The End of an Era

Sad news that Philip French will be leaving The Observer later on this year:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2013/may/04/philip-french-observer-film

His column is always a highlight of the weekend and his book I Found It At The Movies was brilliant.

A small crumb of comfort is that there are more books in the pipeline...

Movies versus Cinema

A billiant speech by Steven Soderbergh on the difference between movies and cinema:

http://www.indiewire.com/article/full-transcript-of-steven-soderberghs-impassioned-state-of-cinema-rant-from-sfiff

In summary, movies are what we watch and cinema is something that is made.

Most Romantic Film? Just play it again...

The Guardian has an article on the Time Out list of Most Romantic Films and each of its critics adds his/her own top ten:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2013/apr/23/most-romantic-films-poll

As ever my list would vary over time, although Casablanca will always be number one:

The Thatcher Era - in films

It was during the 1980s that for the first time in my life I had access to good cinemas and film clubs and thus had the chance to see most of the films I wanted to as they came out. 

Not many of them are overtly political, and looking back it is difficult to see too many unifying themes beyond the fact that they are good and merit re-watching.

In no particular order here they are:

1. The Company of Wolves (1984)
I'd been a lifelong admirer of Angela Carter's and Neil Jordan's tribute to Hammer, co-scripted by Carter did not disappoint:

2. Local Hero (1983)
Gregory's Girl was brilliant but parochial.  Local Hero with its environmental theme and music by Mark Knopfler was a well-deserved international hit.

 

 

3. The Long Good Friday (1980)



I'd been a lifelong fan of Helen Mirren since O Lucky Man!  Bob Hoskins gives a superb performance and the whole film is brilliant.

 

 

4. The Draughtsman's Contract (1982)

This is the complete antithesis to the social realist films that appeared in the 1980s but was a well-deserved success. The soundtrack by Micheal Nyman was a revelation and I've loved his music ever since.

5. The Ploughman's Lunch (1983)
The script is by Ian McEwan, the director is Richard Eyre and the lead actor is Jonathan Pryce.  For me this is the film of the 1980s that best sums up the Thatcher era.

Argo

We'd decided to end our season once the clocks went forward, as the lighter evenings meant that people were less likely to turn up to see a film, even one so carefully chosen as those we try to screen.  However we'd had so many requests to screen Argo and had already booked the Village Hall for last Thursday, so we went ahead with our screening. 

There was a slow trickle of people to start with, but we needed with one of our biggest audiences of the season - and we were all rewarded with an excellent film: we know in advance what the outcome would be, but the film was real edge-of-the-seat stuff.

Here are my notes:

Argo

USA 2012                    120 minutes

Director:                      Ben Affleck

Starring:                        Ben Affleck, Alan Arkin, Christopher Denham, John Goodman, Tate Donovan and Victor Garber

Nominations and Awards

• Won three Oscars (Best Film, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Editing) and nominations for four Oscars
• Won three BAFTAs (Best Film, Best Director and Best Editing) and nominations for four BAFTAs (Best Actor (Ben Affleck), Best Supporting Actor (Alan Arkin), Adapted Screenplay and Best Music)
• A further 54 wins and 53 nominations

“The craft in this film is rare.  It is so easy to manufacture a thriller from chases and gunfire, and so very hard to fine-tune it out of exquisite timing and a plot that’s so clear to us we wonder why it isn’t obvious to the Iranians.  After all, who in their right mind would believe a space opera was being filmed in Iran during the hostage crisis?  Just about everyone, it turns out.  Hooray for Hollywood.”

 

Roger Ebert

In 1979 six American officials managed to escape from the US embassy just as it was being overrun by a pro-Ayatollah mob that held the remaining personnel hostage.  The six escapers hid in the Canadian embassy from where they were exfiltrated by Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck), an unorthodox CIA agent, who claimed to be a Canadian movie producer scouting locations for a sci-fi film called Argo.

 

The film is based on The Master of Disguise by Tony Mendez and magazine article by Joshuah Berman called The Great Escape in which Mendez exposed this startling piece of declassified secret history to the world.  There is no official corroboration to the story, but it is so incredible that it somehow compels belief. 

Ben Affleck first came to attention as an actor in Kevin Smith’s films such as Mallrats (1995) and Chasing Amy (1997).  As a writer he won an Oscar and a Golden Globe for the screenplay of Good Will Hunting (1997) which he co-wrote and starred in with Matt Damon.  Subsequently he starred in a series of films including Armageddon (1998) and Pearl Harbor (2001) which were box office successes despite receiving negative critical reaction.  Subsequent films including Gigli (2003) and Surviving Christmas (2004) were critically panned box office flops and in 2007 Affleck turned to directing, with Argo being his third film as director.  All of his films have been thrillers, with Gone Baby Gone (2007), involving a conspiracy of honourable public servants, and The Town (2010) depicting a heist by likable boson crooks, with Affleck co-wring the screenplays for both films.    

On its release Argo received widespread acclamation from US critics, with Roger Ebert choosing it as his film of the year. The film received seven Oscar nominations, although to the surprise of many Ben Affleck did not receive a nomination as Best Director.  Entertainment Weekly commented on this controversy as follows:

Standing in the Golden Globe pressroom with his directing trophy, Affleck acknowledged that it was frustrating not to get an Oscar nod when many felt he deserved one.  But he's keeping a sense of humor.  "I mean, I also didn't get the acting nomination," he pointed out.  "And no one's saying I got snubbed there!"

