Dracula from Reverend Productions - A theatre review from a non-theatre-goer

Dracula promo poster
©Reverend Productions -
http://www.reverendproductions.com/#!productions/ccq

If you know me (unlikely) or have read my work (even less likely), you would know that I mainly do analyses of film, and the bulk of my spare time is used watching even more film.  I can’t remember the last time I went to a play, excluding a Shakespeare production somewhere, but I think it was about about 9 years ago watching Abagail’s Party performed by a small company in North Carolina.  Oddly, the Reverend Productions, er, production (is that right?) of Dracula reminded me of that North Carolinian Abagail’s Party.

It is quite significant that, given my extensive experience with film, my gauge for assessing a play based on theatre’s aesthetic criteria is wholly shot.  Seriously, I can’t seem to assess anymore whether the play was ‘good’ or ‘bad’, but I found it incredibly interesting.  That’s why I’m writing this review now – it was interesting, and I want to tell you about it.

Reverend Productions in their own words in the programme, is an ‘Oxford-based repertory theatre company’ who ‘creates new plays around familiar stimuli.  Working through immersive, extended improvisation and a collaborative writing process, (Reverend Productions) create(s) work which seeks to explore the enduring relevance of well-known and well-loved stories for contemporary theatre-going.’  And while this may sound awfully pretentious (as well it may be – I’m not really sure) it admittedly  creates the cumulative effect of being fresh.  Or messy.  However, this collaborative and improvisational method of writing and performance is one of the links to my experience with Abigail’s Party, being a form of the writing and performance process popularised by Mike Leigh.

While the tickets were sold through the Oxford Playhouse – the spot in Oxford for dramatic theatre – the performance was at The Old Fire Station, a relatively small area, with a cafe and a few studios with the expressed aim of raising awareness of, and providing a haven for the homeless community.  The aims of the locale are both ambitious and respectable, and I was able to watch the play safe in the knowledge that there were Zumba classes taking place in the next room.  It was an unusual setup (probably. Again, I don’t know) for a production, but the facilities were extremely adequate.  But the space was my second encounter with the proposed text.  The first was a poster I found in my workplace.

The promotional poster was mostly black, set in what looks like, possibly, a public bench at night.  The standard pavement cracks, indicating the separation of the individual blocks, is the most well-lit object in the image, and above that, a standard wooden bench, with metal supports.  Sharp overhead lighting makes these objects apparent, though the bench is still largely in shadow, and sharply standing out in the top right of the image is the light reflecting off a long wisp of blonde hair belonging to a beautiful, mysterious lady in a long black trenchcoat, the overhead lighting giving her striking features a look of menace.  She looks to the left in anticipation, and just below the centre of the image is her hand, resting on the bench, fully lit.  DRACULA, in bold grey letters, starting from the middle left of the image and imposed over the back of the bench and across the darkest part of the woman’s chest.

Why would I spend so much time writing about the poster?  Because it is this, more than anything, that convinced me and made me excited to go see a small local theatre production when I generally have very little interest in attending plays.  I tried explaining it to a friend of mine, who declined going with me.  “I’m really keen on adaptations of Dracula, I said.”  I am.  I find it a tremendously fascinating story, and it was the aesthetics of the story and renderings thereof that captured my imagination and frightened me as early as the age of 7.  The aesthetics of the poster design was also highly appealing.  The darkness, the threat, the mystery surrounding it was enthralling, and based on my knowledge of the story I could imagine how it fit into the framework of the tale.

“You think that girl on the poster is hot and that’s why you’re going,” says my friend.  She’s not wrong – entirely.  What I said before about liking Dracula adaptations was true, too.  Really, I promise.

I knew it wasn’t going to adhere to the novel, that it was a contemporary imagining, and was only populated by a cast of four.  How does a small theatre production company in an intimate venue with a limited cast communicate the ideas and themes of the novel – a novel which was adapted into an excellent three-hour BBC mini-series in 1977 starring Louis Jourdan – in a 70 minute time frame?  The sheer ambitiousness of the project itself is worthy of commendation, and the execution is itself fascinating to watch unfold – the narrative alone (which I am supposing is relatively consistent in spite of apparent improvisation, due to the fact that certain music and lighting cues, along with certain props, are in place at key points) is intriguing in its minimalist approach.

