Cinecism

Welcome, Foolish Mortals!

2011-05-11T08:19:00.001-07:00

...on the other hand, I thought The Haunted Mansion was AMAZING.

Which just goes to show how far expectations and the reasons why you see a film influence your feelings.

Full disclaimer - oh boy, do I love that ride! I dream about it. All the time. Last month, I almost signed up to go work at Disney just to be closer. Instead, I chose to buy this film - this awful, awful film - to sate the addiction for just a little longer.

It cost me 0.01p. One careful previous owner (who hadn't thrown it across the room in disgust)

So. The script is very disappointing - much in need of some proper jokes. The two funny house-servants weren't funny. The kids were totally undercharacterised. But apart from that, it wasn't so bad.

I guess its failure comes from the ride itself. The concept behind the Pirates of the Carribbean is "THERE ARE PIRATES!". Within that framework, Elliot and Rossio wove a wide (and witty) story, taking the odd stopoff for Tortuga or a dog with a key, but mostly using the ride simply for tone. I don't know it so well, but I warrant there weren't nearly as many references. Jack, Elizabeth and the Other One are characters invented; so is Barbossa, the monkey, and the haunted gold. They've taken the concept of "piraty things" and expanded it into a story.

Mansion movie is too much like the ride - the house remains the main character, and the film merely serves to give you the guided tour. No wonder Murphy plays a real estate agent. Like Pirates, it has no clear canon or tale - simply a jumble of creepies. Unlike Pirates, though, fanboys have assembled it into stories - it is the fanboys, for example, who took the name Master Gracey off a headstone, made him the portrait in the foyer, and then the master of the house. And unlike Pirates, the writers have taken those stories and tried to make them into plot.

I'm kinda surprised the Mansion-fans hated it. Oh look, the brides chamber! The coffin conservatory! The breathing doors! The Doombuggy approach makes it a very bad film indeed, as the characters shuffle through to show off the next archetectural wonder. But if you're watching cus you can't afford a Magic Kingdom season pass? Next best thing. It's even better if you play it with other Mansion nerds (if you can get them out of their basements) and keep score of trivia. Did you know that the red couch was originally in Disney's 54' 20000 Leagues Under the Sea?

In fact, imdb has a whole list:

the singing busts
the breathing door (even the doorknob is the same) (wow! fancy that!)
Madame Leota (and the spectral instruments)
the busts that follow Jim
the ghostly carriage (a prop outside the ride)
the old man and the dog in the cemetery
Master Gracy's hanging (oh, but I thought that was the narrator and not Gracey! Oh woes!)
the ghostly ballroom dancers
the Raven seen throughout the movie (which - bonus points! - was part of the original concept for the Mansion...)
the hitchhiking ghosts
the hangman
the eyes in some of the walls
morphing pictures in the hallway
several lines throughout the movie that are also used in the ride's narration, such as: "Welcome, foolish mortals", "Final arrangements have been made", "There's always my way"
the floating candelabra in the credits
the bride's dress in the attic
the screeching cat sound effect in graveyard scene (Whoah, I just lost nerd points! I didn't notice this at all! Also, what bloody screeching cat? Who rides the Mansion so seriously that they can identify a screeching cat? I never heard it!)
the skeleton's hands that start to open coffin in the mausoleum
the knights in the hallway attacking Jim
the door knockers heard rapping in the bedroom hallway
the pipe-organ in the ballroom
the clock strikes 13 during the prologue

They forgot to mention the help's costume design. And so on...

What it might hold for someone unable to squeal "oooh, the original Mark Davis concept art!", I don't know. 'Cus honestly, the hitchhiking ghosts aren't very funny if you don't go "the hitchiking ghosts!" Madame Leota is simultaneously under-exposed herself and over-provides exposition for others in what looks like a big narrative misstep - if you're not going "Madame Leota!" And WTF are there dancing instruments in her room?

On the other hand, if you're a Mansion fan there are only three serious complaints to make:

no stretching gallery?
no decent image of the iconic eye wallpaper?
not coherent with my personal mythology!

and if you really want to earn a slap from your fellow mortals (of the non-foolish variety):

no Hatbox Ghost!

There's more than enough eye-candy to keep ones critical faculties dimmed, and I passed a gleeful hour and a half watching it.

What did I want? That atmosphere. That moment when you step from Florida heat into a chill-cold parlour, and the sticky children and Mickey-tat are entirely left behind. Time spent absorbing the atmosphere. Watching out for new gags, new surprises. This? The film delivers in spades. I wanted my ride. I got it.

And if you're not a fan but you do like pretty, then oh! Costumes! Sets! Particularly sets! Some poor makeup though. And there is a good story in there, somewhere, even if you do need to work hard to find it. I'm a sucker for the central romance - I thought Mrs Evers one of the better characters. Loved Gracey and Ramsley. Why couldn't we have had more of those three, instead of kidnapping one for ages and mostly ignoring the other too. Although I'll be buried if that ending made any sense...are we meant to believe that, during eternity, Gracey never came across the letter? I know the building is big but still! True, he's depressed. Still! There are nine hundred and ninety seven other grim, grinning ghouls in there which might concieveably have ended up there too. Here's a better idea. Cus Ramsely is a poorass murderer if he's going to keep evidence in the victim's own house. Frankly he deserves to get caught.

I wonder whether Evers put "Deus Ex Fireplace" on the property listing?

Did love Ramsley, though, creepy old Terence Stamp! Fantastic character - the traditional Brit butler is a little dead, if only on the inside. And Master Gracey too, all emotion and Englishness and looking damn fine in a suit. "Was my crime to fall in love?" Aaaaaaaw.

Oh, I would have rewritten it in so many ways! What if Sara decided she loved Gracey, or had remembered being Elizabeth? That would have been good. I had so much more invested in that romance than the other. I wanted more of why the Graceys were in America. More of the interrelations between the ghosts - they've all been trapped their since the 18somethings, just because the Master couldn't get his act together. What intrigues and politics that would produce! More ghosts in general: the house seemed so empty in those huge rooms, and not in an "isolated!" way. In an "we could only afford eight actors" way. 999 ghosts, remember? That's lots.

And Eddie Murphey was - not-terrible. Had expected the worst. In fact, he just did the best with the material and, given that we've seen the Workaholic Father a billion times before, produced a rounded and solid performance. Not special, but I put that down to the script. No one had anything to work with.

But what I really want to know is....was Elizabeth's music box, with the mirror and spinning maquettes, a tribute to the Pepper's Ghost ballroom? I'll get my coat. Oh Lord, I want to watch it again. Bring on the del Toro reboot, and quick!

Do The Right Thing

2011-05-11T06:30:00.000-07:00

Cinecism is having one of those wonderful mornings when you're having a good sort out, and you suddenly finda copy of Do the Right Thing that you'd entirely forgotten purchasing. For a mere £3 at that!

'Twas curious. Clearly a debut, I loved the rule-breaking style - the totally unexpected dance-credit sequence, the colours, the close-up racist tirades. But I obviously missed something - perhaps I'm just 22 years too late. I felt like it used to be ground-breaking

It felt like a movie with a message, but it's not entirely clear what that message was. The ambivalence was underlined by first the photos, then the quotes of Martin Luther King and Malcom X. Two figures I do not know in detail, but I know that broadly MLK represented peaceful resistance, and MX advocated violence.

We're not meant to sympathise with John Tuturro or the cops, I guess. But what are we to make of Mookie? He's our touchstone character, and one that seemingly gets on with everyone in the neighbourhood, and yet I didn't see the character progression which lead to chucking bins through windows? I guess ground down by Pino's racism, perhaps? But still. What's the motivation? Being a big ole pacifist I loved the Mayor, and grew to love Sal. But why did the riot happen? Just the heat? After an hour of Sal saying how much he loved his neighbourhood, and Buggin' Out failing to garner support for a boycott, where did all those other people come from? Were we just meant to think "it's very hot + this resentment was there underneath"?

At the same time, I feel there were some characters who had a good point to make about race relations, but they were painted as idiots. Buggin' Out has a perspective worth exploring - while it's petty in part to protest about someone else's hall of fame, and his mode of dealing with it unproductive; nevertheless, the lack* of a black-owned, black-run space was also acknowledged within the film (by the three men sitting by the road among others), and I agree that there is something unecessarily antagonistic about a single-race hall of fame in a multi-racial neighbourhood. It's counterbalanced by Love Radio's "WE LOVE ROLL CALL" of great black musicians. One of the smartest scenes in the film depicts Pino struggling with the blackness of his heroes - they're not really black, he argues weakly. When Buggin' Out declares "man, fuck gentrification" - it's a hostile scene, which shows him in a poor light, but that's not to say there are genuine problems with gentrification.

Even before Radio Raheem's martyrdom, I felt he was a sympathetic character. At the same time, while I've a suspicion the radio was meant to represent black agency or something, and that Fight the Power was an expression of his hidden inner soul, in practice? Playing loud music in public is just rude and objectionable.

Are we meant to be confused? Is that the message? "Race - oh darn, what a mess!" Are there just no easy answers?

I wouldn't normally look so closely at the morals of a movie if I'd been enjoying it too. I enjoyed it in parts, and as is always the risk with a portmanteau, some stories interested more than others. Mayor's heroism warmed my little hippy soul, and his winter-non-romance with Mother Sister was dead cute. I couldn't believe that Sal's diner actually functioned as a real shop - I wouldn't eat at a place constantly underscored by shouty point-scoring and squabbling from the crew.

The chief problem for me is the - what we'll call T-patter - gets old quickly. This is unjust in the extreme - for one thing, Spike Lee precedes and obviously inspires Tarantino; for another, academics have convincingly argued that Tarantino's white characters hide "black bodies", or however that article puts it. But I can't help how I feel - this script doesn't have QT's wit or charm, and I kept tuning out of the irritatingly circular dialogue. Perhaps my strong association of it with Tarantino triggers in me the expectation of something throwaway and fun, and I found its juxtaposition with a serious drama too disorienting. Pino reminds me of Nice Guy Eddy - but without the humour, he merely retains the irritance factor. And this very early scene was almost a film-breaker for me:

Sal: Pino, get a broom and sweep out front.
Pino: Vito, get a broom and sweep out front.
Vito: Huh?
Pino: Get a broom and sweep out front.
Vito: What?
Pino: GET A BROOM AND SWEEP OUT FRONT.
Vito: See, Pop, it's just what I was telling ya, every time you tell Pino what to do, he tells me to do what you told him what to do.

It was this or Singing in the Rain...

Did like much of the music. At times, I felt the orchestral score was a bit slapped on, but the jazzier pieces (deriving from the song Summertime?) and pop tunes were great.

Two other thoughts:

I have been musing recently about "becoming black" or "becoming white". Pino sees himself as white, or whit-er than those around him but admires black culture; the Koreans defend their store by claiming they are black. In the past, "black" was used as this catchall category which included both the Jews and the Irish. An example from the 1850s -the Irish were often referred to as "Negroes turned inside out" and Negroes as "smoked Irish." Over time, these groups have "become" white. I still can't decide whether this is a step forward - at least we're more inclusive now! - or a step back - judging on appearance is very childish. It's probably just a step...
I expected death! In fact, this film is notable for having no guns, no knives, and only one murder.
Does Do The Right Thing qualify as a hood movie? If it does, it must be a very early one. I wrote a study of them two years back, investigating the trend from social debate ("Oh no! Look at the problems!") to entertainment ("Gonna shoot some people up!"), characterised by Boyz in the Hood (which I loved), Menace II Society (which I didn't see, but condemned all the same) and City of God, which struck me as the most offensive and objectionable film I'd ever seen. I chose to write the essay in part because I wanted to discuss depictions of violence, and partly because I was just so ANGRY about it.
As an early, pre-Boyz movie I'd warrant this was one of the more realistic. I was reminded of Bowling for Columbine, and Michael Moore's non-scientific juxtaposition of gun ownership and white paranoia about black youths. Because don't all black americans carry guns?! Shock! The only killing that goes on here is a case of police brutality. Good choice.

In all? Rather nihilistic, rather confusing, rather forgetteable. Pity.

*does Love Radio count, though?
becoming white quote: http://www.pitt.edu/~hirtle/uujec/white.html
Another perspective: https://usjamerica.wordpress.com/2009/04/11/becoming-white/

Breakfast academia

2011-04-21T15:50:00.000-07:00

All wars, past and present, have a cinematic touchstone for how they are portrayed. The First World War is written by Wilfred Owen - the pathos of men dying in trenches, the movies like cattle. World War two has a better time - it is appropriate to make Kelly's Heroes, say, adventure, derring-do, and patriotism - after all, we won! An easily villainised bad guy, perhaps, makes WW2 far more straightforward. Vietnam is harder to pin down, I admit.

My favourite war movie is the Dustwar - you know, almost contemporary, south of the Equator, realistic violence, vaguely factual? Stylistically, this is a war that happens on the television - lots of handheld, fuzzy footage. Dustwar movies are always, absolutely about "the other", and the keynote in these films is, I believe, "confusion". Some common themes:

How do we tell the bad guys from the good guys?
What are they saying?
Where are the weapons?
Is that car safe, or is it a car bomb?
Should we even be here?

Black Hawk Down - one of my favourites, and also one of the most shallow. American helicopter crashes in Mogadishu. Chaos reigns as the army decides to rescue their downed men. Then a second helicopter crashes.

It's not a particularly intelligent film - unlike most of these, it doesn't confront the entire problem of conflict, and is in its own way to be criticised for turning the enemy army into a faceless mass of shuffling zombies. There also is its strength, because it conveys the experience of being a soldier on the ground for a few hours - to whom I imagine the enemy are as impersonal as a telesales operator. It is powerful for ignoring Why We Are In Mogadishu entirely, and focusing on what a soldier experiences to survive the next three minutes - a balanced view would have weakened, not strengthened, this film's uniqueness.

This film elegantly illustrates my first point: physical confusion. They get lost, all the houses look the same, they get split up from one another. In fact, the first time I watched this with dad he drew me a map of Mogadishu so we could keep track. Black Hawk Down is about the horror of being lost in a strange place and unable to get physical bearings.

Is it just me, or are you really darn glad for the all-star cast? They're all scruffy men of the same age with identical clothes and hairstyles. Ridley Scott insisited they wear helmets with their character names on them, for the sake of the audience, even though this is inaccurate.

Now watch what I am about to do:

Three Kings - After the first Gulf War, four soldiers go on a private mission to steal Saddam's hidden gold. Sorted! But Three Kings is about moral confusion, as they gradually get drawn into the plight of the abandoned locals.

I mean, it's not that confusing. After about 20 minutes, Clooney decides he's too beautiful to be brutal and starts saving women and children. So at it's core, there is a pretty comforting white narrative to enjoy. But the film points to its ambiguities - the American army are pulling out, with orders not to help the locals, even while our heroes can see that's wrong. Head torturer turns out to be a decent chap who was just following orders. And the moral journey of the heroes is headlined: it is Barlow who is keenest to abandon Amir who they have just rescued from electroshock torture in a bunker, because his survival is incidental. He gets his comeuppance: later the rebels sort-of attack the soldiers in his area, but only to steal a truck, and Barlow is left with the same torturer in a different bunker.

It's not quite that obvious when you're watching. Honest. Other great confusions - the gas bomb which separates the group because they cannot see; Barlow attempting to shoot an Iraqi not realising he is an ally; the torturer has learnt his warfare (and English) in America; the journalist being sent on a wild goose chase to drive around in circles; our heroes finding the right village, but the wrong bunker, and having to return a second time. They even turn confusion against the Other, by mimicing the arrival of Saddam to clear the castle.

This kind of moral confusion is the preserve of the Dustwar movie. I am fairly sure that Black Hawk also contains a morality-charged torture scene - don't the opposition have any better information they want out of soldiers, that they have time to guilt trip them instead?

The Kingdom? Moral confusion. Syriana? Moral confusion. Confusion full stop if you don't make notes.

Hurt Locker - not a film I liked, though I cannot now remember why. The stereotypes seemed too broad, I think. What I did feel, though, is that it is primarily about linguistic confusion. Yeah, that's the worst thing about those foreign people - they don't even speak American! It BAFFLES me that as a soldier, you would go into a war zone and not learn the basic lingo. You know. "Hello". "Where are the toilets please?" "Get on the motherfucking ground!" There are similar scenes in most of these films, but Hurt Locker in particular makes you think that if the two sides could simply communicate, so much time could have been saved. All these scenes of Americans shouting in English, and Iraqis shouting in Arabic, or Kurdish, and I just want to bash their heads together and say "people don't understand if you just talk louder!"

Being part of the bomb disposal squad, there is also considerable uncertainty as to what can be trusted. Car or carbomb? Refugee, or prisoner-attached-to-a-bomb? Or corpse with a bomb surgically implanted?

Thought for the day!

Alpha Mike Foxtrot

2010-08-02T02:58:00.000-07:00

I adore The A-Team - was quite obsessed with it for a patch last year, but was ultimately frustrated by how repetitive and unimaginative the plotting was. Evil greedy capitalists screwing over decent folk and bribing the local sherrif? Again?

So the film was a must see, and ignoring a few misgivings, I cannot remember such a few hoursof unabashed happiness. Ever. I laughed all the way through: from the daft opening, with the characters getting Tarantinian freeze frames with their names, to B.A. having "PITY" and "FOOL" tattooed on his knuckles, to Face being the guy to understand their sleazy nemesis and explaining it all with a shell game.

They made exactly the right choice on the tone - trimmed out some of the camp, made the violence feel less cartoonish, but still remained gleefully daft. The director was quoted in Empire with this fabulous soundbite:

"Look, if you don't like the idea of a tank falling out of the sky and shooting at a plane, then this movie's not going to be for you. But I think if you don't like the idea of a tank falling out of the sky, then you fundamentally have a fucking problem with cinema."

Getting that tone right was the chief thing I had been previously concerned about, and I'm still impressed that they managed to keep it all raw and realistic. And to fly a tank at the same time. The actors were all perfect (I loved Lynch!), the script was very good - it just would have been nice if they had enunciated better. I missed quite a lot of the banter because the accents just would not stick in my head. And some of the action sequences needed to be a little clearer too - I couldn't always keep track of who was shooting at what. Everything you would want was there: drugging B.A. to get him on aircraft, rigging up weapons from stuff they have lying about.

It was also a deeply problematic film. Looking back on what I've typed, I've dedicated more time to griping than squeeing: decidedly not how I feel. Damn the politics - it was awesome. Tank. Plane. But there's only so much you can say about having fun...the following section is basically deeply spoilerific, but surely this doesn't matter considering what we have under discussion.

One of the more interesting twists was that B.A. got very zen in prison, and came out refusing to kill. Now I thought this was really cool - it neatly mirrored Mr T's conversion to religion and by giving him a proper character arc, transformed him into the most interesting of the bunch. It also tallied with my headcanon: despite the ludicrous amount of firearms, I think there are only six onscreen deaths in four seasons, suggesting that they were trying to avoid killing as far as possible. Whether this is legal or moral is never explained. He quotes Gandhi, and explains multiple times that he is not comfortable killing. Hannibal - who is cooler than this - quotes some Gandhi back:

"It is better to be violent, if there is violence in our hearts, than to put on the cloak of nonviolence to cover impotence."

And tells him he needs to discover "something worth fighting for". When they later repeat this fuzzy terminology, and he says "Yes, I've found it" - it's never really defined what "it" is. "Peer pressure", as far as I can tell. Peer pressure and guilt tripping, and I was rather disappointed. Hannibal isn't really that manipulative; B.A. can still be a cool hero and not kill people - in fact, seeing how keen he is to protect kids in the original, I figure he'd be pretty disappointed.

In truth, I probably shouldn't have been looking to the A-Team for positive messages about violence. It has always been about heroic veteran vigilantes. But in my own head, I had partly reclaimed it as part of the "post-Nam counter cultural dropout thingie". In the show, we never see them as soldiers except in some misty past none of them talk about - their missions are always Robin Hood style mercy missions to ordinary folks. The show's stance on the army is therefore more ambiguous - they are obviously patriots, obviously proud of their fellow men. But the impression I had was like the Democracy Village banner: "We Support The Soliders; We Do Not Support The War". And to my mind, perhaps all the heroism was maybe a sort of atonement - their own mad manifestation of PTSD. Face in particular has never seemed like a violent man to me - someone who fights to get out of situations, and would really rather retire, but can't give up his friends or the jazz.

This is my personal slant, and it's only just occured to me how personal. We all enjoy fiction on our own terms, but I thought I was giving the story some depth. Actually I was just making it palatable. Would I be able to enjoy The A-Team TV if the characters were portrayed as pro-war, pro-that war in particular? As it stands, the army theme is window dressing - the characters are apolitical, the messages neutral. Maybe not with the same vigour, or in the same way.

The movie makes the right choice in its structure - it shows the team's first mission in a pre-title-sequence, then shows them blundering into the crime-they-did-not-commit and the film is concerned with them trying to discover who set them up. It was also correct to update the story to the modern day. But juxtaposing the nu-Team with a real war cannot be anything but a political statement, and implicit approval - one scene with Hannibal chatting enthusiastically with happy locals left a particularly sour taste. When they rescue a village under threat from greedy developers, it's an obvious case of good verses nasty. But given the information that they have completed "80 successful missions" in Iraq is...also not cool, because war isn't that clear cut but about following orders. Some were probably of a philanthropic nature, but they can't all have been unless you accept the Iraq war as a Good Thing.

The film is very certain: these are army men. They want to clear their names and be restored to their ranks. They even wait for permission to break out of jail. Probably better characterisation than the show's, but still problematic. It left me with a far stronger impression of people I would not want to spend any time with. That's why I loved B.A. more than I ever have before (I'm normally a Hannibal girl), and was deeply disappointed with the resolution of that arc. It also undermines, say, Hannibal's decision not to shoot a villain in cold blood earlier on.

Summer blockbuster - definitely asking too much. And I'm not going to think about whether the depiction of women was good, bad, questionable, or indifferent, because the answer cannot be good and for now I don't care. Most awesome afternoon ever!

A man chooses; a slave obeys

2010-06-14T02:49:00.000-07:00

I want to talk about violent video games. Today's issue comes with headers, to tidy up my circuitous prose.

Some History

An area which fascinates me, but only in a theoretical way as I have never lived in a house with them before. The arrival of a new housemate gave me the opportunity to properly play a console game for the first time in my life - to the general amusement of everyone else, who went through this phase age 5 or 6.

My parents were rather old fashioned on that front, and on the whole I am greatful: games do feel like a terrible drain on life. Abstractly, I believe that if a video game gives you a compelling aesthetic and narrative experience, it's no better or worse than watching a film (and that, no more than reading a book). And the ability to beat difficult games is no better or worse than any other ability (arguably, better because their effects are confined to so small a world they can never be used for evil). But in practice, less games seem to come up to my high movie watching standards, and looking back on most of my gaming experiences they seem like wasted time

A classic example would be Guitar Hero, which I played for half an hour and switched off in disgust. It is a challenging game which requires dedicated practice, but if you're going to put in that much effort why not just learn the sodding guitar? Especially because the required skillset for hitting the keys in time is far closer to playing the piano.

Belief Systems

Bioshock is a staggering exception, but I'll discuss that later. I'd like to get onto violence, and I'll preface this by saying I no longer believe in an objective "self". We have different modes of behavior we shrug on and off like clothes: Sunday best for the vicar, formalwear for family occasions, something smartcasual for work and sloppy jeans for weekends alone. From person to person, we might have different morality sets - lying to a child or a door-to-door Evangelist in a way we wouldn't to an adult or a friend. We certainly behave differently (i.e. use of swearing) and have different interests depending on the company. With all that taken into account, it seems holding any belief and claiming it is indomitable is problematic, without boiling everything down to a pragmatic "it depends". There are always exceptions, and indeed there has to be.

This might be obvious, but I'm fascinated by the sincerity behind all this. We know that habit can change people by sheer persistance. You can come to love dull activities, endlessly-repeated radio earworms and even people just because they are always there and you get used to it. With all this slipping we do to survive life, surely then we also change our own minds - our basic principles - many times a day.

I now live in two different places, and what my two groups of friends can get away with is very different. Purely because I met one aged 11, and another aged 18, and what I needed at those two times was also different. I'd like to say my metronome behavior was caused by not wanting to freak the older set out by seeming to suddenly change, but in truth it is habit. I just snap back into old patterns.

This isn't necessarily a problem, because both places make me feel at home and I'd even miss the elements of both which piss me off because hey! Friends are the people whose defects you can adore as madly as their qualities. Nevertheless, it is an interesting illustration of the point above. I now live two lives. One lot are amused by my love for violent films, the other is less about cinema and more about me being a secret serial killer. It's the same joke, but an interesting change of emphasis. There, I like gory cinema; here I have a blood fetish. I'm not sure either is correct, or quite that simple. Which of these two people am I? Am I huggy, or rather detatched? Am I an endlessly accomodating doormat, or do I stand up for myself, albeit in a roundabout fashion? What are the level of lies, conscious, unconscious, white and by omission, I am prepared to tell?

The answer to that question relies on your postcode. And how do I answer a question like that, if accepting and enjoying myriad personalities is the strongest life stance I hold (except, naturally enough, when it isn't)? A pal recently used the rather lovely phrase "Schroedinger's Emily", and as if to prove my point, one close friend was really surprised I was enjoying the game - whereas another wasn't surprised at all.

I went into that for two reasons: first, to warn you I'm perfectly capable of holding multiple, contradictory beliefs and I think that on some level you must be too. But chiefly, to illustrate that I am mentally flexible and aware of my flexibility, and thus incredibly susecptible to things I experience. On this basis, I believe if it's mad enough for one person to experience life like this, it stands to reason that many others must also.

And finally, on violence

The chief question involving violent entertainment is "Should we legislate against it?". I find this a hard question to answer:

Nothing should legislate against art. A solid hangover from my Oscar Wilde days.

Art impacts life. Shakespeare knew as much:
"That guilty creatures, sitting at a play / Have by the very cunning of the scene / Been struck so to the soul that presently /They have proclaim'd their malefactions"

This point is irrefutable. If what we see does not change us, then why would there be advertising? Why would pressure groups be so concerned about the depiction of their chosen minority on screen? Why do companies put product placement in movies, and pay celebrities to wear their clothes? How does tie-in merchandising work? Why are documentaries made, or movies with a social concience? Why do cosplayers expend time and effort creating replica costumes from their favourite heroes?

If art did not impact life, then none of these strategies would work. The fact is they do, QED. Arguably, holy books are nothing but books containing stories so marvellous, so affecting that they move people to be better than they can be and dedicate themselves to a cause - and thus art impacts life quite profoundly.

But when it impacts life should one man's right to "make art" be counted as more important than the rights of others to live safely? My answer to that would depend on whether Oscar Wilde or Doctor Who is closer within my mental reach. I mean, art is immortal and makes humanity seem meaningless in comparison: a few lives in exchange for the Mona Lisa (or pick your favourite work of art, including great albums or movies) which will be adored by generations doesn't seem like a big sacrifice. But then on other days, it's life, life above all - one single human life is more important than anything else. It's humans who create art after all.

I'm not sure I can ever work that out. Would it really matter to us, now, if ten more nameless Greeks had burnt at the Library of Alexandria - but the complete works of Socrates and Euripides had survived?

Art affects people in different ways. Should we kill off whole genres of entertainment because it might just set off some lone nutter, already primed by life. I don't think there's ever been conclusive proof of killings purely in the wake of vicious media. There have always been other factors - enviroment, upringing e.t.c. And they often inspire the means through which sprees take place, but as far as I'm aware, don't cause them. My evidence is that I've seen Clockwork Orange and my dad's seen Natural Born Killers, and we're both still sane and dandy. If any film was that dangerous, then how could the BBFC raters - who see all the most degrading cinema has to offer - not be locked away in maximum security?

But see above. If Clockwork Orange is even tangentally going to be implicated in the death of a real human being, would it not be better never to have been created? Regardless of the thousands it has inspired in its turn?

How do you reconcile all of that? Even if I could untangle those three threads to my satisfaction, there are other things to take into consideration:

Is there a difference between commercial violence and artistic violence? i.e. Rambo vs Antichrist, violent rape porn vs Irreversable, The A-Team vs Saving Private Ryan. Movies aim to make you feel by using images. Does it make a difference if violent images are designed for enjoyment? Or if you enjoy violent images regardless of their creators intent? If you're going to judge between art and "porn", how do you tell? And once you've said "you can watch these films because their intent is art", how do you force viewers not to enjoy them as porn?

Saving Private Ryan is an interesting one there, because the BBFC rated it a 15 - despite the loopy levels of violence. They judged that it had important historical merit, and as such teachers should be able to show it in class. Does its "artistic" intent automatically mean no kid has ever laughed "phwoar, look at that head go!" while viewing?

Why do we rate realistic violence as more dangerous than tame? If protecting the young is our goal, then surely presenting painful death is more important than showing something gleefully consequence free?

It's clear then that there are two strands in the debate on legislating violence: preventing people from copying what they see AND protecting young minds from scary images. Sex is case in point. While I don't want my hypothetical kids seeing all that on screen till they're much older, nevertheless sex is basically a good act, while violence never is. Seeing a happy consensual couple get on with it at whatever age is not a damaging image - violence is always "wrong" and is always "disgusting".

And this leads us onto one of the bigger ethical questions never asked in this debate:

Should we be enjoying this? We should respect the human right to choose - to an extent. We can all agree that extent is causing actual damage to actual people. It's written in the BBFC basic manifesto that adults should be able to choose their own viewing so long as it is not dangerous. But should we choose to watch pain for our entertainment? Is it good for - dare I say it? - our souls? Is someone who refuses violent imagery a "better" person?

Violent video games

I thought I knew where I stood on all of this. I love a bit of violence, me. My stance on film is, broadly, put the art first - even though I value life, and I admit influence exists. I do not want a world where we cannot make movies about war or crime. I have great faith in the idea of rating systems, and the BBFC in particular. We have to change the world before changing movies would have any noticeable effect on violence in society. I am suspicious of "entertainment violence", such as The A-Team, particularly with reference to children - kids need more heroes like Doctor Who, saving the world through brains and not brawn. But that's the role of parents in judging what is wholesome for their kids to consume.

The twin in the movie violence debate is the violent video game. As mentioned above, video games are as valid an artistic experience as a film - so should get the same rights. Having never played one, I've always assumed I stood in the same place.

No. No I don't, emphatically not - coming into proper contact has raked this whole debate up again, even when I thought I'd done it to death and was bored.

Bioshock

The problem wasn't so much with Bioshock. The game is beautifully designed, giving you a strong experience aside from killing stuff. I experienced very vivid emotions while playing, but this was targeted on the characters: pity for the splicers, mad love for Andrew Ryan, and a strong sympathy with Jack, the character I was playing. His desire to get home, his total dislocation really affected me. When sneaking down corridors, my mind was ticking on the issues being raised by the story - in particular, something the game never explored. I couldn't help but be distracted by the tragedy of having to "splice" magic powers to survive attacks by "splicers" who had gone mad and become addicted because of the splicing process. The thought of becoming what I was fighting was my primary concern; and with it, that to escape I had to contribute to the destruction of a beautiful city which I really came to love. The enemies are obviously mad zombies, you primarily attack them with magic powers and the location is very far dislocated by anything you could experience in real life. It is also a very scary game - you get sufficienly involved by it that the survival instinct kicks in, and you kill things because you have to. Opportunities to hurt anything like a real human raised in me a huge level of antipathy, and I believe this is encouraged by the game.

Perhaps apt to the questions I mentioned above, the game touches on the morality/life dichotomy. You crash land and discover an underwater city, built to escape the cold war and where "the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality, where the great would not be constrained by the small". In other words, built on selfishness - built on people who would make violent cinema without considering the human consequences. But the city is in ruins, death by selfishness; and the game's narrative gives you regular opportunities to either act selfishly or for personal gain. All this puts morality at the forefront of the experience, and constantly forces you to think about what you are doing and why. Maybe this softens the effect of the violence?

The chief emotion I experienced throughout- and this is absolutely exploited - is pathos: for the Little Sisters, for the Big Daddies, for the splicers, for Ryan and the rest, for the city itself, for the main character, and ultimately, it all rather upset me in a very enjoyable manner.

Grand Theft Auto

I had been thinking about the debate while playing it, because I did enjoy killing things very much. So my next choice was perhaps obvious: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.

Well, shit. I didn't actually try the whole game, just spent an afternoon on sandbox mode, but my response was very different. Unlike Bioshock, it is set in a very familiar location and is packed with real-world detail. The fact the graphics were unrealistic actually made it worse - I think I would have found it harder to hurt or threaten people if the visuals had been less bright and blocky. There are no long-term consequences to creating mayhem: escaping cops is easy, nothing goes on your permenant record and you merely lose your arsenal and get let out ten hours later if caught. And there are certainly no emotional consequences - unlike poor lost Jack onto whom I could project my isolation at being in a strange place, you are playing a criminal. And unlike brooding horror, GTA is packed with exciting upbeat rock.

All that is cold rationalisations why the violence in GTA affected me in a different way to Bioshock. I don't know how far any of them are "true". All I know is that pointing and clicking at someone's head, then watching it explode in a shower of blood gave me a very visceral reaction. If I could avoid killing in Bioshock, then I did - and those times I had to assassinate something I recognised as human gave me a very vivid "do not want!" experience. Within five minutes on GTA, we were attempting to replicate the Ripper killings by luring them around corners and dicing them with the katana for the LOLs. Holy smokes, I'm a pacifist. And a Doctor Who fan. And I think trivialising the Ripper killings is sick.

I think the chief difference is, GTA does not give you an emotional compass to work from. Life hasn't shown you how to respond to your myriad violent options, and the game doesn't help. And one of the ways humans react to such situations is with humour - think of a nervous laugh, awkward smiles or bad taste jokes. You can't comprehend the horror of a child's corpse - so here, have a dead baby joke. A lot of my generation feign racist/imperalist beliefs - even among my most liberal pals - that they absolutely do not hold, and to my mind it's because racism is so terrible you often can't respond to it sincerely without being totally swamped. Tarantino movies do something similar with their combo of violence and humour. Hence why replicating the Ripper killings suddenly seemed amusing and acceptable.

I also experienced, even temporarily, a total desensitisation towards violence. As mentioned above, my mind is as malleable as pulped intestine - so being immersed in such a game did have an effect on me. I felt like yes, this could have a noticeable effect on my real life if played to excess. Humans respond very quickly to learned behavior - there are stories of WOW players who escaped wild animals with their online skills, of ER viewers who have saved lives. Scientists have proved that neurotics are better in survival situations - people on, say, a train who spend the journey panicing that it might crash respond quicker to their mental worst-case-scenarios instead of freezing. I was so pumped up after watching Run, Lola, Run that when I was accidentally locked into the bathroom ten minutes later, I climbed out of the window and made my own escape. I do not think I would have done that in a calmer state of mind.

On the Sims, when you click another character you get a dial of interaction options. If they are a stranger, you might be able to "Greet" or "Tell Joke". But if you put time into making them friends, the number of interaction options increases - and now you can do everything from "Attack" to "Romance", with numerous options within. I feel that if confronted with a real weapon, I feel my options have expanded from "Panic!" and "Put It Down" to, in the right situation, "Use". Bear in mind I only played for about four hours, so I am sure the number of positive messages I'm getting outweighs the negative ones.

Nevertheless, I felt rather queer about the whole experience for a while afterwards. My chief question, as mentioned above, was "should we be enjoying this?" Which is NEVER a question I have asked about film before. You identify with film characters and you choose to watch, so you are thereby complicit in any bloodletting taking place. But having the power to point and shoot when you choose draws attention to the decision making process, and makes you directly involved, which is perhaps now it suddenly seems dirtier.

A friend has suggested that, with my background in violent media scholarship, perhaps my reaction was a response to what I know of GTA's reputation. This may be correct (and so it might also be of Bioshock).

Dead Space

Undeterred, I looked for another game to play properly, all the way through and chose Dead Space - sci-fi horror. Now, this was another realistic one and very beautiful too. You are running up and down rusty, light-flickery corridors, very post-Alien, and being attacked by fleshy spider creatures. One of the game's USPs is the combat. You can aim very accurately, and emphasis is on disabling Necromorphs instead of diminishing their damage points. Which is a pretty cool system, when you think about it, as it takes into account realistic injury. Once I got ahang of the controls, I adopted a definite tactic - one or two shots to the legs so they collapse to the floor, and while they flailing are struggling to move, one to the head. Followed by a good kicking to make sure they are definitely dead.

Well. Quite.

As such, it is a very sadistic game indeed. Even though the Necromorphs are the least human thing I've attacked in this experiment, the game system requires you to think carefully about how best to cause pain - with the obligatory satisfying splatter of blood. I was not comfortable with this, and switched off after about half an hour. It seemed like Deep Space was trying to develop a plot, but it didn't sufficiently draw me in that time to give an emotional compass which made killing Necromorphs in that fashion acceptable to me.

A summing up

I had three different responses:

Bioshock: realistic style, unrealistic situation. Could play.
GTA: Non realistic style, realistic situation. Could play, but later felt sick at myself.
DS: realistic style, fairly unrealistic situation. Couldn't play.

