Cultural Review of 2009

As in previous years, I present my highly subjective review of the year.

Film
I managed to see all of the films that were nominated for Best Film, Best Actor or Best Actress category at the Oscars, mainly at the beginning of the year. My favourites were Frost/Nixon, Milk and Slumdog Millionaire (although I still think Trainspotting is a way better film). I also loved Moon, which won an award for best British Independent Film (although the OH hated it) and Rudo y Cursi, possibly the best football film ever.

Music
I may have to retire the music category if my apathy towards new music continues. I did get out and see a couple of bands - Maximo Park and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs who were both fantastic and the support band at one of these gigs is my only new discovery of the year, Joe Gideon and the Shark. Rage Against the Machine being the Christmas Number One was probably my musical highlight of the year though.

Theatre
I achieved my aim of seeing at least one production for each month of the year, although amongst that list were some absolute stinkers. The highlights were seeing Sir Ian McKellan and Patrick Stewart in Waiting for Godot, the one-man show Stefan Golaszewski Plays and the very funny The Priory, but my favourite was Three Days of Rain with the wonderful James McAvoy.

Television
In the post-Wire era, any comments about television shows need to be preceded with the phrase "Its not as good as The Wire, but...". So with that disclaimer in place, I was impressed by In Treatment (although 5 episodes a week was a huge committment), Curb Your Enthusiasm was excellent and The Daily Show continued to inform and entertain. Embarrassingly, I became addicted to Come Dine with Me, but I'm hoping to ween myself off it. On DVD, we rediscovered NYPD Blue, which isn't as good as The Wire, but...

Books
I read over 100 books this year so its a wonder I found time to do anything else. The best were Tropical Fish: Tales of Entebbe by Doreen Baingana, Giraffe by J M Ledgard and The Road by Cormac McCarthy. I also loved The Picture of Contented New Wealth by Tariq Goddard (I'm looking forward to his 5th book in 2010) and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley which left me wondering why it had taken me so long to get around to reading it.

Tough & Corny

Putting my worries aside for an evening, I went to the cinema to see Rudo y Cursi, the new film starring Gael Garcia Bernal and Diego Luna. Y Tu Mama Tambien is one of my all time favourite films, and this film was pretty much a "Who's who" of Mexican cinema.

The film was fantastic, soothing my worry that I'd gone off cinema. It was sort of about football, but you didn't have to be a football fan to enjoy it as you only saw the games through people's reactions to it.

The screening was a special event with the stars, director and producer in attendence. I'll admit that was one reason for me wanting to go - I do find Gael Garcia Bernal very attractive (despite his shortness). The discussion after the film was the usual thing - the panel were great, but were let down by the audience's contribution - mainly inane comments or nitpicking criticism that missed the point. But the stars made it a special event. They were witty and engaging, with way more charisma then you usually see on today's stars. Of course, there is no reason why they shouldn't be - young, good-looking, and talented. And perhaps that is the nub of it, most stars today aren't that talented and even less of them could be described as talented.

Film Recommendations Wanted

So we've got the Love Film service and we received DVDs through the post. But the problem recently is that I haven't been enjoying many of them.

Here is a quick sample of recent picks:

Hannah Takes the Stairs - an American indie film in the little known genre called "Mumblecore". The sound is poorly mixed and the characters witter on about their nothing lives. I turned it off.

Somers Town - I've enjoyed Shane Meadows other films, but didn't warm to this one, perhaps because I knew it had started life as an advert for the Eurostar.

Blame It on Fidel - A French child suffers when her parents become revolutionaries. I found it hard to care.

The Baader Meinhof Complex - The Baader Meinhof gang are a minor obsession of mine, but this made a very interesting period incredibly dull.

Righous Kill - It should have been a warning sign that it was a film starring De Niro and Pacino that I'd never even heard of. Less than the sum of its parts.


There have been two that I have enjoyed

Mad Detective - very interesting film from Hong Kong about an ex-detective with mental powers that are great for detection but not for his own sanity. Like nothing else I've ever seen.

Six Shooter - a short film by Martin McDonaugh. Very funny in an odd, disturbing way.


So I'm looking for some recommendations. What have you seen that you've loved? I will watch pretty much anything, except chick flicks. It doesn't have to be new even.

Pschedelic Psaturday

Left to my own devices tonight, I'm having a retro evening.





Music courtesy of Beyond the Beat Generation - streaming "the undiscovered area of 60s underground". Their archive contains 27 versions of the song Gloria and 8 versions of Louie Louie.





The psychedelic film Wonderwall will be screening later and I have books by Richard Brautigan and Tom Wolf on hand. I may even put on a suitable dress from my collection.





If only I still had that lava lamp...

The Project: 1950s Hollywood

Many years ago I read Peter Biskind’s book “Easy Riders, Raging Bulls” which was a fantastic warts and all account of film-making in Hollywood in the Sixties and Seventies. I enjoyed it so much I rushed out to buy another book of his “Seeing is Believing: How Hollywood taught us to stop worrying and love the fifties” (not the most snappy of titles).