The play, as I saw it, is entirely set in the London flat of Jack (Brian McMahon) and Lucy (Eleanor Rushton – featured on the poster): a newly married couple already experiencing initially unspecified problems.  As the production begins, Lucy and her longtime friend Alex (Charlie Howitt) are drinking together in the apartment, catching up and waiting for Jack to return home.  Almost immediately – which I can tell if it’s clumsy or efficient – Lucy reveals that the night before, she had a dream in which a man appears in front of her bedroom window (odd in itself as they live on one of the higher levels of the building), whom she allowed in and surreptitiously made love to. 

So far so Dracula.

Alex reveals that she has let her brother Johnny (Kit Spink), recently returned from an extended and mysterious journey abroad, and she is putting him up in her flat in spite of his erratic behaviour and over-protectiveness.  Lucy apparently knows Johnny as well, and encourages Alex to bring him over for dinner, with the aim of encouraging Johnny the opportunity to socially interact.

As Jack, a psychologist working with children demonstrating extreme sociopathy, returns home the marital tensions become apparent, but the interaction is all amiable and friendly.  Johnny comes by to walk Alex home, and Lucy initiates a conversation, which Johnny “people call me Renfield” (eh? yeah?) takes to, becoming thoroughly interested and focused on Lucy, frequently offering to be available to her anytime it is needed. 

The night goes downhill quickly, Johnny, er Renfield, blowing up at increased insistence that he talk in detail about his time abroad, Lucy revealing to Alex in confidence that she actually went out the previous night, and met this strange man on the waterfront and submitted to him, in very unspecified ways, and lots of arguing and typically British discomfort following.  Throughout, the most tense moments are broken by neighbours shoving notes complaining about the noise under the door, and Lucy begins behaving in an increasingly sinister manner.  

That, of course, is the set-up, and, in spectacularly half-British fashion, what results is a combination of a Mike Leigh-esque breakdown of social restraint to reveal true underlying emotions, along with set pieces worthy of a measured Grand Guignol.  Perhaps the cumulative effect can be compared to a modern-day stage production of an early Hammer Horror, as, yet again, film is really my only frame of reference.  But underlying this, there is an obvious attempt to create something deeper and more significant with the characters which I wouldn’t say is always successful, but is never boring.

I actually am quite sad that the run was so short (1 week, to my knowledge, I having seen it on 28 May) as it would interest me tremendously to watch it again.  I’d love to view the level of variance that improvisation provides, what is consistent, and if I am able to delve deeper into the overall structure of the production.  For such a loose-sounding structure, the piece was incredibly tight, fitting the allotted time, plot points hit at the right moments, and it never felt narratively unbalanced (the plot turned at the right points to engage further interest).

With Dracula, Reverend Productions has at least turned out a piece that is intriguing, shocking, mysterious, erotic, and completely shot through with unease and menace.  It is a strange little beast of a play, or, at least I think it is.  I don’t know, I don’t go to the theatre much.

Dracula website:

http://www.reverendproductions.com/#!dracula/c1bf2

 

Details for Reverend Productions:

www.reverendproductions.com

info@reverendproductions.com

Review: You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger

This review was intended for publication in the Journal for American Studies in Turkey, but was dropped as a) there were too many submissions and b) I already have a book review appearing.

I am including the review as it was originally written.  This means that, as the journal has an aim towards American Studies, I needed to aim the review towards the journal's needs and audience.  This means having to write some things I don't exactly believe.

However, if you wish to view an amended version, please visit my more academic blog at:
http://wickhamclayton.wordpress.com/2013/06/24/review-you-will-meet-a-tall-dark-stranger-2010-dir-woody-allen/

___________________________

You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger. Dir. Woody Allen, Prod. Letty Aronson, Prod. Co. Mediapro / Versátil Cinema / Gravier Productions / Antena 3 Films / Antena 3 TV / Dippermouth, USA / Spain, 2010.  Main Cast: Gemma Jones (Helena), Anthony Hopkins (Alfie), Naomi Watts (Sally), Josh Brolin (Roy)

 

It has become increasingly difficult to know what to expect when you go to see  'A Woody Allen Film'.  Although different periods of his filmmaking history demonstrate the use of particular aesthetic trends and themes (often depending on collaborators), since approximately 2003 he has been consistent in his films' generic and emotional inconsistency.  For every 'light' comedy, such as Scoop (2006) and Whatever Works (2009), there has been a stark, weighty drama such as Match Point (2005) or Cassandra's Dream (2007), and films that juxtapose the two to with varying degrees of stylistic integration, such as Melinda and Melinda (2004), and Vicky Christina Barcelona (2008).