Perhaps we are dealing with two different debates, and far from what I always assumed what is good for cinema is not good for videogames.

Something Dead Space and GTA have in common is they are "third person". You play the game over the shoulder of your character; in Bioshock, your eyes are the whole screen. Of cinema, I would say that detatchment is the best response to violence - viewing the violent characters as alien to oneself, as something on show. If you feel close association with violent characters it is more likely for the film to break out into real life. Perhaps when I could see my avatars on screen in DS and GTA it enabled me to be more violent than when I was immersed in Bioshock. This is a strong reversal to what I would claim about cinema: I think immersive film violence is more dangerous than when you have a bit of perspective.

I would also say that consequence-free movie violence is more troubling than high-rated sticky screaming, and this is backed up by my video game experiment. GTA was sufficiently fake looking, and free from consequence that I created some quite enthusiastic mayhem even though the rendering of blood was quite dilligent. Bioshock felt like a real world, but my disgust was padded by an obvious fantasy setting and magical powers. I felt troubled at killing some characters - but not the hordes of default zombies. I completed the game. Deep Space had realistic graphics, and was set in a world which, despite monsters and the futuristic tech, still felt sufficiently real that I could not continue. I felt it was encouraging me to be cruel

Strong narratives are better than weak ones. Like the best movies, Bioshock manipulated me throughout - but I felt like I chose how to feel in any given situation. Even though it was usually how it wanted me to feel. It both dictated my emotional response, and asked me to formulate my own. I brought my real-world morals to it - it did not give it's game-world morals to me. GTA rewards villainy, Bioshock rewards something but it doesn't immediately tell you what that is, and that sense of identification made me check my own actions on several occasions. So freedom is not a good thing: GTA and DS never really told me how I should be responding to the game experience, and I found it consequently more difficult to create a story. Whereas I would say deciding how you stand on a film, instead of having it obviously prescribed, was important.

To sum up my response:

The more I recognise a creature as "real" - either due to the quality of graphics or their human appearance and personality - the harder I find killing.
Conversely, if characters have no personality, are fantasy/fictional or are presented with unrealistic graphics, I find it very easy.
The more immersed I am personally in a game, the more I feel as if my personal integrity is at stake - the better I will be have, the harder I find killing.
Conversely, the cartoonishness of GTA and possibly the third person perspective of both allowed me greater freedom to do things I would not in life.
The harder a game works to make a world emotionally satisfying, and ascribe ethical/emotional meaning to actions on screen, the more invested I feel in it, and the harder I find killing.
Conversely - you get the drift.

Despite all this - and this is the important bit - I feel these unrealistic games did tug at my primal human bloodlust in the real world with more than the realistic. This may only be true for me, but yes I believe they have real life consequences and can be dangerous in eroding moral values. Do I think violent video games should recieve tighter legislation? Yes, definitely - different to how I feel about film, but perhaps that is because I don't have the same passion as for them.

Probably. But then see every single argument I made on films above - they still apply. I'm flexible. I'm also a rather flawed test dummy as I've only ever played a few console games, and thus perhaps the novelty gave them greater effect over my emotions. If I had played hundreds, perhaps I would be desensitised and better recognise them as fiction, nothing more.

Cigarette?

2010-03-08T05:33:00.001-08:00

I've been thinking a lot recently about Guns of Navarone, and in particular, the fact my gay-reading becomes increasingly more elaborate with every watch.

But as a fan of buddy movies, I normally see gay readings as totally off limits. After all, films can be homosocial without having to be homosexual as well - and I think romance is over-valued as a cinematic fallback compared to a good friendship. So what is going on?

Thinking about the topic, I've developed a general theory on why some films seem gayer than others, and the secret resides in the depiction of female characters. All buddy movies are homosocial, but is it just the absence of screwing that rescues them? I mean, on the face of it:

Buddy movie
Movie is chiefly about the relationship between two (or more) same-gender protagonists. The relationship is non-sexual, but undeniably romantic.

Gay movie
Movie is chiefly about the relationship between two (or more) same-gender protagonists. The relationship is sexual, and probably (but not necessarily) romantic.

On that reasoning, sex is the only difference. But for all we know, it could be going on off-screen - in Brideshead Revisited it almost certainly is.

Having explored my thoughts for a while, I think the key lies in the presentation of female characters. And now it's on paper, I am amazed by how comprehensive this theory is. Explicitly straight films and shows tend to show women as allies on an equal level, and when they aid the male protagonists, it is through "feminine" skills. In gay or unintentionally queer movies, women are the most dangerous antagonists, threatening the safety or happiness of male protagonists. They also often exhibit "male" qualities. Very very gay movies have two levels of threat - a narrative one and an emotional one. You can't split the two, of course (emotion comes from narrative; emotion can also be narrative), but less gay movies exhibit one of the two, or one less strongly.

I don't think this is a universal theory, mostly because it supports things I've always thought about movies. If it is a universal theory, then I've just found a formula that proves me right: unlikely. But there are still some interesting things to explore here.

So this is an examination of some of my favourite homosexual and homosocial movies, analysing what the female characters represent in each. There are spoilers ahoy.

Gay movies

Brokeback Mountain
Main antagonist: 1950s mores; wives
Female leads: wives
Threat: emotional, though as a real-lifey-drama arguably the emotion is the narrative.

The tragic ending is the fault of men, but that's merely the last ten minutes in a very long film. The tragedy throughout is our heroes' inability to be together, and the chief reason why they cannot - 1950s morals - is embodied in the fact they both get married. Though prejudice is the real problem, the two female characters represent that problem. All other factors in their misery - the need to get jobs, to conform to social pressure - are linked straight back to their wives.

Victim
Main anagonist: a blackmailing ring; the law
Female leads: Melville Farr's wife, the blackmailer.
Threat: narrative and emotional

As a film about prejudice, homophobia comes from left, right and centre and mostly from men. But characters who actively cause negative events are exclusively female. The emotional challenge in the film is Mrs Farr trying to come to terms with her husband's "condition". Drama is caused by him a) hiding his feelings for her sake; b) fearing her reaction, or that she will be hurt, by his state and c) her walking out on him. When the blackmailers are exposed, the head of the ring is the only other female character of significance in the film. She is therefore responsible for the entire plot.

Beautiful Thing
Main antagonist: "Mama Cass" and mum
Female leads: "Mama Cass" and mum
Threat: narrative and emotional

One of the things I love about Beautiful Thing is how positive it is. Two boys fall in love on an 80s council estate, and no one really minds. It pretends to be social realism for about an hour - complete with an abusive older brother who you're sure is going to be vital later - then chucks it in favour of life-affirming romantic fluff. Consequently, there are no serious antagonists. However, when they are trying to hide their affair, it is their female next door neighbour who frequently threatens to reveal them. And the character who they must win over is one of their mothers. No fathers, brothers or other male friends ever appear on screen - actually, an argument I develop below, as a single mother the mum is mascarading as a male. And mum's boyfriend is the most homo-friendly character in the film.

Movies that, by this reasoning, are coded gay

Guns of Navarone
Main antagonist: time, Nazis - and a female traitor
Female lead: two resistance fighters, one being a traitoress.
Threat: narrative

Our heroes are an all-male team, joined by two female resistance fighters on the island. The two women naturally exhibit masculine qualities - they are armed and tough. However, one turns out to be a traitoress, and the one factor which comes closest to jepordising the success of the mission. This is pretty impressive, when you consider a ship-sinking storm, a critically injured teammember and the entire German army couldn't do it.

You could also argue that she is threatening because she is mascarading as male. To neutralise the threat, they must expose her as a female - she is undressed, begins crying and we discover she is a traitor because she is afraid of pain. We see two other torture scenes in the film, one with the entire band and Franklin, one featuring only Franklin, and the boys manage to keep their fearless masculine composure thoughout. The second female character, is made safe because she also exhibits female qualities: she is in love with Andrea, and ultimately marries him.

Brideshead Revisited - the first half
Main antagonist: alcoholism; lady Marchmain
Female lead: lady Marchmain (later Mrs Ryder and Julia)
Threat: emotional

All that chumming around at Oxford is cut short by Sebastian's drinking. This depression is caused chiefly by his cloying family, and for the first half of the series/book they are represented by Lady Marchmain. She drives a splinter between the pair; she is also responsible for chasing her unhappy husband out of England. Lady Marchmain sends a chill down my spine. We can use the same argument as we did for Navarone, because Lady Marchmain is mascarading as the male patriarch of the family.

The second half, Sebastian drops out in favour of Julia, and thus the argument is no longer valid.

Movies that, by this reasoning, are not coded gay
Ones I've never thought gay, for no good reason, which is now explained by my theory. This theory might not be universal, but it certainly works for me.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Main antagonist: fate, law and the Bolivian army
Female lead: Etta Place, an ally

The studio explicitly flags the pair up as non-gay by depicting them as mutually in love with Etta Place. She is the third member of the group, an equal and takes part in the shooting and robbing. But in her dialogue, she highlights the female-skills she brings to the team - "darning socks"; her main task in Bolivia is to teach them Spanish, and when taking part in heists it is foxing people dressed as a glamorous woman.

The A-Team
Main antagonist: the US military; Colonel Decker; local bad boys
Female lead: Amy Adams, an ally

There is the odd girlfriend about to "prove" the A-Team are straight. But Amy Adams is used much like Etta. She is an equal member of the team, also taking part in shooting, and when her femininity is highlighted it is in a useful way. Her skills within the team are researching, investigative journalism, sympathy and occasionally feminine wiles.

Reservoir Dogs
Main antagonist: each other
Female lead: none

Pretty clear case. If there aren't negative male-female relationships to contrast the positive male-female relationships to, then there can't be any gaying. Some people think White and Orange are gay. I think this takes a lot away from the film, but I admit there is an angle - and the angle is covered in my theory. While the principle threats are the police and one another, the drama is caused by Mr Orange's blood puddle -a puddle caused by an armed woman. But to my mind, that is pretty weak.

Lord of the Rings
Main antagonist: Sauron; Saruman; lots of orcs
Female lead: Arwen, Eowyn

There's lots of slash on the web, and I've never bought it. I've never even bought Sam/Frodo - it's platonic love, which makes it no less valuable as love. No female antagonists - well, virtually no females, until the movie beefed them up.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Main antagonist: fate; Hamlet
Female lead: none

Oh God, I'm so chuffed with this theory. Another pair I've never thought remotely slashy dashed off the list.

Sherlock Holmes (2009)
Main antagonist: Lord Blackwood
Female lead: Irene Adler, an ally; the future Mrs Watson

This is a tougher one, and maybe that's because it's not clear cut. Even though Irene is allied with the villains, the men work with and not against her. Though she has masculine qualities, she also flaunts her feminine wiles. Similarly, Mrs Watson challenges the future of the central relationship; yet she also seems aware of that relationships importance and does not attack it. Both are threats, but they are pretty small ones - Irene is never directly responsible for foiling, injuring or seriously upsetting the leads. Holmes and Watson are too culturally embedded as a safe, unshatterable pair for Mrs Watson to ever be a serious challenge in our eyes.

Lots of fangirls do read this as gay, and I agree it's a tough one. There is evidence beyond the fact that both are hot, chiefly the way they bicker like an old married couple. It's certainly gayer than Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

It seems almost suitable that in a case where female representations are mixed up, so would be my conception of how gay it is. And this theory comes into its own when I started looking at shows which for me are a very murky area.

Arguably gay:

Doctor Who
Main antagonist: long running TV show, too many to count

My feelings are mixed, because the evidence points several ways and because I'm hesitant to apply human constructs to alien characters. In general I think this is non-canonical. But its interesting that in general, the female characters on screen function like Etta and Amy: they are friends who bring positive female skills to the Doctor's positive masculine skills.

However:

Doctor Who:Utopia-Sound of Drums-Last of the Timelords
Main antagonist, from the Master's perspective: Martha, Lucy Saxon
Female leads: Martha, Lucy Saxon; Martha's female relatives
Threat: narrative and emotional

In the Russell T. Davis take, The Last of the Timelords, where the slashiness goes off the scale, women are antagonistic. Martha is responsible for taking down the Master, and to do it she utilises masculine attributes (espionage, adventure, would involve shooting if it wasn't Doctor Who). Ultimately, the Doctor cannot take the Master prisoner because he is killed by Lucy Saxon - another woman. Moments before, it is Martha's mum (not her father) who threatens to kill him. In Sound of Drums, the threat of Mr Saxon is headed up by a female agent. In Utopia, a female Futurekind destroys the spaceship and Chan'tho attempts to kill the Master.

It's interesting to see a text about which I have some confusion, itself exhibiting confusion about how it portrays its female characters. Another one causing me headaches is...

Blake's 7
Main antagonist: The Federation, represented by Travis and Servalan
Female leads: allys Jenna and Callie; villainess Servalan
Threat: narrative

At the moment, I'm categorising my leanings as bad writing. I didn't get slash vibes in season one, where every episode was written by a single author, because Blake, Avon and their relationship were consistant. Season two is hard for me to read in any other way, because six or seven authors are contributing and they have a different take on each of the three. Is that professional respect? Friendly irritation? Contempt? Loathing? Ideological issues? Are they a valid buddy pairing, or do they want to kill one another? This makes the relationship so frenetic it's hard to interpret it coherently without throwing love into the mix. As Avon himself would doubtless point out, love is a brilliant way of justifying illogical, irrational behavior.

Lets put it through my theoriser, though. What are the women like? Like Doctor Who, only stronger, its a mix. It features ally-female characters, yet their skills are masculine ones - the same goes for Kasabi, Avalon, Ilsa and other spare females that show up along the way. There's a general absence of womanly-women, even if the female protagonists get shafted in favour of the men.

And though the show exhibits a wide range of antagonists, the overarching villain is the Federation as represented by Servalan. Travis is a major antagonist, but he is very much under her thumb. I'm now going to rewatch the series and see if, on an episode by episode basis, things seem gayer in Servalan episodes.

Ones Which Don't Work

Star Trek
I don't know how I feel about the Fandom That Invented Slash. I haven't watched enough Star Trek to make a judgement. However, I'm pretty sure that women are in general not villainous, and would probably come into the Amy Adams feminine ally catagory, suggesting that Star Trek is not slashy. This is obviously a perspective which many people disagree on, however, perhaps pointing to how ideosyncratic this theory is.

Hamlet
I could argue that Gertrude's infidelity is far more of a plot mover than Claudius' murder, with some success - Freudians have been doing it for years - but it's clutching at straws. Claudius is overwhelmingly the chief antagonist, and he does the murder that causes Gertrude's infidelity. Again, by this reasoning, this would suggest that I should not find a gay reading in Hamlet. And it's true that I'm flexible: I can take or leave it, it's not a vital part of the story because Horatio is merely walking exposition.

But I do often think that Hamlet/Horatio makes a lot of sense, given Hamlet's misogyny and the way his miserable confusion comes back to women so often, and there are plenty of lines that can be read in that manner. It certainly makes better sense than the generally accepted theory that Hamlet is in love with his mum.

Death Note
I'm only half way through, so perhaps things change, but I've never got strong slash vibes off this thing despite it being potentially the slashiest thing ever. Misa is a girly girl, and she only presents a threat unintentionally. Despite this, I'm not confident enough to argue that she is "not a threat", because by this point I worry I would be misjudging how threatening she is on the grounds of what I already believe.

So my final theory stands thus:

Buddy movie

Movie is chiefly about the relationship between two (or more) same-gender protagonists.
The relationship is non-sexual, but undeniably romantic.
Female characters (if present) are allies
Their usefulness resides in demonstrating "feminine" skills
Subjectively: there is less evidence.

Coded Gay movie

Movie is chiefly about the relationship between two (or more) same-gender protagonists.
The relationship is sexual, and probably (but not necessarily) romantic.
Female characters are present:

as narrative villains, or
as emotional antagonists

Female characters display "masculine" attributes (dress) or skills
Subjectively: there is more evidence.

Possibly gay, possibly not

Movie is chiefly about something else entirely
An important aspect of the movie is the relationship between two (or more) same-gender protagonists.
The relationship is non-sexual, and not necessarily romantic
Female characters are present both as narrative villains and emotional antagonists AND as allies.
Female characters can display "masculine" or "female" attributes
Subjectively: evidence inconclusive

I feel a book coming on, oh yes I do!

Victim (1961)

2009-12-07T04:42:00.000-08:00

All sorts of reasons, but chiefly due to my interest in censorship and classification: it was the first English language film to use the word "homosexual" and it was banned in America for a year. It's an exercise in soapbox noir - one of the many 1960s films taking advantage of greater social freedoms and less restrictive censorship. Our hero - think Atticus Finch as played by Gary Cooper - is attempting to bring down blackmailers who were responsible for the death of his sort-of-boyfriend. Along the way, he meets an ever growing number of other closeted fellows being blackmailed, while all the time the noose gets tighter around his own neck.

Before the film could be made, the BBFC went through the script and removed four lines - including our hero's tame-but-still-shocking admission that he "wanted" a particular young man. Three of them later snuck back in. The internet claims the film is part of the reason public opinion changed, and parliament got moving on changing the laws which still threw people in jail - things finally got straightened out in 1967.

It's sympathies are loudly announced very early on: "Victim", of all names. Normally, that's the type of thing I couldn't stomach - and there are one or two points where characters as good as turn to the camera and present a charity appeal - but it's redeemed by being brilliant, heartbreaking and featuring the ever yummy Dirk Bogarde as an Englishman in distress. The heroism on screen is matched by the heroism of the actors and production team, for creating a potentially career-ruining piece of cinema - the list of people who turned down roles is long and legendary.

Despite its significance as a gay movie, it is perhaps most interesting for the ways it is, to modern audiences, repressed and representative of a different era. It's made very clear that Dirk Bogarde is "one of the good ones". He is linked with two men in the movie, but both are from the past: we never see him interact with them on screen. And lest our imaginations run away from us, we are also told he was as pure as ice and chaste as snow with both of them, breaking off both relationships to save himself from temptation. This would be regarded as rather a mixed message nowadays, but in context makes sense: why risk alienating your audience? Prof Dyer, who taught me last year, suggests "Victim" also refers to the gay underground as "victims" not only of blackmail, but also of their biology - and indeed, the film does reinforce the idea that the poor devils just can't help it. The idea of it being a valid lifestyle choice is a very long way off. Much of the action tellingly takes place in the West End, and I think the presentation of the Mrs deserves study. I also wonder what audience reactions at the time were like.

Enough on the background, what of the film? Heartbreaking. Soul destroyingly, life crushingly heartbreaking. And an awful lot of fun. Comes recommended.

In other news: Why have I only just heard about "The Sea Wolves"? Surely, if someone was filming Guns of Navarone - Wild Geese crossover flicks, I should have been informed?

I love it when a plan comes together!

2009-11-04T02:26:00.000-08:00

Then:

http://www.grudge-match.com/Images/A-Team.jpg

Now:

http://media2.slashfilm.com/slashfilm/images/ATEAM_REV_01_10-10-09.jpg

I love the new image - just close enough, yet at the same time updated. With the addition of Mr Copley to the cast, my hopes are now fairly high for this big screen remake. I know nothing of Mr Rampage, but 3/4 aren't bad.

I am concerned they are going to make it more serious - I like the TV show silly. It's my break from serious and heartbreaking drama. But hell - I'm never gonna argue with a men on a mission movie, whatever the tone. Roll on!

Another bad memory

2009-10-19T05:17:00.000-07:00

I treated a friend to High Plains Drifter last night. She's a big fan of Nick Cave, and "Red Right Hand" has always reminded me of this film. It had occured to me that, as an activist, she would be a bit put out by the rape scene which casually shows up five minutes in, but it bothered her so much that it set me musing. I don't think she's going to get on with my arch-favourite genre in the long run.

Because as I attempted to defend the film, it occured to me that I can't think of a single rape-free western. Once Upon a Time in the West, For a Few Dollars More, Ballad of Cable Hogue, Sholay - even Paint your Wagon and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Unforgiven passes, but then it does cut a hooker to ribbons in scene one; Open Range also passes, but it's interminable so you still wouldn't want to watch it. Rio Bravo, I think, is OK. I don't recall anything in 3:10 to Yuma - but the threat is definitely there. Maybe Blazing Saddles.

But certainly violence against women is ever-pervasive in the genre. Why is it there? The Western works in tropes more than perhaps any other genre. All movies have their cliches - fat cops with donuts,the hardnosed detective with a drink addiction and rubber duck, the passionate journalist who just can't hold down a relationship. But these things are all modern - the writer can, if he likes, meet some journalists, detectives or cops and learn about the genuine professions. He can't meet a cowboy.

And while he could do some research - well, it's not like writing about the Infanta, or the Wars of the Roses. It's the Tarantino school of movie writing - the Western exists mostly through fiction. Very much like the way Jack the Ripper has come to stand for whole styles and ideas, despite the fact he was once a rather desperate human being in need of serious help.

The Wild West heroes are America's Arthurian knights - mythic and archetypal. Even revisionist westerns play against the idealised rendition. You know who they are: the lanky coffinmaker who can measure up a body as soon as it rides into town; the lone gunfighter; the profit-driven cowboss/ mining director/ railroad magnate; the honest homesteader; the whiskery beer-sot who periodically spits in the dust. Oh, and the sherrif. I'm sure essays have been written about how this represents aspects of the American psyche. And then for the girls, unsurprisingly enough, there are Madonnas and Whores: dumpy schoolmistresses or vicar's wives, and dancing girls, waitresses and hookers with a heart of gold.

It is a harsh and horrible world, westerns want to tell us, populated by fallen people of both genders. Rape is a mode of interaction justified by the setting and the style - because without exception, the world of the western is a very violent one. Shootings, floggings, abandonment in the desert without water, being dragged behind horses, hung, beaten to death with bricks, blown up, dropped down mine shafts, being fed to ants and live burial happen all the time - so does theft, extortion and crimes of all colours. So should we really be surprised that violence gets directed at women as well? Calypso herself admitted that her distaste was hypocritical, considering Clint had gunned down a room of fellows minutes earlier. And part of me wanted to say, "this movie has someone stabbed through the neck with a sharp stick then left to suffocate as blood gurgles up through his throat", but at the same time I do understand exactly what she meant - one was worse than the other. Maybe it's like why "positive discrimination" against whites is justifiable (sort of) because they are not a marginalised group - in other words, violence against women does seem worse because it's still horribly pervasive in the modern world and needs to be treated as sensitively as any other form of movie-hate.

Or maybe it doesn't bother me as much, becuase it's written into my book of wild west expectations? Because it's also a trope - like the Rush To The Airport or Climactic Gunfight.
Calypso expects westerns to feature fellows getting shot, but would be surprised if killer crabs demolished the one-horse-town in the second reel, or our hero suddenly developed superpowers. Because I have watched a lot of westerns, my definition of the genre is wider and more complex, so casual rape is something I do half expect of the genre.

Sergio Leone said "The west was made by violent, uncomplicated men", and the western is a violent, uncomplicated genre. The location is out in the wild, and as such is liberated from the ethics, the hypocritical etiquette and mores of civilised Victorian life. There is a focus on the natural world - sweeping mountains, deserts - suggesting humans who have gone "back to nature" - and as such, all the characters are operating on primal urges. Thus the fellows are all manly macho men - hard drinkers who live to shag and shoot. I can only name you a single Western in which the hero chooses to drink milk.

Maybe this is at the root of problem of depicting women. Something like the Ents and the Entwives. In The Two Towers, Treebeard explains that the Ents liked to wander the wilds, while the Entwives liked to stay in one place, to garden and to tame the wilderness. They fell out because the Entwives wanted to civilise while the Ents wished to roam free. And thus: the message of western seems to be that actually, men fare better like this - whether it be the romanticism of Johns Wayne and Ford or the loners at one with the land who populate Sergio Leone's output. The minority of male characters in a western will be dressed in ties and starched colllars - most will be dressed down, whether honest farmers or good fer'nothings. Whereas women wear proper Victorian dresses - wondering where Wild West women get their immaculate hairdos is the oldest joke in the film studies department.

So it's the same dichotomy of the Ents - while the Men are relishing this return to nature, Leone's "simplicity", Women want to civilise the West and make it more like home. Women are resisiting their location, while Men are fitting into it. Optimistic old-school Westerns paint a romantic image of a simpler, better age, when men were men, where you knew where you stood and so on. Pessimistic Westerns are more likely to tell you that this is the true face of humanity - but in both cases, Man is right in accepting this natural state. You don't get many westerns which end with the hero deciding it's not for him and that he'll return to the big city. Interesting dichotomy here too - many westerns are about progress, but the message seems to be one that simpler is best.

There's an inherent criticism, then, in the behavior of women in Westerns - all of whom are in denial about embracing the natural world. I seem to have accidentally argued around the other thing Calypso really objected to, and I do not suggest for a moment that she's wrong in objecting. It was the way the women, after some token resistance, melted onto Clint Eastwood. Because they "secretly wanted it". At the time I said "well it's Clint Eastwood for goodness sakes", but now I've had it out on paper I think I get it. Wild West Men are simple and honest, and as discussed above, have embraced their primal urges - want woman, have woman, have woman now. Wild West Women are rarely shown in this fashion. They are civilised, but the West is not. They are proud and cling onto their notions of dignity and society which Wild West Men know have no meaning "out here". So maybe the inference is that there is a primal Wild West Woman inside each of them, but one they are supressing under their manners and neat appearance. Or, indeed, in the context of his genre they do indeed secretly want it. Which yes, I would also find very objectionable - outside of my beloved westerns. Which just goes to show that academia can justify anything.

There's an essay in here somewhere. And I'm not sure it's as cleancut as all of this. The thing I hate most about academia is the way it has less and less relevance to the subject under discussion. Like the way, in spy movies, spies stop trying to beat the enemy and concentrate on beating the enemy spies instead. While this theory is a nice framework to watch and understand Westerns through, lets be clear about the intents of the filmmakers. Fairly sure, in many cases, the historical setting and genre precedents are justification to show something unpleasant - which we are secretly meant to enjoy watching.

And I think I will enjoy westerns less for having it. I don't mind it at all on a film-by-film basis, because all I can think of have a good in-world justifications aside from my highfalutin' ideas about humanity and violence expressed above. So, Butch Cassidy is parodying the trope. High Plains Drifter is about a man who intends to let a small town destroy itself, and what he does in the first ten minutes sets up ripples that influence the course of the film. Once Upon a Time in the West doesn't really have an excuse for everyone treating Jill like shit - but makes up for by making her a very strong woman, maybe one of my favourite film heroines. Incidentally, have you ever thought about the tagline to that film:

"There were three men in her life. One to take her, one to love her, and one to kill her."

Quite aside from the essay inherent in a tag which defines the female protagonist through the actions of the male characters, have you ever worked out which character is which?

Anyway. Tell me what you think.

World Cinema: week 1

2009-10-02T05:56:00.000-07:00

Welcome back! This semester I'm studying World Cinema and I'll be keeping you updated as I study - partly as revision, partly as rant-space, and partly as an excuse to blog.

This week we watched Pather Panchali, and discussed exactly what World Cinema was. Obviously it's a huge catagory, and one bound up with all sorts of politics. How useful is such a term, when it encompasses EVERYTHING ELSE outside of "normal" cinema - which is assumed to be from the West and in English. Does it include Europe? Britain? Or is it merely the "Third World" countries, places with crappy economies, in which case is there any way this is a topic you can discuss politely and without giving offence? It's precicely these touchy grounds regarding nationhood, race and all the rest which made me want to take this course.

I'm reminded of a quote I heard pre-Live 8. There was controversy because of the lack of black prescence on stage - so they also held "Africa Calling" on the same day, featuring African artists at the Eden Project. A comedian commented:

"We've organised a party for Africa but forgotten to invite any Africans. It's OK - they can come along, but can they stay in the greenhouse?"

That's key to my understanding of World Cinema. Along with World Literature or World Music, it's a rather limiting pigeonhole seen from a Western perspective. For example, India has had the largest film industry since the 70s - producing 1,000 movies a year. The first Japanese film to escape from Japan was in 1934, despite having produced films for 20 years before that. True national cinema didn't start to emerge until after the war, with 1948 being the first year of the Best Foreign Language Oscar. All this remained rather eletist until the 70s and the rise of the Film Festival, when World Cinema became very prominant. In the 90s, a vote was taken for the most important directors of our time - the two winners were from Taiwan and Iran. In which may become a running theme, I couldn't get their names down fast enough. A good, short history of trends in World Cinema can be found here.

So it's a ludicrous term when you think of it, and maybe that's why I'm gonna spend the next eight weeks attempting to define it.

My chief association for World Cinema encompasses non-mainstream. When Oceanic's German pen friends came over, I was looking forward to having a good natter about German cinema - and was disappointed to discover I'd seen more German films than they had. When I reflected on this, I considered that most Brits don't watch British cinema either - we are far more likely to be exposed to films from America, or made with an American co-production. British National Cinema - Billy Liar, Alfie, This is England - is far more the preserve of the film literate than the general public. For this reason, I now think of indie British movies as World Cinema, exposing a view of what "normal cinema" is as not just Western-centric, but Hollywood-centric.

This is especially interesting when compared to Pather Panchali - one of the Great Masterpieces of Indian Cinema by Great Director Satyajit Ray. But the film is in Bengali, a language spoken by only 5% of the population, and had little relevance to regular Indian cinemagoers. The popular cinema of India is, as you know, "Bollywood", which is produced in Urdu, Tamil or Hindi. The film ran for seven weeks in India - in the US, it ran for eight months.

One of the qualities of World Cinema picked out was how this seemed more "real" than Sholay -
and indeed the film was criticised within India for it's depiction of poverty, but again this is something I associate far more with independant/arthouse cinema. Mainstream cinema self-censors - it's not reality, it's the common consensus sold back to us. Pick any marginalised group and you know their depiction will be lacking. Look at the lack of interesting female characters, the Bechdel Wallace test, all the roles as sex object or token girlfriend, the absence of protagonists who are just female and get on with it. We're a long way from screaming and falling over, but the principle remains the same: woman, as represented by film, bears little relation to woman in real life. There's another overlap with social realism - it has always had a mission to faithfully represent the under-represented.

And one of the things I criticised the genre for last year was the way it purports to be life, and yet is no less fake. The documentary style pre-conditions us to accept what we see as truth - people commented on the tottery "auntie", and how she seemed to be not acting but real. But it is a constructed a version of India - as I mentioned above, in a language only 5% of the population speak, depicting a single lifestyle. It isn't, and doesn't attempt to be, representative. Yet it's taken as realistic compared to, say, Sholay - merely because the second seems fake.

Does world cinema have a duty to represent itself? I'm reminded of the French brothers who made Le Fils and L'Enfant, who always shoot with a sense of community - portraying a very specific group of people, despite the universality of their themes. Yet I'm not sure any film can escape representation. A spy thriller from Japan will share common themes with one from America, but even without trying, the Japanese will make a film about their conception of spying, and so will the Americans, and something gets represented all the same. Even High School Musical successfuly depicts the experience of being in an American high school - contrast it with The History Boys, The Wave and Battle Royale. At the same time, I don't think any film could be completely representative of a country - I'll be interested to hear any suggestions you might have to the contrary. Of course, "all art is quite useless" - I would have high disdain for any film that set out to be didactic first and fiction, or at any rate cinema, second.

Perhaps part of the appeal in World Cinema is this representation - appreciation of things strange and exotic. We can't help but view foreign cinema as foreigners. An obvious statement, but nevertheless a true one. We enjoy universal human emotions (love, hate and the rest), while also experiencing the strange - whether that be mannerisms, customs or merely costume and appearance. Pather Panchali, for example, is a detailed depiction in the life of an ordinary family. In other words, it's social realism - everything from the style to the subject matter screams it. A genre I detest with a firey passion. I understand it is well made and Important - with my brain but not my heart. Where is the fun in watching real life? I get enough of that when not at the movies. Truffaut, rather spitefully, commented on Pather Panchali that "I don’t want to see a movie of peasants eating with their hands." And while that's a mean and small minded view to take towards anything, if he had applied it to British realism and said "I don't want to see a movie of Cockney housewives cooking chips" I might have more sympathy.

So on some level I was appreciating it as a documentary, because as mentioned above, it seemed "real". And yet the exotic depiction of life also appealed to me - little things like keeping money wrapped in a sari, and yes Truffaut, eating rice with their hands. Had it been made in Britain - and the tropes are the same, from the struggling housewife to the layabout father - I'd have found it interminable.

There is maybe something a little patronising in this connection to European realism. From the 50s-70s, Ray was Indian cinema for cine-snobs in the West. This was nothing unusual for that time - most countries outside Hollywood were filtered through one or two directors - and arguably it is still done today (China? Crouching Tiger. Japan? Anime. Brazil? City of God e.t.c...). Ray learnt filmmaking from Jean Renoir (France), he adored The Bicycle Thieves (Italy), and his greatest influence was a year spent watching movies in London. Obviously globalisation means nothing grows in a vaccum, but what Europe praised coming out of India was a cinema that Europe had invented. It took far longer for the all-singing, all-dancing, and totally unique Indian cinema to be appreicated.

(Or is this just my Western perspective? As someone used to British Social Realism, I am boxing it as such, but missing all sorts of layers and influences which an Indian audience would understand? Tricky tricky.)

Again, this makes sense in context. 30 years ago, all academics wanted to talk about were auteurs - arty, irrelevant movies. Recently, there has been a rise in "genre studies" - in other words, studying films that normal people watch. So the move from Ray to accepting "Bollywood" matches a global trend.

But there is a danger here with foreign cinema - because what is foreign anyway in this day and age? Tarantino can make Kill Bill, and Edgar Wright Hot Fuzz, even though the obvious properties would identify one as "Japanese" and the other "American". Do we enjoy the World Cinema we do precicely because appeals to the West? Either accidentally, or consciously made for export?

So, back to my first definition - it's not a place but a state of mind. It's not necessarily about where the producers come from, but the underlying ideology and the snobs who consume it.

Si-len-ci-o...!

2009-09-24T06:32:00.000-07:00

Until 9 o'clock last night, David Lynch was my Favourite Director Whose Films I
Haven't Actually Seen. He'd inherited the title from Werner Herzog, and Quentin Tarantino before him, and I'm curious to see who comes along next.

Because last night, we watched Mullholland Drive - the closest thing there is to a dream on screen, and marvellous exercise in "Ghost Light" cinema. Ghost Light being an episode of Doctor Who, its incomprehensibility on par with it's beauty.

I have the same feeling for it's mysteries as I do for Blade Runner. The director has made a film with an ambiguity, and thus you are meant to appreciate the ambiguity. If he had meant it to be solved, he would have solved it. As it stands, I think the director means to give us headaches, no more, and is having on with the promise that it "makes sense". He generously gives us ten "clues" in the DVD case, such as "Where is Aunt Ruth" and "notice appearances of the red lampshade", to muddy the issue further. I don't think there needs to be an explanation - to be beautiful and enigmatic is enough. It makes sense on a thematic, sensory level - if not on a logical one.

If I had to pitch for a theory, I'd say parallel realities that are in a constant loop. The blue box represents shifting from one reality to another, and these events have been played out again and again. Turning the key resets the world, and shifts you to the other one. A bit Sliding Doors, and a bit Run Lola Run, and a bit like Donnie Darko in the way the two realities bleed into one another. It reminds me of a story, but I haven't put my finger on which yet. I'd also say the most important clue on the list is number five - "who gives a key, and why?" - but don't bother your head with the "can you hear the title of the film that Adam Kesher is auditioning actresses for? Is it mentioned again?" , because I knew from the start they wouldn't mention it once. I'm also intrigued by the Adam-Cowboy subplot, partly because it does seem to have something solvable about it. The Cowboy says, if he chooses Camilla, he will see him once more - if he doesn't, he will see him twice. Adam sees Betty across the room at casting and is obviously fascinated, and if Betty had auditioned then he would have picked her. Instead, she runs - he casts Camilla - and you do see the Cowboy once more, in the second reality, where he has physically picked Camilla over Betty.

I was reminded of it when Calypso read me one of Freud's nuttier essays for a laugh. To him, the box represents the female, and also represents death, and in turn, leads to the two fundamental parts of life - the necessity of death and the choice of love. Which is all fruitcakes, especially in the context he was describing it, but it reminded me of the film in several ways. Cinematically, the portmanteau tale reminded me of the Coen brothers at times. It was also a clear precursor to Donnie Darko - not so much the weirdness as the similar soundscape. Oh, the sound! I've never seen a movie with such marvellous sound design before. Very beautiful and strange. As was the sense of dreamlike timelessness - somewhat like Tarantino: he makes modern movies, but with such a retro feel that I am always shocked when characters pull out a mobile or ipod a la Death Proof. Betty is going for a consciuous Grace Kelly thing, but Rita is almost vampiric - as if she had walked straight out of a black and white movie, and had yet to regain all her colour. Her look is just so classical, and creepy.