I expected it to be similar to his previous book, but on an earlier period, but that wasn’t the case. It is an analysis of over 30 films and how they relate to ideology of the 1950s. Unfortunately of this 30+ films, I’d only seen one and the book has been languishing on my shelves unread.

This year, I’m determined to read it, but in order to appreciate it I obviously need to watch the films discussed. So my project (for I’m quite fond of such things) is to watch the films and read the accompanying chapters.

So far I’ve watched:

• Twelve Angry Men – my favourite so far. Perhaps a little too neatly tied up for modern tastes but very well done.
• The Day the Earth Stood Still – classic Sci-Fi. Surprisingly intelligent.
• Attack – decent war film and not a world away from Generation Kill which I’m also currently watching.
• From Here to Eternity – star-studded war and romance. Quite enjoyable considering I don’t really like war or romance films.
• My Darling Clementine – the disc started to skip, so I didn’t finish it. I struggle with Westerns, which doesn't bode well for one section.
  

Tonight, I’m back to the Sci-Fi with “It Came From Outer Space”.

No More Odysseys

As I’ve got older I go out less, or rather the going out I do is different. Whereas in the past it would have been bars and clubs, these days its more likely to be cinemas and restaurants. And I really don’t mind that most of the time. I haven’t had the interest or energy for clubbing for a good number of years.

But occasionally I do miss those epic nights out, those ones that you only have when you are young, where the night takes you on an adventure, where you end up somewhere entirely differently from where you planned and meet weird characters along the way.

Last night I saw a film that made me think about these nights out. “Wrong Numbers” was the low-budget debut by Alex Holdridge who directed “In Search of a Midnight Kiss” which I loved. It was about one of those epic nights, following two 19 year olds quest for alcohol. It was perhaps a juvenile story, but well-written and acted and I’m not so old as not remember what those nights were like.

You just don’t have these kinds of nights out when you’ve got a mortgage and a (semi) serious job. You go where you intended to, you have enough money to get home and you stick the friends you came with.

Gone are the nights of;

• Drinking syrup-like real ale from a beer festival because everywhere else is closed (me)


• A homeless man vomiting in your car (characters in Wrong Numbers)


• Going to the wake of a stranger to continue drinking (me)


• Attempting to steal beer from a shop by just running out with it (characters in Wrong Numbers)


• Ending up in a cabaret club hosted by a Japanese transexual that you've never been able to find since (me)


• Being lured into a religious group's meeting on the promise of drink (Wrong Numbers)


• Walking home barefoot from a club and buying a freshly baked loaf from the bakers at 6am (me)
  

Actually it is probably for the best because while they are happening, those nights rarely feel much fun.

Top 5 Worst Films Ever and Top 5 Best London Cinemas

As mentioned below, Funny Games has made it into my worst films ever list. So I thought I'd post a list of them. And for some positivity, I thought I'd do a list of my favourite cinemas. A list of my favourite films is too hard and probably not that interesting/ Worst cinemas doesn't matter as all bad cinemas tend to be bad for the same reasons and I've ranted about that before.

Top 5 Worst Films Ever

Hotel - Directed by Mike Figgis, I had the displeasure of seeing this at the London Film Festival a few years ago. I saw it for free and still felt cheated. It contains split screens, a film within a film, vampires, The Duchess of Malfi and a cast of upteen famous and some good actors, plus Saffron Burrowes who Figgis was dating at the time. It was a mess, it was pretenious, it was terrible. The comments on IMDB for once seem to universally agree on this. The last thing I saw directed by Figgis was those adverts about how to behave on public transport, which I doubt will improve anyone's manners on the bus, but a career high point after this nonsense.

Funny Games - see below for my opinion.

Disclosure - I went to see this with my mother., the only time just the two of us have been to the cinema together since I was a child. Our town had been without a cinema for about a decade, but a new arts centre had opened with a cinema screen and we went to see this at that newly opened venue. There were five people in the screening; us, a couple who sat in the back row kissing and a member of the local council who slept through it all. Unfortunately, we had no such distractions. It is apparently a sexual thriller (a genre sprung from Fatal Attraction and Bacic Instinct that my friend C refers to as "Lick My Gun" films) but it is neither sexy nor thrilling. It has a tacked on virtual reality sub-plot, which made no sense and confused my mother. Even her love of Michael Douglas didn't redeem the film for her and I recall her muttering afterwards about him not being as good as his father anyway.

Ghosts of Mars - Released in the USA as John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars, which was actually an accurate title as he seemed to do pretty much everything on the films, writer, director and music. It was pretty obvious that no one else had stepped in and told him it was rubbish. It is a sci-fi, horror western in case you are interested, a mercifully small genre. It stars Jason Statham who if he isn't the world's worst actor, must have taken some lessons since this was made. Like Hotel, I saw this one back when I worked in a different sector and I sometimes got invited to free film screenings. It seems churlish to moan, but that is testament to how bad these films were.

