came as a bit of a shock – it was really like seeing the film for the first time, only worse as I was convinced what I was seeing on the screen was not there the first time. This added to the disorientation that the film naturally creates.
My impression from watching the film the first time was the wonderful atmosphere of 1950’s San Francisco, before the spate of tower blocks that grew in the 60’s and 70’s. Hitchcock’s films always have this wonderful veneer of artificiality, especially with external shots, which in many cases were internal with back projections of course, as he famously hated working outside the controlled world of the paramount studio. For me this gives a unique charm, especially with Hitchcock’s colour films. It’s something that spreads to the general surreality of the cars of the time (in this case a Jag and a DeSoto.)
This time I felt less of this atmosphere I caught the first time. Of course the famous shot of Kim Novak standing in front of the Golden Gate dropping flowers into the water is a masterful shot – perfect composition and lighting – the strange mystery of standing under an enormous bridge.
This time I was struck by several things. I actually think Kim Novak is quite ugly and plain in this movie – and this adds to the strangeness of the piece. Why would a man be so obsessed with this plain girl – a plain canvas perhaps to load on all his desires? After “Madeleine” falls from the tower the first time, I thought this is where the film ends. The dream sequence really surprised me. Barbara Bel Geddes was a delight – but why keep her so frumpy behind the specs? And what happened to Midge after the hospital sequence? The section in the Sequoia Sempevirens forest made me very sad with its reflections on mortality. It was a very effecting moment, beautifully shot. The image of Madeleine’s gloved hand marking out the birth and death of Carlotta on the tree section is very haunting indeed. And the music was a wonderful Herrmann score – modernist in the opening credits and romantic when required.
But what does it all mean finally? Is it the guilt of a fat man’s obsession with young blonds? I always thought Vertigo was fear of heights, but now I find that it is just the dizzying swaying sensation. This could be a description of mad love too, or obsession. It’s a study of mental collapse then. Maybe after the screen goes to black the Jimmy Stewart character jumps after his lost Madeleine?
My impression from watching the film the first time was the wonderful atmosphere of 1950’s San Francisco, before the spate of tower blocks that grew in the 60’s and 70’s. Hitchcock’s films always have this wonderful veneer of artificiality, especially with external shots, which in many cases were internal with back projections of course, as he famously hated working outside the controlled world of the paramount studio. For me this gives a unique charm, especially with Hitchcock’s colour films. It’s something that spreads to the general surreality of the cars of the time (in this case a Jag and a DeSoto.)
This time I felt less of this atmosphere I caught the first time. Of course the famous shot of Kim Novak standing in front of the Golden Gate dropping flowers into the water is a masterful shot – perfect composition and lighting – the strange mystery of standing under an enormous bridge.
This time I was struck by several things. I actually think Kim Novak is quite ugly and plain in this movie – and this adds to the strangeness of the piece. Why would a man be so obsessed with this plain girl – a plain canvas perhaps to load on all his desires? After “Madeleine” falls from the tower the first time, I thought this is where the film ends. The dream sequence really surprised me. Barbara Bel Geddes was a delight – but why keep her so frumpy behind the specs? And what happened to Midge after the hospital sequence? The section in the Sequoia Sempevirens forest made me very sad with its reflections on mortality. It was a very effecting moment, beautifully shot. The image of Madeleine’s gloved hand marking out the birth and death of Carlotta on the tree section is very haunting indeed. And the music was a wonderful Herrmann score – modernist in the opening credits and romantic when required.
But what does it all mean finally? Is it the guilt of a fat man’s obsession with young blonds? I always thought Vertigo was fear of heights, but now I find that it is just the dizzying swaying sensation. This could be a description of mad love too, or obsession. It’s a study of mental collapse then. Maybe after the screen goes to black the Jimmy Stewart character jumps after his lost Madeleine?
Friday 2 July 2004
The Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain has always been a favourite of mine, right from childhood. I imagine in its time (1969) it was a bit of an anachronism. It was one of the last WWII films, and 60s Britain was really about leaving that wartime generation of austerity and moral rectitude behind. (By the way hurragh for the 1960s, my life would not have been so good if it wasn’t for that decade…)
I love early James Bonds and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and this film is really a remake of these – Saltzman producing, Guy Hamilton directing, the same production teams. All the plusses of Goldfinger and Chitty, and with beautiful shots of Spitfires, Hurricane, Me109s and He111s. All the star turns are a treat, particularly from Larry Olivier, Suzannah York, Ian McShane, Michael Caine (though his death is sudden and unexplained,) Robert Shaw, Trevor Howard, Kurt Juergens, Peter Cushing, and more.