I'm intrigued by the total control he has over his actors. Total. One of the reasons I'm not always enchanted with film is the concept of control. So, in a book you have total control over every aspect except your audience's imagination - in a comic, you can determine what things look like but have less control over, say, internal monologue or describing the way people speak. In films, you can't determine exactly the look of your actors, nor their performance - actually, they may take your meaning and twist it utterly. David Lynch has them like puppets on strings - a lot of the expressions and manners of speaking, to me at least, seem to come straight from his imagination. I can't define it. It's wonderful.

I want to write an essay about how watching cinema changes you physically. The way people change when watching violence, sex or something scary or romantic. For example, I heat up when watching something scary, and when I am really, really enjoying a film, I discover my breathing rate tends to slow -which is something that did happen while watching. Calypso is a fine person to watch cinema with - she instinctively understands that a movie should be 90% total silence, and 10% movie trivia. Contrary to what you might expect, if nothing pressing is going on, I don't mind interruptions to point out that character X is being played by the director's estate agent, or shot Y is a tribute to an obscure film no one has actually seen. Of course, this percentage changes depending on the nature of the film, but I was intrigued to discover it started life as a TV show. Might explain where all the exposition went.

As it was, it is brief and self contained. Mysterious. Beautiful. Silencio!

You keep calling me Walter. I don't like you.

2009-03-07T16:17:00.000-08:00

So, at seven in the evening a film studies friend, obviously having spotted the bloody-smiley I've been sporting all week, asked "Watchmen's been out all day, have you seen it yet?" No, but I was just on the way to the IMAX. He wasn't a big fan of 300 (Jesu, is it only me?), and commented "if it doesn't amount more to a pretty picture, then at least you want to see it on IMAX so it's a really pretty picture."

Fair assessment, but I knew like I've never had faith in anything before, that it had to be good.
The following review contains spoilers, please don't read it.

Quid dicam? This film could not have been better. That's not to say it's the best film I've ever seen, far from it. But as an adaptation of Watchmen, it is everything I hoped.Every character inhabits their part perfectly, except maybe Ozymandeus and we'll come to that in a minute. Dr Manhattan is brilliantly realised - the little twitches of emotion on an emotionless face is just brilliant. Comedian and Rorschach, who I can only define as my two favourite things in the comic, are spot-on perfect. I mean, there's nothing more to say than that - they could have walked off the page. Ach, hell - everyone's good.

But Ozymandeus...Adrian Veidt of the books is such an all-American hero. He needs to be played by someone charasmatic, someone you know would jump out of a helicopter for you without even thinking. A young Robert Redford would be perfect. Now, Matthew Goode's intepretation was widely different to mine, incorrect if you ask me. Yet he did what he was trying to do very well, even if we disagree on characterisation, and I give him permission to play Dorian Gray whenever he likes.

The pacing was what I really worried about, and it's fine. The narrative constructs itself as a series of flashbacks, which is initially a little jarring, until you realise that's what it's doing. There are probably about 8 or 9 flashback sequences in the film, and they're there to colour the main narrative. And do so wonderfully. It's so deliberately episodic that it might have benefited from Tarantino style headings: "Mr White" and all.

As such, it's not so much a story constructed through plot but connections and symbols. Take the knowingly cliched soundtrack: Vietnam is scored to, what else, Ride of the Valykiries. President Nixon and his cabal plot nuclear war on the set of Dr Strangelove. We're operating in a parallel timeline, but the music instantly takes us back to our folk memory of our equivalent era - Sounds of Silence, Bob Dylan, 99 Luftballoons. And that's combined with things like Pat Buchanan and Andy Warhol, even more cultural icons, to let us know where we are. Just don't try and excuse the use of Hallejulah in a scene which was already pretty poor.

You don't even miss the squid. The concept of alien invasion works in the comic, because it's a comic about comics, and comics were always keen into their outer-space stories. It would have felt odd in the film. As an adaptation, this is how it's done, because it's so detail-rich and you know there was more. They lose half Rorschach's origin story, cut my favourite line, snip all over the shop - but the film still feels like a complete entity. I can't wait for the director's cut - apparently, there's going to be three ultimately: the two hours and forty minutes theatrical cut, the three hours and twenty minutes director's cut, and the four hours and thirty minutes ultimate cut, which has pretty much everything in there, including Tales of the Black Freighter.

But they did get some things wrong. I missed Hollis' death. I love both Nite Owls, and it's an important scene. The film could have easily been ten minutes longer to fit that in. With Hollis having been introduced, it's almost certainly been shot. They cut some of my favourite lines: I particularly missed Rorschach scolding Moloch for having a gun without a license. It cements the fact he sees all crime as equally wicked. Rorschach with the hacksaw? It was an awesome scene up until then, but it's not quite as twisted as what he does in the graphic novel (covers him in petrol, hands him a hacksaw, and advises him he probably shouldn't bother trying to cut through the handcuffs before pulling out a match). And the last fifteen minutes dropped the ball, horribly. They get to Karnak and...the ending has to be a kick in the gut. When I read Adrian use the phrase "half an hour ago" I dropped the book and burst into tears, justlikethat, in a way no comic has ever done, and very very few books. The film loses the impact, and I don't know why. And then you turn the page, and there's this full-page panel of a street filled with bodies and death. Then another, and another, and you just keep turning pages and there's nothing but death and silence. It's an awesomely powerful sequence, and an obvious candidate to keep - but they cut it. I don't understand why.

And they managed to make that whole bit at the end into one of those superhero endings which just keep fizzling in little events. It almost worked - particularly a key character claiming not to be a villain from a superhero comic. You could feel an indrawn breath across the whole audience, and this was an audience of fans, most likely all of whom had read the comic at least twice. But then they let the tension go again. The final scene of Laurie and Dan even lacked impact, and they needed about an extra 30 seconds to allow the true horror, genius and even meaning of Ozy's actions. In addition, I think the film was a little too overt in its condemnation of said actions. He's not a bad guy. I think it's telling that the last fifteen minutes were also those containing the most changes. It just lacks meaning, and it didn't feel real. Too rushed, I think.

A lot of people criticised it for a lack of depth. I understand them, to an extent - but it's only a film, and it did its best. And there were good changes too. It made sense for Ozymandeus to do the speaking at the meeting when Comedian burns the map. Although I missed Kitty's half of Rorschach's backstory, I appreciate it had to go - at that point in the film, the emphasis has to be on moving forward.

I mean, I'm only nitpicking because on the whole it was wonderful. Jesu, people! It's stayed true to the book's filthy darkness. Stylistically it's deliberately taken beats from the comic. The score is excellent - on the way to the IMAX, I kept thinking "I'm looking forward to the music", because I knew it had to ditch broad orchestrals in favour of electronica and ambient moodiness. Which it did, most of the time, to great effect. I'm listening to "Edward Blake - Comedian" at present, and it's taken obvious inspiration from Blade Runner. It's detail rich - you need several watches to take in the visuals, never mind the plot. Rorschach's mask - it's just so watchable. I particularly love it when it goes nuts. The hacksaw scene, the shapes just fly all over it. And when he gets thrown across the room, the shapes fly into chaos until he rights himself. The highlight of the film? Rorschach's escape from the apartment block. You're just rooting for him so, so, so much. Even those of us who know he's not going to make it.

Things to look out for? In the comic, Rorschach muses that Adrian is possibly homosexual (with a distinctly disapproving tone) - if you keep your eyes peeled when Dan checks the floppy disk, one of the folders on it is labelled "boys". That made me chuckle. IMDB claims the graphic novel suggests Rorschach is gay, but that strikes me as very unlikely considering the distaste he regards sex with full stop, and also a pointless line of investigation: can you imagine Rorschach with a date? No, thought not. Rorschach also uses a Vedit aerosol when breaking out of Moloch's house. In the prison break, someone uses a wilhelm scream when they are dropped off a balcony. Finally, when Laurie and Dan are at the Gunga Diner, you can see pink triangles on the wall - surely they're the Gay Women Against Rape posters from the comic?Interestingly, the

Aint it Cool review has virtually identical things to say to
me:http://www.aintitcool.com/node/40339And it's helped me to understand what was missing at the end. I am looking forward to

"Oh, and that when you go to see the movie this weekend, you won't be watching Jackie Earl Haley -- Jackie Earl Haley will be watching you."

And I've settled down to what I believe is the most jarring aspect of the Watchmen movie, it's not in the spoilerific section because it's of general interest. Me back on my personal hobbyhorse: Too. Violent.

There are three types of movie violence, broadly speaking.

There's Type 1 "gore" - not very realistic, completely excessive, and designed to produce a football-supporter-style "phwoar!!" reaction. Planet Terror, 300 and Street Fighter are perfect examples. You are meant to visibly wince, and after the film it's appropriate to go "ah, you remember the bit where the guy's head went into the wood-cutter? That was gross, ma$n!"

There's what we'll call Type 2 "kung-fu", although obviously it encompasses all sorts of fights - exciting, viceral, borderline video game, encompassing Star Wars, James Bond and The Matrix. This violence is meant to impress the skill of the fighters on you. Wounds tend to be shrugged off, as are natural reactions: you can be kicked six times in the gut and still be smiling in a Type 2 movie. And so can the audience.

And there's Type 3, "realistic". It's debateable whether Type 3 movies are meant to entertain or not - I believe that the vicarious enjoyment of cinema can be extended to very, very unpleasant scenarios as much as happy ones. But this third type sets out to disturb, not in a childish way like Type 1, but in a very real and horrible way.

And there are overlaps, of course - the jury is out on whether Reservoir Dogs is a type 3 "realistic" or a type 1 "gore". And I'll be interested if you can provide any films which don't fit into those three, random catagories I just plucked out of the blue, so I can refine my explanation.

It's all a problem of semantics, because I'd only actually call Type 3 violent. The most violent scene I've ever seen is in a PG. Our heroes have been kidnapped and lined up against a wall by Character A - except Character B, who's broken his leg, who is lying on a table next along. Character A wants information, but our heroes are naturally too hardass to say anything. So he saunters over the Character B, and just waits. Then he gently rolls the barrel of his gun up the broken leg - obviously intensely painful - and that's it. But it is _violence_ in it's purest form. No excitement, no blood. It's just such a threatening gesture.

Incidentally, The Departed is my favourite depiction of film violence of all time, because it is everything it can be, and I believe it expresses the experience better than any other film. It's thrilling, set to a pumping rock soundtrack - and I think there must be something of a thrill in real violence too, otherwise why would it happen, if it wasn't on some level fun? Yet it's also firmly type 3, because it's hard to watch. You want to join in, but you can't look. And every piece of violence in the film tumbles through this contradiction. It's very effective, and I like it a lot.

The point of this digression is to bitch about the violence in Watchmen. It's a nasty little book, and the world it's set in is just horrible. True, you're seeing it through the eyes of Rorschach who is undeniably paranoid, and regards humanity as crooked and flawed. I was cheered, then, that it was going to be an 18 because this film needs to be nasty.Bit of a disappointment, because the violence was defiantly Type 1. Cartoonish, bloody and totally OTT. Every time soemthing nasty happened, there was an audible wince from the audience. It jolted you out of the film because type 1 gore is dehumanising. J. said to me afterwards, the worst part was the knife going through the woman's leg.I replied that it wasn't that at all - it was the knife going through a leg, not the woman's leg. The fact it was her as opposed to anyone else was irrelevant.

Yes, it was unpleasant but Zack Snyder had never sat back and considered why he was using this violence, what was the purpose. Why, in a film otherwise so grounded in reality, was everything so luridly vicious? Why couldn't it have been a nasty 18, instead of just a splatterific one? From the bone-crunching way the fights were filmed, to the actual colour of the blood, there was something just wrong. Hyper-real, and wrong. It was this aspect, more than anything else (and the fact they cut out my favourite bit), which disappointed me.

Oscar rage!!!!!!!!!

2009-02-23T09:48:00.000-08:00

Anyone who’s been on my blog before, anyone who’s actually had to go through watching it with me before, will know loathe the Oscars. Yet being a fan of movies, I can’t get away from them – and so I’m not going to be a grown up about this thing I hate, and ignore it. I’m going to be childish and bitch, at some length, at why it is the most trivial, smug and meaningless night of the year.

Fans of the concept, with happy naïve ideas that the winner is always the most deserving, should look away now.

Firstly – I don’t believe in it in principle, that you can judge five different films and pick a winner. Between five horror films, you can at least pick the best horror film – but between a romance, historical, drama, comedy and horror, how can you even begin? Out of Africa is a better romance than Saw was. Is it a better film? Not remotely! In this contest, Out of Africa is the best film involving lions, Africa and Meryl Streep, and Saw is the best movie about a leg on the floor. Sure, you can prefer one over the other – but I thought the Oscars were about the “best” movie, not a mere popularity contest?

Which it blatantly is – how can it not be? – yet it keeps up this façade of rewarding merit. Your vote is almost certainly going to go to the genre you prefer. I love buddy movies, and so I’d naturally enjoy a buddy movie more than a horror movie. Sit me down in front of The Sting and the Exorcist, and I’ll always pick the former, regardless of quality. Same goes for performances, same for music, for costumes.

An enterprise which involves this sort of arbritary voting is always going to be a bit crooked, but the Oscars almost turn it into a sport. Isn’t it funny how all five Best Picture nominees are English or American? Now, of course, this might just be because us superior Westerners make better films than anywhere else in the world – but any sane human can tell you that’s balls. A serious line up for this years best movie might involve one or two English language movies, but would also encompass the variety world cinema has to offer.

As soon as you notice there’s rarely a foreign film up for awards, except in a token way, you wonder who the show is for. It’s not like the Korean audience are going to go “ooooh, American films are better than Korean films because they win more Oscars”. No – the institution is designed by Hollywood as an exercise in back-patting and marketing, for the English-speaking audience. To the rest of the world, they’re meaningless. So why should it matter to us?

And the Oscar voters love sentiment. Real people. Real lives. Drama, angst – weighty topics. It’s favouritism, not merit. Is a story intrinsically better because it is deep and meaningful than fantastical and frothy? Not a jot! Yet as a body, their votes always reflect a love for Americana, social commentary and above all, a healthy dose of slush.

An example. Did Al Pacino win an Oscar for the Godfather, for the widely acknowledged best performance of all time? No. Except if you count the Oscar they gave him for the Godfather in 1993. He received it, supposedly, for Scent of a Woman – but it was Michael Corleone who went on stage to pick it up. Same thing happened with Martin Scorcese and his Oscar for Goodfellas, which he won a few years ago for Gangs of New York. Of course, Al was good in Scent, and the direction was good in Gangs. But that's not what it was about. It was about the sentiment. A friend blog, Hilarity Ensues, suggests Meryl Streep and Sean Penn get more nominations for being Streep and Penn than because they actually deserve it.

I admit, there's a personal vendetta here too - Titanic won because of the noise it made. Everyone was mad for it! Screaming, crying, fangirls. Again, it won because it was Titanic, for being groundbreaking, for causing such hysteria. Not because it was the best film of that year. Even among epic-tragic-romances-in-pretty-dresses, it's not well regarded. The punchline is the moment it beats L.A. Confidential, one of the most stunningly impressive films I've ever seen, to the best Oscar gong.

Now bear with me. One of these films had classy direction, four great central performances, a plot so gorgeously complex that even after five viewings I can't appreciate the detail, and a fantastic, subtle script, which only becomes more impressive when you see the laberynthine source material from which it was adapted. The other one...well, the other one's Titanic.

Certainly Titanic is very enjoyable, and if you're a fan of period slush you'll obviously love it more than my precious crime epic. You can't deny it does what it does - ludicrously romantic melodrama - very well, and I'm pretty fond of it in my own way. But on any just system you've got to admit that L.A. Confidential is a better crime epic than Titanic is a romance.

And that was the moment I lost faith in the Oscars. 7/10 movie critics will tell you I'm right. Empire and Total Film both think I'm right. The Imdb list things I'm right.

And Oscar history is packed with this - A Beautiful Mind beat Fellowship of the Ring, Chicago beat Two Towers. Look at the above lists. It's not just the Oscars, either - Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead beat Goodfellas at Cannes, and see how many film buffs you can find who think that's fair! Here's a whole list: http://www.filmsite.org/worstoscars.html

The point of all this is, people rarely if ever win Oscars because they deserve it. If they do, well, that's nice as well. And if Greatest Director Of All Time Alfred Hitchcock lost all 5 of his nominations, then how can the list mean anything at all?

Which brings us around to Mr Ledger, the cause of the rant. You might recall me saying words to the effect of "the Joker was a fantastic role, certainly deserving an Oscar - but if he wins, he'll have won for being dead." And I stand by that.

You can say there's never been a superhero film like Dark Knight before (there hasn't, but wait until next week...); you can even say there's never been a peformance like that in a fantasy movie before. But the rule still stands - you don't get actors in fantasy! Actors make films, not movies! It's why Johnny Depp didn't win an Oscar for Pirates of the Carribean: World's End, Ian McKellen didn't get one for Fellowship of the Ring, though both were nominated. "But Johnny Depp and Ian McKellen weren't very good...", to which I say come off it. They never had a chance. Neither were playing schitzophrenic black lesbian single mothers in wheelchairs.

Fantasy movies - by which I mean dungeons, dragons, sci fi, superheroes et al - get Oscars for sound design and special effects. Period. Sometimes costume, music if they're lucky, maybe editing.

Return of the King, of course, won everything (see: sentimental voting, Al Pacino winning an Oscar on behalf of earlier achievements - the King Oscars were actually for the whole trilogy). It's the only Fantasy film to ever win a best film Oscar, unless you extend the definition to include Around the World in 80 Days or Wings. Same goes for directors - Return of the King is the only one. What about Blade Runner, I ask? What about 2001: A Space Odyssey?

A 1931 Best Actor Oscar was won for Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, although that technically comes under mental illness. Someone managed to get Best Supporting Actor and Actress for Cocoon and Fisher King respectively, though both do have strong elements of real life in them. And without meticulously researching the content of every film I've never heard of, that's it for Oscars. Heath Ledger's achievement is even more impressive than previously thought.

I was surprised to find myself giving a spontaneous cry of joy at hearing he’d got it after all, instead of rolling my eyes as you might have expected from the rant above. Which just proves that we all get pretty sentimental at times, and I find myself wishing, if only for a moment, that the whole system was fair....

Adaptation...

2008-12-23T09:34:00.000-08:00

...is felgercarb. I think I've got a handle on what it should be now; all the same, it's an impossible subject, and one currently much on my mind. As indeed is "felgercarb", a nice piece of swearing from original Battlestar Galactica. Oh how times have changed.

It is possible to make a perfectly true adaptation, but usually only of very slim books. Age of Innocence - still, believe it or not, my favourite Scorcese - is a word for word transfer. Even descriptive passages are lovingly transferred; even the scene where our hero imagines his love interest walking up behind him. Another one that comes to mind is Brideshead Revisited, the TV show. You'd be hard pressed to find a line missing from that adaptation (well, I can, but only because they had the misfortune to cut my favourite line...).

It's also a good 17 hours long, and herein lies the rub. Cuts have to be made. Books are not films, films are not books - it's part of the excitement. If you don't, then you end up with something like Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet, nicknamed "the Eternity version" for good reason. And the film still managed to waltz off with a nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay, despite the fact he'd done nothing to the script but choose one Folio over another, and juggle the odd soliloquy.

I actually handle cuts with some equanimity. As a film student, I understand that a perfect copy of the book is rarely possible, nor even desirable - to an extent, if it's the same as the book, why not read the book? And as PJ justified, Frodo and Sam didn't not go to see Tom Bombadil, they just didn't show it on screen.

Changes are worse - for one thing, the author knew what they were doing. By changing small details, other facets of the story fall out of kilter, important themes fall by the wayside - it's the literary equivalent of going back in time and stepping on a butterfly. A personal example is Denethor in Return of the King. This isn't a subject I can speak fairly on - you see, he has always been my favourite character in the books. He's human and flawed, makes some bad decisions, is worn out and weak. But he's not evil - as far as I know, Tolkien never wrote Bad Guys. Saruman is given sympathy; and there are quotes pointing out that even Sauron was not born evil. The film does make him a bad guy - and like that, a whole layer of complexity is gone from the plot. It would have only taken two lines to give him some much-needed motivation. Stories are always better when all the characters are sympathetic.

Little things matter less. Does it matter that Gregory Peck plays New-Zealander Mallory as an American in Guns of Navarone? Or that David Niven plays American Dusty Miller as a Brit? Not really, because their characters are preserved. Apparently, the Cirque du Freak fandom is kicking up a fuss because a white girl has been cast as Debbie - again, this is far less henious a crime than, say, making her an ass-kicking Vampire babe, or giving her a terminal illness, or killing her off in a weird way.

For me, it's TONE that is the great killer. The Denethor complaint is a tonal one more than anything else - it kills the atmosphere in Gondor. A good example of this is L.A. Confidential, a terrific movie which I respect twice as much through having read the book. Which is significantly different, and about 6 times as complex. Characters are killed in different times and places, names are swopped, subplots dropped and switched. But it still FEELS like the movie of the book, because the tone is so close. The nastiness (nastier in the book, I'll add - it made me feel sick in a way that nothing has since), the corruption, the interweaving plots. Unless you'd been paying great attention to the book, and making notes, your synopsis would be identical to one of the film - something about three policemen, a vice ring, the Victory Motel, the Nite Owl, Piers Patchett, Lynn Bracken. Who has about three pages in the book, but they're memorable ones. The shootout at the Victory happens at the end, instead of the start - but who's counting? Because it's there.

Or maybe it's because all these are films I've loved first, which is why I take it well, as opposed to the Denethor case, which I take oh-so-personally.

Yet I have said, and with a single exception believe, that no story is unfilmable. There's always a way. I find it hard to imagine people thought Lord of the Rings was unfilmable - it's so cinematic! Look at The Message - a movie about the life of the prophet Mohammed...who isn't allowed to be depicted in art. What do they do? Never show him on screen, and when he and another character are speaking, the other character speaks to the Fourth Wall and falls silent "listening" to his reply. It's genius - crazy, but genius - and the film gets on with it so that you barely notice the daftness.

If you can get over a main character who's not allowed on screen, you can get away with anything. A lot of people are calling Watchmen unfilmable. They're wrong, and I hope Mr Snyder is going to prove them wrong in the new year. It too is so terribly cinematic - the comic borrows liberally from film techniques, particularly intercutting, but also flashbacks and the use of sound. A lot of the depth will have to go - but like Lord of the Rings, it never hurts to have more material than you need. Because you can feel in the film that Middle Earth is massive and ancient, because of those tiny references. Thus with Watchmen - I think you'll believe the world because those things are cut, but under the surface.

The single exception is Sandman. Terrific TV show, perhaps, but it'd make a lousy movie, mostly because there's no plot. or rather, lots of plots - Sandman is a twelve volume omnibus of the best fantasy short stories you've ever read, linked by the central character of Morphius, who's basically the god of sleep. The only way to do it justice would be dump it on a freewheeling first time director, who'd be able to capture the ambling from one thread to another.

A typical issue of Sandman will start with a little story about a man; that man will go to sleep and dream a story, and inside that story there are three characters who sit down and each tell an anecdote about their lives. Maybe an anecdote about storytelling. That's six plots, all equally vital and equally superfluous to juggle. Which is why it can't, and shouldn't be made, except as a Tales from the Crypt style weekly show, filming the longer and better ones. And as soon as you give it to the telly, the budget is unachieveable. Sandman is currently the sole exception to my rule.

What's got me on this?

For one thing, I've been reading Guns of Navarone, and enjoying it immensly. It's one of my very favourite films, and the book doesn't disappoint. As for the film, some cuts - the German patrol thinking Stevens/Franklin is their own missing guard, the boat which gets blown up in the movie searching them twice instead of once - most of which I can justify. Changes, very interesting changes - because the film is actually more complex, where changes are mostly made to simplify the book. For example, film folks will remember Greek tough-guy Andrea had sworn he was going to murder Mallory once the war was over. This element isn't in the book - they're just good buddies. And while Miller puts himself in charge of their injured teammember, Stevens is just a random extra. In the movie, the injured Franklin is also his longterm buddy, adding a layer of complexity and emotion. It's this deep relationship which causes all sorts of tensions and arguments later on, and is directly responsible for the movie's best three scenes. It'll be interesting to see if they're there at all, and how they'll play out in the book. Anna, the girl - I think I already spotted her in the cast, but in the book She is a He. And Jensen's role is cut down almost completely.

And then there is the sheer irritation factor of Miller being American - he's my favourite character in the film, because of his crumbling British stoicism, his wry British sarcasm, and the fact he's played by David Niven, who's so British he couldn't locate America on a map.

What muddies the issue further is that after the success of the film, Alaister McLean wrote Force 10 from Navarone as its sequel - which means characters which die in the first book, but survive the first film, are there in the second book. I want to go back to Force 10 now - which I read first - and see whether Miller is still an American...

I feel the film is a fair interpretation of the book so far. All the major events are there, and the tone is the same - exciting, tense, and heroic. And just bubbling underneath that, the insane mental and physical hardships of war. I'm just looking forward to seeing how they treat those three scenes...

And also because last night, we went to see Twilight. Against the odds, it wasn't "High School Musical with emos", as I'd feared - it was actually a pretty darn good movie. Especially when you compare it with rival movies for teen girls. This is what set me off - because the vampire novels of my childhood, Cirque du Freak by Darren Shan and its 11 sequels are coming to a cinema near you sooner than I'd like.

They're very special books - if for no other reason that I reread them last month, and they are still incredible:

Reinterpretation of vampire legend gets full points. Everyone has their own blend - I'm writing three vampire stories at any one time, and they all conform to my rules. If Darren Shan's is the most gritty, it's also the most realistic. Not necessarily a recommendation - after all, I love Anne Rice's gothic aristocracy of the night as much as the next gal. This is a world where the police notice the civil war going on among the undead; where sun exposure can kill you after a while, but gives you the worst suntan in the world first (instead of blowing you up on sight, which is lousy, or making you look like David Bowie, which is worse); and the gamut of vampire powers is restrained by common sense. It must be said that the vampire stories I'm writing only conform to one of these...

The characters deserve special mention, because I'm not sure exactly what it is or how he does it, but by the time they started getting killed, I really minded. Gavner! Arra! Mr Crepsley! Mr Tall! Kurda! Annie! Debbie! Steve! Lefty! Evra! The book is written from Darren's point of view, so while he's a character you like, it's not the same deep fondness as you aquire for the people around him.

I've neglected to mention Mr Tiny, mostly because he's just too scary. Great character, but not as adorable. Incidentally, why haven't they cast Sylvester McCoy yet...?

Aimed squarely at young teenagers, they never patronise and never shy away from being dark, even though the writing style occasionally reminds you you're no longer 8. Yet there are scenes which still upset me, shock me, make me wince and think.

I'm upset about the movie. Partly, it is true, because I wanted to make it. And it would be incredible. But as I said, it's all about TONE. This is a book for young adults, and they're going to pitch it at children. They'll *ahem* take out the fangs and the blood and grit, and neuter it completely. Which is a shame, because the world has no lack of sanitised kid-fare. To work, it needs to be the same level of intensity as the latest Harry Potter - but no studio is going to take a risk on making it a 12.

What's worse is that it will suck stylistically. My movie would look like the photos of my favourite artist, Eugenio Recuenco, filmed in the style of Night Watch, all deep contrast and dark, sticky blacks, with the occasional splash of intense colour. I adore the whole circus aesthetic, designing the Cirque would be terrific. As would Vampire Mountain. They've moved it from Europe to America - if anything, perhaps this is is better? Our heroes spend the time in anonymous towns and empty nowheres, and America still has a lot of those.

But they're just going to drown it in CGI, forgetting that Shan-pires aren't magical, romantic or supernatural - they're scarred, earthy, and basically just humans a tiny bit more dead. Not to mention that they'd never let me make their precious child-friendly movie with these images in mind. My use of CGI would be as limited as possible - as Guillermo del Toro has proved, you can get away with a suprising amount without it.

It can't all be bad. I do like the fact that they're compressing books 1-3 into one film - even though you could do, say, Tunnels of Blood as a seperate film, setting them all at the same time is much better. In book 1, Darren goes to a circus and as a result becomes a vampire - you can cover that in the first twenty minutes. You could very effectively set book 2 (Sam, the Cirque, R.V. and the Wolfman) and book 3 (Evra, Murlough and Debbie) at the same time, by parking the Cirque near the town where Murlough is.

More importantly, it sets up a good precedent for the rest of the series, which occurs in natural slim trilogies. Next up come the three at Vampire Mountain - I don't recall the details so clearly, but they could easily make one good movie; what I remember of the hunt for the Vampanize Lord also could do with some heavy trimming.

I would cast a different boy as Darren in every movie. He's going to have to stay looking young, so instead of having Actor A for three films, and replace him with Actor B just when things get intense, it would be an accepted fact of the series that it will always be someone new. Perhaps it's the Doctor Who in my system making me think that this is a Good Thing. Still, it'd make for some interesting comparisons across the series as a whole.

Most importantly in attaining a unique tone, I'd find a good composer. I do not want someone to think "Children's film - lets have strings and magical flutes!". In the book, vampire music is heavy slow drums. That'd be an interesting sound; or Dark Knight's Joker theme, or anything electronic and offbeat. As little music as we can get away with, and with a composer willing to experiment with sounds.

Enough of the movie I'm never going to make, and you're never going to see. What about the one we've got. Time for some internet research...

Just a conspiracy of cartographers...

2008-12-19T04:27:00.000-08:00

I'm a big fan of absurdist drama - Waiting for Godot, about two men trapped in an endless cycle of waiting under a tree; Rosencrantz and Guldenstern are Dead, about two minor characters trying to work out what's going on, trapped again in the endlessly cycling plot of Hamlet; Six Characters in Search of an Author, again about characters who were abandoned by their author and take on a life of their own.

And hundreds more, Pinter and Satre and Camus - those just happen to be the three plays I'm fond of, mostly because they delve into meta-fiction - the idea that fiction isn't real. "No duh", you might be saying - but most films or books expect you to believe them for the duration of consuming them. Wheras characters in an absurdist drama can and do sit down and say "look, I'm not sure we're real..."

I find this fascinating. My line between fiction and reality has always been somewhat dodgy - I do believe that as soon as a story has been committed to paper, why shouldn't it be real? It's no less real than reading a story in the newspaper. You can say "yes, but the ones in the newspaper actually happened" - but you have no more proof, except the words on the page. And what is "actually happened" anyway? Your experience of the events is exaclty the same, if not more vivid, in a book. If you were to imagine that your [insert close person] had been run down by a tram, does the fact that they haven't make your feelings of sorrow any less real? You have the emotional experience - you can't throw it away and say it was nothing.

I'm going to borrow a line from someone else now, but it's a thought I had independantly too, he just puts it very well. If you ever cried at a film - E.T., Top Gun, Casablanca - while a "real life" tragedy has left you unmoved, then what the hell is the difference? Sure - you feel bad about the war/famine/disease/disaster, but in a distant, "bad things happen", nothing I can do to help way. You can't do anything to help E.T. either, mate. Because he's not real. So why are you reaching for kleenex?

With that in mind, and if you're not already calling men in nice shiny white suits to take me away, you can understand why I'd find metatheatre fascinating.

And so we come onto Knife in the Water, a film I positively loathed throughout for various reasons I'll discuss in a minute, until it got to the end and I realised what it was. Absurdist drama!

Look at the hallmarks - mundane, repetitive dialogue. Pointless plot. A location without time, personality, or recognisable features. We're pretty sure it's Poland, and at one point we know it's 5AM. But apart from that, it could be anywhere. And the time/place is meaningless anyway, as the characters are archetypes, one without a name. The Hiker comes and goes out of nowhere, as if he has spent his entire existance waiting by that roadside, and ceases to exist as soon as he gets off the boat. Imagine he's a ghost if you like, only there to spark off the situation. He's a walking plot device. When Andrzej swims off, he seems to disappear. Because they're characters who have no life outside the immediate story.

They do mention other people - the seamen, some parents, the man who could beat Andrzej at jacksticks. But the Hiker's backstory is conveyed only through Krystina's surmises, she has no backstory at all, and all we know about Andrzej is that he is successful, and there's an abstract "meeting" he needs to be at. We see no one else, and no proof of anyone else, in the film. Andrzej himself seems to be conscious of this - assuming the windscreen wipers won't be pinched. Who would steal them? Everyone in that world is on the boat. Which makes their later theft even more surreal.

Even if you don't agree with me, see at least that they are sailing through an empty world. Someone on IMDb suggested that they already knew each other, and I can see where they're coming from: they do seem to be aware of something out of the ordinary. I found the characterisation very uneven and bizzare, as if Andrzej knows he has to invite the guy aboard, even though there's no good reason for him to do so.

The film ends as it begins, preparing the boat, driving off, driving on the road, and you know nothing has changed. The Hiker will stay a daredevil showoff. The couple will stay married. It's my avowed opinion that the three of them are stuck together in this empty, foggy nowhere - emphasised most strongly by the final shot of the car paused at the crossroads. You just know they're going to be there forever. If they went looking for the police, can you imagine them actually finding them?

Even if you don't go as far as me, you can't deny it does have overlaps with the absurdist/existentialist genre. Certainly, looking at the story that way gives an added layer of interest to a film which really, I did not think much of.

It's only 90 minutes - that's shorter than Reservoir Dogs - but boy does it drag. They eat. They posture. They squabble, in a masculine way, about pretty much everything. Sure, it's minimalist, and I appreciate the mounting tension is meant to be gradually conveyed in looks and mundane lines. But something gets lost in translation, and perhaps the fact I knew what they were trying to do dulled its impact on me. It doesn't build and simmer, just comes and goes. Every time the titular knife was produced, it should have produced absolute terror. Maybe it does on other people. When it comes to the climax, it should be at a point where violence is unavoidable and the only solution. Actually, it seems arbritary, like someone is telling the characters that it's time to wrap the story up.

I can see it has merit, and I wish I could appreciate it - but it missed me on an emotional level entirely. Which is in itself a facet of absurdism, a deliberate distancing. I think it wants to be "psychologically taut" - for me, the technical term is actually "boring".

Krystina was by far the most interesting character, and that only when compared to the last fifteen minutes. Having been unimpressed with its attempts at raising tension, when things actually started happening it did get good. I loved the quiet way Krystina asserted her authority over both of them, after all the showing off; I loved Andrzej's guilt for something he hasn't done, and the fact his pride can't admit Krystina cheated. In my opinion, the film would have been better for getting here half an hour sooner.

It's very nice too look at, however. Polanski was trained as a photographer, and you can tell because the cinematography is just beautiful. You got a real sense of the heat, and the stillness, or the fog, or the rain. All was let down, however, by that godawful music. It must be said I'm not the words greatest fan of jazz, especially that noisy style, but every time it comes in it's loud and intrusive and makes me want to die. Again, I think the atonality is deliberate; it doesn't change the fact it doesn't work for me.

The question is, was it written as absurdist drama? Probably not. Mind you, there are plenty of people who are hot on the religious symbolism - most tellingly, the Hiker's crucifixion pose, the walking on water and the boat's name framed often so it merely says "Christ". A flawed theory, I think - because it's meaningless symbolism. The Hiker is not a Jesus figure, in no way (he carries a knife, no discussion needed), and what then does the imagery add to the movie? Roman Polanski has completely rejected that angle; and anyway, isn't he Jewish...?

..while TIME magazine describes it as a trip in a Freudian sloop; and I think you could make a lot of the Oedipal angle - the Hiker's poem is about his mother, and Krystina making sure he eats, tucking him in, drying his hair, is motherly behavior.

So why, then, should I not cling to my theory? It's the only way I can find to appreciate this movie...

2008-12-07T09:18:00.000-08:00

I have the greatest respect for Sofia Coppola.

Ok, rephrase. As a gal who wants to break into direction, it's infuriating that the most successful femme director I can think of has a very famous daddy. Still, it's hard to deny that she's pretty great. I think the first half of The Virgin Suicides is one of the most terrific half-films I've seen since JFK (people keep interrupting me before I can get to the end).

So onto Marie Antoinette, which I respected but did not love. And I'm not sure why.

I don't mind the historical inaccuracies, for example. I liked the stunt casting, the mix of accents and use of modern music. I liked the portrayal of a historical figure as a modern party girl - it made for an interestingly incongruous contrast. It's always nice to see The Past presented as fun, instead of a dry and dusty period drama. I admired the way in which only tiny bits of life outside Versailles filtered through. Because when you study the period, you do get the impression that actually the King was given no idea how bad things really were in France. The plot was not even style over substance - style was the substance. Which I tend to admire in films. You can make trivial, substanceless films which nevertheless do seem to be packed with meaning and depth - Velvet Goldmine is one of them. Events of massive importance are completly downplayed; while time is lavished over balls or the sequence at her house. I like this too. And of course, it was delicious to look at and wonderfully directed.

Yet with all possible criticisms rebutted, and being willing to defend all the dodgy choices she made, I was nevertheless left cold. It was like looking at someone else's Facebook photos - must have been fun; I still wasn't there at the time though...I felt there was something deliberately distancing in the casting of Kirsten Dunst, Rip Torn and Steve Coogan. I simply didn't care. Lost in Translation did this to me too - at the time, I assumed it was because I was feeling homesick, fed up and jetlagged (i was watching it on a plane) and didn't appreciate having those feelings duplicated. Having mentioned it above, I felt that this should have been Velvet Goldmine in wigs. It wasn't.