            You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger falls into the latter category, with Allen using his trademark wit to punctuate what is likely his most emotionally brutal film since Husbands and Wives (1992), a fantastic feat unto itself.  Tall Dark Stranger centres on four primary characters:

Alfie Shepridge (Sir Anthony Hopkins), who leaves his wife and in an attempt to regain his youth, and marries a young prostitute, Charmaine (Lucy Punch), whom he hopes will give him a son to replace the one he lost; Helena (Gemma Jones), Alfie’s jilted wife of forty years who begins seeing a psychic to ease the pain caused by her divorce; Sally (Naomi Watts), Alfie and Helena’s daughter who is in an unhappy marriage with Roy (Josh Brolin), and considers having an affair with her new boss, Greg (Antonio Banderas); and Roy, a formerly celebrated writer struggling to maintain his success while Sally supports them, as he begins a relationship with Dia (Freida Pinto), an engaged woman who lives across the street from him.  Ultimately, this film attempts to draw a correlation between an individual's happiness and their ability to delude themselves about life's harsh realities, and most painfully, how one's delusions can affect those close to him/her.

            Stylistically, Tall Dark Stranger contains almost all of the tropes we have come to expect from Allen: warm hues in its cinematographic palette, long takes, a 'flat' 1.85:1 aspect ratio, though the camera is far less static than in the bulk of Allen’s catalogue.  He still uses primarily monaural soundtracks including pre-recorded music, largely old 78s, and features lots of talking and quipping in his dialogue.  As sometimes happens with Allen's films, if he hasn't established the appropriate rapport with an actor, the dialogue can come out stilted and forced.  If his actors are comfortable using the script as a template to build off and riff on, then the performances can seem very fluid and integrated with the style.  However, Tall Dark Stranger proves a case of wholly sufficient performances, without the smooth rapport of, say, Diane Keaton, Tony Roberts, or Alan Alda.  It is a pleasure to see excellent actors such as Sir Anthony Hopkins, Naomi Watts and Josh Brolin use their tremendous talents bringing an Allen script to life, and he manages to also elicit wonderful performances from Gemma Jones, Lucy Punch, and Freida Pinto, who inhabit and express Allen's ideas with grace and delicacy.

            However, with Allen's aesthetic style almost firmly cemented, with the exception of a few choice films, what has become particularly interesting is attempting to place him within a particular national identity.  As an American filmmaker with overtly European influences, one could claim that his early films largely set in New York aim to create a different or alternate perspective on American life.  However, with his later films, beginning with Match Point, Allen has set many of his later films in Europe, creating fascinating observations about America's place in the west, particularly with regards to cultural integration.

            Tall Dark Stranger, more than any of Allen's other European-set films, manages to place the American character, Roy, as part of a smoothly functioning multicultural whole, who doesn't particularly stand out amongst his British friends – Dia and her parents, who are of Asian descent are successful and accomplished, with little attention drawn to their cultural heritage, and also with Greg, a Spanish person who is not “othered”, despite Banderas’s prominent Hollywood image of a swarthy, sexual Latin/Spanish man.  Greg’s nationality isn’t addressed, and he is shown as equal to the other characters because he is similarly fallible.  In fact, Tall Dark Stranger arguably focuses on how humans, regardless of cultural or national heritage, are all deeply flawed, and often rendered impotent by our imperfections; an idea communicated on a slightly more microcosmic scale in Manhattan (1979).

            It is also significant that Allen's filmmaking style is effectively unchanged from his displacement from America to Europe.  He doesn't embody a typically 'American' aesthetic, if there is such a thing, which tightens the interwoven cultural strands, and highlights the film's focus on the human condition.  According to Allen, it seems, whatever your nationality, in whatever (western) country you inhabit, life is equally difficult and disappointing, and the only thing that matters is how successfully you can lie to yourself.