The Horse Whisperer - I went to see this when I lived with a group of girls including a horse-mad Italian. It was her choice. She drove us there. The only reason I didn't get up and leave was because I'd have to get the bus home. It was so dull, even the horse-mad Italian didn't enjoy it. It may have looked good but it was boring, meladramatic, hackneyed and did I mention, it was dull?


Top Five London Cinemas

All of these cinemas show films that go beyond the latest blockbuster, but that is not all.

The Tricycle, Kilburn - you can become a member for a bargain price, it has a great bar/cafe area, comfortable seats sponsored by stars and patrons of the arts.
Screen on Baker Street - possibly the most comfortable cinema seats with plenty of legroom.
Cineworld Haymarket - The only major chain cinema in this list, included for its main screen, a beautiful old auditorium with high ornate ceilings, this is how film viewing was meant to be.
BFI Southbank - Formerly known as the NFT. Great seasons of films, lovely location in one of my favourite parts of London and their "no food or drink except a bottle of water" policy that many think is harsh, but I agree with wholeheartedly. I once watched four films in one day here.
Riverside Studios, Hammersmith - interesting seasons of films, most films are shown as themed double-bills for less than the cost of one ticket in most other cinemas. Another one with a good cafe.

The Electric would have been included before it started pushing itself as an exclusive member's cinema and racked up the prices for non-members (it isn't a members as in supporters club like at other cinemas, but you have to work in the media and/or live in Notting Hill and be approved by a committee).


So what are your worst ever films? And best cinemas in case I'm ever in your area?

Saturday Cinema: "Lars and the Real Girl" and "Funny Games"

We decided to spend Saturday at the cinema. Not one cinema, but two actually. We had a list of five films between us that we wanted to see so thought we'd see two of them. The decision on which we would see was based upon the timings at our favoured cinemas. I also added the suggestion that we shouldn't see more than one film that was likely to be bleak.

So our plan was set with an afternoon showing of "Lars and the Real Girl" at a small independent cinema, followed by an early evening screening "Funny Games" in the more bearable of the localish multiscreen cinemas.

"Lars and the Real Girl" was funny and sweet, prehaps a little silly, but ultimately heartwarming. In case you don't know it is about a man who falls in love with a sex doll! But not in a sexual way at all. He is delusional, brought on by grief and fear of losing people he loves. I shed a couple of tears, not uncontrollable weeping, but a subtle few as things of a heartwarming nature tend to have this effect on me. The cinema was comfortable, the patrons well-behaved which always helps.

Then onto the next cinema. It seems to be a growing trend amongst the chain cinemas to not bother with the box office much and now you have to buy your tickets at the food concession. I don't know why this bothers me (its not as if their box office staff were knowledgeable film fanatics) but it somehow feels wrong to buy your ticket from the popcorn stall. But the selling of popcorn and nachos seems to be a bigger priority on the actual films in many of these places. We were in the minority in our screening in not having a giant bucket of something to eat and the first couple who left during the film, were holding an empty popcorn bucket as if they'd only stayed until the food ran out.

But they weren't the only people to walk out and I only stayed out of stubborness. I must have apologised the OH twenty times afterwards for even suggesting this film. It was dreadful. It has catapulted itself into my Top 3 of Worst Films Ever Made. The following will contain spoilers, but hopefully you'll heed my warning and not watch it, so the spoilers shouldn't matter. The basic plot of the film is about an affluent family arriving at their holiday home, then two young men claiming to be friends of the neighbours call round and end up torturing them.

You don't actually see any of the violence on screen though because, of course, that is not the point. This is a clever film. It is not a violent film, it is a film about violence in films. The intruders talk to the camera, a remote control is used to rewind action and change the outcome of events and they discuss real and unreal universes in a manner rarely seen outside of first year philosophy classes and Richard Linklater films. My reason for hating the films was not that I didn't understand this (I'm not so sure about many of my fellow cinema-goes, who may not have been able to hear much over the sound of their own popcorn munching). But it wasn't hard to grasp as it wasn't done in a subtle way.

Playing with viewers expectations, the viewer as voyeur, violence in films, these are not new subjects. And this film is a direct remake of the director's own early film in German. It was made ten years ago when perhaps it might not have been so unoriginal, although I'm not convinced.

On IMDB, two of its key plot words are listed as Eggs and Golf Balls. There aren't many other films that can make the same claim and I did actually dream about eggs last night. But there ends its effect. It wasn't scary, it wasn't funny, it wasn't original, it wasn't clever. It was too long. It was a waste of time.

Variations on a Theme

It often seems to happen that little things in my life with coincide so it feels like a there is a theme. What I mean is that I will be reading a book about something and then quite by accident (or perhaps sub-consciously) I will watch a film or read a newspaper article on a similar subject. It happened a few months ago when I was watched Little Miss Sunshine and read Miss Wyoming, while the Miss World Competition was happening in the real world.