But what the hell! Just stick it on and drown in the preeety dresses, and looovely buildings, and fantastic direction. No one can beat Sofia Coppola for the pastoral stuff - pay attention whenever the characters are allowed outside. I loved the scene with the sunrise. But maybe that's just because I like sunrises...

I hate misleading trails...

2008-12-07T08:04:00.000-08:00

It appears that honest trading standards do not apply to the movie business. Hey, let's put the words QUENTIN TARANTINO in big letters in both the Hero and Hostel trailers, even though he's just the producer! Let's cut together the Spy Game trailer from a single five minute sequence in the movie, to make it look like a slick action movie! Instead of a meditative talky thriller. Let's trail Solaris - as a love story! Instead of a slow paced I-don't-know-what.

I'm sure you've all got your favourite example of misleading movie trails. Sometimes you've just got to be prepared for disappointment. And so we come on to the tantalisingly named movie Changeling, which has already got my fantasty-fan juices boiling. The tagline, too small to read on that poster, is "To find her son she did what no one else dared".

That had better be pass through the labirynth of eternal darkness, find the three Keys to the three Gates of Dawn and finally challenge the Knight Mare guarding the Tower of Silence with a sword of pure Ebonyte, or else I'm going to be pretty damned disappointed...

Masala!

2008-12-04T02:36:00.000-08:00

Back from film studies screening, at a godawful hour of the evening, and with nobody but you lovely people to sqoon at!

Say you've just, I don't know, spent an hour arguing about what film to watch, and you've narrowed down to a choice of four:

a knockabout buddy comedy about two criminals on the run
An all-singing romantic musical
A serious drama about a great man restoring his dignity after terrible tragedy
An exciting action-adventure thriller, complete with explosions, chases and train heists

Oh to live in India when the inevitable TV argument breaks out! Sholay does all four of these, and crucially, does them well. I did laugh. I did cry. I did feel stirred, and excited.

According to our lecture, it's known as the "masala principle" - yes, like the meal, which refers to the mixture of spices. Apparently, it's a deliberate ideal of Indian cinema - and one I rather like - to put the audience through the whole gamut of emotion, instead of just focusing on one. We (or at any rate, I) tend to be suprised by cross-genre works - the romance in Rear Window; the thriller in Casablanca. Horror films should be scary, dramas serious. There are no such genres in Hindi cinema - because in general, films are nowhere near that limited.

No wonder they're so popular - during the slapstick bits, I was thinking "Ooooh, Friend 5 will like this!"; and then later, during some of the actiony sequences, I wondered if I should get a copy of Friend 3 for Christmas. When we got into Wild West territory, I wondered whether dad had ever stuck this on while doing something else over a long afternoon. And, of course, if you asked me what the film was about, I'd say "buddy movie" straight off. It even has a coin that keeps coming down heads!

To fit all that in, it's no wonder this epic ran to something like 3 hours - which most of the Film Studies seemed to resent, if the applause and hasty exodus at the end were anything to go by. Lucky for them, then, that the Indian Censor's board actually trimmed it by 16 minutes. I enjoyed every darn minute of it - I feel films should be long. Two years back, I tried being obsessed with Reservoir Dogs, and even though I made a pretty good try, there really wasn't enough there. It's only 96 minutes, and they're a pretty thin 96 at that, and it soon comes to a rather poor choice between writing fanfiction or just rewatching the movie again. Compare to, say, Lord of the Rings - three films, and if that's not enough, some 8 books, not to mention all the scholarship and nerdery those 8 can generate. But there is a point where that runs out too - maybe that's why I've got into Doctor Who in such a big way? Because there are hundreds of episodes - the total running time beats most director's whole careers. And even more books. And an ever expanding series of audio plays. And graphic novels. And then there's the spinoffs. At this point, it doesn't look like I'll reach the end of all that for quite a while.

Which might explain why my regard for Sholay is so high - it's long enough that you can't take it in in one sitting, making it presumably rewatchable. And as it's so cross-generic (is that a real term?), it'll match any mood. You can just sit down and get lost in it. I remember at the time of my Godfather patch, complaining something of this sort: that seeing a film is OK, until it's over - at which point you want to know more, see more, experience more of the backstory and little details, know what's in the rooms the characters don't enter and generally immerse yourself in the world. Being a fan of a long running TV show with myriad cashins and spinoffs appears to come closer to this ideal than any film ever has.

There is another reason I liked it. Perhaps it was deliberate, so as not to isolate us daft Westerners entirely, but I thought it was a bizzare pick to demonstrate Hindi cinema because it borrowed so liberally from American genres. At times it plays like a greatest hits of all the westerns you've ever seen, starting act one, scene one "pan down onto a train arriving at a dusty station". Once they get the "Butch Cassidy with subtitles" bit out of the way, they're straight onto Seven Samuri, protecting a small village from evil bandits, with a bit of Dollars More-style vengeance on the side, and thats even before you get to the 8 minute shot for shot tribute to Once Upon a Time in the West. The use of sound is completely Sergio Leone (the chilling sound of the swing), and there are certain bits of music you'd swore were ripped from Morricone too. Particularly, the whistling (Cheyenne's theme, anyone?), the harmonica (duh...) and that harsh, screaming atonal tune they whipped out for the confrontation at the end.

Now there's nothing wrong, in principle at least, with ripping off other movies. I wrote a western script soon after I'd seen Once Upon a Time in the West, though it owed more to L.A. Confidential now I look at it again; I also wrote a script for a very Coens-y "crime out of control" caper in my Reservoir Dogs patch, and of course, remade Fellowship of the Ring. But none of these - no, not even the remake - were as blatant as a particular patch in the middle of a flashback.

Other than that, I didn't particularly mind. Sergio Leone pinched as much as he was pinched from, and it was a very good "uber-western" if you can stop yourself labelling the influences. It's just...even though Sholay's take on that scene was easily as effective, as scary, as upsetting, it still struck me as something too brilliant and iconic to nab. Especially because the moment the family at the happy homestead showed up on screen, I thought "now I know what's on the way..." QT had the right idea. Pinch the plot of City on Fire - a movie no one's ever heard of - remake it better, and maybe you can get away with it. Although Sholay's influences are very clear indeed, it's crucial to add they match the films they emulate. It's no better, or worse, or even different to any of the movies namechecked above. As such, it's a definite recommend for fans of the genre.

It's such a sixties film too - granted, it was made in the 70s. The Butch Cassidy nod wasn't just for a buddy movie with bicycles: the whole style and use of the camera at times reminded me too.

It's got all the normal stuff too, like great performances (particularly liked Singh) and very exciting direction. Rajha was impossibly serene, but at least she was nice to look at. Which was pretty much her role in the plot, as far as I could tell. The train heist was great, as was the Basanti's dance at a pivotal moment. Now, that felt like proper Hindi cinema - a gorgeous blend of the Western setting and uniquely Eastern song'n'dance, wrapped up in a sort of concept which wouldn't be out of place in myth - the woman who dances to save her lover (Beren and Luthien before Morgoth, much?). According to our lecturer, most Bollywood movies can be derived from a mythic source - which was a strange thing to say, because I believe that is true of all fiction (i.e. whether you're a Christian or not, the idea of a hero who seems to die, then returns, or the concept of self sacrifice for the good of many are very strong in our culture, literature and movies. And I don't just mean Narnia. Doctor Who, for one, and that's one of the most athiest shows going. Well, maybe humanist - you certainly can't accuse it of a religious agenda)

The other thing I disagreed with our lecturer on was his dismissal of the term "Bollywood". He took it as a suggestion that Hindi cinema is a mere imitation of Hollywood, whereas I have always understood it to suggest an equal status. British, French, Russian, Chinese cinemas don't get their own -ollywood after all, and the Brits in particular are guilty of imitating American films. And especially before showing us a movie which, far from exemplefying the uniqueness of Indian culture, actually clings to an established American genre for its lifeblood. He also suggested there was some colonial sneering in the fact we still call "Bombay movies" B-ollywood, instead of using Mumbai, but personally that's just because I reckon Mollywood would sound daft.

Anyway, I'm still in that "new favourite film" sort of glow, which usually washes off in a few hours. Hope it does, for your sakes, otherwise I'll be making you watch it at Christmas...

There are a few other things worth saying about our Film Studies lectures in general. The first is the demonstration of the maxim "all power corrupts" - our lecturer must have been silently annoyed, like the dripping of a tap, by all those little cinema gripes. Now he's in charge of his own screening, he's elected himself king of his own little kingdom. Not that I mind - mobiles off, food away, all things I agree with. I am also endeared to him by the fact he insists on us sitting through the credits. I hate nothing more than people switching off the DVD halfway through the playout theme. Not counting, y'know, genocide and poverty. The mood just vanishes from the room instantly, but keeping the music keeps the atmosphere and gives you a chance to process your response. Two notable examples are Blade Runner, where I need that dark pulsing Vangelis to deal with the unicorn, and Reservoir Dogs, where the chuckling smirk of instantly "Lime and the Coconut" gives the audience a release for the tension, and provides a great contrast. As if to say to those of us, with tears standing in our eyes and stomachs crunched from sympathetic wincing, "Hey, folks? It's only a movie..."

The other thing is his insistance on using genuine 35mm film instead of, say, projecting a DVD. I think it's just something that only a film buff could understand. DVDs are clean and clear quality - watching real film is akin to the Grindhouse experience. Scratches all over the place, the sound dipping in and out, or vanishing entirely; bits of the image getting lost, or going interesting colours; hearing the reel scratch and seeing the bright flash of colour when it's changed. In Sholay's case, truly inadequate and hard to read subtitles. In terms of immersive hi-def experience, it's easy to count the disadvantages. But I think it's something we all instinctively understand, that watching it on "proper film" is part of the magic, which a DVD can never touch; like a proper music buff refuses abandon LPs.

2008-11-17T05:13:00.000-08:00

Today we are going to talk about the Bechdel-Wallace Test, a cunning little observation which originated in this comic strip.

Pay attention, because you're going to be really scratching your head in a few minutes time. For a film to pass, it only has to have three little critera:

1) it must feature two named female characters...
2)...who have a conversation...
3)...on a subject other than a man...

...

thinking? Good, because I sat down with the only other film student in my kitchen, and it took us about 15 minutes to come up with anything. Apparenly only 5% of films pass, and it hardly suprises me.

Without even thinking about it, I know none of my favourite movies do. Reservoir Dogs has no speaking female roles, Zulu shunts our only representative off in the first 20 minutes, and Signs doesn't have more than two in the same timeframe, let alone the same scene.

The problem is, women just aren't interesting. Really. Lets consider this:

Women are interested in men, the family and the home. And nothing else.
Men, the family and the home are not interesting, because that's where the audience is

Unless you're into real life dramas, of course...In most films, the female role is to be the representative of this area. Connie and Mrs Micheal Corleone are both images of innocence and family stability in The Godfather while the men get all the fun. Sissy Spacek's role in JFK is to be more or less chief villain. I hate, hate, hate any actress who ever demeans herself to say "Oh honey, you work such long hours, why not stay at home with us and the kids?" - especially if the husband's character is working on something really interesting. You know he's going to ignore her, because no one wants to see Oliver Stone directing Kevin Costner in three hours of tree houses, piggy backs, and cookie baking - even if he does then produce a thoroughly annotated screenplay about it.

Even if you are a fan of real life drama, there has to be more than life than a career as a) girlfriends b) mothers c) wives d) whores e) prepubescant horror movie fodder. And f) glamorous newscasters, for disaster movies. Sometimes, you get male characters concerned with the home. And that's fine too - the Prez in Air Force One. But when you don't, and it's not seen as unusual. Perhaps because it isn't - maybe all there is for a girl to aspire to is one of the above roles. The number of female characters who don't conform is very small. Take Kill Bill - Uma Thurman plays an asskicking ninja assassin...taking vengeance for the attack on her wedding and death of her daughter. The ideal mothers day movie. Or La Femme Nikita- her transformation into a femme from a streetpunk is as important as her transformation into a contract killer. Or one of the strongest female characters I've ever seen, Jill in Once Upon a Time in the West, who nevertheless is only allowed to be items a-d on the list above.

To on extent it's the modern equivalent of non-white characters in the 60s and 70s - they weren't there unless it was a role a white actor couldn't play. We've more or less got that one straightened out now. These days, it's very rare to have a character who "just happens to be gay", whose sexuality is not part of the plot (Captain Jack off Torchwood and Doctor Who was one of those, originally). So when will the reclamation of womankind come?

The one case I can think of is Ripley in the Alien movies - playing a role written for a man. The problem is, female roles are still written for "women", as opposed to just people. I don't see myself as "female" at all - I mean, I am, it's a simple fact of biology. But very little in my behavior is defined by the fact. It doesn't affect the movies I watch or the life decisions I make. I would eat no differently, my room would still be a tip, my interests would be unchanged were I male. Hath not a girl eyes, hath not a girl hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a bloke is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die?

There are no characters which represent me in film - not androgynous, certainly not, just don't give a damn or see why it makes such a difference. Not obsessed with "being a woman", and occupying that narrow band of not-very-interesting-interests. Did you just say Juno? Yes, intelligent teenager, teenager into her movies, pregnant teenager. We need characters who just happen to be female, in the same way that a black and white actors can now (with obvious exceptions) play interchangeable roles. Why can't I play Hamlet?! Sarah Bernhardt did...

Does it matter? Well, it strikes me that no woman should ever say the phrase "female characters aren't interesting" as loudly as I just did, so there is a genuine problem somewhere. And the fact that I've never noticed this imbalance until now probably suggests a deeper problem - that through this imbalanced media, we're taught to accept these passive and pointless roles in both film and life.

Perhaps this is why I never cement anything when I write. Characters have no certain age - somewhere between 12 and 20 is pretty accurate in my book - and often remain nameless. I can't recall ever placing them geographically - the racial mix makes certain assumptions, but they could be anywhere in America, the UK, Europe, Denmark, et al - or anywhere certain it time. "About now" - but my stories develop over many years, rarely being written down, so "now" can again represent a period of about 10 years. Occasionally, class will come into it - I usually have a fair idea of their background - but this very rarely governs their behavior. I assume they're straight in the same way everyone assumes someone else is straight the first time you shake hands - until given proper evidence to the contrary. Like everything else, it's not something I decide, because I prefer to work with a person, not an "American", not a "90s kid", not a "lesbian", not a "teenager", and a lot of the time not "a woman". Because every now and then - two characters spring to mind - I don't give them gender either. They're "probably female", but I've never given the matter too much thought. All that matters is what they do, and what they say.

All this probably says more about me than about cinema - I'm not saying this is universally the right thing to do. For one thing, people are certainly defined by their backgrounds - a teen will talk differently to an old woman, an American from a Brit, a guy from a girl. In terms of plot too, working this way ignores the genuine rules of our society entirely. There are things which, as a [stereotype], you cannot do - you could recast any of the Reservoir Dogs female, but it wouldn't make any narrative sense, because those characters have social prejudices too. And if my system was adopted by everyone, we could never make films about people from X group trancending their traditional limitations, and lose the (percieved) shock contrast of, say, Jodie Foster's scarily masculine Madeline White in Inside Man, or Sidney Potier's fish-out-of-water Virgil Tibbs in Heat of the Night. I'm writing in a purely fantasy world - no dragons, no magic, but still as alien - because these things are impossible in anything resembling a reality.
But maybe, just maybe, it's something to think for Hollywood to think about. And please, never have the "stay at home, darling!" cliche ever again...

Probably says something about the industry too - male dominated, it's no wonder the movies they make are male dominated too. Before discovering this test, I used to ask people to name me five female directors. Which is actually easier - there's Sofia Coppola, Leni Riefenstahl, Mira Nair, Kathryn Bigelow...as a gal who wants to direct, and direct "guys with guns" movies at that, Kathryn Bigelow is something of a heroine: Point Break, a heist movie; Near Dark the vampire western and K-19: The Widowmaker, a war film.

I'm not normally an angry feminist, except on this topic - because I'm not given any interesting female rolemodels on film, and because I know that short of a sex change, my chance of a job in The Industry is even more infantessimal. There are some angry feminists who go way too far in trying to right the wrongs of the world, and making sweeping assumptions on the slightest evidence. Yet there are problems, and without trying to be radical about it, they are probably rooted in the fact that films are made by and for the Middle Aged Affluent White Male.

I got quite angry at The War of the Roses, for example - a film my dad has always praised for the sacharrine-free depiction of a collapsing relationship. He's right, it is good - the dialogue between the Roses especially remind me of a thousand fractious arguments watched, avoided or taken part in. The problem is that it's Mrs Rose who mysteriously, abstractly decides she's unhappy and strikes the first blow while refusing to give a reason. And it's Mr Rose, poor Mr Rose, who has to cope with this impossible, motiveless female Other. It angered me for expecting the audience to accept that couples break up due to feminine whims - she hasn't got children to look after, she hasn't got a house to decorate, so she's going to take it out on him. Naturally. Very little suggestion, for example, that it's the fact he works too hard that she's decided to ditch him.

That's just one example that irritated me recently, but the problem is so endemic in Hollywood that once you open your eyes to it, it's hard to ignore.

So with no further ado, here are some movies which pass the Bechdel-Wallace test:

Heavenly Creatures, School of Rock, Ghost World, Kill Bill, Pan's Labyrinth, Tideland, Serenity...

Plus everything I've ever written. It might be interesting to note that all those films are either for children, or have a strong root in fantasy...

The challenge: how many can you think of? Leave it in the comments...

Qui critices criticebant - who criticises the critics?

2008-10-22T07:19:00.000-07:00

Decisions, decisions. Do I start watching my haul from the Library - la Jetee, M and Do the Right thing?

Or do I continue with my self appointed Batman marathon? Tomorrow, I'm watching the Dark Knight Returns on a midnight IMAX. Last weekend, I watched Tim Burton's Batman - more on that below. This weekend, I hope to watch the "best" of the set, Batman Returns. And then if I'm feeling brave, Batma and Robin, the film everybody's talking about. At least, the film everybody's talking about when I declare Batman Forever is the worst film ever made (quote: "So...you haven't seen Batman and Robin then?"). Jesu, films can be worse?! In any case, I intend to bravely find out.

Yes indeed, I'm having a great time taking advantage of my local movie resources now I am at la University. Item one is the Maughn Library - mostly yer Hitchcocks and Wellses, though I did find Lost Boys there this morning, so I'm happy. Only problem is most of the films are one day loan - and living 90 minutes away means there's no sensible way to take out a film, watch it and return it (yes, they can be watched in the library, but there's no atmosphere and the reflections are dire...). Many films are on short loan -you can borrow them for three hours maximum, which is hilarious as a few of them actually take longer than that to watch.

Item 2 is the video library back at our hall of residence, and boy is that funny - a dumping ground for all the subpar Hollywood tat of the last ten years; a cross section of Hell's video rental. Striptease, Dungeons and Dragons, Drunken Master 4, Air Force One, and as noted above, all four of the Burton(ish) Batmans. There's the odd gem, but to be honest I'm having more fun indulging my love for the high budget terrible.

Not that Batman was terrible, of course. It was really very effective in places - Bruce Wayne himself was adorable, though I hope he's not going to find true love in every movie, because that'll just get too tedious.

Finally, in answer to the question on everyone's lips - "Is Watchmnen unfilmable?", I would like to add that nothing is unfilmable. They managed to condense L.A. Confidential, one of the most plot-rich books you'll ever read, without losing any of its charm and often, seemingly, without losing any of the subplots either (they cut hundreds, but on the whole all the details you'll remember will be there).

They also made Lord of the Rings. This is because someone sat down and realised no, you do not have to film every single appendix - we just let people know they're there.It made it a far richer film experience, because the audience could feel there was far more to the film than beyond the four walls.

Watchmen is one of the most cinematic things I've ever read. You've got to do what they did to the two examples above, and try and make the best film possible. The basic plot - "Rorshach's quest for the mask-killer, and what he finds there" - is very simple indeed. Don't ignore the complexities, but you really can't include everything. Something that instantly springs to mind is the subplot with the newsseller/Tales from the Black Rock comic. Ultimately, this is very important in the shock factor of the ending, but it's secondary to the main plot. Things will have to go - this is what we call adaptation, if you're not Age of Innocence - but that's what turning it into a film is all about, and stick with the comic if you can't handle that. The Minutemen will be as the Silmarillion is to Lord of the Rings - every now and then someone will say "Luthien", or "Turin", but it doesn't matter if we don't exactly understand the detail - to hear it is to infer a world richer than the one we are seeing. I'm thinking the Comedian-Laurie story will go entirely, except for nods only the knowing will get.

Cutting was never the problem for me. There's no reason why movie-Frodo didn't go to see Tom Bombadil, we just didn't see it. It's changing the plot and changing the tone which galls with me, and Mr Snyder has already admirably proved he's not going to let this happen with Watchmen. He fought the studios, set it in the 80s and dear sweet Orson Welles, he didn't let them change the ending. Goodness knows who thought that was a good idea...

So, onto the article that's got me angry:
http://www.overthinkingit.com/2008/10/15/is-watchmen-unfilmable/

He makes a lot of claims for the comic medium over film, many of which are terribly false. Yes, comics have a way with the passage of time, but that doesn't mean film doesn't also. Yes, you can load comic panels with detail, but sometimes it's a) overdoing it, b) distracts from the flow and c) films also do this. American Beauty comes to mind as a film where someone has thought about the contents of every frame - or the circular pan to Fur Elise in Elephant around the boy's room, letting the audience infer detail for a good two minutes about the character. Comics are not necessarily better for being as long as the author wants them to be - Watchmen is perfect, but it's easy to cry indulgence on anyone writing spinoffs, preludes, et al. He lists all the things that comics can do - like having a completely simmetrical issue. But they can't, say, contrast the action onscreen with the choice of music - Don't Stop Me Now, Stuck in the Middle with You, Singing in the Rain. These are things that film can do, which you can't. Now which innovation is better? Answer: neither. They're just different. Is film worse for having music and other tricks at its disposal? Sure, artists have to work harder, but maybe this proves that film is a better medium? In answer to that, many filmmakers reject such flashy techniques anyway - we have a whole range from fullblown showy onslaughts to tiny handheld affairs which might as well be comic books. La Jetee is entirely pictures. And no character development in movies? Don't make me laugh. The faculties of voice mean that a character can be established with a single line - what about Mink in Miller's Crossing, who gets a single scene, yet already you know who he is?

Methinks the best way to defend your chosen medium is not by bashing another. Because films are equal to comics, and they're both equal to audio plays, or ballets, or live theatre - no medium superscedes, not when you're dealing with artists at the top of their game. As it turns out, I'm writing a comic at the moment, and I've been trying to do a "violent scene + chirpy music" scene in a medium which requires only images, and succeeding to boot, so it is possible.

And to return to Watchmen, I don't think the comic vs film analogy is fair, because it borrows so liberally from film. Many scenes are basically cross-cut with another. Or a sequence of panels is used to suggest a pan, or zoom out. One could basically use it as a storyboard. I'd also mention those five massive panels towards the end, which I will be very disappointed if they aren't accompanied by total silence - because the thing that really impressed me about that part of the comic was the fact that they'd managed to draw complete, dead silence.

The point is, if someone does it properly, Watchmen can be made - and like LOTR or L.A. Confidential, made in such a way that you don't entirely notice or miss what's gone. This comic actually made me cry with shock. Lets hoping the movie manages too...

Presenting and dissecting: the Empire top 500

2008-09-28T03:53:00.000-07:00

Two events preceded my dismemberment of the Empire top 500. The first was my mum saying "you won't like what number 2 is" (Titanic? Godfather 2?). The second was the news about Paul Newman, which must have hit thousands of people harder than it did me (friends, family, costars, people who actually knew him), but has left me something of a blubbery mess. And unlike Heath Ledger, where my first guilty concern was "How will Terry Gilliam finish his movie?!", it's not even the fact I'll never get to see the much mooted reteam with Robert Redford. I just feel genuinely crushed, on a personal level, not a cinematic one.

I'm upset, and I'm prepared for the worst - therefore, my criticism may be a bit more angry than usual. Let the dissection begin.

Bets for winner - Goodfellas, Pulp Fiction, Fight Club, Empire Strikes Back, Kane. Maybe Shawshank. Probably not Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, though we live in hope. LOTR will be in there, but lower down than in previous years.

499 Saw - glad to see this in here. It means the original has risen above the crud that followed, and its survived the hype as a respected film. I still think it's a powerful piece of cinema with a lot of merit, even if it is responsible for starting a hatewave of similar gorenos. But Saw knows, the way only a trendsetter can, that it's a great film not for the amount of blood it sheds (its far more tame, visually, than you'd expect of a film with this reputation), but the expectation of bloodletting it toys with from the moment those hacksaws come out of the toilet.

497 Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon - interesting to note this has been overtaken by the wushu craze it spawned. I assume Hero and Flying Daggers will be higher up the list.

490 Sweeny Todd? Really? I have a Depp-loving music-fanatic friend who instantly replaced American Beauty with this as her favourite film.

489 Brick - yay, my sister will be happy - this was her top vote.

469 Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - first Gilliam movie. I'm happy to see this here, not because I particulalrly like it (though I do), but because it proves that Brazil and Twelve Monkeys have to be on the list in a higher position.

465 Twelve Monkeys, as if on cue. And the first of the ones I've voted for.

458 Batman - after sitting through the cinematic heart attack that was Batman Forever, I'm even more keen to see any part of that franchise which can make it onto a top anything list in a non-ironic way.

457 Full Metal Jacket. Kubrick is love!

455 Top Gun - my mum is one of the many many people responsible for getting this on the list.

453 - Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. What is this doint here?! Who voted for it? Certainly no one I've ever met, all of which loudly criticise it at any oppertunity.

452 Unbreakable - YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! No I didn't vote for it, but hot damn I love this film. Top-whatever lists are always more fun, because I could recite the top 100 films on this list for you as we sit here. The top end of lists are always more offbeat.

448 History of Violence - I'm happy that films this quiet can make it onto the list.

444 Hairspray. I'm a massive fan of the new movie, and I'm suprised to see any version of it on this list. So now I'm even more keen to see this, the 88 Waters edition.

438 LOST BOYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I didn't vote for this, as I didn't expect it to make the list! Now I feel really bad - this film is brilliant!

429 Danger: Diabolik - I've been meaning to see this since forever.

405 Dirty Dancing - I'm very happy to see this on the list, because it really does have an indefinable something that puts it one above everything that's come since. Even I like it!

401 Batman Returns - yet another of the Burton Batman franchise! These I have to see...

388 The English Patient - this is the first film on the list I've seen and thought "what's this doing here?". It conforms exactly to the Out of Africa Oscar success equation (spoilers for both), but that doesn't make it good. I thought the characters were unsympathetic, and a romance doesn't work if you're too busy thinking "you filthy adulterers!" and feeling sorry for the spurned husband.

383 Serenity - yes it's a good film, but I'd sacrifice it without thinking for another series of Firefly.

382 Cache - reviewd this for CineGuernsey, favourably. I could see what it was trying to do, but I didn't really get it until I saw the directors comments on it afterwards, at which point I appreciated it far more - but I still didn't like it.

374 Hot Fuzz - I voted for this! I didn't take it with me to university! I really want to watch it now!

355 Sunshine - aka the ultimate sci fi movie. Like your science fiction 2001 blend, with silent sequences and arty posturing? Or do you prefer final-frontier style exploration? Or are you more a fan of post-Alien "it's coming to get us" cinema? Watch Sunshine - you get it all. I wouldn't call it derivative, though, because it manages to blend all these things so you never feel bored. And I loved the ending.

354 Un Chien Andalou. In case you haven't heard the story of the time I watched this at the Tate modern, in a room filled with unsuspecting members of the public on a day out with their children, in full knowledge of what was going to happen the moment that thin cloud streaks across the moon - now you do. Those kids will be scarred for life...it's good, but it's a funny thing for the list as it's not exactly favourite movie material.

354 Bugsy Malone - this is a pleasant suprise to find on the list.

351 Zulu - frankly, I'm relieved to find my second-favourite-movie-of-all-time on this list at all, never mind so high up! It kinda confirms that Navarone won't be on here, however - I find it hard to believe that it would be better loved than Zulu. Who feels like a celebratory sing song?

343 Monsters Inc - is this the highest Pixar? No, Toy Story is still to come - but I'm happy to see it beating The Incredibles and especially the overrated Finding Nemo. True fact: this film makes me cry.

339 Spirited Away. One of my favourite Studio Ghiblis, I'm happy to see it beating Princess Mononoke. Also, I think my sister voted for it.

337 300. I'm glad to see this here - it seems in vogue to criticse it, which is a shame considering how much fun it is. Yes, it lacks historical accuracy; but if you've ever read fictional epics The Aeneid or the Iliad, you'll recognise the narrative tradition of heroes going on one-man killing sprees (particularly books 10-12 of the Aeneid - Aeneas is Leonedas) Think of it - if a few more had voted for it, it might have been in position 300...

336 Titanic! How does it feel now, you barstool, to be be beaten by LA Confidential? Not nice, is it? Confidential is more of a film than you will ever be!! HA!

333 Sixth Sense was always inevitably going to be the most popular M Night movie, so I'm not expecting Signs - the one I voted for - on the list now. I'm still happy to see it though, and I'm chuffed that Unbreakable got on too.

329 The Lives of Others. I watched a lot of films when reviewing for CineGsy, and it was sometimes hard to find positive things to say. Often, I had to go to IMDb to see what people found so appealing about them. Not so this - a very, very awesome piece of cinema.

325 Kill Bill vol1 - I just want it logged that I thought part 2 was better.

322 Aladdin - true story: I only saw this film earlier this year. I have seen barely any Disney. Parents, you have failed me!

285 Solaris - the original, and a film I have to see, on account of having adored the remake

282 Godfather Part III - returned to the fold at last! I am extremely happy to see this. Yes, it was a disappointment compared to parts I and II, but the number of films that aren't can be counted on the fingers of one hand. It's still a worthy piece of cinema, and seeing Michael come to terms with his crimes and losses makes it a fitting coda to the trilogy.

276 Layer Cake - I know it's good, but I had no idea it was this popular.

275 My Neighbour Totoro - beating out Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke, this is a film I must see.

268 The Lady Vanishes - heaps of Hitchcock are inevitable on any such list, normally near the top. I thought this one was excellent.

262 The Virgin Suicides won my JFK award for best film I've only seen half of last year. I've seen the first half again since then, I've seen it five or six times, and I'm always interrupted. Pity - the start really is bloomin ace.

251 Darling - very very interesting. We studied this for Film Studies, so I'm aware of how technically impressive is, but I had no idea it was well enough liked to reach so high. Darling is such an unpleasant main character, it's hard to have any sympathy for the film as a whole.

237 Delicatessen - I'm into my surreal stuff, but bizzare cinema still has to have something at its heart, and this bounced off me entirely. I felt nothing, even as I appreciated the interesting ideas and nice cinematography.

235 Battle Royale - I am still dying to watch this film.

230 Howl's Moving Castle - I'm even more suprised to see this beating the three previous Ghibli's on the list.

215 Jackie Brown - I could have easily predicted that the QT movies would have lined up like this (Res Dogs - top thirty, Pulp Fiction - top ten, probably top five), but it's still nice to see Jackie get some love.

197 Point Break - very suprising pick. I can't believe, for example, it's more popular than Top Gun. It was good, and the foot chase was one of the greatest I've ever seen, but when you look at the films its beating, I can't imagine any real people saying "This is a better film than Mean Streets, than Fargo, than The Departed" or whatever.

193 Ed Wood - this is my favourite Tim Burton film, and I'm happy to see it so high up.

188 School of Rock. Wow, who saw this coming? When narrowing down my list, I concentrated my votes on things I thought were in with a chance - like Guns of Navarone and Signs - and didn't vote for things like this and Lost Boys which I decided were unlikely to succeed. I can't believe it's here, and I can't believe its so high.

186 United 93. When ticking off films on a list, you always find yourself wishing you'd seen films you turned down the chance to see. It wasn't that I thought this was distasteful - cinema should be allowed to show anything - I just didn't want to watch it. I've no problem with other people doing so. It's an hour and a half of my life, and respect or no respect, I'd much rather spend it listening to music, watching Doctor Who or reading graphic novels than thinking about 9/11.

185 Paths of Glory - it was good, but Full Metal Jacket (no. 457) was better.

167 Don't Look Now - though it thoroughly deserves its spot, I'm suprised it is well enough loved to get so high.

159 The Royal Tenmbaums, another nice suprise. We watched this in a double bill with Von Ryan's Express, then went to bed at 11:30. Genuinely probably my best New Year's Eve ever.

158 Unforgiven - just a wonderful piece of cinema.

157 True Romance - Oh I am happy to see this here! It's easily overlooked, but it's also one of QT's most charming scripts. Cameos by the ghost of Elvis? A cast of characters who drift in for one scene then vanish? That lovely theme tune, the scariest Christopher Walken scene ever, the theme from Lakme (and British Airways, you plebs), not to mention it's really really romantic.

156 Saving Private Ryan -watch Band of Brothers, and then tell me this is a good film. Yes, Omaha is a raw piece of cinema, but the music is cheesy, and the movie can't decide which message its pushing. Is war a tragic waste? A violent mess? or something noble to be proud of. Between the graveside salutes, heroic rescues, flagwaving and stirring trumpet theme, I couldn't be sure whether this was anti-war at all. Not that pro-war films are bad, but it sat uncomfortably with the leftie-leanings also in the script.

150 The French Connection - it was hot stuff at the time, but has been bettered by what has come since. Seeing this has reminded me that Rififi has not made the list; it's also temporarily made me question whether LA Confidential will be here after all.

149 The Red Shoes - never seen it, but if the film is anything like the creepy-pantomime-surreal picture, then I really want to.

138 Cool Hand Luke, Paul Newman. I'd forgotten in the middle there. Now I've remembered. I need to see this film, I hate the system as much as anyone.

136 Amadeus - nice to see it here.

135 Duck Soup - ditto. This is a deliciously silly film.

130 The Man who Would be King - if I'd been in Guernsey one week longer, I'd have taken it out of the library, as I've had my eye on it for ages. Buddy war movie better than Zulu, than Bridge over the River Kwai they say? Must see!

129 Harvey is one of the most wonderful films ever made. I particularly like the ambiguity - Harvey is cute, and also scary, and also the product of a deranged imagination, or too much alcohol, and at the same time terribly wonderfully real. It's all in the twitch in the corner of James Stewart's eye.

127 The Sting - another wonderful movie. I've anticipated this morning's news for a while, and I'm about as upset as I expected to be, no more or less.

118 Withnail and I. True fact: lead actors Paul McGann and Richard E. Grant have both played the Doctor. Really. McGann was in the 96 Fox TV movie, and Grant did the role for about a minute in the Comic Relief spoof episode.

117 Miller's Crossing. Seeing this here confirms my other favourite Coen, O Brother Where Art Thou, will not make the list.

101 Raising Arizona better than Miller's Crossing?! Never!

97 Reservoir Dogs - told you it'd make top 100. Probably my vote that did it. It also gives me licence to hate everything that comes after it. Hereon in, we have all the predictable films to look at. And Butch Cassidy still hasn't hit the list; neither has L.A. Confidential, and I don't believe either are more popular than Dogs...

84 L.A. Confidential - but I was wrong, deliciously beautifully wrong. It is probably a better film too - TAKE THAT TITANIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

83 Brazil - oh joy, now I'm in a brilliant mood!

76 Manhattan - expected this to be higher.

75 A Matter of Life and Death - this has the potential to turn into a real favourite movie, give it a few more months. I've been itching to see it again. So glad to see it so high.

69 Three Colours Red - my sister voted for this. Wonderful film, but I'm sure Blue must be on here and higher.

54 The Two Towers - interesting. My favourite is Fellowship; the public's fave is normally Return of the King, but I've always thought this one was best. I'm getting sick of writing - I just want to find Butch Cassidy on the list, and see what's come top now.

53 Donnie Darko - a favourite film I didn't bother to vote for, knowing it would be on the list.

43 The Big Lebowski -I kinda knew this one would be on here. Great film.

37 Clockwork Orange -oh horrorshow - not that I didn't know it wouldn't be on here, but I'm happy to see it.

34 Return of the King - interesting, very interesting. Will this be the highest? my hunch says Fellowship will still be higher.

32 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid - when I had all but given up on it. I am absolutely delighted to see it so high up! My favourite movie of all time, making the top 40. Grin like an idiot, remember and feel a bit downcast again.

30 Aliens beats Alien, which is what I always thought anyway. I can see what Alien is trying to do with the "quiet menace" thing, but it's been done since and better; or at least, done since that the original is no longer original at all. But Aliens is scary.

28 Citizen Kane - just because I can, look here it is! Not at the top - what a relief. Not that it ain't good, i still ain't seen it. It's just so tedious when it does.