Solaris: Appearing on Kinobuff's podcast. Listen, won't you?

Hi everyone.

This week I had the honour of appearing as a guest on the latest podcast by Anna (Kinobuff), in her blog on Russian cinema.  Anna, Derek and I analyse individually and comparatively the three versions of Solaris: Stanislaw Lem's 1961 novel, Andrei Tarkovsky's 1972 film, and Steven Soderbergh's 2002 American production.

Go here:

http://kinobuff.com/2012/06/30/solaris-solaris-solaris/

to hear our good-natured, pizza-fuelled discussion on a terribly hot day.  We had a great time, and I hope to join them again another time!

Follow Anna's blog, as she consistently provides wonderful, insightful, and entertaining analyses of some great Russian film texts.

Like Death, But Faster- The failed prototype of a conference paper

Hi Everyone!

So, on 15 April 2012, I spoke at the tail end of the annual British Association of American Studies conference at the University of Manchester.

I had initially written this paper, and upon reviewing it en route, realised that I could not, in good conscience, read what I had written.  First, I made a couple of blatantly unsubstantiated claims, which are easily disproved.  I made them in the first place because I was working on my fallacious memory of films that I had not seen since I was about 11.  Even though I rewatched them, my early faulty memory dominated my textual analysis- always a bad move.  Second, the writing style was incredibly stilted, and I could in no way comfortably read this without boring everyone, including myself.

With powerpoint presentation in hand, including several film clips, and a list of quotes and references, I proceeded to use these sources to create a presentation based on my entirely revised memory of viewing these films.  What I came out with was a far more accurate account of the similarities between the texts I was researching.

For your amusement, however, I am here publishing my original paper in its horribly misguided form.  The areas highlighted in red are entirely untrue and were excised from the final presentation.  Some other claims are extremely tenuous, and I left those out as well in my presentation.  However, quite a bit of this did make it in, placed in a more conversational manner and organised slightly better, I feel, without having to worry about the information matching my speech cadence.  I also added in a couple of references at the bottom that I included, but couldn't quite fit into the format of this paper.

Enjoy, and if you want to ask anything, please do!

Wick.

PS- I'm NOT including a Bibliography, but if you want a reference, ask anytime.

Like Death, But Faster: Superheroes and the American Slasher


Although within the last ten years, superhero films have been a moneymaking staple of the Hollywood film industry, examples of successful superhero franchises are still apparent from the mid-80s and earlier.  Although comic books appear to be the primary medium for the appearance of these stories, popular television series such as “Superman” starring George Reeves, “Batman” starring Adam West, and “Wonder Woman” starring Linda Carter were all significant cultural artefacts within the 50s, 60s, and 70s, respectively.  Although the Christopher Reeve-starring Superman series is the only example of a significant superhero-based film franchise.  Roz Kaveney analyses Christopher Reeve’s Superman as the perfect balance between tongue-in-cheek humour and serious steely integrity, (2008; 233) and David Hughes claims that Christopher Reeve as the right choice, in retrospect, to play Superman properly.  Other films, such as the film spin-off, Batman: The Movie (1966; dir. Martinson) starring West, and Supergirl (1984; dir. Szwarc) starring Helen Slater are notable additions to, what can essentially be considered a subgenre of action.

Based on box office figures, the popularity of these films ascended and declined simultaneously with that of franchise slasher films, such as Friday the 13^th and Halloween.  However, while the Superman franchise died out, the slasher franchises appear to have adopted formal traits of the superhero film, giving it a new lease on life.  While initially adopting a distinct form, different from the superhero films, the slasher, beginning in 1984 with the appearance of A Nightmare on Elm Street and its seemingly indestructible antagonist, Freddy Krueger, with his own set of overbearing strengths and obscure weaknesses, began to infuse these antagonists with characteristics of the superhero.  What results is a group of film series finding new life by appropriating elements of these dying superhero films, resulting in an antithetical framework: the anti-superhero, or, indeed, the super anti-hero.  An observation of the narrative styles and film forms demonstrate similar framing of not only the stories as they are told, but also the appearance and presentation of these antagonists; Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees from the Friday the 13^th films, and Michael Myers from the Halloween films; in comparison to Superman, Batman, and Supergirl.  By doing this I aim to demonstrate both the aesthetic influence of these superhero films, and the way in which the generic interplay of these conventions, in turn, informed later superhero films to create a form of dysfunctional superhero with considerably more depth and darkness than the Superman who fights for “truth, justice, and the American way”.