It has just happened again. Last night I went to see a film “The Inheritance”, that turned out to be a Scottish road movie (neatly coinciding with my weekend post). During the film I was contemplating the idea of a road movie in our small country, that you can really drive from one end to the other quite easily in a day. The film got around this by slowing the journey down by a) having a slow driver who wanted to take in the scenery, b) a useful navigator so they kept getting lost and c) a clapped out old camper van that broke down every so often.

Then there was a bit of dialogue in the film about Greggs. Greggs for anyone who doesn’t know (which means you definitely aren’t northern) is a chain of bakers. It started in the north where it is ridiculously popular – the high street of my hometown (which comprised about 40 shops) had 3 branches of it on that one road, plus a few others around the town. Pasties are their big thing. So these two brothers in the film, one who lived in London, the other who’d stayed in Scotland mention Greggs and I realised that Greggs is a huge subject in the north-south divide.

When I first left the north, I was horrified to find there were no Greggs in Norfolk. What was I supposed to eat? Babies in my town are fed Greggs pasties as soon as they are old enough to hold them. There were no Greggs in London when I first moved here either. So this became a valid topic of conversation, both with Southerners and with my family and friends on returning home, where I would have to gorge myself on their Cheese & Onion pasties every visit. Then a few years ago, they expanded and now there are quite a few in London. But here is the thing, they aren’t the same – the pasties are a different shape down here, smaller and of course, more expensive. So I never eat them down here, but now “the difference between Greggs in the north and south” has become a new topic of conversation when I return to the north.

So I concluded (during the film last night) that the issue of Greggs is the crux of the North-South issue.

This morning, I started reading the book “Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North” by Stuart Maconie. It was a present from my friend who has never left the north as she thought it would be appropriate for a “northerner in exile”. Its easy enough reading, amusing but not life-changing. I felt that I could have written something similar myself. Within the prologue, he discusses whether a road trip is possible in England and Greggs the Bakers. Actually so far, I feel as if I have written it already.

So there it is, the common themes in my life at the moment are UK road trips and what a chain of bakers means to regional identity.

Pretty Vacant

We watched "Factory Girl" on DVD last night. I have more than a passing interest in the 1960s, love the Velvet Underground and don't mind a bit of Warhol now and then, so I thought it might be interesting. It wasn't.

How such an interesting time with so many iconic characters could result in such a dull film is quite remarkable. The film was supposed to be the real girl behind the image of Edie Sedgwick, but on the basis of this, there really wasn't much behind the image. Her father abused her as a child and one of her brothers was killed in an accident but nothing more is offered about he as person. She was then, allegedly, exploited by both Warhol and Dylan. I say allegedly because the film caused outrage in both camps, with Warhol's estate insisting she was not cut off by him and had already left his entourage of her own accord and Dylan tried to have the whole project blocked. Then this film comes along and exploits her image in much the same way.

The Dylan bit was actually hilarious - unintentionally I should imagine. To get around the legal problems with Dylan being unhappy at being accused of causing the downfall of someone he claims to have barely known, the filmmakers could not call the obviously-Dylan character, Bob Dylan. Instead, they made this unnamed musican as Dylan-like as possible - he entered with a harmonica around his neck and spoke in the same way that Dylan sings (I'm pretty sure Dylan does not speak in the same way he sings) which had us laughing everytime he came on screen. Lou Reed was apparently also appauled when he read the script although this may have been as much to do with someone from Weezer playing him.

This is the first thing I've seen Sienna Miller in other than gossip columns (or when I saw her in real life) and she is nominated for a BAFTA at tonight's awards. So how was she? She wasn't bad at all. She was ok. But then she was playing a pretty rich girl who wants to be famous and respected, but is best known for who she hangs around with and what clothes she wears. So not much of a stretch there really. And at times it did feel like the purpose of the whole film was just an excuse for her to wear lots of pretty clothes. But on a positive note, the clothes were very very nice.

Screen Time

Of my vague resolutions the only one I’ve really made much head way with is my resolution to watch more films. Not exactly a difficult aim and quite an enjoyable one. So since the beginning of the year I’ve seen three films in the cinema, plus one regular film club screening.

Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
The previews described it as “part heist movie, part Greek tragedy” but it was pretty much all Greek tragedy really. It had that awful inevitability about it, where you want to scream “Don’t do that. That’s a really bad idea!” and you just know its going to end badly for everyone concerned. It didn’t end quite badly enough for Ethan Hawke’s character in my opinion, but that’s just because I have an unexplainable dislike of him.

No Country for Old Men
Its not that I didn’t understand it or that I’m a heathen who only likes blockbuster action films, but really I thought that was one of the most over-rated films I’ve ever seen. Every review I’d read of it, the reviewer was practically wetting themselves over it. But it did nothing for me. I didn’t hate it but it didn’t seem anything that special. The phrase "Emperors New Clothes" sprung to mind. Yes, it looked beautiful – give the cinematographer an Oscar by all means, but then again how difficult is it to make a good looking film with a million dollar budget? I've seen lots of good looking films. Sometimes I want something more.