24 Fellowship of the Ring does get a look in after all - I've always thought it was the best. Its just so pretty!

21 The Third Man I probably love enough to add to my fave movies list sometime soon. Greene, what a genius!

20 Blade Runner! Which I am going to see on a massive frack-off screen tomorrow!

19 Godfather Part II, where it belongs, lower than Part I. Guernsey has just opened up the coolest Godfather pizzaria - showing the film throughout the meal, and serving things like Connie meatballs, or Five Families pasta.

15 The Dark Knight - I genuinely expected this to make top 5, but 15 is impressive for a film this recent. But not this overhyped. Not saying it's not brilliant, I just mean the hype is astronomical.

14 Once upon a Time in the West - happy to see it beating tG,tB, tU - what a piece of cinema.

13 Chinatown - can't believe I still haven't seen this.

And here we go for the top 10. We're still sans Pulp, Fight Club, Goodfellas and two Starwarses.

10 Fight Club - lower than usual.

9 Pulp Fiction - again, suprisingly low. Star Wars has to win now. Still haven't seen Shawshank either. I'm not sure we're missing any significant Hitchcocks.

8 Singing in the Rain - proving the top ten hasn't been exclusively voted for by angry young men, this is a terrific film - far less cloyingly sappy than you've been lead to believe. It's actually very witty.

7 Apocalypse Now - probably the highest of my favourites to hit the list.

6 Goodfellas - sorry, Rob; I can see what this film was trying to do, but it didn't work for me. I need to see it again, in a different mood. Guess this means Age of Innocence is off the list.

5 Jaws - yes, this is better than you think it is - it's a buddy movie, not a monster movie - and thoroughly deserves its spot.

4 Shawshank Redemption - here it is. What's the other film then? Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back and...the one my mum said would make me angry.

3 Empire Strikes Back - ooh, I expected Star Wars to be here and Empire to win. I still prefer Star Wars, though, darker be damned.

2 Raiders of the Lost Ark -aha, I kinda lost count of my Indies - there's been a lot on here, so I forgot about this one. When we watched this in class, Friend 2 was amazed by the amount of action - it really is non-stop. You couldn't get away with it in a modern film, but this does it with a lot of wit and charm, and it's bouyed up by memories of that childhood summer when you went to see it with your dad. So. It is Star Wars, right?

1 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Must have missed the 'Wars further up the list; how could I forget this was here? It had to be THE GODFATHER, didn't it. Vastly superior to Part II in so many ways, I voted for it, wonderful piece of cinema that it is.

It also means that the total number of films off this list I've seen is 187/500. Less than I expected - most lists nowadays I've seen just under half. Now there's a challenge.

So there you go. I'm happy. I wish Run Lola Run had been there; I bet wrongly when I voted for Guns of Navarone, and am still suprised by School of Rock's high placing. I suppose Signs was always a long shot, but I loved it too much to skip it entirely. And especially in light of this morning's bad news, I couldn't be happier by how high Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid has come.

2008-09-26T12:08:00.000-07:00

And now I have the jitters. When AMC have a production blog written from Africa as we speak, it's hard to dismiss "They're remaking the Prisoner" as mere rumours. You may recall that I was (briefly) impressed by the idea of David+Janet Peoples teaming up with Christopher Nolan for a movie, but that was then and this is now. It is actually happening.

Alarm bells go off when the AMC website describes it as "reinterpretation". Its a little more free than "remake", it means they can do whatever the hell they like. I'm giving it cautious support - after all, there's no sense in remaking something identical, unless the original has perished in fire. And there are new things for the premise to say, new threats for No. 6 to kick against - who's betting the villains won't be pesky Ruskies this time?

From AMC's Site: "A man, known as "Six," finds himself inexplicably trapped in "The Village" with no memory of how he arrived. As he explores his environment, he discovers that his fellow inhabitants are identified by number instead of name, have no memory of any prior existence, and are under constant surveillance. Not knowing whom to trust, Six is driven by the need to discover the truth behind The Village, the reason for his being there, and most importantly -- how he can escape. Jim Caviezel (The Passion of the Christ , The Thin Red Line) will play the role of "Number Six" and two-time Oscar Winner, Ian McKellen (Lord of the Rings, The Da Vinci Code) will co-star as "Number Two."

The lack of memories is an interesting edge - it means that fans of the original will be on a peculiar sort of tenterhook along with new viewers. Not "what's going on here?" but "is what's going on here the same as it was last time?". It delays the fan backlash until after the show, not before. In the old show, the characters all knew precicely what was going on - they just didn't bother to share it with the audience.

So many questions - I am trying to be optimistic. How are they going to replace Rover? Is this Number 313 chick, who will inevitably play love interest, going to turn round and double cross him? Who is Number 1, this time round? Are they going to keep a tribute to the talk at the start of the episode? Will No. 6 be played as an American? WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN IN THE LAST EPISODE?!?!? (mind you, old-school fans will appreciate that that question is still being asked about the old series final episode Fall Out...)

No, I'm not having angry heart attacks, not yet - because I believe it can be done. Because Number 6 standing up against conformity is timeless, and has its place in every generation. Because there are always new ways to go with an idea that ingenious. If anything, I'm encouraged that they're going their own way instead of slaving to what's past. It's not like with Brideshead Revisited, where the job of an adaptation is to be accurate. I could be annoyed if the characters are called Two and Six instead of Number 2 and Number 6, because it's a tiny thing that'll grate 24 times an episode.

No, the worst thing will be dealing with my sister (no offense, Half Pint) who has such a think for American Series Television, the way I have a thing for Kitchy 60s TV, once it airs and she invariably likes it more. The house will be unbearable!

2008-09-02T10:26:00.000-07:00

What is the worst film ever made? On my sidebar I list Hannah, a cheesy short I saw at a filmfest about a little orphan bonding with her grandmother - though my hatred was considerably heightened by Friend 1, whose name is Hannah, and as far away from that stilton as a person can be. It was the Doctor Who movie for a few hours until I calmed down. The Buffy the Vampire Slayer was limp, unconvincing and suffered badly in comparison to the TV show. an Odyssey movie which was longer than Fellowship of the Ring and had a fraction of its ingenuity, not to mention budget.

This whole thing was sparked off by my friends - I wanted to get them over for a film, and decided Dungeons and Dragons would be good for a laugh (I've long given up dragging them through classics). But no one was around, so I, still indulging my craving for something bad, went over to see Batman Forever instead.

Oh. Dear. Just awful - I wasn't aware they made films this bad. By the second half, I was keeled over in agony on the floor. The music was intrusive and awful. The script was bare minimum. The production design was unpleasant. The costumes were crass.

The actors did their best. Nicole Kidman's role was the most interesting - finally, a spurious love interest who doesn't mince around like she's the love of the hero's life. She has an obvious and obsessive lust for Batman. He fancies her right back. They never even try the "love" word. I kinda like that - how often is pure carnal attraction at the root of blockbuster relationships? She also fits in great with Gotham's existing collection of psychos - her obsessive behavior fits in just great. Gotham's glitterati go to the circus for the social occasion of the season - says it all, really.

Anyone else ever noticed that? The majority of Batman villains - at least, those iconic enough for me to have heard of them, have no super powers? Mostly they're twisted civillians - Two Face, Riddler and Joker to name three. Poison Ivy, I admit, is an exception. Lex Luthor doesn't either (he's Superman, but same universe).

Tommy Lee Jones was great, absolutely great for the first half of this, in what can only be called LedgerJoker mode - a very similar performance, scarily so. It all went downhill when he was paired up with Jim Carrey - who individually, wasn't bad. Now one person on screen, mincing and monologing can just about get away with it. It's when you put these two over-the-top villains on screen together that it falls apart. Its almost convincing alone - but together, its too much, and you just want to scream.

"Too much" could be the watchword of this whole debacle. The problem I had with Dungeons and Dragons is it tried to do something unfeasibly ambitious very limply. Opposite case with Batman Forever - it only tried to do the barest and most obvious plot available, yet with so much enthusiasm it goes too far. The music is REALLY LOUD to tell you something DRAMATIC is happening! The script lacks imagination. The direction and editing is bare minimum and confusing. Val Kilmer makes for a soulless center, and Robin is only ever the "young rookie" of cliche. "I want to help, I'll be your partner!" "No, you can't help I'm fine alone" *Robin saves Batman* "You can be my partner now". Alfred is classy as always. But it's the volume of the villains, combined with the OTT of the sets really caps it off. I watch Doctor Who, OK? I put up with tash-twirling meglomaniacs on a episodely basis, so I've got a pretty high tolerance for over-acted threats of DEATH. But even by my low standards, this was awful.

These people aren't scary. They're not funny. And they're not charming. If a baddy is none of these things, then why does he even bother?

It basically failed by treating it as a comic book movie, and treating the audience as braindead chumps. I can certainly see why The Dark Knight was treated as the second coming - its realistic approach is a breath of air after this day-glo disaster. An hour and a half I'll never get back. Now I'm going to watch Batman Begins to recover.

In other news, they're making the Green Arrow movie!

My contact with comic books is governed by what's in the local library graphic novel section. It's pretty small, so I've devoured the Batman pretty quick and moved onto the rest of the DC universe. I like Green Arrow best, she said, like the girl who joins the Beatles fanclub on the strength of a "best ofs" album. "The Archer's Quest" is the only one I've read, but it was instant fan conversion - its a brilliant comic. Plus, bows and arrows are cool.

I was pretty sure, in this world of "darker" heroes that there wouldn't be room for a grown man dressed as Robin Hood - the costume, if nothing else, would be a bar to him ever getting a movie. Turns out I'm wrong, and if they do it well, then it could well be the most intriguing supermovie ever made.

Supermax - its a prison break movie, with a wrongly incarcerated Oliver Queen trying to escape with the help of various villains he put behind bars. But because its a prison for super-powered people, there are all sorts of additional challenges.

Ace idea - every super hero movie ever made goes down the same route of "12 hours to save the Earth" drama, when every fan of ANYthing knows the small-scale adventures are sometimes the most effective. This is different. It's about superheroes, but they're not saving the world. They're just doin regular stuff. It also scores points for using a tier-2 character like the Green Arrow, and while early reports say the Joker, Riddler and Lex Luthor are all in the script - there's also a whole host of people I haven't heard of, which is good for comic fans. It's nice to let the little people have a go: Blockbuster, Shock Trauma, Gemini, Cascade, Tattooed Man, Multiplex, Djinn, Merlyn, Pied Piper, Latarian Milton, Iron Cross & Heatmonger & Backlash (Aryan Nation), Calculator, Count Vertigo, Floronic Man, Split and Icicle. If that isn't enough, all will be imprisoned - going by their regular names, and without their costumes. Someone is actually trying to make a comic book movie for the people who made the graphic novel what it is - fanfriendly cameos that even I, with casual interest, hope to spot every reference.

So far, so awesome. One question: why the Green Arrow? His power relies completely on gadgetry - he's an ace shot with a bow. Not only will the prison enviroment rob him of his skill, it's not the type of thing you can easily replicate either. If the script truly does put a powerless superhero in the middle of their movie, this could well be the next greatest supermovie ever made...

http://www.slashfilm.com/2007/04/08/david-goyers-unconventional-green-arrow-movie-super-max/

Supermax

2008-09-02T00:34:00.000-07:00

My L.A.Confidential has been voted the best movie made about L.A. Its an obvious choice given, er, the name. Still, after the Oscar snub it deserves everything it can get. Is Titanic on the list of best L.A. movies? No? Well there you go!

The top 10 is:
1. L.A. Confidential
2. Boogie Nights
3. Jackie Brown
4. Boyz N The Hood
5. Beverly Hills Cop
6. The Player
7. Clueless
8. Repo Man
9. Collateral
10. The Big Lebowski

I've seen about half of these.

The other big awesomey news is that my little island is opening up a Godfather themed restaurant! Well, pizza place strictly. According to the news article which I now can't find, they've got half a limo as decoration, and bits of memorabilia on the walls. We are so going, as soon as possible!

Surf Nazis must die!

2008-08-26T08:52:00.000-07:00

Looks like QT is taking the rap for his leaked Inglorious Bastards script for, I quote, being disrespectful to German soldiers.

Calm down, folks. The Nazis have been reliably eeeevil bad guys ever since the 40s, just like the Russians in 60s Bond. And even if we're all big boys and girls now, and we understand things are more complex, we're still talking Tarantino.

Remind me of the last time he's made a movie remotely resembling Real Life as we know it? The sticky irony of Mr Orange's situation is as realistic as its ever got, and even then his actions at the end of the movie are governed by a Samuri concept of honour or something. Pulp Fiction was one massive homage to a genre - none of those people were meant to be real. Jackie Brown moreso, but it was also busy being a blaxsploitation tribute at the same time. And Kill Bill! That's my entire argument boiled down into two 2-hour chunks!

If it was a serious director making a serious Private Ryan-esque movie about slapping the it to the hun, then we could be alarmed. But surely any Tarantino war movie would be a boy's-own men-on-a-mission tribute BEFORE it was an intelligent commentary on 1940s politics. I'm expecting comic-book level gung ho behavior, the requisite bloodbath, some truly unredeemably villanous Nazis, and I'm expecting to have fun watching it.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2008/aug/15/quentintarantino.secondworldwar

The guardian confirms this theory - that it's going to be pure unhistoric pulp. So what's the problem? I mean, I'm defending a script I haven't read, for a movie I haven't seen, so he could still prove me wrong. Who knows - maybe troops going on a Holocaust-vengeance mission might turn out to be tasteless? *sarcasm* But at this rate, no one's going to get to see it!

I'm a little disappointed that both Tim Roth and Simon Pegg are out of the picture - I was looking forward to the Roth vs. Madsen rematch rumoured, oh, two years back. Their replacements are interesting to say the least. But I'm willing to give it a chance. And if in a years time this post mysteriously vanishes, you'll know I bet on the wrong horse.

I've skim read this link, if anyone wants the spoilerific low-down on the leaked script - which I don't particularly, but you might:

http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/07/weve_got_quentin_tarantinos_in.html

And here's the telegraph, with a much more general article along the same lines:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/celebritynews/2562334/Quentin-Tarantino-angers-Germans-with-film-about-slaying-Nazis.html

What to take?!

2008-08-23T06:18:00.000-07:00

As with most young people my age, I'm off to le university in a month or so.

Yeh. I know. At least I'm in London, doing film (well, Classics with Film, but you don't want to know about the first half)

I'm already stocking up on essentials - movie-themed notebooks, posters, and my obligatory movie mug (Pound World had some awesome Get Carter retro ones, but they sold out, so I got the Bullet one instead. Dead cool. I've just got to see the movie quick before someone asks about it...)

Top of the list, just above accomodation and food, is narrowing down a DVD selection. Ach, the agonising choice. I've found a wallet with 10 spaces in - and two DVDs can fit cosily in each, bringing it up to 20 spaces. Additionally, they've all got to be things which are mine, predomenantly mine, or things unlikely to be missed.

Definitely making the cut is:

Tideland - all mine, won't be missed ("worst film I've ever seen" - mum), and a hard film to find in a hurry. Plus, I'm going off for a film course, so hopefully I'll find someone prepared to sit through this interesting watch.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead - like Tideland, this is mine and even more obscure.

Guns of Navarone - same criteria.

LA Confidential - At Southampton, there was a DVD library of classics which could be borrowed, naturally for work puporses only. I'm expecting Kings to have a similar system, which is why The Godfather probably won't be coming with me. Is this well regarded enough to deserve a slot? I certainly think it should be, but I'm not going to risk it.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid - this is the first one which isn't mine. But it's my favourite film - I feel I have a claim. And it's not that often watched either. Same goes for:

Brazil - again, not even remotely mine. But I want it.

Not making the cut:

Fellowship of the Ring - if I had to pick 20 DVDs to take to a desert island, this would most certainly be coming. But I'm not, and I have to pick practicality over sentiment. I love this film, but I don't watch it enough to make it worth giving it a spot. Same goes for Signs and Zulu - if I were at home until Christmas, I probably wouldn't even take them off the shelf.

The Godfather - as pointed out above, this should probably be at the college already. But I'm taking Reservoir Dogs, just in case.

Time Bandits, Labyrinth, American Astronaut - all mine, but I won't be tkaing them. Same goes for Big Lebowski.

That leaves 12 spaces, and a horrible long list for them:

Planet Terror, High Plains Drifter and The Company of Wolves - none of which are really mine, and they're not exactly favourites yet, but by Christmas they could be.

The Warriors and Miller's Crossing - Miller's is mine. These were in the above catagory last year - now they're pretty close to making my top list. OK, taking Warriors - I'll leave the other for now.

Jackie Brown - tempting, but maybe not.

Apocalypse Now and Blade Runner - surely surely these must be in a local DVD library?

Hot Fuzz and Lost Boys - I want to weep! Two of my favourite movies, and two I watch an awful lot. Unfortunately, there's no way I'll get either of them out of the house.

I've found the library catalogue - they seem to have a lot there, including Dogs, but hell, I still want my own copy. I've also got room on my portable movie player - maybe Hot Fuzz will have to go on there.

OK, so here's the damage:

Brazil
Tideland
L.A. Confidential
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Guns of Navarone
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Blade Runner (final cut)
Reservoir Dogs
The Warriors
Apocalypse Now (redux)
Planet Terror
Miller's Crossing
Plus one disk from the Prisoner boxed set (Arrival, Chimes of Big Ben, Dance of the Dead and A, B and C -I'm regretting picking that one already)
My Doctor Who count is equally restrained - my favourite, Utopia, an episode I'd show to the uninitiated, Blink, and maybe one of the videos too. Although that's a seperate minefield (I've narrowed it down to six...)

Yuck! Nasty nasty job...

Voting on the Empire top 500

2008-08-04T12:11:00.000-07:00

Well thats me done. I expected to feel a sensation of crushing regret as I started to type, mabe just after clicking submit. But no. Even the fact they've allowed for people to login and change their vote did not tempt me. I find myself in the bizzare position of being completely satisfied with the top 10 I contributed to their poll, having cut it down from 18 favourite films.

1 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
2 Signs
3 Zulu
4 Fellowship of the Ring
4.5 Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
5 The Godfather
6 Reservoir Dogs
7 Lost Boys
8 L.A. Confidential
9 Hero
10 Donnie Darko
11 School of Rock
12 Brazil
13 Guns of Navarone
14 Constantine
15 Hot Fuzz
16 Apocalpse Now
17 Blade Runner

Here's my motivation for what went, and what stayed:

Apocalypse Now and Blade Runner
A lot of semi-favourite movies hang around my list, such as Velvet Goldmine or Legend of 1900, and every now and then I'll be writing it out (I'm cool like that), and suddenly one will slip on and fit perfectly. These are two such movies, films I've raved about for so long it seems pointless to leave them off. But as new additions, I decided not to put them on my top ten. Its not like they need the votes.

The Godfather, Reservoir Dogs and Fellowship of the Ring
"It's not like they need the votes" was my mantra for initially cutting down my list. The idea of voting is so you can't bitch when you don't like the results, and when it came to making up the gaps, it suddenly struck me that a vote for these two would be a futile blow against two things that always get on my nerves. That is, whenever they are beaten by their inferior sequels - Godfather 2 and Pulp Fiction and, although this makes me less mad, Two Towers and Return of the King. So here's hoping it'll nudge them higher. It would also be colossaly unfair for me to deny three films which I have, at one time or another, loved with every fibre of my being, merely to clinically advance the hopes of things I have loved less.

Brazil and L.A. Confidential
When I look at top 100s, I'm not just on the eye for my favourites - I want films which deserve to be there to be there. Rififi, Run Lola Run, Brazil and L.A. Confidential come in this catagory. It's out of 500, so I have no doubt both will get on (L.A.C is often on these things, and Brazil missed out on the Total Film top 100 by only a few places), but this is a protest vote.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is also a film that deserves to be on the list, but however clinically I'm voting, I certainly can't deny my favourite film of all time. Same goes for Signs, which might be in with a chance, and Zulu, that could squeak in at the very top.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Wasted vote. I love it, but I can't kid myself for a moment it would be worthwhile. Total Film's 100 had a stats section, where it listed some unlikely films nominated - but its sufficiently obscure no one would list it there either.

School of Rock, Lost Boys and Constantine
School and Lost Boys were the first to be crossed off the list - pointless votes, and I didn't feel too bad about it either. Constantine was hard. For a while it was there, with the same grace of disbelief that had kept Guns and Zulu there. I wanted it to make the list, and I'm proud to be a minority fan, so I wanted to publicly give it some affection. Common sense prevailed - it had to go.

Hero and Donnie Darko
They blew me away at the time. Do I still love them as much as I did? I haven't seen them for a while, and the idea of it doesn't fill me with the same excitement as others on the page.

Guns of Navarone and Hot Fuzz
They're at the top end of my list, when one or two points can't make any real significant difference. Hot Fuzz is certainly in with a chance; I'll be suprised if Guns makes it, but like Zulu, its a possibility. However small.

It's not a bad list. Take a look at my sister's contribution, a bizzare mix of well recieved modern films, but hardly classics, and scarily respectable things:

1 Brick - Good call
2 Run Lola Run - see what i mean about alarmingly highbrow?
3 Enchanted - I quite liked this, but I was disappointed that the satire did not go so deep as I'd liked.
4 Spy Game - ach, a favourite of mine, and a film I can't watch too often.
5 Inconvenient Truth - see what I mean?! She has a documentary! I don't have a documentary...
6 The Two Towers - she's picked a different Ring from me, but it's still a good'n.
7 Signs - yay! See, we need a few more votes like this!
8 Phonebooth - very good piece of moviemaking indeed, but it hasn't earnt itself a reputation as a film to be voted for, if you know what I mean.
9 Spirited Away - yays!
10 Trois Coleurs: Rouge - Oh I'm chuffed about this, I'm very impressed.

What'll be at the top? Well, with the turbulence of the last few weeks, I'm expecting The Dark Knight Returns will be alarmingly highly placed. EMPIRE doesn't have pretentious voters, so while Citizen Kane will be there, it'll be lower. Pulp Fiction and Fight Club are, of course, going to do well, as will the Godfathers (but which one will come higher?)

Voting is open on the Empire website until September sometime.

Movie trivia quiz!

2008-07-31T09:51:00.000-07:00

18 films and ten questions - can you match the movie to the criteria?

As it turns out, they're my favourites - but it made for a fairly random selection of genres and eras. Longtime fans of the blog will notice I've finally started counting Apocalpyse Now and Blade Runner among my favourite movie list, instead of just madly gushing.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid Hot Fuzz

Zulu L.A. Confidential Guns of Navarone Hero Apocalypse Now Blade Runner

Signs Constantine School of Rock Lost Boys Donnie Darko Brazil

The Godfather Reservoir Dogs Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

EASY

1 There is only one repeat director on the list - who is he, and which are his films?

2 Spot the only foreign film

3 My favourite directors are Terry Gilliam and M. Night Shyamalan, but I also rate Stanley Kubrick, Quentin Tarantino and Ridley Scott. Which one of the five has no film on the list (and which one of theirs would you recommend I add?)

MEDIUM

1 One is based on a play - one is based on a graphic novel

2 Six are based on books

3 Three have sequels (and one is about to have a sequel)

4 My friends think I watch too many violent movies, and I notice that there's only one film on my list in which no one is killed - which one is it?

HARD

1 Bearing in mind I loved both films for several years before realising, can you spot the only repeat actress on the list? Who is she, and which two films is she in?

2 I have identified four actors on the list who are in more than one film - who are they?

AND FINALLY...

1 Are all my questions correct? Spot anything I missed?

You take away all a man has, and all he's gonna have

2008-07-27T07:12:00.000-07:00

I blame Trial of a Timelord. The epic 14 part adventure, one of the most unpopular Doctor Who episodes of all time, and one that's got me so tense about what's going to happen next that almost anything seems preferable.

For the last few days, I've been avoiding it - all in aid of my extended family, three of which are coming to stay. I need to be in a fit state to answer questions about my school work, to smile graciously, to not spend whole days on tenterhooks and have whatever I watched last on TV knawing away at my brain.

With Trial as an alternative, an alternative I know will put my brain in an alarmed spin, almost anything seems like a good idea. Like Don't Look Now, the famously terrifying movie, which I never would have even sat down to otherwise.

To watch Don't Look Now, you have to get over the basic idiocy at the root of the plot. Venice, with its canals and waterways, is the worst damn place in the world to get over a drowning. And with its claustrophobic alleys, bridges, sharp corners and shadows, its a bad place if you feel like a nervous breakdown too. I've been there, and it's beautiful - but water is everywhere you look.

The main thing I couldn't get over with this movie was quite how 60's it was. Even though it was made in 1973, it was still in that flush period of cinema. Crosscutting like they'd only just been shown how, exposing flesh as if they'd only just been allowed, suggesting connections and art.

Ignoring how desperatley 60s it is, the whole thing is beautifully shot. Julie Christie is wonderful to look at (she reminds me very much of Friend 7), and Donald Sutherland has a wonderfully twitchy look - he already looks unhinged.

I love the title, and I love the sublties of the plot - it doesn't hold your hand, and there's a lot going on which could only be caught on a second or third watch. The only downside was that overfamilarity with the plot that classic movies have. Yes, I knew what was going on almost blow by blow. But I still enjoyed it.

I'm also amused to see its being remade. Hahahahahaha! Nicholas Roeg has cautiously said he is interested in how it could be reimagined.

That was last night. This afternoon, the same rules applied - not Trial, almost anything but. I first saw Unforgiven on a long haul plane journey, on the recommendation of my dad - logic dictates this must have been about five or six years ago, making me 12 or 13. I remembered it being awesome, and I've meant to rewatch it ever since.

Memory does funny things. I remembered the plot in some detail - who gets killed where, mainly. But I was sure Richard Harris played a larger role - I remember him being soulessly sadistic, completely unsympathisable and getting shot at the end. I'm now wondering if I had him mixed up with Michael Gambon's nasty piece of work from Open Range - not a very good movie, a sort of post-Unforgiven elegaic and ponderous Western, with an awesome gunfight at the end. I've only seen it once, though I have stuck the last 15 minutes on more than that.

I was also suprised by Gene Hackman's character - I remember him being a villain. Now he was unpleasant, but he doesn't do anything wrong. He smashes English Bob to pieces, but they go back a long way, and to be honest who wouldn't want to? Bob was maybe my favourite character, but he's still very smug, enjoys annoying others, and (apparently) makes a habit of badmouthing the President on Independance Day.

Even though Little Bill is mean, I don't feel he steps out of what his job and the age in which he lives demands of him. He does the best he can about the opening scenario - it wouldn't have been fair to hang the pair, whipping was the best "eye for an eye" solution, and the final price of horses was a pretty financially crippling one. Ned didn't deserve to die, but Bill didn't know that - he's just trying to keep violence out of his town. The gun ban is his best idea of how to prevent treasure-seekers coming for their reward - Bob and Munny earn their beatings by ignoring that law. By the end, with the poor dear only trying to build a house, I feel he earns more sympathy than anyone.

What I did remember correctly was the punishing violence, the cruelty in which characters are dispatched, and the bleak meaness that suffuses the whole thing. But only vaguely, like an idea. Maybe this movie is responsible for a lot of my own fiction - I write, only for myself, stories and movies. I 've always refused to be sentimental about the matter - I like death to be cynical and unfair. I haven't yet started rolling dice to see which of my characters gets hit first, but its only a matter of time. I always enjoy movies where bystanders get shot, killers get the shakes, and death is not instantaneous. For one thing, more might do something towards combating the urban violence problem. It also makes for more interesting drama.

I'd remembered all that, but I had forgotten quite how vivid and upsetting the whole thing is. Violent, but not quite that violent...it neatly backs up my theory that violence is about tone and treatment, not about what you see. Some of the most violent moments I've ever seen have been in Doctor Who - they are rendered far more nasty by their unlikely nature. You assume the pacifistic kids program can't be too baDOHJEEZYUCK!...because you're not expecting it. When I'm watching horror movies, or things I know to be unpleasant, I expect far more and am affected far less. I'm not for a moment suggesting Trial is more scary than Don't Look Now; but taken in context - one, a horror classic; the other, an overlit campy sci-fi from British television, your standards are different. Even with my standards raised pretty high, Unforgiven was still shocking. And it's only a 15...

So you see, my resolution to avoid Trial of a Timelord, and thereby stay in a stable state of mind, somewhat backfired. Don't Look Now had me sleep very badly indeed; Unforgiven has depressed me, and put me in the mood to see Reservoir Dogs (another thing which might prove tricky with an 9-yr-old in the house). And as if that weren't enough, apparently the guy hired to write the new Brideshead script is vehemently anti-Catholic...

Just shoot me now...

Decent men in an indecent world.

2008-07-26T02:37:00.000-07:00

In their ivory towers, the movie hotshots are trying to predict the Next Big Thing. Lord of the Rings slipped under the radar; who saw The matrix coming, or Star Wars for that matter?

Ignoring The Rings for a moment, I've never been a part of an event movie. At the time it didn't suprise me that LOTR was packing cinemas - because, thats what always happens, right?

The Dark Knight is an event

There was a queue out the entrance and around the building. The cinema was full, completely full. There were kids, adults, men, women; some sporting their Batman T-shirts, the rest just idle fans. This never happens at our cinema - there are only 60 seats on the largest screen, and its rare more than ten of them are filled. There's no slant on the chairs - its just an average size dark room with chairs on the floor.

As if I wasn't already impressed, they then proceeded to watch the entire film in silence - save the odd nervous giggle at the Joker's quips. No rustling sweets, misbehaving kids or chatter.

That's because The Dark Knight is an event movie. There was something special in the air. Me and my friends have been feeling it for months - initially, I put it down to just plain ole excitement. Friend 3 loves superhero movies; I'm getting into graphic novels, but especially Batman (and Green Arrow, but thats beside the point); Friend 5 loves Christian Bale, and Friend 4 was just excited. But when the trailers started appearing, I was frothing more than anything and bouncing like they'd just announced the Hobbit or something.

For one thing, it's blowing up New York again. Movies used to do that all the time, and then a certain real life event came along and did it properly. Suddenly, Towering Inferno was out of fashion, Spiderman and Men in Black 2 were respectfully tweaking their explosive climaxes, and United 93 and World Trade Center entered pre-production. Film will never be the same again - at least not for a while - because Die-Hard-style building explosions are no longer blockbuster fun, its part of the public consciousness. Even me, who deals with real world tragedy by ignoring it, who lives in England away from the epicenter, who lost no one and knows no one who did, even I feel it as a part of my life - because like hiding from Daleks behind the sofa, or queueing for hours to see Star Wars, its part of the folk memory of our times.

So even though nothing was said, I could feel it in the room. Watching Gotham burn was weird because its the first time any city has been attacked this gleefully on screen Since. At the same time, the shaky Joker camera footage, the dark colours, the downbeat tone showed that something has changed in the blowing-shit-up genre. The same can be said of the hostage situations - the "war on Terror" thang has made these real for us as well.

We also had to contend with the ghost of Heath Ledger who is - haven't you heard? - dead, apparently. Again, nothing was said - as if it needed to be, with such a focus in every Dark Knight related piece. But that too leant the film yet another edge and importance.

Lets get this out of the way - he was fantastic, mindblowingly so. But if he gets the Oscar it will be a travesty of justice. Why? Can you remember the last time an actor won an award for a *shudder* superhero movie? That's because it doesn't happen. They're not "real films" at all. Now you can argue that there's never been a superhero film this good; but lets be honest. Hollywood loves sentiment. And if he wins the award, it'll be for being dead. I'm not saying he doesn't deserve the Oscar - he is, as I said, all kinds of fantastic. But under normal circumstances, he wouldn't stand a chance. It'll just prove what a screwed up, biased and hypocritical affair the whole Oscar lark is.

This film was already special - not on its own merits, but the poignancy of real world things it reflected. But thank goodness it was brilliant into the bargain.

Bale. Caine. Oldman. Freeman. Eckhart. Gyllenhall...erm, who have I forgotten - Ledger, of course. And of the less well knowns, we got a bit more Cillian Murphy as the Scarecrow, and ex-Master Eric Roberts as a mafiosi. Oh, and William Fitchner, who's one of those "where do I recognise?" guys, who I think has a wonderful face.

All wonderful. One flaw of the movies is Batman isn't interesting - he's a lot more fun when he's Bruce Wayne (the opposite of the comics). One of the things that makes this film better than any other super-flick is his backup. Lucius, Alfred, Gordon and (here) Dent are all on his side, giving a range of character interaction and scheming.

In the previous film, he was just fighting the scum - here, despite the presence of two super-villains, the same fight against mafia corruption or police informants keeps it grounded in reality.

I particularly loved the Batman - Harvey Dent relationship. Both characters are doing the same thing in different ways - cleaning the streets, one legally, and one dirty. But both are inspired by the other's efforts. It makes for an interesting dynamic, especially with Rachel in the middle. Rachel isn't given anything to do, but Maggie puts in a much better performance than Katie Holmes did last year. She was just adorably insipid. And she's also responsible for a scene that, given a few months, could be one of my favourites ever (to enter spoilerdom, her bravery in hoping that Batman will rescue her date first when both assume he's going to save her - and her wonderful reaction when she realises he isn't. Wow, what a brainjob. It reminds me of a scene in Count of Monte Cristo. I like it when cinema gets cruel.)

Put Gordon in, and you've got a wonderful trio of heroes. I've always thought Gary Oldman's contribution turned him into maybe the biggest hero of both movies. He's helping in the ordinary way he can, and it suprised me how much I cared for him every time he got into danger. Its always nice to see him playing a good guy - in an alternate universe, he'd doubtless be taking on the giggling psycho role instead. Which I'm sure he'd do admirably, but as a "real actor" his reactions are endlessly watchable. Nice to look at too.

But its all about the direction, really - Nolan gives the whole franchise a sense of dignity and subtlety. Obvious scenes are cut short or missing, suggested by slight reactions. Fight sequences are rooted in dialogue and plot.

That man knows how to make a film. Watch the direction of Two Face - the final confrontation, the ugly half is shadowed to make him a diseased man in a real situation, to make the tension more real. Watch the times when his head is turned one way or another. Its wonderful (and justabout makes up for the fact that Two Face really isn't as interesting as Harvey was. Aaron Eckhart has this wonderfully RobertRedfordish look. Clean shaven, blonde hair - like Redford, he's made for playing decent, upstanding Americans. I didn't buy his emotional transformation, and I wish his makeup had been a little less extreme - he's a very pretty person, and it would have been better had they concentrated on making his honest beauty completely warped and twisted rather than replacing half his head with Imoteph The Mummy. It could have been more devastating - it was only the reactions of the other characters which cemented what a total tragedy his loss was.)

The final Joker scene, hanging upsidedown but with the camera the wrong way up, swaying in the light and the wind is one of the most inspired pieces of direction - cemented of course, by a terrifically freaky piece of acting.

Its cunningly avoided a 15 too. There are a dozen incidents which, with the addition of a bit of blood, would nudge it into a higher catagory. I've always had a lot of faith in the BBFC, but if this is a twelve then Ed Wood deserves an Oscar. Only some very creative cutting snuck it into a lower band - like prosecuting a mobster, when you know he's guilty but don't have the evidence to prove it; thus here, I could feel this film was meant to be a 15, even though it avoided any shots which would move it up.

My one criticism is I didn't know when it was going to end. This might seem mean, but I like to know how much further I've got to go. Even in offbeat, indie efforts, you can normally identify if you're in the climax, the buildup, the payoff. There were several moments when I felt the film was rounding to a conclusion - but then it started up again. I always find that unsettling.

And as usual, a trip to My Local Fleapit Cinema couldn't completely be without hitch - today, they had got their sound balance all wrong - the dialogue was frequently too quiet, drowned out by the music. Which is a pity, because whenever the thumping strings came in it felt intrusive. Shame, because the Zimmer-NewtonHoward team up creates some pieces of music I love - so it was a pity to hate them in context.

Anyway, that's that over - bring on film three! But if you think I'm kidding about the "special" thing, check out IMDb. Dark Knight is beating out Shawshank Redemption and The Godfather on the top 250. it won't last - big new films always jump onto the list then vanish. So even though I'm sure it'll eventually drop, that's one loud round of applause from the internet, for a film only out a few days. Check out the poll - 29.9% think its better than The Godfather, with a very very close 29.2% arguing its worse. I voted for Godfather, incidentally.

In other news, I've just finished reading "Force 10 from Navarone" the sequel to the novel which Guns of Navarone, one of me faves, was based on. It was great! Well, strictly, it wasn't - it was pure pulp, an above-par airport novel. But I loved it, and the novel was far less trashy than it could have been.

The surviving heroes of the first book are catapulted into yet another situation which requires random silent killings, manipulation, sabotage, betrayal, and it's every bit as morally bankrupt as the movie.

I loved the film for its characters - all present and correct - and particularly their silent interaction to resolve tense situations. You may recall the scene on the boat when they are boarded by German soldiers and wordlessly, after a few minutes, explode into violence. The book is stuffed with such scenes. Like the film, even though it looks and feels like a goodole Boy's Own romp, its not afraid to ask tricky questions and be bleak about the cost of war.

