Craig Skinner
I'm an equal opportunities film lover, passionate about finding new films and digging deep into film festival line-ups to find new voices and hidden gems. I'm a contributor to HeyUGuys, Bleeding Cool and The Huffington Post. My writing can also be found at Craig Skinner on Film.
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- Feb 28, 13
Nicholas Sparks adaptations seem to be becoming a genre all of their own, Spark is even credited as producer here, and there is little in Safe Haven that will most likely be of interest to those not already head of heels in love with his particular brand of romantic melodrama. Fans of his now tried and tested formula will no doubt lap up this new adaptation from director Lasse Hallstrom, who one can’t help but feel is simply picking up a cheque.
Beginning with a sequence involving the escape of Katie (Julianne Hough) from police detective Kevin (David Lyons) at a bus station, filmed very much in the vein of a ‘gritty’ television police procedural, the film quickly moves to the perpetually sunny and ‘dreamy’ Southport. This small town in North Carolina provides the main location for the bulk of the film, with a few cuts back to Kevin and his continued hunt for Katie, and with it a host of clichéd ideas about small town living and a selection of even more clichéd inhabitants.
Leading the pack of clichéd Southport residents is Alex (Josh Duhamel), a widowed father of two who takes a liking to the latest resident of Southport, the guarded but reasonably friendly Katie. Alex is drawn in simple but relatively effective broad brush strokes but comes across far more as a robot designed to be everything a woman wants rather than even a weak facsimile of a real person. This ultimately seems to be the modus operandi here, as the basic need to provoke a simplistic response from a weak-minded audience member seems to motivate every character trait and plot point far more than any sense that this all needs to make sense or feel at all genuine.
Katie’s secret for instance, which leads her to flee her home and hide out in Southport is rather flimsy and it’s hard to understand why it needs to remain a secret for so long when most people – especially dreamy widowers – would totally understand and sympathise with her situation. Katie never even opens up to her overly-friendly neighbour Jo (Cobie Smulders) who seems so eager to make Katie happy, for reasons that later become very clear. Simply telling her or Alex would wrap things up too quickly though. She must keep it a secret because it works out ‘better’ for the plot. A plot which follows the three act structure so rigidly that if you check your watch when you think each act is ending you will not be surprised to find that that the film’s runtime has been perfectly split into three.
As the film reaches its climax, with the reveal of Katie’s secret and the arrival of Kevin in Southport, the film begins to ramp up to an absurd and unfortunately comedic level of melodrama, with additional moments of peril thrown in simply to increase the level of threat without any thought to how silly they come across.
In the film’s final scenes the biggest melodramatic secret of all is revealed and it is such an incredibly left-field piece of writing that Sparks and co. almost deserve praise just for having the sheer guts to include it. The final reveal is a twist that is actually painfully obvious around thirty minutes into the film but one that most will undoubtedly dismiss as simply too insanely ridiculous to possibly be real.
Whilst this wonderfully absurd reveal and some of the more histrionically acted scenes do provide some unintended pleasures the film is for the most part an exhausting slog through clichéd characters and formulaic writing that is near impossible to take at all seriously.
- Feb 24, 13
I’ve never particularly liked the Oscars and I rarely care too much who wins but I’ve always found them oddly compelling.
As someone who reads a lot of film sites, magazines and listens to a lot of film podcasts the Oscars are also impossible to avoid and every year the volume of coverage seems to get greater and greater. This year I decided that in order to try and combat awards fatigue I would place some bets on the BAFTAs and Oscars, thereby providing me with a manufactured reason to care about the ‘Oscar Race’.
For the most part it’s worked and thanks to a number of critics writing interesting, insightful pieces about many of the Oscar nominated films this awards season has been an occasionally interesting and not too infuriating one to follow.
Last week I was asked by Indiewire to try and predict the Oscar winners and also suggest who I think should win (from those nominated). Having followed the run up to the Oscars reasonably closely I decided to have a go. Below you can read the list that I submitted and also my picks for the other categories not covered by Indiewire’s poll.
As the winners are announced this evening I will also be updating the list, so bookmark this page to see all the winners and find out how many I got right.
Best Picture
Will Win: Argo
Should Win: Amour
The Winner: ArgoBest Director
Will Win: Steven Spielberg
Should Win: Michael Haneke
The Winner: Ang LeeBest Actor
Will Win: Daniel Day-Lewis
Should Win: Daniel Day-Lewis
The Winner: Daniel Day-LewisBest Actress
Will Win: Emmuelle Riva
Should Win: Emanuelle Riva
The Winner: Jennifer LawrenceBest Supporting Actor
Will Win: Robert De Niro
Should Win: Phillip Seymour-Hoffman
The Winner: Christoph WaltzBest Supporting Actress
Will Win: Anne Hathaway
Should Win: Anne Hathaway
The Winner: Anne HathawayBest Original Screenplay
Will Win: Amour
Should Win: Amour
The Winner: Django UnchainedBest Adapted Screenplay
Will Win: Argo
Should Win: Lincoln
The Winner: ArgoBest Foreign Film
Will Win: Amour
Should Win: Amour
The Winner: AmourBest Documentary Feature
Will Win: Searching for Sugar Man
Should Win: The Invisble War
The Winner: Searching for Sugar ManBest Animated Feature
Will Win: Frankenweenie
Should Win: Frankenweenie
The Winner: BraveBest Cinematography
Will Win: Life of Pi
Should Win: Skyfall
The Winner: Life of PiBest Original Score
Will Win: Argo
Should Win: Argo
The Winner: Life of PiOriginal Song
Will Win: Skyfall
Should Win: Chasing Ice
The Winner: SkyfallProduction Design
Will Win: Les Miserables
Should Win: Les Miserables
The Winner: LincolnCostume Design
Will Win: Les Miserables
Should Win: Les Miserables
The Winner: Anna KareninaFilm Editing
Will Win: Argo
Should Win: Zero Dark Thirty
The Winner: ArgoMakeup
Will Win: Hitchcock
Should Win: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
The Winner: Les MiserablesSound Editing
Will Win: Argo
Should Win: Zero Dark Thirty
The Winner: Zero Dark Thirty/SkyfallSound Mixing
Will Win: Les Miserables
Should Win: Skyfall
The Winner: Les MiserablesVisual Effects
Will Win: Life of Pi
Should Win: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
The Winner: Life of PiDocumentary Short
Will Win: Open Heart
Should Win: [Abstained]
The Winner: InocenteLive Action Short Film
Will Win: Curfew
Should Win: [Abstained]
The Winner: CurfewAnimated Short Film
Will Win: Paperman
Should Win: Paperman
The Winner: Paperman - Feb 24, 13
Charlie Sheen Is Winning With Inside the Mind of Charles Swan II
Whilst I think the way in which Karina Longworth has her cake and eats it with this piece – dismissing those that have written about Sheen whilst falling into similar traps herself – there is some really fascinating detail in this piece at LA Weekly.
Steven Soderbergh on Quitting Hollywood, Getting the Best Out of J-Lo, and His Love of Girls
A great long interview with the now retired (?) filmmaker Steven Soderbergh, which includes the following fascinating piece of news about Kafka:
Well, I’m remaking—it’s been a long process—but I’m overhauling Kafka completely. It’s funny—wrapping a movie 22 years later! But the rights had reverted back to me and Paul Rassam, an executive producer, and he said, “I know you were never really happy with it. Do you want to go back in and play around?” We shot some inserts while we were doing Side Effects. I’m also dubbing the whole thing into German so the accent issue goes away. And Lem and I have been working on recalibrating some of the dialogue and the storytelling. So it’s a completely different movie.
Chinese censoring of Cloud Atlas is true truly a real problem
Hollywood has already begun tailoring films for China and much like Scott Mendelson I suspect this may result have worrying results.
Blu-Ray Consumer Guide: Face Up To Reality February 2013 Edition
Another of Glenn Kenny’s essential Blu-ray posts.
Filmmaker Alex Barrett on the miracle of cinema.
Liza Schwarzbaum’s final post for Entertainment Weekly.
Deep Inside: A Study of 10000 Porn Stars and Their Careers
Crunching the numbers on American porn stars yields some fascinating results.
Criticwatch – The Side Effects of What We Do
E Film Critic provide an update on some of the most shameless quote whores.
Zeebox founder and former iPlayer boss Anthony Rose on the future of TV
Damsel, Arise: A Westboro Scion Leaves Her Church
A very interesting interview with Megan Phelps-Roper, who has recently left the Westboro Baptist church.
Red Obsessions: Film Business Moves from Hollywood to Asia
Another piece on how Hollywood is reacting to the growing market for films in Asia.
- Feb 08, 13
Whilst film-makers often deliberately infuse their films with messages relating to current concerns – the allegorical explorations by Romero in his zombie films immediately spring to mind – more subtle or even subconsciousness reflections of recent events often find their way into films.
In the following piece I explore the way in which Wreck-It Ralph, a film that may appear to be simple childish confectionery, can be read as a playful retelling of recent American political and economic history. Whether many of the similarities with recent events are conscious inclusions on the part of the writers – some who have previously worked on The Simpsons and are therefore not strangers to political commentary – is of course in question but, as I hopefully illustrate below, the film certainly supports this kind of reading.
“I was just tired of living alone in the garbage”
“Well now you live alone in the penthouse”
So goes an exchange between Ralph and one of the Nicelanders, the well-to-do residents of the large building that it is Ralph’s job to constantly wreck in the game Fix-It Felix Jr. The conversation between the two occurs when Ralph returns to the game world of Fix-It Felix Jr. having attempted to get a medal and earn his ‘rightful’ place in the building, to live amongst the Nicelanders in a swanky penthouse.
The search for a medal is inspired by the medal that Fix-It Felix earns every time he rescues the Nicelanders, but the one that Ralph manages to procure is from the game Hero’s Duty. Shortly after winning the medal Ralph finds himself in the game world of Sugar Rush – described at one point as a “candy-coated heart of darkness” – and loses the medal to Vanellope von Schweetz, a precocious ‘glitch’ who uses it to enter a race. At this point the medal transforms into a coin.
Ralph’s quest becomes something symbolically fascinating when one focuses on these two scenes; what he ultimately finds himself coveting is money and a symbol of economic success, property.
Watching Wreck-It Ralph with this in mind leads to an intriguing reading of the film and as one looks deeper at a number of the characters and scenarios the similarities between them and the recent political and economic situations in America begin to pile up. ‘Average Joe’ Ralph’s plight is one that in many ways represents the modern American dream, a desire to break free from the monotony of a menial job that appears to have no reward or sense of satisfaction.
He dreams of financial success, which is in turn linked to property ownership, and the kind of celebrity worship that Felix enjoys (desire for celebrity worship has recently become an important part of the modern American Dream).
Ralph is eager to please the Nicelanders, the one-percenters, but also strives to be one of them and move out of the slum that he currently lives in. When the reality of Ralph’s situation and the class immovability that he faces becomes clear Ralph does what so many others in the real world do, he turns to therapy. He does not find solace here though, amongst a group of characters who have the exact same problems. This is a common anxiety that Ralph is experiencing, one that results from being repeatedly sold a false dream, an impossible dream that like Felix he can ‘win’ day after day.
Ralph looks further afield for answers and to try and fulfil his dreams. First he travels into Hero’s Duty, a game that involves a state of endless war, one that can never be won, a war waged against a constantly regenerating enemy. The enemy, which are referred to as bugs, are reminiscent of that great work of American allegory, Paul Verhoeven’s Starship Troopers. Echoes of the ‘War on Terror’, PTSD, and paranoia regarding ‘Homeland Security’ are strong in this sub-plot in Wreck-It Ralph and the way in which the bugs later invade the game world or Sugar Rush, not through a visible assault but by more covert means, hiding within the world waiting to strike speaks directly to American paranoia regarding foreign threats.
Sugar Rush is run by the less-than-benevolent King Candy, who on the surface appears jovial and rather harmless but actually resembles more of a dictator figure. A left wing reading of this character would certainly suggest that King Candy shares some similarity with the former president of America, George W. Bush. That King Candy is revealed to actually just be an older racing character (Turbo) reinforces this reading, with the character of Turbo standing in for the former president and father of George W. Bush, George Bush Snr.
King Candy even uses the electronic underpinning of the game world to rig the game to stop Vanellope – read Obama – from entering the race, and also suggest to others that she doesn’t even belong in the world of Sugar Rush. These scenes draw an interesting parallel with the controversies surrounding possible electoral fraud in Florida and spurious claims regarding Barack Obama’s birth certificate. A line dropped from the script in which King Candy comments on not wanting a “race riot” suggest that the film could have had even stronger leanings towards more risqué political content if it were not for a few of the wrinkles having been ironed out during production.
Vanellope ultimately triumphs though, thanks to Ralph defeating the foreign threat and the reveal of King Candy’s true nature, and despite having the option to be the same kind of royal that King Candy was Vanellope casts aside this prior regime and states that she wants Sugar Rush to be a true democracy. Significantly she also chooses to keep her glitches, those unique characteristics that led her to victory but may seem so worrisome to the more conservative residents of Sugar Rush.
Ralph returns to his game and although he doesn’t make it into the penthouse, he has realised that’s not what really matters. Amusingly though his dump has been transformed – shades of urban renewal – and he now lives in a new house. Whilst Vanellope may not be in charge of the world of Fix-It Felix Jr. it would appear that the new administration and a shift in attitudes is having a positive effect on Ralph’s life. Whilst Ralph’s life may not have actually significantly improved, the future is now a little brighter and the glimpses he gets at Vanellope winning the hearts of her world and beyond give him hope.
- Feb 08, 13
The film is fascinating in the questions it raises about nature vs. nurture. Do you find yourself coming down more on one side of that debate and did making Chained change your views at all or lead you in new directions?
Such a great question. I think the dangerous part of nurture vs. nature is the assumption that it is one or the other. It is so deeply case specific. If we look solely at Bob and Rabbit… Bob’s nurture was so damaging, it built a monster. He knew only pain and deception. Mistrust and fear were his first words. Intimacy was ruined and sex mixed with violence. Yet…clearly, he yearns to have companionship and to not be alone. He cannot be rehabilitated, but there is still a deep ingrained human need in him to be loved. Rabbit had love from his mother for nine years. Then the damage occurred. I like to think the knowledge of what love truly feels like enabled him to save his own life and the life of Angie, yet…what will happen to him now? He has been broken. No matter how good his intentions… can he ever recover?
I understand that when you first read the script for Chained you found some of the ‘torture porn’ elements to be gratuitous. What do you consider to be the definition of torture porn and in what way did you find them gratuitous in the first version of the script?
Damien O’Donnell wrote a powerful script, No two ways about it. But it was not a movie for me. I felt I had seen a lot of it before, in that there was a large B story in which detectives searched for the killer throughout, and yes, the killer, who was simply called, THE DICER, was unappealing to me in that he killed by torture. I didn’t know why. I felt unmoved. I felt disconnected. I felt the women were made simple and victimized even before he got to them. Torture porn has a large audience and many folks are great at telling those stories. I’m not one of them. I wanted to explore the idea of a REAL HUMAN MONSTER. How are they made? The idea that something as “every day” and “seemingly safe” as a taxi ride could become threatening… that the pain we all experience guides us in our decision making each day…making us either less or more empathetic.. that’s what’s scary and fascinating. I love scary movies, but I wanted to deal with the monster who doesn’t wear a mask. He stands next to you at the grocery store, and you don’t know how dangerous he is.
How important to you was it to not provide concrete answers in Chained? There are threads that seem to be left loose to encourage audiences to question what they’ve seen and think about the characters’ behaviour. Was this a very conscious consideration and if so, was there anything in particular you did to ensure the film played in this way?
I love a bit of uncertainty at the end of things. It allows for dialogue and audience involvement after the movie. Its intentional on my part and deeply important to me. In the same way I treated the last shot of SURVEILLANCE, I adore the different views on what might become of someone who has survived such things. What happens next. Will the love they knew once be the thing that echoes, or will the violence be too loud? I think that pain is so (as I said above) case specific, it is not for me to say what happens next. It is for all of us to discuss. There really is no excusing the violence Bob imparts, but there is a way to understand it. But we built him. If we can save children from abusive situations, we can begin to end the cycle of the abused becoming abusers. Until then, our silence and hands in our pockets, only keep the monsters coming.
The sounds of Rabbit in the house over the end credits were really important to me. He returns to the only home he has now. He does what he knows. But in my opinion Angie is fine. Next stop, IKEA.
I read in another interview that you would like to do a director’s cut of Chained. What would be different in that cut of the film and do you have any plans to release that at any point?
I would adore to do a director’s cut. I was limited by a running time requirement and had to lose some things I loved. There was a scene as well that I lost due to feelings the distributors had about it. I miss it terribly. The ending was cut significantly enough that Jake Weber told me he was a bit heart broken to see what was missing from that final scene with Rabbit. If there is any way I can raise some money, or if enough people want to see a directors cut…I’M READY.
What was the hardest scene to cut from the film and why?
There were a few. All hurt. But that’s part of the process. A film is made three times. It is written. It is shot. It is cut. So much happens in each stage. I’d say the scene I vaguely referenced in the prior question was the hardest. I don’t want to give away what it was, but I dig the hell out of it. Second in line was the continuation of the “card game” with driver’s licenses that Bob and Rabbit play. There was a round improved at 3 a.m…. amazing. Hysterical. Telling. It just ran too long and had to go. But in a director’s cut…that sucker would be in!!!
So much of the film is incredibly tense and often very uncomfortable to watch. How did you find shooting these kind of scenes and did you do anything in particular to help bring out more emotionally deep performances from the actors?
Every actor involved was so brave and so trusting of me, I had only to make certain I returned that gift. I is imperative that they know they can trust me. That I am not going to make light of what they are doing and how much work it is. I will push them, yes. But I will always be there to catch them. I think discussions are incredibly important. They bring up different feeling in each actor and then are released on the screen. I enjoy blocking and making certain lines are run… but I DO NOT REHEARSE. I think each actual performance should be filmed. Actors are collaborators. They are artists, not puppets. I never want to say..” okay…great…but can you do what you did in that rehearsal (I was too stupid to film)?
How did you find shooting on the RED One and the Alexa? What strengths and/or weaknesses do you thinking shooting on digital had and were there any particular benefits that you found for this film in particular? Do you think you’ll ever shoot on film again?
I love film. I love digital. The Alexa is amazing. The Red is a great camera as well. I also love my Canon Rebel. They are like boyfriends, cameras. Each has something to offer. Some you take home, others you take downtown. I believe I will shoot on film again, certainly, but I have to say I am truly cherishing digital right now. It is not film. It is what it is, and it evolves every day. Most important to me, it allows me to keep the set quiet at the end of a take… to not break the mood… to keep the actors protected in character, but to whisper, ‘still rolling…that was beautiful…let’s go again right now…this time imagine you are afraid he/she will laugh at what you say next’ I can experiment. I do not worry about burning film. I have the actor’s back, and the camera has mine.
One advantage of digital is that you can see what’s just been shot immediately. Did the actors in Chained watch their takes during filming and if so, what effect do you think this had on the actors’ performances?
Neither the actors nor I would watch the takes after we shot them. Maybe once I would show them a playback of something beautiful…some incredible moment.. but again… I have found that watching it takes me out of the creation. I felt the actors felt the same way. I watch footage later. In the moment I keep shooting. Unless I see something go wrong or the cinematographer says we need to go again for camera… I shoot on mood. I think everyone knows when it works.
How did you find the arbitration process with the MPAA that you went through with Chained and what are your personal views about the censorship & classification of films?
Wow. The MPAA. Yeah. Hmmmm. The arbitration was surprisingly pleasant for a situation that didn’t go my way. I believe the people involved are doing what the guidelines set forth for them to do. I simply do not agree with the guidelines. Ultimately what they kept saying was, “It just feels to real” “You have made a great film…we don’t think children should ever see it” Touche’. I mean, hey…neither do I. This is not a kid’s movie… but to say that a sixteen year old cannot go with a parent or discerning adult and after the movie have a dialogue about abuse and safety and the horror of actual violence… is absurd to me. The concept that violence that is sexualized or made funny is better for those 17 and under is grotesque. It is numbing. I love those films for what they are, truly… but we are setting our youth up for a surprise if they think throat slitting is funny or sexy. I can’t help but think that if Brad Pitt played BOB, I would have had an R. But almost proudly I say… Vincent, Eamon, Julia and Jake and Evan (et al) all did such an authentic job… It meant the MPAA was going to have to actually approve intelligent conversations between children and adults. I wish they would have.
I understand your next film is going to be A Fall From Grace. What stage are you currently at with that and what can you tell us about the story? And are you still intending to follow it up with The Monster Next Door?
A Fall From Grace is in the final and delicate stages of casting. I hope to be in pre production by March… fingers crossed. It is all such a beautiful and awkward ballet, this film business. One never knows how it will unfold, only that with passion, eventually, it will.
The Monster Next Door is indeed slated to follow AFFG. I cannot wait!
- Feb 07, 13
Born into the Japanese rural peasant life of 1918, Tome, played by the magnetic Hidari Sachiko, is the daughter of a promiscuous woman and a mentally challenged father, although her father may of course be any number of men. The situation she is born into is ugly and vulgar and so is set the tone of her life. She herself gives birth to a daughter, following an unpleasant situation that results in her being offered up to and impregnated by the landlord’s son, and it is only through her own tenacity that this baby survives, ignoring the suggestions of elders that she should terminate it. Moving to the city and leaving her daughter with her father, Tome begins work in a factory and then as a maid, until an unfortunate accident leads to the death of the child she is caring for.
There is a depressing inevitably in her next career move, her almost passive acceptance of it makes it even more so, as Tome begins working at a local brothel. Tome adapts and survives though and raises above the other women, ultimately working as a madam, securing customers for prostitutes and taking a substantial cut in the process. Resilient and resourceful she is a classic Imamuran woman, but the harsh treatment she so often receives, the ugly view of human life and the stark inevitability of the story is evidence that this is also classic Imamura in many other ways.
The sense that all this has happened before and will of course happen again pushes down on the story, a story already crushed from all sides by the claustrophobia of a character trapped in her circumstances. The tight, on location cinematography adds to this oppression, with Imamura often shooting inside with low ceilings and close walls closing in from all sides.
The film deals with issues beyond Tome’s confined life though and it is undoubtedly no coincidence that her life moves from pre-war Japan, skipping quickly through World War II and then onto the post-war period. The repetition common through all of Insect Woman, most notable in a repeated shot from inside a barn, and the sense that nothing is really changing reflects a bleak outlook that was not perhaps an uncommon one in post-war Japan. There is a glimmer of something approaching hope though in the film’s final moments, as Tome injures her foot on a rock only to continue on. As this moment and in a way, the rest of the film suggests, obstacles will constantly be placed in the way but it is through an almost animalistic resilience and will to survive that these can be moved past.
Much like Masters of Cinema’s release of Imamura’s Pigs and Battleships, which included his first feature Stolen Desire, the MoC release of comes complete with Imamura’s second feature, the delightfully whimsical Nishi Ginza Station. Designed as something of a vehicle for lounge singer Frank Nagai, Nishi Ginza Stationis just over 60 minutes and very much a lightweight B picture but a very enjoyable one. Clearly riffing onThe Seven Year Itch, the number of similarities are almost too numerous to list, the film concerns a henpecked husband who runs a pharmacy, has two children and a reasonably stable family life but dreams of escaping to a tropical island and the delights of Sally, a grass skirted native who lives there – cue some pretty unfortunate but entirely of the time attitudes to race.
In a way he gets his fantasy, or at least something close to it, but the film ends on a reconciliation and a re-establishment of conservative family values, albeit with a sense that nothing has really changed. This latter point may be the closest the film gets to the kind material Imamura dealt with in his later career. But casting aside the desire to see the film framed within Imamura’s filmography one finds a rather frothy but entirely enjoyable comedy with just a little bite. Not exactly a revelation, Nishi Ginza Stationis nonetheless a rare treat and a wonderful sweet one after the rather difficult and heady ‘pleasures’ of Insect Woman.
- Feb 06, 13
Le Silence de la mer is a real treat, both as a standalone experience and also particularly for anyone familiar with and interested in Melville’s body of work. Le Silence de la mer was a film that so easily could have never been seen, with Melville taking a huge gamble in making the film without the consent of author Bruller and agreeing only to release it if it gained the approval of a specially selected jury of resistance members. The film thankfully passed the test and Bruller gave Melville his blessing to release it in 1949.
Telling the story of a German officer (Howard Vernon) who is thrust upon a French unnamed man (Jean-Marie Robain) and his niece (Nicole Stéphane), and uses their home as his home, Le Silence de la mer is a difficult balancing act and one that must have been even trickier and all the more sensitive just a few years after the end of World War Two. Whilst the German officer, Werner von Ebrennac, talks at length throughout the film, the French uncle and niece remain completely silent, their opinions and thoughts only relayed through the voiceover from Jean-Marie Robain, the niece significantly having no such platform.
Von Ebrennac is cultured and intelligent, sympathetic and idealistic and during his many monologues he reveals his dreams of uniting France and Germany, and indeed all of Europe, believing that this is the war that he is fighting for. The ugly truth of the Nazi agenda is revealed to him though, in a rather heartbreaking scene, and the film ends with the French man finally communicating to von Ebrennac, albeit not verbally, that accepting the truth of the Nazi occupation and continuing to follow orders should not be his future. The silent and stubborn integrity that von Ebrennac witnesses in the French home clearly has an impact on him and the film is all the more emotionally resonant due to the complex journey that von Ebrennac goes on throughout the film.
Melville presents a complex and intelligent argument about war and resistance in a film that is both icily still and intellectual but also quietly very emotional.
- Feb 05, 13
There’s a lot to Silent Running in the technology, the story and the ecological message. What first got you excited about making the film?
When I was initially thinking about doing any film I inadvertently came across Tod Browning’s movie The Freaks and there was an amazing character played by Johnny Eck, who could walk on his hands. That was the beginning of an idea for creating an amazing robotic character that people wouldn’t be able to figure out very easily. I’d always been bored by men in robot outfits.
So I was beginning to think about how a movie might incorporate that so I wrote various treatments and ended up writing a treatment for Silent Running which was seen by a friend of mine who was an agent. And some other people at Universal Studios who were very open to experimenting with some new film forms, because of the advent of Easy Rider which had made a huge amount of money as an independent film. I don’t know how much you know about that story…
They gave you one million dollars, right…
We had only one million dollars to make a movie and they would not intervene in any way, they would not look at dailies, it was a complete sociological experiment on behalf of the management of Universal Studios. There were five films made, each for about a million dollars, and Silent Running was part of the package.
The main thing was just to be able to make a film at all. A science fiction film that would have some kind of heart and soul to it rather than being a repellent science movie with a lot of characters that are de-humanized. To try and combine those two factors and do it at a very low price. And do some amazing visual effects. I’d come off 2001, which took a very long time and cost a huge amount of money and was very complicated and I was trying to figure out if it was possible to make a very low budget movie that had some of those qualities.
For instance, the front projection system that Kubrick used on 2001 for the dawn of man sequence, and a couple of other shots, was very cumbersome and difficult and challenging and heavy but I knew the principle of it so I worked with an engineer in LA and we designed a very portable front projection machine that allowed us to do some pretty amazing shots in Silent Running at very low cost, very quickly and with a very small crew. And that was one of the enabling technologies that I developed forSilent Running. Just to make it comfortable and easy to make a sci-fi movie for a low budget with a small crew.
You’ve built a studio too or are you still building it?
I’ve actually built a studio here at my home.
And the aim is to do a similar thing, to make the process of making a film leaner?
Yes, exactly. There are several components to it. You have to start with my current belief that the motion picture production industry is in serious jeopardy because I don’t think it’s a sustainable business model for films to cost $200 million a piece or more. Secondly I thought Avatar was fantastic and a major breakthrough movie. And it was an extremely technologically driven movie that completely disassembled the entire process of what it is to make a movie, shooting on a virtual stage, shooting virtual characters and avatars. It was hugely expensive because that was the first time out but at the same time doing the movie in 3D made that big 3D breakthrough and that movie became the highest grossing movie of all time.
So I figured that’s what the audience wants to see, you can see that 75% of world box office gross comes from these kinds of spectacle movies. So I felt that if I can do the same thing that I did post 2001, which was to figure out how to do a movie like that for a lot less money, it would be a kind of no-brainer business opportunity. So that was one aspect of it.
I’ve been developing what I call virtual set, virtual location technology. The way Hollywood does things is to build big sets on big stages and they have large crews and they go location with twenty trucks and large crews. I think that since we can superimpose anybody into anything, blue screen or green screen, instantaneously and at extremely low cost then it would be reasonable to experiment with movies that had no sets and no locations. Doing it all virtually.
I’ve developed a camera technology where the camera is encoded with motion capture data so that a real time computer knows exactly where the camera is so you pan, tilt, dolly around with what I call my zero-gravity crane on a stage. And we have 180-degree panoramic green screen and our automated lighting rig so we can photograph actors superimposed into a virtual environment instantaneously and in real-time. So it allows us to actually do rehearsals very in-expensively, we can rehearse the entire feature film in three or four days, cut it together and do what I call a live action animatic.
So you see an issue not just with the technology and the automation but also in the process of pre-production, production and so on?
Yeah, I think the closer you can get to allowing and enabling the actors and the director to work very closely together towards perfecting a performance, the drama, the dialogue and the blocking, the better off you are. And it’s been shown that in the animation business, particularly at Pixar and a lot of the public presentations that Ed Catmull [current president of Walt Disney & Pixar Animation studios] has made for instance, that the process of animatics and pre-visualisation is vitally important to de-bugging a movie before it actually goes into production. They do that regularly at all animation studios so they can see the whole film at a very early stage before they actually render anything. They cut together their storyboards, they cut together animatics, they cut together illustrations and kind of de-bug the movie at a very early stage and they go through that three, four times during pre-production.
So a lot of time you end up actually shooting your principal actors in the principal sets and locations, which in my case are virtual. You know exactly what you need, you can shoot it very quickly, you can shoot a hundred or more set-ups a day and it looks fantastic. And I go one step more which is just to replace the computer graphic backgrounds with miniatures which in my opinion look much much better than any computer graphics environment, and are actually much less expensive.
You’ve also been at the forefront of pushing higher frame rates…
Yeah, that’s the other thing I was mentioning. I think one of the problems with the movie industry right now is that the way films are presented in cinemas is very substandard. First of all the theatres themselves are just boxes with a screen at the end and seats. There’s no showmanship, no curtains, no anything going on that’s dramatic or theatrical like you would experience if you went to a live performance in a dramatic theatre or went to Circ du Soleil or the circus or a live rock ‘n’ roll show. There’s no showmanship in movie theatres. Secondly they project the movies at never brighter than 15 foot-lamberts of brightness, which is much less than you see on your home television sets which is usually 50 or more foot-lamberts of brightness.
So the colour saturation is low, the frame-rate is low, the screen is relatively small, it’s rectangular and usually flat. So there’s nothing close to the days when I grew up with movies where we had Cinerama and deeply curved 90-foot wide screens and you could create a kind of spectacle, event movie which is where I started with 2001. That’s all pretty much gone. It’s alive to a certain extent in IMAX theatres but even IMAX has converted now to 2K digital projectors on smaller screens. So not anywhere in the industry is there a kind of spectacular exhibition format. Then you have the additional problem of 3D projection which reduces the brightness to an average of 2.5 foot-lamberts, which is way way too dim to create any sense of spectacle. It creates a lot of eye-strain and a lot of problems with brightness, so you see very little colour saturation, very little contrast, you’re seeing a really sub-standard image.
Then you have 24 frames-per-second, which has been the standard in the industry for ever, since talking movies came in, which has been revealed to the professionals in the industry to be inadequate for 3D because the blurring and strobing that happens at 24fps really disturbs a clear perception of 3D. So they have to slow down the action and try and keep it from blurring and strobing to hold the 3D image together. The result is that Peter Jackson is now shooting The Hobbit in 3D at 48fps, Jim Cameron is planning to shoot Avatar 2 and 3 at 60fps, if not 48. That’ll be an improvement but the next thing we need is even wider, bigger screens and more powerful projectors.
If we got to a point where it was 100fps or even 72, with good 3D projection, 9.1 sound, 8K presentations, then what do you think is next, is there a next leap?
I’m not really worried about a next leap beyond that. Because getting to that is all we can do in the next few years. I’m shooting films right now at 120fps in 3D and I know that the result is absolutely stunning but very few people on this planet have actually seen that, yet. I have a very challenging process ahead of me to start demonstrating this and doing at least one film that I want to make. I have several films lined up but I’ve got one in particular that would lend itself to this. It’s a big space adventure movie. And I’ve got to make the movie and show it in this process and convince people that there’s a very big audience that wants to see this kind of tremendous technological, creative, visual leap forward to much higher quality. I don’t see right now any visible advantage to go even higher than 120 frames, I think that’s about as much as the human eye can absorb, but combining 120 frames and high brightness and gain screens that are very wide and large with a different seating configuration is a huge epic change that will take some time to effect. But I’m working on it.
You mentioned a space adventure film. I’ve read that you have two scripts in particular that you’re working on and that they have an ecological bent, is that right?
Well, not so much an ecological bent as much as a survival bent. Having to do with reaching for the stars and why we would have to go to the stars. Are we using up this planet at such an exponential rate with population growth and depletion of the resources that we’re going to have to leave the earth. I was just at a symposium in Florida last month called ‘The One-Hundred Year Starship Symposium’ that was sponsored by DARPA and there were a lot of very interesting speakers there and a lot of talk about a very big issue that faces humanity. Which is, how are we going to survive and where are we going to go when we use this place up. Those issues are part of the underpinnings of some of the movies I’m working on.
You worked on Tree of Life obviously but what in modern sci-films have you seen that you’ve liked, have you seen Duncan Jones’ Moon for instance?
I’ve seen Moon. I was frankly disappointed with it. I didn’t think there was enough going on and I didn’t think the effects were as good as they could have been. I thought it was a really good first effort and an admirable movie but it just wasn’t enough to make it, enough action and dynamism as I would like to see in a movie. But a move in the right direction.
I mean I wouldn’t call Tree of Life a science-fiction movie at all, it’s a completely different animal. I think it was a very brave and courageous movie to make that really gets people thinking and its very beautiful but it would be better to see a movie like that in IMAX or some more powerful medium because I think that the imagery of space is incredibly beautiful and I think creating a kind of public consciousness about the universe and space is a very important thing right now.
In the UK there’s a bit of a movement pushing science a bit more with people like Brian Cox on television talking about space, science and the Large Hadron Collider. I think people still don’t appreciate science enough though at the moment. Do you think there’s a lack of that too?
Well I think it requires a very high bandwith medium to get people immersed in the experience of it. Presently with our medium, which is basically movies or high definition television, if you see a documentary or something about a scientific effort or the Collider or whatever it’s not powerful enough to really move you internally and that’s why I want to try and get back and get to even better than my experience forty years ago with 2001 on a giant Cinerama screen, where a transition takes place where you don’t to anymore need to resort to traditional cinematic form, you get to something that becomes a direct first person experience for the audience. That goes beyond story, drama and conflict, it goes into something that the audience can directly absorb. That’s a territory that very few people are even thinking about right now.
I never got a chance to go on the Back to the Future ride that you worked on but looking at Brainstorm I can see that first person approach and it’s not an area that people seem to be exploring now.
I think Jim Cameron is probably moving more in that area than anyone because I think he’s recognised that a lot of the appeal of Avatar is that people feel that they’ve been transported to another dimension or another world in some way. That seems to be one of the things that a lot of people write about, the 3D brings a kind of immersiveness to it. Even though there is all these limitations that he is trying to overcome with the next versions. Yeah, I’m going there. I’m definitely working on it but I know that the medium has to get a lot better in order to do it. It kind of puts me outside of the mainstream and I work more with people in the flight simulation industry than I do with people in the movie industry. Trying to recreate reality, it’s a whole other artform.
Do you see a future where you’ll be moving in the cinema as well then?
Possibly, I’m not so concerned with physically moving because that’s such a costly high maintenance thing to build simulation rides with hydraulic actuators. I’ve done that before and I’ve had a lot of success with it. People seem to really enjoy it but that’s only appropriate for something that’s four or six minutes long. You can’t just do that to people for an hour and a half. On the other hand I think the immersiveness of the medium itself can be very much improved and there’s plenty of room for improvement and fortunately right now it’s all doable with almost off the shelf equipment. I mean there’s high speed cameras, there’s high speed projectors, there’s high bandwidth data storage. All the stuff I’m doing now I can purchase so it’s not that hard to get there. I didn’t have to invent anything new to do what I’m doing.
There have obviously been filmmakers such as Gareth Edwards with Monsters and Neill Blomkamp with District 9 where people with an effects background moved into directing. It does seem almost easier now than it did some time ago.
Oh yeah, tremendously easier.
How did you find that transition and how do you see that difference now?
I found the transition quite easy. My experience became one of discovering that the directing part of it is the easiest part of it. That it didn’t take me long to learn about screen direction or working with actors and that it became a very straightforward process. The real challenge has been to make the breakthroughs to bring a more powerful medium to the screen and that’s why it was such a profound life-changing disappointment to me when I couldn’t get anyone to make Brainstorm in Showscan, which was my plan. And if Brainstorm had been made in Showscan and Natalie Wood had not died I think it would have been quite a disruptive, revolutionary step forward for movies.
It just didn’t happen at that time and I’m hoping that there’s a confluence of energies right now that have made it possible because digital technology is so inexpensive. We don’t have to pay for gigantic film prints in 70mm and huge projectors and big cans of film and lab cost. It’s all very easy and inexpensive to do. There’s no reason why we can’t make some big leaps forward right now.
The technology is of course so important to filmmaking and there does seem to be more attention being paid to it recently but do you think that people need to be more informed?
I think they need to much more technologically informed and from my experiences they are still not very well informed. Actors are not informed, few directors are informed, even the cinematographers are still as informed as they could be and it’s a big uphill battle to make any change. I think there’s a huge amount of inertia in the motion picture industry to keep things the same as they always have been because people find it very threatening to embrace change or to do things differently than they’ve done all their life. It’s always a hard struggle.
