These are my notes from last night's screening - a far cry from the house-trained vampires of the Twilight world:
30 Days of Night
USA 2009 (113 minutes)
Director: David Slade
Starring: Josh Hartnett, Melissa George and Danny Huston
Nominations and Awards
• Nine nominations including four for best horror film.
“For all that die from the preying of the Undead become themselves Undead, and prey on their kind. And so the circle goes on ever widening, like as the ripples from a stone thrown in the water.”
Bram Stoker
Each year the town of Barrow in Alaska has a month in which the sun does not arise, the so-called “Thirty Days of Night”. Some inhabitants leave the town and go south for the month while others carry on with normal life. During this period a group of vampires attack the town and start to massacre its inhabitants, but the survivors, led by Sheriff Eben Olseon (Josh Hartnett), fight back and a grim battle for survival ensues.
The film is based on a graphic novel by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith which they wrote after their initial film treatment received no interest from studios. The subsequent film deal was brokered with Sam Raimi acting as producer; he had been attracted by Templesmith’s unique mood and concepts for the vampires and noted that the project was “unlike the horror films of recent years”. A straight to video sequel entitled 30 Days of Night: Dark Days is due for release in October 2010.
30 Days of Night sits firmly within the sub-genre of vampire films that links directly back to Nosferatu (1922), the greatest of the silent versions, in which Max Schreck portrayed vampire as the hideous creature from European mythology, a creature whose sole desire is to feed on the blood of others. Other films within this tradition include Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht (1979), with Klaus Kinski as the vampire, Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot (1979) (where the appearance of the vampire was based on Max Schreck’s Count Orlok) and the brilliant Let The Right One In (2008) in which a vampire in the form of a young girl helps a young boy to defeat the bullies who are making his life a misery. The Swedish film Frostbiten is set in Lapland and follows essentially the same story as 30 Days of Night but treats it as a farce.
Earlier this year Stephen King bemoaned the way in which the vampire genre has recently been hijacked by "lovelorn southern gentlemen and … boy-toys with big, dewy eyes", referring of course to the global success of the films based on Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight novels: David Slade is currently directing Eclipse, the most recent film in this series.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Thursday, October 14, 2010
A Single Man
These are my notes for the film we will be screening tonight:
A Single Man
USA 2009 (99 minutes)
Director: Tom Ford
Starring: Colin Firth, Julianne Moore, Matthew Goode and Nicholas Hoult
Awards and Nominations
• Won BAFTA for Best Leading Actor (Colin Firth)
• Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Colin Firth)
• A further 12 wins and 23 nominations
“...an indulgent exercise in 1960s period style, glazed with 21st-century good taste, a 100-minute commercial for men’s cologne: Bereavement by Dior.”
Peter Bradshaw
George Falconer (Colin Firth), an ex-pat English professor at a Los Angeles college in 1962 is struggling to cope after the death of his long term partner Jim (Matthew Goode) in a car accident. He plans to commit suicide and the film follows him over the course of his final day as he meets various people including Charley (Julianne Moore), a semi-alcoholic divorcee, and Kenny (Nicholas Hoult), a bisexual student, but these encounters force him to reconsider his decision.
The film is based on a semi-autobiographical 1964 novel by Christopher Isherwood that is set at the time of the Cuban missile crisis, i.e. before the sexual revolution of the late 1960s, when Isherwood was concerned about losing his young partner who wanted to move from Los Angeles to the more relaxed atmosphere of San Francisco. Isherwood’s decision to set the action over the course of one day was inspired by his admiration for Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, which took its structure from James Joyce’s Ulysses. Another critic noted the novel’s resemblance to Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice, even going so far as to suggest that its title could be Death in Venice, Cal.
Colin Firth received unanimous praise as well many awards for his performance in the film. In The Guardian Peter Bradshaw noted that the role of Falconer
“is such a perfect match for Firth’s habitual and superbly calibrated performance register: withdrawn, pained, but sensual, with sparks of wit and fun.”
He made his film debut with a lead role in Another Country (1984), but it was his role as Mr Darcy in the TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice (1996) that brought him to international attention. Since this success he has appeared in a wide variety of films on a regular basis, ranging from art house to purely commercial, but it is A Single Man that has brought him his greatest critical acclaim to date. He has recently received rave reviews as well as predictions of future awards for his performance as George VI in The King’s Speech (2010) which will receive its first UK screening at the 2010 London Film Festival.
Tom Ford made his name as creative director for Gucci and YSL before setting up his own brand – Tom Ford – in 2005. In his new role he had dressed many of Hollywood’s leading men, and in parallel with his own label also established his own film production company. A Single Man is the first film that his company has produced as well as his first film as director.
A Single Man
USA 2009 (99 minutes)
Director: Tom Ford
Starring: Colin Firth, Julianne Moore, Matthew Goode and Nicholas Hoult
Awards and Nominations
• Won BAFTA for Best Leading Actor (Colin Firth)
• Nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Colin Firth)
• A further 12 wins and 23 nominations
“...an indulgent exercise in 1960s period style, glazed with 21st-century good taste, a 100-minute commercial for men’s cologne: Bereavement by Dior.”