The narrative structures of the early superhero films are fairly standard across the superhero genre.  Firstly, the narratives are largely episodic as opposed to causally driven.  Typically, each film establishes the superhero and the antagonist/s separately, each at the centre of various set pieces.  Eventually, however, the antagonists cause a problem with which the superhero becomes involved, and gradually the antagonists attempt different ways of dispatching or using the superhero until the climax, where he/she defeats the villains.

This is the same with the late-80s slasher franchise films: the protagonists and super-antagonists are developed individually through a series of set pieces.  Eventually the protagonists and super-antagonists become aware of each other, and after a series of meet-and retreat encounters, they face each other in the climax.

Also, the superhero films and slashers share narrative elements regarding identity and anonymity.  For example- Batman/Bruce Wayne wears a mask, as do Jason from Friday the 13^th and Michael from Halloween.  Superman’s disguise is Clark Kent, but this serves the same purpose- to blend in with others so that he can walk around undetected.  However, there is a distinct difference between the killers such as Jason and Michael and the superheores like Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent: Michael’s mask is linked to his murderous actions, though it isn’t addressed in the original franchise, and Jason’s mask covers his deformity, the uncovering of which Ian Conrich notes as a climactic feature of the Friday the 13^th films. (2010; 180)  One can almost imagine this as the case with superheroes as well.  However, the discovery of the true identity of either the superheroes or the masked killers appear as significant narrative drives of these films, except in the Superman films, where this search is peripheral.  However, it plays a major part in  Batman: The Movie, and the entirety of A Nightmare on Elm Street is dedicated to discovering who Freddy is, what his powers are, and how he can be defeated.

A significant contribution provided by masks is that of visual and iconographic prominence.  Here is a slide featuring the 3 primary superheroes and the 3 primary super-antagonists.  Naturally, Superman and Supergirl look very similar, though Supergirl is a bit curvier.  However, each retains a distinct visual look that clearly sets them apart from other characters, not only within each film, but typically within the whole of cinema.  In fact, Conrich states, “Jason’s hockey mask is so much part of his identity – his one essential accessory – that without it he is incomplete and maybe even unable to function convincingly as the executioner.” (180)

Let’s look at the Slasher films from the period first. According to the documentary Going To Pieces, 1984 showed a point of low box office receipts for the slasher subgenre, though Friday 13th The Final Chapter fared well.  However, later that year, A Nightmare on Elm Street took the slasher deep into the realm of the supernatural.  Of course, this occurred as Friday the 13^th Part V: A New Beginning was in production, which attempted to use the same formula as previous films reconfigured, to use Vera Dika’s term, but relatively unsuccessfully, though it still made a profit.  The A Nightmare on Elm Street series continued to create sequels, and in 1986, Jason Lives! Friday the 13^th Part VI was released, using gothic imagery and sensibilities, and bringing him back from the dead via lightning bolt a la James Whale’s Frankenstein.  In Friday the 13^th Part VII: The New Blood from 1988, Jason faces against a teenage girl who is a telekinetic.  That same year, Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (dir. Little; 1988) attempts a closer return to the early 1980s slasher formula, and it introduces the character of Jaime, who is the daughter of Laurie from Halloween and Halloween II, who has died before the events of Halloween 4.  Jaime, however, through nightmares, is able, on a small level to foretell the danger that Michael presents.  This is followed by Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers, in which Jaime is rendered mute by the traumatic experience of the previous film, but shares a psychic connection with Michael, in a similar way that the protagonist has psychic connection to Jason in Friday the 13^th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan, released the same year.  Significantly, this is the same year as the release of Tim Burton’s Batman.