- Feb 03, 13
David Simon takes a look at a recent unseemly journalistic trend.
Anne Billson blogs about ‘The Girl with the Black Helmet’.
Ludivine Sagnier: ‘I got frightened and shut down’
An interview with the wonderful French actress on the occasion of the UK release of Love Crime.
It would appear that I’m not the only one that dislikes the direction that Empire Magazine has moved in and wishes that it was be a lot better.
How Do You Pronounce Quvenzhané
Armond White reviews Beasts of the Southern Wild and, perhaps unsurprisingly, has some issues with the film’s racial politics.
Why Indomina Abandoned Distribution
Anne Thompson looks into why Indomina abandoned distribution this week.
Techcrunch break down the number of TV shows and films currently on Netflix and LoveFilm.
Quentin Tarantino Interview Part 1: Django Unchained Trilogy and More
Quentin Tarantino Interview Part 2: On the N-Word
Quentin Tarantino Interview Part 3: White Saviors
Lots of great information from Zwigoff in this interview at The Playlist. Including, shockingly, some gripes about the Weinsteins.
Patton Oswalt’s favorite pop culture of 2012, from The Queen Of Versailles to Sklarbro Country
Patton Oswalt’s got really great taste and here’s an excellent list of what he was digging in 2012.
- Feb 01, 13
At the time the casting of Two-Lane Blacktop was somewhat unconvential. Could you talk a little about how you came to choose the particular actors you used, specifically James Taylor and Laurie Bird.
Well, I think that James was probably the first one to be cast and I had been intervieweing just about every young actor in Hollywood and I didn’t find anyone that really struck me. I saw James’ photo on a billboard on the Sunset Strip and I was interested in his face and I asked our casting director Fred Roos if it would be possible to meet with him. He came in and that was it. I was convinced but we actually had to convince the studio at the time, which was not the studio that ultimately made the movie, and so we shot a screen test and everybody was thrilled with that and he was cast.
And then Laurie Bird was someone I had met when I went to New York and met with Rudy Wurlitzer and we were struck by some qualities that she had as a person that we thought were simiilar to the character that we were developing in the script. And so we spent two or three hours doing an audio interview with her and that was the basis for a lot of what went into the script for the character. Later on when I couldn’t find anyone to play the part someone had the bright idea to consider the girl that was the prototype, and that’s what happened.
Their screen tests are on the new Blu-ray and they’re quite intriguing to watch. Were they shot mostly just for the studio?
Yes, they were shot for the purpose of convincing the studio.
In Road to Nowhere the fictional director comments that casting is 90% of directing. Is that something you believe in?
Yeah, I would probably make it 95. [Laughs]
I think it’s something that I actually teach my students. I was looking at some scenes from students yesterday and somebody had a very successful scene because of the fact that they had found just the right actor. Also, it’s something I use to include not just the actors but the locations, they’re are part of the casting process.
You’ve had many strong female leads in your films, including Millie Perkins in your westerns and Cockfighter and Jenny Agutter in China 9, Liberty 37. How did you come to work with those actresses?
Millie Perkins was my next door neighbour and Jenny Agutter, I’m not quite sure how we came to her but when you go through a casting process on a picture that’s ready to be made you sometimes don’t have quite as much time as if you have a few more months to plan. People start throwing out ideas and one of them clicks and that’s what happens. You wind up with that terrific actor.
China 9, Liberty 37 to me feels more romantic than your other films. Is that something you would agree with?
Yes, I think it is more romantic than some of my other movies but I think that I tend to have a romantic outlook. I tend to like romantic movies. I think that may be more overtly romantic but I think some of the others are too, I think Two-Lane Blacktop is very romantic too.
I think so too but where specifically do you see the romance in Two-Lane Blacktop?
For me Two-Lane Blacktop was my way to do a version of Shoot the Piano Player and it’s really a story about a character whose tragic flaw is the inability to communicate and it’s all about his inability to communicate his romantic feelings that I think leads to his disappointment in the movie.
Do you yourself see the ending as a downbeat ending?
No, I think the ending is a way to stop the movie as opposed to a way to end it because unless you end with marriage or death [chuckles] there are no other endings in movies. So we just stooped the movie, we don’t end it.
I’m a big fan of the two movies you made in the Phillipines. There are a couple of lines in them that I particularly like, “Death is a punctuation” in Flight to Fury and there’s one in Back Door to Hell about how we’re all going to “die anyway, today, tomorrow, thirty years from now”.
[Laughs] I didn’t write either of those so I guess they’re the sentiments of Jack Nicholson and John Hackett.
Is that something that you liked about the scripts though. There’s a sense of fatalism to them, is that something that appealed?
I enjoy, y’know, a slight diversion towards philosophical discussion just as I do in life but I don’t really concentrate on that in my movies. It’s just part of the characters.
I think there’s a real end of era feeling to Two-Lane Blacktop. Do you feel that about it and did you get that sense at the time at all?
When you’re in any given time frame I don’t think we think ‘oh, this is 1989 the end of decade’, it’s just another year and more accurately it’s just another day, that’s all.
Do you see it looking back though?
I don’t really. I mean it’s easy to say that the sixties had a certain personality or something. I think there’s a certain truth to it though, London in the sixties was, using a term we would use in my classes in Stanford, a dynamic place to be at that time. And at other times Los Angeles has been the most dynamic place, at least in America, perhaps in the world. Things happen faster in certain places and at certain times but to say, okay this is a ten year period that happens to match the passing of a decade is possibly stretching it.
In a more general sense I suppose I’m getting at, was there a sense of a change coming or change happening?
Again something you’re not aware of at the time but looking back I would say that the time we made Two Lane Blacktop was certainly a stimulating time to be making movies, at least in Hollywood. We may never have that much freedom to make such unusual movies as we did at that time.
I spoke recently with Douglas Trumbull and he echoed those sentiments but also talked about recent changes in technology. I understand that’s something that you’re also interested in. Road to Nowhere was shot on Canon 5Ds, for instance. Do you find digital filmmaking liberating?
I’m an early adopter and I took to digital still photography very early on. I was appreciative of not having to breathe all those chemicals in the dark-room and I also appreciated the greater control you have, it’s much easier to manipulate the image than to have to kind of wave your hand in a funny way [laughs]. I like it a lot and I feel the same way about digital movies, it’s much greater control, you have greater control over the colour, it’s a more permanent control. In the lab you may have one batch that comes out good and then the next batch might be a slightly different part of the process in terms of the first film that goes through a new batch of chemicals being different from the last batch that went through before they changed the chemicals. There are so many variables in that system and it’s much more specific in the digital world.
I did used to love the dark-room though for the tactile nature of it though, is there anything about that which you miss?
I don’t miss that but I do miss handling the film. I used to work with an upright moviola and I do miss that, that was a very tactile experience and a much more physically active than just pushing buttons on a computer.
You’ve obviously had a lot of work as an editor on your own projects and other peoples. Is there one part that you prefer, the editing, the directing or the writing?
Having come originally from the theatre where part of the director’s job is not only coaxing a performance out of the players but also controlling the timing and so on, that’s two things and the editing is the equivalent of the second part, so I consider it a continuation of the directing.
Some directors and editors often say that the film is really made in the editing room. Do you feel that that’s the case or that a lot of it is on the page?
There’s no easy answer to that. Yes, there are some films that you’ve edited in your head and they just go together and other films become completely different in the process. I would say that Road to Nowhere was film that was drastically altered in the editing process.
Do you tend to storyboard beforehand?
I only storyboard when I’m forced to, which is when I’m doing special effects. So when I was doing all the miniatures for Avalanche Express, all the avalanche itself and the minature trains and so forth, that all needed to be storyboarded but if I don’t need to do it I don’t do it.
You made a diagram for Two-Lane Blacktop to proof a point too, is that correct?
Yeah, I did an overhead view looking down on the car and showing all the different positions the camera could have. It would give us that many perspectives and I used that when I went to MGM to try to convince them to finance the movie.
Do you still have the diagram?
No, I don’t. I wish I did [laughs].
Me too, I’d love to see it as I’m sure a lot of film fans would. You shot second unit on a few films too including Robocop. Did you need to do storyboards for that?
I didn’t do storyboards but Paul Verhoeven did storyboards. He didn’t like the idea of having a second unit director, I must say I don’t either if it happens to me, so he wanted to maintain his control over it as much as he could so he would give me storyboards everyday to dictate how I would shoot the scenes.
I’ve read that you shot second unit on The Big Red One too, is that true?
No, that’s one of those strange IMDB fantasies I guess, they have me down for a number of things that I had nothing to do with.
As a teacher is there one thing that you think is most important to teach your students or is there one thing that you think that you’re imparting to them that is the most use?
I basically, as much as I can, teach philosophy of filmmaking as much as any of the technique. I do a little bit of each. The rules, the grammar of filmmaking are so simple that you can teach them in about twenty minutes but it takes a lot longer to learn so sometimes we have to reinforce those lessons over and over again to get them across. It’s pretty simple stuff. I teach a basic philosophy though that’s based on a kind of mentor of mine, not someone I actually met but someone whose books I read, and that’s Artur Hopkins. It’s really again quite simple stuff, that we are at the service of the material that we are doing and that the job of the director is primarily to convince everyone of that. To make everyone part of this team working together and not to try and call attention to ourselves individually. It’s a little bit about being selfless and essentially the idea that anything that calls attention to a person or a technique is detrimental. That if you notice the music or if you notice the cinematography or if you notice the direction then you can be sure that it’s bad.
How do you feel generally about ‘breaking the forth wall’, so to speak, because in Road to Nowhere there’s an interesting game played with that?
Well it’s against everything I was ever taught, against everything I believe and what was amazing to me was how quickly the audience begins to believe again. We shake them up and knock them out of the movie and they come back within seconds and I think it has to do with our wanting to believe, when we go into that theatre, into that dark room, we want to suspend our disbelief and we want to be wrapped up in this story that we’re asked to participate in. It’s so powerful and I think that’s one of the big revelations for me and I think seeing how quickly the audience came back.
Just to return briefly to Two-Lane Blacktop, I understand there were scenes that were cut that no longer exist. Could you talk a little about these?
Well, the script turned out to be a very long screenplay. We shot most of it and we wound up with a three and a half hour first cut and we were contractually obligated to deliver a movie under two hours. We wound up with a movie that was actually an hour and three quarters. So we threw away half the movie [laughs] and yes there were some wonderful scenes. There was one scene in particular where they’re evading a cop car that’s trying to catch them and they pull into a residential neighbourhood and pull into the driveway and the cop car never shows up. They get out of their car and they look through the window at this house and they see a family of a man and a woman and their two children having dinner. There’s nothing said but there’s a kind of nostalgia about their sense of what they’ve left behind and the life they’re living now.
Is there any sense do you think that they want to recapture that kind of a family unit?
I don’t know, whenever you move on to another stage of your life there’s always a possibility that you’ll feel nostalgia for what you’ve left behind but at the same time that doesn’t mean that you’d necessarily like to go back to it.
The road as well is a powerful symbol of abandoning something, a lot of films have used it as symbol in this way. Do you see the road as having a potential for giving up on a a past life? What do you see as the symbolic potential of the road?
I think the road is what you perceive it is or what you wish it to be. It can be many things. To me the road is really a way to ground a movie in real life. One of my other mentors was Siegfried Kracauer who wrote a book called ‘Theory of Film’ in which he basically says that if you shoot a movie in a room without windows then it’s not really a movie because it doesn’t have any connection to the street or to life itself. But if you have a window and you see out into the world… and one of the trademarks of Darryl Zanuck is that he would have just that, he would have a window or an open doorway in every scene in his movies, even though he wasn’t the director, and there would be all this teeming life going on outside in the world and that made it a much more powerful movie.
In Road to Nowhere Mitchell Haven sees the world through the prism of films, his window into the world seems to be through film, Lady Eve and The Seventh Seal for instance. That seems to shape how he perceives the world. As something of a cine-nut myself I could empathise with that. Do you see the world through films, do they open your mind in that way?
I don’t know if I see the world through films but I think in Road to Nowhere he uses film as a way to connect to his love. He wants her to experience the emotions that he felt with these movies and in that way bond more closely with her. I think that he equally sees film through the real world, in other words he tries to represent reality with his cinema and that’s his attraction to a real life crime story that he becomes so in love.
I really enjoyed Road to Nowhere and am so happy to see you making films again. Is there anything next on the horizon?
We’ve got three projects now, two that Steve Gaydos has, one is a script that he’s already written called Rattlesnake Shakedown and another is a book that he’s just optioned by Herbert Gold called The Man Who Was Not With It and there’s a third project that I’ve had for a number of years called Love or Die which may be my next one. Whichever one comes together faster is the one that we’ll do, the one that we raise the money for.
- Jan 31, 13
In 1965 Shohei Imamura set out to make a documentary about Tadashi Oshima, a man who had gone missing, dropped out of the lives of everyone he knew, left no word on where he had gone, and simply vanished. What drove him to do this? Could he have actually been murdered? What do his friends and family really know about what happened to him? All these questions and more come to the surface as Imamura slowly peels back the layers of his life and uncovers new information. Significantly though, none of these questions are ever actually answered.
Furthermore, the veracity of what we are seeing on screen is always in question. This isn’t strictly a documentary, this is obvious from the beginning, but there do appear to be facts behind and within the film but these are constantly mixed with liberal additions of fiction and fabrication.
Throughout the first half of the film we are introduced to everyone in Oshima’s life, the details of his and their lives slowly uncovered through interviews. The interviews focus mainly on relatively mundane details and despite the cumulative result being somewhat effective in building a picture this part of the film does drag considerably. Also, as one is very quickly more than aware that all may not be as it seems there is certainly an issue inherent in telling an audience a series of not particularly interesting facts over the course of an hour that are almost certainly not facts. It’s hard to invest too much in what is being said when you are constantly wondering if the some of what you are being told is simply a lie.
The film picks up pace and comes alive somewhat in the second half as Oshima’s girlfriend takes centre stage and the fabrication, the defining characteristic of this film, becomes more and more apparent. The film also has a wonderful ending in which tension builds and builds during a heated argument until Imamura pulls a wonderful cinematic trick and events spin off towards a reasonably logical conclusion.
The film was co-produced by the Art Theatre Guild (the first film that they funded) but released by the major studio Nikkatsu in 1967. The original intention was to investigate the disappearance of 26 men (or 24 – depending on the source) and possibly to even turn this into a multi-part television series. Given this wider scope it is easy to see how this could have built into a rather fascinating project. As it stands though A Man Vanishes is an oddity, an interesting experiment built on a fascinating idea but it is a conceptual work that is far more interesting to consider or discuss with others than it is to watch.
- Jan 30, 13
Walter Hill has a lot of good will in the bank for making a number of somewhat flawed but wonderfully enjoyable hard boiled pictures over the past forty years. His films may have done little to raise his status as a director to that of a venerated and individual artist, films such as The Warriors or Streets of Fire have hinted at something rather special, but he has never seemed like a director who simply ticks the boxes and churns out pictures. Streets of Fire in particular is a film as extraordinarily interesting as it was financially misjudged, leading to Hill finding it difficult since to make films on such a large canvas.
With Bullet to the Head, Hill has found himself in a much safer area of filmmaking and jumps aboard the current bandwagon that appears to have been ignited by The Expendables and a sense of nostalgia for some for the kind of ‘old school’ testosterone fuelled action films that filled the shelves of VHS rental stores in the eighties and nineties. It is notable perhaps that none of the films in this ‘new wave’ have yet managed to live up to the admittedly low bar set by the much-loved American muscle films of the eighties and nineties.
Hill has teamed here with Sylvester Stallone, working from a script by Alessandro Camon, to make a film that seems so stuck in the nostalgia of an older age of action films that if were not for the inclusion of a Blackberry – its novelty within the story is painfully hammered home by some incredibly leaden dialogue – it would hard to guess that the film was made as recently as this decade, or even the last.
The setting of New Orleans should have perhaps provided some interesting flavour to an otherwise bland story of a vengeful contract killer, Jimmy Bobo (Stallone), working with a cop, Taylor Kwon (Sung Kang), to track down those responsible for killing his partner and ripping him off. Sadly nothing is made of the location beyond some vague mentions of crooked redevelopment plans and with a large number of scenes taking place in drab, flatly lit locations – a somewhat interestingly designed Turkish bath aside – it would be very easy for this film to be transposed to any American city with only minor changes to the script.
As Bobo and Kwon drive between these mundane locations the audience are treated to some rather atrocious and often offensive ‘banter’. Clearly taking cues from the tradition of buddy movies of the eighties and nineties the film rests heavily on the growing relationship between these two characters and how it develops through this banter. Thomas Jane was originally slated to play the role later filled by Kang but lost out as supposedly a more “ethnic” actor was wanted. It’s clear why this was the case with so much of the back and forth between the two leads resting on racial banter. Almost all of these ‘jokes’ that hinge on race come from Bobo and are aimed in the direction of Kwon and they are never at all funny and quickly become exhausting.
Furthermore, the film never seems to have a stance on this behaviour and Stallone’s racist character ends the film happily driving off into the sunset in a brand new Ferrari, having learnt nothing at all meaningful. There are suggestions that Bobo is not just a scumbag, he often acts with a flimsy sense of honour, but it’s hard to know why we are supposed to get behind his plight or care about what happens to him.
The introduction of his daughter early on at first seems to suggest some attempt at depth to his character but ultimately she simply provides the damsel in distress necessary, it would seem, to bring the film to its climax. Another tired action trope wheeled out of retirement for one last go around.
There is some respite from the casual racism and tired plotting though, with the final scenes in particular providing some of the strongest sequences in the film. Well choreographed and competently framed and edited action bring the film almost to a close and it’s at this point that Hill finally shows that he still has some of those same strengths that made his earlier films so enjoyable.
The setting for these final action sequences are a building previously used in Will’s Hard Times and the final showdown between Stallone and Keegan, played with as much depth of character as a cinder block by Jason Momoa, features a fight using axes that is very reminiscent of the final fight using large hammers in Streets of Fire. Unfortunately these retreads of earlier work only further highlight how little here is new and how much it seems like a poor imitation.
Seeing Hill directing an action film and being back on the big screen should be cause for celebration but Bullet to the Head comes up short in so many areas that it would unfortunately not look out of place sitting alongside the recent output of Steven Seagal on a supermarket bargain DVD shelf.
- Jan 30, 13
Peter Watkins once described Punishment Park as taking place “tomorrow, yesterday or five years from now” and it is a statement that applies as well now as it did when he first said it in 1971. Punishment Park is a faux-documentary that focuses on a number of ‘political prisoners’, who are given the choice between serving out a prison term for their perceived crimes or three days in ‘Punishment Park’.
If they choose Punishment Park, before an unjust jury, they must travel on foot across an area of desolate American land in an effort to reach their goal, an American flag. They are promised that halfway along their journey they will find water and if they reach the flag they will be set free. Chasing them throughout their ordeal is a group of law enforcement officers who are assigned to Punishment Park as a training exercise.
The film begins by cross-cutting between a group of prisoners making their way across Punishment Park, the officers who are about to follow them training with lethal weapons and a trial of a group of new prisoners. The stories come to a head, the officers and the prisoners clash and the end, much like the film in general, is an incendiary indictment of a dominant system that is completely out of control.
Characterised, following its première, as something of a hysterical left-wing masochistic fantasy Punishment Park could so easily have been just that but the film is far from it and in the intervening years it has become more and more apparent that the film is far from hysterical but actually coldly reflective of the society in which we live.
Whilst the US government is not quite in the same situation as we see in Punishment Park there are certainly parallels that can be drawn between the film’s core conceptual conceit and situations in America and around the world. The temptation is of course to applaud Watkins for prescience, the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp being a possibly obvious reference point, but significantly Watkins is tapping into something far more disturbingly general about the way in which human beings can behave to one another and the abuse that often occurs when a powerful entity crosses a line. Bringing to mind the work of psychologist Philip Zimbardo, Punishment Park is disturbing and affecting not because it comes across as simply savage satire but because what occurs feels all too real.
- Jan 30, 13
Flight opens with an introduction to Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) that sets up the character with exactly the kind of neat and effortless writing that makes Flight such a solid drama. Whip has just woken up in a hotel room, clearly feeling the effects of a heavy night, and he’s not alone. As he answers the phone to his ex-wife – a small argument with her about money ensues – we see Whip leer at the posterior of the woman who has just emerged from his bed and survey the empties from the night before.
It’s an introduction to a character that suggests a lot of things, not least that the character that we are about to spend almost three hours with is not entirely likeable. Then comes the real kicker, Whip Whitaker is a commercial pilot. Not only that but after drinking heavily the night before he is just about to pilot a plane of unsuspecting passengers.
Whip pauses to take a line of coke and he’s ready to fly.
What follows this first scene is a bravura piece of filmmaking from director Robert Zemekis in a sequence which inter-cuts Whip piloting and ultimately crashing a plane with scenes of Nicole (Kelly Reilly), who Whip will later encounter, scoring drugs, shooting up and eventually succumbing to a non-fatal overdose.
The plane crash, which is preceded by an incredibly effective series of tension ramping moments, is extraordinary and when seen on a big screen will leave many feeling breathless and gripping the arms of their seats. This is very much just the beginning of the story though and it is the fallout of this crash that makes up the real meat of the film.
Whip is first celebrated as a hero – his daring manoeuvre saves the lives of 96 of the 102 souls on boards – but slowly the loose threads that make up his life begin to unravel in both small and far larger dramatic ways. Most significantly his alcoholism is uncovered and as he starts seeing Nicole we begin to see two interesting viewpoints on addiction. As Whip continues to spiral downwards – aided by the angel and the devil voices on his shoulders of union rep. Charlie (Bruce Greenwood) and lawyer Hugh (Don Cheadle) – Nicole begins treatment and finds a way to recovery.
Whip still has further to fall though and Zemekis and screenwriter John Gatins provide little hope throughout that we will see a simple tale of redemption. The story develops at a leisurely pace at times, often too leisurely, but the space given to the story helps make for a fully realised and engaging character study, and when the film reaches its climax it feels momentous in a way that is entirely justified by the journey we travel to get there.
Unfortunately there are times in Flight in which Zemekis over eggs the pudding somewhat. The attention drawing extravagance of a camera flying towards Washington’s face as he snorts a line of coke, for instance, is almost unforgivable but aside from some occasional over-the-top camera-work Zemekis plays things relatively straight and refined.
The same can’t be said for the soundtrack unfortunately, which features perhaps the most on-the-nose soundtrack choices I have ever heard in a dramatic feature. Songs featuring drug references are particularly rife, the use of With a Little Help From My Friends approaches out and out comedy, and those with an even passing knowledge of popular music will most likely tire of the incessant intrusions of oh-so-relevant song choices such as Under the Bridge or Sweet Jane.
Despite pulling you out of the film these music choices are nowhere near enough to derail what is for the most part an incredibly well handled, smart and dramatically rich film about a fascinating character. Washington has perhaps never been better and as the film reaches a climax that rests on the fascinating concept of “one lie too many” it is a testament to Gatins’ convincing writing that we almost will Whip to keep lying.
Presenting dense ethical ideas and emotionally rich situations within the arc of an engaging story, Zemekis and Gatin have made exactly the kind of big film that Hollywood can do so well, but sadly rarely do.
- Jan 29, 13
In the booklet for the Masters of Cinema Blu-ray release of Repo Man you comment that you can write ten to twenty pages in a good day. What sort of writing habit do you have? Do you ever get ‘writer’s block’ and if so how do you cope with it?
I haven’t experienced writers block. Not that everything I write is any good, or that those 10-20 pages won’t end up in the bin. But I’ve no problem spewing.
You both write films and write about films, which comes easier to you and is there one that you prefer more? If so, why?
Screenwriting is much more fun. It is a wonderful art form in itself and for many years I wrote scripts for the pleasure of it. But film-related writing is recompensed, which helps pay for the dog food.
What was the experience of actually filming Repo Man like, what particular challenges did you face and was there anything in particular that you learnt in the process?
It was a hot experience since it took place over six weeks in July and August, all in downtown Los Angeles which in those days was highly polluted. Tiring, too, since there were so many night shoots. So I learned to write fewer night exterior scenes! Dealing with most of the actors was a breeze since they were for the most part very professional and willing. Harry Dean Stanton was less of a pleasure – fighting with the other actors, trying to direct them, demanding salary increases – but also a very, very good actor, which made the experience worthwhile.
I understand that you originally intended to include animated sequences and flashbacks in Repo Man. Can you talk a little about these and why they did not end up in the film?
I don’t remember any flashbacks. One of the car chases was meant to turn into a cartoon along the lines of the one I drew. But in those days these things weren’t farmed out to slaves in China and Korea. Animation was much more expensive and we didn’t pursue the cartoon angle.
What do you think is the key to keeping costs down in feature filmmaking and how did you achieve it with Repo Man?
We didn’t. Most of the $1.8 million budget of REPO MAN was wasted, on Studio overheads, producer overheads, huge trucks, honey wagons, the exec producer’s trailer and other giant, slow-moving frivolities. The film should have cost $100,000, and been shot in four weeks, starring Sy Richardson and Dick Rude.
Where do you see the future of film production moving, particularly when considering current trends towards extremely expensive special effects heavy blockbusters and super cheap indies shot using easily available digital equipment?
Philippe Dauman, head of Viacom (which owns MTV and Paramount) announced that the huge returns on TRANSFORMERS 3 “affirmed our strategy of a reduced release slate and a focus on franchises.” In other words, the studios have given up on lower-budget films and want to make as few pictures as possible – toy- and superhero-based children’s films – with beef slaughterhouse and game tie-ins. Low budget and independent films will continue to be made – but how do they reach an audience? How do they make a profit when theatrical distribution and online sales are locked up by massive corporations?
As a teacher what do you think the most important lesson you teach your students is?
That they should make allies among their colleagues and continue to do creative projects with them after they leave school. This worked for me and the producers of REPO MAN (all ex-UCLA), and for Trey Parker and the SOUTH PARK guys, after they exited the University of Colorado.
I always thought the ‘generic products’ in Repo Man to be something of a deliberate satirical swipe at consumerism in the eighties but I read recently that this wasn’t the original intention. Can you talk a little about how you decided on the labelling and why?
Originally we wanted to get product placement – free beer and such – but after we drew a blank (only the Car-Freshener Corp. would give us any product!) I thought fine! Generic it shall be! Ralphs’ supermarket gave us a lot of generic goods; the DRINK and FOOD cans we made ourselves.
What can you tell me about Repo Pup? [Cox's introduction to Repo Man on the Blu-ray ends with "Coming soon..." and then an image of two dogs superimposed on a picture of space and the text "REPO PUP. Coming soon to a media device in your galaxy."]
The dogs are in their spacesuits and raring to go. But I’m waiting for a ‘cease and desist’ letter to arrive from Universal’s head of litigation. That’s what gives me energy to pursue the REPO brand.
- Jan 29, 13
Winner of the Grand Prix in Cannes in 1983 Imamura’s The Ballad of Narayama, an adaptation of two stories by Shichiro Fukawa, must been quite a shock to an audience unprepared for its dark and often sexual subject matter.
The film primarily focuses on the elderly Orin, a 69 year-old woman living in a village that has for a long time dealt with famine and hardship through a chilling mixture of infanticide and geronticide. As Orin approaches 70 it is clear that she will soon become ‘too old’ to be supported by the village and must make the journey up Narayama Mountain to die. Before doing so she decides to put her affairs in order but it just so happens that this mostly involves the sexual lives of her offspring.
The Ballad of Narayama is filled with black comedy and some really funny moments of bawdy humour as a result of all the sexual adventures (and misadventures) that the villagers get up to but there is never the sense that any of this is being treated flippantly. Cutaways to the ugly side of nature, a snake slowly swallowing a rat for instance, in the middle of a sex scene or an act of bestiality from one of the more simple-minded villagers quickly reveals the tact that Imamura is taking.
At times playing much like a bleak and cynical nature documentary in which humans are the subjects, The Ballad of Narayama is a searing and savage portrait of humanity and the fine line between civilised behaviour and base violent animal instincts. This is not just simple condemnation, there is also empathy for these often engaging and humorous characters. The blend of humour with more upsetting scenes really carries a punch and makes the film both entertaining and challenging.
Ending with a long sequence in which Orin makes her way up the Narayama mountain to die, carried on another’s back, the film takes a tonal turn and this final section is far more lyrical and sombre than what has gone before. This shift is adeptly handled and as the film reaches its beautiful and sad climax it is perhaps quite surprising, following some of the earlier broader scenes, just how moving and powerful it ultimately is.
- Jan 28, 13
Following an opening featuring a black screen and the sounds of 9/11 calls ,which lasts for a deeply uncomfortable period of time despite actually being relatively short, Zero Dark Thirty moves into more scenes which are well played to upset and discomfort an audience. We are introduced to the lead, Maya (Jessica Chastain), who is the somewhat unenthusiastic bystander, and later accomplice, in the torture of man believed to have information relating to global terrorism.
Maya appears in these scenes as something of a blank slate, aside from a few awkward looks she is at first also very passive, and despite the film’s reasonably lengthy running time she always remains somewhat inscrutable, with the camera often lingering on her blank and seemingly dispassionate stare. She has one purpose it seems. To find Osama bin Laden.
Recalling the singularly focused female protagonists of seventies revenge pictures – Meiko Kaji’s ‘born for revenge’ protagonist in Lady Snowblood comes to mind – Maya has little to no back story in Zero Dark Thirty and despite multiple interactions with co-workers she seems to form no real social bonds. When she later refers to the terrorists as having killed her friends the line almost comes across as laughable due to the vague or non-existent relationships she has fostered with others.
Her main friend in the CIA and the man who we first see torturing prisoners in the early scenes is Dan (Jason Clarke), an educated CIA agent who helps Maya in her quest to hunt down bin Laden. Dan quickly becomes burnt out and returns to America, an attempt to put the torture he has inflicted upon others behind him, although not predominantly due to guilt it would seem but out of some fear of retribution. He even comments to Maya, “You don’t want to be the last one holding a dog collar when the oversight committee arrives.” That Dan is aware that what he is doing may be considered wrong emphasises how warped the situation is within the CIA. Whilst the question of whether torture is wrong or right is not represented on screen there is certainly the sense that those within the CIA know that what they are doing may not be entirely legal.
The lack of care for this subject by the characters is highlighted in a scene in which Barack Obama is seen on a television stating that America does not torture. Again director Kathryn Bigelow returns briefly to Maya’s blank stare before the characters get on with what they were doing. This isn’t a subject of particular interest to them despite their close relationship with what Obama is talking about. The characters in Zero Dark Thirty are focused on one idea and there is little to no room for self-analysis.
The controversy that has swirled around Zero Dark Thirty regarding a positive depiction of torture is a massive red herring when it comes to what the filmmakers are actually saying and appears to be largely born out of a significant amount of baggage brought to the film, rather than anything that is up there on the screen. Those who find the torture of human beings despicable, if only this wasn’t just part of the human race, will find the actions of members of the CIA in Zero Dark Thirty deplorable and disgusting. Any sense that this led to evidence that helped find bin Laden will, of course, in no way change that. It is also disingenuous to suggest that this is the whole story, as the film presents it. It is made abundantly clear in Zero Dark Thirty that there is a web of information that leads to the discovery of the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan and it has been gathered in various ways.
What has not been at the forefront of discussions relating to Zero Dark Thirty, and what was also absent from the mainstream news when bin Laden was actually killed, is the desire for his death that seems to be so often just accepted as a given. “If you really want to protect the homeland you need to get bin Laden.” So says Maya, when her dogged pursuit of bin Laden is called into question by her CIA superior Joseph Bradley (Kyle Chandler). When Maya says ‘get’ she quite clearly means kill. Bin Laden’s death is the ultimate goal, not his capture and arrest, and this is never once questioned by any of the characters in the film. It’s probably quite likely that it also wasn’t discussed in the real halls of government buildings in Langley, Washington and further afield either.
Bin Laden’s death is in many ways the end point of Zero Dark Thirty, but the film does not end with a whooping gung ho mission accomplished celebration of the death of bin Laden. Instead, the final line uttered in Zero Dark Thirty is “Where do you wanna go?” – said by a pilot to Maya – and a lingering shot of Chastain’s face. After another brief period of staring into her inscrutable blank stare we see her expression change to one that looks almost despairing, before finally she begins to cry.
It’s an open-ended and somewhat bleak note to end on and leaves an audience with an indelible sense of what the past two hours and forty minutes have really been about. There’s an emptiness, a pointlessness to the whole endeavour that doesn’t give the audience a sense of catharsis, a deep sigh of relief at the end that the job’s been done, we’re safe now, the bad guys lost. The final emotion is one of despair.
Director Kathyrn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal discard the simple American cinematic tradition of good guys and bad guys and leave the audience with the sense that even in the U.S. government’s attempts to guard themselves from threats and seek some cathartic relief for the truly horrible events of 9/11 they have also found themselves in the ‘bad guy’ role and it comes with a sense of pointlessness and despair which is written all over Chastain’s face. As Maya provides a symbolic surrogate for America, the final line in Zero Dark Thirty provides a crucial question for not just a post-9/11 America but a post-bin Laden America. ”Where do you wanna go?”
- Jan 23, 13
Whilst Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane sits atop film polls year after year and holds a prominent (and worthy) place in canonical discussions of film, Touch of Evil often takes a second place to the grandeur of Kane. But for me, Touch of Evil reigns supreme.
A crowning achievement from Welles, visual elegance combining beautifully with a hard edged but absorbingly Shakespearean tale, Touch of Evil seems like the natural succession both stylistically and thematically to Kane but it is in many ways more rewarding for being, even in spite of studio meddling, such a complete and near perfect piece of storytelling. I like Citizen Kane a great deal and consider it to be a masterpiece in many ways but I adore Touch of Evil.
Welles’ twisted Hank Quinlan is one of Welles’ greatest creations, a dark and troubling character played with conviction by Welles himself, and it is the moral downfall of the already low-down Quinlan that is the real story of Touch of Evil. Its strength though is that whilst this is more than enough to carry the film it is also filled with side plots and a multitude of engaging characters to add further depth and complexity to the story.
The married Vargas couple (Charlton Heston and Janet Leigh), for instance, appear at first to be the leads of the film, and in a way they are (they were certainly considered the stars by the studio), but in many ways they are supporting characters in the story of Hank Quinlan. It is through the treatment of Susie Vargas (Leigh) and the morally contrasted character of Mike Vargas (Heston) that Quinlan’s true self is revealed.
This contrast is also crucial to the way in which Touch of Evil works, a film that constantly refers to crossing conflicting borders, both physical and of a more symbolic nature. The confident and highly sophisticated direction from Welles and the way in which the story is pieced together in the editing (at least in the way Welles intended it to be edited) ensures this is conveyed visually and audibly with a fine attention to detail in every area. Every composition and the subtle mix of sounds that accompany them is a carefully thought out choice, a variety of techniques all in service of a thought provoking, gripping and wholly entertaining story.
Disc One
The 1998 Reconstructed Version in 1.37:1 and 1.85:1.
Whilst the inclusion of multiple versions of the film in this release is wonderful and particularly welcome from a reference point of view it is this reconstructed version that will undoubtedly get the most plays. This version of the film was put together by producer Rick Schmidlin and editor Walter Murch in 1998 using a 58-page memo Welles wrote to Universal following a screening of a rough cut of the film. A pdf of which is available from Masters of Cinema.
Welles was unhappy with the way in which the film had been edited when he left the editing room to fly to Mexico for work on Don Quixote, and also the insertion of new scenes shot by director Harry Keller.
Universal had been concerned that some of the film was confusing and the additional scenes and attempts to simplify some of the editing were efforts to make it easier for an audience to understand. Important aspects to the film, such as the cross-cutting between Mike and Susie Vargas, were lost in the version Welles saw, and he responded with the now infamous memo, a list of ways in which these and many other problems that he saw could be fixed.
Schmidlin and Murch used this memo, and a few additional memos Welles wrote regarding the sound design, to construct this new version of the film. It’s one that is closer to what Welles wanted but it’s important to note that this is not a director’s cut of the film, which is unfortunately an absolute impossibility, but it is probably as close as we will ever see.
There are a number of significant improvements in the 1998 Reconstruction that are particularly noticeable and noteworthy – the aforementioned inter-cutting and the textless opening for instance – but there are also a number of minor changes that have an impact. Changes to the sound mix, including experimentation with diegetic sounds that shares similarities with Kurosawa’s Stray Dog or Lucas’American Graffiti, and small cuts or the lengthening of scenes restore the film to something closer to Welles’ vision (going by the memo at least) and make a startling difference to the way in which key scenes work. A small trim to the sequence in which a number of people enter Susie’s room, for instance, transforms the scene from coming across as somewhat humorous to being genuinely terrifying. I could go on but suffice to say the changes here are important and add greatly.
The re-edit was achieved on a budget of just $325,000, and once completed Schmidlin and co. were given an extra $40,000 to use towards a digital restoration. This was put to good use and a number of the imperfections in the print, mostly the more significant scratches, have been removed as much as possible. This has been done delicately and there are very few times when the work done is particularly noticeable, just a few instances in which the image looks a little smoother.
There is reasonably heavy grain throughout and the contrast is a little higher than on the other versions of the film. This is mostly for the better as Russell Metty’s stunning black and white cinematography is at its best in its starkest moments.
I saw this reconstructed version theatrically around 1999 and this new HD transfer far exceeds the already rather worn out 35mm print that I saw projected. Seeing the film then was a revelation and watching this new HD version of the Reconstruction I felt the same. A beautiful transfer that befits such a visually stunning film.
This version, and the Theatrical cut, are both presented in 1.37:1 and 1.85:1. This is a definite improvement over the 50th Anniversary Edition, which only included the film in 1.85:1, and it is a welcome opportunity to compare and contrast the two ratio choices. Welles and Metty reportedly shot the film with both ratios in mind, with television and its insistence on a 4:3 aspect ratio as an obvious consideration, and the film certainly ‘works’ in both aspect ratios.