Here's the trailer:

Walk the Line

This is from the archive: we screened Walk the Line way back in 2007.

WALK THE LINE

USA 2005, 136 minutes

Director:          James Mangold

Starring:          Joaquim Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon

Awards and Nominations include: 

Oscars

Win                 Reese Witherspoon (Best Actress in a Leading Role)

Nominations    Joaquim Phoenix (Best Actor in a Leading Role)     

                      

Golden Globes

Win                 Reese Witherspoon (Best Actress in a Leading Role – Musical or Comedy)

Win                 Joaquim Phoenix (Best Actor in a Leading Role – Musical or Comedy)

BAFTA

Win                 Reese Witherspoon (Best Performance by Actress in a Leading Role)

Nominations    Joaquim Phoenix (Best Performance by Actor in a Leading Role)   

Total of 28 wins and 24 nominations

Walk the Line follows the life of American country music legend Johnny Cash from his dirt-poor childhood in rural Arkansas up to the high spot of his career in 1968 when he performed a live gig at Folsom Prison California.  The film begins with the preparations for the Folsom Prison gig and the story then unfolds in an extended flashback as Cash fingers a circular saw in the prison workshop: Cash was traumatised by the tragic death of his elder brother as a result of an accident with a circular saw and was made to feel guilty over it by a bitter father who denied him affection, respect and encouragement.

 

The main theme of the story is Cash’s gradual discovery of his talent as an artist, from buying his first guitar whilst in the US air force until he finally takes up a musical career after switching from gospel singing to county music.  However there is also a powerful secondary theme about Cash’s lack of self-esteem and his need to prove himself in order to impress his unyielding father, and it is this that leads to degradation and despair resulting from his drinking, drug-taking and womanising.  Finally Cash is saved by the love of a good woman, June Carter, whose whole life had been spent in the country music business.  Cash and Carter were married in 1968 and remained together for the rest of their lives: they both died in 2003.

 

It was not until film-makers started searching for an “authentic” America in the 1960s that Hollywood started taking country music seriously.  There was country music on the soundtracks of both Bonnie and Clyde and Five Easy Pieces, and in the 1970s Robert Altman’s Nashville used the country music scene to cast a critical eye over the country as it prepared for its bicentennial.  Since then there have been biopics of both Loretta Lynn (Coalminer’s Daughter) and Patsy Kline (Sweet Dreams).  However neither Lynn not Kline ever enjoyed the success or achieved the iconic status of Johnny Cash.

Here's the trailer:

Skyfall

I missed Skyfall at the cinema, so I'm very much looking forward to seeing this: somehow it doesn't seem quite right watching a James Bond film for the first time at home on TV.

Here are my notes:

Skyfall

 UK 2012                      143 minutes

Director:                      Sam Mendes

Starring:                        Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Javier Bardem, Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw and Naomie Harris

Awards and Nominations

• Won two Oscars (including Best Original Song for Adele) and three Oscar nominations (including Best Original Score)
• Won BAFTAs for Outstanding British Film and Original Music (plus nominations for Javier Bardem and Judi Dench as Best Supporting Actor and Actress)
• A further 25 wins and 51 nominations

“In this 50th year of the James Bond series, with the dismal Quantum of Solace (2008) still in our minds, Skyfall triumphantly reinvents 007 in one of the best Bonds ever. This is a full-blooded, joyous, intelligent celebration of a beloved cultural icon, with Daniel Craig taking full possession of a role he earlier played well in Casino Royale, not so well in Quantum -- although it may not have been entirely his fault. Or is it just that he's growing on me? I don't know what I expected. I don't know what I expected in Bond No. 23, but certainly not an experience this invigorating."

Roger Ebert

When M’s past comes back to haunt her Bond’s loyalty is put to the test.  MI6 itself comes under attack and it becomes Bond’s mission to track down and destroy the threat, no matter how personal the cost to him.

Skyfall is the 23^rd Bond film and many critics hailed it as possibly the best ever, with the only real challenger being the 2006 version of Casino Royale, which followed closely the plot of Fleming’s first novel.  Skyfall has no direct link to Fleming’s work but shares two of the writers who worked on Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace and is true both to his spirit and the series (Skyfall is the name of Bond’s family estate in Scotland).

Sam Mendes made his name with the Oscar winning American Beauty (1999) and followed this with Road to Perdition (2002), Jarhead (2005) and Revolutionary Road (2008), all made in the US.  There was some surprise when it was announced that he would direct Skyfall, but Daniel Craig had worked Mendes in Road to Perdition and had made the initial approach with regard to the Bond film.  Mendes had also worked with Judi Dench early in his career when he had directed her in a stage production of a Chekhove play.  In Skyfall he gives her a role, almost a co-starring role, worthy of her talent which is reflected in the BAFTA nomination for Best Supporting Actress, although Anne Hathaway won the award for her role in Les Miserables (2012).

It has recently been reported that Sam Mendes has declined an offer to direct the next James Bond film in order to focus on his theatre work, although the film’s producers have not discounted him directing another Bond film at some point in the future.

 Here's the trailer: