Apparently, Spielberg meant this as an homage to old
films noir – or at least they are a stated influence on this film (which is a mélange
of many influences). This allowed me to get over what seemed to be a flawed
ending, too obvious, too slow to play out once the villain is already exposed –
but, in actuality, many of the old noirs (especially those with late-breaking
villains) also played out in this way. And Minority Report’s ending, when you
ponder it, isn’t quite as simple as it seems because the villain’s choice
really could have gone either way, cementing the fact that it was a choice
(i.e. the key to the whole film). Seeing this film again (decades later) made
me think I really need to read more Philip K. Dick novels, having only read A
Scanner Darkly, which was great, claustrophobic and paranoid, but great. Minority Report is also paranoid, about a
future where three “pre-cog” individuals (led by Samantha Morton) lay in a
milky pool in a Washington DC office building having visions of future murders,
either premeditated (brown ball) or crimes of passion (red ball). This has
enabled a “pre-crime” task force to apprehend murders before they actually
commit their crimes. The Year is 2054
and they chase criminals using jetpacks. Of
course, this is also a Tom Cruise action film, but don’t let that dissuade you –
he’s playing a drug-addicted father of child who has been abducted (and
presumably killed). So, there’s a grimness to the film that is solidified by
its murky cinematography (by Janusz Kaminski) providing glimpses to a high tech
but grimy future (with shadowy burnt out areas not unlike those in Escape from
New York). Once the plot kicks into high gear, there are some action scenes,
allowing Cruise to strut his stuff, but the vibe here is dark, not fun. Worth a
relook, if it has been awhile.
After a stressful week, I was looking for a calming
film and finally settled on this late colour classic from Yasujirō Ozu, which I
hadn’t watched in ages. It always felt a bit different in his oeuvre from the
well-known and very familiar-feeling classics (Late Spring, Tokyo Story, Early
Summer, even Late Autumn which is also in colour). Perhaps this is because he
had the opportunity to make this film for Daiei studios rather than his contractual
home Shochiku. Or maybe it was working
with celebrated cinematographer Kazuo Miyagawa (Rashomon, Yojimbo, Ugetsu,
Sansho the Bailiff, etc.)? Also, it was his first time working with Machiko Kyôand Ganjirô Nakamura (two Daiei stars) – they play
travelling actors, presenting rough and ready kabuki shows to country towns in
Japan. Nakamura was actually a very
well-established kabuki actor so he pressed Ozu to change the name of the film
from “The Ham Actor” because he thought that might tarnish his reputation. He also refused to appear on stage in the
film so his badness is only implicit.
The plot sees the troupe arrive in a small seaside town where Nakamura
meets up with an old flame (Ozu favourite Haruko Sugimura) with whom he had an
illegitimate son, now a young adult. When his latest flame (Kyô) cottons on to
this, she causes trouble for the son and for Nakamura’s “Master”. So, it’s a family drama of common people
(shomingeki) just like Ozu’s other films -- and the “family” here is under stress
and falls apart just as in some of his other films. Other Ozu trademarks – static tatami-level
shot-reverse shot combinations, red objects in the frame, still life “pillow
shots” as punctuation, are all here.
Yet, the film (for all its sadness and conflict) feels light-hearted and
often breezy, possibly due to the Nina Rota-like (Fellini-esque) music and the
bright colours. With this combination of
emotions and especially the film’s ending, where life goes on, I guess we might
agree it is wistful (perhaps mono no aware?). So, as an antidote to a stressful
week, it worked a charm.
Shayne P. Carter is probably best known for leading the
Flying Nun band Straitjacket Fits in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, as
singer/guitarist/songwriter.They were
part of a New Zealand music scene (along with the Chills, the Clean, the Bats,
the Verlaines, etc.) that became popular in the college radio scene in the US
while I was a d.j.I don’t think I ever
saw them live back then but I admit that they weren’t my favourites from the
scene, tending toward something more dramatic, possibly like arena rock (if Flying
Nun could ever reach that scale), which wasn’t exactly my cup of tea. That
said, songs like “She Speeds” and “Hail” were on heavy rotation in my world. I didn’t know them at the time but Carter’s
earlier band, the DoubleHappys, fit my indie-rock mold better (I discovered
them later). Perhaps the difference was in Carter’s collaborators, trading bassist
and songwriting partner Wayne Elsey for David Wood (bass) and Andrew Brough
(guitar/vocals), retaining drummer John Collie. Tragically, Elsey had been
killed while on tour, falling from a train in Carter’s presence (they were both
only 21), which had a traumatic impact and affected Carter’s life as well as
his musical direction.A moving single, “Randolph’s
Going Home” (in collaboration with Peter Jefferies), was Carter’s way of paying
tribute to his friend and documenting the tragedy.Later, Straitjacket Fits got signed to Arista
Records before imploding and subsequently Carter founded Dimmer who have had
continued success in New Zealand.In
2019, Carter published his autobiography which inspired filmmaker Margaret
Gordon to track him down to make a film out of it.Like many Kiwis, Gordon has spent time in
Melbourne and has contacts with some of my friends who were drawn to
collaborate on the film (Reece Sanders worked on motion graphics and Simon
Wright helped with some editing, I think).When the producers struggled to afford to pay for the music rights for
some of the clips, I contributed $50 to their kickstarter campaign (and have my
name in the credits – is this a conflict of interest for this review?).