The 1.85:1 ratio is actually a crop of the 1.37:1 image and whilst this would suggest that the 1.37: 1 version is the OAR this is debatable as it seems to have been the understanding that this would have always played theatrically matted to 1.85:1. Watching the film open matted in 1.37:1 there are clear benefits – the frame includes more of the famous Wellesian ceilings for instance – and the compositions contain more intricate use of shadows than is visible in the 1.85:1 image.
I personally prefer the 1.85:1 ratio over the squarer 1.37:1 as a rule and there are certainly times here when the compositions feel more suitably claustrophobic. Both choices feel like something of a compromise for a viewer so it is the perfect choice on the part of MoC to include both. It’s also worth noting that it was never entirely clear which ratio Welles himself preferred, although comments from him appear to suggest he lent more towards the 1.37:1 ratio in general. This is evidenced in a rather lyrical piece he wrote, which is included in the booklet that accompanies this release.
The elements used for this version are as follows (as taken from the MoC booklet)
This version was reconstructed by Walter Murch & Bob O’Neil, referring to notes from Orson Welles’s 1957 memo. This 2010 HD transfer utilised a 35mm Safety Composite Fine Grain (printed 6pts. Lite) – created at YCM Lab in 1998. The restored/reconstructed mono audio (SET188751) utilised as sources the “theatrical version” source DME (SET195468), the “preview version” print (SET107951), and an ADR line. The source for the opening scene music was taken from the body of the “theatrical version”.
Special Features:
Commentary by restoration producer Rick Schmidlin (1998 Reconstructed Version – recorded in 2008) – A mixture of insightful details on the reconstruction and a few critical thoughts on the film. Schmidlin is very enthusiastic and brings some wonderful anecdotes about the film, putting together the reconstruction and the première of the reconstruction.
Commentary by Rick Schmidlin, Charlton Heston & Janet Leigh (1998 Reconstructed Version- recorded in 1999) – A little on the purely anecdotal side, this commentary track is an enjoyable listen but there’s not too much insight into the film that isn’t covered elsewhere. Heston and Leigh are particularly entertaining to listen to talking about the film and the affection they still held for it is obvious.
Bringing Evil to Life [21:00] – A collection of interview segments that piece together the production of the film. A good quick overview of the film’s production this is certainly worth watching but most of the the information is covered elsewhere and in greater depth.
Evil Lost and Found [18:00] – Essentially an extension of the above, this focuses on the problems that Touch of Evil went through and how the 1998 Reconstruction came together.
The original theatrical trailer, which includes alternate footage.
Disc Two
The 1958 Theatrical Version in both 1.37:1 and 1.85:1.
The original version of the film released in cinemas in 1958, the theatrical version of Touch of Evil is a shorter and problematic watch. Although this is the version that many who saw the film prior to 1998 (and even before the preview version was realised in 1972) will probably be most familiar with, it feels like such a significant compromise. Once you’ve seen the Reconstructed version and noticed the significant improvements, it’s almost impossible to forget the changes when watching this version.
Beyond taking an academic approach, the theatrical cut is still very much worth checking out, and at a much leaner 1 hour 35 minute running time, and with added, clunky exposition from Keller’s reshoots, the film does play more like a fun B movie thriller – as it was considered by Universal upon release.
The theatrical version is also available to watch in both 1.37:1 and 1.85:1 and although there are some areas in which the print damage clearly increases and the image gets softer (more so than the reconstructed version), the picture is still near immaculate.
The elements used for this version are as follows (as taken from the MoC booklet).
This 2010 HD transfer utilised a 35mm Safety Composite Fine Grain (#2) (w/ExtraR-7) – SET192840 – created in 1958. Reel 11 only is from a 35mm Safety CompositeFine Grain (#1) – SET192839 – also from 1958. Audio is sourced from a mono MAG– DME SET195468.
The 1958 Preview Version in 1.85:1.
Discovered in 1972, this version of the film was the halfway point between the rough cut that sent Welles to his typewriter to pen the memo, and the theatrical cut released in 1958. Sold in the 70s as the uncut version this is perhaps more compromised in many ways more than the theatrical cut, and contains even more footage from Keller’s incongruous reshoots. Considering the problematic history of the film it is an interesting watch, though, and certainly a worthy inclusion.
The Preview Version image is smoother than the other two versions but the quality of the image is still very high. As a result of “insurmountable technical problems with the 1.37:1 master of the Preview version” the preview version is only available to watch in 1.85:1.
The elements used for this version are as follows (as taken from the MoC booklet).
Also formerly referred to as the “Long” or “Extended Version”, it derives from an old surviving 1957/1958 preview print which was an interim version of the film during the editing and re-editing process prior to release. A 35mm Silent Dupe Negative (printed in 1972 from a composite preview print, which dates back to 1957/1958) – SET240723. Audio has been restored from a studio print – SET107951 – as the source. It is a 2008 HD transfer.
Special Features:
Commentary by Critic F. X. Feeney (1957 Theatrical Version – recorded in 2008) – An entertaining and lightly critical take on the film. Feeney was the resident film critic for Z Channel in the eighties and was at least partly responsible for kicking off the director’s cut craze, so it’s a little strange to hear him speaking here on the theatrical cut rather than the Reconstruction edit. Nonetheless his commentary is excellent and Feeney is as entertaining to listen to as he is to read. Whilst his commentary lacks a little in deep academic insight it is an enjoyable listen and his thoughts on the film are definitely worth a listen.
Commentary by Welles scholars James Naremore & Jonathan Rosenbaum (1958 Preview Version) – recorded in 2008) – Whilst more scholarly than Feeney’s commentary, Rosenbaum and Naremore’s commentary is a little on the dry side. Both very knowledgeable about Welles and Touch of Evil though they manage to bring with them some information not represented elsewhere on the disc.
A 56-page booklet featuring essays by Orson Welles, François Truffaut, André Bazin, and Terry Comito; interview excerpts with Welles; a timeline of the film’s history; and extensive notes on the film’s versions and ratios.
This review was originally posted at Bleeding Cool.
- Jan 21, 13
With startling special effects and a convincing portrayal of an imagined future it is easy to discuss Silent Running simply within the context of being an accomplished science fiction film, but like the best that science fiction has to offer Silent Running is far deeper than its outward appearance may suggest.
That is not to say that the special effects and so on are not important and worthy of high praise. Director and special effects supervisor Douglas Trumbull, hot on the back of 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Andromeda Strain, managed to create physical special effects that even today look entirely convincing and natural to their surroundings. The biodomes that are so important to protagonist Freeman Lowell (Bruce Dern), and in many ways the human race as a whole, look less futuristic now than they may have done in 1972 (visitors to domes such as the Eden Project in Cornwall will attest to this I’m sure) but the image of these fragile structures floating in space is a powerful science fiction image, and it is one that has all the more impact due to Trumbull’s impressive use of miniatures.
But it is scriptwriters Deric Washburn, Michael Cimino & Steven Bochco’s emotional story of Freeman, the domes and his robot companions that makes Silent Running such a compelling and rewarding film. Filled with post-sixties rage about the destruction of the environment, the story of Silent Running is powerful, critical and prescient but crucially it is devastatingly heartbreaking.
Freeman Lowell is a complex and conflicted character and when he commits acts that in another context may seem unthinkable we understand his motivations and sympathise with what he is doing. Almost 40 years on it is hard to think of a more cogent film that tackles direct action and environmental concerns so thoughtfully and effectively. It’s also still hard to find a more emotionally affecting science fiction film.
- Jan 16, 13
“Accurate and faithful in every particular of fact and atmosphere is this pictorial history of the first transcontinental railroad.” So opens John Ford’s 1924 silent epic The Iron Horse, a tale of the building of the first transcontinental railroad. Not quite as historically accurate as the opening title card may suggest, Ford’s film is a grand tale of the mythic West that he spent so much of his professional career exploring.
The Iron Horse tells both a small and a large story over its more than two-hour runtime, focusing both on the story of the building of the actual railroad and the smaller romantic story of Davy Brandon (George O’Brien) and Miriam Marsh (Madge Bellamy).
The Iron Horse was a film that really helped make O’Brien a star and his pairing here with Ford was the first of many successful films directed by Ford and starring O’Brien (he also starred in Murnau’s Sunrise in 1927).
With charisma and a commanding physical presence it’s easy to see why he was an appealing choice for leading man and his background in stunt work made him the ideal choice for more action heavy roles such as this. Bellamy, despite a much lesser role, shines in The Horse Horse too with wonderfully mischievous glances that really suit scenes such as the one in which she manipulates the railroad workers into doing something they previously said they weren’t willing to do.
Ford directs these kind of scenes, those that communicate subtlety in human interactions, with real skill, making good use of edits and changes in the framing to convey visually what is being underlined by the dialogue in the intertitles. The action scenes are equally assured with clear sequences in which motivations and actions are accurately communicated to the audience. The Iron Horse could actually quite easily play without intertitles and an audience would find it incredibly easy to follow.
Ford’s fingerprints, his love for Lincoln and the mythologising of ‘The West’ for instance, are all over this early silent offering but also evident are Ford’s talents in effectively telling a compelling story on film.
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- May 21, 13
Whilst Side Effects has received a lot of publicity for potentially being Steven Soderbergh’s last film, the HBO produced Behind the Candelabra is currently playing in competition at the Cannes Film Festival and will receive a theatrical release throughout Europe next month.
‘TV Movies’ have played Cannes before and they will no doubt play here again, particularly as the line continue to blur between the two mediums and American television continues to generate so much incredible work, and Behind the Candelabra is a fine choice for a festival which Soderbergh has such an important history with.
If Steven Soderbergh does indeed give up filmmaking and begins working on television instead, and Behind the Candelabra is anything to go by, the only thing that will be missed will be the chance to see his work on a cinema screen. Behind the Candelabra is as much a film as any other I have seen at Cannes this year. The only difference perhaps is that it is the best that I have seen so far.
Beginning with the meeting of Scott Thorson (Matt Damon) and Liberace (Michael Douglas), introduced by a long-haired moustached Scott Bakula as Bob Black, the film chronicles the pair’s relationship, including its collapse and Liberace’s – or Lee as he likes to be called off-stage – death in 1986 of an AIDS related illness. In this raw portrait we see Scott and Liberace each at their most ugly and their most fabulous, with no compromise seemingly made in portraying a relationship filled with contradictions and overlapping and conflicting motivations.
After a relatively short time with Liberace Scott moves from his home in Los Angeles and his job as an animal trainer to Liberace’s palace in Las Vegas, where he lives until their breakup as Liberace’s “secretary”, his “lover”, his “son” and much more. Liberace first takes to calling Scott his “baby boy”, a name he shares with one of Liberace’s poodles, and it is clear that Scott could just be another in a series of boyfriends, but there is something deeper here. When they finally split and Scott is sat in front of lawyers he struggles to describe their relationship, to justify it somehow, but no explanation is required for the audience. We have just seen Soderbergh, working from a script by Richard LaGraveness based on a book penned by Thorson and Alex Thorleifson, take us inside their world, to live with them and understand the choices they have made, the degree to which they love each other but also the toxic nature of their co-dependancy.
With humour peppering the film throughout, Rob Lowe’s highly amusing turn as Dr. Jack Starz providing a number of laugh out loud moments along with a number of zingers from Liberace, much of the sadness in the film creeps up on you but an underlying melancholy pervades. Ending with an imagined performance by Liberace and a series of title cards that fill in some of the blanks regarding the final act in Liberace’s life one experiences a similar emotional carthasis to Scott at Liberace’s funeral and we too share his sadness and wonder.
Despite the two hour running time the film feels like an epic biopic, with so much detail, humour and emotion crammed in. Using his regular aliases of Peter Andrews and Mary Ann Bernard Soderbergh also acts as the cinematographer and editor on the film and whilst it may be a great loss to film to not see Soderbergh direct again, his retiring from working as a cinematographer and editor will also be a significant loss. Behind the Candelabra is exquisitely made, with superbly crafted cinematography capturing the excess that defines the beautiful production design. If this is indeed Soderbergh’s final film he’s going out on an absolute high but if, as many suspect, he continues to make films, even if they are on television, this is further evidence that the quality of his work could continue at a very high standard.
***** (5/5)
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- May 21, 13
Takashi Miike returns to Cannes with perhaps his most conventional film yet, an overblown but highly entertaining thriller about five cops transporting a despicable child murderer across Japan.
Tatsuya Fujiwara, who is perhaps best know in the West for his portrayal of the naive and sweet Nanahara in Kinji Fukasaku’s Battle Royale, plays Kiyomaru, the child murderer whose life is in great danger. Kiyomaru was responsible for the death of the young granddaughter of a very wealthy and influential man, Ninagawa (Tsutomi Yamazaki), who decides to take matters of justice into his own hands and places an advertisement in a number of national newspapers offering a reward for Kiyomaru’s death.
Following an assignation attempt by Kiyomaru’s only friend he turns himself in at a police station and becomes their problem. A big problem. With 1 billion Yen up for grabs for anyone who kills Kiyomaru, rewards dished out even for those who simply attempt to kill him and the great influence of Ninagawa gradually making itself felt more and more the police are left struggling to keep Kiyomaru safe as they transport him across Japan to stand trial for his crimes.
Assigned to protect him are four, then five, police officers who struggle with the assignment to protect a criminal who shows no signs of remorse and taunts them whenever the opportunity presents itself. When a website goes online which seems to be tracking their movements the cops also begin to doubt one another and as tensions became strained the (melo)drama increases in pitch no end.
Miike shoots the film like he’s attempting to outdo every scene that has preceded it in terms of stakes and drama and with a clichéd and far too bombastic score from Koji Endo the film almost teeters on the precipice of appearing like a parody of a Tony Scott film. Miike, operating on a propulsive script from Tamio Hayashi, manages to reign it in just enough though. Explosive truck flips, shootouts and frantic editing are the order of the day though and all on a larger canvas than Miike is generally free to paint on.
Grounding the high stakes melodrama and more thrilling action is the underlying importance of what the cops are doing. Their assignment is not simply to protect Kiyomaru but the very idea of justice and what the Japanese police force represents. If Kiyomaru dies what does this mean for justice.
Swimming in deep waters filled with issues such as the death penalty, justifiable homicide, vengeance and what does the concept of justice actually mean, Miike rarely dips too far below the surface but this all gives interesting flavour to what is already a very enjoyable thriller.
***½~ (3.5/5)
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- May 19, 13
With thirty years working in film and a number of highly successful martial arts movies under his belt Donnie Yen has been at various times an actor, director, producer, action choreographer and even medal winning martial artist.
Yen was in Cannes to promote his upcoming film Iceman Cometh 3D and I was lucky enough to speak to him about the film, action filmmaking and much more.
On the Iceman Cometh.
It’s obviously quite straightforward. It’s basically a story about this Ming Dynasty warrior travelling years later to modern Hong Kong. It’s a very straightforward, entertaining action film. Of course, with romance and a sense of humour. A black sense of humour. So hopefully this film can bring a lot of joy and entertainment to audiences.
On 3D and the challenges faced in shooting in 3D.
It’s my second 3D movie. I’ve done a movie called Monkey King which is about to come out the end of the year. That’s actually my first 3D movie. It’s very difficult to adapt, especially with action. I’ve been doing action films for so long. There’s a certain sophistication in bringing the best action onto screen but with certain requirements of 3D, equipment and cameras, certain logistics, elements… there’s a real give and take. You really have to adapt your style. In the beginning it was quite difficult.
I’ll give you an example. The 3D cameras are quite heavy and there are certain restrictions with angles. But in the world of action filmmakers angles are a very crucial element in order to bring out the dynamic action itself. One example is that you cannot place the [3D] camera all the way down on the ground. If you want a really low angle to really bring out the heroic dynamics of their particular movements the camera will not allow you to place it at the lowest point. Certain areas like that you have to make these adjustments.
On why we haven’t seen him yet in The Expendables.
…Actually, they asked me. I was honoured that they asked me to be an Expendable [in the second film] but I didn’t find the role too challenging. And also because of my tight schedule… If they ask me again and if the compensation is interesting enough then maybe I’ll definitely be more excited about it.
On the way in which comedy and action travels.
I think one advantage that we have with action movies is that obviously the physical performance is an international language. So therefore, there’s not a language barrier. So when you are involved with bringing the comedy elements into the physical performance I believe that all countries can understand. There are not really local jokes, for example. That requires a particular regional or cultural understanding to understand it.
Choosing the particular fighting styles for his characters.
As a veteran filmmaker, as someone who has been making action films for a very long time, I’ve spent a lot of time understanding the character back stories before I choose what style. Now I don’t even have to think about what style because once the character is properly in place the style should come automatically. For example, if I’m playing a policeman I would not be thinking about flying up two stories high. So that already sets a tone for what type of style in that movie. In a movie like Iceman, where the character is from 400 years ago and he’s an ancient warrior, it expands the world of creativity for me. In terms of choreographing these movements.
Regarding a sequel to Iceman Cometh 3D.
…Actually we will have a sequel. I can tell you that much.
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- May 18, 13
Jodorowsky returns with his first feature film in over twenty years – his last being the rather disappointing and atypical The Rainbow Thief – the bewitching La Danza de la Realidad (The Dance of Reality). An adaptation of his autobiographical book of the same name La Danza de la Realidad is obviously a deeply personal work but it is not a film that it is anywhere near as difficult to connect to as something like The Holy Mountain, a dazzlingly beautiful but near impenetrable riddle of a film.
Jodorowsky has lost none of his wit or imagination since making films such as The Holy Mountain, El Topo or Santa Sangre and despite La Danza de la Realidad being a far easier film to understand and appreciate immediately than his previous works it is still far, far, far from a straightforward film.
Beginning with Jodorowsky appearing on screen and delivering an introductory monologue about money and life the film moves quickly into a circus sequence that introduces us to the young Alejandro Jodorowsky, played by Jeremias Herskovits, and his father, played with incredible intensity by Brontis Jodorowsky.
We are then slowly shown the town of Tocopilla, a town Jodorowsky lived in for ten years as a child, but the town and all of its inhabitants are heightened & imagined versions of reality. We are seeing the world and this story through the prism of a child’s view, the exaggerated influence of memory and the imaginative embellishment of Jodorowsky’s (the director) creative mind. Everything at first may seem strange or even ridiculous, his mother for instance has an almost laughably voluptuous bosom that spills out of her dress and she sings every line in an operatic style, but these seeming flights of fancy make a great deal of sense within the context of the film. The symbolic potency of his mother’s breasts, the very things that physically nurtured a young Jodorowsky, quickly becomes clear and the exaggerated style with which she delivers her lines speak to the way in which Jodorowsky remembers his mother, more than what she was actually like. They represent an impression, a memory, a feeling, rather than a literal manifestation.
The story we see unfold in Tocopilla is predominantly told from the perspective of the young Alejandro but approximately a third of the way through the focus shifts more in favour of the father, as we follow his journey beyond Tocopilla. It is a very interesting structural choice, particularly as the father is an incredibly unsympathetic character at first, but the way in which we see the father’s partial redemption adds emotional weight to many of the later scenes.
These later sequences, which involve the father attempting to assassinate the country’s dictator and the father’s subsequent partial paralysis, are also more serious than some of what has gone before. Many of the early scenes in Tocopillia are often amusing, if only because it is hard not to find some of the more exaggerated symbolism a little on the hysterical side, but they are nonetheless still heartfelt and highly effective.
Jodorowsky reportedly made the film entirely in secret, no doubt helped by the fact that the cast and crew mostly have the surname Jodorowsky, and it is clear that there was not quite as much money available for CGI and set decoration as he needed to fully realise his vision, but these rough edges rarely detract. Jodorowsky has crafted a beautiful bricolage which is both easy to digest and engage with and also unlike anything you have seen before. An absolute marvel.
****~ (4/5)
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- May 18, 13
“He had thrown himself into it with a creative passion, adding to it all the time, decking it out with every bright feather that drifted his way”.
So says Nick Carraway of the titular Gatsby in Baz Luhrmann’s dazzling if flimsy adaptation of the 1925 novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The quote also aptly applies to director Luhrmann to such a degree, the film is certainly excessively adorned with metaphorical bright feathers, that it almost seems obnoxious to make such an on-the-nose comparison. What is perhaps more surprising as one sits in the Debussy at the Cannes Film Festival, the location for the press screening of The Great Gatsby, is how this could also be used to describe those behind the Cannes Film Festival itself.
Beginning life in the thirties, roughly a decade after Fitzgerald’s novel was published, the Cannes Film Festival grew throughout the following decades and with the addition of the Marché du film, Cannes’ film market, in 1959 the festival began cementing itself as an important meeting place for art and commerce, the two central driving forces behind film itself. These two forces, which so often pull and push in different directions, but occasionally flow together, seem very apparent in The Great Gatsby, a film that, despite being the work of a highly talented group of people, feels in almost every way to be the work of a director with a singular vision.
The artistry which Luhrmann displays as a filmmaker, evident even though it is not always put to its best use, is at perhaps its most heightened in Gatsby, a film that is almost exhaustingly overstuffed in its early scenes. But Luhrmann’s particular brand of stylistic excess also seems very much of the moment. Despite sticking with the 1922 setting of the novel Luhrmann uses the most incongruous soundtrack choices possible, filling the film with loud blasts of Jay-Z, Lana Del Ray and Beyonce, amongst others. The effect is curious but not entirely unsuccessful. It will be intriguing to discover what teenagers and twenty-somethings, the so-called millennials, will think of this film, but if Luhrmann’s previous attempts to smash the ‘old world’ head-on into the modern world, Romeo and Juliet and Moulin Rouge for instance, are anything to go by it will most likely hit exactly as it is supposed to.
The clash of the old and the new is also something that is impossible to escape as one walks around Cannes, a beautiful and historic location for a festival but one swamped with technology as thousands of press and production companies descend on the city. In Cannes this struggle between the traditional and modernity moves beyond what appears on the screen in Gatsby too, with the premiere attended by over two thousand individuals, all dressed in tuxedos and evening gowns, all seated in the Grand Theatre Lumiere with one extra accessory, a rather large pair of red active 3D glasses.
As the camera sweeps through a digitally constructed New York City of 1922 or pans over the heads of revellers at one of Gatsby’s legendary parties, all captured in the rather broad 3D, one is struck by the degree to which all that we are seeing is both visually dazzling and also rather tacky. The bombardment of garish images that we see is rather in keeping with the tone of the first half of Luhrmann’s Gatsby but as the pace slows in the second half and things become more seriousness there is a difficulty in taking certain dramatic moments as anything but further absurd histrionics.
It’s another contrast in Gatsby shared with the Cannes Film Festival but another characteristic that more raises a smile than it does impress. If one stops for just a moment in Cannes and surveys the scene in front of them they are more than likely to see sights such as gentlemen in tuxedos awkwardly juxtaposed with a guy in a Toxic Avenger mask or a tacky seaside ice cream parlour nestled next to a estate agent selling multi-million Euro homes.
Cannes seems so much like the natural home for Luhrmann and his Great Gatsby, and even the character of Gatsby himself, that it may just be the most perfect opening choice in the festival’s history, even if it will no doubt be far from one of the best films shown here.
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- May 17, 13
François Ozon, the former enfant terrible of French Cinema, returns after his career best In the House with a rather sedate, even if it is occasionally mildly provocative, character study into the sexual awakening of a seventeen year-old girl.
Isabelle, the girl in question, is played by Marine Vacth, an actress for who this will no doubt be a breakout performance. Vacth has the kind of movie star charisma that can hold the camera and keep an audience spellbound. And Ozon takes every opportunity to leave the camera lingering on Vacth, allowing her to convey her character’s subtle but complex emotions through minor changes in her expression.
Isabelle is first seen on a beach, through a pair of binoculars held by her younger brother, as she sunbathes topless. The tropes which Ozon taps into with this scene and many other key moments in this story of an experimental young girl who turns to prostitution, for the experience more than anything else, are all very familiar and images quickly form in one’s mind from films such as Belle de Jour or Lolita. Like those films though glimpses of Isabelle’s naked body are not used simply to titillate. Ozon has some more high-minded ideas here, even if they are a little simplistically conveyed.
A later scene which features Isabelle studying Rimbauds’s ‘No one’s serious at Seventeen’ even brings to mind Kenneth Lonergan’s modern masterpiece Margaret, but Ozon’s writing here is far from the rich subtlety with which Lonergan handled similar material. The Rimbaud scene in Jeune & Jolie is a microcosm of the wider issues in the film, which do not spoil an otherwise engaging story but they certainly weaken the telling and make for a far more lightweight experience.
With this scene, and others, Ozon is far too explicit in the way in which he makes clear what the film is about, beyond the provocative concept of a teenager turning to prostitution. In telling a heightened version of the teenage experience Ozon is working in an interesting area but when Isabelle sees a reflected version of herself, standing watching her as she loses her virginity early on in the film it is clear that Ozon is not going to let us slowly understand her experiences through what we see. He is simply going to tell us explicitly and repeatedly.
It is particularly noticeable therefore when there are some more subtle ideas conveyed, such as the way in which Isabelle quickly begins to ritualise her experiences with clients, her repetitive behaviour and secret lifestyle playing very much like someone slowly becoming consumed by an addiction. These more nuanced moments are few and far between though.
Despite issues with thematic concerns being so far in the foreground Jeune & Jolie is nonetheless an engaging character piece, with the excellent central performance of Vacth and some handsome and often understated cinematography from Pascal Marti being the main highlights.
***~~ (3/5)
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- May 17, 13
A depressing insight into a poor family in Mexico makes for uneasy if occasionally powerful viewing in Heli, Amat Escalante’s third feature following Sangre in 2005 and Los bastardos in 2008.
Heli is named after its central character, a poor young man who works at a local Japanese Automobile factory and lives with his partner, their daughter, his sister and his father in a small and rundown house. His sister Estela is only twelve but is in a relationship with the 17 year-old Beto, a police cadet who is currently going through some very gruelling training – the sole American voice in the film is an instructor ordering that he must roll over his own vomit – in order to join the Mexican drug war.
In an effort to impress Estela and to fund their running away together, Beto steals a large amount of cocaine and the effects of this choice are felt not just by him but Heli and his whole family. A chilling sequence which opens the film involving a hanging over a motorway gives us an early sense that this will never be a happy story but the events depicted are often more nightmarish than one may even expect.
Watching Heli is something of a gruelling experience and as Escalante piles on one heinous abuse after another, there is an act of animal cruelty and one of genital mutilation that are particularly difficult to stomach, one gets the sense that maybe Escalante could be falling into exploitation traps. Wisely though Escalante, and co-screenwriter Gabriel Reyes, ensure that everything has a narrative and thematic purpose and the often brutal or miserable scenarios are never simple provocation. The aforementioned genital mutilation occurs during a torture sequence which reveals a disturbing effect of the trickle-down impact of the drugs trade in Mexico and what this can do to smaller communities. It also features children witnessing and partaking in the crimes, all whilst an Xbox game hums on a screen in the background.
Cinematographer Lorenzo Hagerman, whose background is in documentary filmmaking, takes a relatively naturalistic and simple approach to the camerawork, with long takes and simple framing often adding to the unease of watching what is on screen. There are breaks to this naturalistic approach though. An odd logic slip in the use of diegetic sound is almost certainly a misstep and a rare moment in which you are snapped out of the film but a crane shot during one of the film’s more emotional moments, almost certainly the only one in the film, is superbly handled and effectively adds to the impact of the scene.
A dark tale, Heli is certainly not easy viewing but Escalante’s bleak journey is one worth taking, for its raw and intense power is often rather extraordinary.
****~ (4/5)
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- May 16, 13
Based on real events and inspired by an article in Vanity Fair, Sofia Coppola’s latest directorial turn concerns itself with those that emulate the kind of characters she has previously devoted whole films to; Dorff’s Johnny Marco in Somewhere, Kirsten Dunst as Marie Antoinette and to a lesser extent Bill Murray’s Bob Harris in Lost in Translation. A fascination with celebrity is something that clearly interests Coppola but her portraits have had little to say in most cases, most notably in the vacuous Somewhere.
So, in focusing instead on the effect that these kinds of lifestyles have on those that covet them and hang on their every designer outfit choice Coppola has found fresh new ground and gone some way to living up to the promise of her first two films. Unfortunately only some way though.
The Bling Ring’s focus is five friends, nicknamed the ‘Bling Ring’ by the media, who rob the wealthy celebrities that they idolise by sneaking in through open doors or windows, or in Paris Hilton’s case a key that she so helpfully leaves under her doormat. Once inside they get a rush from trying on the clothes and accessories of celebrities such as Audrina Patridge, Paris Hilton or Lindsay Lohan and even go so far as to spend time partying in Hilton’s “nightclub room”.
The obsessed teens attempt to inhabit the spaces and adopt iconography all in order to be one with those that they idolise, but they begin very much as empty vessels and no amount of shoes or handbags will ultimately change this. And herein lies The Bling Ring’s greatest issue. As a study in the vacuousness of celebrities and celebrity culture it is near paper thin and without any strong or interesting characters it is hard to separate the experience of watching The Bling Ring from the past time that many, including those in ‘The Bling Ring’, have of scrolling aimlessly through TMZ and so on.
Without some far more biting satire than Coppola gets anywhere near to here, or anything at all more interesting to say about this world than it’s pretty ridiculous and empty, it’s hard to understand who this film will really connect with. If you hate the celebrity obsessions that seem to so often dominate popular culture you will probably raise a wry smile occasionally in The Bling Ring but mostly just find it to be filled with obvious observations and little insight. For those who are deep in that culture it will probably wash over them, allowing them to enjoy the thrill of the cameos and peeks inside Hilton’s actual house, without any of the consequences that the real life ‘Bling Ring’ had to deal with.
The young cast impress greatly at times and their delivery of some of the more amusing lines with a pout and a “like totally” help make The Bling Ring something of an enjoyable experience, despite it’s flimsiness. Leslie Mann also threatens to steal the entire film with a handful wickedly funny scenes. The mother of Nicki (Emma Watson) and Sam (Taissa Farmiga), Mann’s character is utterly obsessed with The Secret, an obnoxious and entirely real self-help phenomenon that concerns itself with how “like attracts like”, and never misses an opportunity to bring it up, always in the most amusing way. The Secret and its link to getting rich through positive thinking is a pretty easy target though and like much of the film its treatment by Coppola is mostly just something that mildly entertains rather than enlightens.
**~~~ (2/5)
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- Apr 14, 13
Discussion about the title of a film is not something that generally finds its way into a film review, and with good reason. The title of a film is usually somewhat extraneous to the actual experience of watching the feature and its importance lies outside of the film itself. Much like the marketing that surrounds any production, the title is part of what gets many people into the cinema and sat in front of the screen. The title Simon Killer is a different beast though, and it may be the most distracting title of a film that I have seen in some time. Settling down in front of this film it is impossible to shake the implications that the name suggests and this can ultimately lead to a sense of frustration and anxiety, and whether this is a negative or positive aspect is, however, certainly debatable.
As the titular character of Simon, played with cool detachment by Brady Corbet, meanders around Paris he interacts with a variety of people in an awkward and often angry manner. With each interaction one sees the potential for violence – a feeling egged on somewhat by the foreboding title. What is rather effective about Simon Killer, and is perhaps its greatest strength, is the way in which we are fed constant anti-climaxes. The multiple connecting vignettes that make up this structured but loose narrative each carry with them this approach, but some end with a sense of conclusion or continuation while others are simply cut off. It’s a bold and interesting approach to telling the story but it is also one that does not entriely work. Whilst the sense of frustration and disconnect feeds directly into this character study of the disturbed Simon, it also leads to genuine frustration and disconnect that leaves one feeling unsatisfied by the story on screen.
Director Antonio Campos, director of Afterschool and producer of the similarly arch Martha Marcy May Marlene, does manage to hold ones attention though with his measured but stylistic approach to the look and sound of the film. By filling the film with a number of question raising moments and anti-climaxes there is also enough to keep this title moving forwards, towards an ending that is, perhaps unsurprisingly, both one of escalation and borderline nihilistic destruction.
Much like Camus’ L’Etranger – both the character of Simon and the storytelling of Simon Killer seem to recall this (in)famous text – Simon Killer’s detached protagonist is incredibly difficult to engage with but unlike the dense character study of L’Etranger – a story which offers a fascinating insight into a deeper philosophical idea – Simon Killer merely skims along the surface of a great deal of interesting ideas. The themes of anti-romanticism that Campos dips his toe into seems more like a cute idea with the Paris setting, for instance, providing a neat little gag rather than a platform on which to explore something deeper. At its worst Simon Killer is as juvenile as the behaviour of its central character, but thankfully its weaker moments are reasonably scarce and for the most part the film is an interesting, if a little surface level, character study that is difficult to shake off as it reaches its inevitable, anti-climatic finale.
(3/5)
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- Mar 26, 13
Following the release last year of a collection of Ozu’s ‘Student Comedies’ by the BFI, reviewed here, this week sees the release of another collection of early silent films from the Japanese master. This new set, titled ‘The Gangster Films’, includes three features, the remaining fragment of a feature and a lecture by Tony Rayns.
When viewed in retrospect Ozu’s filmmaking career appears to be one of gradual refinement, the removal of various elements of film language in order to get to a much more simplistic – simplistic being in no way a pejorative – form of filmmaking. It is therefore very interesting to watch these earlier efforts with his later work in mind.
All three features included in this set, Walk Cheerfully, That Night’s Wife and Dragnet Girl, are grouped under the banner of ‘Gangster Films’ but they are more just films that each have a criminal element. Those looking for something more akin to a Japanese take on the gangster films that Warner Brothers made in the thirties and forties should definitely look elsewhere.
Despite the somewhat dark subject matter, particularly the focus on criminality and the victims this results in, these films are generally still rather sentimental, focused on family or family like dramas and end on rather moral notes. Walk Cheerfully in particular is almost crushingly consumed with the morality of the characters and the implications of their actions, often to the detriment of the drama.
That Night’s Wife also focuses heavily on the implications of crime but the use of this as a central concern leads to far more tension than in either Walk Cheerfully or Dragnet Girl. At a brief 63 minutes That Night’s Wife is the shortest of the three features and the tension that bubbles beneath the surface throughout helps makes it by far the most entertaining of the films. Whilst That Night’s Wife mostly relies on surface level pleasures it is a rather enjoyable silent and also notable for the way in which Ozu edits the picture. Perhaps surprisingly the editing is reasonably fast paced and filled with plenty of continuous edits that are most unlike his later work.
The final film in the set, Dragnet Girl, is perhaps the most well known and highly regarded of the three and it’s reasonably easy to see why. Despite a rather complex plot, especially for Ozu, the film is filled with smart visual storytelling that leaves no doubt in one’s mind that Ozu already had a great understanding of film language, even if he was yet to find his own unique style. One of the most interesting moments in the film involves a group of people turning their heads in response to a sudden sound. The effect is extraordinary and it makes for a very amusing and well played moment of visual playfulness from Ozu.
There is a sense with Dragnet Girl, and to some degree the other features in this set, that Ozu has been heavily influenced by the West. This is most obvious in the posters we see for Hollywood films in the background of scenes but there are many other similarities in the style and subject matter. There is, of course, the case to made that some of these influences are ones that Japan was experiencing at the time – changes in fashion for instance – rather than influences specific to Ozu but the subject matter of the Dragnet Girl does seem hugely influenced by Hollywood gangster pictures and in particular Hollywood’s frequent return to the shadier side of the boxing world in its crime films. That said Dragnet Girl is not derivative but more a film in which Ozu wears his influences on his sleeve.
This new set from the BFI is another welcome release in an already expansive collection of Ozu on Blu-ray and DVD and well worth the purchase. It is not without issues though and unfortunately these did mar my experience somewhat. The biggest issue with the set is thankfully one that you have the option to disregard and that is the scores. The newly commissioned scores, by Ed Hughes, are well made but they often work so much at odds with the visuals that they distract greatly. They are also so filled with incessant climaxes and moments of highly strung drama throughout that they are liable to leave you with a case of nervous exhaustion. The BFI have included the option to watch the films without the scores though and watching them completely silent is certainly a far better experience.
There are issues with the transfers too, although these are mostly confined to the transfer of Dragnet Girl. The first two features have reasonably solid transfers that carry across some damage whilst clearly eliminating the more problematic elements, leaving only trace signs of digital manipulation. The tra nsfer of Dragnet Girl is incredibly soft though with a lot of detail missing, scrubbed away to such a degree that the image is often blurry. The disc is also plagued by what appears to be interlacing artifacts throughout. A disappointing transfer in what is otherwise a rather fine set.
The post The Ozu Collection: The Gangster Films DVD Review appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Mar 18, 13
To those that lived through the dark periods of the BBFC, the Video Nasties debacle and beyond, the current classification/censorship situation in the UK may well seem like something of a dream scenario. Week after week previously banned films are released uncut, possibly surprisingly nuanced decisions are being made – the 15 certificate for Kick Ass, for instance – and the BBFC are providing the public with a great deal of information regarding their decisions. Taking a look at the BBFC website one finds a plethora of information about certification decisions and a number of documents relating to research and processes. David Cooke, the current Director of the BBFC, even blogs at The Huffington Post.
It may well seem like a new dawn for transparency and freedom of artistic expression, but recent decisions by the BBFC and published documents relating to the body have got many film fans worried that we are actually in a very troubling situation in the UK. Following the difficulties surrounding the classification of A Serbian Film and the rejection of films such as The Human Centipede II and The Bunny Game it is clear that the BBFC have an issue with a perceived new wave of films dealing with sexual violence.
The terminology surrounding these high profile cases has made its way into many classifications though, with explanations including phrases such as “Contains no material likely to offend or harm“ (The Spirit of ’45 – classified U) appearing in films in the lower categories. What do the BBFC mean by harm and how do they know what will or won’t cause offence? These are the kind of questions that I would like answered by a compulsory classification board that charges distributors and controls the way in which we see films in the UK.
There have been inroads into better understanding the way in which the BBFC make decisions and what research they use. The most recent and high profile piece of research commissioned by the BBFC led to a great deal of criticism though – I wrote a lengthy piece on the research here – and has done more to concern those keeping a close eye on the BBFC than put their minds at ease.
This research is part of a larger effort on the part of the BBFC to assess their recent classifications and make decisions regarding future policies. One of my biggest criticisms of the recent research – there are many – was that the sample size was very small, something that the BBFC have stressed is related to that research being a qualitative study, but the BBFC are now conducting another study that aims to poll the opinions of a much greater number of people. You can head here and fill out the survey, if you haven’t done so already.
Please do, I think it’s very important.
Done it? Good. One issue that you may have noticed with the survey, and it’s something that I have seen many complaints about on Twitter, is that it leaves very little room to offer your opinion about the same things that were asked of the smaller group, or indeed any other comments that you may have. Dependant on the answers given you may have seen a box that gave you room to write in a longer response to one of the questions or you may have just had boxes to tick. If you’ve got anything else to say there’s no option for further comments, something that is a standard on most surveys of this type.
So, we at HeyUGuys would like to offer you our comments section to write what you didn’t have the opportunity to say in the survey. We will then be passing on your comments to the BBFC. These comments have the potential to influence the way in which the BBFC make decisions and we will be providing the BBFC some space here to reply to your comments should they so desire.
I hand it over to you…
The post Your Chance to Tell the BBFC What You Think appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Feb 14, 13
Nicholas Sparks adaptations seem to be becoming a genre all of their own, Sparks is even credited as producer here, and there is little in Safe Haven that will most likely be of interest to those not already head over heels in love with his particular brand of romantic melodrama. Fans of his now tried and tested formula though will no doubt lap up this new adaptation from director Lasse Hallstrom, who one can’t help but feel is simply picking up a cheque.
Beginning with a sequence involving the escape of Katie (Julianne Hough) from police detective Kevin (David Lyons) at a bus station, filmed very much in the vein of a ‘gritty’ television police procedural, the film quickly moves to the perpetually sunny and ‘dreamy’ Southport. This small town in North Carolina provides the main location for the bulk of the film, with a few cuts back to Kevin and his continued hunt for Katie, and with it a host of clichéd ideas about small town living and a selection of even more clichéd inhabitants.
Leading the pack of clichéd Southport residents is Alex (Josh Duhamel), a widowed father of two who takes a liking to the latest resident of Southport, the guarded but reasonably friendly Katie. Alex is drawn in simple but relatively effective broad brush strokes but often comes across far more as a robot designed to be everything a woman wants rather than even a weak facsimile of a real person. This ultimately seems to be the modus operandi here, as the basic need to provoke a simplistic response from a weak-minded audience member seems to motivate every character trait and plot point far more than any sense that this all needs to make sense or feel at all genuine.
Katie’s secret for instance, which leads her to flee her home and hide out in Southport is rather flimsy and it’s hard to understand why it needs to remain a secret for so long when most people – especially dreamy widowers – would totally understand and sympathise with her situation. Katie never even opens up to her overly-friendly neighbour Jo (Cobie Smulders) who seems so eager to make Katie happy, whose motivations later become very clear. Simply telling her or Alex would wrap things up too quickly though. She must keep it a secret because it works out ‘better’ for the plot. A plot which follows the three act structure so rigidly that if you check your watch when you think each act is ending you will not be surprised to find that the film’s runtime has been perfectly split into three.
As the film reaches its climax, with the reveal of Katie’s secret and the arrival of Kevin in Southport, the film begins to ramp up to an absurd and unfortunately comedic level of melodrama, with additional moments of peril thrown in simply to increase the level of threat without any thought to how silly they come across.
In the film’s final scenes the biggest melodramatic secret of all is revealed and it is such an incredibly left-field piece of writing that Sparks and co. almost deserve praise just for having the sheer guts to include it. The final reveal is a twist that is actually painfully obvious around thirty minutes into the film but one that most will undoubtedly dismiss as simply too insanely ridiculous to possibly be real.
Whilst this wonderfully absurd reveal and some of the more histrionically acted scenes do provide some unintended pleasures the film is for the most part an exhausting slog through clichéd characters and formulaic writing that is near impossible to take at all seriously.
*~~~~ (1/5)
Safe Haven is out in UK cinemas on the 1st of March.
The post Safe Haven Review appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Feb 05, 13
(The following post contains spoilers for Wreck-It Ralph)
Whilst film-makers often deliberately infuse their films with messages relating to current concerns – the allegorical explorations by Romero in his zombie films immediately spring to mind – more subtle or even subconsciousness reflections of recent events often find their way into films.
In the following piece I explore the way in which Wreck-It Ralph, a film that may appear to be simple childish confectionery, can be read as a playful retelling of recent American political and economic history. Whether many of the similarities with recent events are conscious inclusions on the part of the writers – some who have previously worked on The Simpsons and are therefore not strangers to political commentary – is of course in question but, as I hopefully illustrate below, the film certainly supports this kind of reading.
“I was just tired of living alone in the garbage”
“Well now you live alone in the penthouse”
So goes an exchange between Ralph and one of the Nicelanders, the well-to-do residents of the large building that it is Ralph’s job to constantly wreck in the game Fix-It Felix Jr. The conversation between the two occurs when Ralph returns to the game world of Fix-It Felix Jr. having attempted to get a medal and earn his ‘rightful’ place in the building, to live amongst the Nicelanders in a swanky penthouse.
The search for a medal is inspired by the medal that Fix-It Felix earns every time he rescues the Nicelanders, but the one that Ralph manages to procure is from the game Hero’s Duty. Shortly after winning the medal Ralph finds himself in the game world of Sugar Rush – described at one point as a “candy-coated heart of darkness” – and loses the medal to Vanellope von Schweetz, a precocious ‘glitch’ who uses it to enter a race. At this point the medal transforms into a coin.
Ralph’s quest becomes something symbolically fascinating when one focuses on these two scenes; what he ultimately finds himself coveting is money and a symbol of economic success, property.
Watching Wreck-It Ralph with this in mind leads to an intriguing reading of the film and as one looks deeper at a number of the characters and scenarios the similarities between them and the recent political and economic situations in America begin to pile up. ‘Average Joe’ Ralph’s plight is one that in many ways represents the modern American dream, a desire to break free from the monotony of a menial job that appears to have no reward or sense of satisfaction.
He dreams of financial success, which is in turn linked to property ownership, and the kind of celebrity worship that Felix enjoys (desire for celebrity worship has recently become an important part of the modern American Dream).
Ralph is eager to please the Nicelanders, the one-percenters, but also strives to be one of them and move out of the slum that he currently lives in. When the reality of Ralph’s situation and the class immovability that he faces becomes clear Ralph does what so many others in the real world do, he turns to therapy. He does not find solace here though, amongst a group of characters who have the exact same problems. This is a common anxiety that Ralph is experiencing, one that results from being repeatedly sold a false dream, an impossible dream that like Felix he can ‘win’ day after day.
Ralph looks further afield for answers and to try and fulfil his dreams. First he travels into Hero’s Duty, a game that involves a state of endless war, one that can never be won, a war waged against a constantly regenerating enemy. The enemy, which are referred to as bugs, are reminiscent of that great work of American allegory, Paul Verhoeven’s Starship Troopers. Echoes of the ‘War on Terror’, PTSD, and paranoia regarding ‘Homeland Security’ are strong in this sub-plot in Wreck-It Ralph and the way in which the bugs later invade the game world or Sugar Rush, not through a visible assault but by more covert means, hiding within the world waiting to strike speaks directly to American paranoia regarding foreign threats.
Sugar Rush is run by the less-than-benevolent King Candy, who on the surface appears jovial and rather harmless but actually resembles more of a dictator figure. A left wing reading of this character would certainly suggest that King Candy shares some similarity with the former president of America, George W. Bush. That King Candy is revealed to actually just be an older racing character (Turbo) reinforces this reading, with the character of Turbo standing in for the former president and father of George W. Bush, George Bush Snr.
King Candy even uses the electronic underpinning of the game world to rig the game to stop Vanellope – read Obama – from entering the race, and also suggest to others that she doesn’t even belong in the world of Sugar Rush. These scenes draw an interesting parallel with the controversies surrounding possible electoral fraud in Florida and spurious claims regarding Barack Obama’s birth certificate. A line dropped from the script in which King Candy comments on not wanting a “race riot” suggest that the film could have had even stronger leanings towards more risqué political content if it were not for a few of the wrinkles having been ironed out during production.
Vanellope ultimately triumphs though, thanks to Ralph defeating the foreign threat and the reveal of King Candy’s true nature, and despite having the option to be the same kind of royal that King Candy was Vanellope casts aside this prior regime and states that she wants Sugar Rush to be a true democracy. Significantly she also chooses to keep her glitches, those unique characteristics that led her to victory but may seem so worrisome to the more conservative residents of Sugar Rush.
Ralph returns to his game and although he doesn’t make it into the penthouse, he has realised that’s not what really matters. Amusingly though his dump has been transformed – shades of urban renewal – and he now lives in a new house. Whilst Vanellope may not be in charge of the world of Fix-It Felix Jr. it would appear that the new administration and a shift in attitudes is having a positive effect on Ralph’s life. Whilst Ralph’s life may not have actually significantly improved, the future is now a little brighter and the glimpses he gets at Vanellope winning the hearts of her world and beyond give him hope.
Wreck-It Ralph is out in UK cinemas on the 8th of February.
The post Wreck-It Ralph’s Playful Retelling of Recent American Political and Economic History appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Jan 29, 13
Chained arrives on Blu-ray and DVD next week and I was lucky enough to pose some questions to the film’s director and co-writer, Jennifer Lynch.
The film is a dark and utterly fascinating look at a serial killer and explores a number of interesting questions regarding the psychology of this kind of person. I asked Jennifer Lynch about this, ‘torture porn’, shooting on digital, what’s next and more.
The film is fascinating in the questions it raises about nature vs. nurture. Do you find yourself coming down more on one side of that debate and did making Chained change your views at all or lead you in new directions?
Such a great question. I think the dangerous part of nurture vs. nature is the assumption that it is one or the other. It is so deeply case specific. If we look solely at Bob and Rabbit… Bob’s nurture was so damaging, it built a monster. He knew only pain and deception. Mistrust and fear were his first words. Intimacy was ruined and sex mixed with violence. Yet…clearly, he yearns to have companionship and to not be alone. He cannot be rehabilitated, but there is still a deep ingrained human need in him to be loved. Rabbit had love from his mother for nine years. Then the damage occurred. I like to think the knowledge of what love truly feels like enabled him to save his own life and the life of Angie, yet…what will happen to him now? He has been broken. No matter how good his intentions… can he ever recover?
I understand that when you first read the script for Chained you found some of the ‘torture porn’ elements to be gratuitous. What do you consider to be the definition of torture porn and in what way did you find them gratuitous in the first version of the script?
Damien O’Donnell wrote a powerful script, No two ways about it. But it was not a movie for me. I felt I had seen a lot of it before, in that there was a large B story in which detectives searched for the killer throughout, and yes, the killer, who was simply called, THE DICER, was unappealing to me in that he killed by torture. I didn’t know why. I felt unmoved. I felt disconnected. I felt the women were made simple and victimized even before he got to them. Torture porn has a large audience and many folks are great at telling those stories. I’m not one of them. I wanted to explore the idea of a REAL HUMAN MONSTER. How are they made? The idea that something as “every day” and “seemingly safe” as a taxi ride could become threatening… that the pain we all experience guides us in our decision making each day…making us either less or more empathetic.. that’s what’s scary and fascinating. I love scary movies, but I wanted to deal with the monster who doesn’t wear a mask. He stands next to you at the grocery store, and you don’t know how dangerous he is.
How important to you was it to not provide concrete answers in Chained? There are threads that seem to be left loose to encourage audiences to question what they’ve seen and think about the characters’ behaviour. Was this a very conscious consideration and if so, was there anything in particular you did to ensure the film played in this way?
I love a bit of uncertainty at the end of things. It allows for dialogue and audience involvement after the movie. Its intentional on my part and deeply important to me. In the same way I treated the last shot of SURVEILLANCE, I adore the different views on what might become of someone who has survived such things. What happens next. Will the love they knew once be the thing that echoes, or will the violence be too loud? I think that pain is so (as I said above) case specific, it is not for me to say what happens next. It is for all of us to discuss. There really is no excusing the violence Bob imparts, but there is a way to understand it. But we built him. If we can save children from abusive situations, we can begin to end the cycle of the abused becoming abusers. Until then, our silence and hands in our pockets, only keep the monsters coming.
The sounds of Rabbit in the house over the end credits were really important to me. He returns to the only home he has now. He does what he knows. But in my opinion Angie is fine. Next stop, IKEA.
I read in another interview that you would like to do a director’s cut of Chained. What would be different in that cut of the film and do you have any plans to release that at any point?
I would adore to do a director’s cut. I was limited by a running time requirement and had to lose some things I loved. There was a scene as well that I lost due to feelings the distributors had about it. I miss it terribly. The ending was cut significantly enough that Jake Weber told me he was a bit heart broken to see what was missing from that final scene with Rabbit. If there is any way I can raise some money, or if enough people want to see a directors cut…I’M READY.
What was the hardest scene to cut from the film and why?
There were a few. All hurt. But that’s part of the process. A film is made three times. It is written. It is shot. It is cut. So much happens in each stage. I’d say the scene I vaguely referenced in the prior question was the hardest. I don’t want to give away what it was, but I dig the hell out of it. Second in line was the continuation of the “card game” with driver’s licenses that Bob and Rabbit play. There was a round improved at 3 a.m…. amazing. Hysterical. Telling. It just ran too long and had to go. But in a director’s cut…that sucker would be in!!!
So much of the film is incredibly tense and often very uncomfortable to watch. How did you find shooting these kind of scenes and did you do anything in particular to help bring out more emotionally deep performances from the actors?
Every actor involved was so brave and so trusting of me, I had only to make certain I returned that gift. I is imperative that they know they can trust me. That I am not going to make light of what they are doing and how much work it is. I will push them, yes. But I will always be there to catch them. I think discussions are incredibly important. They bring up different feeling in each actor and then are released on the screen. I enjoy blocking and making certain lines are run… but I DO NOT REHEARSE. I think each actual performance should be filmed. Actors are collaborators. They are artists, not puppets. I never want to say..” okay…great…but can you do what you did in that rehearsal (I was too stupid to film)?
How did you find shooting on the RED One and the Alexa? What strengths and/or weaknesses do you thinking shooting on digital had and were there any particular benefits that you found for this film in particular? Do you think you’ll ever shoot on film again?
I love film. I love digital. The Alexa is amazing. The Red is a great camera as well. I also love my Canon Rebel. They are like boyfriends, cameras. Each has something to offer. Some you take home, others you take downtown. I believe I will shoot on film again, certainly, but I have to say I am truly cherishing digital right now. It is not film. It is what it is, and it evolves every day. Most important to me, it allows me to keep the set quiet at the end of a take… to not break the mood… to keep the actors protected in character, but to whisper, ‘still rolling…that was beautiful…let’s go again right now…this time imagine you are afraid he/she will laugh at what you say next’ I can experiment. I do not worry about burning film. I have the actor’s back, and the camera has mine.
One advantage of digital is that you can see what’s just been shot immediately. Did the actors in Chained watch their takes during filming and if so, what effect do you think this had on the actors’ performances?
Neither the actors nor I would watch the takes after we shot them. Maybe once I would show them a playback of something beautiful…some incredible moment.. but again… I have found that watching it takes me out of the creation. I felt the actors felt the same way. I watch footage later. In the moment I keep shooting. Unless I see something go wrong or the cinematographer says we need to go again for camera… I shoot on mood. I think everyone knows when it works.
How did you find the arbitration process with the MPAA that you went through with Chained and what are your personal views about the censorship & classification of films?
Wow. The MPAA. Yeah. Hmmmm. The arbitration was surprisingly pleasant for a situation that didn’t go my way. I believe the people involved are doing what the guidelines set forth for them to do. I simply do not agree with the guidelines. Ultimately what they kept saying was, “It just feels to real” “You have made a great film…we don’t think children should ever see it” Touche’. I mean, hey…neither do I. This is not a kid’s movie… but to say that a sixteen year old cannot go with a parent or discerning adult and after the movie have a dialogue about abuse and safety and the horror of actual violence… is absurd to me. The concept that violence that is sexualized or made funny is better for those 17 and under is grotesque. It is numbing. I love those films for what they are, truly… but we are setting our youth up for a surprise if they think throat slitting is funny or sexy. I can’t help but think that if Brad Pitt played BOB, I would have had an R. But almost proudly I say… Vincent, Eamon, Julia and Jake and Evan (et al) all did such an authentic job… It meant the MPAA was going to have to actually approve intelligent conversations between children and adults. I wish they would have.
I understand your next film is going to be A Fall From Grace. What stage are you currently at with that and what can you tell us about the story? And are you still intending to follow it up with The Monster Next Door?
A Fall From Grace is in the final and delicate stages of casting. I hope to be in pre production by March… fingers crossed. It is all such a beautiful and awkward ballet, this film business. One never knows how it will unfold, only that with passion, eventually, it will.
The Monster Next Door is indeed slated to follow AFFG. I cannot wait!
The post The HeyUGuys Interview: Jennifer Lynch for Chained appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Jan 23, 13
Following an opening featuring a black screen and the sounds of 9/11 calls ,which lasts for a deeply uncomfortable period of time despite actually being relatively short, Zero Dark Thirty moves into more scenes which are well-played to upset and discomfort an audience. We are introduced to the lead, Maya (Jessica Chastain), who is the somewhat unenthusiastic bystander, and later accomplice, in the torture of man believed to have information relating to global terrorism.
Maya appears in these scenes as something of a blank slate, aside from a few awkward looks she is at first also very passive, and despite the film’s reasonably lengthy running time she always remains somewhat inscrutable, with the camera often lingering on her blank and seemingly dispassionate stare. She has one purpose it seems. To find Osama bin Laden.
Recalling the singularly focused female protagonists of seventies revenge pictures – Meiko Kaji’s ‘born for revenge’ protagonist in Lady Snowblood comes to mind – Maya has little to no back story in Zero Dark Thirty and despite multiple interactions with co-workers she seems to form no real social bonds. When she later refers to the terrorists as having killed her friends the line almost comes across as laughable due to the vague or non-existent relationships she has fostered with others.
Her main friend in the CIA and the man who we first see torturing prisoners in the early scenes is Dan (Jason Clarke), an educated CIA agent who helps Maya in her quest to hunt down bin Laden. Dan quickly becomes burnt out and returns to America, an attempt to put the torture he has inflicted upon others behind him, although not predominantly due to guilt it would seem but out of some fear of retribution. He even comments to Maya, “You don’t want to be the last one holding a dog collar when the oversight committee arrives.” That Dan is aware that what he is doing may be considered wrong emphasises how warped the situation is within the CIA. Whilst the question of whether torture is wrong or right is not represented on-screen there is certainly the sense that those within the CIA know that what they are doing may not be entirely legal.
The lack of care for this subject by the characters is highlighted in a scene in which Barack Obama is seen on a television stating that America does not torture. Again director Kathryn Bigelow returns briefly to Maya’s blank stare before the characters get on with what they were doing. This isn’t a subject of particular interest to them despite their close relationship with what Obama is talking about. The characters in Zero Dark Thirty are focused on one idea and there is little to no room for self-analysis.
The controversy that has swirled around Zero Dark Thirty regarding a positive depiction of torture is a massive red herring when it comes to what the filmmakers are actually saying and appears to be largely born out of a significant amount of baggage brought to the film, rather than anything that is up there on the screen. Those who find the torture of human beings despicable, if only this wasn’t just part of the human race, will find the actions of members of the CIA in Zero Dark Thirty deplorable and disgusting. Any sense that this led to evidence that helped find bin Laden will, of course, in no way change that. It is also disingenuous to suggest that this is the whole story, as the film presents it. It is made abundantly clear in Zero Dark Thirty that there is a web of information that leads to the discovery of the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan and it has been gathered in various ways.
What has not been at the forefront of discussions relating to Zero Dark Thirty, and what was also absent from the mainstream news when bin Laden was actually killed, is the desire for his death that seems to be so often just accepted as a given. “If you really want to protect the homeland you need to get bin Laden.” So says Maya, when her dogged pursuit of bin Laden is called into question by her CIA superior Joseph Bradley (Kyle Chandler). When Maya says ‘get’ she quite clearly means kill. Bin Laden’s death is the ultimate goal, not his capture and arrest, and this is never once questioned by any of the characters in the film. It’s probably quite likely that it also wasn’t discussed in the real halls of government buildings in Langley, Washington and further afield either.
Bin Laden’s death is in many ways the end point of Zero Dark Thirty, but the film does not end with a whooping gung-ho mission accomplished celebration of the death of bin Laden. Instead, the final line uttered in Zero Dark Thirty is “Where do you wanna go?” – said by a pilot to Maya – and a lingering shot of Chastain’s face. After another brief period of staring into her inscrutable blank stare we see her expression change to one that looks almost despairing, before finally she begins to cry.
It’s an open-ended and somewhat bleak note to end on and leaves an audience with an indelible sense of what the past two hours and forty minutes have really been about. There’s an emptiness, a pointlessness to the whole endeavour that doesn’t give the audience a sense of catharsis, a deep sigh of relief at the end that the job’s been done, we’re safe now, the bad guys lost. The final emotion is one of despair.
Director Kathyrn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal discard the simple American cinematic tradition of good guys and bad guys and leave the audience with the sense that even in the U.S. government’s attempts to guard themselves from threats and seek some cathartic relief for the truly horrible events of 9/11 they have also found themselves in the ‘bad guy’ role and it comes with a sense of pointlessness and despair which is written all over Chastain’s face. As Maya provides a symbolic surrogate for America, the final line in Zero Dark Thirty provides a crucial question for not just a post-9/11 America but a post-bin Laden America. “Where do you wanna go?”
The post Zero Dark Thirty – Torture, Revenge and a Question for America appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Jan 18, 13
(This article contains some minor spoilers for Django Unchained and be warned that most of the clips included are NSFW)
Like many of Tarantino’s previous films Django Unchained is filled to the brim with film references. Below I’ve attempted to guide you through some of these references and links to other films.
I’ve only seen the film once at a screening and am sure that given the opportunity to sit down with the film on Blu-ray I will undoubtedly find even more, so the following is in no way definitive but hopefully provides some answers to for those wondering what Tarantino was referencing in Django Unchained. Also, most importantly, hopefully it will lead you to check out some of the films in question.
The most obvious film reference in Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained is right there in the title. Django was a 1966 ‘spaghetti western’ directed by Sergio Corbucci and starred Franco Nero in the titular role. The film was a great success, particularly in Europe and Asia, and led to tens of unofficial sequels that featured the same character name but did not feature Nero in the lead role.
Django has always been synonymous with Nero though, so much so that it even led to some non-westerns which starred Nero being retitled abroad with ‘Django’ somewhere in the title. Nero appears in Django Unchained in a cameo role in which he asks Jamie Foxx’s Django about his name.
Tarantino has even previously appeared in a ‘Django’ film, with a cameo role in Takashi Miike’s 2007 film Sukiyaki Western Django, a film that is (spoiler) a prequel of sorts to the original Django.
Tarantino also has a cameo in Django Unchained as an employee of The LeQuint Dickey Mining Co. There are two other members of the Mining Co. that we encounter (played by Michael Parks and John Jarratt) and all three have Australian accents (Tarantino’s is utterly dreadful – perhaps deliberately). The choice to use Australian accents could well be a link to Tarantino’s love of Ozploitation or simply be related to the casting of Jarratt, who unlike Tarantino or Parks is actually Australian (he is probably most well known for his role in Wolf Creek).
The soundtrack to Django Unchained features tracks taken from the original Django soundtrack, including the incredibly memorable theme tune to the film, but the film ends with a track from the 1970 comedic spaghetti western They Call me Trinity, a film which starred Terence Hill in the title role. Hill also starred as Django in the unofficial sequel Django, Prepare a Coffin.
Zoe Bell also appears in Django Unchained in a role that was reportedly cut down and wears a red mask that is very similar to those worn in the original Django.
Tarantino makes reference and takes inspiration from Corbucci’s other westerns beyond Django in Django Unchained, including nods to Minnesota Clay and, Corbucci’s masterpiece, The Great Silence. A saloon near the start of the film is called Minnesota Clay, a film that features a scene in which a character shoots the ear off of another. This also occurs in the original Django and presumably at least one of these had some influence on the infamous ear mutilation scene in Reservoir Dogs.
The Great Silence appears to be a key inspiration for Tarantino with the snow filled scenes in Django Unchained being very reminiscent of the memorable winter setting of The Great Silence. Like Django Unchained The Great Silence also features a German actor, Klaus Kinski, playing a bounty hunter, but he plays a character who has none of the charm or manners of Waltz’s King Schultz.
Tarantino also uses an Ennio Morricone track on the soundtrack to Django Unchained which was taken from Corbucci’s 1966 western The Hellbenders, a film released in the same year as Django.
The film references in Django Unchained go further back in film history than Spaghetti Westerns too with the oldest reference probably being a nod to Edwin S. Porter, the director of the 1903 film The Great Train Robbery, with a wanted poster for Edwin Porter appearing in the background in a scene. The Great Train Robbery was an important film due to the innovative techniques used by Porter but is probably most well known for a shot which features a character firing directly at the camera, a shot that has been referenced multiple times in films since, most famously by Martin Scorsese in Goodfellas.
Tarantino also pokes fun at the Ku Klux Klan in one of the film’s funnier scenes in which a KKK group mount an inept attack on Django and Schultz. The attack is scored by The Ride of the Valkyries, undoubtedly inspired by its use in D. W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. Where Griffith opted to celebrate the KKK and portray them heroically, Tarantino ridicules them and uses the music to directly parody Griffith’s cinematic representation of the Klan.
Tarantino also undermines and ridicules Hollywood’s previous approach to civil rights when Django and Schultz enter Mississippi. The text ‘MISSISSIPPI’ fills the screen and scrolls from one side to the other. This is almost certainly a joke at the expense of Gone with the Wind, which opens with a very similar title sequence. Where Gone with the Wind portrayed a rather idyllic view of the South Tarantino lays the text over slaves trudging in mud.
In a gag that really only works in the credits Tarantino credits Russ Tamblyn in Django Unchained as ‘Son of a Gunfighter’ (this name is not referenced in the film) and his daughter, played by Tamblyn’s real life daughter Amber, is credited as ‘Daughter of the Son of a Gunfighter’. Son of a Gunfighter was a 1965 western starring Russ Tamblyn and directed by Paul Landres. Landres was most well known for directing TV westerns, including The Lone Ranger and The Cisco Kid, and the sheer volume of his credits is really quite extraordinary.
There have been a number of westerns that feature black actors in prominent roles and although Tarantino does not make explicit references to many it is not a stretch to imagine that films such as Boss Nigger, Buck and the Preacher, Charley One-Eye and Legend of Nigger Charley were not far from his mind when making Django Unchained.
The plot of Django Unchained also somewhat mirrors some of the elements of Hannie Caulder, a 1971 western starring Raquel Welch in the lead role. The character of Hannie Caulder is raped by three men who also murder her husband. Caulder seeks revenge and makes a deal with a bounty hunter to train her to kill the three men.
Blaxploitation films of the seventies are, unsurprisingly, another key reference point for Tarantino but the nods to this genre are often rather minor. When Schultz and Django first meet Calvin Candie, for instance, it is in the Cleopatra Club, perhaps a reference to Tamara Dobson’s character Cleopatra Jones, who appeared in the 1973 film of the same name and the rather weak sequel Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold two years later.
One of Candie’s slaves, who we are first introduced to in the Cleopatra Club, is called Sheba, again possibly a reference to another ass-kicking blaxpoitation heroine. Tarantino favourite Pam Grier played the title role of Sheba Shayne in Sheba, Baby, a character billed in the advertising as “Hotter ‘N’ Coffy, Meaner ‘N’ Foxy Brown”.
Most notably the love of Django’s life, his wife Broomhilda, has the rather unusual surname ‘von Shaft’, undoubtedly a reference to the 1971 blaxploitation smash hit Shaft.
When we are first introduced to Broomhilda she has been put in the ‘hot box’, a punishment for trying to run away from Calvin Candie’s plantation. This could also be a reference to another blaxploitation film, the somewhat lousy The Hot Box, a Roger Corman produced ‘Women in Prison’ film which featured a script co-written by Jonathan Demme. The logistics of the hot box in The Hot Box are very different to those of the one in Django Unchained though.
In the Cleopatra Club we also first introduced to ‘Mandingo fights’, a practice that was made famous by the exploitation picture Mandingo, directed by Richard Fleischer and released by Paramount Pictures in 1975. Tarantino has previously talked about Mandingo at length and it was almost certainly an influence that led to the inclusion of these scenes and the Mandingo fighting sub-plot in Django Unchained.
Samuel Jackson’s character of Stephen has been described by many to be a an ‘Uncle Tom’ character (a character type which gets its name from Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin) and whilst Django Unchained bears very little similarity to Goodbye Uncle Tom, a 1971 faked documentary that explores slavery, it was almost certainly a reference point for Tarantino. The soundtrack for Goodbye Uncle Tom also features music from Riz Ortolani, who appears on the soundtrack to Django Unchained.
The track Rito Finale that is used in Django Unchained first appeared on the soundtrack to Violent City, a Sergio Sollima directed Italian crime film starring Charles Bronson. Sollima was well known for his westerns before moving into crime pictures and made an exquisite pair of westerns in 1966 and 1967, The Big Gundown and Face to Face. Both were incredibly political and fantastic examples of the genre.A number of pieces of music in Django Unchained are taken from the scores for other film, including cuts taken from Two Mules for Sister Sara, Hornet’s Nest, Under Fire, Day of Anger, The Last American Hero and His Name Was King. This last track supplies the theme tune for the character of King Schultz. The film His Name Was King was another western featuring Klaus Kinski, although he did not play the ‘King’ character.
The track ‘Unchained’, which is used to great effect in one of the film’s later shoot-out sequences, samples heavily from the track Payback by James Brown. Although Payback did not actually first appear on a soundtrack it was originally recorded for the Larry Cohen film Hell Up in Harlem, a sequel to James Brown scored Black Caesar. Reports as to why it was not actually used differ but it appears to have been due to a dispute over the cost of making the music James Brown supplied for Black Caesar fit to the film.
So, what have I missed? Let me know in the comments section below.
Django Unchained is out in UK cinemas now.
The post A Guide to the Film References in Django Unchained appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Dec 21, 12
An almost unbelievable story regarding a gross miscarriage of justice arrives in UK cinemas this week. Directed by Amy Berg, the documentary West of Memphis tells the story of the West Memphis Three (Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley), three boys convicted of murder in Arkansas in 1993.
I reviewed the film at the London Film Festival (you can read what I had to say here) and even picked it as one of my top ten of 2012. An extraordinary film, West of Memphis is one recommendation that is very easy to make.
I was lucky enough to speak to director Amy Berg in October we spoke at length about the process of making the film and the case itself.
What was your first involvement with the film and the story?
I came in very late. I came in after Peter [Jackson] and Fran [Walsh] had presented all of this new evidence to the judge. Well, they didn’t even get to present it, it was denied immediately. And then they had to regroup and decide how to get the information out because they thought Damien [Echols] was going to get executed. They contacted me in 2008 and I spent six months just reading up on it. It had been fifteen years since Damien was convicted. They had been funding his defence, which had ultimately been getting involved with everyone working together. There was just so much information, a conviction means everything’s on the public record. There was a camera pool at the trial, so all the news stations had recorded it. So I got to watch the entire trial and really go fact for fact on the case that was presented in court. That’s where I started.
So you started in very much an investigative way?
Yes, I wanted to take their [the prosecution's] case and look at everything they presented to prove these guys were guilty. And every single point was disputed in one way or the other. I had to personally feel that Damien was innocent before I could sign on to do this film because obviously there was a slant towards getting him out of prison. I’d heard of the West Memphis Three and I’d heard of the case but I didn’t really know anything about it. So I spent that six months looking at everything; his alibi, the confession, the forensics, the DNA evidence. Every single thing that had happened and every single time I kept finding that there was no connection for him. He didn’t know those kids, he didn’t know Jessie, he offered his own hair when they said they were going to test the DNA. It was obvious to me that he didn’t do it, that Jason didn’t do it, that Jessie didn’t do it. It was just a bad circumstance that brought the three of them together and a huge miscarriage of justice.
Was there any particular thing that clinched it for you?
Well the forensic evidence. That really made sense to me. They were presenting that these guys had stabbed these kids to death and the autopsy showed that there was no depth to the wounds, that there was no organ damage. That these were scratch wounds. It just seemed so obvious that if that was a universal thought amongst all of the forensics experts, you have to take science seriously. The fact that the medical examiner is an arm of the prosecution is such an unfair system. The medical examiner should be on behalf of the citizens of the state and the state. It should be an unbiased entity and instead it’s about getting conviction. Arkansas is the only one left like that. It’s not a new idea it’s just that that’s the only place that’s not dismantled their medical examiners. It’s crazy.
One of the most extraordinary moments in the film is seeing the turtle bites side by side with the wounds on the children. It’s such a great way of showing the evidence. Were there any other ways of showing things that you didn’t end up using? Obviously you’re representing something that’s very much on paper.
Yes, there’s so much. There was something that was really shocking to watch but it ended up on the floor. Vicky Hutchinson’s son was brought in for questioning and he was eight years old, and he was a school friend of the boys that were murdered, and watching the prosecutor and the police investigator try to get information out of eight year old. They were willing to take anything. He was changing his story and they were just going for it. You are seriously trying to get information out of eight year old who wasn’t there about what happened? It was just shocking.
And obviously there’s a parallel there with Jessie and the way they spoke to him.
Yeah, he’s on that level. It’s awful.
Coming on to the project did you know who you were going to get access to?
No, I had no idea. Every single character had something interesting to share but it was hard to find them.
How did you manage to persuade them? Terry Hobbs’ daughter, for instance?
It wasn’t persuasion it was just literally persistence. That’s what it was. Just being there and listening. I didn’t show up with a camera. I spent months talking with people. Just letting them feel comfortable. Me understanding who they were. I think that ‘s really important.
Obviously the documentary is a mixture of compiling footage and new footage. What sort of process did you go through? Did you do a rough assembly edit before going back again?
We did character assemblies for each person. Their arcs and then found the intersecting points. We built scenes and started with that.
I assume there was a process of cutting things down too?
I never had a cut over three hours. It was just mixing and moving things around. You just keep changing things. It was hard to manage a film at two and half hours. It’s hard mentally to manage all that information. That was about as long as it could be. I always wanted it to be under two and half hours but it’s hard to do.
And you used ‘pillow shots’, shots of sky and so on that are in-between interviews.
Yeah, I really felt that the visual concept was really in line with Capote. I love that film and I feel like that was a really similar type of story because there was so much intensity and chaos but there was the quietness of the story. I just felt like setting up each environment was really important for transitions in and out. So whenever we would wrap we would go and grab a few of those shots. If for some reason an interview got cancelled I had a long list of shots that I had that I wanted. Like the shot with the birds and the train, I was like, ‘I missed it again, what time does that happen? I’ve got to get that.’ Then of course you go the next day and then it doesn’t happen.
The investigation obviously needs to begin now as it never really started properly. Are you optimistic about the future?
It’s hard to be optimistic after seeing so many who are unwilling to even admit that they made a mistake. In England you guys used to have the death penalty. Then you executed an innocent man and you got rid of the death penalty. That’s an admission that we have a faulty system. We aren’t willing to do that in America. We not willing to admit that we made a mistake. You never hear somebody saying that. Come on, we’re not above errors as human beings. It’s obvious just from looking at this case that a lot of mistakes were made.
West of Memphis is out in UK cinemas today.
The post The HeyUGuys Interview: Amy Berg for West of Memphis appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Nov 13, 12
18-year-old Pauline (AnnaLynne McCord) is a very disturbed teenager, even more so than the average teenager. She even quips at one point though, “I don’t know of a teenager who doesn’t profile as a socio-path…”. Pauline is exactly the kind of child her mother, played with pointed prudishness by Traci Lords, doesn’t want. When presented with this problem child, who often comes across as arrogant and rude, Phyllis (Lords) despairs and in later scenes it becomes clear that she is at the point of wishing she had never had her.
Director Richard Bates Jr.’s film brings to mind modern alt-horror classics such as Lucky McKee’s spectacular May, especially in his choice to explore the experiences of a disturbed but sympathetic female lead character. In focusing on an adolescent lead Bates also heavily taps into the new experiences and concerns with finding oneself that generally accompanies ones teenage years. Pauline is treated very much as an outsider, by her mother but also by pretty much everyone around her, including a priest who is supposed to be helping her (played by Lords’ friend and prior director John Waters), her teacher and her peers, and this has a profound effect on how she interacts with the world. As an outsider she is deprived of affection and her desire for this becomes increasingly crucial as the story develops.
Bates Jr. does an excellent job of exploring these adolescent issues, of being an outsider, seeking affection and affirmation from those around you and, most importantly, deciding who you are. Pauline’s inner thoughts bleed out into the film through a number of dream sequences that both make explicit those thoughts that we might otherwise grapple to comprehend, and further extend our understanding of what kind of person Pauline really is. The dream sequences present a difficult line for Bates Jr. to tread, as these type of scenes so often falter in the hands of first-time filmmakers, but here Bates Jr. manages to inject a large amount of style without failing to convey what is required to the audience. Thanks in part, perhaps, to his dry run short film of the same name in 2008.
AnnaLynne McCord, who is probably best known for her long-running stint on the recent 90210 reboot, is excellent as Pauline, filling her performance with enough nuances amongst the more obvious snarling and quizzical head tilts to really convince an audience of the complexity and depth of the character. It is in the empathy that one has with Pauline that the heart and strength of the film lies, ensuring that the ending, which is the ultimate attempt from her character to define herself and convince those around her of her strength and compassion, is emotionally effective and crushingly bleak.