Frank and Cindy
The film club screening this month was a documentary about a one-hit wonder musician and his wife, as filmed by her son. I’d never heard of Frank’s group Oxo who had one hit in the USA in the 80s, but that didn’t matter. Unlike No Country for Old Men, it didn’t look good. It won’t be winning any cinematography awards anytime soon but it had something more. It was funny, it was touching, it was interesting, it was original. Unfortunately it may never come to a cinema near you but it is still going round various festivals.

Juno
Courtesy of the Sunday Times, we went to a preview screening of this last night. A comedy about teenage pregnancy doesn’t sound the most promising (I was half expecting something like a Ken Loach film!) but it was brilliant. It was funny and heart-warming and really properly feel good, which is saying something as very little usually makes me feel good. I liked everything about it - the music, the titles and since I no longer have a father, I would like to be adopted by her father in the film.

My only qualms with it is the way it is being marketed as being a script by a stripper turned writer – actually she was an advertising executive turned stripper first of all, but that doesn’t make for such good copy.

The people coming out of the cinema behind me had a strange complaint about it though. They didn’t believe the girl was 16 as "she acted more like a 12 year old with her constant drinking of Sunny Delight". This wasn’t a major part of the plot and seemed a very small odd thing to pick on, but perhaps they were students doing a thesis on “the consumption of soft drinks in contemporary cinema”.

Cultural Review of the Year 2007

In the time honoured tradition (i.e. I did it last year), here is my Cultural Review of the Year. I realise it is a bit early but doubt anything is going to make a last minute bid for a place.


Film
A pretty good year mainly due to Raindance Festival and film club. Favourites were In Search of a Midnight Kiss, Control and Zodiac. On DVD I loved Lives of Others and Little Miss Sunshine (even though I sobbed my way through the latter)

Music
Better than last year in that I did actually get out to see a few bands and in particular the Connect Festival, but my interest in new music is still waning. Reading The Observer Music Monthly’s Top Albums and Singles of the Year, I knew shamefully few. Anyway, my album of the year would be Malcolm Middleton’s A Brighter Beat or Maximo Park’s Our Earthly Pleasures. Live act of the year would go to the Jesus and Mary Chain, followed by the Polyphonic Spree.

Theatre
Without a doubt the best production I saw this year was Rock and Roll. The best production I’ve ever seen at all in fact.

Television
The final series of the Sopranos was better than the one before but ‘Homicide Life on the Street’ was my favourite show of the year, even though it is very old and we were watching it on DVD so is possibly cheating.


So what were your highlights of 2007?

The Gambler

Gambling seems to be everywhere these days. One of our friends quits his high-paid corporate job to play poker. The England Rugby team adopt Kenny Roger's song 'The Gambler' as their World Cup anthem. Then last night I watch the film 13 (Tzameti) which is also about gambling.

13 (Tzameti) was recommended to me some months ago by my cultural cohort over at Melanethos and I bought it immediately, but shamefully only got round to watching it last night. It was really very good - after a bit of a slow start, it became gripping, creating the tension the OH compared with a penalty shoot-out.

It involves a sort of gambling - I won't give away what but will use apt cliche of saying 'the stake were high'. It was far more tense than the card game scenes in 'Lock Stock...' and 'Rounders' which are the two gambling related films that immediately sprung to mind for comparison.

My stomach was in knots - I'm not good with tension, from gambling or penalties.

The Usual Suspects

Last night it was back to the Raindance Film Club. The end of the festival left a void so it was good to be back in the warmth and comfort of the Raindance organisation once more.

The film being screened was Exhibit A, which I had already seen, but standing with the first twenty and last ten minutes broken up by opening and closing the door, so it was good to see it uninterrupted from a very comfy sofa and with the ultimate Raindance accessory, a free bottle of Cobra beer (something everyone associated with the festival developed an unhealthy obsession with).

The film was good – an interesting idea, well executed. I’m wary of recommending to anyone though on two grounds. Firstly it hasn’t got proper distribution yet, despite winning an award at the festival and being nominated for a few at the British Independent Film Awards, so I’m not sure if/when/how anyone will actually get to see it. Secondly, it isn’t a barrel of laughs – in fact it makes for very uncomfortable viewing, so much so that one woman ran out of the first screening of it and one of the actors said it wasn’t the sort of thing they’d want to watch.