Although I didn’t get to see the film on the big screen when local shows happened
here last year, I did see Carter’s solo show at the Northcote Social Club (which
was great). I also bought his solo album from 2016 (Offsider) on bandcamp,
which is a stark piano-based affair, an instrument Carter apparently taught
himself for this release (recommended!); he’s also recorded with an orchestra,
provided accompaniment to stage performances, and generally taken artistic
challenges and risks rather than played it safe.I finally had the chance to watch the film on
Amazon Prime last night and, having spent the last year refamiliarizing myself
with Carter and his music, I found this a deep and moving experience.He’s an amiable character, funny and self-deprecating
despite his success. Beyond the music (which is well-documented here from the
early Dunedin scene to beyond), Gordon’s film takes us into Carter’s personal
experiences growing up half-Maori/half Pakeha (European), feeling that he didn’t
belong in either culture. Since he didn’t
feel comfortable reading passages from his memoir aloud for the film, he
recommended NZ newsreader Carol Hirschfeld to do this instead, an odd conceit
but well explained (and which also informs us a bit more about Carter’s
character and the walls of defence he has erected, which may also include his
humour). At any rate, I am pleased to say that the doco is never less than
engaging, finding a way through editing, music, graphics, found and shot
footage (visiting old haunts), and carefully chosen talking heads(archival and new) to flesh out Carter’s story and the
adjacent stories of his bandmates and other scenesters (he volunteered as a
carer for Chris Knox after the latter’s stroke!). This is a film and an artist
that you should definitely check out!I’ve
been re-evaluating Straitjacket Fits and Dimmer now in this new enriched light.
Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger
(2024) – D. Hinton
Martin Scorsese is omnipresent talking about film, particularly classic
films and film preservation. He has 493 “self” credits on iMDb which is
probably an underestimate. Occasionally,
he has made his own documentaries or essay films about his relationship with
cinema and the influence of movies he’s seen on his own oeuvre, such as A Personal Journey
with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies (1995) or My Voyage to Italy
(1999). This time, as directed by David
Hinton, he talks us through his feelings about the films of Michael Powell and
Emeric Pressburger (and their production company The Archers). I’m also a big fan of this duo – there are 16
reviews on my two blogs for films directed by Powell and often also written by Pressburger.
I gave 5 stars to The Thief of Bagdad (1940), I Know Where I am Going (1945)
and Black Narcissus (1947) and 4.5 stars to The Edge of the World (1937), A
Canterbury Tale (1944), A Matter of Life and Death (1946), and Peeping Tom
(1960). Scoresese has a particular affinity for the ballet films, The Red Shoes
(1948; 4 stars) and The Tales of Hoffmann (1951; which I still haven’t watched all
the way through) as well as The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943; which I
need to watch again and review). He narrates his way through all the films with
a healthy dose of clips and also links them to choices he made in his own films
(primarily Raging Bull, 1980). He highlights the risks they took -- their
experiments with plot, Technicolour, composition – and their fierce
independence (leading to many ruptures with producers and companies). Scorsese
also discusses his real interpersonal relationship with Powell who became a
friend and mentor and who eventually married Scorsese’s longtime editor Thelma
Schoonmaker. He talks a lot about Powell’s love for England and his embodiment
of the stereotypical English reserve.
Pressburger, a Hungarian Jew who moved to Berlin and then escaped to
England, also gets his fair share of behind-the-scenes stories and clips. In
all, it’s a touching and insightful tour through the Archers’ body of work,
although inevitably it contains an arc that moves from success to decline and
disregard. Fortunately, Scorsese isn’t the only voice heralding the cinematic
output of this great duo (and they were finally re-appreciated in their
lifetimes). If you haven’t checked out any of their great films, what’s
stopping you?
I’m pretty sure I didn’t really appreciate the Minutemen
when I saw them open for R.E.M. at the Mosque Theatre in Richmond, VA, in the Fall
of 1985 (except perhaps their Creedence cover “Have You Ever Seen the Rain?”).