But I won't be watching the movie. The lack of the original cast has already killed the idea for me, and it looks like they've replaced Stavros with an American character played by Harrison Ford.

Hold the press. I take it back. Locations list: "Jersey, Channel Islands". I live in Guernsey, a slightly smaller island only 20 minutes away. Now that's more exciting, although I find it hard to tally the remote pine forests, relentless snow and harsh terrain with the glorified seaside resort across the water. A closer look at the list reveals they filmed in Yugoslavia and Montenegro - that must be the Yugoslavia bits then. But they can't have used it for Navarone, surely? the Malta location seems far more likely. So then what? The Italy scenes are more likely to be in one of the studios.

Nevertheless, that has piqued my interest. As has the presence of Paul Jerricho, who played a minor character I loved from 70's Doctor Who.

But the reviews suggest it's not quite as morally taut as the original - and the absence of Peck'n'Niven, not to mention cutting Stavrous entirely, means this is still a lost cause. Now, as for reading the Guns of Nav book, I'm very excited indeed - as soon as I find a copy, that is...

Oooh, and interesting trivia which I wondered about for the whole book. Mr MacLean wrote Force 10 as a sequel to the movie, not his original novel.

Try to produce a work of art.

2008-07-24T12:39:00.000-07:00

The world's going to hell in a handcart.

You may remember a few months ago, I wrote an optimistic meditation on the new Brideshead Revisited film. One of my favourite books, turned into one of my favourite TV shows. A slow-paced, nostalgic story of love, religion and middle age.

Last time, I was trying hard to be gentle. I don't want to damn it out of the blue, I want to give it a chance. And I understand that of course, they have to change things. I'm prepared. But I genuinely think this new movie is going to be a trainwreck.

Its all a matter of tone, and meaning. For me, Brideshead Revisited is about a middle aged man who realises he has spent his entire life searching for something he lost at the age of 19. For author Waugh, it was about the operation of divine grace on a small group of characters. For Jarrod, the new director, its about "young individual from a poorer, less interesting background who is welcomed into this beautiful, magical, alluring kingdom with wonderful, magical people. And then he begins to realize that everything is not what it seems.”

None of those things are in the book. Waugh was a converted Catholic who, I presume, saw God in everything - and for him that would be the strongest force in his character's lives. I'm very sentimental, very nostalgic, and my chief worry on going to university is that one day that'll happen to me (pessimistic, but it could happen). When I read the book, its all about Charles trying to regain what he saw in Sebastian - whether that's true love, or what he represented in terms of the rich lifestyle, or his free lifestyle, or just the joy of being young. He's only in 3 chapters or so - but his influence is all over the place. Anthony Blanche notes "inevitably we talk of Sebastian" early on in the novel, and it happens for the rest of the book. The classic image of the show is, well, poncing about with teddy bears.

To justify my reading, my film would be all lingering shots, subtle glances and covered with bittersweet loss from the first five minutes. I might even mix the scenes up Tarantino style, interspersing the early sunny scenes with the later grey and grim ones to telegraph that things are going downhill from the start. Waugh shoved the full of very subtle hits, use of language which is ravingly obvious if you go looking for it. And a fascinating memo sent by him to Hollywood reveals that religion would be the central theme of his movie.

I do not know of Mr Jarrod's background, but for him the story is about class. To be honest, I barely noticed it, just as I barely noticed the religious undertones until they were pointed out. But having seen the trailer, just as I would play up the loss, he's playing up the class issues. The insinuation that Charles is getting in with the family for the money is no where in the book, although it is an interpretation one could follow. He sees the world of Brideshead as temptation - decadant, rich, exotic but corrupt. Again, I disagree - because he sees it as something happening to Charles, wheras for me it's something in the past. He's always looking back at it. Mr Jarrod is playing up the thriller-ish aspects of the novel, sexing up something which was perfectly fine as it was.

Tone. Chaos, eh? This was sparked off by an article on the NYTimes website. Lets do a commentary:

"THE images from the 11-episode mini-series are still vivid, 27 years later. Louche young Oxford students in crisp linen suits (and one teddy bear) drinking endless cocktails. A spectacular country estate, dripping with treasures and crackling with religious, sexual and dynastic tensions. A delicately beautiful Jeremy irons"

Yes, Jeremy Irons was pretty yummy in this. You note they start with the TV show, not the book. The book was already big - but like the Godfather movie, the epic show preserved it in the public mind and made it big.

It is those lingering memories, even more than Evelyn Waugh’s novel, that anyone attempting to turn “Brideshead Revisited” into a feature film for the first time naturally has to contend with. And so as not to contaminate his approach Julian Jarrold, the director, studiously avoided the mini-series — all that elegiac emotion, spread out over 659 languorous minutes — and returned to the book. “It exposed some of the myths I’d had about ‘Brideshead,’ ” Mr. Jarrold said of his rereading. “I’d had the memory of it being a nostalgia trip about the passing of English life and a bygone era, a glorification of aristocracy — about people wearing odd clothes and poncing around Oxford.” That was part of it, he said.

But there was also a bite and a sharpness that are as relevant now as they were in 1945, when the novel was published. “One of the reasons for the book’s popularity is, it is an archetypal type of story of this young individual from a poorer, less interesting background who is welcomed into this beautiful, magical, alluring kingdom with wonderful, magical people,” Mr. Jarrold said. “And then he begins to realize that everything is not what it seems.”

I'm not going to deny the bite and sharpness. The dialogue, the observation of character is priceless. But as I've already noted, I never for a moment saw it as a story about class. It's not even mentioned. It's just an issue that doesn't matter to me personally - my family is affluent, some people I know are richer, others are poorer. So what? I don't believe in class tensions.

The film, which is to be released on Friday, is set in the 1920s, ’30s and ’40s and stars Matthew Goode as Charles Ryder, the unworldly student whose friendship with the aristocratic Lord Sebastian Flyte (Ben Whishaw) introduces him to a whole new world of money, class privilege, deep happiness and deep despair. Castle Howard, an estate in Yorkshire, stands in for Brideshead, home to Sebastian and his family, a symbol of a dying way of life and a character in itself. The mini-series was written by John Mortimer and stars Anthony Andrews as the teddy-bear-carrying Sebastian. It opens and ends with Charles (Mr. Irons), now a British Army officer, unexpectedly encamped at Brideshead during World War II. He begins to replay in his mind the role Brideshead, with its dark sorrows and bewitching delights, played in his life some 20 years earlier.

In this new version the filmmakers have, of necessity, pared down the story. World War II comes up only at the end. There is less time to dwell on the seemingly endless summer when Charles and Sebastian meet and their lives gradually become entwined. Some supporting characters given prominence in the mini-series — Sebastian’s younger sister, Cordelia, played in the original by Phoebe Nicholls, for example, or his waspish friend Anthony Blanche (Nickolas Grace in the series)— appear only glancingly in the film.

See what I mean? For me it would be paramount for WWII to open the film, to let the audience know this is all happening in the past. It would best support my interpretation as a story of lost ideals and innocence. Here, they leave it to the end. Serious mistake. Pity Cordelia will be cut down, but it was inevitable; as with Anthony. I imagine Bridey has been cut entirely.

“It was a terrible struggle, and we worked for many, many hours on the screenplay in order to make the right choices,” said Jeremy Brock, who wrote it with Andrew Davies. “But bluntly, you have a 330-page novel and a two-hour film, and you don’t have the luxury of being able to include everybody.”

Yeh, that's fair. And what they're cutting out is the least of my worries. It's what they're adding and twisting that gets my goat. So...

The filmmakers also have played up the love triangle of Charles, Sebastian and Sebastian’s bewitching sister, Julia (Hayley Atwell). An extended scene during a night of erotic possibility in Venice serves to advance Charles’s romance with Julia. (All the changes — including placing Julia in Venice — were approved by the Waugh estate, the filmmakers said.)

I approve of this. The novel is in two sections - Charles and Sebastian and then Charles and Julia. Without making two films, they can't adequately do either, so fudging them together is really their only option. I'm not sure what "erotic possibility" means though. Actually, the word "extended" disturbs me about as much. Anyway...

“This puts Julia center stage,” Mr. Brock said of the Venice scenes. “When you read the novel, there is a sense that she is slightly the one who comes after Sebastian, that she is No. 2, and I think it’s not quite fair. The true love story for Charles is the one with Julia.”

As I said, all about interpretation and I think that's ridiculous. The true love story for Charles is the one with Sebastian - Julia comes afterwards, she's an echo of what he misses. She acnowledges it in the book; Charles notes they look similar. Mr Brock is deliberately pissing off the Valyard here. Or, to put it more simply, he's actually deciding he doesn't like something and plunging in to restore Julia to where he thinks she should be. Very chivalric. Now I know its only a story, but screwing with fiction really gets my goat - in my mind, it's like a time traveller deliberately interfering with the past. Anyone who's ever watched sci-fi will appreciate you can't change history on a whim, not just because you'll change the present (in our analogy, come up with a worse film), but because you just shouldn't - because its a law you shouldn't break.

Am I overreacting? After all, protecting the integrity of the time continuum and keeping a movie adaption canonical aren't exactly of equal importance. There is a reason why history works the way it does; and there is a reason why stories are written the way they are. Now changes must be made - every now and then, you step on the odd butterfly - but militantly deciding to go back and kill baby Hitler is always wrong. And that's what Mr Brock is doing - he's decided he wants to change things. Ach, yes Im overreacting.

Perhaps he's closer to Mr Waugh's intent: "Charles's romantic affection for Sebastian is part due to the glitter of the new world Sebastian represents, part to the protective feeling of a strong towards a weak character, and part a foreshadowing of the love for Julia which is to be the consuming passion of his mature years." Because I see the story backwards, I see his love for Julia as a result, not a foreshadowing.

And while the homoerotic longings between Charles and Sebastian are more implied than explicit in the earlier incarnations, in the film they share a quick kiss. Instantly their easy camaraderie is polluted by a new awkwardness and inhibition. “There’s a sense that maybe they’ve crossed a line that one of them isn’t ready to cross,” Mr. Brock said of the kiss.

Heh. Its all about tone, boys and girls. Whats the point in making something so obscure so obvious? Let the platonic crowd have their fun, let the "get out of the closet!" brigade prove their argument, and let the people who like it on the fence stay on the fence. Because there's nothing that clear cut about youth, and for me this is the biggest problem encountered so far. If you choose to so read it, then Charles'n'Seb can be at it like rabbits the whole time. There's way enough evidence. On the other hand, the story works just as well if its an entirely innocent relationship. I feel its a mistake to deny that it is love, but

In a surprising casting move Lady Marchmain, the matriarch whose deep religious faith reverberates so tragically through the lives of her children, is played by Emma Thompson, made up toward the end of the film to look much older.“I always associate Emma Thompson with being youthful and contemporary and playing decent, sensitive characters, whereas obviously this is the complete opposite,” Mr. Jarrold said. But Ms. Thompson can play old as well as young, lacing her character’s prodigious charm with a chilly savagery. As much as it is a story about a lost period of English history — a final shining moment before everything changed forever — “Brideshead” is a novel about the inexorable pull of Catholicism. The issues it raises are particularly relevant now, Mr. Brock said, though viewers may interpret what they see differently depending on the role of faith in their own lives. A scene toward the end, when the Marchmain family tussles over the soul of Lord Marchmain (Michael Gambon) as he lies on his deathbed, is wrenching and even shocking. After abandoning his wife and her self-sacrificing piety for a life of sensuality and ease in Italy, Marchmain has returned home to die. But what sort of role should Catholicism play, with its ability to pull in lapsed members with a “twitch upon the thread,” as Waugh put it, citing G. K. Chesterton, at the end of Marchmain’s life? To Charles’s fascinated horror, the question is of central importance to the family, and there is only one possible answer. “In that tug between individual freedom and fundamentalist religion, there’s a story that’s apposite for our time,” Mr. Brock said. “In the modern age that’s something we’re all dealing with.”An important divergence in tone from Waugh’s novel, Mr. Jarrold said, comes in the closing scene, when Charles — now back at Brideshead during World War II — talks to Lieutenant Hooper, a fellow soldier who has a rough accent and the forthright views of a modern man unimpressed by the aristocracy. How to portray him led to long discussions about the way that Waugh “is sometimes profoundly undemocratic” and disdainful of Hooper and what he represents, Mr. Jerrold said. In the book Hooper is “described as a traveling salesman with a wet handshake,” he said. “But he’s the future of England, and the hope of the 1945 generation, and we’ve put a positive spin on him.”

Again, look - class issuese

So lets leave the final word with Mr Waugh, from a different memo to Hollywood about seeing his books filmed: "It has lately been demonstrated that cinema audiences do not know whether the films they see are spoken in Italian or English. It is useless to write down to their level. Try to produce a work of art."

Ugh. I'm thoroughly miserable now, so miserable I've just finished off half a pack of chocolate wafers and am listening to the Beach Boys. It ain't working.

Under those circumstances, it might seem a bad idea to pre-judge another one of my favourite books about to emerge as Hollywood property.

Cirque du Freak is the story of an ordinary kid who becomes a vampire. Only please don't stop reading, because it is so much more than just that. It was one of my favourites as a kid - I bought all 12 books. What is more impressive that they still read well now I've grown up a bit. Author Darren Shan treads a fine, fine line and while the books are aimed at children (every chapter ends on a cliffhanger - "and now the spider was heading for me!"), its never patronising and satisfyingly dark. It starts out as a book about a teen vampire hero. 11 installments later, he's handling alternate Earths, parallel futures and middle age. In one novel, a newly converted Darren dates a local girl in an effort to retain a normal teenage life. Generic stuff. But Debbie comes back in 10 years as an adult with her own flat, while Darren still appears to be 13. He never shies away from making things hard, and tackling ideas like that where other kids books would make it easy.

At one moment, a desperate situation is resolved by a piece of outrageously cheesy deus ex machina. The next chapter begins "No. I wish it had happened like that, but it didn't", and all of a sudden, beloved characters are dying and you can only watch helplessly - especially because last chapter you were groaning because it was all too happy. And characters do die, lovely ones and in cruel ways. JK Rowling only got this dark in the final chapters of Book 7, and was never this ironic.

So lets have a look at the movie. It's being written by Brian Helegand, who wrote Knight's Tale. He has my stamp of approval. The cast list reveals a Wolfman and Murlough have been cast. These are the villains for books 2 and 3 - evidently the first three have been compacted. Another good move - the 12 book series vaguely falls into four trilogies anyway, and these three are similar in tone et al.

Its being directed by Paul Weitz, and suddenly I really wished I'd seen Golden Compass - his last adaptation of a dodgy kids book. If it's as average as everyone said, then I'm a little edgy about him handling my baby. I also wish I knew something about the composer - his films all seem to be indie or low-profile, so hopefully he'll do something interesting and not fantasy-default.

The cast is OK. Ken Wantabe isn't the Mr Tall of my mind, but he will do it well. I wish Mr Tiny wasn't credited as Mr Destiny, but there goes - the actor has a wonderful look. Mr Tiny needs to have presence - be creepy, without really knowing why; just as Mr Tall has to be completely trustworthy, in the same way.

The stars have my temporary approval too. Darren and Steve look perfect, although I don't recognise anything they're in. The jury's out on Mr Crepsley, played by John C. Reilly. He's not an actor I like much (from Chicago, but still), and Mr C is one of the most insanely special characters. A suggestion on the IMDb board is that he should have traded roles with Willem Dafoe, who is playing Gavner Purl. Now JCR would make an awesome Gavner, but I'm willing to give him a chance.

I just have one problem. They're gonna make it a sodding PG. Now done properly, this thing deserves an 18 rating - its still one of the most violent things I've ever read. But that's stupid - its still a kids book. All I'm asking is a 12. Don't aim it at the tweenie market, its not Harry Potter. It should be aimed at young adults. For 13, 14yrold kids who want a horror movie of their own with some proper gore. I can't think of a way that this film could be made faithfully at PG, and retain the alarmingly visceral feel. Drop the visual nastiness, and the nastiness inherent in the plot will be the next to go.

On the whole, I'm optimistic. I'm looking forward to the film I would make, which is a mistake, but I feel it'd be hard to do these books badly...if there is a mouse on set. By mouse I mean a director, a writer, a producer who will weed out the cheese. If they try to do it sentimentally, or use that awful "magical music" exhibited by current kid movies. Its a bleak piece of fiction; the world of the cirque is not wonderful in any way.

Case in point: A Series of Unfortunate Events. Another good series of books. I rather liked the film - Jude Law made a terrible Lemony, it needed to be someone far older and cynical, but the look was wonderful. But the ending! They gave it a happy ending!

Something about the film will piss me off. But I'm not going to issue a fatwah for the crew just yet, because if they steer away from sentimentality and and keep it honest as the book, then there is an awesome film waiting...

In these parts...

2008-07-22T03:54:00.000-07:00

The problem with iconic milestone movies are so busy being milestones they forget to be movies too. Take Birth of a Nation - famous for inventing cross-cutting, moving cameras and modern language of cinema; famous for being shamelessly racist. The Jazz Singer - the first talkie. Everyone knows that. Cinema kids are born knowing it. Who needs to see it? And so on.

What they forget to tell you is that these films are sometimes bloody brilliant too, as well as being a museumpiece. And so we get onto In The Heat of the Night, which I implore you to see as soon as possible.

This is mostly thanks to Sidney Potier (or "ney Potier" as he was credited, before I moved to a TV that could handle the aspect ratio), who's all fire and ice and rage, all wrapped up in stillness and silence. To top it off, he doesn't half look lovely in that suit. And I really wanted him to survive to the end - which, to be honest, is something I rarely ever do. I'm always secretly hoping for a violent, a shocking, an ironic twist on what we've already seen. This is chiefly in bad movies, or at least ones I know are going to do the obvious thing. Rob Roy, anyone? When a movie is good, such as the Three Colours Trilogy, it earns the right to a happy ending. Really, genuinely rooting for a character to survive is a rarity in these parts. Rod Steiger won the Oscar, and I guess he's great too. But, seriously?

"In these parts" would be a good phrase to apply to the rest of it. Sure its about race, but its also about small towns. I live in a small town - actually, its an island - think Wicker Man's Summerisle meets Hot Fuzz's Sanford. That's us - all town carnivals, country fetes, jam making competitions and backbiting gossip. I have little difficulty believing that HOT FUZZ SPOILER our local council would assassinate someone for having an awful house.

It manages to do all the detective movie cliches, from gradual grudging acceptance to "You have two hours to solve the case", yet somehow it all stays convincing. And kudos to the exciting direction too. You can really tell this movie was made in the 60s - not only for its frank discussion of racial issues, but the sense of playing around with the camera. I particularly liked the slow zoom on the fugitive as he flees across the bridge to Arkansas.

To cap it off, the soundtrack is wonderful. More movies should start with decent theme songs.

It must be something in the water. I went to the library to take out my two classic DVDs as usual, and came back with this and Mephisto - another serious drama, this time about Nazis. What's wrong with me?! Normally I avoid this "real life issues" cinema like anything!

The B-feature to today's post is a link to yet another essay on movieviolence affecting real life behavior:

http://www.cybercollege.com/violence.htm

It's defending the belief that yes, screen violence does directly increase it in real life.

I have personally always believed that while violence on screen can sometimes be a trigger or inspiration for real life violence, cinema alone will not turn you from an upstanding citizen into a psychopath. I hold as Evidence A, me myself. I'm a walkover, a doormat, quite possibly the least aggressive person you've ever met, so nice it's actually too nice. I feel guilty about killing mosquitos - which I rarely do anyway. Usually, I let them live. That's how passively unviolent I am. This essay blithely claims:

"Studies show that people who watch a lot of TV violence not only behave more aggressively, but are more prone to hold attitudes that favor violence and aggression as a way of solving conflicts. These viewers also tend to be less trusting of people and more prone to see the world as a hostile place."

Hmmmm...now you see, normally I'd dismiss a claim like that out of hand. As we've already established, I watch and enjoy a high level of screen violence, while remaining an utter pansy. Yet what about the second half? In all honesty, I do get rather paranoid at times; and a triple whammy of Easy Rider, Borat and Heat of the Night has just totally put me off America.

In any case, even though it momentarily made me sit up and think whether all this stabbin' and shootin' was affecting me after all, nevertheless it is not a very good essay. It goes on to associate Christianity with the violence problem to prove humanity is naturally violent - which is total bull, because if people are getting killed over religion, then you're doing it wrong. It's too biased, and its evidence is weak.

Can I arrange a hit for Tuesday evening?

2008-07-21T02:10:00.000-07:00

What the hell was wrong with the 90s? Did everybody suddenly wake up and realise their life was worthless? I refer, of course, to the triple whammy of American Beauty-Fight Club - The Matrix, all basically attacks on the cubicle-worker existance. Good old 1999, vintage year for movies or so I'm told.

It must have been something in the air, and last night I watched Office Space, 1998's black comedy about - yup - depressed office workers; Fight Club without the violence, if you like. It appears to have been written as an act of total wish fufilment. That's pretty much all I can think of to say about it - I loved it, and I recommend it to any frustrated office workers in the mood for something lighthearted.

I've just come back from holiday in Italy. Bit of a trial, really, as my knowledge of the language was cribbed from The Godfather movies. Consiquently, my entire vocabulary consisted of "father", "family", and "can I arrange a hit for tomorrow night?" - not that useful to your average traveller. And that was about Sicilians anyway...we think we might have seen some mobsters one evening too. Apparently, the mafia is still a big problem in Italy. I'd kinda thought it had died down, but we found the anti-mafia office in Florence, mafia-related songs on MTV (all rap; it's the equivalent of getting out of the ghetto songs, I suppose) carry anti-mafia warnings. Hilariously, MTV's anti-mafia logo is the little hand with the puppet strings a la Godfather - which is one of the least anti mafia films I've ever seen. Even though Michael Caine carrying a massive sodoff gun has become an iconic 60s image, I might recommend Get Carter to put off anyone considering a career in organised crime. It's entirely without illusions, and very unpleasant to boot. Mind you, I'm probably the only person who's ever decided to become a military helicopter pilot after watching Black Hawk Down, so maybe it wouldn't work...

We spent a lot of time on Italian music channels, basically because the films were all dubbed. Such a torment. Although we caught Grease one evening (the songs were all from the original), and they showed Apocalypse Now: Redux another. That was exciting. If you want to listen to some anti-mafia Italian rap, may I recommend Cappotto Di Legno by Lucariello - and stay clear of current chart topper In Italia, which is the most mind-numbingly awful piece of music I've heard in any language.

We also did some set-trooping. We visited Florence with a Baedeker, and found the square and church from Room With a View. As I've already noted, The Godfather was set and filmed in Sicily, but we did also get to ogle the Venice sets from Brideshead Revisited TV. Venice is absolutely the most romantic place on earth, and packed with shops selling carnival masks. Most are tat for the tourists, but some are gorgeous. And one such shop proudly advertised that it had provided the masks for Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut.

Speaking of Kubrick (kneel and pray, folks), I've now seen Paths of Glory and enjoyed it very much. My mum's comments was that she "couldn't see the point". I sympathise with this - it was wonderfully made, the performances were great, and all in all a powerful piece of drama, but apart from admiring the pretties I too felt a something missing. But who cares - it was gorgeous, He really does have a thang for long, wide shots which I love.

Finally, I've just finished K- Unpronouncable's Three Colours Trilogy, and I lovem. Lovemlovemlovem. They're just involving on every level. The music is brilliant. The direction is so pretty that even when nothing is happening, its beautiful. The link between the three films - three colours of the french flag, and all about the three ideas they represent - means that every film has a strong colour palette. I also like the ironies of the way the central concept is used. Blue is about liberty - but it's freedom by isolating yourself from everything. White is equality in the sense of getting even. Only Red, fraternity, doesn't try to be clever - its about communication, or the lack thereof in the modern world. Even my sister, who can sometimes be a bit blonde, loved Red. And the endings, while maybe obvious, are terribly satisfying. And did I mention the music is wonderful?

2008-07-06T09:14:00.000-07:00

There are two things you have to know about me before I start reviewing Perfume. The first is that I have no sense of smell. Now of course, I must have one - its not like I was born disabled. I can still taste food, for example, and taste is closely linked to smell. But most smells are lost on me. I don't notice smokers in restaurants. I can't smell sewage, flowers, the sea. The idea of a "summer" smell is alien. In contrast, Friend 5 is real big on it - apparently, my house has a particular smell, and every now and then she'll catch a scent and instantly recall a time. The most recent olifactory experience I've had was with rotting celery, but that had been pinned to my hair for several hours before I noticed it. The smell, not the celery. I knew the celery was there.

I only point this out because smell isn't a sense I use at all, yet Perfume made me suffer from phantom smells all the way through. I understood what it would be like to have these sensations, without a reliable knowledge. Some masterly direction going on, methinks - like explaining green to a blind man.

The second is about the creepy-deepy stuff. What the back of the box calls "distubing imagery and sexualised nudity". My favourite series of photos by my favourite photographer is images of murdered women. Actually, I have them as my screensaver. I can see you backing off and smiling weakly - honestly I'm not a serial killer. I just love the way he uses the light, and creates images that are really, really wrong, without exactly knowing why. Look at them - they start here, and keep clicking right. All his pictures are somewhere in this line, though.

Imagery is a big - maybe the biggest thing for me in film, and much of the look of Perfume reminded me of these photos. All good directors are effectively creating art in the way they frame the screen.

It's a two-way process too - lots of Recuenco is inspired by old movies (and the next few to the right), 40s movies (and to the right), even Kubrick (this one and the next two to the left - Clockwork O, Dr Strangelove, and is the third meant to be Paths of Glory?)

With excellent direction and superb visual pretties, what else is there left? Well, the plot was fun - and I particularly liked the surreal direction it took towards the end. There were flaws, though. The acting was competant, but couldn't cover the characters were simply cardboard cutouts. The Murderer was drawn the best; but Alan Rickman's daughter was merely a sacrificial lamb to the plot. She was very nice to look at though.

The problem compounded: the script was prime awful. I only mention this because a) films based on books tend to have decent scripts if nothing else and b) I almost never notice them, so this must have been especially dull. To make the issue worse, its lumbered with a fairy-tale style monologue, lacking in charm. What he's saying is interesting, but the way he does it stinks. No pun intended.

It still comes highly recommended though - its just wonderful to look at, and the soundtrack prevented me from sleeping. That's right - not the imagery, or the plot, or the dead naked people. The music. Shudder!

I don't want to use the word "orgy", because its taken on a decadantly sexual meaning, and that's not what the scene was about - it was about love.

Missing in action...

2008-07-04T13:12:00.000-07:00

You think you've seen me excited? Think again! They've found Metropolis!

Metropolis is Fritz Lang's 20's sci-fi silent classic. No, don't stop listening - its fantastic. You can't take your eyes off the screen - admittedly, the absence of dialogue means you can't follow it if you do that - but the imagery is impressive, and at times genuinely scary. The plot is dire, but who cares when its that pretty? My original review is here, in which I note:

"I'm going to start with the bad things, starting off with the fact it's not all there. A card flashes up at the beginning of the film and cheerily announces that a quarter of the film is believed to be lost. Now that is tragic - I don't believe anything has upset me that much all year. It's horrible to think that in seventy years time, current films may be similarly fragmented. It didn't spoil my enjoyment of the film, but I just thought the idea was pretty distressing. Somebody evidently had a grudge against the Thin Man, because virtually all his scenes were replaced."

And it really did give me the wobbles to think about a quarter of such a wonderful film curling away into flames, or rotting in a box somewhere. The Wicker Man almost met this fate - just imagine films as good, which chance and time didn't save. I remember passing a rundown, boarded up cinema in a tiny limestone town in France - all very Manon des Sources - and wondering whether Metropolis was hiding away there somewhere. So sign me up for the new DVD! Here's the news, straight from contactmusic!

"Lost footage from cult sci-fi film METROPOLIS has been discovered in
Argentina.The director's cut of Fritz Lang's 1927 classic, featuring an extra 30
minutes, was believed to have vanished forever after it was cut by Paramount
bosses because of bad reviews.However, the curator of the Buenos Aires Film
Museum discovered a copy of the movie in his archives - and a projectionist
noticed it was longer than all other versions of the iconic film. Film restorer
Martin Koerber, who is one of the few people to see the lost footage, says, "No
matter how bad the condition of the material may be, the original intention of
the film, including all of its sub-plots, is now once again tangible for the
normal viewer. The rhythm of the film has been restored."

Well, use of the word cult gets my goat as it always does, but you wouldn't believe how relieved the news makes me. I keep everything. I'm a hoarder, and a sentimental one at that. In front of me as I speak - a tin of uber-strongmints I won two years ago at a speacking contest, a 3-yr old birthday card, a dollar note from an old art project, a WKD bottlecap from my 18th, and a Guiness tower paperweight - with its original packaging. And I'm a creator - I draw, write, shoot, paint and everything. The idea that a whole work of creation has winked out of existance is one of the most horrific things to me. I'm still in mourning for a poem accidentally trashed a few years back. Admittedly, it wasn't great, but the idea still troubles me. Its why I love film, and not theatre. Yes, being in the room has an atmosphere - but its so brief, and my memory so short. It fades and vanishes. You can't compare theatre directors fairly, as you can in cinema - because all you are relying on is memories of distant events.

The impermenance of such things disturbs me. Ovid, Roman poet and quoted here suprisingly often to say he's never made a film, ends his first book of the Amores by claiming he will live on through his poetry. At the time, it was a pretty generic claim for a poet to make - but he has lived on, and will far longer than I shall, and in that sense it makes pretty chilling reading. He prefaces this claim by listing past greats who have been remembered. Homer! Virgil! But others, a lot of others, of who no trace remains. Particularly scary is his praise of Gallus, of whom not a single line remains, but whose name is also praised by most other Roman love poets. He must have written some formidable stuff. Aristophanies was a Greek comedy writer. To be a serious scholar of Aristoph. seems to be made up of trawling through his jokes and trying to work out why they are funny. Its like watching Comic Relief, without a knowledge of contemporary TV, or watching Broken News, without ever having seen a news item, or watching Spitting Image when its the only record you have of half the politicians mocked. One of the people he makes fun of all the time is fellow playwrite and author of tragedies, Euripedes, only 18 of his 95 plays which survive to the modern day. Some of Aristoph's jokes poke fun at plays we know he wrote, but no longer exist. We know, for example, that he was notorious for including beggars only through Aristophanies' parodies - because barely anything of what survives contains them. I blame the bastards who burnt the library at Alexandra. Tom Stoppard has a comment to that effect in Arcadia - which another character answers like so:

"We shed as we pick up, like travellers who must carry everything in their arms, and what we let fall will be picked up by those behind. The procession is very long and life is very short. We die on the march. But there is nothing outside the march so nothing can be lost to it. The missing plays of Sophocles will turn up piece by piece, or be written again in another language. Ancient cures for diseases will reveal themselves once more. Mathematical discoveries glimpsed and lost to view will have their time again. You do not suppose, my lady, that if all of Archimedes had been hiding in the great library of Alexandria, we would be at a loss for a corkscrew?"

Yes, I just typed it all up. I think its meant to be comforting. It doesn't work. What does work is Neil Gaiman's Sandman, in which the God of Dreams has a library of lost, half finished, half dreamt of books. At least they still exist somewhere.

Its not just film and TV which suffer from the ravages of time. Back in the late 60s, the BBC destroyed old episodes. Why shouldn't they? Contracts prevented rebroadcasting, and the home video player unthought of. Whole TV shows have vanished into the aether. The show Z-Cars has two whole years from which no episodes survive - despite the fact it was being shown weekly at the time. United! has no episodes left at all. A whole show! Just like that! You remember faintly enjoying something from yesteryear, look back and its gone. I only found this out recently via my association with Doctor Who. 108 episodes are missing, presumed destroyed. It used to be more - just like Metropolis being discovered in Argentina, so episodes have been recovered from censors offices in Australia, New Zealand, Japan. All that's left of them is a few photos (or "telesnaps" if you're a real fan) and the audiotrack of each episode. Gone.

On the DocWho forums, there's a lot of conspiracy - and anger - directed against collectors who supposedly own and secretly hoard some of these episodes. They're thinking too small - I'll be unhappy if I never see Fury from the Deep. But I'll be unhappier if there is no way at all for me to ever have seen it - short of a time machine and a video-recorder. I find the concept of these things gently sitting in someone's private room quite comforting -we come, we die, but the art lives on. And one day - maybe not in my lifetime - a well meaning relative will return it to the BBC. I rank its survival for the human race as a whole as more important than it being recovered by this generation.

Does this give anyone else the shivers in the same way it does me? Its not only their absence. There are people who have memories of these things that no longer exist - they've seen them, and one by one their memories die with them. Recently, I got onto Doctor Who with my Latin teacher - not an avid fan, but she used to watch Hartnell and Troughton. Back in the 60s. My first reaction to Hartnell fans normally is one of faint embarassment - he's the original, his episodes are lengthy and B&W, I've still not got around to seeing them - in film parlance, like talking to someone who claims Citizen Kane is their fave. But she's not a fan who discovered them through video like me. She was there. At the time. My first reaction was one of internal shock - maybe she saw "Fury from the Deep"? Or "The Tenth Planet"? Its there, in the corner of her mind, just flickers of black and white - the odd image or idea she recalls, augmented by time and memory. These things which only exist in minds.

I was only 9 or 10 when I watched Through the Dragon's Eye. Its one of those surreal childhood memories which everyone has tucked away. Children from the 60s recall hiding from the Daleks behind the sofa - I was terrified by this, an educational program wrapped up in a sub-Narnia story of a magical fantasy world. Not just me either - IMDb reveals a whole generation it has tainted. It was scary at the time, but its scared me since as well. Our hero disappearing into the fog. Boris drowning in a quagmire. Charn. The knitted scarf. For years, its been in the corner of my mind - and one of the questions I ask pretty frequently of strangers is if they have seen it. The tactics payed off recently - turns out one of my best friends not only remembers it, she recorded it on video. We watched it, and it was weird. Like going back to a place you remember but have not visited for a long time. I remembered very little, yet it was all familiar. And the scene I remembered most vividly - the human-sized mouse turning back into a real animal in the underground cave sequence - where was it? It never happened. And just as entire seasons of Troughton's Doctor Who have been erased in solid form, so they are being erased in the memories of those who saw it.

Incidentally, mum has the same reaction to Escape to Witch Mountain. She has minimal interest in watching Doctor Who, but keeps harassing me about a particular episode which she recalls through the same creepy childhood mist. Her predominant memory is of corridors, dark corridors in a military base - although she did recall enough for us to track down the only one it could be. "The Singing Ringing Tree" is another one often associated with childhood trauma. And I'm sure you have your own. But I stray from my point, which was that in absence of a solid version, our own ideas start to influence the story as it exists.

Robert Rodriguez plays with it in Planet Terror by deliberately inserting a "Missing Reel" card, then jumping to twenty minutes later in the movie with no explanation. Characters have been killed or injured, buildings damaged, whole situations changed. Tarantino, in one of the many pre-Grindhouse interviews, describes a film he saw when this actually happened, and which he was always dying to know. Eventually, with fame, time and cash, he managed to dig one up - and it wasn't half as interesting as the speculation. It happened with "Tomb of the Cybermen", which people raved about for years as the lost gem of Doctor Who - a real classic. Then it was found, and everyone discovered it was really rather ordinary after all. It led to a pretty effective quip on Tachyon TV webzine, "The BBC have found Episode 7 of The Daleks Masterplan. However, it's so embarrassing they've wiped it again." In another place they suggest: "The BBC have announced that the final three episodes of the new Doctor Who series will be destroyed before they are even transmitted. A BBC statement said: "For the fans who complain that the series isn't as good as it was in the 60's and 70's, we will be wiping the final three episodes as soon as they leave the edit suite. This way fans can debate whether they were ever any good or not for years". Losing things gives them an epic status - and this is because memory takes over.

I warned you I had a hangup about this. People often refer to these times as a "throwaway lifestyle" - temporary communications through email, temporary fame through TV or the web, using items designed for temporary use. What no one points out is that now we're saving more than ever before. Take your favourite DVD - chances are it'll have deleted scenes, maybe even a blooper reel. You can order Through the Dragon's Eye on video - other vigilantes have copied their copies, and buy them through eBay. Day of the Daleks has survived, been released by the BBC, and so my mum can resolve her bizzare memories. Amazon, ebay and the rest allow you to contact people who have what you look for - myriad file formats, and the technology to muck around with them in the home gives us a greater flexibility. Look at those 60s Doctor Who fans, who recorded the episode as best they could with an audio tape recorder and a microphone - creating the only surviving evidence. We can record onto video, Skybox, a HDD player, transfer it to DVD, download it off the iPlayer or even, for those of flexible moral standards, various illegal methods of preservation. In the medieval times, few people were rich enough to have books - they were rare luxuries, which had to be hand copied at great expense. Ever seen medieval chained libraries - like something out of Harry Potter- where the books are in heavy wooden boxes, literally chained to the shelves to preserve them? How many books do you have in your house? We have the National Film archive, and a library under the British Museum with a copy of every book ever written. The BBC have even apologetically set up a detailed tribute website so you can reconstruct what's gone, and Blue Peter are offering a life sized Dalek to anyone who can return missing footage.