With a short but efficient running time of eighty-one minutes Bates Jr. manages to fill Excision with a sense of dread that is highly potent and an almost wicked approach to escalation which leaves you almost holding your breath as the film reaches its conclusion. Destined to be regarded as something of cult curio and perhaps even relegated to simply being a half-remembered shocker, Excision is too thematically rich to be dismissed so easily and deserves serious consideration.
****~ (4/5)
Excision is available on DVD and Blu-ray now and is also playing in limited cinemas. Find more information at the official website here.
The post Excision Review appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Nov 01, 12
Excision opens in limited UK cinemas this Friday and is well worth hunting down. A fascinating film from first time director Richard Bates Jr., Excision is adapted from a short he made in 2008 and tells the story of a rather disturbed teenager named Pauline.
Played by AnnaLynne McCord, Pauline is troubled in many ways and has an obsession with surgery and the more bloody side of life (and death). The film explores her character’s thought processes in a very interesting and, in many ways, empathetic manner and the way in which Bates treats this central character is very much in the film’s central draw.
Playing Pauline’s rather strict and unsympathetic mother is Traci Lords and I was lucky enough to ask her some questions about the film and her part in it.
Were you familiar with Richard Bates Jr.’s short film before you starred in the feature and what did you initially think of it and the idea?
My agent sent me the script and short film. I was intrigued. And after several meetings and a screen test…the role was mine .
Was there one thing in particular that most drew you in when you read the script for Excision?
Phyllis was a role I hadn’t played before. I felt challenged by her emotional journey and wanted to explore that.
The empathy and sympathy that an audience feels for the main characters in Excision is complex. How did you personally feel towards the characters and did this effect the way in which you approached your performance?
Phyllis was a really difficult character to play. She was written really cold and bitchy. I knew that what was behind that – the pain – needed to always be there lingering. And I needed to bring a sense of humour to the role.
Was there any particular experience or research that you drew on for the role of Phyllis?
I just really thought about what it would be like to have a child that I didn’t like. The pain, the guilt and the denial that would dig at you. I have a 5 year old son and I know how blessed I am. I adore him! The thought of “not liking”, although loving, ones own child was rich for me. It hit me emotionally.
What sort of rehearsal period did you have for the film and was there anything surprising that came out of that?
Ricky and I went through the script page by page. It took us two days. We changed dialogue, added pieces….played. We found some humor in those sessions.
What was the hardest scene to shoot and why?
The dinner scenes were the hardest to shoot because we “Block Shot” them which means all my coverage for every one of those scenes was shot in one afternoon. I had like 16 pages of dialogue and the scenes were scattered throughout the film. It was hell. The reason it was shot this way was…MONEY! We had such a small budget and very little time. It was brutal on the actors. I remember bawling my eyes out as I drove home that night, so exhausted and worried that I had forgotten something in the madness.
How do you read the ending? Do you find it cathartic, bleak, optimistic?
Devastating.
The film speaks to the experiences of teenagers in a way that is perhaps far more meaningful than a lot of popular culture aimed at teenagers. Do you agree and if so, was this something that drew you to the film?
Yes, it’s horrifying what children are doing today. Shooting up schools, killing their parents, destroying their bodies.
What’s most surprised you about the reactions to the film?
Nothing. I expected people to either love or hate it. And they do. I am very proud of my work in this movie.
I’m a really big fan of Cry Baby and thought you were wonderful in it, and Serial Mom too. Do you have any plans to work with John Waters again? Did you discuss it at all on set?
Ahhh, thank you so much! John Waters is a dear friend of mine. I put Ricky in touch with John. I knew he would find Excision twisted enough to be worth doing. I’m delighted he said yes, as was Ricky! Any excuse to work together we will!
Excision is getting a limited theatrical release from Friday the 2nd of November and will be available on Blu-ray and DVD from the 12th.
The post The HeyUGuys Interview: Traci Lords for Excision appeared first on HeyUGuys.
- Nov 01, 12
Rust and Bone impressed me greatly when I first saw it in Cannes earlier this year (you can read my review here) and it has really stayed with me since. I powerfully emotional film Rust and Bone tells a tale of human interaction in a melodramatic but incredibly resonant way.
I attended a roundtable with writer/director Jacques Audiard and co-screenwriter Thomas Bidegain (who also acted as translator for Audiard) when the film had its UK premiere at the London Film Festival and the director and writer had a lot of interesting things to say about the construction of the story and revealed much about their approach.
How would you characterise Rust and Bone?
Jacques Audiard
It’s a melodrama. We call it ‘Melo-trash’… It’s a love story.What about Matthias Schoenaerts stood out and led to him being cast?
Jacques Audiard
The part we wrote was tougher than what it is on screen now. A closed character. More like an animal somehow. Very rapidly we felt that the character was not seductive enough. The question was, how would a girl fall in love with a guy like him. So, the work with Matthias was to make the character more juvenile somehow. And he got a lot of charm this way. But it also changed the position he had with his son in the story. In the original scenario he was a really violent father and then with that juvenile thing he became a big brother. Clumsy but loving. It really changed a lot of things in the film. At the end what he discovers is that he is a father. He ignored that beforehand.The film is gripping in part due to its unpredictability. Were there things which you changed to make it more so and were there other versions of the story? Perhaps a different ending?
Thomas Bidegain
No, the ending was always like this. We wanted the film to be unpredictable but it is because it’s character driven. It’s really the characters who took us through the journey. So, it is an adventure film. A ride. You just get on and go with the characters. As we were writing the characters were taking us through the story. It was difficult to write scene 54 before having written scene 53 because we were never quite sure of what the characters will do in the scenes. Will they make love, will they talk finally or not? It was really a game between those characters and us writers.It sounds like a very linear writing process, did you then go back and make any changes?
Thomas Bidegain
We went back. We changed the characters… It’s always the same when you write, you build the story and at one point you find yourself in a dead-end and you go back to the beginning and you change the definition of the characters. That will allow you to go a little further in the story.Jacques Audiard
At certain times we thought we would tell the story of the two characters at the same level. But both characters are not equals and the main character is him. He’s the one that brings us into the story. Because at the accident Stephanie’s character has you tend to think that she ‘s the lead character and that’s the character that will lead the story but that’s wrong. The lead character is the guy.Thomas Bidegain
It’s important to stress the importance of the kid. We saw the kid as the invisible narrator. At the beginning his eyes are closed and he wakes up at the end. The film has very strong images – the fights, a woman with no legs – those are images from fairytales and images that a kid will see. The monstrous reality as seen through the eyes of a lost kid.Jacques Audiard, the criminal underworld seems to be a theme that runs through all of your films. What is it that draws you to that?
Jacques Audiard
Because I’m a bourgeois. [Laughter]Making movies is always going towards something you don’t know. Going for the unknown. So it could be geographical territory, it could be the relationship between two people, it could be psychological, there’s always something you don’t know. Cinema, that’s really the way I use it. I use it to look at something somewhere that is different. So I learn a lot of things with films and I make film for that. And as a viewer that’s what I like as well. A film that doesn’t teach me anything will leave me cold.
It sounds very much like each of you are both involved in pre-production, production and post-production. What area is it that you find most exciting?
Thomas Bidegain
I think the quality of Jacques is to let everything that happens enter the film. Not to close the thing at any time. To keep the ball rolling all the time. Even to the mix. I think that’s a rare quality for a director.Jacques Audiard
Cinema cannot be narcissistic. Or egotistical. The difference between cinema and literature, for instance; literature is a solitary practice and modern contemporary art is solitary. Cinema and theatre are collective gestures. When we write we write as two people, we write together. When I’m on set, maybe I can do the lighting, maybe I can frame the film – I used to be an editor too – but the great thing is the collectivisation of all the talents. The metabolism that you go through. And at the end the idea, the thing that you thought of yourself, is better. Much better because all the talent add to each-other. Isn’t that beautiful.I think people who make films in order to impose their ego… I don’t understand.
So, do you reject auteurism?
Jacques Audiard
No, because I am an auteur.When you use cinema you are an auteur but I recognise those because I know where things come from. And a lot of things have been added to it. It is probably better than what I would have come up with by myself, than the original idea that I had.
Could you comment on the state of filmmaking in France and worldwide.
Jacques Audiard
I don’t know if we’re really qualified to answer about that.[After some persuading] I still really love cinema but I can say that I adored it at one point. And something has changed. Something has changed and I do not agree with it. There is an industry aspect of cinema. It’s the relationship between cinema and reality, the fact that at one point cinema was helping is understand the world and most of the time now cinema is telling stories but it’s different. Cinema tells us about cinema and not about reality. That relationship between reality and cinema is more and more disturbed. But the films I like today come from Ireland, from Korea, from China, because they tell me something I don’t know and inform me about the state of the world.
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Rust and Bone is out in UK cinemas on Friday the 2nd of November.
The post The HeyUGuys Interview: Jacques Audiard & Thomas Bidegain for Rust and Bone appeared first on HeyUGuys.
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- Apr 22, 13
Welcome to the Masters of Cinema Monthly.
Today, Masters of Cinema announced their June-July line up and gave cinephiles five good reasons their wallets may feel a little lighter this summer.
The press release is as follows,
From landmark silent cinema and a thrilling rediscovery from a French legend to an early sound cinema classic and the finest art cinema of 1960s Japan, The Masters of Cinema Series remains as eclectic as ever in its June and July 2013 line-up – a five-release slate that includes big name directors D.W. Griffith, F.W. Murnau, Jacques Rivette, and Kaneto Shindō.
Producer of the Masters of Cinema Series, Andrew Utterson stated “In June, we will be releasing beautiful Blu-ray presentations of Kaneto Shindō’s 1960s cult supernatural horror Kuroneko and haunting drama The Naked Island, alongside a definitive reissue of Tabu, F.W. Murnau’s Oscar-winning collaboration with Robert Flaherty.
More cinematic treats follow in July with an immaculate reissue of D.W. Griffith’s troubling but hugely significant silent epic The Birth of a Nation, and we welcome legendary French director and New Wave pioneer Jacques Rivette into the series for the very first time with the major rediscovery of his rarely seen Le Pont du Nord”
Managing Director of Eureka Entertainment, Ron Benson added “Across five standout releases, world and UK premières abound, with new restorations aplenty, we continue our quest to release the very finest in world cinema, using the best available materials and a meticulous attention to detail and design.”
We knew that Birth of a Nation and Tabu were on their way soon but it’s great news that there’s not too much more time to wait for these releases. Naked Island and Kuroneko have been likely candidates for a Blu-ray upgrade for a while now, particularly following Criterion’s Blu-ray release of Kuroneko in 2011, but to get both so close together will be a real treat.
Factoring in MoC’s release of Onibaba earlier this year, Shindo will soon be very well represented on Blu-ray in the UK. I, for one, can’t wait for the Kuroneko release in particular. It’s an extremely entertaining ghost story and also incredibly rewatchable.
The most surprising announcement today was the forthcoming release of Jacques Rivette’s 1981 film Le Pont du Nord, which until now was not known to be a likely future release. I’ve not yet seen the film, and what I’ve read makes it sound like something of a puzzle of a film, but I look forward to digging into it in the next couple of months and wrapping my head around Rivette’s riddle.
The rather wonderful covers for the June/July releases are as follows,
On April the 4th Film Criticism lost one of its greatest voices. Roger Ebert was one of, if not the, most famous English language film critic and highly regarded by many in the field of criticism.
Ebert was a critic that I read infrequently but whenever I returned to read his reviews I was always entirely sucked in by his writing. There was always something so engaging about the way he wrote, something I still find hard to put my finger on.
Upon hearing of his deathm I did what many other fans of his work did and started reading and re-reading his many, many reviews. His website has just been overhauled and it’s a wonderful site to get lost in.
In particular, I’ve spent a lot of time reading his Great Movies reviews and I noticed that, perhaps unsurprisingly, a number of Masters of Cinema films were included in this section. I’ve picked a few of these and posted excerpts below, and the titles I’ve used link to the reviews. I urge you to check out the new website more fully and get lost, as I did, in Ebert’s writing.
I imagine it is possible to see “Sunrise” for the first time and think it simplistic; to be amused that the academy could have honored it. But silent films had a language of their own; they aimed for the emotions, not the mind, and the best of them wanted to be, not a story, but an experience.
Murnau, raised in the dark shadows of expressionism, pushed his images as far as he could, forced them upon us, haunted us with them. The more you consider “Sunrise” the deeper it becomes — not because the story grows any more subtle, but because you realize the real subject is the horror beneath the surface.
You cannot know the history of silent film unless you know the face of Renee Maria Falconetti. In a medium without words, where the filmmakers believed that the camera captured the essence of characters through their faces, to see Falconetti in Dreyer’s “The Passion of Joan of Arc” (1928) is to look into eyes that will never leave you.
The Gospel According to St. Matthew
His personal style is sometimes gentle, as during the Sermon on the Mount, but more often he speaks with a righteous anger, like a union organizer or a war protester. His debating style, true to Matthew, is to answer a question with a question, a parable, or dismissive scorn. His words are clearly a radical rebuke of his society, its materialism, and the way it values the rich and powerful over the weak and poor. No one who listens to this Jesus could confuse him for a defender of prosperity, although many of his followers have believed he rewards them with affluence.
That might be the best approach for anyone seeing the film for the first time: to set aside the labyrinthine plot, and simply admire what is on the screen. The movie begins with one of the most famous shots ever made, following a car with a bomb in its trunk for three minutes and 20 seconds. And it has other virtuoso camera movements, including an unbroken interrogation in a cramped room, and one that begins in the street and follows the characters through a lobby and into an elevator. The British critic Damian Cannon writes of its “spatial choreography,” in which “every position and movement latches together into a cogent whole.”
Welles and his cinematographer, Russell Metty, were not simply showing off. The destinies of all of the main characters are tangled from beginning to end, and the photography makes that point by trapping them in the same shots, or tying them together through cuts that match and resonate. The story moves not in a straight line, but as a series of loops and coils.
It’s said this film inspired Yasujiro Ozu’s “Toyko Story,” the only film that ever made my students cry. This one might do the same. Entertainment is about the way things should be. Art is about the way they are. The closing passages of “Make Way for Tomorrow” depend on deep empathy between the filmmakers and the characters. They respect them. These two people have spent a lifetime together, raised a family and lived in their own home until Bark got laid off. They’ve maintained a mutual dignity and they’re not about to turn sappy now.
Look at how gently, and with what respect, they treat each other. Observe how certain strangers, caught up in the business and pleasure of their own lives, observe this and glimpse for a second their own futures. See how strangers can be kind — for a moment, anyway, although they too may have parents they don’t have room for.
Yasujiro Ozu was born in 1903 and died in 1963, but his films were not widely seen outside Japan until the early 1970s, because he was thought to be “too Japanese.” He is universal; I have never heard more weeping in the audience during any movie than during his “Tokyo Story,” which is about children who in a subtle way are too busy to pay proper attention during a visit from their parents.
It is impossible to select Ozu’s best film because his work is so much of a piece, and almost always to the same high standard. His stories usually involve two generations. They are family dramas, without violence. There are few scenes where the characters vent their emotions, and some of the most important decisions are implied, not said. He is wise about the ways we balance our selfishness with the needs of others.
The film gathers fearful force. Ordinary human values have been set aside for all the major characters, and that is tested above all when the rich businessman rapes Haru, with Enokizu and the mother in the next room. Haru cries for help. Enokizu seems emotionless, fixates on a dripping faucet, tightens it and then finally reaches for a knife — but the mother stops him. She does not want to lose the man’s financial support.
When the film was released in 1979, it was sometimes called the Japanese “In Cold Blood.” Not at all. Richard Brooks’ 1967 film offers motivations for the characters — greed in one, childhood wounds in another. It contains a famous line: “I thought Mr. Cutter was a very nice gentleman. I thought I so liked the old man. I thought so right up to the time I cut his throat.” What is most disturbing about Enokizu is that he has no feelings at all about his victims. It is simply in his nature to kill.
Masters of Cinema Monthly May 2013 – Announcements And Roger Ebert’s Great Movies
- Apr 15, 13
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
I’m quite a fan of film podcasts. They have a lot of potential to be excellent platforms for interesting film criticism and much like blogging, podcasts allow for unlimited freedom to discuss whatever you choose to, without the constraints that print or radio journalists seem to have to work within.
One new podcast that has made its way into my subscriptions is the MoC Cast, a new show from Masters of Cinema fans Thomas Jennings and Joakim Thiesen. The first episode of the MoC Cast recently debuted and Tom and Joakim began the show by speaking about their love of the series, before discussing some MoC news and then launching into a lengthy discussion of Peter Watkins‘ Punishment Park.
You can find more details about the podcast on the MoC Cast site (http://moccast.blogspot.co.uk/) and follow them on Twitter @MoC_cast.
Below is what could be described as their mission statement,
Distributors such as Criterion and Masters of Cinema deserve to be celebrated which is exactly what Joakim and I intend to do with this new podcast. Much like the excellent Criterion Cast each episode of The Masters of Cinema Cast will pick a release and review the film as well as taking a look at what special features the release has along with news and rumors.
Easter is a time when many film fans take the opportunity to watch something Christian themed and many sites take the opportunity to focus on one of the many films that feature a cinematic representation of Jesus. This year Fandor looked at The Gospel According to St. Matthew, Masters of Cinema #33, and in particular at Pasolini‘s focus on faces.
You can read the piece at Fandor here and I have embedded the video and the preceding text introduction below.
It’s the beauty of Pasolini’s faces that I emphasize in this three-part video. The first part encompasses every close-up in the film, playing them in sequence at 300 times normal speed to give a sense of one face blurring into the next, all humanity fused into one. The second part focuses on the film’s many shot-reverse shot sequences (as well as sequences that involve multiple characters responding to each other, and there’a also a breakdown of the long sequence where Christ speaks in different locations and times of day). Shot-reverse shot is a critical device in the film. The film’s dramatic scenes are hardly exposited through medium shots or elaborate staging. Instead we see people talking and listening through shot-reverse shots, depicting the life of Christ and the Gospel of Matthew as a series of dialogues and debates.
One of the most intriguing, and it would seem controversial, entries into the Masters of Cinema Series was Pedro Costa’s Colossal Youth. Costa was over in the UK late last year and film critic David Jenkins posed some very interesting questions to the director. The interview was published last month and you read it in full at Mubi.
Although Jenkins and Costa do not speak about Colossal Youth, there are a number of topics covered that provide excellent background reading for contextualising the film. One of the most amusing things about the interview is how often Costa returns to talking about David Fincher. Quoted below are his thoughts on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, but I would urge you to head to Mubi to read the full interview.
I saw the girl, I saw the motorcycle, I saw the tattoo, it’s all right. It’s a bit too fancy, too chic maybe, but I understand. There’s the iPhone, the sex, the loneliness. It’s three hours because there’s a guy killing girls. Why not just have no-one killing anyone and having a girl with a motorcycle? Can he do this? I think he can. I sent a message to his DP who I know very well. I said, “Avoid the killings. Three hours without the killings. You can have the Bond guy. Let’s set it in Sweden for the yellow light. You can have the editor, the lover, the challenge between young and old, bodies coming together. I understand those fetishes. Let’s avoid every single murder, killing, weapon. That’s the challenge.” I have to deal with this. You can seeThe Big Sky and analyse it shot by shot. It’s an amazing piece of craft. But you have to do a little bit more. It’s about destiny. It’s about going beyond something. It’s about love. It’s about racism, humiliation, pain. And it’s a long film. It’s big. Big scope! The Big Sky! The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo should be a remake of that film.
Since the release of Fear and Desire by Masters of Cinema I have seen many cinephiles wrestling with whether or not they should really be watching it, considering Kubrick‘s own feeling that the film should be buried. Most, it would seem, choose to indulge in watching it anyway (as I did) but a feeling that this perhaps it is not the ‘right’ thing to do still pervades.
Masters of Cinema producer Craig Keller Tweeted about this recently, making clear in a succinct sentence why Masters of Cinema chose to release it and why you should definitely consider checking it out.
Directors are never good gauges of their own work, and Kubrick was way off on disowning FEAR AND DESIRE…
— craig keller (@evillights) March 21, 2013
Considered by many to be the film that launched the Nouvelle Vague, Claude Chabrol’s Le Beau Serge was also the début film from a prolific director who went on to make a large number of films until his death in 201o aged 80. Chabrol became synonymous with thrillers and a distanced approach and there is some sense of this in his first feature. Le Beau Serge also feels very much like the creation of a young man though, albeit one who already carries a certain understanding of life and sadness.
Opening with the arrival of Francois (Jean-Claude Brialy) in the town of Sardent – the sound of engine abruptly rupturing the tranquillity of a countryside scene - we are quickly made aware that this visit is a homecoming for Francois after a long absence. As he walks down the streets of Sardent, a real town that Chabrol lived in as a child during the occupation, he begins to chat to a local, played by a non-actor and real-life resident of Sardent, about how the town has changed. He then sees an old friend of his, Serge (Gerard Blain), who is now married and living a miserable and drunken existence. Serge’s wife is pregnant for a second time, the couple having lost their first child, but Serge appears to care little for his wife or his soon to be born child and instead drinks himself into oblivion on a daily basis.
As Francois comments, the town and its buildings may not have changed but the people have.
As the opening shot suggests, this is the story of a city boy returning to his countryside home town and everything that this experience entails. Francois has moved on, he’s been highly educated and feels as if he has experienced life, but despite his almost smug position as a member of the intelligentsia he has nothing on Serge, a character who one can almost see the weight of his problems bearing down on his body. Blain is fantastic as Serge, a French Jim Stark with a drinking problem, and the depressing state of his character carries a lot of the emotional weight in the film.
The more intellectual side of the film is provided very much by his interactions with Francois and it is no coincidence that the defining characteristics of the two men are divided very much by what side of the film they also represent. It is a simple but highly effective piece of writing by Chabrol. The dichotomy between the two central characters is something that Chabrol references in his filmmaking choices too, most notably in a scene in which he breaks the 180 degree rule in order to highlight a rupture and a switch.
This is one of few filmmaking surprises for a film that is considered to have kick-started the Nouvelle Vague, none of the jump cuts that would be so incessant in Godard’s À bout de souffle for instance, and Le Beau Serge is for the most part a well crafted classical piece of filmmaking. Despite being considered the beginning point of a movement Le Beau Serge comes across much more like a stage in an evolution of something rather than a revolutionary moment. Echoes of Italian neo-realism are also obvious in Chabrol’s approach and it is no surprise to discover that this was a reference point for Chabrol. He even took an early version of the script to Rossellini, who reportedly was less than impressed with it.
There is a truthfulness to Chabrol’s début though that is really rather startling and the real life woes that are it its core and that Chabrol so interestingly explores make this a fascinating film to engage with on multiple levels.
This new Blu-ray takes another fine transfer from Gaumont and adds to it a collection of interesting special features and a fine booklet. The image quality of this release is superb, with a fine layer of grain present throughout, and few signs of any serious damage. Although I don’t have the Criterion release of this film screenshots would seem to suggest that the only difference between the two transfers is that the Masters of Cinema release is slightly brighter.
The Masters of Cinema and Criterion releases differ on the special features and Chabrol fans will probably be very tempted to pick up both. Whilst this MoC release does not have the commentary that appears on the Criterion release, it does feature an excellent documentary. Entitled Chabrol Launches the Wave this documentary gives some wonderful insight into the build up to and of the making of this film. Coupled with the booklet included with the release one has a great deal of information about what is a very interesting period in French film history. The MoC disc also features L’Avarice (which translates as greed) , a 1962 short film by Chabrol, taken from the portmanteau film Les Sept péchés capitaux (aka The Seven Deadly Sins).
- Mar 05, 13
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.February the 19th marked the 100th anniversary of the birthday of Frank Tashlin, who sadly passed away in 1972. Tashlin was an extraordinary director who was somewhat under-appreciated in his time. This has been corrected to some degree since, with the excellent Tashlinesque book by Ethan de Seife and with Home Entertainment releases opening his films up to a wider audience .
Tashlin is represented in the Masters of Cinema series with his 1957 film Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? and if you’ve never watched any of his films this is an excellent starting point and a possibly one of the funniest films MoC have ever released.
To convince you further, here is the fourth-wall-breaking opening sequence from Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (which shares some similarities with another 1957 featured in this column).
Eureka Entertainment recently posted the following on their Facebook page,
Unfortunately there will be a small delay on the recently announced CHABROL titles. Both titles (LE BEAU SERGE & LES COUSINS) are now set to be released on 8 April 2013
Also, regarding the Sadao Yamanaka DVDs,
Unfortunately you’ll also have to wait a tad longer for the release of THE COMPLETE FILMS OF SADAO YAMANAKA. The DVD release date has also been put back until 20 May 2013.
And finally, The Murderer Lives at 21,
A bit of an update regarding the DVD & BD release of THE MURDERER LIVES AT 21 [L'ASSASSIN HABITE AU 21]. The release date has been put back until 20 May 2013. Sorry that you’ll have to wait that bit longer!
One thing that Masters of Cinema can never be praised enough for is the way in which they raise the profile of certain filmmakers and films, often leading to many new fans and reappraisals of the work presented. Those films, such as the sublime Cœur fidèle released by Masters of Cinema in 2011, that could so easily be neglected by even the most enthusiastic cinephile.
La Poison feels very much like one of those special releases. Outside of the Sacha Guitry Criterion Eclipse set released in 2010 (this release also helped lead to renewed interest in the director) Guitry has not been well represented on DVD and Blu-ray outside of France and his name is actually probably not too well known amongst film fans.
The Eclipse set from Criterion included four films from Guitry’s pre-War period but this latest release from Masters of Cinema is a much later film from Guity and one that was made just six years before his death in 1957.
The Russian born Guitry was a child of the stage, the son of the well regarded actor Lucien Guitry and in his early years he worked as both an actor and a playwright. After a few short works Guitry committed to cinema in 1935 and went on to release a number of films in a relatively short period.
Whilst he continued making films throughout the Second World War suspicions regarding his collusions with the German occupation led to a troubling period for Guitry. This difficult period undoubtedly left a mark on him and his reputation for many years and there also appear to be many echoes of his treatment that fed into La Poison.
Originally released in 1955 La Poison came after Guitry’s difficulties with the law surrounding his alleged collusion – he was never actually brought to trial – and it is interesting to note the cynicism that the film is bathed in. The film is not at all heavy going though and the humour that runs throughout is all the better for the cynical edge that Guitry brings to it.
The story of a husband, Paul Braconnier (Michel Simon), murdering his wife should, one may think, be a rather dark and sinister piece but Guitry weaves the tale into a twisted comedy that is reminiscent of the more wicked side of Ealing comedies treated with the light touch of Lubitsch. Guitry’s script and the way in which, in his framing choices and editing around Braconnier, we are placed alongside Braconnier leads to a devilish sense that we are co-conspirators and the degree to which you find yourself wanting Braconnier to ‘win’ in the film’s final scenes is a testament to Guitry’s writing and Simon’s remarkable performance.
The only area in which La Poison possibly stumbles is in the first few minutes, in which Guitry introduces the audience to the key actors from the film and the crew from behind the scenes. It’s an interesting moment in breaking the fourth wall but it surely would have been better placed at the end of the film rather than the beginning. As a result of its placement at beginning of the film the early scenes of the story take a moment to acclimatise to as you cast aside the actors you’ve been introduced to and begin to become invested in the characters. It is a minor misstep, a mismatch between the opening and the approach of the main text, in an otherwise wonderful black comedy.
The new Blu-ray from Masters of Cinema, which utilises a recent digital restoration from Gaumont, is a superb release and features an excellent transfer, which retains a fine layer of grain. The source materials used were clearly damaged and some detailed work has been done to restore the film without losing anything in the process. There were a couple of moments that lead me to wonder if some work had been done to clean the image and then re-lay digital grain over the top, although if this is the case it is certainly not particularly obvious and I suspect that I could well be imagining it simply because I’m looking to hard for something.
The disc comes with a single special feature but thankfully it’s a rather excellent one. On Life On-Screen: Miseries and Splendour of a Monarch is a sixty-one minute documentary that accompanies the film and it covers the La Poison, Guitry and Michel Simon in a reasonable amount of detail. The documentary provides a great introduction to Guitry but is also informative enough and entertaining that even those already familiar with his work will undoubtedly find it interesting. The disc also comes with a booklet that includes a short excerpt from a essay by François Truffaut.
La Poison is out now on Blu-ray and DVD.
When viewing the early works of a notable and highly respected filmmaker it is very difficult to not simply see the roots of their later work an think merely in terms of what would come afterwards. And so watching Stanley Kubrick‘s début feature Fear and Desire, and the accompanying shorts included on this disc, I found it near impossible to ignore the ‘baggage’ of Kubrick extraordinary filmography.
A further element which also distracts one from attempting to formulate any kind of objective view of the film is the history of Fear and Desire and Kubrick’s feelings towards it. Kubrick made many efforts to effectively bury the film and its release now would almost certainly not have occurred if Kubrick were still alive today. This also leads to rather conflicting feelings about even watching the film, but it does seem somewhat acceptable if one considers it to be of interest from a historical point of view.
It’s relatively easy to see why Kubrick, a notorious perfectionist, felt so negatively about Fear and Desire as its flaws are obvious from the outset. Whilst it is far from a perfect film it is also far from a bad film though, and it is almost certainly a good thing that it will now be seen on Blu-ray, not on Youtube or on a dodgy third generation VHS.
Taking in place in an unspecified location and at an unspecified time the Howard Sackler scripted Fear and Desire is a film that one finds oneself wrestling with from the outset. Occasionally beautifully composed shots sit alongside poorly framed and very poorly blocked shots, interesting juxtapositions slam up against amateurish edits and highly engaging ideas are marred by Sackler and Kubrick’s reliance on voiceover.
The existential musings delivered in voiceover are particularly problematic as they state things that could be shown visually and at times express things that actually have already been visually communicated. They often sap any drama out of the film too, leaving you feeling more like you are stuck in a dusty lecture theatre than in a tense situation in the middle of a war.
Kubrick would of course go on to further explore these ideas about war and man’s very nature in Paths and Glory and Full Metal Jacket with far greater success but Fear and Desire is nonetheless an interesting which if not eclipsed by Kubrick’s later work would still have many call to be considered something of fascinating if flawed little gem.
Using the same source material as the recent Kino Lorber release, a 35mm print restored by the Library of Congress, this transfer from MoC is superb, if a little raw. Whilst there are clear signs of damage it is pleasing to see that there has been nothing done to obscure detail or leave behind unsightly digital artifacts.
Those in the UK, or those who are wisely region free, will be pleased to discover that the MoC disc trumps the Kino release with regards to special features. Both discs include the Kubrick short The Seafarers but MoC also add the Kubrick shorts Day of the Fight and Flying Padre, an interview with Bill Krohn and a booklet. The shorts are, perhaps unsurprisingly, mostly interesting from a biographical point-of view but they are very welcome inclusions here.
Fear and Desire is out now on Blu-ray and DVD.
Masters of Cinema Monthly – La Poison, Fear and Desire, Frank Tashlin and News About Delays
- Dec 11, 12
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
Due to some unforeseen circumstances this column has been on a brief hiatus but is now back and just in time for the latest new release announcements from Masters of Cinema. Read on for the complete list of new releases (artwork will be added as soon as it is available).
Here’s the brans new and official Masters of Cinema announcement of more fresh titles for the next few months.
Producer of the Masters of Cinema Series, Andrew Utterson stated “In March, we welcome legendary French director Claude Chabrol into the series for the very first time, with a back-to-back French New Wave double-bill, Le Beau Serge [Handsome Serge] and Les Cousins [The Cousins], alongside fellow French filmmaker Henri-Georges Clouzot’s exquisite comedy-thriller The Murderer Lives at 21 [L'Assassin habite au 21].
More cinematic treats follow in April with a stunning new presentation of Michelangelo Antonioni’s majestic slice of Italian art cinema La notte [The Night] as well as rare treasures in the form of a blazing new restoration of Yūzō Kawashima’s utterly thrilling but long-unavailable-in-the-westBakumatsu taiyō-den [aka A Sun-Tribe Myth from the Bakumatsu Era] and the collected release of fellow Japanese filmmaker Sadao Yamanaka’s entire surviving works.”
Managing Director of Eureka Entertainment added “Across six standout releases, world and UK home viewing and Blu-ray premières abound, with new restorations aplenty, as we continue our quest to release the very finest in world cinema, using the very best available materials, all with a meticulous attention to design and detail.”
And here we get to unveil the artwork for these titles.
As I’ve been away for a month or two and am therefore a little behind on reviewing all the MoC releases I have decided to return with reviews of two titles that have not perhaps received quite as much attention as others. I therefore chose Sam Fuller’s Park Row and Ernst Lubitsch’s Trouble in Paradise, two titles that are DVD-only but are certainly discs worth picking up.
Any discussion of an Ernst Lubitsch film will most likely involve some mention of the ‘Lubitsch Touch’, that now famous indefinable quality that Lubitsch had when making films. I fell in love with the ‘Lubitsch Touch’ before I heard the phrase or even knew who he was but it is something that immediately made sense the minute I knew of its existence.
My first experience with the work of Lubitsch was his 1940 romantic comedy The Shop Around the Corner which, thanks in part to it being oft repeated on UK terrestrial television, I saw a large number of times as a child. Undoubtedly a popular favourite for television due to the lead performance of James Stewart, The Shop Around the Corner is exactly the kind of light Hollywood entertainment film that made me fall head over heals for the Golden Age of Hollywood and encourage my cinephilia no end.
Unlike the work of Hitchcock, Capra or Wilder, who were all reasonably well covered by UK television and the kind of names that I first began to learn when investigating Hollywood films in my youth, Lubitsch was and still remains something of an outsider. His work has certainly not gone unseen and he is a director that is held in high regard by both filmmakers (Wilder for instance) and critics but his name and his films are nowhere near as well known as they should be, considering their quality and potential for wide appeal.
This is most likely largely due to the question of availability. Whilst I failed to see many Lubitsch films as a child because they simply weren’t on television those looking to consume themselves with his work will still find it reasonably hard, with few of his films easily available on home entertainment releases. Masters of Cinema have done a great job in addressing this in the past with their Lubitsch in Berlin box-set and continue the good fight with this latest Lubitsch release, Trouble in Paradise.
Widely considered, and with good reason, to be Lubitsch at his peak, Trouble in Paradise is not only a beautifully crafted film but it is an absolute delight for every single minute of its succinct 83 minute running time.
The film begins with the meeting of two con artists, the debonair Gaston Monescu (Herbert Marshall) and the mischievous and minx-like Lily (Miriam Hopkins), who fall in love whilst simultaneously attempting to steal from eachother. The ability of each to thieve and con is what attracts them to the other and it is no surprise that this film was made shortly before the Hays Code began to crack down on such depictions of criminality and also sexuality, something which Trouble in Paradise certainly has plenty of too.
The film pops and crackles with an abundance of risqué dialogue and scenes in which the viewer is left in no doubt about what is actually going on. This is 1932 so of course we don’t see any explicit references to sex but there is enough in the dialogue and in closed doors and passages of time to leave the viewer in no doubt about the not soi hidden sex lives of the leads.
When, for instance, Gaston Monescu, now playing a long con involving manoeuvring himself into the life of the wealthy Madame Mariette Colet (Kay Francis), comments, “…I would give you a good spanking [beat], in a business way of course”, the humour is entirely derived from the suggestiveness of the line.
The script, based on a play by Alador Laszlo and adapted for the screen by Samson Raphaelson and Grover Jones, is filled with a number of real zingers in the dialogue that provide plenty of laughs. Simple asides from characters, Madame Colet commenting that “Marriage is a beautiful mistake, that two people make together”, for instance, or one character repeatedly saying goodbye without actually leaving are all complimented by edits as sharp and precise as the crack of a whip.
An utter pleasure, Trouble in Paradise already has a reputation as bona-fide classic but unfortunately it is nowhere near as well known as other classics of the period. Hopefully this new release from Masters of Cinema will help raise its profile and address this.
This disc from MoC is of a high quality but it is clear that the print was not in pristine condition when the latest scan was done. It has been sensitively treated though and although I have not seen the Criterion edition word is that there are minor improvements here over that previous disc.
The MoC release features one extra, a discussion between Kent Jones and Dan Sallitt, and whilst this leaves the disc lacking a little by comparison to the greater volume of extras on the Criterion disc this new exclusive video is a very welcome inclusion. As is the booklet that accompanies the MoC release; 44 pages of insight into the film and Lubitsch in general compliment this fine release nicely.
Two aspects of Sam Fuller’s life hang heavily over any discussion of his work, his service in the military (for which he was awarded the Bronze Star, the Silver Star and The Purple Heart) and his background as a newspaperman. It is the latter that feeds so strongly into Park Row, his fifth film as director and a film that he also wrote and produced.
To Park Row Sam Fuller brings not only his experience as a newspaperman but also the headline-grabbing approach, as the poster for the film proudly declares, “The picture with the page one punch”. Fuller writes and directs Park Row with an immediacy and explosiveness that fits tightly with the subject it explores, the birth of the ‘modern’ newspaper and the hard-fought battles that led to its creation.
Despite being given the option to shoot the film in Technicolor Fuller opted to shoot in black and white, newspaper’s at the time were not in colour after all, and he approaches the direction with his usual mix of skilled craftsmanship but also an almost reckless seeming dynamism. A long take part way through the film that pre-dated steadicam use is probably the most obviously expressive example of his approach but it is not alone with a speed to the camerawork and editing at times that is certainly not stuffy or stagy (despite the film taking place on one set).
Fuller’s filmography is one that is cherished by many film fans and his wonderful mix of tabloid subject matter with intellect behind it makes him an easy filmmaker to recommend to those not already familiar with his work. For those who are already Fuller devotees (this writer included) then this will undoubtedly be jostling for one of the top places in looking back at 2012′s best home entertainment releases. A thrilling example of Fuller in his prime, Park Row is entertaining, exhilarating and incredibly re-watchable.
This new transfer of the film from MoC is excellent and a marked improvement over the only previous release, the American MGM on-demand disc. Although my memories of the specific issues with that disc are a little vague, it is a while since I last saw it, there were definitely more issues than there are here and in particular I seem to remember a slight colour issue that is not at all present on the MoC disc. This new DVD represents the best the film has looked on a home entertainment release to date and whilst scratches and imperfections are common throughout the film they are not of a distracting nature.