This turned out to be their final tour before singer/guitarist/lyricist d. boon
died in a van accident in December of that year. Knowing that outcome adds a lot of extra
emotional weight to this otherwise straightforward doco about the band – even the
predictable ex-punk talking heads seem to have an extra level of tenderness toward
the band. Of course, a lot of that
devotion is due to the striking contribution of this band to music
history. They were punk, yes, but not in
the stereotypical sense. Instead, they were flying flannel as self-professed
corn-dogs out of San Pedro, CA, ready to absorb classic rock, country, jazz, and
everything else they heard into their short sometimes abrasive songs; they grew
into musicians with superb creative technique (drummer George Hurley gets many
kudos here). Our guide through the band’s history is bass
player/singer/lyricist Mike Watt, now an elder statesman of the music scene (as
well as in 2005). I guess I did not realise how many of the band’s songs he
wrote himself (nor the fierce rivalry between him and d. boon) – thinking about
it now, you can see the difference between boon’s political lyrics and Watt’s
more narrative take (esp. on “History Lesson Part 2” of course). He’s down to
earth, switched on, and authentic in his spiel. I’ve got 3 or 4 of the band’s
albums, including their opus Double Nickels on the Dime, which was designed not
only to compete with Husker Du’s Zen Arcade, another double LP, but was a reference to Sammy Hagar’s “I can’t drive 55” because his driving might have
been crazy/exciting but his music was boring – the Minutemen opted for the
converse, boring driving (at 55 or below) but crazy/exciting music.
Let’s face it, after the high-water marks of Walkabout
(1971) and Don’t Look Now (1973), director Nicolas Roeg never really made it as
an auteur (he also co-directed Perfomance, 1969, with Donald Cammell and served
as cinematographer for Lester, Schlesinger, Truffaut, others). This might be his last hurrah (though there
were other attempts to follow this theme to come). Perhaps following on from
the cut-up technique he used to edit the Julie Christie-Donald Sutherland sex scene
in Don’t Look Now, he used that technique for Bad Timing, although for the
entire film. Some reports suggest the film
was shot as a straightforward erotic thriller and only later sliced and diced (à
la William Burroughs) but I prefer to see it as a puzzle film, intended as
such. After Tom Waits’ “Invitation to the Blues” plays, we are in an ambulance
with Art Garfunkel tending to a comatose Theresa Russell (subsequent versions
of this scene include “Who Are You”). From there, we jump back and forth in
time across their (intense) relationship. It’s an “opposites attract” scenario
with free spirited Russell living in the moment and Freudian psychotherapy
professor Garfunkel trying to control her. In keeping with Garfunkel’s
occupation, sex and death are the main themes here, but it isn’t clear who is
unravelling more as the film “progresses” (or just as more details are added to
beginning, middle, and end). At some point,
we realise that Harvey Keitel is actually a police detective investigating
whether any malfeasance has taken place on the night that Russell was sent to
the hospital and suspicion rests on Garfunkel. Things do conclude with a
revelation and I guess that cements the feeling that both characters are equally
damaged by this oil-and-water affair. But the reason to watch this film (if you
are fully prepared) is for the madness and intensity and brave acting by both
Russell (who subsequently married Roeg) and Garfunkel (previously in Carnal
Knowledge, 1971, another risky choice) who don’t shy away from nakedness
(physical or emotional). Reviews suggest
this is polarizing (no surprise).
This is the fourth Sean Baker film I’ve watched and I
came to it a bit late, after all the hype surrounding its Best Picture Oscar
win (and the Best Director, Screenplay, and Editing wins for Baker) has died
down. I wasn’t sure if I was prepared to
like it, given the Cinderella story marketing frame, to which I only barely
paid attention, seemed a bit cliché. And, as the film unfolded, the blue-collar
erotic dancer meets spoiled Russian heir plot seemed just an opportunity to
show decadence on the screen rather than to explore any meaningful ideas about
class differences. But then the fairytale
plot evaporated and the intensity and stress racheted up, scene by scene, so
that this felt more like a Safdie Brothers outing (although I haven’t yet seen
their solo efforts) than the keenly/wryly observed naturalistic films of Baker’s
oeuvre (e.g., Red Rocket, 2021; The Florida Project, 2017; Tangerine, 2015). The
chaos and breakdown of relations between the characters is both comic and harsh
and although Anora (Best Actress Mikey Madison) remains the heart of every
scene, there are some excellent character turns by Karren Karagulian and Vache
Tovmasyan. Still, it was hard to tell if this was just a thrill ride for
viewers or something deeper – and then the final scene between gangster/minder
Igor (Yura Borisov) and Ani/Anora made the film for me. Not only did this
provide the necessary emotional release for the character but it revealed just
how many defenses had been up, perhaps for a very long time, as a protective
shield necessary in a hard hard world (even if the temptation to dream about
that fairytale might be omnipresent, if not fully conscious).