In such an atmosphere, its unlikely anything will be lost in quite the same way as Metropolis was. And after sinking into a well of despair halfway through, maybe there is some comfort to be found in Arcadia.

"oh Septimus - how can you bear it? All the lost plays of the Athenians!
Two hundred at least by Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides - thousands of
poems - Aristotle's own library brought to Egypt by the noodle's ancestors?
How can we sleep for grief?"

"By counting our stock. Seven from Aeschylus, seven from Sophocles, seventeen from Euripides, my lady!"

Because this isn't a record of all the things a careless human race has misplaced, or "put in a safe place" - it's an expression of joy that something has been saved. The rest of Metropolis! Pray, O desparate movie buffs, pray that unlike "Tomb of the Cybermen" it was as truly worth recovering as everyone has always hoped. And now I'm going to watch some celebratory Through the Dragon's Eye...

Film Studies Survey

2008-07-03T08:48:00.000-07:00

I'm out of ideas today, and clearing out my film studies folder - so I thought I'd treat you to a tour of a moviesurvey we had to write and present our results. Nothing lifechanging, but fun in its own way.

Section 1: the voters

Total number of surveys filled in:
· Men: 12
· Women: 14
Only one voter had difficulty answering this question correctly; we can only assume he ticked female by mistake.

Age range:
· 1-13: 0
· 14-21: 13
· 21:40: 5
· 40+: 8

At this point we asked what people's favourite films were, mostly for nosy snobbishness.

Section 2: film

What genres of film do you enjoy?
We specified all the obvious genres, of which the most popular were:
Comedy
Thriller
Action
Adventure
Crime

The least popular were:
Horror
Sci fi
Romance
Western
Art-house

All genres recieved a fairly large number of votes however, and two voters also added "asian films" and "feel good films" to the list.

Predictably enough, lots of men disliked romantic films – however, a similar amount unexpectedly disliked horror. Women were more predictable, liking romance, rom-com and drama best, disliking westerns and sci fi – thrillers being the only anomaly. Film taste was more universal over all ages.

Five people ticked the box claiming they have very wide taste – so some of them are probably lying.

What influences your decision when deciding what film to see?

Again we suggested a series of reasons. Hardly anyone takes notice of what reviewers say, much preferring the opinions of people they know – particularly women. Most people think the genre and story are very important factors, however are unconcerned by the amount of “objectionable” content. The number concerned about the cast are about equal with that of the crew. Though posters help promote awareness of the film, most people wouldn’t go to see something on the grounds of the poster alone.

Do subtitles put you off?
The majority of people (16) had no problem with subtitles, although 3 preferred dubbing. 7 people never watch foreign films anyway – particularly women.

What do you think of all the remakes in Hollywood?
Most people were against remaking old films, with 5 out of 13 proposing to round up and shoot people who tried. 2 people remained neutral, and 7 had no problem with it. Only one person thought they were a good idea. In general, women thought they were a worse idea than men.

Sequels?
17 people would definitely see the sequel to a film they had enjoyed, though 8 people said they would be wary, as they sometimes spoil the original. Nobody complained that too many sequels were happening.

Section 3: watching film

What’s the most recent thing you’ve seen at the cinema?
There were a wide spread of answers to this question. 4 had not been since Pirates of the Caribbean – two people had seen Fellowship of the Ring most recently and one person had most recently seen Titanic.

Who do you usually go to the cinema with?
Most people go to the cinema with somebody – most people go with either family or friends, very few ever go alone. Alarmingly, five people don’t take into account what they’re watching before deciding who to take…

More women went with their families than men, both sexes were equal with taking friends and partners. Women were more emphatic that they would never go on their own.

Is cinema food overpriced?
Most people said yes – 17 would be happier if it were cheaper, though 4 didn’t mind too much. 4 people thought it was about what they’d expect to pay. Women are far more stingy about the cost of cinema food.

And nobody said it was cheap…

Are the tickets at your local cinema…
12 people said they thought it was alright – 11 said it was overpriced. Again, nobody thought they were too cheap. This time, men had more problems with the price.

Do you prefer going to the cinema or watching films at home?
12 people said it depended on the film – of those with a preference, 10 preferred home viewing to the cinema.

How often do you go to the cinema?
About every 2 weeks:………0
About every 2 months:……..11
Once or twice a year:……….12
Less:……………………...…1
Never:……………………….1

Women went to the cinema frequently than men

How many of these are a problem at your local cinema?
Too many adverts – 10
Bad picture quality – 6
Never anything good on – 4
Other people – 8
Talking – 11
Eating – 12
Mobiles – 4
The misanthrope - I object to the very existence of the other audience members: 6

Perhaps our cinema is just bad, but someone found issues with every suggestion we listed. All the votes came from locals, and thus all about the same place. In addition, we received these complaints:
Cold
smells
Rubbish sound
Small screen (6 complaints!)
People’s heads
People laughing at inappropriate times
People throwing sweets at the screen
Don’t show all films

Ever seen something more than once at the cinema?
9 people said they never did this, though 11 said they had once for a particular film. Four people admitted to doing it pretty frequently. Women rewatched more than men, by a very very tiny amount.

What do you usually eat there?

Chocolate -11
Sweets -11
Sweet popcorn -10
Popcorn -7
Hot dog/burger -5
Mints -4
Nothing-4
Ice cream -3
Usually, I go out to eat beforehand - 3
Salty popcorn -2
I go out of my way to buy something quiet-1
Nachos-0

Two people commented on drinks – diet coke and water respectively. It’s interesting to note that ¾ of the nothing voters were female, and all the people who voted for salty popcorn over sweet were men.

Section 4: merchandising!

The majority of people will consider getting the soundtrack or the source novel if they liked the film – replica/actual movie props were the least popular piece of merchandising. 4 people would agree to purchase actor spittle. The majority of people, however, never buy anything. Apparently, women are willing to spend more on merchandising, a fact which probably won’t surprise anyone…

If you’ve seen it at the cinema, will you buy the dvd as well?
Most (13) people would definitely buy the dvd, and 12 said they probably would. Only one person claimed they would not normally.

How much would you be willing to pay for an ordinary dvd?
£1-£3 -0
£4-£6 -1
£7-£10 - 6
£11-£15 - 18
£16-£20 -0
more -1

How much would you want to pay for a special edition or boxed set?
14 people said it would depend on the set.
£11-£15 -
£16-£20 - 5
£21-£25 - 6
£26-£30 - 1
£31-40 - 2
more - 1
Men were willing to pay more.

Do you buy dvds as soon as they come out?
If they really wanted to see a film, 16 voters would buy the dvd immediately. 9 would wait for the price to fall, and 1 person doesn’t buy dvds.

Which of these would make you more likely to buy a dvd:
I buy dvds to see the film, not the extras -15
special editions (remastered, directors cut etc) -10
deleted scenes -8
extra disc(s) -6
directors commentaries -5
free gift (art prints, statue, poster etc) -5
Making-ofs -5
special packaging - 2

Generally, the girls more were attracted by bumper deals.

Section 5: randomness
These weren't part of the survey, I was just curious...

Is Star Wars a cult film?
16 people thought it was, 9 people did not (grumble! Shows what they know, eh?)

Ever knowingly purchased a pirate dvd?
Six people had – four said they thought it was worth it. Of this number, half were male.

Ever claimed to like a film you really don’t?
Never -14
Once -3
I sometimes tell white lies-13
Frequently -1

The guys had far more integrity than the girls – only three admitted to telling the occasional white lie.

If you could shoot any one person in the movie business, who would it be and why? (all answers quoted directly from the sheet…)

Artistic differences:

-The director of Star Wars for giving us the prequel after the original first film (Ed: do you mean George Lucas :) ?)
-James Cameron (for making Titanic)
-Michael Bay – ruining good premises with too much brainless action
-Any director/actor who claims they have never seen the original of a remake they just made.
-The President of Fox TV (they cancelled Firefly!)
-Sid Sheinburg (recut Brazil) or any other studio head which cramps decent directors (Ed: yes, this one was me...did you guess?)
- Kiera Knightly – she is in everything and is a terrible actress
-The director of Ideal Husband

Personal insults:
-Steven Spielburg (Egotistical)
-Jennifer Lopez – she is way too full of herself
-Colin Farrell
-Michael Wood
-Jenny McShane – has a steamy scene with a fave actor! I hate her!

Irrational hatred:
-Jim Carey – I don’t find him funny!
-Jim Carey – I hate him with a vengeance
-Angelina Jolie- I just don’t like her
-Drew Barrimore – why not?
-Roger Rabbit – Haven’t a clue why
-Damon Albarn. He played a cockney taxi driver once.

Everyone else:
-Daniel Radcliffe
-Amanda Bynes
-The Ministers for Sport and Culture
-Anyone who uses fire arrows in film

Did you have difficulty narrowing that list down to one?
Eleven people voted yes, hating their victim with a single minded passion – the other eleven people voted no, proving what a high number of idiots there are in the industry.

Hottest male star:
According to the guys…
Sean Bean
Russel Crowe
Johnny Depp
Samuel L Jackson
Jude Law
Brad Pitt x2
Paul Newman
Nick Cage

According to the girls…
Bruce Willis
Tom Hanks
Johnny Depp
Zac Efron
Patrick Swayze
Jeremy Sumpter
Joaquin Phoenix
Hugh Jackman
Robert Redford
Ewan McGregor
Orlando Bloom
Rufus Sewell

40+ group

Bruce Willis
Brad Pitt
Paul Newman
Patrick Swayze

21-40 group

Sean Bean
Russel Crowe
Tom Hanks
Johnny Depp x2
Samuel L Jackson

14-21 group
Jude Law
Zac Efron
Jeremy Sumpter
Nick Cage
Joaquin Phoenix
Brad Pitt
Hugh Jackman
Robert Redford
Ewan McGregor
Orlando Bloom
Rufus Sewell

Most votes: Johnny Depp and Brad Pitt

Observation: a few men refused to name a hottest male actors, while the women all happily put down their opinion of both male and female stars.

Hottest female star:

According to the guys…
Keira Knightly x2
Meg Ryan
Kim Basinger*
Scarlett Johanson
Halle Berry
Natalie Portman x2
Monica Belluci
Helen Hunt

According to the girls…
Julia Roberts x2
Sandra Bullock
Natalie Portman x2
Cameron Diaz
Kate Winslet
Monica Belluci x2
Keeley Hawes
Reese Witherspoon
Juliet Aubrey

40+
Sandra Bullock
Meg Ryan
Scarlett Johanson
Monica Belluci
Helen Hunt
Julia Roberts

21-40

Keira Knightly
Julia Roberts
Kim Basinger*
Natalie Portman
Halle Berry

14-21
Natalie Portman x2
Kate Winslet
Keira Knightly
Monica Belluci x2
Keeley Hawes
Reese Witherspoon
Juliet Aubrey

*(from about 10-15 years ago – she’s getting a bit old now -ed, added by a voter)

Most votes: Natalie Portman (4), Monica Belluci (3), Keira Knightly and Julia Roberts (2)

Worst film ever seen:

Army of Darkness
Blair witch project
Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the movie)
Dark City
Dodgeball
Evolution
Fritz the Cat x2
Hercules in New York
Ideal Husband
Lady in Black
Langaliers
Lord of the Rings
O Brother, Where art thou?
Open Water
“Can’t remember, but Sting was in it”
The 60s
The Cube
The Good Girl
Titanic

And the vigilante– someone couldn’t narrow it down to one and felt the need to put down a shortlist of the really bad films watched all the way through:
A Town called Bastard
Bats
Hawk the Slayer
Heaven’s Gate
Pete’s Dragon
Star Trek V: The Final Fronteir
The Long Chase
The Pad – And how to use it
The Sphynx
The Ultimate Warrior

We two against the world.

2008-06-28T07:35:00.000-07:00

So we watched Planet Terror. Did I enjoy it? Stupid question. It was everything I expected it to be, and awesome to boot.

PT is unashamed trash, glorious wonderful trash. The script is knowingly awful (but never at the expense of a few good lines - say, the running joke about useless talents), but you watch it to see a babe with a machine-gun-leg, not Proustian digressions on the nature of the self.

Speaking of legs, this movie came out last year when my sister broke her thighbone. At the time I suggested she have it replaced with a gun - even though it was the other leg. I'm not sure she appreciated the suggestion. Ironically enough, the broken leg would resurface as we watched - she repeatedly pointed out the medical flaws in Cherry's ability to walk, talk, swear, shag, ride a bike, on account of her being a) in shock and b) under anesthetic. Everytime I began to explain that, having been attacked by zombies, presumably the zombie-juice would cauterise the wound in some way, she replied defensively that I had no idea what it felt like, and she did. Which presumably means there's something about the whole "I just broke my leg while on a cycle" scenario that she's not telling me...

I loved the jumpy, scuffed up style. In my opinion, the film would have been dire without it. It took the film one level more away from reality - allowing for greater gore content and excusing the deliberately terrible bits. At the same time, the raw nastiness of the screen quality amped up the nastiness of the movie, giving it a surreal, lurid quality. When I was looking for a copy of Saw to view at Halloween, the only one I could find to borrow was a pirate edition which was savagely blurred - I bought it in the end, because the script and performances alone were not atmospheric enough without the mucky detail of the bathroom set. And thus here, the occasional jumps and scuffs, those moments when everything but red washed out of the film, the sound was all crackled up, the image wobbled or the film burnt up entirely. Hell, its just like our local cinema!

At the same time, it still made a good movie. I loved the Wray-Cherry relationship, the sherrif-Wray relationship (and wasn't the idea of placing the inevitable scene when they bond man-style in the "missing reel" a genius one - we instantly know what's gone on), and the two brothers (particularly when it gets all buddyish). And I want Dakota's syringe gun!

Turns out my family are as nerdy on Robert Rodriguez as I am - Dad identified Cheech Marin as Sex Machine from Dusk til Dawn, while my sister spotted the running Machete gag from Spy Game, and I identified Dakota's son Tony as Rodriguez's own son Rebel. Incidentally, don't RR's kids have the coolest names - Rebel, Racer, Rocket and Rogue. His daughter is a more restrained Rhiannon. Although it might come as a hinderance when Rocket wants to become a tax attorney, it's an awesome name for a kid.

RR still makes his films like indie films, despite having the mainstream budget. Planet Terror, for example, stars his personal physician as a doctor, and his real estate agent as a strip club owner. He used his own son because he didn't want to genuinely traumatise a child. And if you've seen the film, check out the imdb FAQ for further details of his son's role because its just fascinating. The bottom line is: I love this guy.

Favourite fact from imdb: John Carpenter was originally involved in the music, and although RR eventually wrote it himself, extracts from Escape from New York appear. You may well ask why this is so interesting. One of my mid-movie reactions was noting the similarity of both movie and music to John Carpenter's Assault on Precinct 13. It's always nice to prove yourself right...

Afterwards, we watched a particularly violent episode of Battlestar Galactica, and I was back to wincing. Planet Terror's gore is so over the top - the lurid over-saturated colours make it look less like ketchup and more like a sort of salsa - that it soon ceases to have an effect. Coupled with the outlandish plot, its far less disgusting than BSG's rather restrained garotting which was set in a realistic place. Well, relitavely...

I just wish I could have seen it on screen. And I wish I could drag my friends around to see it - it's the type of film that should be seen with friends. As it was, I watched with father and sister who were a good audience. It's just a pity its way. way. way. way. too unpleasant in every way for my buddies. I wouldn't enjoy it, because they wouldn't. But I might get them to see Death Proof - a girly movie, with lots of car chases.

My only fear is that, with Planet Terror turning out so good, I won't enjoy it as much. Especially because that movie was the one I was most excited about - the grunge, grime and horror. Death Proof sounds like more its own film, and less of such a faithful pastiche.

Speaking of QT, I saw a horribly exploitative offer in town today. It's one thing to be ripped off; its quite another to recognise you are being ripped off, and want it anyway. It's a limited edition Reservoir Dogs case. I say limited edition - I mean cheap knockoff. The DVD cover's like none I've ever seen before, and the whole thing smacks of a shoddy pirate effort. It comes in a case with handcuff cufflinks, Vic Vega dogtags, a Vic Vega flick-razor (it's actually a comb, but it looks like the razor, so who's counting), sunglasses and - the ultimate in tasteless cool - a Vic Vega cigarette lighter. Now what the fuzz would I do with a lighter? I don't even smoke, and I'd run out of cops to burn pretty quickly. But...but...its so preeeety...

Anyway, good sense prevailed - I can't justify it. But I can ogle it lovingly all the same. Instead, I got Paths of Glory and The Big Lebowski in the HMV £4 sale, and took All About Eve out of the library. It's gonna be a good week...

2008-06-27T10:28:00.000-07:00

Thank you, thank you oh blessed gods of rain - the barbacue has been cancelled.

We're watching Planet Terror!

Yes, this does make me a truly awful friend.

Was that a haiku?

He's a disco-dancing, Oscar Wilde reading, Streissand ticket holding friend of Dorothy, know what I'm saying?

2008-06-27T09:00:00.000-07:00

Who would want to be a guy? Girls have all the freedom. I can watch any genre I like - guys can't. If I parade crime as my movie dish of choice, no one minds - in fact, its really rather cool. I don't know a single guy who admits to loving romances - do they exist, or are they just very quiet about it?

At the same time, when the misery of no romance finally hits following the end-of-school dance, I can still indulge in a mega-marathon of Brief Encounter, When Harry met Sally and Clueless, armed with one box of kleenex and one box of chocolates. Who would be a man?!

Brief Encounter is what happens when one wakes up with "As Time Goes By" in the head, realises there's no legal way to get hold of Casablanca before 11o'clock, and has to settle for second best - the British black-and-white smoldering couple instead of the American; train stations instead of airports. I wasn't entirely joking about the kleenex either - while I handled the latter two movies, well, like a man, I actually cried all the way through Brief Encounter. Which is probably a new record. Or something. I'm a pretty easy cry, but this was impressive even by my standards. All the way through.

I was impressed by the music - 40s movies tend to drown in their overwritten scores. BE did drown, but it matched the mood of the film very well. All or most of it was Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto. I'm not a classical expert - but you'd recognise it if you heard it, because the tune was ripped off as "All by Myself". So while the swells of piano and strings echoed the emotion, certain scenes appeared to be accompanied by the famous love ballad. To pretty good effect as well.

To say its an old film, a lot of Laura's dialogue feels so real and raw. Definitely not a film to watch when feeling sore over love yourself. Mind you, romance never gets old. One of the attractive thing about Ovid's love poetry (written in the good ole Roman days, remember) is how fresh and modern it feels.

Incidentally, my favourite scene was between Alec and his friend Steve. It was bizzare for showing Alec apart from Laura - everything else was from her point of view, leading to the post-1999 interpretation that maybe he's a figment of her imagination. Like ignoring James Stewart for five minutes, and giving Harvey a whole scene to himself. I liked the sudden danger it gave the film - the tone was emotional and bittersweet, but Steve knowing gave it a threatening reality, and his amused reaction made their behaviour seem truly sordid. I'm not in the habit of assuming just because a writer is gay his characters will be gay also (and its a hard position to defend when Oscar Wilde is your favourite author), but I kinda assumed Steve was, at least as gay as one could be in the 40s. His slightly jilted reaction suggests Alec does have a whole world apart from Laura, which you never feel in the rest of the film.

When Tarantino made Pulp Fiction, he told all the characters to assume they were the hero of their own movie - a Mia Wallace movie, a Pumpkin and Honey Bunny movie, whatever. Its an attitude I like to take to films in general. I want to see the Steve and Alec film, not because I think Alec is anything other than entirely straight, but because it would be interesting...

And finally, he's played by Valentine blummin' Dyall! I only just found this out, but excited doesn't cover it. I'm checking the video as we speak. The "Man in Black" was in 70s Doctor Who as the Black Guardian (my no. 1 vote for villain who should come back into the new series), in my 2nd favourite episode of all time Enlightenment. I can see why I didn't recognise him - he looks different 40 years younger, without a big black eeevil cape and a dead bird on his head.

In short it was wonderful. Its certainly made a good double bill with When Harry met Sally (well, I watched BE the evening before, and WHmS the morning after, but the effect was the same). Particularly the moral "men and women can never truly be friends because the sex part always gets in the way", which really could have applied to Brief Encounter. Even though I felt too young to appreciate it properly - I'm still a good ten years off being a thirty-something wondering why she isn't married and depressed about middle age - I'm enough of a pessimist to get the idea. I admired it as a rom com because it was desperately romantic, without being cheesy. By the time it got to its cliches, it had earned them by being so cynical earlier on.

Incidentally, the new year speech - the one at the end - was printed in Empire as a great scene, and I loved it so much I bought the movie. At least Brief Encounter's famous last scene is repeated at the start, so you don't have to wait the whole thing for the stuff you recognise.

And then onto Clueless, which I watched with my sister. We both found it hilarious - until I realised or remembered it was based on the novel Emma. At that point, knowing the rest of the story, my enthusiasm faded. Final verdict - very good, but give me the Heathers any day.

Am I a bad friend? Ever since Grindhouse was announced, I've been really excited to see it. I groaned when it didn't come to England intact; I complained when it didn't come to our island at all. I've already got the soundtrack; I already quote it. If you check in regularly, you'll probably be sick of hearing about it. One of the worst nights of my life was spent in a hotel room between the hours of 8 and 11:30, with a full version of Grindhouse showing at the cinema next door from midnight onwards. It was torture - I can't handle late nights, and it would have been better had my parents said "no" outright - at least then I could have got angry at them, instead of gradually feeling my strength seep away, and realising I couldn't handle (let alone enjoy) any film (let alone one criticised for its length) if I was already too tired half an hour before it starts.

Finally, I start seeing it in DVD shops. Initially, I decided to wait for the inevitable three disc set - the real film, packaged with the long versions of Planet Terror and Death Proof which made it through English cinemas. But it's been years since Kill Bill, and there still isn't a decent boxed set out. So I gave in in the recent bargain sale and bought both.

That was two weeks ago - the path of true love never did run smooth - and the next obstacle was my family. Namely my mother and sister - but eventually an occasion when they are both out presents itself - Friday. Today. Am I excited? Oh yes. But there's a problem...

Two days ago, my friends and I went out for breakfast. Its the summer holidays, and our usual meet ups have been getting dull. Hence we are becoming more creative. Breakfast was one novel replacement for going out for dinner. We started planning a barbacue. For Friday.

Folks, what do I do? I can't throw over a party for a DVD I can watch anytime...can I? Its not like I have somewhere else to go - I'm just staying in on my own. But...but...but...

My IMDB top 250 - part one

2008-06-25T11:57:00.000-07:00

It's a long time since I printed out a copy of the top 250 and stuck it on my wall. Three years later (maaaan, this blog is old!), at 121/250, I have seen almost exactly half. Frustratingly, of course, films drop on and off the list - I'm sure both 12 monkeys and Butch Cassidy used to be here - but no matter.

So here's an analysis of the ones I haven't seen -

Initially, just as a prompt to get me writing - but now its more of a mission statement, a review of things to see over the summer. And a confession - yes, I have STILL not seen Kane...

1. The Godfather (1972)
2. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
3. The Godfather: Part II (1974)
4. Buono, il brutto, il cattivo, Il (1966)
5. Pulp Fiction (1994)

6. Schindler's List (1993) - longtime readers will be aware of my pathological dislike of real life tragedy. I like to be troubled, I like to be disturbed - but only in a Tideland-y sort of way. I understand this film is brilliant, and if the chance to see it ever arises maybe I'll give in. But I'm not going out of my way to thoroughly spoil my evening. Selfish attitude? The truth.

7. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) - I didn't realise this was quite this high. In any case, its one I'm really looking forward to still. Insanity floats my boat; so does rebellion against conformity and institutions. Jack Nickleson is one of the "great actors" I still haven't got around to. Plus, my mother thought it was a "distasteful" film, or "very nasty" or something like that - and that's normally a good indication that I'll enjoy.

8. Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
9. Casablanca (1942)
10. Star Wars (1977)
11. 12 Angry Men (1957)
12. Shichinin no samurai (1954)
13. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
14. Goodfellas (1990)

15. Rear Window (1954) - much like Schindler's Ark, I know this film isn't going anywhere. I'm not excited - bad experience with Vertigo and the first half of Psycho has put me off Hitchcock's psyce- dramas. Although 39 Steps and The Lady Vanishes were a lot of fun. One day, it'll be on TV or cheap in Oxfam. Until then, I can wait.

16. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

17. Cidade de Deus (2002) - Hypocracy is the spice of life. Forget anything I ever said about avoiding harrowing real life dramas - this is one I'm looking forward to. I've heard a lot about the atmosphere - y'know, sweaty and raw, untrained actors, the crew almost getting linched by local gangsters. Looking forward to an excuse to see it.

18. C'era una volta il West (1968)
19. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
20. The Usual Suspects (1995)

21. Psycho (1960) - Watched the first half of this in film studies, and boy it was tedious. We got as far as the shower, but I wasn't inspired to watch on. Half a year later, on a school trip, we had just checked into our hotels after the longest day (we'd been up at three AM for a coach to Paris, then a flight over the Atlantic, then another internal flight, then another coach. Eventually, we were up for a full 24 hours) - at this point we had been up for maybe 20 hours straight. So I found the classic movies channel, and put it on as background noise. Turned out it was Psycho, and I suddenly got really fond of it. Hey, I was homesick, I was entertaining visits from others in our group (our hotel room was acutally a five room suite, so people kept coming up to ogle), and besides - I thought Norman Bates was great. Plus, my roomate began her shower at exactly the wrong moment...much like the above, I'm not actively looking for it, but I am now willing to sit it through to the end.

22. Fight Club (1999)

23. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)- did I ever tell you Kubrick was God? He never appears on my favourite directors lists, but he'd be near the top of my top 20 if pressed. This is one of the few I haven't seen - or rather, seen all of. Our history teachers let us watch the first half as a treat after finishing our Cold War studies. I loved it, tho I assume everyone else would have preferred Friends or Finding Nemo. All I need is an oppertunity. In fact, I'll get it out next time I go to the library...

24. The Silence of the Lambs (1991) - I've never been enthusiastic about this. Much like the Third Man, i feel a viewing would be marred by the "join the dots" spoilers. So for The Third Man, once you've got past Vienna-zither-ferriswheel-feet in the door - hands in the grate, you already feel you know it too well. Now actually, that's rubbish - there's so much more to that film, and all the famous bits are in the last ten minutes. But still, they can keep their chianti for now. Jodie Foster doesn't interest me, neither does Anthony Hopkins. Plus, my mother reckons it's still too unpleasant for me. And while I don't stick rigidly to my parents recommendations, I figure there's no harm in this one.

25. Citizen Kane (1941) - ah, dear old Kane - the bane of my life and butt of my every joke. I really need to see this film before I mock it into a corner it can't get out of. But there's nothing worse than watching The Greatest Film Of All Time while trying to watch it with a blank slate and fresh approach. In actual fact, I have seen it - back on a Saturday afternoon, barely recalled from childhood. Tragically, the true identity of Rosebud is all I remember.

26. North by Northwest (1959) - I've already expounded my feelings on Hitchcock. Some classic movies feel as fresh and modern as the day they were made - Some like it Hot, Casablanca, the Third Man. Some should have stayed in the 50s. Until you try it, you never know; but I can't help but feel a weariness when approaching them.

27. Sunset Blvd. (1950) - this film is an entirely unknown quantity. With the exception of "alright, I'm ready for my close up", and a passionate rendition of the musical's title song by John Barrowman, I know nothing. There's a fine line between knowing too much, and knowing enough to whet the enthusiasm.

28. Memento (2000)
29. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
30. It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
31. The Matrix (1999)

32. Se7en (1995) - Friend 3 is dead excited about seeing this, and in celebration of her 18th birthday bought it, Usual Suspects, Fight Club, Smoking Aces and a few other things she hadn't been allowed last week. I hope to borrow it off her - I need to lend her History of Violence anyway.

33. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) - much like Citizen Kane, I saw this through the same childhood mist. I remember a motorcycle crash (or was that Dam Busters?), and the attack on the train. It barely counts as having seen it though...

34. Apocalypse Now (1979)
35. Taxi Driver (1976)
36. American Beauty (1999)
37. Léon (1994)
38. Vertigo (1958)

39. American History X (1998) - I caught the middle 20 minutes of this the day my sister broke her thighbone. We were up late, waiting for news from the hospital. It depressed me. Not the leg, that was very upsetting of course; I mean the movie. Ed Norton is always worth a watch, but to be honest racism pisses me off more than it makes me feel sad or sympathetic, and irritable isn't a good way to watch a movie. Plus, it was nasty, but not in a movie-OK way. Despite that, the black-and-white cinematography was very eyecatching - and I did only catch the middle on a day already stressful, so I am willing to give it a fairer trial.

40. Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain, Le (2001)

41. Paths of Glory (1957) - more Kubrick. Am I excited? You can blummin bet I am...

42. The Departed (2006) - incidentally, I'm impressed to see this here. Current movies always get onto the list - few stay for long.

43. M (1931) - Boy am I excited about this. As mentioned above, there's nothing more exciting than discovering a movie classic is as raw and terrifying as anything produced by the modern world. I don't know, I haven't seen it. But I have seen Metropolis, and that more than earnt its stature as great. And people say great things.

44. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) - ugh. Well maybe that's unfair - I had that reaction to reading the book, and turns out that's fantastic (who knew?). So maybe I should give this a go. But I feel the same sort of safe tedium about it expressed above about North by Northwest. Plus, after loving Gregory Peck so much as morally grey Mallory in Guns of Navarone, I'm not sure I could go back to seeing him as whiter-than-white Atticus Finch.

45. A Clockwork Orange (1971)

46. Chinatown (1974) - this is now very, very high on my list of must-sees. Partly because I know there is a killer twist, without knowing what it is - a very rare state for me and a high-profile movie. But also because its a gangster classic, and I'm swiftly running out of those.

47. Alien (1979)
48. The Third Man (1949)

49. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) - I recognise the name - but this is the first film on the list I couldn't tell you anything about. Actors? Plot? I kinda assume it's a boys own adventure, but was it a western? Or set in the war? Or was that Maltese Falcon? uncertainty is a wonderful thing.

50. Leben der Anderen, Das (2006)
51. Forrest Gump (1994)
52. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

53. The Shining (1980) - are all Kubrick's films on the list? Well, sans Eyes Wide Shut (probably). In any case, I am actively avoiding this. I just can't do scary movies, any scary movies; scary movies that scare even hardened horror fans are one place I refuse to go. Kubrick or no.

54. Double Indemnity (1944) - oooooh, noir! Fun fun fun...

55. The Pianist (2002)
56. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
57. Laberinto del fauno, El (2006)
58. Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
59. Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi (2001)

60. L.A. Confidential (1997) - I almost got my sister to see this yesterday. She is (guffaw) attempting the top 1001 film list, which is hilarious to me personally. Her plan to watch one a day is even more failed than mine - she's watching Wimbledon instead. The list is covered with films which she's refused to watch over the last two years. I came over with a craving to watch this, she agreed - because it was on the list. But I bottled out - she said "shall we watch it?" with such a sense of tedium I knew she wouldn't take in a word. It's about enjoying them, not ticking them off a list. Right?

61. Requiem for a Dream (2000) - my interest in this was first triggered by the theme's use in the LOTR: Two Towers trailer. Even though it has been overused in trailers since, I advise you to check it out because its a very exciting piece of work. I actually thought we had this recorded off the TV - apparently not. I'm still looking out for it though.

62. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
63. Aliens (1986)
64. Reservoir Dogs (1992)
65. Boot, Das (1981)

66. The Maltese Falcon (1941) - no, this is the boys-own WWII adventure, which makes Sierra Madre the western, right? Right? It hurts being unfamiliar with great films - and a trip to IMDB points out it is actually a film noir (oops...) Where Eagles Dare was the one I had in mind. At least I got one right...

67. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) - its funny that the sequal always gets the honours - it doesn't happen with many films. Even the Alien, Godfather and Star Wars franchises have the decency to praise both parts one and two. I'm not desperately excited about this.

68. Untergang, Der (2004)

69. There Will Be Blood (2007) - ugh, sounds a bit worthy for me. Plus, despite the attractive promise in the title, I can't help but recall it was also the tagline for Saw II.

70. No Country for Old Men (2007) - on the other hand, the Coens are always worth a watch, and I couldn't be more excited about this. Plus, Friend 3 got it for her birthday...

71. Raging Bull (1980) - Scorcese is one of the greats, I get it. I don't get him, though - I recognised Goodfellas was great, but didn't feel it; I did love The Departed; again, Taxi Driver bounced off without changing my life. I refused to see The Aviator and, just like my mother, Age of Innocence may still be his greatest achievement. I am still excited about Casino, and particularly Mean Streets. But Raging Bull sounds so unpleasantly downbeat. Plus, I am still confused as to the absolute godhead of de Niro. He was impressive in the end of Heat, but I'm missing the point somewhere.

72. Rashômon (1950) - I'm definitely willing to give this a spin. My contact with Seven Samuri was...completely underwhelming, in two words. I didn't even, as with Taxi Driver, recognise why it was great without feeling it on an emotional level. So I'm keen to give Kurosawa a second chance; and the multiple viewpoint device interests me.

73. Metropolis (1927)
74. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

75. Modern Times (1936) - watching Chaplin is just one of those things I'll get around to in time.

76. Rebecca (1940) - no. Nonononononono. I read this recently as part of my deluded quest to finish the "1001 books to read before you die", and adored it. Particularly Max, and particularly the central deed of the novel. Now while I'm sure Mr Master of Suspense does a great job of presenting the claustrophobia and "haunting" of a dead woman, that doesn't change the fact that someone has changed the facts within the novel. This central deed has been made accidental instead of horribly deliberate, removing one of the major things I loved. Plus, who could make Rebecca in black and white? Granted they had no other option, but when I remake it (and I hope you will buy a ticket, for all the critics will compare it unfavourably with the original) it will make full use of colour schemes. It's one of the most coloured books I have ever read...rant over.

77. Sin City (2005) - I wanted to see this when it came out for the style, and I'm still keen to. I haven't quite worked out how yet - it won't come on TV, I don't want to buy it and I can't get my parents involved - dad thought it was terrible (not enough intelligent plot), and I can guess my mum's reaction. Plus, I'm keen to get going on the graphic novel too - I'm devouring the local library's collection at a terrific rate.

78. Singin' in the Rain (1952)
79. Amadeus (1984)

80. Hotel Rwanda (2004) - you know my feelings on this I'm sure. My favourite Africa movies are Zulu and Out of Africa - buddy adventure and sweeping romantic triumph. Genocide? Oh wonderful. However good it is, you'll have a trick pursuading me to watch it.

81. Some Like It Hot (1959)

82. All About Eve (1950) - my entire knowledge of this film comes from my co-blogger Catherine, who blogged it for the Film that Changed my Life blogathon. Even though I'm always lazy with recommendations, nevertheless I intend to jump at it the first chance I get. I'm assured by her enthusiasm that it won't be a tedious classic, and that its bite will have survived into the 21st C.

83. Vita è bella, La (1997) - English class - and five people were late. 15 minutes late. When they fell in through the door (and falling is the only word to describe it) they were all clutching kleenexes, red eyed and snuffling miserably. They had been studying Holocaust movies in Drama, and this was my introduction to Life is Beautiful. Yes, I'll watch it, OK? Are you happy now?

84. The Prestige (2006)
85. The Great Escape (1963)

86. The Elephant Man (1980) - not even a film I've ever thought about. I know its good, but apart from that I neither know nor care about it.

87. City Lights (1931) - more Chaplin. I remember being recommended this film a lot in a circle from a few years back. Much like Modern Times, I'm not going to run out and go looking, but I'm willing to watch.

88. Sjunde inseglet, Det (1957)
89. Full Metal Jacket (1987)
90. Jaws (1975)
91. On the Waterfront (1954)

92. Touch of Evil (1958) - this is another one which sends me scurrying to IMDb to confirm it's the Orson Welles noir. Now I'm looking forward to this - because its noir, and I want to enjoy something Welles-y which isn't on the same pedestal as Kane.

93. The Sting (1973)

94. Once Upon a Time in America (1984) - Sergio Leone, oh yeah! Gangsters! New York! 3 hours...nah, its definitely worth it. Even though de Niro again makes me feel slightly less enthusiastic.

95. Blade Runner (1982)

96. The Apartment (1960) - um Jack Lemmon and Billy Wilder? Well, Some Like it Hot was awesome - and Billy Wilder was on Empire's top 20 directors list (two years ago it was my mission to see one by every director - I'm still missing Sam Peckinpah and Orson Welles. I've got Woody Allen completely covered now...) So just give me the oppertunity.

97. Nuovo cinema Paradiso (1988) - I know exactly what to expect from this film - which is nice. And on a day when I feel like unashamed sepia nostalga, I'll go running for it. I love the music in any case.

98. Braveheart (1995) - there's a flipside to "knowing what to expect" of a film. I know exactly what's coming from this film, and I'm already bored. Still, it'll be fun to see Patrick McGoohan stretch his hammy-evil muscles as King Ed.