Aside from an improved transfer this new disc also adds a very decent selection of extras with a 22 minute video piece with critic Bill Krohn, a 3 minute video piece from Christa Lang Fuller (Sam Fuller’s wife), the original trailer, an isolated music and effects track and a wonderful 56 page booklet which features interviews with Fuller, letters from him and an excerpt from his autobiography.
An easy disc to recommend, this is essential Fuller and a solid package.
Masters of Cinema Monthly December 2012 – Announcements, Park Row and Trouble in Paradise
- Oct 08, 12
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
It’s announcements time again for Masters of Cinema and as usual we have all the details right here for you. In addition to the previously announced release of Fear and Desire the first couple of months of 2013 will see the release of Shindo’s Onibaba, Fellini’s City of Women, Guitry’s La Poison and Von Sternberg’s The Blue Angel. Read on for the full press release, the special features announced and for a glimpse at the new covers.
Also, below that you will find an interview with Soul Power director Jeffrey Levy-Hinte. The film has recently returned to the series after a brief period of being OOP and I for one am very happy to see it return. The film is a fascinating document and an enjoyable concert film all in one and well worth checking out if you have not done so before.
The MoC announcement press release is as follows,
Following a spate of epic releases for the last quarter of 2012 which included Fritz Lang’s Die Nibelungen and Carl Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc, The Masters of Cinema Series returns in 2013 with the nearly-impossible-to-see debut feature film by Stanley Kubrick, a long-awaited Blu-ray and DVD Dual Format release of Josef von Sternberg’s classic first-collaboration with Marlene Dietrich, new restorations of films by the European giants Fellini and Guitry, and a Blu-ray upgrade of Kaneto Shindô’s cult horror confection Onibaba.
Producer of the Masters of Cinema Series, Craig Keller stated “January sees the release of Stanley Kubrick’s 1953 debut feature Fear and Desire, newly restored by The Library of Congress — a war-film psychodrama that exhibits many of the thematic obsessions and visual motifs that would course throughout all of Kubrick’s films over the next four decades — needless to say, ravishingly photographed, even this early on in his career. We are extremely excited that UK audiences will at last be able to see where that body of work called “Kubrick” all began. Also this month: we’ve got the HD debut of Josef von Sternberg’s immortal The Blue Angel, in both its German and English-language versions (shot by Sternberg simultaneously) featuring Marlene Dietrich as the impossibly erotic cabaret singer who bewitches Emil Jannings — and consigns him to perdition.
In February we present three titles, two of which capitalise on sumptuous HD restorations carried out by Gaumont. The first of these is Federico Fellini’s unhinged 1980 post-punk epic, City of Women [La città delle donne / La cité des femmes], starring the great Marcello Mastroianni in a kind of reprise of his role from Fellini’s 8-1/2. The second new HD restoration is the initial entry into The Masters of Cinema Series by the French comic genius Sacha Guitry — La Poison [Poison] — starring the equally brilliant Michel Simon (of Renoir’s La Chienne and Boudu sauvé des eaux, and Vigo’s L’Atalante). We’re so proud to introduce this venomously witty murder-comedy to UK audiences — it’s a perfect example of why Guitry was revered as a kind of god both by the French public at large and by the critics and filmmakers that went on to form the New Wave. Our last release of the month is a new Blu-ray upgrade of the recently deceased Kaneto Shindô’s Onibaba — one of our most popular films — an unsettling, atmospheric erotic horror film whose Scope frames veer between sunlit existential dread and moonlit mystery/suspense.
Managing Director of Eureka, Ron Benson added “We’re very excited by this Jan/Feb lineup — with new HD elements of all five films, each accompanied by numerous supplements and the kind of lengthy booklets our fans will be thrilled to pore over. But we’re only getting started — 2013 might be our most exciting year yet.”
Full details of each of the titles announced can be found on the Eureka / Masters of Cinema website www.eurekavideo.co.uk/moc
For latest news and updates from Eureka & The Masters of Cinema Series, Eureka can be found on Facebook www.facebook.com/EurekaEntertainment and via their twitter feeds @mastersofcinema & @eurekavideo.
The majority of the special features for these releases have also been announced and you can find these below, along with the covers for each release.
ONIBABA
• Gorgeous new 1080p HD transfer
• Full-length director’s audio commentary by director Kaneto Shindō and the stars of the film, Kei Satō, and Jitsuko Yoshimura
• Video introduction by Alex Cox
• 8mm footage (40-minutes) shot on location by lead actor Kei Satō
• Optional English subtitles
• Original theatrical trailer
• Production stills and promotional art gallery
• 36-PAGE BOOKLET with a new essay by Doug Cummings, an English translation of the original short Buddhist fable that inspired the film and a statement from writer/director Kaneto Shindō about why he made OnibabaCITY OF WOMEN
• Glorious new HD restoration of the film, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
• Newly translated optional subtitles.
• Substantial booklet containing writing on the film, vintage excerpts, and rare archival imagery.
• More features to be announced closer to the release date!LA POISON
• Glorious new HD restoration of the film, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
• Newly translated optional subtitles.
• Substantial booklet containing writing on the film, vintage excerpts, and rare archival imagery.
• More features to be announced closer to the release date!FEAR AND DESIRE
• New HD restoration of the film by The Library of Congress, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
• Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing.
• Stanley Kubrick’s early short film, The Seafarers, in a new HD restoration.
• New and exclusive video discussion of the film by critic and Stanley Kubrick author Bill Krohn.
• Substantial booklet containing writing on the film, vintage excerpts, and rare archival imagery.
• More features to be announced closer to the release date!THE BLUE ANGEL
• New 1080p HD presentation of both the German-language and English-language versions of the film, with progressive encodes on the DVD.
• Newly translated optional subtitles on the German-language version, and SDH on the English-language version.
• New and exclusive video essay on the films by critic and scholar Tag Gallagher.
• New and exclusive feature-length audio commentary by critic and scholar Tony Rayns on the German-language version.
• Original screen test with Marlene Dietrich.
• Archival interview clips with Dietrich.
• More features to be announced closer to release date!Now, read on for my interview with Soul Power director Jeffrey Levy-Hinte.
What was it that first drew you to make Soul Power and in particular what made you decide to direct it?
Working as an editor on When We Were Kings I became familiar with the extensive archive of concert footage that was shot in Zaire in 1974. When we completed Kings, we put the concert material back in the vault. Over the years the knowledge weighed on me — I was one of the few people who knew of this amazing archive and I felt that I had the responsibility to ensure that the public was given the opportunity to experience (the film of) this concert for themselves.
What was the greatest challenge you faced in getting the film made?
The greatest difficultly in making Soul Power was believing that it would get completed. The amount of footage was daunting; there were numerous detractors who felt that a feature film wasn’t worthwhile; and I needed to maintain my day job throughout. But in the end the strength of the material carried me through the tough times and gave me the drive and the confidence to complete the film.
How did you go about first compiling the footage and reducing it down to a manageable amount?
The footage was all shot in connection with Zaire’74, a music festival organized by Stewart Levine and Hugh Masakala. In the intervening years some of the footage had been transferred to 3/4″ video tape, others printed to film, and still more was processed and never looked at again. I decided that the only way to approach the film was from the ground up. I took the hundreds of 16mm film rolls and 1/4″ sound rolls, had them transferred to digital formats, and then David Smith, my editor, and a team of interns set about organizing and synchronizing it — this took about 6 months.
The only way to handle this amount of diverse footage is to be very systematic. After transferring, organizing, and synchronizing the footage, the next step was to watch all of it, a task that was intermittently thrilling and terrifically boring. Then David Smith and I decided on about 100 or so moments/situations that could be turned into scenes. We also looked at all of the concert footage and chose a couple of songs from each artist to edit together. Over time we worked through the scenes and figured out what really what moved, enlightened, and entertained us. About 50 scenes made it into the initial string out, which lasted 6 hours, and that was before we added in the music. Again this was exciting, tedious, and inspiring — we came to refer to the editing process as climbing Mt. Zaire and we are buoyed by the awareness that there was a fine film to be crafted from the raw materials, if only we had the confidence and patience to see it through to the end.
How long was your first cut of the film and what was the hardest thing to cut?
The first version of the film that I showed to a very small circle of colleagues was a little over 3 hours. It was a gangly, unbalanced piece — the first half was the verite run up to the concert, and the second half was solid music. Though it is always a little painful to hear the unalloyed truth about one’s creative work, the feedback from this screening and the ones that followed pushed us to refine and focus the film. In the last major pass of the film we cut out two performances — one by Sister Sledge and the other by the Pointer Sisters — that never worked from the beginning, but for which I had a very strong affection. These were painful cuts, but they undoubtedly made the film stronger.
How did you find the balance between the political story, the sports story and the story of the music? Was this difficult?
We worked diligently to find the right balance to the different elements of the film. We were primarily concerned to balance the behind the scenes mechanics of the event with the musical performances. We also searched the footage diligently to get more material on the politics of the era, and particularly the participants’ understanding of Mobutu‘s brutal regime. Unfortunately there was no footage that related peoples’ feelings about Mobutu — in When We Were Kings, Norman Mailer spoke eloquently about Mobuto but given that Soul Power is a verite film, we didn’t have the luxury of incorporating a retrospective interview. But the lack of discussion of Mobutu gave more space to explore the subtler issues of black pride and empowerment and what it meant to the musicians to be performing in Africa — issues with a strong political content but ones that didn’t directly involve politics.
What challenges or advantages came out of the fact that there was already a documentary about the boxing side to the story?
When I first came onto When We Were Kings, Leon Gast had already been working on a version of the film that tried to balance the boxing and the music festival stories. This proved to be very difficult and the “breakthrough” that allowed us to complete When We Were Kings was the decision to focus the film on the narrative of the Ali-Forman fight. When I approached Soul Power I felt liberated that I didn’t have to spend time on the boxing side of the story. The only real difficulty came from my decision that to not allow the films to use the same footage — it was very important to me that Soul Power was seen as a unique and stand alone work, and not one that was dependent upon or derived from Kings. As much of the best footage was used in Kings, this forced me to work harder to find the very best of the remaining footage. In the end Soul Power is a much stronger film for the effort.
Do you intend to direct features again?
So the short answer is Yes — I would love to direct another film. Though I enjoy producing films, there is no question that directing is the best job there is. Only the director has the opportunity to guide the process and shape the final work, to fully infuse the work with his sensibility, perspective, and values. It is at once an awesome responsibility and a challenging, exciting ride. I only hope that I am fortunate enough to get the opportunity to direct another film.
Are there any projects that you have at the back of your mind that you’ve always wanted to make but not yet had the opportunity to?
There are always numerous projects floating around that I would love to. I have a script that is a contemporary adaptation of Goethe‘s Sorrows of Young Werther; I have another script based on the memoir entitled Famous Long Ago, about a radical-activist journalists from the late 1960′s; and everyday brings with it a few new documentary ideas. I am also working on (producing) a television series based on the film The Kids Are All Right and another series. The real difficultly is not finding projects, but in not getting overwhelmed by all of the projects that interest me.
Next month in Masters of Cinema Monthly: I catch up with a host of reviews of previous titles and releases still to come.
- Sep 04, 12
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
Neil Armstrong sadly passed away on the 25th of August and upon hearing the news I immediately reached for my copy of For All Mankind. An enrapturing film and a wonderful way to remember Armstong, I can highly recommend checking it out if you haven’t done so already. I have embedded a clip from the film, which depicts a defining moment in modern history, below.
A recent appearance by MoC Producer Craig Keller on Cambridge 105 offers an interesting peek behind the curtain of MoC. Listen to a podcast of the show here and if you’re anxious to jump to the interview in particular then skip to around the seventeen minute mark. One of the most interesting moments in the show is when Keller talks about the ‘smaller’ films that MoC manage to release and in doing so he drops this tantalising tease about next year’s releases.
…What we can do from time to time is exactly highlight films of that stature [films that don't necessarily have a big name attached] because maybe we’ve put out x number of films that have a larger name and move more “units” and that gives us a little bit of leeway every now and then to come out with something a bit more esoteric. And in fact, next year there’s some really exciting stuff around that whole part of the park happening.
On the 1st of August Sight and Sound announced the results of their decennial film poll which resulted in two MoC titles making the top ten. Murnau‘s Sunrise (MoC spine #1) took the number five spot and Dreyer‘s The Passion of Joan of Arc (forthcoming on the label) was placed at number ten. The ‘Greatest Films’ issue of Sight and Sound featured prominent advertising from MoC, celebrating their films’ inclusion in the list and also the films by filmmakers featured in the series who also made the top fifty.
MoC Producer Craig Keller was also one of those asked to contribute to the poll and you can find his list and comments here.
The Sight and Sound poll has been a huge talking point amongst the online film community and another poll was even undertaken in response. I was asked to contribute a top ten to this list and a couple of MoC films also made my list.
Chungking Express
The Passion of Joan of Arc
North by Northwest
The Crowd
Rashomon
8 1/2
Paris, Texas
Metropolis
A Woman Under the Influence
Blue VelvetAs you might be able to guess from this list, I am very much looking forward to the MoC release of The Passion of Joan of Arc.
Also high on my most anticipated list is the forthcoming release of Park Row, Sam Fuller‘s gripping newspaper drama. The original theatrical trailer for Park Row, which will be included on the forthcoming DVD release, was recently added to the Eureka Entertainment YouTube channel and you can find it embedded below.
In addition to the prior new release announcements MoC have also detailed the Blu-ray release of Das Testament Des Dr. Mabuse which was first announced in May. The Blu-ray will be available packaged as a dual format release and a steel book on the 24th of September. The film is the second in the Mabuse series, following Dr. Mabuse, der spieler, and is also available as part of the MoC Complete Fritz Lang Mabuse DVD Set. MoC unfortunately have “no immediate plans” to release the other Mabuse films on Blu-ray.
MoC have posted a few new offers on their site, including the opportunity to pick up the previously out-of-print 2-disc DVD of Dreyer’s Michael. The release features two transfers of the film, with two alternate scores, a commentary from Casper Tybjerg, an audio interview with Dreyer and a rather nice booklet too. Head here to grab a copy. I would advise being quick if you want to get one as this “very small run” is likely to sell out fast.
Let’s Wash Our Brains: Ro.Go.Pa.G
Released in 1963, Ro.Go.Pa.G is a feature length film divided into four segments, each segment made entirely separately by four art-house heavyweights, Roberto Rossellini, Jean-Luc Godard, Pier Paolo Pasolini and Ugo Gregoretti. These individual stories unsurprisingly yield mixed results both in terms of style, content and quality but even at its weakest Ro.Go.Pa.G is fascinating to view as an interesting look back on each filmmaker’s career at a particular point in time.
The films are also mostly very much of their time in terms of themes and subject matter, with the atomic bomb, advertising and airline travel providing the backdrop for Godard, Gregoretti and Rossellini’s respective segments. Pasolini opts to concern himself with one of his most returned to obsessions and contributes a mock behind-the-scenes piece depicting the making of a film of The Passion of Christ. Almost self-parodic at times this short film, entitled La Ricotta, is saved by Pasolini’s wonderful eye for the sadness and absurdity in life and alongside Gregoretti’s amusing, cutting and rather prescient Il Pollo Ruspante, provides the real meat in this mixed portmanteau.
Not fairing so well are Rossellini and Godard, the former making a rather dull but reasonably serviceable piece about a stalked air hostess, but the latter succumbing too much to the self-parodicism that threatened to sink Pasolini’s segment. Rossellini’s film is a rather uninteresting tale that is reasonably well told but Godard’s entry is seemingly full of ideas that go nowhere, ideas incessantly thrown at the screen without any sticking. Godard’s end of the world Il Nuovo Mondo is also full of a large number of jump cuts and visual ticks that add up to very little beyond a retread of areas he had already explored more successfully earlier in his career. A messy flounder of a film but one that is nonetheless interesting to watch as an early effort but also interestingly as an early hint of what was to come far later in Godard’s career, with self absolved and uncommunicative films such as Film Socialisme.
This new Blu-ray release from MoC is my first time watching Ro.Go.Pa.G since last seeing it on VHS many years ago. Whilst the transfer on that VHS was one of the better ones from that era it hardly offers any contest against this new HD transfer. Unfortunately my experiences with the film have all been home entertainment so I am unable to comment on the transfer with regards to its fidelity to the original 35mm source but the transfer looks mostly as one would expect it to with good grain retention and no signs of excessive manipulation. The film obviously suffers from issues surrounding the time it was made and there is evidence of some wear and tear in places too but these are mostly minor. I did observe some rather strange brightness fluctuations during the Rossellini section but these were limited to just that part and are presumably an issue that is as source and not one that could be remedied.
The extras on the disc are minimal, only a trailer, but there is also an excellent 56 page booklet accompanying the release, which provides a lot of background reading.
Ro.Go.Pa.G is available to buy now.
Last week saw MoC release Francis Ford Coppola‘s Rumble Fish on Blu-ray and I was lucky enough to ask Mr. Coppola a few questions about the film and his career in general. The fruits of this can be found below.
You’ve said previously that Rumble Fish is perhaps your personal favourite of all your films. Is this still the case and does this have more to do with a personal connection or is it for other reasons?
It was a very enjoyable time, as I felt free to explore the kind of film it was, the style of the project. Although it was based on a novel, I felt it was more the sort of personal film I had always wanted to make, the last being The Conversation. And it had personal connections to my relationship to my older brother.
The film seems informed by an important idea surrounding nostalgia, Rusty James is nostalgic for a time when The Motorcycle Boy reigned, for instance. What do you think the film has to say about this idea of nostalgia and possibly the dangers of focusing too strongly on it?
It says what it says.
What impact do you think your difference in age from the teenage characters in the film had on making the film? How different do you think the film would have been had you made it at the same age as the protagonists?
Age is more a matter of the level of hunger you have to make a specific film as well as the lack of resources. I feel the three films I made recently (Youth Without Youth, Tetro and ‘Twixt) have those elements.
You recorded a commentary for the film around seven years ago and you are speaking about the film again now. Is there anything in particular about this film that makes it one that you are happy to return to, to discuss or is there something about it that to you makes it more interesting for you to talk about than your other films?
I think my commentary reflects my present thoughts.
What drives you to experiment, as you did in Rumble Fish and many of your other films?
I’ve always approached projects out of enthusiasm, and the love of cinema. I resent the dominance of genres, as they force you to conform to certain rules – whereas I cannot resist experimentation.
How do you deal with the struggle between balancing experimentation and “traditional” technique? Do you indeed actually find this a struggle?
It’s the struggle between intuition and thought, with intuition suggesting there are other ways to approach a subject. Hence, the need to experiment to learn if that’s so.
Do you make a conscious decision between experimentation versus following more obvious paths when you embark on a film?
I rarely resist the opportunity to experiment.
How important to you were the elements of the making of rumble fish that you pulled from the past (painted shadows, lenses and so on) and what for you do they bring to the film?
Those things came from enjoyed methods of the past, and seemed right for the style of Rumble Fish.
You worked with some frequent collaborators on Rumble Fish but also people you had not worked with before. Do you make a deliberate decision to re-use the same people and also to bring in new people and what effect does each have on your process?
I love to work with collaborators I am accustomed to, but that’s not always possible. Sometimes they are not available, sometimes they are beyond the budget parameters.
Time seems to be a very important thematic concern in Rumble Fish. At what stage did this become a consideration and when making the film were you more interested in a discussion about time or to make a very specific point about it?
I’ve always been interested in the ‘unreliability’ of time.
You went through a very interesting pre-visualisation stage with Rumble Fish [some of this can be seen on the special features on the Rumble Fish Blu-ray]. What effect do you think this had on how you made the film and is it something that you continue to do (on Twixt, for instance)?
One always wants to try out ideas, visualization or sequences before the moment of truth, when they have to be committed to. But I do this as a way that leaves a lot of freedom later on. Yes, I would try to continue doing that.
Do you think this is a particularly exciting time for filmmakers and what do you think are the key areas that show real potential for cinema to grow and change?
This is a tough time for filmmakers because audiences are not drawn in large numbers to other then a few genres. Distribution and therefore capital is hard to come by. But it is always an exciting time for cinema because it is so young and there is so much to to learn.
A lot has been written about cinema being a bad shape right now but there has also been a lot written about emerging technologies. Do you think cinema is in a good place right now and how do you foresee things changing in the future?
I feel that what cinema can be is vast – if somehow the filmmakers are allowed to experiment.
The availability of films on Blu-ray (and DVD) often opens my eyes to films and elements in films that I had not seen previously, in a very exciting way. Are you a fan of the format, how do you feel about your films potentially being experienced for the first time on a home entertainment system and how do you feel about the impact that the extras included on the discs have?
When I see a film that excites me, I enjoy looking through the extras to see what more I can learn about it.
You spoke at comic-con about a film that you were currently writing that you wanted to express on a “slightly larger canvas”. Are you able to speak about the current status of that film and is there anything you can tell us about what the film is about?
I made three films in the last five years with the mentality of student (this is easy to do by merely working with very small budgets); in a way I was trying to annihilate the old filmmaker in me by starving him, denying him any support or backstops. Now having done three freshman films, I feel ready to go on to the next step, which is a more ambitious, longer, (more expensive) kind of films.
I find it counter-productive to talk about what a film is about when I’m writing it, as it let’s out the steam. I want to write this with a head of steam.
Rumble Fish is available to buy on Blu-ray in standard and steel book version now.
- Jul 16, 12
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
Today saw Masters of Cinema announce their Q4 releases for 2012 and the announcement is a mixture of pleasing confirmations and delightful surprises.
September will see Soul Power return to the series, available as a dual format release and a standalone DVD. The title went out of print late last year (as reported in my first column) and it very much looked as if it would not return. The Blu-ray release quickly reached exorbitant prices on Ebay as many collectors wanted to plug that hole in their collection and I’m sure that the resurgence of interest in the release had an impact on MoC’s decision to bring it back.
October sees the long delayed release of Die Nibelungen, which I’m sure will be worth the wait. I for one can’t wait to kick back and feast on five hours of Fritz Lang at his best, and on Blu-ray no less.
Much shorter but no less essential is the other October release, Sam Fuller‘s vital and gripping drama about newspapermen in the 19th century. The film is a favourite of mine (a still from it has provided me with a Twitter background for a couple of years now) and I can’t wait to see the new MoC edition. Previously only available as part of the U.S. MGM Limited Edition Collection (an on demand DVD-R service) this will be the film’s début on DVD in the UK and the release will hopefully include some worthy extras. My dream extra would be a commentary from David Simon, although I may be asking a little too much there.
November brings the new restoration of Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc. The chance to see Dreyer’s beautiful film in HD is a tantalizing prospect and this release is one that many are highly anticipating, and with good reason.
MoC served up two Billy Wilder releases last month and in November they will release another film from Wilder’s idol, Ernst Lubitsch. Wilder reportedly had a sign in his office which read ‘How would Lubitsch do it?’ and although I have seen shamefully few Lubitsch films I can see why Wilder considered him so important. I look forward to expanding my Lubitsch knowledge with Trouble in Paradise.
And finally, December will see the release of two Japanese films from MoC, Ozu’s beautiful Floating Weeds and Kinugasa’s Gate of Hell. Ozu’s Floating Weeds was a remake of his own black and white silent The Story of Floating Weeds and it will be interesting to see if MoC have secured the rights to that too for a double film release.
The releases announced are a mixture of formats and it’s interesting to see that MoC have changed their release strategy slightly, with standalone releases also available. Feel free to let me know what you’ll be picking up in the comments and on what format.
Read on for the full list of titles and details, taken from the official press release, and click on the links at the foot of the post for the hi-res covers.
10 September 2012
SOUL POWER
The vérité documentary – compiled entirely from footage shot in 1974 – of the astonishing back-to-Africa 3-day music festival “Zaire ‘74”. It was held in Kinshasa ahead of the biggest boxing event of all time: the Muhammad Ali–George Foreman “Rumble in the Jungle”. Re-issued as a Blu-ray + DVD “Dual Format” edition & standalone DVD edition.22 October 2012
DIE NIBELUNGEN [THE NIBELUNGEN]
From the same legend that inspired Wagner’s Ring cycle of operas, but with Fritz Lang’s signature cinematic touch, a 5-hour fantasy epic in a beautiful new restoration by the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung, Germany. Blu-ray and DVD editions from spectacular HD materials.PARK ROW
Ripsnorting drama from the maverick legend Samuel Fuller, who drew on his own experiences as a newspaperman to self-finance this long-overlooked hardboiled gem about media wars in the 1880s New York press. DVD edition from a new progressive transfer.12 November 2012
THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC [LA PASSION DE JEANNE D'ARC / JEANNE D'ARC'S LIDELSE OG DØD]
One of the most famous and iconic of all silent films, Carl Theodor Dreyer’s mesmeric The Passion of Joan of Arc is released in an exclusive new restoration featuring Dreyer’s very own Danish intertitles – on Blu-ray for the first time anywhere in the world, in a limited-edition premium “Dual Format” (Blu-ray + DVD) SteelBook edition. Also available as standalone DVD & blu-ray sets.TROUBLE IN PARADISE
Described by Pauline Kael as nothing less than “perfection”, and by Empire Magazine as “the most sophisticated comedy ever produced in Hollywood”, Ernst Lubitsch’s very first comedy of the sound era is a cinematic feast of wit, charm, and romance. DVD edition from a new HD transfer.3 December 2012
FLOATING WEEDS [UKIGUSA]
A typically exquisite offering from the great Yasujiro Ozu, reworking his own A Story of Floating Weeds [Ukigusa monogatari] to explore the trials and tribulations of an ageing actor on his return to a seaside port and lives he left behind. Exclusively restored, on Blu-ray for the first time anywhere in the world (in a Blu-ray + DVD “Dual Format” edition), and also available as a standalone DVD set.GATE OF HELL [JIGOKUMON]
Critically acclaimed but long unavailable in the west, Teinosuke Kinugasa’s enthralling Cannes and Oscars-winning tale of feudal intrigue, political machinations, and erotic obsession is available once more. Beautifully restored in a Blu-ray + DVD “Dual Format” edition, also available as a standalone DVD set.Just a quick reminder that there is still time to enter the competition to win two very rare Masters of Cinema posters. Click through to the last column for details on how to enter.
Hi–res cover artwork:
- Jul 09, 12
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
This column has been on a bit of holiday but I’m back and I have reviews of the four latest Masters of Cinema releases to share with you. But before I get to that I have a couple of very special competition announcements.
In the last column I held a competition to win three Masters of Cinema posters and the randomly selected winner is the following lucky gentleman.
Hey, you know how Double Indemnity is my favourite film? Just won these posters from @bleedingcool ! Cheers guys! eurekavideo.co.uk/offers/posters…
— Adam Wright (@Mockturtled) June 29, 2012
Now you may be feeling a little bit jealous of Adam right now (I know I am) but I have another poster competition this month and it’s pretty incredible. I have one copy each of the Masters of Cinema quad posters for Ugetsu Monogatari and Sansho Dayu to give away to two lucky Masters of Cinema Monthly readers.These posters are currently limited to editions of just 6 and unavailable to buy so the winners will certainly have something to brag about.
To let everyone get a chance to be in with a shot there are three ways to enter. You can enter by Tweeting me @cskinner, leaving a comment below or emailing me directly – craigskinnerfilm (at) gmail.com – with ‘MoCM Competition’ in the email subject line. Two winners will be randomly selected on the 15th of August 2012, with the first chosen getting the first pick of the two posters and the second winner receiving the remaining poster Good luck!
Originally serialised in 1914, Harry Leon Wilson‘s novel Ruggles of Red Gap would go on to be released as a novel, adapted into a stage play and three films, the films released in 1918, 1923 and 1935. The most famous of these, the 1935 film adaptation directed by Leo McCarey and starring the multi-talented Charles Laughton, has recently received a much deserved Blu-ray release from Masters of Cinema.
Laughton stars as the titular Marmaduke Ruggles, a very prim and proper English butler who is lost in a bet to a rather less prim and proper couple who hail from a remote American boomtown, Red Gap. Ruggles is forced to make the journey to America and so begins the fish out of water story which is at the centre of the plot and the playground for much of the comedy.
The clash between the ever so proper Ruggles and the brash and ill-mannered Egbert Floud (Charlie Ruggles) is a particularly ripe source of amusement and the opportunities taken to have one or both of the characters drunk leads to some of the film’s most memorable comedic moments.
Acting drunk is perhaps one of those ultimate tests for actors, it being something that so often goes hideously wrong and looks absurd, but Laughton more than rises to the occasion and the scene in which he is far more than two sheets to the wind is both hilarious and utterly convincing.
Laughton was a superb actor and Ruggles of Red Gap is a wonderful showcase for his particular skills as a comedy performer. A look to one side or a seemingly casual gesture translates into a lot of laughter and it is no wonder that the Ruggles character has become so synonymous with Laughton.
It is not only in the comedy that Ruggles of Red Gap pays dividends though and it is perhaps no surprise to those familiar with McCarey’s work that there is more depth and tenderness to Ruggles of Red Gap than the class comedy and broad humour may at first suggest.
Climaxing with Ruggles becoming something of a celebrity in the small town of Red Gap, and finding new place for himself in society, McCarey makes clear in the final scenes that Ruggles of Red Gap is a rather intoxicating fable about the ‘American Dream’. Ruggles is seduced by the American belief in self-determination and the chance he has in this new land to reinvent himself. This reaches a head in a memorable sequence in which Ruggles recites the Gettysburg Address to a group of captivated locals. The scene is powerful, mostly due to Laughton’s unfaltering and beautiful delivery of the speech, but also in part down to the understated and appropriate way in which McCarey builds to the sequence and frames the proceedings.
The moving recitation of the Gettysburg Address by Laughton was so well regarded that it was even released as a 78rpm record two years after the film was originally released. This recording is included on the Blu-ray amongst a selection of intriguing special features. Also on the disc are three radio adaptations featuring Laughton and a video interview with actor and Laughton biographer Simon Callow. This video piece featuring Callow is an easy listen and occasionally interesting but a little insubstantial. If you are looking for more detail though Masters of Cinema come through with one of their always excellent booklets.
The transfer on this new Blu-ray is excellent and despite a few minor contrast fluctuations and negligible inherent print issues, the film looks startlingly good. Those in particular who pay close attention to grain retention will find absolutely nothing to complain about here as very careful attention has clearly been paid to ensuring everything is as it should be.
Ruggles of Red Gap is available to buy now.
Another adaptation and another stellar performance by Charles Laughton, Island of Lost Souls has also arrived on Blu-ray in the UK thanks to Masters of Cinema.
The film’s release history in the UK is one fraught with censorship issues and it is one that provides an interesting case study for the shifting Zeitgeist that has informed and continues to inform the classification and censorship of films in the UK. Originally rejected by the BBFC in 1933, again in 1957 and then given an X certificate in 1958 (with cuts) the film was not actually released uncut in this country until 1996, over sixty years after its original release.
The 1996 release was, perhaps a little surprisingly, still classified as a 12 but when resubmitted to the BBFC last year for this Blu-ray release the film was awarded a PG classification. The film will be shown as part of a season at the BFI to celebrate the BBFC centenary. Presumably in 2112 we will be able to sit in a cinema in the UK and watch the uncut versions of films such as The Human Centipede 2 and A Serbian Film, in a celebration of another one hundred years of the BBFC rejecting films and continuing to be one step behind, although I suspect neither cinemas nor the BBFC will last that long.
That Island of Lost Souls had such power to shock the, admittedly delicate, sensibilities of the BBFC in the thirties and the fifties is almost certainly in large part down to the rather unpleasant themes that the film explores more than any graphic content on display. Sure, there are moments that would have most likely raised an eyebrow with the censors and had them scribbling furiously about cuts but the real power in Island of Lost Souls lies in its thematic content, specifically the disturbing ideas of Dr. Moreau (Charles Laughton).
Moreau is the archetypical doctor-who-plays-God, meddling in the ‘natural order’ of things and attempting to create a new race of human animals. Stumbling onto Moreau’s island and into his insane world of cross-bred animal men – including the seductive Lota (Kathleen Burke), a ‘panther woman’ – is Edward Parker, played by the square-jawed and all too wooden Richard Arlen.
This stranger in a strange world opens the door for us to step through, as we are introduced alongside him to the strange and dark experiments going on, but ultimately it is not this hero character that one is interested in in Island of Lost Souls. The star of the film is without a doubt Laughton as Moreau and the film is very much something that circles around his central performance. In truth this loose adaptation of H.G. Wells‘ novel is a little weak at times, with some clunky dialogue and too much crammed into too short a running time, but the film is more than saved by Laughton’s compelling ‘central’ performance.
Long delayed, this release comes in the wake of The Criterion Collection’s Region A release and draws on the same source material (two 35mm positives and a 16mm private screening print). Although I have not had a chance to compare the two releases side-by-side, reliable sources indicate that there is very little to separate the two beyond slight variances in contrast, a common difference between MoC and Criterion (see also Harakiri). The multiple sources used for this transfer were clearly in a reasonably poor shape and the film has a number of visible scratches and marks. The transfer is sensitive though and these issues have not been digitally scrubbed along away with a number of important details. Some work has clearly been done but there are no obvious signs of digital manipulation. The audio (stereo) is clear but also suffers from being a little rough around the edges, with noticeable sibilance in places.
The extras on this disc are a little disappointing when racked up against the Criterion release (two interviews and a trailer here) but for those locked to Region B this is still a great buy.
Island of Lost Souls is available to buy now.
Writing about a film as critically adored and much discussed as Double Indemnity inevitably results in treading similar ground to those that have gone before and it’s particularly hard to introduce such a film with the requisite amount of praise without simply gushing. Added to this is the lingering thought in my head that I could never write such a wonderful intro to the film as the first paragraph in Bosley Crowther‘s New York Times review from 1944,
The cooling-system in the Paramount Theatre was supplemented yesterday by a screen attraction designed plainly to freeze the marrow in an audience’s bones. “Double Indemnity” is its title, and the extent of its refrigerating effect depends upon one’s personal repercussion to a long dose of calculated suspense. For the sole question in this picture is whether Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray can kill a man with such cool and artistic deception that no one will place the blame on them and then maintain their composure under Edward G. Robinson’s studiously searching eye.
Whilst Crowther moves onto areas in his review that I don’t entirely agree with – he believed that the structure of the plotting damaged the film – that opening paragraph has stayed with me since I first read it, in part due to it being a wonderful piece of prose but mostly because it so perfectly distils one of the film’s greatest strengths, its icy coolness.
The cold, calculated behaviour of the two protagonists, Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) and Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck) is the fertile ground for Wilder to play out a number of chillingly suspenseful scenes whose clever structuring and intelligent framing is still providing influence for filmmakers today. And so it should. It is clear now, with the benefit of hindsight and the ability to watch a great number of Wilder’s films again and again, that he was a true master of the cinematic medium and Double Indemnity is a prime example of the careful and brilliant way in which he told a story on screen.
Like Neff and Dietrichson attempting to pull of the perfect murder, Wilder is crafting a film with skill and delicate calculation. Unlike the doomed pair though Wilder is entirely successful. Credited with a place in history thanks to a reappraisal of the so called ‘Film Noirs’ of the forties and fifties in later decades, Double Indemnity is more than simply an archetype of a film type. A satisfyingly delivered thriller, plotted like a knife slowly twisting in one’s gut, Double Indemnity is beyond everything else a thoroughly gripping film experience and one that it is a pleasure to return to frequently.
The new Blu-ray from MoC boasts a superb transfer and one that for any who have only seen the film on DVD or television, such as myself, will almost certainly prove revelatory. In an early scene, for instance, Neff comments on the dust in the air and one can actually see the dust about which he speaks, a detail previously masked by low quality viewing experiences with poor transfers. A small difference but these quickly add up and the experience of watching the film on Blu-ray is a absolute treat. There are a few minor issues, the odd flicker and even a couple of missing frames, but these are nothing to be concerned about as this is otherwise a good quality dupe negative sensitively treated, resulting in a fantastic transfer.
The special features are also of a high standard, with a commentary from Nick Redman and Lem Dobbs ported from the US DVD, the Shadows of Suspense documentary, a trailer and a radio adaptation of Double Indemnity, which again features Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray but sadly not Edward G. Robinson. The release also comes with a great booklet filled with interesting interviews with Wilder, Cain and Chandler and an excerpt from the screenplay detailing the alternative ending, which is now sadly lost.
Double Indemnity is available to buy now.
One of the greatest horror films of all time, The Lost Weekend is not a pleasant film to watch but it is a gripping, disturbing and utterly brilliant film from the masterful Billy Wilder.
Wilder traps us with its protagonist, Don Birnam (Ray Milland), in the nightmarish world of an addict. In this case the addiction is alcohol and Wilder and co-screenwriter Charles Brackett (adapting from Charles R. Jackson‘s novel) present an all to vivid depiction of a man struggling with the very serious sickness that is alcoholism.
The Lost Weekend allows us a glimpse inside this sickness in a way that few films have managed, even in the sixty plus years since. As Birnam struggles with his desire to get just one more drink we are placed alongside him, almost willing him on in his pursuit, the desperation he experience reaching such a painful level that we like him just want it to be over. But there is little respite and so his plight continues and the horror builds and builds.
In what is one of the film’s most uncomfortable and tense sequences Birnam attempts to buy alcohol only to find every shop closed. Closed shops could be considered such a minor problem to most but here it is amplified to an agonising degree when Birnam’s need for a drink is factored in. Wilder knows just when to amp up the tension too but also allows the right amount of space for the story to develop alongside the increasing pains of Birnam’s addiction.
As his plight escalates the effects of his dependency get stranger, with disturbing hallucinations - in a scene sold brilliantly by Milland’s heightened performance – appearing just in time to almost tip him over the edge. These hallucinations are also, interestingly, predicted by the enigmatic Bim, an orderly in an alcoholic ward that Birnam washes up in. Birnam claims at one point that his is a man split in to, the writer and the drunk, but maybe there is another, the cold hard voice of reason – Bim (the name is a contraction of Birnam). Whether Bim is imagined or not though, he represents truth and speaks about the reality of Birnam’s situation, an important counterpoint to the self-absorption that consumes Birnam and in many ways the film, although the former is for the worse and the latter is for the benefit of the story.
I have yet to see a better or more honest film about addiction and I doubt I ever will. Raw and unpleasant, The Lost Weekend is essential viewing, even if it may be hard to sit through at times.
This new Blu-ray from Masters of Cinema continues their unbroken record with Universal releases and continues to beg the question as to how can all these releases be so spot on whilst Universal continue to go a little overboard with the DNR-ing on their own releases. The Lost Weekend looks simply wonderful with clear definition in the black and white image. Blacks in particular are rich and deep with grain always present and mostly consistent.
The Lost Weekend Blu-ray offers a fantastic set of special features and represents a really great value purchase. In addition to a video introduction from Alex Cox, a trailer, a radio adaptation and a decent sized booklet, the disc also contains all three parts of the BBC Arena documentary on Wilder, Billy, How Did You Do It? Directed Gisela Grischow and Volker Schlöndorff, the documentary is fantastic and clocking in at just over three hours it provides a great overview of Wilder’s career.
- Apr 30, 12
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
It’s announcements day in the world of Masters of Cinema but before I get to the news I have a rather exciting competition to announce.
Masters of Cinema have recently begun selling a small selection of the Quad posters that they create for their releases. The three posters currently available are for Metropolis, Touch of Evil and Double Indemnity. The posters can be purchased here and are highly limited editions. MoC have been kind enough to give us one copy of each and one Masters of Cinema Monthly reader has the chance to win all three. To let everyone get a chance to be in with a shot there are three ways to enter. You can enter by Tweeting me @cskinner, leaving a comment below or emailing me directly – craigskinnerfilm (at) gmail.com – with ‘MoCM Competition’ in the email subject line. One winner will be randomly selected on the 1st of June 2012 and will be sent all three posters.
Masters of Cinema announced today their release schedule for July through to September and although not a Masters of Cinema release, Eureka also announced that they will be releasing the Giorgio Moroder version of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. I am not a fan of this version of the film at all but I understand that it has its supporters and many will, I’m sure, welcome news of its release in the UK. On the subject of Metropolis and its many versions I can highly recommend David Kalat’s recent piece at Movie Morlocks on the film. Kalat was involved in the MoC edition and has a few things to say regarding the concept of there only being one definitive version.
MoC will be releasing a Lang film in September though with The Testament of Dr. Mabuse getting the Blu-ray upgrade treatment in September (the film is currently only available in the ‘Complete Fritz Lang Mabuse Box Set’ on DVD). Presumably we will also still be getting another Lang this year, with the long delayed Die Nibelungen getting a release “before Xmas”.
Confirmed for a July release is the previously announced dual format release of RoGoPaG. I’m very much looking forward to upgrading my VHS and checking out the film again. It has been some time since I last saw it but I remember being very fond of at least two of the four films that make up the feature.
MoC’s deal with Universal continues to be fruitful, with another title announced this month. Francis Ford Coppola’s Rumble Fish will get a release in August. Rumble Fish was one film that I have been hoping for since the deal was announced last year and the news is very welcome. Beautifully directed Rumble Fish is a real treat and features a fantastic pre-boxing-career performance from Mickey Rourke.
Also announced are three new Pasolini titles, following last month’s Pasolini Blu-ray double, and Cecil B. DeMille epic Cleopatra. I look forward to bringing my thoughts on these and the other new releases in the coming months.
You can read the full press release for this month’s announcement and check out the covers below (click on the images to enlarge them).
Released on 23 July 2012
HAWKS AND SPARROWS [UCCELLACCI E UCCELLINI] (Masters of Cinema) DVD
Featuring a score by the legendary Ennio Morricone, and starring Italy’s popular comic actor Totò, Pasolini’s “Palme d’or”-nominated anarchic comedy depicts the adventures of two men and a talking crow – a picaresque fable that lampoons politics, religion, and the legacy of neorealism. DVD edition from a new HD master.PIGSTY [PORCILE] (Masters of Cinema) DVD
With an all-star cast (Jean-Pierre Léaud, Anne Wiazemsky, Franco Citti, Pierre Clémenti, Marco Ferreri), Pasolini aims fire at the corruption of modern life via twin tales of cannibalism and bestiality, anticipating his own SALO in its concern with bourgeois degradation. DVD edition from a new HD master.Released on 27 August 2012
RUMBLE FISH (Masters of Cinema) BLU-RAY & BLU-RAY SteelBook)
Adapted from the S.E. Hinton novel, and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, this cult classic of teen angst tells the tale of street hoodlum Rusty James and his older brother The Motorcycle Boy, starring Matt Dillon, Mickey Rourke, Diane Lane, Dennis Hopper, Nicolas Cage, and Tom Waits, with a soundtrack by Stewart Copeland of the band The Police. First time anywhere in the world on Blu-ray; limited-edition Blu-ray and limited-edition SteelBook packaging options.RoGoPaG (Masters of Cinema)
Bringing together four greats of European art cinema – Roberto Rossellini, Jean-Luc Godard, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Ugo Gregoretti – this celebrated portmanteau collection of shorts lives up to its subtitle: “Let’s Wash Our Brains”! Dual Format edition from a new HD master; first time anywhere in the world on Blu-ray.Released on 24 September 2012
CLEOPATRA (Masters of Cinema)
Claudette Colbert stars as the eponymous Egyptian pharaoh queen in this pulse-thumping sumptuous Cecil B. DeMille epic, which won the Oscar for Best Cinematography and was nominated for several more, including “Best Picture”. First time anywhere in the world on Blu-ray; Blu-ray and limited-edition SteelBook packaging options.OEDIPUS REX [EDIPO RE]
Pasolini’s personal take on the ancient Sophocles Greek tragedy of patricide and incest (Sigmund Freud would later write of “the Oedipus complex”), starring Franco Citti, Silvana Mangano, and Alida Valli, and nominated for the “Golden Lion” at Venice. Dual Format edition from a new HD master; first time anywhere in the world on Blu-ray.THE TESTAMENT OF DR. MABUSE [DAS TESTAMENT DES DR. MABUSE]
Fritz Lang’s tour-de-force crime thriller rife with supernatural elements, all converging around an attempt by the eponymous Mabuse (or someone acting under his name… and possibly his will), confined to an insane asylum, but intent on establishing an “Empire of Crime”. Dual Format edition from an HD master; first time anywhere in the world on Blu-ray.This past month Eureka Entertainment also announced that the Founder and Director of its Masters of Cinema Series, Nick Wrigley, will be stepping down from the company at the end of May. I would like to extend my thanks to Nick for all the great films he helped get released and I wish him well in his future endeavours.
Eureka are currently asking for feedback on the MoC dual format releases on their Facebook page. Dual formats have been a point of contention for some and a common talking point about MoC’s recent releases, so here is an opportunity to give Eureka some direct feedback on the subject.
Coming up later this week, an extra column with reviews of some of the new releases, as soon as Brendon is well enough to finish writing them up.
Masters of Cinema May 2012 – Pasolini, Coppola, DeMille & Lang Plus Win! Masters of Cinema Posters
- Apr 03, 12
Welcome to Masters of Cinema Monthly.
First off let me apologise for the lateness of this month’s column, which was originally intended to be up a couple of weeks ago. Although delayed, by my moving house, the column still has plenty of fresh news and three reviews of new Masters of Cinema releases.
My new home has a lot more wall space than the old one so I will almost certainly be taking this opportunity to pick up one or more of the MoC quad posters now available to buy. MoC did previously sell the poster for Metropolis but did not sell the subsequent posters created for the UK theatrical release of their films but you can now buy posters for Metropolis, Double Indemnity and Touch of Evil directly from Masters of Cinema. They’re limited releases so it’s probably best not to wait too long and I’m sure that if these sell well then MoC will expand the range of posters available. More posters can be seen on the Eureka Facebook page here. I’m particularly partial to the poster for Lost Weekend myself.
Probably the biggest news this month is that The Birth of a Nation is being released on Blu-ray by Masters of Cinema later this year. The film has recently had a Blu-ray release in the United States from Kino but this will be the film’s début on the format in the UK. Watching The Birth of a Nation is a deeply troubling experience but the film is fascinating for a number of reasons and holds a significant place in film history. I look forward to digging into the release and discussing the film further when it’s released later this year. Here’s the press release from Eureka in full,
Eureka Entertainment are very pleased to announce the acquisition of rights to a sparkling new HD restoration of one of the great silent films – one of the most controversial films of all time – D. W. Griffith’s THE BIRTH OF A NATION.
The film tells the story of the American Civil War and its aftermath, as seen through the eyes of two families. The 1915 film has shocked audiences with its attitudes towards race yet remains one of the defining films of the silent era.
THE BIRTH OF A NATION will join Eureka’s Masters of Cinema Series, the home of classic silent movies, and will be released later in the year on Blu-ray for the first time in a dual format (DVD & Blu-ray) edition.
Just in case I wasn’t convincing enough in encouraging you to pick up Masters of Cinema’s recent release of Silent Running maybe this video of Edgar Wright discussing the film, posted by Trailers From Hell, will help.
Nick Wrigley posted the following updates on the long, long, long delayed release of Die Nibelungen in the Criterion Forums.
DIE NIBELUNGEN will be out before Xmas, and there is other activity taking place which is very exciting.
It will be spine #40.
The Masters of Cinema Twitter account also mentioned this month that the number of Lubitsch titles in the series will reach 7 by the end of the year. Their Lubitsch in Berlin box-set is still available from online retailers and from Masters of Cinema directly, despite what unscrupulous Ebay sellers may be saying.
Speaking of Lubitsch, Dangerous Minds recently pointed my browser to news of a new score for The Oyster Princess (a film included within the MoC box-set) composed and performed by Bee vs. Moth. You can watch a video of Bee vs. Moth performing a selection of the music and head over to their site for dates and locations to see them perform the score.
Originally slated for release last year Island of Lost Souls will now make its way into the Masters of Cinema Series in May. In addition to now being released on Dual Format, as opposed to the DVD only release scheduled for release in 2011, the film is also getting the steelbook treatment, a common trend now it would seem for MoC, and Eureka posted a packshot of the striking steelbook design.
That’s certainly going to stand out on the shelves amongst a host of uninspired Blu-ray covers. You can pre-order the steelbook now.
Island of Lost Souls was originally rejected by the BBFC (when the ‘C’ stood for Censorship not Classification – although I have still have my doubts about the renaming) in 1933 and after a further rejection in 1957 the film received a cut release in 1958. Receiving an uncut ’12′ certificate release in 1996 the film was finally available to see uncut in the UK but when resubmitted by MoC the film received a possibly surprising PG release. A recent article at the BBC goes into further detail about the reasons for this, including a number of quotes from BBFC director David Cooke. The article is well worth a read and also features details on an upcoming BBFC season at the BFI Southbank in November, which includes Island of Lost Souls.
Now onto the new Masters of Cinema releases.
Accattone is an appropriate opening to the impressive directorial career of Pier Paolo Pasolini, playing as it does as something of an open ended question and an unfinished thought. The film deals with a unlikeable protagonist named Accattone, which roughly translates as ‘beggar’ or ‘bum’, but rather than condemn or judge Accattone, Pasolini’s film explores this character rather pragmatically, allowing us to wrestle with the moral and ethical implications of his actions and most importantly, his motivations.
It is a wonderful set up for the career of Pasolini, a filmmaker whose output was filled with morally complex and densely problematic subject matter, films which raise questions of the audience but provide few simple answers.
Accattone is a pimp and a thief living in the slums of Rome, spending his time hanging out with his close group of male friends and mistreating all the women that enter his life. The first woman to enter Accattone’s life ends up wrongly imprisoned and the second, despite falling in love with him, fairs little better. The slums of Rome presented here are a pretty ugly place to spend 120 minutes but Pasolini infuses the film with a odd kind of revelatory beauty, filling the film with multi-faceted characters that deny simple definitions or stereotypical readings.
Despite using a cast of non-professional actors – resulting in a mixed bag of performances, of which Franco Citti as Accattone sits atop – Accattone is far from the so-called Neo-Realist wave that had consumed Italian cinema at the time of the film’s release. Although many of those films are far from the un-mediated cinematic endeavours they are presented as by many critics Accattone is still very far removed, with a number of stylish flourishes, a particularly memorable 360 pan of the town that settles on the titular character being a notable example, and there is the definite sense that Pasolini is looking for a more experimental than raw look at an Italian underclass.
This experimentation is not always successful, the aforementioned mixed performances are an issue and some of the visual language that Pasolini toys with is not entirely on message, but it hits far more than it misses and what is left as the dust settles is a fascinating an engaging film.
Benardo Bertolucci said of Accattone that, “Watching Pier Paolo Pasolini shoot Accattone I felt as if I were present at the invention of cinema.” and whilst I can’t speak to the experience of watching Pasolini shoot Accattone, watching the finished film with the benefit of foresight does feel as if one is present at the point at which Italian cinema shifted and saw the birth of one of its most exciting filmmakers.
This new Blu-ray from Masters of Cinema represents a significant upgrade in quality from the DVDs previously release by Tartan in the UK, as does Comizi D’Amore, which is included here as an extra. The latter was shot on 16mm and blown up to 35mm so does not look quite as impressive but is nonetheless a vast improvement in terms of picture quality and also in correcting the incorrect aspect ratio of the Tartan release. Comizi D’Amore is an utterly fascinating documentary that provides a insightful snapshot of attitutes to sex in Italy at the time of filming and acts as a very interesting primer to a viewing of Accattone.
The disc also comes with a commentary for Accattone by Tony Rayns which provides a reasonable amount of detail on the film and also on Pasolini’s subsequent career. Rayns also makes reference to ”a series of Pasolini releases” from Masters of Cinema at one point. It is of course possible that he was referring to these two releases but it in light of hints from MoC regarding more Pasolini it seems highly likely that more titles will be joining the series soon.
Accattone is available to buy now on Dual Format.
The Gospel According to Matthew
It does seem almost perverse that a non-believer, Pasolini, could make what is perhaps the definitive cinematic version of the story of Christ and one that was even endorsed somewhat by the Vatican, with its placement on a Vatican film list compiled in 1995.
But simply being a non-believer does not hamper Pasolini’s ability to convey belief and most importantly, to tell a good story.
The journey of Christ in The Gospel According to Matthew is gripping and serene in equal measure and at the heart of the film and the character is a streak of rebelliousness and a revolutionary attitude that adds a thrilling dimension.
The choice to cast Enrique Irazoqui in the lead role only adds to this, with his stern features and almost wry facial expressions contributing to this fully realised portrait. Pasolini had at one time actually considered casting Jack Kerouac in the role, a concept that is almost unimaginable but one that leads to rather interesting musings on what could have been.
As an atheist watching the film I cannot speak to the ‘spiritual’ significance to the film but as someone who has made efforts to understand and appreciate the texts upon which Christianity was built I can appreciate the care that was taken by Pasolini to treat the figure of Christ with respect and without deviating too far from the words of the widely distributed version of the bible many have come to know so well.
In fact there are even times when Christ’s words appear more like modern sound-bites, smart answers to tricky questions wrapped up almost too neatly in a quick response. The rebellious nature inherent in this portrayal really makes the dialogue work though and despite seeming like diametrically opposed concepts, Pasolini’s Christ is one of angry grace. Pasolini also treats Christ’s words and the reported miracles with deference but not excessive reverence, resulting in the tone almost lapsing into one of a matter-of-fact accounting of events.
This intelligent treatment of the tone, the rebellious, almost political nature of Pasolini’s Christ (more Che Guevara than old-Hollywood sword and sandals) and the beautiful visual storytelling in his filmmaking choices make for a rich and compelling film.
The level of detail in this new HD transfer is very high. There is a light dusting of consistent grain throughout and there are very few signs of damage carried over from the original print. The uncompressed stereo audio track is clear and also without any evidence of damage, well representing both the dialogue and the many varied soundtrack choices.
Accompanying the main feature on this disc is Sopralluoghi in Palestina, a film that documents Pasolini scouting for locations in Palestine. The film is not exactly a documentary, more a loose collection of footage with interviews and voiceover but is nonetheless very interesting and provides a great deal of context for the film, especially when one is considering Pasolini’s intentions.
Regarding the title, The Gospel According to Matthew rather than The Gospel According to St. Matthew (as it was previously known in the UK), MoC have posted the following quote from Pasolini which clears up the choice.
Question: “Who controls things like changing the title of a film – because you presumably know Il vangelo secondo Matteo was changed in England…”
Answer: “That’s something I wonder about myself, with considerable anguish I must say. I don’t know what to do about this kind of thing. I’d like to know how you do find out, because I feel completely helpless.”
The Gospel According to Matthew is available to buy now on Dual Format.
Based on a script by John Steinbeck Lifeboat at first appears on the surface (pun purely accidental) to be a piece of stunt filmmaking, an attempt to do something that may seem impossible. To set an entire feature film in a boat and, barring one establishing shot, and never move from the boat in question must have seemed like lunacy in 1944 and an act of directorial masochism.
As with many of Hitchcock‘s films though this conceptual conceit masks a greater depth (the puns are honestly very hard to avoid) and Lifeboat is ultimately a deeply intelligent and sharply observed film about important moral/ethical quandaries. There is also a line in political commentary that runs throughout the film and its position as a film made in 1944, five years into World War Two, makes the events depicted all the more intriguing for a viewer to wrestle with and dissect. Consider this exchange for instance,
“A guy can’t help bein’ a German if he’s born a German, can he?”
“Neither can a snake help being a snake if he’s born a rattlesnake! That don’t make him a nightingale!”
It’s easy to see that sort of sentiment as being simply WWII propaganda supporting the war effort but just because it is the second character’s comment that ends the conversation this does not been that this is the simple point that Hitchcock and Steinbeck are trying to make. The subsequent scenes and the ultimate fate of the German in question do more to problematise this exchange than they do to affirm it. The fact that the film has been considered as British Jingoism by some and Nazi propaganda by others goes some way to illustrating that reading the film too simply may be a serious mistake.
Despite the depth of the thematic concerns in Lifeboat one cannot ignore the technical achievements also contained within. Crafting a film entirely set within this one, confined location is a magic trick from Hitchcock that is worthy of high commendation. The extras included on this release include a making of and a discussion of the film between Hitchcock and Francois Truffaut and despite both being interesting additions to the release I can’t help but wish there was something more substantial and altogether ‘nerdier’ on the disc, highlighting the exact way in which Hitchcock achieved what seems almost unachievable.
One modern example of confined filmmaking, Rodrigo Cortes‘ Buried, led Bleeding Cool’s own Brendon Connelly to put together a feature with Cortes explaining exactly how to achieve this feat and I can recommend giving it a read as it provides insights into the challenges Hitchcock faced too. Some magic tricks somehow seem even more impressive when one discovers how they are done.
Also included with this release are two short films from Hitchcock, Bon Voyage and Aventure Malagache. The former is a wonderfully tricky little piece of storytelling that has a very enjoyable twist that I won’t spoil here. The latter is not as entertaining as the first but is nonetheless certainly engaging and well worth a watch. The quality of these shorts is not great, with some serious damage at times, mostly vertical scratches, but it is not enough to ruin the experience.
The quality of the main feature is excellent and up to the standard we have come to expect from MoC’s collaborations with Universal. The print clearly has issues but it has been sensitively handled here. The transfer must have been particularly troublesome due in large part to the foggy aesthetic, especially in the early scenes, but there are really no reasons to complain about anything here.
Lifeboat is available to pre-order now on standard Dual Format and Steelbook Dual Format.
As an extra bonus I have embedded the radio play of Lifeboat below. NBC broadcast this in 1950 with Hitchcock returning to direct and Tallulah Bankhead reprising her role from the film.
Extra extra bonus: For those unaware of how Hitchcock managed to slip a cameo into Lifeboat, spoiler, you can find it in the picture below.
Next month in Masters of Cinema Monthly: A Mizoguchi doublebill.
Masters of Cinema Monthly April 2012 – Lifeboat, Pasolini, Lubitsch and The Birth of a Nation
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- Mar 27, 13
Following an opening featuring a black screen and the sounds of 9/11 calls, which lasts for a deeply uncomfortable period of time despite actually being relatively short, Zero Dark Thirty moves into more scenes which are well-played to upset and discomfort an audience. We are introduced to the lead, Maya (Jessica Chastain), who is the somewhat unenthusiastic bystander, and later accomplice, in the torture of man believed to have information relating to global terrorism.
Maya appears in these scenes as something of a blank slate, aside from a few awkward looks she is at first also very passive, and despite the film's reasonably lengthy running time she always remains somewhat inscrutable, with the camera often lingering on her blank and seemingly dispassionate stare. She has one purpose it seems. To find Osama bin Laden.
Recalling the singularly focused female protagonists of seventies revenge pictures - Meiko Kaji's 'born for revenge' protagonist in Lady Snowblood comes to mind - Maya has little to no back story in Zero Dark Thirty and despite multiple interactions with co-workers she seems to form no real social bonds. When she later refers to the terrorists as having killed her friends the line almost comes across as laughable due to the vague or non-existent relationships she has fostered with others.
Her main friend in the CIA and the man who we first see torturing prisoners in the early scenes is Dan (Jason Clarke), an educated CIA agent who helps Maya in her quest to hunt down bin Laden. Dan quickly becomes burnt out and returns to America, an attempt to put the torture he has inflicted upon others behind him, although not predominantly due to guilt it would seem but out of some fear of retribution. He even comments to Maya, "You don't want to be the last one holding a dog collar when the oversight committee arrives." That Dan is aware that what he is doing may be considered wrong emphasises how warped the situation is within the CIA. Whilst the question of whether torture is wrong or right is not represented on-screen there is certainly the sense that those within the CIA know that what they are doing may not be entirely legal.
The lack of care for this subject by the characters is highlighted in a scene in which Barack Obama is seen on a television stating that America does not torture. Again director Kathryn Bigelow returns briefly to Maya's blank stare before the characters get on with what they were doing. This isn't a subject of particular interest to them despite their close relationship with what Obama is talking about. The characters in Zero Dark Thirty are focused on one idea and there is little to no room for self-analysis.
The controversy that has swirled around Zero Dark Thirty regarding a positive depiction of torture is a massive red herring when it comes to what the filmmakers are actually saying and appears to be largely born out of a significant amount of baggage brought to the film, rather than anything that is up there on the screen. Those who find the torture of human beings despicable, if only this wasn't just part of the human race, will find the actions of members of the CIA in Zero Dark Thirty deplorable and disgusting. Any sense that this led to evidence that helped find bin Laden will, of course, in no way change that. It is also disingenuous to suggest that this is the whole story, as the film presents it. It is made abundantly clear in Zero Dark Thirty that there is a web of information that leads to the discovery of the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan and it has been gathered in various ways.
What has not been at the forefront of discussions relating to Zero Dark Thirty, and what was also absent from the mainstream news when bin Laden was actually killed, is the desire for his death that seems to be so often just accepted as a given. "If you really want to protect the homeland you need to get bin Laden." So says Maya, when her dogged pursuit of bin Laden is called into question by her CIA superior Joseph Bradley (Kyle Chandler). When Maya says 'get' she quite clearly means kill. Bin Laden's death is the ultimate goal, not his capture and arrest, and this is never once questioned by any of the characters in the film. It's probably quite likely that it also wasn't discussed in the real halls of government buildings in Langley, Washington and further afield either.
Bin Laden's death is in many ways the end point of Zero Dark Thirty, but the film does not end with a whooping gung-ho mission accomplished celebration of the death of bin Laden. Instead, the final line uttered in Zero Dark Thirty is "Where do you wanna go?" - said by a pilot to Maya - and a lingering shot of Chastain's face. After another brief period of staring into her inscrutable blank stare we see her expression change to one that looks almost despairing, before finally she begins to cry.
It's an open-ended and somewhat bleak note to end on and leaves an audience with an indelible sense of what the past two hours and forty minutes have really been about. There's an emptiness, a pointlessness to the whole endeavour that doesn't give the audience a sense of catharsis, a deep sigh of relief at the end that the job's been done, we're safe now, the bad guys lost. The final emotion is one of despair.
Director Kathyrn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal discard the simple American cinematic tradition of good guys and bad guys and leave the audience with the sense that even in the U.S. government's attempts to guard themselves from threats and seek some cathartic relief for the truly horrible events of 9/11 they have also found themselves in the 'bad guy' role and it comes with a sense of pointlessness and despair which is written all over Chastain's face. As Maya provides a symbolic surrogate for America, the final line in Zero Dark Thirty provides a crucial question for not just a post-9/11 America but a post-bin Laden America. "Where do you wanna go?"
This piece was originally posted at HeyUGuys. - Dec 31, 12
Based on a play of the same name, The Sapphires is a spirited but misguided Australian musical feature from director Wayne Blair and writers Tony Briggs and Keith Thomspson. Loosely based on the experiences of Briggs mother and aunt - a postscript reveals that it is very loosely based - the film tells the story of the Cummeraganja Songbirds, a plucky girl group, made up of sisters, who travel to Vietnam to entertain the troops and find fame and fortune. With a swift name change, to the easier to pronounce The Sapphires, and the addition of a new member, their estranged cousin, the group enlist the help of enthusiastic 'soul man' but rather useless drunk Dave (Chris O'Dowd) and set about shooting for the stars.
Whilst the fact that the group never quite make it to the top should not be a surprise it is, in a way, a rather pleasing story development in a film that it is otherwise incredibly by-the-numbers. With every turn The Sapphires appears to reveal the screenwriters reluctance to show courage in what they are writing; plot points hint at something unexpected before falling back on the obvious and characters behave in reckless and almost surprising ways before quickly apologising. Occasionally the screenwriters even dip their toes into commenting on the racial tensions that an all aboriginal girl group in the sixties has to face before quickly pulling them out of such interesting waters and getting on with the light hearted japes.
Cheifly responsible for these japes is O'Dowd, who is the bright spot amongst a number of middling characters - more the result of weak writing than bad performances - and his attempts at injecting a little soul into a group that have up until now been performing country and western standards provides the film's funniest scenes. The musical performances are also pleasant enough but there is little that really pops or shines, despite the group's rather glittering name. Incongruity is rife too with a number of songs plucked from the seventies, despite the film's clear setting in 1968. The choreography during the many musical numbers is also disappointing at times, falling back on very unexpressive traditional moves and framing for the most part and looking like something of a cheap imitation as a result.
Cheapness is a general issue throughout too, with the sequences set in Vietnam suffering greatly from Blair failing to mask the artificiality of what we are seeing. An attack on an army base, for instance, should be tense and actually rather upsetting for anyone invested in the relationships on screen but it is very seriously undermined by characters awkwardly leaping out of the way of unconvincing explosions going off on a flatly lit location.
Innocuous and inoffensive The Sapphires is an easy film to watch, too easy perhaps, and many will find it a pleasant enough evening at the cinema but for those looking for something a little bit more special or something with any bite or sparkle, it's best to look elsewhere.
This review was originally posted at Craig Skinner on Film. - Dec 31, 12
There are two comments that film critics/academics will often hear from non-film critics/academics when discussing a theory they have relating to a specific film. These are, "I think you're probably just reading too much into it" and "I don't think that's what they were actually thinking about when they made it".
It seems quite likely that the first is an issue with the way in which the majority of people experience the world, with an uncritical mind, and the latter with the common belief that only ideas and attitudes that filmmakers 'deliberately' put into their films matter. Both responses are ones that are actually somewhat encouraged by a film that attempts to pull together a number of rather far-fetched readings of The Shining.
Room 237 presents the viewer with these readings through a reasonably fine selection of clips from Kubrick's films and beyond, and through the voiceovers of those expounding the theories. One effect of this is that we are never really presented with the people whose theories we are listening to, resulting in further distance from people that we really need to understand and appreciate where they are coming from.
The disembodied voices throw out a number of wild ideas as the film progresses, including theories pulling in references to Native Americans, World War Two and the idea that Kubrick was involved in faking the moon landings. The last theory is in the segment, the film is divided into nine, in which director Rodney Ascher really appears to nail his colours to the mast with what the film is really about. Rather than a serious and considered look at competing analyses regarding The Shining, Room 237 is either a rather snarky look at crazy conspiracy theories or a stupendously idiotic attempt at serious analysis.
When a voice informs us that the only anagram that you can make from the letters in 'Room No. 237' is 'Moon' it's not hard for anyone with a basic grasp of anagrams to realise how ridiculous that statement is and what other, rather unfortunate, word those letters can also be made to spell. The moment is rather funny within the film but it is only funny because it is such a mocking moment, a laugh at how deluded the concept is. Leaving that moment in tells the audience not to take any of this too seriously, it's just a bunch of wild theories. Why not a documentary about genuine, serious film analysis though, without all the mocking? Would that be so bad. It might help tackle the two comments I raised at the head of this review.
There are moments that approach serious criticism and even illuminate details in The Shining but they are somewhat buried, or at least obscured, by a great deal of silliness. The film delves into the set design, for instance, plotting out the layout of the hotel in a rather interesting way. Spatial fidelity is an area of film analysis that is all too often relegated to the margins of film criticism, with a lot of film critics often not too happy digging into technical areas of film analysis. The film lays out the inconsistencies in the relationship between spaces due to the way in which they are seen and for a moment the film becomes rather interesting, but it quickly moves off into a rather more zany direction. The modus operandi seems to be, the crazier the theory the more worthwhile it is to the film. Entertaining/funny theories seem to win out over sensible, carefully thought out ones.
I once saw the rather fantastic author/mathematician/scientist Simon Singh deliver a lecture on the Bible Code, the concept that The Bible can be used to predict events in the future. Excepting the challenge to find examples of the 'Bible Code' in Moby Dick Singh went on to show how the code could be used to find references to Princess Diana's death. Many, many references. To a hilarious degree. It was a funny exercise that swiftly undermined The Bible Code, making it clear how easy it was to find something once you are looking for it. Much of Room 237 is unfortunately just like watching someone explain The Bible Code and point out the ways in which it predicts the future.
Damage to the perception and understanding of film criticism is something that this film will undoubtedly result in, both from those who take the ideas far too seriously and perpetuate them further and also from those that lump in all critics/academics with the voices we hear here. The film will no doubt be entertaining to some, it was to me at times, but an interesting look at The Shining and the theories surrounding it, it most definitely is not.
This post originally appeared at Craig Skinner on Film - Dec 31, 12
Everything about Rust and Bone (originally De rouille et d'os), Jacques Audiard's follow up to his arthouse hit A Prophet, should signify a failure not a film that is not only good but actually great. Audiard has managed to pull a magic trick of sorts in weaving a beautiful story from subject matter and difficult to navigate sequences that so easily could have seemed trite and cringe worthy in the hands of many other directors.
The most compelling case for this is in a sequence in which Stephanie (Marion Cotillard), a whale trainer who has recently lost her legs in an accident, sits in the sunshine and imagines conducting her whales again. Seated in her wheelchair, her eyes closed, the sound of Katy Perry's Fireworks swelling on the soundtrack - a call back to an earlier scene - she waves her arms, imagining directing the whales again. As the music gets louder it subtly shifts into Alexandre Desplat's beautiful and tender score for the film. As one's shoulders initially hunch, ready to cringe at what could be a terribly corny scene, Audiard pulls every string in exactly the right way, and as one's shoulders relax the scene reveals itself to be not cringe worthy at all but emotional and near rapturous.
It is also Cotillard's extraordinary performance that pays dividends in this and many other scenes. Quite possibly her finest performance, she is utterly convincing as Stephanie, a character that is emotionally complex and intriguing from the outset.
Stephanie is only one half of the 'odd couple' that makes up the central thrust of Rust and Bone though. After a chance meeting at a club with the troubled and reluctant father Ali - played by Bullhead's Matthias Schoenaerts - Stephanie begins to develop a rather unconventional relationship with him, with Ali providing her with everything that she needs, liberating at her physically and emotionally. It is never quite clear if Ali understands that this is what he is doing for Stephanie and how important it is to her emotional well-being and her psychological recovery from her accident and this ambiguity is well played in subtle exchanges and sparse dialogue.
It is in this uncertainty, for the audience and for Stephanie, as to Ali's motivations and feelings that one can find some of the real substance to Rust and Bone. The emotional conflicts central to the film are extraordinarily deftly handled by Audiard but there is also a lot resting on the shoulders of Cotillard and Schoenaerts. Cotillard is, as I have said superb, and Matthias Schoenaerts proves without doubt that his performance in Bullhead was not just a feat of great casting, as his character here is complex in a number of different ways and he rises to the challenges the role involves.
Ali's relationship with his son Sam is a particularly difficult area, with Ali struggling from the very beginning to deal with the responsibility thrust upon him. His character is unlikeable at almost every turn and it is almost painful to watch some of his interactions with his son Sam (Armand Verdure), especially in contrast to his burgeoning relationship with Stephanie, and it is perhaps only in the final extraordinarily powerful few seconds of the film that one can ultimately warm to him.
Audiard and co-screenwriter Thomas Bidegain have filled Rust and Bone with contrasts and parallels - the physical ability of Ali and Stephanie's disability, the Ali/Stephanie and Ali/Sam relationships and so on - deeply seeding a number of interesting ideas into a script that is at its core a thinly veiled a melodrama. Audiard has then obscured the melodrama further with an almost minimalist filmmaking approach, save for a few sound mix choices and an appropriate use of slow motion at times, creating something that is compelling to watch unfold and never too insistent upon moving you.
The structuring of the story does become a problem at times, with an unfortunately abrupt jump in time shortly before the final act being particularly troublesome, but the strong character development helps smooth over any cracks in the way the plot moves forward. These minor issues aside, Rust and Bone is an incredibly well crafted and intensely emotionally absorbing film worthy of serious attention.
This review was originally posted at HeyUGuys. - Oct 12, 12
One thing that becomes crystal clear when watching Inferno, the feature-length John Herzfield documentary on the making of the first Expendables film, is that star, director and co-writer Sylvester Stallone is very, very serious about The Expendables. Regardless of what ultimately appeared on cinema screens in the summer of 2010, Stallone's intention was to make something special, a return to a cinematic experience in which stars are the draw, an action spectacle in which the protagonists are heroes and, most importantly, heroes of action.
This intent never quite translated into The Expendables and the film was ultimately oddly cold and flat and most disappointingly, entirely lacking in any well conceived or executed action.
The film, or at least the way the film was marketed, seemed to click with enough people and The Expendables went on to be a financial hit, leading to the green-lighting of a sequel, The Expendables 2.
For this second instalment Stallone is out of the directing chair but there is still the sense that the film is is his pet project and he has managed to persuade even more action stars to come along for the ride the second time around.
The film opens with The Expendables pretty much as they were in the first film, with the addition of sniper Billy 'The Kid' (Liam Hemsworth), and in an extended pre-title sequence we see the group of mercenaries blasting their way through a town and blowing away hundreds of what we are to assume are "bad guys". The Expendables are attempting to rescue a Chinese billionaire, cue the painful one-liner "That's what I call Chinese take-out", and they arrive in customized vehicles with gung-ho slogans emblazoned across them, things like 'Shock and Awe' and 'Knock, Knock'. The former is presumably a reference to the military doctrine and the latter simply a joke due to its placement on a battering ram.
Now, if you chuckled to yourself at the idea of a military battering ram having 'Knock, Knock' stencilled on the side of it then you may actually find some enjoyment in The Expendables 2, a film peppered with 'jokes' that are mostly pitched at that sort of level.
On a number of occasions the action takes a time-out in order for one of the characters to quip something that seems well placed to entertain the other characters/actors, even if it leaves most audience members groaning and slamming their heads into the seat in front. The most painfully unfunny 'comedic' quips are those that reference other films, films that feature the actors who are playing the characters making the jokes. So we have Arnie accompanied by quips about getting his ass "Terminated" - don't think too hard about the visual of what that could actually mean - and Chuck Norris popping up out of nowhere, only for his character to be described as a "lone wolf" and then make an actual "Chuck Norris Joke", and not a very good one at that. The effect of all this quipping and referencing is wearying and not all funny.
Even if these kind of asides were funny they certainly wouldn't fit in with a lot of the rest of the dialogue, which is often po-faced and far too serious, despite all the bombast and ludicrous action exploding either side of it.
Stallone has the most cringe-worthy stoic and faux-philosophical musings to spout in the film but the pauses in the story for Stallone to say something that attempts to be meaningful are not the only efforts to play this farce with a straight face. Death, cruelty and exploitation are all treated with some sort of attempt at respect in places but these moments are always bookended with daft action or misjudged humour. A key character's death, for instance, loses a little of its impact when it is preceded seconds before with a trademark roundhouse kick from JCVD and then a very awkward line reading of "I'm dying" from the victim of the kick.
The idea put forward by Stallone's character (Barney Ross) in his more sombre moments, and explicitly made clear in Inferno, is that the characters are on some kind of noble and heroic warrior's path, but there is a vast difference between that concept and what is conveyed through the story and action sequences.
The opening sequence exemplifies this issue, with the Expendables blasting their way to the finish line with a series of moves that most closely resemble an obsessed video-game player who knows where every single bad guy is before they appear and where every trick to the game is hidden.
None of it ever looks hard. And it sure as hell doesn't look heroic.
This sequence, and the many others that follow it - with the exception of the mess of a climax to the film - are at least rather impressive in places thanks to some ingenuity in the conception of the action and some reasonably solid execution. It is in this area that the film excels far beyond what the original had to offer but that is perhaps damning the film with faint praise.
Simon West, whose career began with the asinine but entertaining Nicholas Cage actioner Con Air, has a much better handle on this large scale action than Stallone had in The Expendables and this is ultimately the film's saving grace. A gleeful desire to blow up as much stuff as possible in the most ludicrous way pervades these action scenes and that's mostly in the film's favour, with its 'action' being the main selling point.
The action in the larger set pieces is often fluidly edited and has the satisfying sense of a series of dominoes falling down one after the other, exactly as they are supposed to. It doesn't exactly make the scenes seem dangerous or suspenseful but in terms of spectacle West does impress. West and cinematographer Shelly Johnson's also pay attention to framing the action for clarity and to enhance the experience in these larger set pieces, something that is occasionally lacking in recent action blockbusters.
