People said they liked my writing. I noticed that I liked writing. I got a little motivated to write, but what? This blog is easy, with my muse, the dead Jane Spears. What else could I write? How could I enter that void of creating something from nothing? It has always fascinated me how writers […]
I’ve got a few movie reviews queued up but this one comes first because I helped make it.
The weekend before last, as part of the 48 Hours film competition, I joined a bunch of folks (lots of them Hanna’s friends and church-mates) to make a short film in 48 hours. We got the “monster” genre and the same givens as everybody else. I was in the writing team and then was “1st AD”. With no experience whatsoever, I think that title was a slight overstatement. Notwithstanding, I had a heap of fun. I like our movie, too and feel pretty good about my contribution to it. The judges weren’t as impressed. Perhaps they didn’t put as much emphasis on writing, acting and directing over production values (ours were fairly rough) as we thought they would.
But, decide for yourself.
By the way, watch this space. I have shot my mouth off about writing some scripts so I guess I have to now. Plus, I had such fun on the set and want to get more experience so I’m putting myself out to help on more films. Secret ambition: to be “Second Second Assistant Director” in something decent (and to know what that means).
Tags: movie vampire 48hours
I wish I’d made this up but the idea came from email as spectroscopy, quite cool in itself. Ed tells me that spectroscopy is the analysis of light frequency to determine molecular structure. You go layer by layer, identifying the number of electrons in each. As a metaphor for this, it stands up. I know […]
A few snippets of enjoyment and a foray into futurism, amidst my misery. I have joined a team that is entering the 48 Hours film competition this year. Hanna and a bunch of the folks working on her movie are in it. At least one of the team was in the group that won the […]
Look Both Ways IMDB Year: 2006 Writer: Sarah Watt Director: Sarah Watt Rating: 5 out of 5 Those stars that I put on these reviews? You know that they don’t mean “it’s good”, don’t you? What they mean is I like it. The Aussies have done it again. Strangely, only I added Little Fish to […]
It works because it plunges me into a dilemma. Capote is singularly single-minded. Can anyone quote his line as he bribes the Prison Warden for access to visiting Perry? But is his work really his sole motivation? Yes, if you count his identification with Perry as providing the content for his literature. “It’s as if Perry and I grew up in the same house. And one day he went out the back door and I went out the front.” We don’t so much love him as get drawn into the question.
Capote doesn’t love Perry either. He’s just drawn into the question. The fact that, apparently, he isn’t horrified by him is all that distinguishes their relationship from ours with Truman.
Of course Philip Seymore Hoffman deserved the Oscar. I was a fan already. He commits from the outset. Effete, right? As the audience moves on to its next fascination, PSH is the only one who isn’t disposable.
Tags: capote
I don’t usually like feel-good movies. I like gritty. I cut a little slack for NZ movies. I liked Whale Rider. The reason that most feel good movies get up my nose is their sentimentalism, simplistic emotion, schmaltz, sugariness or, worse saccharine. If I’m going to feel really good at the end of something, I want it to be for a reason, hard-won in some way that has some depth, that illuminates something about the world or humanity.
Yes, I liked Me and You and Everyone We Know. I even liked “the Station Agent” (it went right to the limit, then pulled back). But I really did not like “Amelie” or , “Erin Brokovich”, as examples.
No. 2 I like because it is about life. Old Maria recognises the stuckness in herself and the system around her. A legacy from those who have gone before, the second world war, colonialism. In her irrascible way, she makes an intervention. Not a didactic or particularly calculated one but a disrupting one, none the less. She has been reading social complexity theory. It works because something shifts. Gradually, the associating, eating, singing, dancing, fighting, truth, love and leadership that she wishes for all emerge.
Maybe I am naiive, but for all the simplicity of the plot, I can’t say I found it predicatable. More, easy to go along with. And it was beautifully portrayed, with many funny scenes of ordinariness. I think my favourite was a dialogueless moment between Maria and Charlene in Maria’s bedroom. Yes, the music was stirring but the interaction between the two was rich and profoundly moving. That’s gotta be a measure of acting and directing.
I say “Yes” to this celebration of life with vivid performances from everyone in the cast.
Requiem for a Dream crossed with Neighbours? Not everybody rated Lantana but I did: five stars. I liked Somersault, too but Little Fish pushes at the envelope. For a while I wanted it to get started and regretted recommending it to Ed. Was this a dull suburban character drama? Who said I wanted to know […]
One night sitting around talking about movies, I dared to say to Jane: “You never want to see anything I want to see. We always end up getting Merchant and Ivory”. I know that’s what I said because Jane immediately wrote it down. Then, referring to her records, she calmly compiled this list of the […]
Alright, movies are back. I went to two film festival films on my own. I chose them carefully, not to be “good” movies but to speak to me in the process I am going through. Then I realised that’s what a good movie is. First I saw 2046 but I didn’t like it much. It’s […]