Unexpectedly the screening last night was followed by Q&A with the producer. And here is where I’m going to rant. He seemed like a great bloke, he spoke eloquently but unpretentiously about his film. I had no problem with anything he said or did – but rather with the contributions from the audience. The people who attend these things and ask questions/make comments always confirm to set stereotypes. Of course, I’m not referring to the people I knew there who are all wonderful, witty, talented, smart, cool, amazing people, and noticeably weren’t of the most vocal group. The types I’m referring to are these, who were all presented and correct last night and will always show up at this type of event:

1. The Over-Familiar Expert – he (its normally a he) will talk to the speaker as if they are old mates and will quite persistently chase for snippets of information. Last night’s was keen to get the nitty-gritty budget details and was pretty dogged about it. He will also lavish praise on the speaker, but in a way that is reflecting back on himself e.g ‘I loved the dialogue. That is exactly how I would have done it’. His exact achievements in the world of cinema are unknown.
2. The Slightly Drunk, Slightly Aggressive Man with a Strong Accent - his comments aren’t always clear because of the combination of drink, accent and excitement. He is definitely enthusiastic but there is an edge to his comments and you feel things could turn at any minute. Last night’s was Scottish but I’ve encountered them from every part of the UK.
3. The Very Posh But Arty Emotional Woman – She is super confident, loves the sound of her own voice and is “keen to explore” some issue that is usually way off everyone else’s perception or interest. Despite being very definitely English, she will undoubtedly feel compelled to share some deeply personal information with the room. Last night’s tried to turn it onto the topic of the abuse she’d suffered and whilst I realise that its an awful thing to have gone through (not sure what exactly as the film wasn’t about abuse), my thoughts are that this is a film screening, not the Jeremy Kyle show.
4. The Grizzled Old Cynic – His comments are brief and barbed in comparison to the others. He’s been there and seen it all before. I actually don’t mind this type that much.
5. The Dog with Comedy Timing – Actually this one is probably unique to this film club (he was there last month too). I think he belongs to number 4. He had impeccable timing with his barking though and perhaps made the most astute observations of the evening.

I suppose though I belong to a sixth category - the people who will never say anything at all.

I Spy

As is probably apparent from past posts, my work situation is by no means ideal. So I’m always looking out for other possibilities. Last week I saw an advertisement for MI5 who were looking for English Language Transcribers. I read the ad and thought ‘hmm that’s interesting’ but put it to the back of my mind.

Then yesterday, I watched the film ‘The Lives of Others’ which I heard good things about but failed to see at the cinema. The film is about Eastern Germany in the 1980s and a Stasi employee whose job it is to listen in on the bugged apartment of a playwright. I was slightly concerned before it started that I might fall asleep – not because of the plot or the subtitles, but because I’d had a heroic number of cocktails the night before so my mind wasn’t at its sharpest and it was over 2 hours long (I’m normally a stickler for the 90 minute film). But I needn’t have worried. It was absolutely brilliant and I’ve seen some pretty good films recently.

So it got me thinking about the job with MI5 and this morning I looked on their website and started the application process. Much to the bemusement of the OH, who asked me why I was interested in the job and looked wary when I mentioned the previous night’s film. He didn’t seem to think this was such a good reason to apply. My others reasons, I’m nosey & like listening to other people’s conversations and I’m unhappy where I am, didn’t seem much better. But pig-headedly I applied for an application form (this is how complex the process is – you have to apply to apply!)

But on the way to work, I was hit with some clarity and have abandoned my idea of becoming a low-level spy for a combination of the following reasons.

1. It was London-based and ideally in the future I want to leave London and don’t know what use they’d be for a former spy in Cornwall
2. The pay was less than I earn now and involved shift work
3. I wouldn’t be able to tell anyone other than my partner what I did for a living & I certainly wouldn’t be able to blog about it.
4. Discretion was vital and to be honest I’m not great at keeping secrets – I’d have to tell my mother and she always tells my sisters and aunties everything
5. I may not pass the security clearance thing – I went to some political meetings as a student and have read a lot of books by Che Guevara and Mark Steele so I’m probably already on a list somewhere
6. I don’t think my hearing is actually that good – I’m terrible at making out song lyrics so I’d probably be pretty useless at this which could led to all sorts of trouble on an international scale!


So I'm not going to join the ranks of James Bond and Jason Bourne. I always wanted to be a detective anyway, not a spy.

Tell Me About Macclesfield: Control

After the film festival where I managed to see 8 feature films and 5 shorts, you’d have thought I might have wanted a break from the cinema for a while. And ordinarily I probably would have, but Control has just come out and I was impatient to see it. So we went to the cinema on a miserable Tuesday evening.

I really enjoyed it although as with most films I’ve seen in the last two weeks ‘enjoyment’ doesn’t really seem an appropriate emotion. I’m not sure exactly what I was expecting, but somehow I thought it would be more experimental than it was – it was very much a straightforward biopic, albeit a beautifully shot one with fantastic music.

A few years ago I did try to read Deborah Curtis’ book ‘Touching from a Distance’ on which it is based, but the ins and outs of Ian Curtis’ domestic arrangements didn’t really interest me. I think I preferred the image of the tragic artist to the reality, but perhaps it’s a sign that I’ve grown up that the ordinariness is just as interesting. And when I cried at the end (rather embarrassingly as we were soon thrust out into the glaring light of the shopping centre, where my red eyes and trembling lip couldn’t be hidden), it wasn’t so much for the waste of genius, but for the broken family and friends left behind.