In the 'smaller' scenes and in the aforementioned climax things fall apart though and the action is often as half-baked as it was in the first film. Shoot-outs rely on pummelling the audience with disconnected shots of guns firing and heads exploding with little in the way of any relationship between the shots. Geographical logic is also often entirely absent and this combined with a lack of consistent coherence in the editing leads to these scenes becoming monotonous and often very dull.
The hand-to-hand combat scenes in The Expendables 2 also come up lacking, despite the talents that action stars such as Jet Li, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Scott Adkins bring to proceedings. When Jet Li's movements look uncomfortable and unimpressive in a close-quartered space it is a clear indicator that something is amiss. Li's one action scene is plagued with edits that are either too long - lingering after a punch connects for an awkward period - or too short - missing crucial movements - and martial arts fans will undoubtedly find a lot to complain about. Later fights featuring JCVD and Adkins, who impressed greatly in the Undisputed films, fair even worse, with the latter's fight with Statham mostly obscured by bizarre camera placements and more inelegant edits.
The Expendables 2 is a Hollywood film that is entirely about looking inward, faded action stars coming out of semi-retirement for a big sequel to a film that was itself a depressing celebration of Hollywood mediocrity.
Hollywood has been having its ass constantly kicked in action cinema over the past twenty years by the impressive talents emerging in other countries and where poaching these talents has failed it has fallen back on old stars. The issue is that the stars in question (West included) were often not particularly good to begin with and this tired attempt to celebrate them whilst at the same time repeating their work is just a reminder of their failings and why they have since been eclipsed by greater talents.
A third Expendables film seems highly likely at this point but this particular Ouroboros needs slicing in half. And quickly.
This review was originally posted at Craig Skinner on Film. - May 22, 12
Cyril is a restless and stern-faced child with dogged determination, played brilliantly by Thomas Doret. The current subject consuming his determined mind is the loss of his bike and the absence of his father. The two are interconnected. Cyril has been abandoned at a care home by his father (Jeremie Renier), stranded with no clue as to why his father has left him and unable to believe that if he had, that his father wouldn't have left him with his bike. Cyril's father has decided that he wants to start afresh though and there's no room in his life for son, both financially and emotionally.
Cyril is unwilling to accept the idea that his father has just abandoned him and sold his beloved bike. He escapes the home to track down his bike and speak to his father. Unable to achieve either he is deposited back at the home, but not before a chance encounter with the near saintly Samantha (Cécile De France), a local hairdresser who seems to find sympathy with the troubled Cyril following an altercation in which he ends up wrestling her to the floor.
The two connect and there is obviously the early hints that Cyril may have lost one parent but found a surrogate in Samantha. Perhaps unsurprisingly, considering the directors' (Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne) prior work this is conveyed with great restraint. The Dardennes never fall into over-egging the pudding when it comes to the relationship between the two throughout the film, but even in these early scenes there is important groundwork laid that holds real significance.
Cyril clearly takes a shine to Samantha, obvious despite his face betraying nothing, following a visit from her after she manages to find his bike. Cyril asks if perhaps he could stay with her at the weekends, something Samantha promptly agrees to, and the two begin spending every weekend together and forming a difficult but very meaningful bond.
In the hands of many other writers and directors this kind of material could easily be horribly trite, filled with cliché and over-sentimentality but in the hands of the Dardennes this is never a concern. Subtlety and naturalism are clearly at the heart of every choice in The Kid with a Bike and the film is so incredibly engaging and affecting as a result of the strong commitment to this approach. The cinematography is understated and mostly hand-held and the only area in which stylistic intrusion interferes in the story is a few instances in which a single piece of music disrupts and distracts. Not a particularly significant problem and in any other film the brief washes of music could even go unnoticed. Here though it is entirely conspicuous and an odd choice that seems to add nothing but instantly pull one out of the film. The moments are brief though and for the most part every moment in The Kid with a Bike is near flawless. Once drawn into Cyril's small world you are captivated, every twist in the story leaving you almost holding your breath, anxious as to what will happen next.
Despite the rather difficult subject matter and tense plotting, it gets darker than the above set up would perhaps suggest, the film does contain some levity. A rather 'pretty' summer bike ride is, for instance, a moment to take a sigh of relief and despite this moment treading a thin line from simply being twee it is entirely in service of the story and in keeping with the events that are unfolding. This sweet aside is also contrasted by heartbreaking moments, such as a near tragic accident late in the film or the moment in which Samantha's boyfriend forces her to choose between him and Cyril, following a bout of particularly bad behaviour from Cyril. Samantha's flat response of "him" to the question from her boyfriend, "It's me or him" is utterly convincing and beautifully underplayed. So much goes unsaid in this brief moment but so much is conveyed, a perfect encapsulation of the beauty of The Kid with a Bike.
Deftly written, sensitively directed and with nuanced and considered performances, The Kid with a Bike is another wonderful and engaging film from Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne.
The Kid with a Bike is in UK cinemas now.
This review was originally posted at HeyUGuys.co.uk - May 22, 12
The release of a inmate from prison and their subsequent reintegration into 'regular' society is an area that is filled with potential for interesting drama.
Ulu Grosbard's under-seen and underrated 1978 film Straight Time (based on the equally excellent book No Beast So Fierce by Edward Bunker) uses this premise to explore the way in which the released inmate's, played by Dustin Hoffman, life is defined by the way in which they have been labelled by society.
In his debut film, Wild Bill, Dexter Fletcher treads similar territory with his lead character struggling to adjust to life outside of prison but in addition he introduces an intense family drama to the mix.
The titular Bill (Charlie Creed-Miles) returns home from prison after many years inside and in the interim period his two sons, Jimmy (Sammy Williams) and Dean (Will Poulter), have been abandoned by their mother and left to fend for themselves. In Bill's absence 15 year-old Dean has taken on the role of the family patriarch and cares for his younger brother whilst trying to hold down an illegal job on a construction site. Rather amusingly, and with a hint of social commentary, the construction site in question is the London 2012 Olympic Velodrome.
Shortly after Bill's release he is deposited unconscious onto Dean and Jimmy's sofa, Bill's old friends do a good job of celebrating his return by helping him get totally inebriated. Dean and Bill instantly clash, Dean clearly blaming his father for, in his eyes, abandoning them. The animosity intensifies when Bill later highlights the boy's living arrangements to the social services leading to a rather awkward home visit.
Bill is at first a reluctant father, uninterested in taking care of the boys and anxious to get away from his old criminal life, planning to move up north for work and a new start. Dean manages to blackmail him into staying though, at least until the social services are off their backs.
The remainder of the film follows a path that is perhaps not too difficult to predict, with Bill upsetting the apple cart by refusing to get back involved with his old friends' criminal activities, Dean and Jimmy reconnecting with their father and a slight romantic sub-plot between Bill and local prostitute Roxy (Liz White). The film rests not on dramatic twists and turns though but on a slow and engrossing story that pulls you into the world in which the main protagonists and a number of side characters (populated by very recognisable British actors) live. This is done with expediency and an economy that ensures that a lot of the characters really get under your skin without the film feeling crowded or over-reaching.
The way in which the actors inhabit their roles is also essential to this investment and there are many performances to commend here. Poulter is perhaps most noteworthy, unsurprising to anyone who has seen his impressive debut in Son of Rambow in 2007, but Liz White is also excellent in a role that could have so easily been a simple stereotype. The way her character is drawn has subtlety and she brings a lot of warmth to the role.
Fletcher perhaps lives up to a widely held belief here about the ability of actor turned directors to coax strong performances out of actors but a lot of the groundwork is clearly already there in the script (written by Fletcher and Danny King). Fletcher's direction is also mostly very competent with the film feeling entirely cinematic, no complaints here about this looking like an ITV drama, but retaining an intimate and small scale approach. Cinematographer George Richmond does excellent work too, helping give the film a look of its own and technically notable shots such as a long tracking shot early on, which weaves through their flat and the corridor outside, belie the low budget roots of the film but are appropriate to the content, not simply grandstanding.
Far removed from the nonsensical and childishly excessive gangster films that have clogged up DVD shelves in the UK, particularly in the wake of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (in which Fletcher starred), Wild Bill is a convincing and absorbing drama and an impressive début feature.
Wild Bill is in UK cinemas now.
This review was originally posted at HeyUGuys.co.uk - Mar 21, 12
Into a quiet diner walks Mallory Kane (Gina Carano). Following shortly behind her is Aaron (Channing Tatum). Mallory is quick to see him arrive and we get the impression instantly that Mallory is a hyper alert character, Carano conveying this through small physical inflections. Aaron and Mallory clearly have history and as the two begin to talk it is clear that Aaron wants her to leave with him but Mallory's not interested. The situation quickly escalates beyond this almost light hearted argument into the two having a full blown physical fight.
The fight is brutal, faces are pounded and bones crunch, but it's also beautifully choreographed, expertly performed and shot and edited with the utmost skill and scalpel-like precision. Using a number of different set-ups Soderbergh, editing the film under one of his usual aliases, cuts between them with enough speed to ensure the sequence is dynamic but slow enough to ensure one's eyes take in all the necessary information.
The scene is something of a masterclass in the way in which action can be shot and edited, and it doesn't hurt that Carano, the star of the scene and the film, is an accomplished MMA fighter.
Mallory is a covert operative employed by an agency whose client book includes the US government. The agency frequently carry out jobs that the government would rather not get their hands dirty doing themselves and Mallory quickly comes to the government's attention. Prior to their confrontation in the diner Aaron and Mallory worked together on a hostage rescue in Barcelona, work that their handler Kenneth (Ewan McGregor) won from US government employer Coblenz (Michael Douglas). Since the mission a lot has changed though, Mallory has 'gone rogue' and her former employers are hot on her heels. Following her escape from Aaron, Mallory steals a car, taking its owner Scott (Michael Angarano) hostage. She then begins to tell Scott all the details that led her to where she is now and the film shifts into a series of flashbacks that make up the bulk of the film.
The script, penned by Lem Dobbs (The Limey), is economical enough to ensure that the film, which is at its heart a fast-paced action thriller, never gets bogged down in overly complex plotting but it's also intricate enough to keep one interested and invested in what is transpiring. Various puzzle pieces slowly fall into place and as the full picture is revealed there are twists and turns but no huge surprises. As we gradually learn what has occurred though we are slowly pulled closer and closer to Mallory's character, investing more in her plight as we do so.
Carano's performance as Mallory, her first major role, is highly commendable and whilst she brings all that is needed to the stunning action sequences it is in some of the more subtle moments that she really impresses. A cracked smile or quizzical eyebrow at the right moment is enough to communicate everything we need to know and feel and the film is filled with silent communicative moments that work extraordinarily well both on a character and story level.
Carano is also surrounded by a number of excellent actors in supporting roles, including, in addition to those already mention; Bill Paxton, Antonio Banderas, Mathieu Kassovitz and the ever reliable Michael Fassbender.
The fight in a hotel room between Carano and Fassbender, which has been at the centre of the film's marketing, is truly extraordinary and a high point amidst a number of excellent physical sequences. Their relationship, two spies thrown together and made to play at being a couple, makes for some interesting and playful interplay between the two but there is more going on beneath the surface. Haywire is filled with subtle genre twists, evidence that Dobbs and Soderbergh are having fun subverting expectations somewhat, and the way in which the film's script deals with the gender of the lead character is also more densely interesting than it may first appear.
When Kenneth (McGregor) comments "Don't think of her as a woman, that would be a mistake." the dialogue is making explicit an area for discussion that runs throughout Haywire. Carano is, for instance, as forceful beating Aaron to the ground as she is when she pulls him towards her and kisses him in a flashback to Barcelona. She's in charge and dominant.
Mallory is not a simple ass-kicking alpha female though, a common archetype that is so often just a male stereotype in the skin of a female action hero, and there are crucial moments when her fragility and emotional range is evident. She is hurt at times, both emotionally and physically, revealing a more complex and truer depth to her character. Haywire is not a heavy-handed essay piece though, it's a super slick action movie which is just thankfully as intelligently thought out as it is entertaining.
Smart, stylish and incredibly well crafted, Haywire is as ludicrously pleasing to the eye as the best of Soderbergh's recent work and even if you don't engage with the intriguing thematic subtext the film is a thrilling and riveting action spectacle with plenty of jaw-dropping action set pieces.
Haywire is in UK cinemas now. - Feb 03, 12
With the release of OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies in 2006 Michel Hazanavicius and the seemingly effortlessly charismatic Jean Dujardin looked set for global domination and a real crossover into the mainstream cinema-goer's consciousness. Outside of France OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies, and the equally smart and entertaining sequel OSS 117 - Lost in Rio (2009), never seemed to really break out in the way that they perhaps should have done though.
Despite some incredibly witty and biting satire and a glorious cinephilic approach to filmmaking, the OSS films seem to have been regarded as little more than Bond parodies in the vein of the dreadful Austin Powers films, a misunderstanding not helped by the lack of awareness outside of France of the original OSS films.
Michel Hazanavicius and Jean Dujardin have reunited yet again though and this time their cinematic playground is not the cult Eurospy films of the sixties but the better known, certainly in the US and UK, Hollywood of the twenties. In particular The Artist centres on the dying embers of the silent film period in Hollywood and the birth of the 'talkies'.
Setting The Artist in twenties Hollywood Hazanavicius again re-creates a period not just within the verisimilitude of everything we see on screen, the costume design and so on, but also in his technical approach. The most obvious signs of this are of course in the academy ratio framing throughout and the absence, for the post part, of synced sound but there are also a number of subtle and expertly applied techniques too.
The period detailing is always present in the composition and also in the way in which the camera moves, or significantly doesn't, constantly conveying a sense of time and place through stylistic choices. There are allusions to other films too, although these are not always quite so rooted to this exact period in Hollywood's history, including an amusing nod to the famous breakfast table sequence in Citizen Kane. There is even one sequence in which Hazanavicius cleverly incorporates footage from The Mask of Zorro and the extent to which this appears so naturally part of the film is a testament to Hazanavicius' technical adherence to the period and Dujardin's spot on performance, and slight similarity to Fairbanks.
Dujardin and co-star Berenice Bejo are also quite extraordinary in the way in which they so convincingly capture a very particular performance style prevalent in the late Twenties in Hollywood. Aside from the temporal specificity in their physical performances, an expertly placed hand on a hip here or an eyebrow raised there, both manage to convey all that is required wordlessly. Silent film stars' rather 'large' performances have become something that is somewhat mocked in some sectors of popular culture but there is no sense of cruel parody here, this is a loving tribute and an attentive pastiche.
The Artist goes beyond pastiche though, 100 minutes of which could have simply been one gag drawn out too far, and tells a grand and very beautiful story. Whilst the coming of sound and backstage Hollywood machinations provide a framework for the film narratively, and provide an interesting and absorbing context, the meat of the story is in the romance between George Valentin (Dujardin) and Peppy Miller (Bejo) and as this difficult and complicated relationship unfolds over many years one becomes invested in their lives and emotions whilst at the same time gripped by the story of the coming of sound.
The Artist is not at its core a cinematic essay piece or simply an indulgent slice of self-reflexism but an intoxicating story told with skill and humour. The final moments in the film blend the two intertwined narratives, the romance and the move of Hollywood to sound, wonderfully in a climatic scene that showcases Dujardin and Bejo's talents even further and brings to a close this joyous and beautiful tale.
The Artist will be released in UK cinemas on the 30th of December. - Jan 20, 12
Director Hong-jin Na made something of a splash with his début film, The Chaser, in 2008 and the film quickly brought him to the attention of Hollywood with Warner Brothers buying up the remake rights to The Chaser for $1 million.
Hong-jin Na's latest, The Yellow Sea, is also the first Korean film to receive investment from a major Hollywood, with Fox International reaching into their deep pockets to contribute to the project. The Yellow Sea is very much a Korean production though with Hong-jin bringing back the same cast and crew for his second film and swimming in very familiar waters to his début both in terms of the genre and the way in which he approaches it stylistically.
The Yellow Sea crosses back and forth across the titular sea, between the Korean Autonomous Prefecture of Yanbian and Seoul in South Korea. Much like the border crossing narrative the lead character, Gu-nam (Ha Jung-woo), is a man divided both by his citizenship (Korean-Chinese, a so-called Joseonjok), by his desire to stay in Yanji City but also to travel to find his wife in Korea and also in his reluctance to break the law clashing with his need to.
After accumulating large gambling debts, and desperate to find his wife, he 'excepts' an offer to travel to Seoul. There he is supposed to carry out a hit on someone, thereby wiping his debts. This hit is not the simple job that was sold to him though and very quickly he finds himself on the run, pursued by gangsters and the police, all the while still trying to track down his absent wife.
The tricksy plot surrounding the hit is certainly engrossing, as is the search for his wife, but it is the grimy and violent action that provides the real meat of the film. None of the action is glamorous or balletic in any way though, the characters in The Yellow Sea fight dirty and they fight with whatever comes to hand, mostly knives and axes, and when vehicles come into play there is more crashing and breaking windows than there are handbrake turns or speeding sports cars.
Whilst this action and the twisting but forward propelled narrative are often gripping and entirely compelling, the pacing across this 140 minute film (the domestic version adds a further 17 minutes) is problematic and occasionally threatens to drag the film down entirely. The film too often stops and starts when moving between scenes and differing types of sequences, slow dramatic scenes then energetic action sequences, drama then action and so on and so on. This lack of fluidity is definitely an issue but luckily the various parts that make up the whole are largely fantastic and the film is mostly a solid and entertaining thriller, just one occasionally saddled somewhat by pacing issues.
The Yellow Sea played as part of the London Korean Film Festival 2011 and will be available to buy on Blu-ray from February 2012. - Jan 10, 12
With startling special effects and a convincing portrayal of an imagined future it is easy to discuss Silent Running simply within the context of being an accomplished science fiction film, but like the best that science fiction has to offer Silent Running is far deeper than its outward appearance may suggest.
That is not to say that the special effects and so on are not important and worthy of high praise. Director and special effects supervisor Douglas Trumbull, hot on the back of 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Andromeda Strain, managed to create physical special effects that even today look entirely convincing and natural to their surroundings. The biodomes that are so important to protagonist Freeman Lowell (Bruce Dern), and in many ways the human race as a whole, look less futuristic now than they may have done in 1972 (visitors to domes such as the Eden Project in Cornwall will attest to this I'm sure) but the image of these fragile structures floating in space is a powerful science fiction image, and it is one that has all the more impact due to Trumbull's impressive use of miniatures.
But it is scriptwriters Deric Washburn, Michael Cimino & Steven Bochco's emotional story of Freeman, the domes and his robot companions that makes Silent Running such a compelling and rewarding film. Filled with post-sixties rage about the destruction of the environment, the story of Silent Running is powerful, critical and prescient but crucially it is devastatingly heartbreaking.
Freeman Lowell is a complex and conflicted character and when he commits acts that in another context may seem unthinkable we understand his motivations and sympathise with what he is doing. Almost 40 years on it is hard to think of a more cogent film that tackles direct action and environmental concerns so thoughtfully and effectively. It's also still hard to find a more emotionally affecting science fiction film.
Silent Running makes its HD début here and it's an impressive one. Masters of Cinema have given the film a new lease of life with this HD transfer, which is stunning in its clarity and detail. Work has been done to restore damaged elements but this is all but impossible to see in the finished HD transfer. Grain is intact, appearing a little too heavy in the brighter scenes perhaps, and apart from a couple of slightly smoother sequences (these are very short) the transfer is consistent and superb. The 2.0 audio track is also clear and seems far more dynamically wide and representative of the original track than the previously released UK DVD.
The booklet describes the technical breakdown of the process and elements used to produce the Blu-ray as follows:Silent Running appears in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1 with mono 2.0 sound. The film was transferred and graded in HD resolution from an interpositive 35mm source element made in 1996 and supplied by NBC / Universal, USA. Further restoration work was completed at Deluxe 142, London. Picture issues such as dirt, light scratches, and debris as well as warped, damaged, or unstable frames were removed or improved upon using a combination of HD-DVNR, Phoenix, and MTI systems. For this Blu-ray, we encoded in 1080 / 24p using theAVC codec.
Special Features:
Full-length commentary by director Trumbull and actor Bruce Dern - Trumbull and Dern obviously still hold a lot of affection for Silent Running and this helps make for a warm and enjoyable commentary. The pair provide a lot of interesting production information and this coupled with their obvious enthusiasm for the film 28 years on (this commentary was recorded in 2000) helps make this a must listen special feature.
Isolated music and effects track - A feature I've never really found essential myself but it is a nice addition regardless, especially considering how wonderful much of the score, soundtrack and the sound effects are.
The Making of Silent Running, a 1972 on-set documentary [50:00] - A great overview of Silent Running's production with a lot of behind-the-scenes information.
Two video pieces with Douglas Trumbull [31:00 + 5:00] - The longer interview segment focuses on Silent Running's production and the shorter has Trumbull talking about his career in general. The latter, despite its short length, is fantastic and definitely one of the highlights of the extras.
A Conversation with Bruce Dern, a discussion with the actor [11:00] - More from Dern on the making of Silent Running and getting the part.
Original theatrical trailer [3:00]
A lavish 48-page full-colour booklet featuring rare photographs and artwork from Trumbull's personal collection, and recollections of the film's cinematographer, special designs coordinator, and composer. - MoC's booklets are always of a particularly high standard and the one that accompanies this disc is no exception. The photographs and artwork included are a particular treat, both contextually interesting and beautiful.
Silent Running is available to buy from the 14th of November.
Read more about the Masters of Cinema Series at Bleeding Cool. - Dec 16, 11
Anyone who has already seen Masaki Kobayashi's 1962 film Harakiri, of which this film is very much a remake, will very quickly realise when watching Miike's 2011 update that little in the story has been changed but whilst the mechanics of the story are unchanged Miike makes significant changes in the way this story is told.
Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai begins with Kageyu (Koji Yakusho), the head of the House of Li, telling Hanshiro (Ebizo Ichikawa) the tale of Motome (Eita), a samurai who arrived at the gates of the House of Li asking for the use of their courtyard to commit ritual suicide (Harakiri, or actually more accurately Seppuku).
Hanshiro is requesting this very same thing and it is clear that Kageyu is attempting to offer Hanshiro a warning. Motome had no intention of actually going through with the suicide and was actually attempting a 'suicide bluff', a newly popular technique of extracting money from the wealthy houses, who would give the desperate samurai money and send them on their way.
The early seventeenth century in Japan (the beginning of the Edo period), the time at which the film is set, was a period of difficulty for samurai who were largely unneeded. Without a war to fought many found themselves without retainers and therefore penniless. This 'suicide bluff' was therefore a way for a desperate masterless samurai to get his hands on some money when he was in direst need. The House of Li are aware of this growing trend and, suspecting that this is exactly what Motome is up to, decide to make an example of this latest chancer. Motome is scared and bullied into committing suicide in the courtyard and has to do so with a bamboo sword, having sold his own sword and replaced it with a bamboo replica, an effort to save face.
This moment of brutality, as Motome repeatedly thrusts the inadequate weapon into his stomach, is the only point in Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai in which Miike presents us with gory violence, the kind that many would probably be expecting in this follow-up to his 2010 film 13 Assassins. Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai is very different film from 13 Assassins and this blood heavy sequence is included in an effort to emotionally confront the viewer, to make it clear what a deeply unpleant act this is. The sequence is much longer and graphic than the equivalent sequence in Kobayashi's original but it is perhaps necessary here, in order to provoke such a strong reaction in some modern audiences.
Returning to Hanshiro and Kageyu the story then continues with Hanshiro seated in the courtyard, ready to commit seppuku. His final request though is for a particular second (the one who decapitates him following his disembowelment at his own hands) but neither this choice or either of his other two choices are available that day. As messengers are dispatched to find them Hanshiro begins telling his own tale, the story of Motome pre-suicide. Motome was actually his adopted son and ultimately son-in law and the story he tells is a very sad one, told entirely in flashback and with a sensitive touch from writer Kikumi Yamagishi and director Takashi Miike.
The unfolding narrative summarised above, and the subsequent developments in the story, are without doubt the greatest strength in Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai and they are as compellingly told here as they were by Shinobo Hashimoto and Masaki Kobayashi in 1962. A key difference between the original and this 2011 remake is the visual approach though. One fascinating aspect of Kobayashi's film was the cinematography, particularly the use of vertical and horizontal lines to divide the characters in the courtyard scenes, and the contrasting approach in the flashback scenes, less harsh delineations and more slow-moving camerawork. Miike takes this same idea in the courtyard scenes, demarcation and visual division, but uses an entirely different technique.
In Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai this is achieved stereoscopically, the characters divided by their position on the positive or negative parallax of the 3D image (mostly using the positive - appearing as if behind the screen). This coupled with a minor use of vertical and horizontal lines in the set design leads to a startlingly effective but relatively subtle result. Aside from being incredibly pleasing to the eye and simple to understand visually, this manipulation of the image enforces the separation between the standing of various characters and, perhaps most effectively, strongly separates Hanshiro from the other characters in the courtyard. He appears alone but, more and more as the story develops, defiant and a lone voice amongst many. Mirrored in the narrative that unfolds this is conveyed visually with his placement in the 3D image, a startling and incredibly impressive example of the capabilities of 3D technology.
This impressive use of 3D continues throughout Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai, in particular in the use of extreme depth of field and an interesting type of 'close ups' in a number of scenes, notably including interior scenes. One common comment regarding the 3D in Avatar was that the 3D was much 'better' in the exterior scenes on Pandora and while this could perhaps be based more on the visual extravagance of the Pandora scenes there are issues in some of the interior scenes, mostly with objects or side characters seemingly incorrectly taking prominence in a scene (stereoscopically speaking). This is not an issue in Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai as at any one time one's eyes are tracking to the 'correct' part of the frame, particularly in scenes in which a character is strongly emoting and this their face should be the entire focus of our attention.
Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai is ultimately a film that focuses heavily on the character's emotions, an investment in their plight is crucial to the twisting and intriguing narrative having the necessary impact, and it is in the aforementioned interesting type of 'close ups' that the 3D technology again achieves something quite special. Characters seems to stand out from the backgrounds, their faces coming to the forefront and holding our concentration. Conventionally this would be achieved with a close up but here Miike shoots wider but achieves the same effect with the background appearing far into positive space and the character's face standing out against it. It is not, it is perhaps important to note, done by placing the character far into negative space. In fact, negative space is used with great restraint and is used more to enhance the extended depth of field and never to make objects or characters fly out at you.
Due to the prominence of characters' faces within the image and the nature of the story a lot of weight rests on the shoulders of the actors and they all equip themselves adequately, a lot of the work is perhaps done in their casting more than anything else though. That said, Ebizo Ichikawa is excellent as Hanshiro and despite playing the same role made famous by the wonderful Tatsuya Nakadia, Ichikawa is very memorable in this new version of the story, making the role very much his own.
Whilst Miike's Har-Kiri: Death of a Samurai may be lacking some of the political urgency that Kobayashi brought to the table in 1962, especially in Kobayashi's use of the film to explore untrustworthy and morally bankrupt leaders and the Japanese concept of honne and tatamae (public perception versus the truth) , Miike has lost none of the classical beauty of this compelling story. Also, with the decision to film Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai in 3D he has employed some stunning visual techniques and found a new and highly effective way to tell this story. - Dec 10, 11
Joyce McKinney is a woman with a lot of love to give and in 1977 she found a man to devote herself to completely. This man was Kirk Anderson and according to Joyce the two fell madly in love. The only problem was that Kirk Anderson was a Mormon and following their whirlwind romance Kirk 'disappeared'. The circumstances surrounding Kirk's disappearance are the first of many situations in which the real story is almost impossible to discern. It later appeared to transpire that Kirk had moved to the UK for Mormon missionary work but Joyce was adamant that he had been kidnapped and taken to the UK against his will.
Hiring a private investigator, a pilot and bodyguards she traveled to find Kirk, liberate him from the Mormon church and continue their relationship. Liberate him she did, and not just from the church. Hiding out in a cottage in Devon Joyce seduced/raped Kirk (what actually occurred is less than clear) and tied him up with rope (the reporter for The Mirror points out that 'chains' sounds better) in the process. These three days of sex in the countryside led to confusion in the media over what actually happened, Joyce's subsequent arrest and tabloid papers going crazy with phrases such as 'The Manacled Mormon' and 'Mormon Sex in Chains'.
Following her arrest and release on bail the tabloid's helped make her a star as she was photographed kissing Keith Moon and even upstaging Joan Collins at the premiere of The Stud. Joyce clearly didn't need much help to capture the public's attention though with comments in court about Kirk such as "I love him so much that I would ski naked down Mount Everest with a carnation up my nose if he asked me to". Joyce is an eccentric and incredibly engaging character and it is her somewhat unhinged behavior mixed with wit and intelligence that is at the center of the story in Tabloid.
The story of Tabloid goes off in a variety of strange directions though with developments in Joyce's life that defy belief. The final act in particular comes almost out of nowhere and Joyce's most recent tabloid notoriety is for a reason almost impossible to guess. Even this strange twist in the tale though, which might on the surface appear inconsequential, is important in unraveling Joyce's unique world view. There is also a highly revealing sequence in which Morris presents footage filmed by Joyce in which she films the same thing multiple times, subtlety shifting the meaning each time. As Joyce perhaps significantly comments, if you keep repeating a lie you begin to believe it's the truth.
Despite the lightweight nature of Tabloid, all of Morris' obsessions are here and the tone feels perfectly pitched to the subject matter. The intense investigation and almost clinical study on show in Standard Operating Procedure, for instance, may seem far from the fun of Tabloid but many of the same themes are explored and the films have a lot more in common than one would first imagine. One example of a similar key theme is the 'truth' of images and the way in which Morris explores the way journalists report on 'facts' they uncover is at the heart of both films.
There is a particularly amusing moment when The Mirror journalist (Kent Gavin), who covered the story, describes Kirk as being chained up and "Spread-Eagled". He repeats this phrase a number of times and to add further emphasis (in part for comic effect) and to highlight the way Gavin relishes the phrase, Morris flashes the text "Spread-Eagled" on screen. The moment gets a big laugh but this laugh has a lot to do with the audience understanding the way the journalist is deliberately sensationalizing the story and the way in which Morris is mocking him by taking this even further. This technique returns throughout the film and Morris uses text and images to compare and contrast with what his interviewees are saying.
The interviews themselves are also clearly heavily edited. This has a lot to do with pacing, the film is beautifully paced, but in this editing Morris is also constantly manipulating the footage to convey precisely the message he wants to convey. The 'joke' inherent here though is that this kind of manipulation of the truth is exactly what the film is so often a commentary on. Unlike Kent Gavin though Morris is not a slave (Gavin admits this is what he was) to Joyce and the story she wants to present. Presenting Joyce early on as intelligent (with an IQ of 168) and not the ditzy beauty queen that a lot of journalists may have taken her for, it becomes clear that control of the story is in the hands of Morris this time around.
Tabloid is without doubt the funniest of Morris' documentaries but the light hearted surface level belies a film that is as complex and fascinating as any of his previous films.
Tabloid is released in UK cinemas on the 11th of November. - Nov 25, 11
The third in Shion Sono's thematically linked 'Hate Trilogy' (following Love Exposure and Cold Fish), Guilty of Romance centres on on a female protagonist, Izumi (Megumi Kagurazaka), who goes on an intense journey of liberation and destruction through sexual transgression.
Izumi's transformative adventure is set against the backdrop of a criminal investigation into the murder of beautiful woman who has been mutilated, a number of her body parts swapped with those of a doll and others (including her clitoris) removed completely. Sono's certainly not a master of subtlety but he does know how to explore a fascinating topic in a provocative and compelling manner.
Stifled by her marriage to a popular writer (played with restraint and poise by Kanj Tsuda), and bored with her monotonous and dull day to day life, Izumi gets one part time job handing out sausage samples and another posing for photos. The former leads to exactly the kind of Carry On-esque innuendos that may be flooding your brain and the latter predictably (this is a Sono film after all) turns into a softcore, then ultimately hardcore, porn shoot.
The coercion of Izumi in the photo shoot to gradually reveal more and more skin until she ends up having sex on camera is a very tricky scene but one that is handled well by Sono. It is also a microcosm of the larger themes explored throughout Guilty of Romance, as Izumi gradually 'finds herself' through engaging in sexual activities, often seemingly against her will at first, although the nature of her character makes this consent complex, intriguing and very occasionally troubling.
Surrounding Izumi are those that want to exploit her and also those that seemingly want to free her from her repressed and resolutely patriarchal lifestyle. Izumi is almost certainly intended to be emblematic of a wider picture that Sono sees in Japanese society and even perhaps in the Japanese media, both the AV (Adult Video) Idol scene and the more mainstream film industry.
Filled with fascinating thematic strands, Sono's conclusion to his loose trilogy is bold and brutal, another compelling and dark tale that fulfils the promise of much of his earlier work. With new attention paid to more restraint in the filmmaking this is one of his most satisfyingly constructed films but still yet another thrilling entry in Sono's increasingly potent body of work.
It's worth noting that the version of the film reaching UK cinemas is the 'international cut', which is roughly thirty minutes shorter than the extended domestic cut.Sono has allegedly stated that he prefers this shorter cut and whilst the scenes cut (mostly surrounding the police investigation and the sex life of the main investigator) do sound intriguing, the shorter cut of Guilty of Romance is lean and far better paced than most other Sono films. Those wanting to see the international cut too are in luck though as this will be included on the UK Blu-ray, out on November the 28th.
Guilty of Romance is released in selected UK cinemas on the 30th of September.
Find more of Craig's reviews at HeyUGuys. - Nov 17, 11
Set in Austin, Texas Red White & Blue first introduces us to Erica (Amanda Fuller), a seriously emotionally damaged person, who appears to be sleeping her way through every male she meets in Austin bars and her new workplace. She finds the job in said workplace thanks to her new neighbour Nate (Noah Taylor) who claims to have a semi-mysterious past working for the US military and clearly harbours disturbing predilections towards violence. This is heavily hinted at when he talks about his childhood in a scene that intriguingly foreshadows a lot of the events in the film's final act. The third character that completes the trio of central protagonists is Franki (Marc Senter), a struggling musician who picks up Erica (although perhaps it's actually the other way around) in a bar and and spends the night with her and his two band mates.
The first third of the film is distinctly Erica's story and the whole film could have easily hung on just the minimal plot developments here, aided by Amanda Fuller's truly stunning performance. Fuller was probably FanTasia Film Festival's greatest revelation for me when I first saw the film there last year, with her brave and impressive performance totally blowing me away. Also crucial to the success of these early sequences is Rumley's early-Linklater approach to the direction. Slacker is a film that instantly comes to mind in the film's first thirty minutes with the shot composition in particular sharing distinct similarities. The film as a whole also bears obvious comparisons to the work of Peckinpah and Larry Clark but Rumley moves outside of these inspirations and the film is, in many ways, uniquely his.
After the introduction of Erica and Nate the film then takes a complete turn and switches to follow Franki's narrative arc. Franki's mother is dying of cancer and he looks after her relatively alone, echoing Rumley's earlier film The Living and the Dead, whilst trying to get his band off the ground. It is hard to say too much about this section or the final act without giving away too much but suffice to say things do not go well for Franki. The final act is then when we see the film turn more towards horror and Rumley plays with the conventions of vengeance in films and also particularly the rape-revenge film. At the core of Red White & Blue though is a tragic and affecting love story that has genuine emotional depth.
The violence and bloodshed in the final act feels entirely narratively justified by the earlier scenes and the emotional investment that Rumley ensures an audience succumbs to gives the film a punch to the gut, an impact so rarely felt in contemporary cinema.
Shot by cinematographer Milton Kam in just 18 days, over 27 locations and on the Red digital camera, there is an effective reliance on intimate natural lighting and the film is visually impressive. In addition to the lighting, the aforementioned composition is also incredibly important in setting the tone and upsetting the mood in key sequences. The editing and direction are almost perfectly economical and even the occasional editing flourish works well within the narrative, only adding to the economy of not telling the audience how to think or feel but simply presenting the story effectively.
Red White & Blue is emotionally engaging, visually stunning and more arresting with each passing minute.
Red White & Blue is released in limited UK cinemas on the 30th of September and on DVD and Blu-ray on the 10th of October.
Find more of Craig's reviews at HeyUGuys.
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- Tickets secured for John Zorn's 60th at the Barbican. The programme looks extraordinary.
- @lolcatcat It occurred to me today whilst listening to Mojo Nixon that you might not be aware of this song: http://t.co/t6noVtVcmu
- @adamhopelies Just looking through it now. Really impressed mate. Great work.
- @Oog Food miles are a little misleading I think. The carbon footprint calculations are more telling.
- @Oog I like quinoa. Plus it's a NASA certified space food.
- @chrisblohm There are films on the beach and you can buy tickets to the Director's Fortnight screenings.
- @Zack_Parks @joshbrunsting I've been given a similar warning when walking into an interview. *cough* Norton *cough* Hulk *cough*
- @adlow76 It actually gets better too. I thought it was pretty serviceable. Better than number two.
- @ryangallagher But...but... Seriously? Do you read it because you find it amusing or as an interesting film blog? Or something else?
- I know Hollywood Elsewhere/Wells has always been bad but I swear it's getting worse.
- Crazy Wells crosses people who stick their feet out off his Christmas card list http://t.co/zVhkV03PYZ
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- The complete list of 55 EA iPhone & iPad games reduced or free right now: http://t.co/Mh3n4aX7l7
- Cheap in the UK too... RT: @ryangallagher: Lots of iOS games on sale for 99¢ “#MacStoriesDeals – Wednesday” ➟ http://t.co/aVGn9nLWqy
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- @adlow76 Cheesy potatoes, cabbage and pasta.
- Just made Pizzoccheri (slightly adapted) for the first time. Tasty and great comfort food for a cold night.
- Counted 13 acts that I would actually be interested in seeing at Glastonbury. The line up continues to be pretty uninspired. ATP is better.