Peter Bradshaw
George Falconer (Colin Firth), an ex-pat English professor at a Los Angeles college in 1962 is struggling to cope after the death of his long term partner Jim (Matthew Goode) in a car accident. He plans to commit suicide and the film follows him over the course of his final day as he meets various people including Charley (Julianne Moore), a semi-alcoholic divorcee, and Kenny (Nicholas Hoult), a bisexual student, but these encounters force him to reconsider his decision.
The film is based on a semi-autobiographical 1964 novel by Christopher Isherwood that is set at the time of the Cuban missile crisis, i.e. before the sexual revolution of the late 1960s, when Isherwood was concerned about losing his young partner who wanted to move from Los Angeles to the more relaxed atmosphere of San Francisco. Isherwood’s decision to set the action over the course of one day was inspired by his admiration for Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, which took its structure from James Joyce’s Ulysses. Another critic noted the novel’s resemblance to Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice, even going so far as to suggest that its title could be Death in Venice, Cal.
Colin Firth received unanimous praise as well many awards for his performance in the film. In The Guardian Peter Bradshaw noted that the role of Falconer
“is such a perfect match for Firth’s habitual and superbly calibrated performance register: withdrawn, pained, but sensual, with sparks of wit and fun.”
He made his film debut with a lead role in Another Country (1984), but it was his role as Mr Darcy in the TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice (1996) that brought him to international attention. Since this success he has appeared in a wide variety of films on a regular basis, ranging from art house to purely commercial, but it is A Single Man that has brought him his greatest critical acclaim to date. He has recently received rave reviews as well as predictions of future awards for his performance as George VI in The King’s Speech (2010) which will receive its first UK screening at the 2010 London Film Festival.
Tom Ford made his name as creative director for Gucci and YSL before setting up his own brand – Tom Ford – in 2005. In his new role he had dressed many of Hollywood’s leading men, and in parallel with his own label also established his own film production company. A Single Man is the first film that his company has produced as well as his first film as director.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Waltz With Bashir
These are my notes for last Sunday's screening:
Waltz With Bashir
Israel 2008 (90 minutes)
Director: Ari Folman
Starring: David Proud, Dominic Coleman, Jason Maza, Robyn Frampton and Sasha Hardway
Awards and Nominations
• Nominated for an Oscar (Best Foreign Language Film)
• Nominated for two BAFTAs (Best Foreign Language Film and Best Animated Film)
• Nominated for Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival
• A further 20 nominations and 26 wins
In 2006 Ari Folman meets a friend with whom he had served in the Israel Defence Force (IDF) 14 years earlier. His friend has nightmares linked to his experiences during the Lebanon War, but Folman is surprised that he cannot remember anything from that period. Later that night Folman has a vision from the night of the Sabra and Shatila massacre, but he cannot tell if it is true. A friend advises Folman to discuss his vision with other people were in the IDF at the same time in order to understand what happened and to revive his own memories.
Folman spent four years making his film. It started as a live-action documentary with interviews and newsreel footage, and then the production team turned it into an animated film using rotoscope animation techniques. The resulting effect looks like one long hallucination and is perfect for the trauma of Folman’s recovered memories. Only at the end does Folman revert to actual footage depicting the victims of the massacre, with devastating effect.
The atrocities are comparable with those on the Eastern Front during the Second World War that form part of the Holocaust, but reports from witnesses within Europe go unheeded. Finally the slaughter end only when an Israeli general intervenes, and it is at this point that the film transforms from animation into newsreel.
As Philip French noted in his review, the subsequent inquiry into the massacres found Ariel Sharon guilty of gross neglect of duty and ordered that he should never again serve as Defence Minister, but twenty years later he became prime minister. However he also notes that an Arab country would not have established a similar enquiry nor would it have allowed a film like Waltz With Bashir to be made.
Waltz With Bashir
Israel 2008 (90 minutes)
Director: Ari Folman
Starring: David Proud, Dominic Coleman, Jason Maza, Robyn Frampton and Sasha Hardway
Awards and Nominations
• Nominated for an Oscar (Best Foreign Language Film)
• Nominated for two BAFTAs (Best Foreign Language Film and Best Animated Film)
• Nominated for Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival
• A further 20 nominations and 26 wins
In 2006 Ari Folman meets a friend with whom he had served in the Israel Defence Force (IDF) 14 years earlier. His friend has nightmares linked to his experiences during the Lebanon War, but Folman is surprised that he cannot remember anything from that period. Later that night Folman has a vision from the night of the Sabra and Shatila massacre, but he cannot tell if it is true. A friend advises Folman to discuss his vision with other people were in the IDF at the same time in order to understand what happened and to revive his own memories.
Folman spent four years making his film. It started as a live-action documentary with interviews and newsreel footage, and then the production team turned it into an animated film using rotoscope animation techniques. The resulting effect looks like one long hallucination and is perfect for the trauma of Folman’s recovered memories. Only at the end does Folman revert to actual footage depicting the victims of the massacre, with devastating effect.
The atrocities are comparable with those on the Eastern Front during the Second World War that form part of the Holocaust, but reports from witnesses within Europe go unheeded. Finally the slaughter end only when an Israeli general intervenes, and it is at this point that the film transforms from animation into newsreel.
As Philip French noted in his review, the subsequent inquiry into the massacres found Ariel Sharon guilty of gross neglect of duty and ordered that he should never again serve as Defence Minister, but twenty years later he became prime minister. However he also notes that an Arab country would not have established a similar enquiry nor would it have allowed a film like Waltz With Bashir to be made.
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