The film gives nice sympathetic coverage of the Germans too – genuine sadness at the dinner table with the missing’s places filled with a solitary candle. The vaudeville actor Hein Riess plays a wonderfully pompous Goering.
The DVD is very well presented – the picture is better than Close My Eyes, twenty years its junior. The "making of" is a contemporary piece happily devoid of too much marketing tat, lovably introduced by Caine in his native East End. There is a wonderful interview with a BoB pilot with a smashing handlebar moustache. He comes across as a loveable guy who realizes he lived through a great time but does not have a hint of the “I fought for people like you” crap that afflicts (afflicted…) many of that generation. The 60’s haters I mean…
Historically the DVD points out that at that time no-one knew that Dowding had access to the Bletchley Park decrypted messages of Nazi High Command. This puts an interesting spin on the film’s words from Dowding as he invokes a miracle. The film also has the non-revisionist view that it was the plucky few (plus the Poles and hopefully not Ben Affleck for the USA) that rebuffed Operation Sealion, whereas nowadays it is more accepted that it was Hitler’s idea to look east that probably saved the day. Operation Barbarossa was being planned at the time I guess. Or was it too early for that? If the BoB ended in autumn 1940, and Barbarossa started in June 1941… It did show that the Luftwaffe’s change of plan from attacking the airfields and radar to blitzing London was a major error. The old maxim that you can’t bomb civilian populations into submission comes in to play. Except if it’s an atom bomb I guess. Did razing Dresden hasten the end of the Nazi’s? Difficult to say.
Anyway, it’s a wonderful romp. One of the scenes that I remember is Robert Shaw waking up in a Kentish cottage early in the morning looking in on his children before driving off to work. I guess it is the mundanity of the scene which is surprising against the fierce deadly battles being fought by this character. And Shaw is always a watchable, if slightly crap, actor.
And the Walton section of the film “Battle in the Skies” is truly great film music. I have yet to watch the DVD with the 100% William Walton soundtrack.
I love early James Bonds and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and this film is really a remake of these – Saltzman producing, Guy Hamilton directing, the same production teams. All the plusses of Goldfinger and Chitty, and with beautiful shots of Spitfires, Hurricane, Me109s and He111s. All the star turns are a treat, particularly from Larry Olivier, Suzannah York, Ian McShane, Michael Caine (though his death is sudden and unexplained,) Robert Shaw, Trevor Howard, Kurt Juergens, Peter Cushing, and more.
The film gives nice sympathetic coverage of the Germans too – genuine sadness at the dinner table with the missing’s places filled with a solitary candle. The vaudeville actor Hein Riess plays a wonderfully pompous Goering.
The DVD is very well presented – the picture is better than Close My Eyes, twenty years its junior. The "making of" is a contemporary piece happily devoid of too much marketing tat, lovably introduced by Caine in his native East End. There is a wonderful interview with a BoB pilot with a smashing handlebar moustache. He comes across as a loveable guy who realizes he lived through a great time but does not have a hint of the “I fought for people like you” crap that afflicts (afflicted…) many of that generation. The 60’s haters I mean…
Historically the DVD points out that at that time no-one knew that Dowding had access to the Bletchley Park decrypted messages of Nazi High Command. This puts an interesting spin on the film’s words from Dowding as he invokes a miracle. The film also has the non-revisionist view that it was the plucky few (plus the Poles and hopefully not Ben Affleck for the USA) that rebuffed Operation Sealion, whereas nowadays it is more accepted that it was Hitler’s idea to look east that probably saved the day. Operation Barbarossa was being planned at the time I guess. Or was it too early for that? If the BoB ended in autumn 1940, and Barbarossa started in June 1941… It did show that the Luftwaffe’s change of plan from attacking the airfields and radar to blitzing London was a major error. The old maxim that you can’t bomb civilian populations into submission comes in to play. Except if it’s an atom bomb I guess. Did razing Dresden hasten the end of the Nazi’s? Difficult to say.