In interviews with the surviving members, its always obvious how devastated they were by the loss of their frontman at a ridiculously young age, but as a friend probably more than a creative force (they did after all recover and go on to greater success as New Order) and I don’t think that has ever left them. Control shows that friendship, the laddish behaviour, the ordinariness and their absolute youth which hadn’t equipped them to deal with this.

I do wonder though who is going to see Control besides those who already love Joy Division?
It doesn’t have any big stars in it like ‘Walk the Line’ (which I found hugely disappointing) or the triumphing adversity that ‘Ray’ did that seems to pack ‘em in at the multiplex, and it certainly doesn't glamorise rock n roll death as perhaps The Doors might. To existing fans the story is probably already well known what with the book, 24 Hour Party People, various Manchester music documentaries (which have been in overdrive recently with the death of Tony Wilson and the anticipation of this film). The story of Factory Records and its various bands is something so familiar to me, I suppose as the story of The Beatles might be to someone growing up in the sixties or Bible stories are to a strong Christian. I might have wondered if I really needed to see another film about this but it still brought something new to the subject and especially proves an interesting counterpoint to 24 Hour Party People, which was very much Wilson's story whereas this is undoubtedly Ian Curtis'.

More Dispatches from the frontline of independent cinema

Working in the festival booth has been strange, mainly because it seems to be the first place members of the public go to on entering the cinema. This is a problem because we only do festival passes, passholder and guestlist tickets. We are not the Box Office which is the big thing with flashing screens and the words Box Office above it. But the Box Office must have some sort of invisibility shield around because nobody spots it - they all come to us with their questions. Questions about tickets are easy enough - they are pointed in the direction of the box office which will sudden materalise in the foyer. Its the other questions that I struggle with:


Question. Where is the toilet?(times this question by 1000)
Answer: (I know this one!) There is one downstairs but you have to pay 20p. Or there is one in here but it is once you go through to the screens so you need a ticket.

Question. Is it true that a film showing in one cinema be shown somewhere else in Leicester Square? I don't think that is right.
Answer. That is kind of the system. But we don't make the rules.

Question. Is this film good?
Answer. We don't know - we haven't seen all of the festival films

Question. Where is the best place to change dolllars to pounds?

Possible Answer: A currency exchange I would think but I don't actually know where the nearest one is.

Question. Is there anything showing that has lots of murders in it? All of the films I've seen at the festival so far have been a bit too 'arthouse'.
Answer. Desparately look through the catalogue and recommend anything that might be violent. Secretly want to shout in their face 'What do you expect? Its an independent film festival'

Question. Is this the place to see films?
Answer. Yes. Secretly wanting to say 'Well, it is a cinema, what else would you do here?'


But despite these random questions, the technical hitches and delays, I'm still smiling at everyone and loving it all., and I'm slightly worried that life is just going to be so dull next week when its all over.

Take Two

There was a huge buzz around the screening of 'Being Michael Madsen' mainly because the man himself was going to be there, and Michael Madsen is a genuine star. Okay, so he's not Robert De Niro, but people know him, even if he is apparently trying to shake off the tag of being 'the one from Reservoir Dogs'. So the screening was sold out, but I was lucky enough to get a free ticket.

The film is a mockumentary about Michael Madsen turning the tables on a tabloid journalist by having him filmed by a documentary crew. It mainly consisted of talking heads from Madsen, his celebrity friends and sisiter (who completely stole the show) and actors playing the documentary makers and the journalist (Jason Alan Smith from the bar the previous night!). I enjoyed the film - it lost pace a bit about three quarters of the way through and also probably suffered by everyone else (bar his sister) being so far overshadowed by Madsen, who is just so big a prescence. Afterwards, there was a quick Q&A, where the director came out with the same dislike for documentary makers he had expressed the night before. Madsen was gruff and huge, which is what being Michale Madsen is all about.

I wasn't sure whether I was going to stay for the next film or not - being out late every night was taking its toil. But the tickets weren't selling well and having been talking to the man behind the film the night before, I felt bad at the thought of it being empty. Of course, I didn't exactly buy a ticket, I got a freebie as part of my volunteer staff status. I am so so glad I decided to stay. Alex Holdridge (is this name dropping if someone isn't actually famous yet -future namedropping perhaps?) was so nervous and to make matters worse, there was a technical problem with the sound. While it was being sorted, the lead actor, Scoot went down to the front of the audience and started talking to keep people's attention.

"In Search of a Midnight Kiss" is the best film I've seen in a long time. It was so good, I nearly cried. Its about a man going on a date with a woman on New Year's Eve. Alex described it to me as like 'Before Sunrise' with more jokes, and comparisons with that are inevitable as it involves a couple who've just met, walking around a city talking. But really that does it an enormous disservice (and I told him this afterwards when he asked what I thought). I found Before Sunrise rather pretentious, the dialogue and situation unrealistic but this felt so real. It was beautifully shot in black & white, the music was amazing, the acting was great - Scoot McNairy being incredibly likeable (unlike Ethan Hawke). But if you liked Before Sunrise, you'd like this, and if you didn't like Before Sunrise, you'll like this. There was an older couple sat in our row (probably in their sixties) and the man stood up and said that he realised he wasn't the film's demographic, but he and his wife thought it was wonderful.