99. The Great Dictator (1940) - look, more Chaplin! Gee, I hope I enjoy the first one I watch, cos otherwise I'll be stumped for the others...

100. Strangers on a Train (1951) - Friend...actually, she doesn't have a number. In any case, a good friend with excellent taste recommended this to me. I enjoyed Hitchcock's other train film (The Lady Vanishes), and I'm definitely ready for this.

OK, running out of time for Easy Rider. It's a sad state when you would rather write about film than watch film. But I can't help myself - watching classics depresses me. Catch you later.

My moustache still smells of your testes!

2008-06-25T11:22:00.000-07:00

Today we watched Borat - and enjoyed it, bizzarely enough. Somehow, much like Team America: World Police I don't think I or my friends were the intended audience. You know the plot: Borat - uncivilised representative of a backward East-European nation - comes to America to improve his country and learns all the wrong lessons. Along the way, he uncovers much of what is wrong with that society and humanity in general; not to mention recieving lawsuits from many of the real people who he unwittingly reveals.

So what did I learn from Borat? Honesty. The people who came off worse were ones with pretentions, inhibitions and prejudices. Lulu, the overweight prostitute (was she a member of the cast from the start, or an unknowing extra who they got on the payroll at a later date?); the black youths who teach him to speak like a homie; the gay pride parade; even the members of the uber-evangelical church - who yes, were scary, but also came out of the movie very well.

There was still smiles to be raised about the Christians and homosexuals - it's a comedy, not a serious examination of society - but the people we saw did not embarass themselves. Even the fake Kazak village - amusing, but also open and friendly.

Contrast that with the uptight dining society, or my goodness the feminists! To be fair, he provoked them. But still - it was mainly the, shall we say, middle class of American who could not accept him.

On the other hand, honesty wasn't the best policy for the headman at the rodeo. Although, with my natural dispensation to think the best of everyone, I like to think his advice he shave his tash to look a bit less Muslim was friendly and well meant, not shameless bigotry. Lets put it this way - I've attended a proper Texan rodeo, and its awesome fun. But I wouldn't like to be the only Muslim in the audience, because it was also quite scary.

Another character (can I call him a character? He's a real person after all...) who has undergone a lot of flack was the fun salesman who recommends a certain gun for killing Jews with. To be honest, the casual racism would have shocked me more

I understand permission to carry a weapon is a basic right in America. It's also bloody stupid. If no one is allowed to have a gun, then you don't need a gun to protect yourself from people with guns. If you are attacked, you are far less likely to get hurt if you don't pull a gun (and if you don't believe me, try the woman in the car from Reservoir Dogs as an example). When I was on holiday there, there was a school shooting - quite an unpleasant one. We watched it on the news, as it was reported with that exploitative enthusiasm that American news programs tend towards. They interviewed a representative of the gun lobby. He said the way to stop school massacres was to let students arm themselves - that way, if someone did start attacking them, they could defend themselves. No comment, asshole.

I like America, honest. I'm not one of those Europeans who assume they're all fat and stupid - that annoys me more than anything. It just happens that I'm talking about two things I really hate about the country - the gun culture, and the television.

Anyway, back to Borat - specifically, those who accuse this of being racist, anti-semetic or offensive? Well it certainly is offensive. But it's unfair to peg it as deliberately unpleasant to any one group is unfair to the myriad of other targets. It picks fun on America and Kazakstan equally.

As for the Jews? It's a mockery of centuries of pointless persecution, not persecution itself. I don't enjoy taking things seriously - and you don't get much more serious than racism. One of my favourite sequences in the film, and certainly the best expose ever of the idiocy of race-hate, was Azimir and Borat realising they are boarding with a Jewish couple. As they hide in terror, spooky threatening music is layed over shots of the family...slowly walking up the stairs...coming closer to the door...with a gorgeously well prepared supper with hot chocolates and brownies.

There is one thing I'd like to know - how did he survive not getting arrested? The movie industry is powerful, but not enough to rescue a star from jail for either indecent public exposure or attempted kidnap.

Incidentally, one way to tell if you are watching Borat with a group of girls or boys - the reaction to the bear. Much like my younger sister's statement that the puppy was the best part of Apocalypse Now, we all loved the bear.

It's also only the second day so far I have adhered to my "one movie a day" mantra - but I do intend to watch Easy Rider later this evening. So maybe that'll make up for days missed...

But why has the LSD gone?!

2008-06-20T10:12:00.000-07:00

Exams are over! I am free! Free to spend my own time again, and indulge in all those special treats I have been saving for myself!

Which has so far become horrible proof of why you should never deny yourself anything 'til a later date. I had all ready my four indulgences - buy Doctor Who episode Ghost Light on DVD, finally read Doctor Who novel "Love and War", and watch two new movies by my two favourite directors.

Only Ghost Light wasn't in HMV. And "Love and War" made me angry and miserable, but mostly angry. The Happening isn't out at the cinema over here - and I'm looking forward to it less and less. And so everything came to rest on Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - the last of Terry Gilliam's "good movies" which I haven't seen. (Now I'm left with Jabberwocky and Baron Munchausen which, even though some do praise, Friend 4 ranks it as fairly dire. And I'm inclined to believe her seeing as I have, over the years, subjected her to almost all his other movies. Incidentally, she likes Time Bandits more, Tideland less, but we're in agreement that Brazil is the second coming.)

And thank goodness for it! Absolutely what I expected, but in a good way (as opposed to The Happening, which on the grounds of his previous excellent movies, I can nevertheless anticipate beat for beat from the trailer). In retrospect, TG making a film about drugs was a bit of a no-duh, after years of movies which made people think he was under the influence.

I didn't catch half the dialogue - but that's OK, as I want to read the book and I get the feeling that much of it was taken verbatim (You know you've got it bad when you deliberately want to see the film before reading the book, when you don't want the novel to scar your impressions of the movie. Even though I seem to recall fans of the book feel something was lost in translation...). You don't watch TG movies to listen to them. You watch them to drown in the imagery, the larger than life characters, the unplaceable grotesque. All big, all slightly off kilter. It's not a desperate feat of the imagination to guess what TG does drugs would look and feel like.

As an adaption - I don't know, haven't read it yet - but the movie made clever use of the first-person perspective. For example, Johnny Depp breaking out of his interior monologue and realising he's speaking aloud. There seems to be something about "drugs + 'Nam + American Dream = counter-cultural classic" - The Beach did it, On the Road did it, and now this.

It also gave me a terrible craving for an exotic fruit drink. Luckily, mum has bought an industrial tonne of drinks for this evening (see below), but 'tis bizzare.

Ah, what else. Definitely top prize goes to those horrible sets, conveying squalour, 80s glamour and nuttiness in equal measure. The music was ace, not only for the movie, but also because it was all genres, artists and songs I liked. Particularly White Rabbit and Somebody to Love, Jefferson Airplane's only two amazing songs. Some interesting cameos by small stars too - Christina Ricci, Cameron Diaz, Tobey Maguire. And Johnny Depp looks disturbingly middle aged, even though he has since made movies more glam.

Mind you, it's not all good. I now have 45 minutes to clear my head before my parents rather swish house party. The only reason I watch films is to tangle my brain inside someone elses - to get out of my life. Like watching Ferris Bueller for a boost when you feel rebellious, or Fight Club when you hate your life, or Velvet Goldmine when you need to feel fantastic. And I can't think of worse place to be, headwise, than Fear and Loathing for socialising with nice people who want to know how my exams went. Mes parens have been at home for several hours now, tidying and cooking pre-party - I've dressed, but my bedroom looks like some of the sets (less vomit. More books. Same number of reptiles. No American flag.) In this post-movie mood, it even seems quite cosy.

I'm listening to Amazing Grace on loop to cool my brain (its a version played on stalacmite organ, quite lovely and peaceful). And for once in my life, I feel like getting very, very drunk (you know what they say about movies influencing behavior? Well...) Mind you, I'd still never want to take drugs. I wouldn't see the point when I could get about as high on flicks like this...

And a PPPPS to all that...

2008-06-17T01:04:00.000-07:00

4. The Happening is out! And Cinecism is not a happy bunny. Why is Cinecism an unhappy bunny? Because it's not out over here. Which means I'll have to endure it being criticised by all and sundry, and won't be able to defend it. Fair enough - If i'm already resolved to defend it, why can't I do it without having seen the film first. After all, being an M. Night fan, I know what one of his movies looks like; and the trailer doesn't seem to have broken the mould. And it never stopped me with Grindhouse. But if the best the Times critic can come up with to justify his 3 star review is "the good news is this film isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be", you know there's not justice in the world.

Fair enough - that's exactly what my most recent Hulk review said. But that was the Incredible Hulk - a comic book adaptation, a sequel to a not-great film, a movie about two big lumps of CG smashing each other. Forgive me, but I'm allowed to be critically sniffy.

We're talking about one of our classiest directors here - a guy who has proved that "mainstream" and "shit" are not necessarily synonomous. Ghosts, superheroes, alien invasion! Only with style and a lot of heart. That's the deal-sealer for me - the way he takes these unlikely movie situations, and really gets into the emotions of what that situation would be like.

We're also talking about a group of petty, petty people who're still peeved about getting caught out by Sixth Sense; the same cynical people who've cheerfully struck back at everything he's done since. Until Lady in the Water that was OK. Because Unbreakable was insanely classy; Signs a brilliant thriller, even if you couldn't make a leap of faith at the end; and The Village had nice music. But Lady has become an open invitation to just lay in. It was not a terrible film! It was an attempt to do something different - and it only failed a little bit.

Michael Bay! Uwe Boll! Ed Wood! There aren't lines of people waiting to pour scorn on their movies, some of which are truly terrible. Check out his IMDB's director's board - the hate never stops and I don't know why.

Maybe it's just the undercurrents. Every director has underlying ideas and themes which he brings to every movie. For M. Night it's redemption through the supernatural, Philidelphia, great set pieces, James Newton Howard music and me crying at the end. The things the masses admired in Sixth Sense - i.e. heartstopping terror - aren't in the other films. People keep saying "ugh, but the Village wasn't scary..." But was it meant to be? No. Incidentally, the things which attracted me to Res Dogs aren't always there in QT's other movies - the sincere human drama and tension. So it works both ways.

In any case, I am peeved that I can't see it at the cinema, already on the defensive, at war with anyone who doesn't like it - on principle unless they first prove that they thought Unbreakable was a decent piece of cinema, and very annoyed.

2008-06-16T06:38:00.000-07:00

One long day, three short points:

1 Yesterday I watched my first, and maybe last episode of House. It was pretty entertaining, but I've a horrible feeling it could get formulaic. But the most striking thing about it was that it wasn't a hospital drama. It was a police procedural. House is the Dirty Harry of doctors - the hardcase maverick who gets results. Foreman is the equivalent of the "rival team". At the start there is a mystery - so OK, it's an illness not a murder, but the formula is the same. Red herrings. Close calls. At one point, the head hospital honcho practically gives him twenty-four hours to solve the case before demanding his gun and his badge. Makes me wonder what other great genre crosses one could come up with.

2 Something interesting I forgot to mention about Incredible Hulk. Somewhere in between "No big green monsters were harmed in the making of this film" and "not based on any real green monsters iving or dead" was an anti-smoking notice. Something along the lines of "any portrayals of smoking are not meant to promote it; it was for artistic reasons only". It's the first time I've ever seen anything like it, and probably the first sign of the MPAA crackdown on smoking. Fascinating! And nice to see some movies keeping the humble cigarette despite their threats. A few weels ago I despaired of the state of the industry if its use was, pardon the pun, stamped out.

3 I'm not yet out of exammode. Two more to go! I am, however, flagging terribly; which means its time to pull out my three moodlifter movies. I feel ill going too long without fiction; I feel rejuvenated by watching something brilliant. But Apocalypse Now, Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Fight Club are more than just good films; they're also movies about how much the world SUCKS. And when the world sucks, there's nothing like giving it a good kick back. Maybe they're not the most conventional excercises in feel good. But they're good for a boost.

Pissed off, and ready for round 3!

2008-06-15T06:51:00.000-07:00

In the car on the way to the Incredible Hulk, Friend 3's mum said "We're so glad you wanted to come - Friend 3 was really looking forward to it, and no one else wanted to!", and I smiled while looking the other way. That was precicely why I was going to see it - because there's nothing worse than no one else wanting to see what you do; and it's only because all my other friends had taken it upon themselves to negatively pre-judge this movie that I hadn't myself.

The sacrifices you make, eh?

My point being, aside from the fact I'm always excited to go to the cinema, I wasn't that excited - and you can barely call our local fleapit a cinema anyway. It's a Subplex. What's the point of casting Tim Roth and Ed Norton only to turn them into CGI anyway?

Friend 3 is a real hero-movie nut. Her favourites are the X-men movies, and no doubt next year we'll all be trooping out for Wolverine. It's only been a month since she went to see Iron Man. Is there anything wrong with female sci-fi geeks? Not at all. But it still makes me smirk that we were the only gals in the cinema, and also (probably) the only ones who discussed whether CG-Abomination was hotter than CG-Hulk (he isn't...).

For me, the genre interests me. It's grown out of nowhere, it's its own beast. It just exists. Shakespeare didn't write about normal people discovering powers and fighting crime; it's not one of the seven basic plots (well, it's hero's journey + police procedural, but you know what I mean). But I'd much rather dive into the graphic novels, because the films are mindnumbingly samey.

Which is where Incredible Hulk suprised me; on three counts in particular, of things I was absolutely expecting, which didn't happen. These were:

1 The First 20 Minutes (F20M) - in the modern world, movie synopses aren't hard to come by. The set-up is revealed in the trailer - you go to see Snakes on a Plane because you know that it's about terrorists who attempt to sabotage a flight by putting motherrhubarbing snakes on it. Which makes the F20M, in which the terrorists plot, and getting to know the passengers wasted time. I want to see stewardesses eaten by pythons already!

Unfortunately, few films are brave enough to leap straight to the main interest. They have to spend the F20M setting up a situation you are already aware of. The Matador was horrible - 20 minutes of two separate characters going around their daily life, when you just knew they were going to meet up. Instead, they should have started at the scene in the bar - where square, business-character winds up chatting with drunk assassin-character. We know the film's heading there, so why not start it there and make their personalities come out through other ways?

Ones that get it right? Reservoir Dogs throws you into the action first and then, when you already admire the characters and are interested in them, shows you the setup. Run, Lola, Run starts with Manni explaining the premise of the movie over the phone - "I'm going to be killed by gangsters in zwanzig minuten unless you find me the cash!". In maybe under 30 seconds. Cuts out the F20M by having the character read out the synopsis instead.

For superheroes, this all equals origin story. Unbreakable was unusual in this regard for making the journey of discovery the entirety of the movie; Heroes was basically Unbreakable-TV, and stretched it over 20 episodes. Virtually all superheroes follow the same basic trip of tragic rubber duck + new powers = crimefighting, and the only thing that separates Batman turn to batting after the death of his parents and Spiderman turn to spidering after the death of his adopted parent is style and tone (for Batman, this seems to be an integral part of his story - I've yet to read one of the comics which doesn't reference it at least twice. Being a bit of a DC-baby at the moment, I've yet to get onto Spiderman, but I'd be interested to know if it's such a key piece of mythology.)

So as I was settling down to sit through a new variation on the same theme, thank you, thank you Incredible Hulk. It compresses the F20M into a slickly edited sequence occupying approximately the same length as the credits. Flashes of characters, situations, newspapers and security briefings give us all the information, and spare us the hassel. Incidentally, in admiration, three unusual things happened to me - I realised I didn't know who the director was, I had to ask who the director was, and then didn't recognise the reply. Unfortunately, after this point direction was average. But it's taken me about 20 minutes to write this rant, and I like to think of them as the 20 minutes I was spared last night. Very innovative, I salute you!

2 Bad Special Effects. Friend 1's response to the trailer was "looks like a video game". My response to the video game trailer was "looks like the movie". Films should never rely on their effects alone - but with big summer blockbusters, and superhero movies in partic, they are very very important. Flying, fire and invisibility are like falling off logs for CG-guys these days - but a large green monster is difficult in so many ways. It needs to look realistic, despite the fact nothing in nature is anything like. And it's big - so the audience can have a good look at all the flaws. Again, kudos goes to the director - the opening punch up at the bottling plant focuses on the soldiers being attacked not the beast doing the attacking. Instead of a green blob of pixels, you see shadows, legs, thrown tanks and smashed beams. Cloverlandly, if you like. This had both the effect of concealing the full Hulk effect until the big scenes, but also grounded it in reality as a threat. Even in the later scenes, full-body shots were kept short - you appreciate the effect before you have a chance to examine it too closely.

All this was with the exception of the inevitable final showdown. My dad refused to attend this one because "all superhero films are irrelevant because the plot just works towards a big fight scene at the end". I said Incredible Hulk was innovative, not the second coming - yes, the plot does descend into what the director calls "the biggest bar brawl ever, with New York as the bar". At this point, the CG became the centre of attention - and it wasn't as effective. Abomination wasn't realised as well as the Hulk. It didn't matter too much - because by that point, I felt the film had earnt a proper comic book punchup by its smart behavior with the CG earlier on.

3 Trite romance - winning the princess is the reward at the end of the heros journey. And boy do I hate it - movies with a love interest seemingly bolted on. Jumper was appalling in this regard - he abandons his childhood crush with a snowglobe, then just turns up out of the blue ten years later. In no time, they're off to Italy together and swearing eternal love. It doesn't help that the leads couldn't act their way out of a paper bag; nor that the script consisted of that lousy "hey, dy'wanna go grab a coffee after class?" dialogue.

Part of the problem is the link between "superpowers" and "teenage angst" - which leads to teenage-angsty romances. Spiderman? Even Batman Begins, universally acclaimed as a classy effort, is lumbered with an awful love interest.

Elizabeth Ross and Bruce Banner were already an item before the movie began, which makes their falling back for each other just that leetle bit more realistic. In tow comes a relationship less irritating and slightly more mature. And while kissing in the rain is still completely unacceptable anywhere but Four Weddings, and while Ms Ross inevitably has little interesting to do, their dialogue is for the most part sparky and believeable.

Spared from the torment of F20M of origin, naff effects and nasty romance, I actually rather enjoyed this one. Edward Norton brings his trademark edgy ordinarity to the part (hell, is that even a real word?), and is delightfully sympathetic; Liv Tyler, as noted above, is mostly decorative. And I want that shampoo that keeps her hair looking so shmexy on all occasions (snow, rain, wind, massive fireball, helicopter crash e.t.c.) Tim Roth is doing his evil English villain bit (even though the politically correct script points out that he's not actually English, he's Russian, therefore making it OK for him to be eeeevil). And William Hurt, officially my least favourite actor, was passably un-irritating.

My favourite character was Ms Ross's new boyfriend - one scene, one speech cemented him as a real human, instead of a narrative obstacle. I just wish I could have seen it on a massive-o screen, with shake-the-floor sound, because I did switch off in the inevitable end action sequence - which maybe could have been excited if the screen had been larger than my TV.

I also wish I could have stopped thinking off better movies. Who dared to use aliases "mr Green" and "Mr Blue" in a Tim Roth movie? Randomly cruel dog-killing also reminded me of Rob Roy? And did anyone else think Fight Club! in the opening sequence when Ed Norton was being slapped by his yoga-teacher?

All in all, if you hate the superhero thang you'll probably still hate this. But if you're lukewarm, then this was a cut above what I was expecting. It's not as tonally exciting as, say, Batman Begins, but it did skip the three things I was dreading.

Oh, and a genuine warning - do NOT see this movie if you're not a needles person. Because I don't really mind them, but it was all sufficiently iccky to make me wince.

Looking forward to the summer!

2008-06-07T02:09:00.000-07:00

Lets start with the worst news. Every year a local company sponsor a massiveo screen at the beach, and show stuff like Top Gun, Grease and Dirty Dancing. First year they did Jaws. Second year, they let the general public vote. Utter Disneyfest, not that I have anything against Disney, but still. In the words of Gene Hackman in Runaway Jury, "trials are too important to be decided by jurys". This year they've outdone themselves - a drive in! With free popcorn! Forbidden Planet, please? The bad news is, they're allowing votes again. The good news is I'm on holiday. All that remains is for me to go on record saying the Disney MGM Studios "sci-fi drive-in" is one of the greatest restaurants in the world.

Friend 3 was showing off her Total Film trailer's DVD (I really must change my subscription and alliegance to Total Film; they're making waves! Mind you, Empire's "movie history" articles still cannot be beat. Last month they did one on the Indianapolis, and believe me the description in Jaws was a picnic compared.) Here's a roundup of what we watched.

The Dark Knight

If I told you I had mentioned an upcoming film beaming, and got a violently excited response from every other girl in the room, chances are you wouldn't be thinking Batman. Garn, I love my buddies sometimes! Friend 5 loves Christian Bale and the first movie. Friend 3 can get enthusiastic about almost anything, but she's an especial sucker for superhero movies. Friend 4 has just go into Smallville, for typically for villain Lex Luthor. And I've been a-reading the Batman graphic novels as quickly as the local library can provide them. First "the Dark Knight Returns" - Batman does middle age, grim, miserable and brilliant. And then "Hush", which is typical bulging muscles and battling monsters stuff, but who knew it could be so exciting when the art is that awesome? And next, whatever I can find. As for the trailer, I'm excited by the little things. I remember quite how much I loved Gary Oldman in the other film, for example. And Michael Caine's back! And Morgan Freeman, but mostly Michael Caine who's wonderful in everything. Nice to see the actor formerly known as Richard Alpert from Lost in there. The Joker? Well, he's jolly scary in "Dark Knight Returns". I'll have to get used to the voice, but his look is great and the laugh insanely wonderful.

Narnia 2:

The Narnia books were never afraid to be dark. Ultimately, Susan stops believing in all that childishness - later books figure only three of the Pevensies. Aslan gets killed in the second book - he comes back, but its still brutal. And in Prince Caspian, they return only to discover that 1300 years have passed and everyone they know is dead and gone. Happens in the Silver Chair as well - Eustace arrives in time to see the funeral of the same dead King Caspian this movie is about. So when they say this movie will be "darker", and don't they always, I believe them. Still, its depressing to see the trailer taking such obvious beats from the Lord of the Rings trailers. Slow the music. Boom. Boom. Boom. Quote. Music rise! Ugh...apart from the cliched cutting, looks like more of the same, which is exciting if you enjoyed the first one as I did, and not if you didn't. Incidentally, one insight you get by watching trailers with girl friends is the relative strokability of the actors. Ad while I'm still the only person who thought elder-Tristran's-dad from Stardust was more attractive than the younger addition, we are united in finding Prince Caspian far hotter than he ever was in the books. Despite this, I'm not excited to hear the actor has been cast as Dorian Gray in the movie, because no film could ever live up to my beautiful book.

Speed Racer

I made them watch the trailer. I gushed. Did I tell you Speed Racer was great? Totally, totally great?

Funny Games

With a little trepidation, I asked if we could watch the trailer for Funny Games. Nervously, because I hardly want to increase my reputation with my friends as an ultra-violence addict, especially with Friend 5 (who prefaces all her movie recommendations for me with "...and its really violent". I suppose it's fair enough on her part, because she doesn't seem to watch anything without 26 twists minimum. This comment was justified ten minutes later when she recommended Pushing Dasies by adding that the murder scenes were "really gruesome", and then returned the film I had lent her last week, mind-frak-fest The Game)

But I am drooling, absolutely drooling to see Funny Games. Either of them. The story goes like this. Michael Haneke makes a violent film all about the connection between media and violence, a satire on the genre; a dig at the people who get kicks from seeing it on screen. But being a foreign film, it only got a limited distribution; and completely missed the American slasher-movie audience on which it was intended to comment. And thus a remake - with a virtual translation of the script, and an almost shot for shot reshoot. Only this time it had Tim Roth and Naomi Watts in it. No, that's not why I want to see it. It's honestly just an added bonus. I said I'd watch either, didn't I? I'd be interested to see both.

In actual fact, the reason I feel so strongly about this movie is because deep down, I know I'm not gonna see it. Too chicken. Which considering my favourite movies, my back-catalogue of reviews and previous enthusiasm to jump head first into kroovyfests might seem a tad hypocritical. But I've seen Cache. And it's along way from Korean hyperdirection, American horror calculated to make megabucks or even trammeled up in the rules of the genre, as gangster or war movies are. Haneke's style can best be described as "absent direction" - so realistic, it mayaswell be a bystander with a video cam. And its in the home. Even Clockwork Orange's "Home" was set in an arthouse future.

My English teacher claims Hamlet has something to say on every topic. And even if Wikipedia claims that "the graphic violence is mostly off screen", Hamlet he say "There is nothing either bad nor good but thinking makes it so", and believe me I'm a thinker.

Which sucks, because it's not a certain Monsieur Roth that makes me want to see it, nor the bloodletting, but Haneke's effort to make a comment about the link between real and screen violence, a topic which I will admit an obsession; torture porn making a comment about the danger of torture porn.

The trailer was a bit derivative. Even though the remake came after Saw, the original on which it is slavishly based came before - yet I can't help thinking the trailer is squarely aimed at those very people Haneke is criticising, especially with the phrase "shall we begin?". Very Saw-y. There's also a Mr Kubrick on the phone for you, from beyond the grave, complaining about the debt it owes the the Clockwork Orange trailer, from the use of classical music to the flashing orange words, so much so I was expecting "Beethoven" to flash up any minute. But doesn't Tim Roth look good? Actorwise, not in terms of looks, not any more alas. Friend 3 adds that one or both of the creepy blonde guys is attractive, and she really likes the dog. I've a nasty feeling something unpleasant has to happen to it. I'm excited about the use of the white colour scheme too, already. And despite the fact the trailer gave me nightmares - yes, really - I really, really, really want to see this film.

Prom Night

More hypocracy - after putting them through 3 minutes of Funny Games, I felt slightly bad positively declaring I wouldn't see this even if paid. I think they agreed - Friend 5 said she'd watch it with us, but we'd probably tear chunks out of it if we did. We were all united in playing spot the actress - Brittany Snow from Hairspray! The girl who plays Monica off Heroes! I was more excited by seeing the guy who plays vampire-hunting Vaugn in Ultraviolet the TV-series in almost the same role here, stalking down corridors with torches and mobile phones, in a neat suit and wearing a gun holster, grimly intoning about great danger. Oh how have the mighty fallen.

Incidentally, our "prom" is coming up. I almost despaired of finding a dress - I threatened to go in a suit and ruffles to save the trouble - before absolutely, positively finding my dream outfit - a one off in the island, reduced in the sale, in a really bizarre shop that usually sells oldladyclothes, in my size. Unbelieveable. Such a lucky find that I can only believe a) the cute jock who's never noticed me will kiss me at midnight as the credits roll or b) an axewileding maniac intends to attend.

Other things coming for the summer?

I could not be less excited about The Incredible Hulk. I was, briefly, when I heard the official guff about it being, you guessed, darker and more thoughtful than the original - a reboot of the series. But the trailer dissuaded me entirely. Whats the point of casting two of our great actors, Ed Norton and Tim Roth, only to turn them into CGI at the first oppertunity?
I will be seeing the X-files movie, because Friend 3 is an X-F nut and she's frothing about it like I would be if, say, Redford and Newman had got their act together for a final movie together, or QT finally got around to the Vega brothers movie.
I might do The Mummy 3. The Mummy is a genuine unsung gem - the script is good, witty and scary in all the right ways, and the characters are all loads of fun. The worst you can say about the Mummy 2 is more of the same. So maybe, if the reviews look OK, I'll go see.
Tropic Thunder - frat pack as actors stuck in a war zone - looks like a riot, so if the critics smile that'll be another one.
Friend 4 and I have made a deal, that if one of us goes to see Brideshead: the movie, in 3D smellovision! the other will go with. I'm hoping it doesn't come to the local cinema.
Am I excited about A Quantum of Solace? Meh. I like the title, and I think Amy Winehouse is an inspired choice for the song. But Bond's bond, and I know what to expect.
The same goes for the inspiringly titled Harry Potter 6.
Did I forget the Hobbit? Its barely a summer movie, we've still got to wait two years, but hell am I excited about that! Not happy with the recurrent rumour that James MacAvoy will be playing Bilbo. He should be stout and bumbling, not elfin and, frankly, hot. Frodo was fare game; but its not cool to have a crush on Bilbo Baggins. Uglier actor please.
Why am I forgetting all the films I'm excited for in the rush to complain about the ones I'm not? The Happening, M. Night Shyamalan's film about the same old things, is coming out on the 13th of June. Hell, it's got Mark Walburg in, who I loved in The Departed, and as per usual James Newton Howard is doing the music, which means if nothing else it'll sound nice. I know this doesn't sound much like excitement, but this movie aint going to change his reputation as the purveyor of creepy mysteries plaguing ordinary American families any time soon. My prediction: if you liked Signs, you'll love this. Signs is my second favourite movie. I can't wait. I'm also amused by "Writer and Director of the Sixth Sense", because he HATES people putting that on his trailers. He stopped them doing it for Signs, but it didn't last long...
Youth Without Youth is out on DVD. We can be thankful for small mercies.

OK, so I'm demoralised that the Doctor Who finale is still the most exciting screen experience on the horizon, but big summer movies haven't been exciting since Jaws, and it invented the idea.

So. Are you looking forward to ANYTHING this summer?

PS - had an argument with Friend 1 about the cinema as a good place for a date. Says something about our opinions of dates. But mostly cinema. I said yes, because you don't have to talk for two hours, and then after than you've got an automatic conversation starter. She said yes, because it's dark and, y'know, you don't go on a cinema date to watch the film...I want it on the record that the first boyfriend that tries that gets dumped, instantly. Same for any who kindly attempt to take me to a "date movie". Not that either of those are a problem at the moment. Johnathan Rhys Meyers quipped that all the guys who took girls to see Fight Club probably never got a second date, but if you ask me...

I need to watch The Third Man!

2008-05-25T12:57:00.001-07:00

It's listening to movie soundtracks that does it. There are just so many films I need to see again, and again, and again, and I have no time to do it in...

Revision. Ahem.

2008-05-25T02:44:00.000-07:00

I am not a happy bunny!

Over here in the sunny world of the A-level student, exam month has arrived! And so has a craving for a good film I haven't felt for an age. You have no idea how much I want to rewatch The Godfather. And Guns of Navarone. I'm starting to get distinctly twitchy towards Legend of 1900 too. Even The Two Towers has wobbled back onto my must see list, after all the excitement about the Hobbit movie. I've resorted to mourfully listening to the Reservoir Dogs and Jackie Brown soundtracks while reviewing contempary opinions on Philip II's financial policy within mainland Spain - it's like last year all over again!

Ah, Reservoir Dogs. I'd forgotten quite how much I love you. The music alone is making my brain dribble out my ears.

This is all one long way to say, don't come here expecting a post for the next few weeks. For though I will undoubtedly give in and write a 32 page article on the use of music in QT movies, or the use of 70s guitar twangs in modern cinema, or try and argue that something blatantly offensive is still valid cinema (see: Song of the South, SS Experiment Camp), theoretically I'm far too busy to do anything of the sort.

I've started thinking about "1567 Revolt of the Nethelands: the movie". The hero is William of Orange, the Dutch noble who (single handedly, they'd have you believe) liberated about half of his country from Spanish dominion and religious persecution. He was a brilliant politician who I wrote my history coursework on, his particular skills being successfully uniting the disparate groups behind a single leader. He needs to be someone with gravitas, but not too beefy. He was really quite a sensitive noble guy at heart - I'm thinking maybe David Wenham, who cinched the gentle-but-heroic Faramir in Lord of the Rings.

The immediate villain of the piece is the nasty Duke of Alva, sent by King Philip II to sort the rebels out with an army, painted by generations of protestant historians and propagandists as a one-note Lord of Darkness. Who better than Christopher Ecclestone? Well, lots of people probably, but I couldn't help noticing the facial similarity between he and the much maligned Duke.

And who for Philip II himself? Like the Duke of Alva, Philip II was the bogeyman under the stairs for generations of protestants. In my Entirely Historically Accurate movie, which will utilise my fair and based-on-available-evidence knowledge,

I want him to be the evil cackling pantomime villain he's been until the revisionist historians got ahold of him. In an ideal world where he's not dead, I'd get Antony Ainley, who played the Master on Doctor Who in the 70s. The Master and Philip II shared several traits - an awful beard, a penchant for black velvet, the habit of chuckling evilly to himself, the desire for WOOOORLD DOMINATION! Yes, it's going to be one of those historical epics where the producer hires a quorum of historical experts on the period, and then ignores most of what they say. Might make a better movie...

I've yet to see Elizabeth: the Golden Age. I'm told Philip II is played very much in this vein, as a villainous religious maniac:

What else am I studying? Well, Branagh's Hamlet is perfect enough for me; Branagh's Frankenstein leaves much to be desired. But it does contain the phrase "maybe if I reverse the polarity of the neutron flow", so it ain't all bad.

My two english modules are one on Hamlet and Chaucer (The Merchants Tale, all lying and "thronging". It'd make a tedious film, unless you made it into an all-out shamelessly bawdy comedy, in which case I still wouldn't be interested. Unless it was filmed it in the original Chaucerian English. The story is all about bad wives - the word wife is spelt wyf, and pronounced "wiff!", and its hilarious...) and the other on the gothic.

I'm not sure Frankenstein could ever make a good movie, because frankly I don't think its a great book. I also agree with those who see it as more science fiction than gothic - it's built on a "what if" premise, it's all about what it means to be human, and it all starts with man meddling with science. Doctor Who remade it as "Brain of Morbius"; Ridley Scott remade it as Blade Runner, hell, even King Kong and Edward Scissorhands can be seen as its distant cousins. The other book I'm studying is The Monk, a good ole story of a saintly friar who gets involved in pretty much every depravity the 17th Century author could get away with. Brilliant book! It'd make a distastefully nasty film though...

Our other history module is on Ireland - specifically 120 years of it, from Wolfe Tone's uprising in 1789 to the Anglo-Irish treaty in 1921. What a bloodbath. Two friends and I considered making a movie of the entire topic, with three of us, changing hats along the way; but frankly, even though it's fascinating, I wouldn't know where to start with filming it. I'd be far too terrified of offending someone, and films why try to be inoffensive normally end up watery and muddled.

Parnell was an Irish nationalist leader, and a pretty darn good one. He was a skilled politician, who had wide reaching links from Westminster, where he was an MP, and more radical nationalist organisations such as the Fenians. At one point, the Times attempted to blacken his reputation by connecting him with open acts of violence - that would be an interesting event for the movie. Another is he deliberately(ish) getting himself thrown into jail to avoid committing to either side of an issue to retain universal support, a smart bit of political manouvering.

So far, so ordinary. The bit which'll make the producers ears prick up was his long running and romantic affair with the married Kitty O'Shea, the biggest open secret in London. They lived together, had three children and refered to each other as husband and wife; Captain O'Shea even bailed Parnell out of prison. Then, at the height of his political career, the Captain decides to divorce her and Parnell's adultery is cited in the divorce case. And it explodes - despite the fact everyone knew, Victorian hypocracy strikes. Parnell's party is split into Parnellites and anti-Parnellites - Parnell loses the support of Gladstone and the Liberal party (note on Irish politics: in this period, the Irish Parliamentry Party were too small to make a difference. They wedded their support to either the Conservatives or Liberals, effectively determining who would get in, in exchange for Irish reforms). And naturally, as this is my movie, play up a sub-buddy relationship between he and Gladstone who knew very well about the affair, but has to play to public opinion. Parnell loses all his credibility; though he does marry Kitty and dies a few years later in her arms.

Hollywood would LOVE it - a big, sweeping historical story, yet with a powerful love story set at the front. From the first gangster movies, cinema has always loved the rise and fall story. I can see the trailer now - "In a land of conflict...one man will risk everything...for the woman he loves..."

...and d'ya know what? A little investigation reveals that Clark Gable played Parnell in the movie of the same name in the 30s. It flopped. But at least it proves my idea was a good one. Time for a remake? I'd go see it, he's one of my favourite characters in this topic (as far as you can have favourites in history. My favourite Brit politician is Peel, because he's smart and pragmatic, willing to deal with problems because they are problems, not because he's committed to this or that policy. And his smile was compared to "the gleam on a coffin lid", which is cool. The other person I really admire is Daniel O'Connell, who organised large "monster meetings" to show support for repeal of the union. The Brit government finally threatened to forcibly shut one down at Clontarff. What did he do? Decided not to hold it. Now that might seem like a pretty useless action, and indeed it was - that was the end of his repeal association - but that's not the point. It would have been easy to just take a stand and watch the slaughter, but giving in was far braver. It's also nice to have someone in this topic 100% opposed to violence. Just don't get me started on Carson, who's still a baddie as far as I'm concerned...)

If anyone knows where to find a copy of this movie (and I mean literally anywhere), I want to see it! You can even post it to me and I'll promise to post it back.

Sod that. I'm watching Reservoir Dogs. Philip's twin foreign policy of concervacion and messianic imperialism will have to wait...