Anyway, it’s a wonderful romp. One of the scenes that I remember is Robert Shaw waking up in a Kentish cottage early in the morning looking in on his children before driving off to work. I guess it is the mundanity of the scene which is surprising against the fierce deadly battles being fought by this character. And Shaw is always a watchable, if slightly crap, actor.
And the Walton section of the film “Battle in the Skies” is truly great film music. I have yet to watch the DVD with the 100% William Walton soundtrack.
Close My Eyes
Close My Eyes was truly one of my favourite films of the 1990's. Partly what made it memorable was the fact I saw it in a special screening on its release at the Cambridge Arts Cinema in the presence of the director Stephen Poliakoff.
OK, the film’s big thing is that its central characters are brother and sister having an erotic affair. This fact seems to polarize completely the opinion of the film. In general most US viewers comments are coloured by the moral degeneracy without punishment angle. Other commentators like it because of the way it is filmed but despite the incest, while others saw it because Alan Rickman was in Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves.
My angle is this – it is really quite irrelevant to the story. In attempting to think of how the writer came up with the incest line, I think this is the only way to have a credible adulterous affair with the husband accepting that the wife and her lover are close without suspecting anything. This does create some interesting dramatic tension and brings the three corners of the affair very close to each other.
In more broad terms, the film is about disturbing change – the long hot greenhouse effect summers, AIDS, the changes in society during the Thatcher years, the stock market and property bubble of the late 1980’s, Docklands, New Money. The affair between the brother and sister is a retreat and a reaction to this change – a retreat from incomprehension of the changes happening in the world into the last taboo. Very mysterious.
The film is really a historical document which deals with that most difficult of subjects, the recent past. Watching it now in 2004, fifteen years after the event, it starts to become comprehensible. Global warming has become more and more real; even if we don’t know what the effects will really be it has become part of everyday life. We have had another stock market bubble rise and burst, perhaps more violently than last time. The property bubble is again near its peak in the UK. Looking at this film is like looking in a mirror of our times.
The film looks absolutely wonderful, even though the DVD transfer is very poor. The filmmakers were very lucky with the long hot summer of 1989, and the Home Counties (Oxfordshire, around Cliveden) look heartbreakingly beautiful, as shot by Witold Stok. As one of the characters says, “I never thought the Home Counties could be so beautiful.” The contrast with the city of London shots if very well done. A gorgeous film to look at. I just checked for Witold Stok’s other work, but there is nothing I have heard of, bar the Comic Strip’s Eat the Rich. The string quartet music by Michael Gibbs really adds a lot of depth to the film – a sad wistful melody threads through the work. Really wonderful haunting stuff. Again he has not done anything else major.
As for the acting, the three stars are all highly proficient and work together very well. Clive Owen looks very young and boyish for those that are used to seeing him in more recent work, such as the great Croupier. My comment on his suitability as the next James Bond is - no he shouldn’t do it. He looks far to vulnerable and he is really far too good an actor to waste on such a meagre rôle. Saskia Reeves does a great job of turning from the ugly Sheffield duckling with a broad accent to the Home Counties wife, sullen but living a perfect life. Alan Rickman exudes strangeness and otherness.
Key images of the film – the first time we see Saskia Reeves’ character in her new life, making a summer pudding – the first real colours of summer and of the film, the bright red of the berries. The static shots of Canary Wharf being constructed. Clive Owen’s character in tears in the Ritz tearoom. Walking barefoot through a London Sunday morning. The Thames in any shot with the parched grass and perfect cottages peeking out from the woods. The great Niall Buggy’s cameo as a rapacious property developer in red braces. The brother and sister returning to the party after their fight with cuts and grazes everywhere and their clothes dirty and torn. So many others.
Still one of my favourite films of the 1990’s after this recent viewing. In the DVD’s accompanying interviews with the cast and directors, Stephen Poliakoff mentions that Richard Curtis said it was one of his favourite British films. This one is really a classic that future generations will come to love, I think.
OK, the film’s big thing is that its central characters are brother and sister having an erotic affair. This fact seems to polarize completely the opinion of the film. In general most US viewers comments are coloured by the moral degeneracy without punishment angle. Other commentators like it because of the way it is filmed but despite the incest, while others saw it because Alan Rickman was in Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves.