Visually, all of these superhero and slasher films frame these characters prominently, in positions of power. (PICS).  This varies greatly from the earlier slashers in that these tend to cover and disguise visual evidence of antagonists.  For example, the early Halloween films largely shoot Michael Myers in the shadows, emerging occasionally.  In fact, the character, in the credits, is referred to as ‘The Shadow’.  In Friday the 13^th Parts 2-5 Jason either is the embodiment of POV shots or is shot in fragments or from a distance until the climax.  However, in the mid-80s, these films began to show these killers more frequently.  Traditional conceptions of both superhero framing and super-antagonist framing are the use of low angles, with distinctive lighting, and featuring prominently the iconographic elements.  However, what is most consistent between these presentations is how the body overall is presented.  The physicality of the characters along with the feats of strength are highlighted through either fragmented close-ups which show the detail of the bodies, or full shots or long shots to show the whole figure, which is sometimes used to demonstrate the scale of feats of strength or the visual alternation between the two.  This is the case with this clip of Superman:

One interesting overlap occurs- In 1987, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace was released, in which Superman’s arch-nemesis, Lex Luthor, creates a villainous superhuman counterpart for Superman using the sun’s nuclear power.  Here is the sequence where he is first introduces.  This has similarities to the presentation of slasher villains, as opposed to the villains in earlier Superman films.

Tino Balio includes Batman (1989; dir. Burton) along with a list of other late 80s-early 90s action films that have adopted a new formula within the Hollywood industrial context: Big antagonists, lone underdog triumphs over a system, and a non-Soviet troublemaker (174).  Balio, however, is briefly summarising industry genre standards from the period.  Batman, however, becomes the first film in the new superhero cycle to adopt and appropriate elements of the recently-utilised superhero-infused slasher film.

The significant difference between the earlier superhero films and Batman is that, while the earlier films show sequences of the heroes helping and saving people, Batman is focused almost solely on fighting and defeating the criminals.  In the opening sequence he doesn’t come to the aid of the family being robbed, but hearing their screams, he seeks out the robbers.  You can see from the clip they are already counting the money from the robbery.  When he does finally come to save someone, Vicki Vale, she appears to be more of an inconvenience and a hindrance.  This is a similar confrontation approach to Michael and Jason, who kill anyone or anything in their way.

Ultimately, by placing superhero narratives and framing within a darker, more violent genre and context, this, in some ways, informs the aesthetic of Batman and even Batman Returns.  Observe, for instance the use of expressionistic aesthetics and gothic narrative devices within Friday the 13^th Parts 6 & 7 next to Batman.  Roz Kaveney states, “In its best sequences, the film is a wonderful blend of the action thriller of its own time and the expressionist gothic nightmares of earlier ones.” (2008; 240)  What we end up with is an aesthetic and generic cultural interchange and symbiance, which has contributed to the progress and evolution of generic forms, resulting in culturally identifying this next wave of superhero not only darker and more complex, but dysfunctional through feeding off of cultural awareness and trends.

Info to be included:

 David Hughes addresses Christopher Reeve as the only person, in retrospect, who could play Superman properly, as well as the dark, psychologically complex aesthetic of Batman.

Roz Kaveney analyses Christopher Reeve’s Superman as the perfect balance between tongue-in-cheek humour and serious steely integrity.

Silence, Smoke, and the Importance of Atmosphere

I love scary.

The problem with any student of horror, or at least is the case with me, is that one becomes hardened extremely rapidly.  I remember the last three times a film scared me: 1- In 2008, I saw The Toolbox Murders (1978) for the first time, and although it was a beautiful mess of a film, the raw energy thrown into it made me listen closely in bed that night to every creak in the house. 2- Around the same time, I watched Suspiria, which I had seen at least 5 times before, repeatedly, and woke up in the middle of the night to hear a loud screeching coming from a room that was glowing green.  Turns out, someone had left a green nightlight on in the room where a hamster was running in the wheel which was grinding against the side of the cage. Crisis averted. 3- In 2004- I watched Ju-On for the first time, after having initially seen the American version (The Grudge), and I had to turn the lights on mid-film.