Anyway, I really can't do this film justice. Go and see it when it is released. It is going to be released in America (and hopefully the UK too) around Valetine's Day as "a romantic film for cynics", which it is perfect for if you believe that every cynic is just a disappointed romantic.

IndieFest

I am consumed by the Raindance Film Festival. Apologies if this is boring to anyone, but there isn't much else going on in my life at the moment - my existence has been taken over by indie films, indie actors, indie directors and indie producers. I'm still going to work during the day, but my evenings have been all about the festival.

Wednesday night - I was working the festival box office in Cineworld Shaftesbury Avenue. This Cineworld is located in the lower reaches of hell, aka the top floor of the Trocadero Centre. The Trocadero Centre is so awful - the tacky shops, the flashing lights and infinite noise of the arcades of the inappropriately named Fun World. In the midst of this, is an independent film festival - two worlds have collided!

Thursday night - I was ushering at the Rex. The Rex is a private club and screening room (it used to be called The Other Cinema, which always led to confusion). It is plush, comfortable and a brilliant setting for the festival, even if the beer is stupidly expensive. So I'm ushering, but its a private party for Delta Airlines, so there isn't much to do. I hold the door open, smile at people, make sure the screening goes ok. The screening is the 5 short films that are up for the Best UK Short prize at the festival. As is often the way with shorts, they were a mixed bag. The first one Cherries was my favourite, a dark vision of the not-too-distant future where the continuing war in Iraq means schoolboys are conscripted into the armed forces.

After the screening, there wasn't anything to do other so I ended up sat with a mixture of Raindance volunteers & staff and associated film types. Actually, Thursday ended up being a prequel to Friday as I was talking with Alex Holdridge, the writer and director of "In Search of a Midnight Kiss" and Mike Mongillo and Jason Alan Smith, the writer/director and actor respectively from "Being Michael Madsen", which were the two films I saw on the Friday night. I don't expect anyone to have heard of any of these people yet, but if Alex Holdridge doesn't become a famous director, there is no justice in the world, but I'm getting ahead of myself here - I'll come onto the films later.

As I may have mentioned before, I suffer from almost crippling shyness at times, so finding myself in these situations where I need to make conversations with total strangers is incrediby hard for me, but that aside it was a surprisingly fun night. The bizarre conversations we had in our group included the following:

the size of Jude Law's penis, politics & apathy, Ethan Hawke, why big breasts are unnecessary, the smoking ban, what's wrong with documentary makers, suicide, Michael Madsen

Moonlighting at Raindance

Volunteering at an independent film festival probably isn’t most people’s idea of fun and I’ve no idea how it became mine, but this week and next, I’m volunteering at the Raindance Film Festival. I volunteered a few years back and had a great time, but since then life and mainly work commitments (the small matter of having a gallery to run in my spare time) stopped me from doing it again. But this year, I’ve got more time on my hands so I offered to help out again. I love film festivals but unless you can somehow blag a pass (I’ve achieved this once) it is either very expensive or you’re faced with the choice of deciding between umpteen films. But by volunteering, I’m saving myself the money and procrastination.

Last night was the opening night and as befits the name, it was a dreary rainy night, but what a great night it was. I was ushering for the opening night film, a none-too-difficult job of just making sure people could find their seats (including Mick Jones from The Clash!!!), after which I got to watch the film for free. The film was Weirdsville, a Canadian slacker comedy directed by the same person who did Pump Up the Volume. Its no Citizen Kane, but it was really funny and set the tone for the evening nicely. Before the film was a prize draw (what is it with raffles at film screenings lately?) for a guitar which was drawn by Mick Jones – sadly as a volunteer I couldn’t enter.

After the film, naturally was the After Party which was at Sound in Leicester Square. I wouldn’t normally go to a nightclub in Leicester Square, especially not on a Tuesday night, but as ever there was the irresistible pull of getting something for free. So a group of us went down there, all still resplendent in our festival t-shirts and feasted on free Cobra lager. The music was pretty good (mainly current indie stuff, then a live band along the lines of Hot Chip), Russell Brand was there, along with a lot of wannabe actors hoping to be discovered. Us volunteers stuck together, finding each other easily due to the t-shirts (it was still possible to tell a lot about a person by the way they wore their t-shirt). It was good fun considering we were a bunch of people who didn't know each other at the start of the day.

I showed remarkable restraint and left at 11.30 - I'm not as young as I once was and it was a Tuesday. I'm still absolutely exhausted today though. My keyboard has looked inviting as a pillow and I was tempted to crawl into a discarded box in the corridor for a nap earlier.