My angle is this – it is really quite irrelevant to the story. In attempting to think of how the writer came up with the incest line, I think this is the only way to have a credible adulterous affair with the husband accepting that the wife and her lover are close without suspecting anything. This does create some interesting dramatic tension and brings the three corners of the affair very close to each other.
In more broad terms, the film is about disturbing change – the long hot greenhouse effect summers, AIDS, the changes in society during the Thatcher years, the stock market and property bubble of the late 1980’s, Docklands, New Money. The affair between the brother and sister is a retreat and a reaction to this change – a retreat from incomprehension of the changes happening in the world into the last taboo. Very mysterious.
The film is really a historical document which deals with that most difficult of subjects, the recent past. Watching it now in 2004, fifteen years after the event, it starts to become comprehensible. Global warming has become more and more real; even if we don’t know what the effects will really be it has become part of everyday life. We have had another stock market bubble rise and burst, perhaps more violently than last time. The property bubble is again near its peak in the UK. Looking at this film is like looking in a mirror of our times.
The film looks absolutely wonderful, even though the DVD transfer is very poor. The filmmakers were very lucky with the long hot summer of 1989, and the Home Counties (Oxfordshire, around Cliveden) look heartbreakingly beautiful, as shot by Witold Stok. As one of the characters says, “I never thought the Home Counties could be so beautiful.” The contrast with the city of London shots if very well done. A gorgeous film to look at. I just checked for Witold Stok’s other work, but there is nothing I have heard of, bar the Comic Strip’s Eat the Rich. The string quartet music by Michael Gibbs really adds a lot of depth to the film – a sad wistful melody threads through the work. Really wonderful haunting stuff. Again he has not done anything else major.
As for the acting, the three stars are all highly proficient and work together very well. Clive Owen looks very young and boyish for those that are used to seeing him in more recent work, such as the great Croupier. My comment on his suitability as the next James Bond is - no he shouldn’t do it. He looks far to vulnerable and he is really far too good an actor to waste on such a meagre rôle. Saskia Reeves does a great job of turning from the ugly Sheffield duckling with a broad accent to the Home Counties wife, sullen but living a perfect life. Alan Rickman exudes strangeness and otherness.
Key images of the film – the first time we see Saskia Reeves’ character in her new life, making a summer pudding – the first real colours of summer and of the film, the bright red of the berries. The static shots of Canary Wharf being constructed. Clive Owen’s character in tears in the Ritz tearoom. Walking barefoot through a London Sunday morning. The Thames in any shot with the parched grass and perfect cottages peeking out from the woods. The great Niall Buggy’s cameo as a rapacious property developer in red braces. The brother and sister returning to the party after their fight with cuts and grazes everywhere and their clothes dirty and torn. So many others.
Still one of my favourite films of the 1990’s after this recent viewing. In the DVD’s accompanying interviews with the cast and directors, Stephen Poliakoff mentions that Richard Curtis said it was one of his favourite British films. This one is really a classic that future generations will come to love, I think.
The beginning of the rest of the year
So it's July 2004 and half the year is over. It seems this year is going by faster than any before. Strange how our perception of time changes with age.
The weather here in Belgium is terrible, so unlike last year with its "Eté sans fin."
It is high time I started to give my film reviews again. What did I see recently? Close My Eyes, The Battle of Britain.
The weather here in Belgium is terrible, so unlike last year with its "Eté sans fin."
It is high time I started to give my film reviews again. What did I see recently? Close My Eyes, The Battle of Britain.
Wednesday 30 June 2004
Wednesday 16 June 2004
1st Email Update
Hurragh! Republishing meant that I can now see all my old film reviews
on the public blogsite. And I can submit entries by email.
Oh happy, happy day!!
on the public blogsite. And I can submit entries by email.
Oh happy, happy day!!
Back after a petit pause
This is my first look at the new style blogspot. I seem to have refound all the old reviews of films I made. I thought I had lost everything but somehow it is still there...
So now I want to go back and review every film I have seen in the last year! Bugger this is going to take too much time.
Plus I no longer have internet at home, so I have to do it all at work. Uck!
The latest film is the 1969 "Battle of Britain", so let me gird my lions for that...
So now I want to go back and review every film I have seen in the last year! Bugger this is going to take too much time.
Plus I no longer have internet at home, so I have to do it all at work. Uck!
The latest film is the 1969 "Battle of Britain", so let me gird my lions for that...
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