Revisiting Ju-On last night, after a long period of absence, brought home exactly how important building suspense and atmosphere is to eliciting fear and horror.  Although it uses identical rhythm and timing for its big scares, its juxtaposition of contrasting light and dark visuals (particularly cutting between shots [think about the internet meme in which you see a pretty standard location picture, and you notice, within a dark patch, that you can see somebodys face or something]) works incredibly effectively- the viewer's eyes become adjusted to the light image, so registering patterns in the dark shots immediately following them takes a moment longer than in an all-dark sequence.  And although there's a nice little synth score incredibly reminiscent of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films, the music knows exactly when to shut up. I don't mean low, pulsing tones to build suspense.  I mean long, protracted periods with no musical accompaniment whatsoever.  The fact that we are not told how to feel renders the absence much more palpable, so that when something DOES appear, aurally or visually, it is much more potent.  The point - which Ju-On highlights perfectly - is that while the Japanese can rely on Hollywood-rendered senses of rhythm and pacing, these films excel in reducing emotional information where it provides greater impact for the viewer.  Create the atmosphere, then leave the audience in near-sensory deprivation, then hit them hard.  They may not know WHY they feel the way they do, but rest assured, they feel it.

Similarly, The Name of the Rose works almost identically, but to different ends.  Until the climax, the truly horrific set pieces cut long before the payoff, so the viewer is immersed in nearly two hours of unresolved, slowly bubbling tension.  With this film Jean-Jacques Annaud proves to be a master of the establishing shot.  The locations for the exteriors go a long way to help this.  Extreme long shots of this isolated cloister in the mountains of Northern Italy render tangible the removal from the rest of the world.  Indeed, it feels like this cloister itself is all that there is to civilization, and, for all intents and purposes, it is.  The mist-shrouded mountains look beautiful, forbidding, and nearly impassable.  The cloister itself stands as a monolith almost entirely seen in shadow.  The slightest movement of the sun itself registers upon the dark, shadowy facade of the turrets.

Ok, forgive me waxing prosaic, but these are truly beautiful establishing shots.  Include the wonderful James Horner score and I can really only compare this to the general sense of locational tension built around Roman Polanski's Macbeth.  The singularly grotesque appearance of all characters, save Sean Connery's William of Baskerville and Christian Slater's Adso of Melk, are truly impressive visually.  It doesn't matter that there are no moderate climaxes mid-narrative.  All of the tension bubbles throughout, and is released in fantastic fashion in the final few moments.  It is a masterclass in restraint, with an excessive payoff.

Though I haven't read Umberto Eco's original novel, I find this, as a film, an engaging experience.  Although a few of the plot points, which are no doubt central to Eco's intent of developing a text steeped in his theories of semiotics, feel a bit silly and stilted within the film, it doesn't matter.  In fact, the whole WHY of the film doesn't matter.  In the end, it is all about what we experience, and the frustration created through delayed satisfaction.

Yes, this was a bit of a ramblesome and meandering meditation, if you will, but, I truly appreciate the skillful establishment of atmosphere where my tendency to be scared has diminished through increased exposure to horror films.

I still adore them though.

The Artist, or: Why Even A Mild-Mannered Sort Loses it Sometimes

My well-publicised francophobia aside (in cinematic terms at least; hey, I'm an eastern-seaboard American who has adopted Great Britain, neither of which has any love lost for the French [thank-you-very-much-Plantagenets-and-Freedom-Fries]), I found myself truly disgusted whilst viewing The Artist last night.  Well, not disgusted. Miffed, say.

How can a film about an actor dog and his pet human that does fanciful tricks like funding and directing his own failed vanity project receive so much acclaim and esteem amongst the film industry, critical community, and viewers in general?  I've met many people who enjoyed the film and still have retained use of their eyes, so the fact that the wonderfully reappropriated film scores for the soundtrack (including perfect usage of Bernard Herrmann's love theme from Vertigo- one of the most perfect pieces of film scoring ever written) does not fully account for their enjoyment.

To start, let me adapt a contemporary American TV slogan and say: What's my beef? (That was from the late 1920s, right?)

The use of the silent film format is regressive.
When was the last time you thought: Dude, when's the next document to be written in Egyptian heiroglyphs coming out?  Knowing my friends, at least one or two of you will have thought that within the last month.  But that's not enough by a long shot to warrant the need for such a text, nor for it to be universally lauded.  Even if it finds a way to express the word "iPhone" in said form, or comes up with a new way to draw a duck.  The fact is, it is an old, obsolete form, and even if it looks nice and pretty, it brings very little new to the table, and even if it is done, the author is challenged by the demand to consistently justify this aesthetic choice, both within and without the text.

This is a struggle the The Artist accepts, embraces, and ultimately fails at.  This can be evinced through the similarly ambitious, but, I would consider failed, experiments in the silent film format by Guy Maddin in The Saddest Music in the World and Dracula.  While I would argue that The Artist is far more entertaining and much less pretentious than Maddin's work, it is kind of like saying "Light green is more pretty and less green than dark green".  Both of these films succumb to the same pitfalls- they both superficially justify this choice, but the intertextual interplay between contemporary sentiments and old aesthetics becomes tiresome.

This can, however, be set apart from Mel Brooks's Silent Movie, wherein, not only is the silent film formula played for laughs, but contemporary knowledge is central to deriving narrative meaning, and, most importantly, humour from the text.  That in itself is the justification, and it is utilised perfectly (should Brooks prove your sort of humour-it's not particularly mine, but I appreciate his effort in this case) throughout to create the intended effect.  If nothing else, Brooks can't be accused of appropriating old formulas to his advantage.

The Artist appears to use the silent film framework for three reasons: a) To palpably create a sense of historical positioning, b) To immerse the viewer into the world of its protagonist, c) To create a metaphor about, not only the protagonist's inability to express himself verbally, but aslo about the human condition.  The film entirely succeeds with the first two, but with the third, The Artist bludgeons the viewer with this metaphor to the extent that all subtlety and nuance, hence, truly embedded meaning is thrown out the window.  It no longer manages to be a film in its own right, it becomes a film about the metaphor, undercutting this aesthetic sensibility.

What is there to like?
It is kind of lovely, I guess.
In fairness, it is a nice diversion with a few laughs and has the potential for happymaking.  There are some genuinely clever moments, which, unfortunately, feed the metaphor of inability to communicate.  There is something beautiful about it, but only superficially.

In terms of the awards-season buzz, though, its success, to me, is more of a travesty than the great Crash of 2005.

Some might accuse me of being a bitter old cynic who fails to find pleasure in some of life's simplest joys.

Well, yeah.  But I still think I'm right.

Reviving the Goat

Hey guys (non-gendered friendly  pronoun),

So my parents have been visiting for the last six weeks (Amazing folks, them), and this has really given me a chance to re-watch some films, when I normally view more new ones.
Among these re-watchings: The Big Sleep, Double Indemnity (dialogue has never been written better than in either of these), Inception (still thoroughly impressed), and ITV's adaptation of The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher (Close to the book, only slightly tiresome).  Also, although they provided semi-awkward viewing experiences with my parents, I still thoroughly enjoyed re-watching Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, The Fury and Eastern Promises. All of them are still astounding, and The Fury, though my parents found it silly, is explosive. Really. Explosive.

I have also been able to see a couple of films that I have managed to miss thus far: The Last Samurai (semi-formulaic but very impressive), and Play Misty for Me (Gender Politics? What? It was awesome, yeah? Question marks?)

The other night I just finished reading the first volume of Peter Ackroyd's  proposed six-volume set on the history of England, entitled Foundation.  It was a very compelling narrative history from the very VERY beginning up to Henry VII and the start of the Tudor period.  I am eagerly looking forward to the next volume.  Ackroyd is incredibly accessible and readable, and if you want a fun beef up on your English history, I would definitely recommend.  I also read American Psycho for the first time, and I have no words to express how much I loved it.  Maybe I do. Funtabulous...? That's a word, right?

Since the new year, I've been listening to the Reznor/Ross 3 hour soundtrack to Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.  Very dark and bleak, but incredibly lovely.  I've also started revisiting late 80s Sonic Youth, including Sister, Daydream Nation and Ciccone Youth's The Whitey Album.  These are standard Sonic Youth fare, but each time I listen there is something new to be gleaned.

Right, This isn't particularly detailed, but this is largely an excuse to get the blog jump-started again.
Feel free to read my old posts, friends, and do ask if there's anything you'd like me to cover, assuming you can be bothered to listen to me natter.

Many thanks, and I'll try to blog more regularly.
Tell your friends and subject them to me.

Oh yeah, my kid can't stop watching The Muppets Take Manhattan. It's kind of sweet.