The Destructive Mrs Ibetolis

In case you're wondering, no I haven't done another runner.

I'm waiting for a new router and am currently typing this at work. 

You see, Mrs Ibetolis thought that by moving my previous router, albeit temporarily, she could rearrange a few things, however Mrs Ibetolis then forgot that said router had been moved and managed to walk into the cable, sending the router flying into a wall and thereby smashing it. 

No router.  No internet.  No blogging.  Unhappy Ibetolis.  Apologetic Mrs Ibetolis. 

I'll be back, hopefully this weekend, depending on when the router arrives.  Catch you all soon.

Coming To A Cinema Nowhere Near Me - 18th March 11'

After last weeks disappointing releases, this week oversees the release of a film by a considerable British talent, an old British stalwart, another past master whose glory days are far behind him and a Sundance winner from some years back that finally got a UK cinema release.

Submarine (Richard Ayoade)

Best known as Maurice Moss, the king of geekdom in the mighty British cult comedy 'The IT Crowd', Richard Ayoade's emergence as a burgeoning director will come as no surprise to those who have followed his wonderful music videos (Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Super Furry Animals being my particular favourites) and guest directing slots on the sitcoms he's best known to star in.  What may surprise is the assurance, panache and skill he has brought to his debut feature and the praise that has followed since it's premiere at the Toronto Film Festival last year.  I get a little too excited when a new British talent emerges, something that happens less and less with every passing year (McQueen, Ramsay Arnold and Barnard the exception) so let's hope that Ayoade is the real thing.

Route Irish (Ken Loach)

And speaking of 'the real thing', Ken Loach's dalliance with the light side, 2009's brilliant comedy drama Looking for Eric, seems to be over for the moment as we're back on familiar territory with his latest feature.  'Consciously political', as described by Observer film critic Philip French, Route Irish is Ken Loach's 'response to the war in Iraq', with the legendary director battling themes he's pursued on several occasions throughout his long career.  Loach's films can be a mixed bag of hit and miss but they never fail to stimulate debate and as an old fan of his persistent rhetoric, I look forward to whatever the old master puts on the screen.

You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger (Woody Allen)

At some point, in the past couple of years, I have mentioned, more than once, that I will never, ever, as long as I so lived, watch another NEW Woody Allen film.  Yet, I can't help myself, it's like the fascination you have with a car crash, you know what you're watching is awful but somehow you can't turn your head away from the ensuing carnage.  However, there are moments when that Woody you loved, you adored, fleeting though it may be, shows flashes of the genius, of the man you once knew, it's there in the DNA and you hope and you pray that one day, that a spark of recognition, a moment of clarity will engulf him and the Woody of old will spark into life onto our screen.  I know and you know it's not going to happen and this film isn't the one that you hoped it would be but....you never know.

Although, you really do.

Ballast (Lance Hammer)

Finally securing a release in the UK, Lance Hammer's 2008 feature film debut was met with critical acclaim and harboured the emergence of a promising new talent.  Featured on many critics top 10 of the year, Ballast picked up several awards as it traveled the festival circuit over the course of the year but has had to wait a long time until it secured distribution over here, something I afraid I'm having to get used to.  Why it has taken so long to get released I just don't know, considering some of the dross that finds distribution easily it beggars belief but I for one am glad that it's finally here.

So that's the lot for this week, is there anything on the horizon stateside I should keep an eye out for?  Or, what should I expect from Ballast?  Let me know. 

Coming To A Cinema Nowhere Near Me - 11th March 11'

After the buzz of the Oscars the good/bad movie ratio has certainly swung back in the favour of the bad, with that said there is at least one UK cinema release that I am looking forward to.

Norwegian Wood (Tran Anh Hung)

The adaptation of the huge international best seller by Haruki Murakami, (possibly his most straight forward work compared to the likes of the The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle or Kafka on the Shore), by Tran Anh Hung has been met with a mixed bag of reviews, although all were knocked out by Ping Bin Lee's photography and Johnny Greenwood's score and to be honest, that will be enough for me, but the prospect of Hung meets Murakami is far too intriguing for me to ignore.

I've been looking forward to Norwegian Wood since it premiered at the Venice Film Festival in September 2010 and as a big fan of Murakami's work, I'm not so sure if I'll be at an advantage or disadvantage, I think this is one film I won't be able to wait for until it's released on DVD.

Well, that's the lot this week, hopefully things will pick up soon, however over the course of the next couple of months we have all these to look forward to, so there's always hope:

Submarine (Ayoade), Route Irish (K.Loach), Cave of Forgotten Dreams (Herzog), Oranges and Sunshine (J.Loach), Source Code (Jones), Meek's Cutoff (Reichardt), Sparrow (To), 13 Assassins (Mike), La Quattro Volte (Frammartino) and, hopefully at some point this year, The Tree of Life (Malick)

That's all for now, are there any future releases I've missed and should keep an eye out for?

Short Reel : Condemned (Oren Shai)

At a mere 14 minutes, I guarantee that you would wish 'Condemned', the latest short from emerging talent Oren Shai, was longer.  It's my only criticism of this brilliant little gem.

With an obvious cinema lovers eye, Condemned plays homage to 1950 melodrama, women in prison movies, spaghetti westerns, exploitation cinema (minus the exploitation) and noir paranoia , all with an unique stylish voice of its own.  What is so unique is that none of it is played for cheap thrills, shock value or nodding approval, at the heart of Condemned lays a story about a female prisoner's vulnerability and fear; real or not and a patience of mood, tone and execution. 

Prisoner #1031(Margaret Anne Florence) waits lonely in her dank, dingy cell in a sleep deprived insomniac daze, the voice in her head acting as narrative, allowing us into her paranoia now made more manic by the lack of rest.  A prison guard, brilliantly played by Ashlee Atkinson taunts her pleas to see a doctor, her claims she'll be dead soon, that she's snitched and everyone is in on it; as paranoid as she sounds, atmosphere, lighting, cinematography and that wonderful Spaghetti Western like music tell you otherwise, prisoner #1031 may well be on borrowed time.

Enter Prisoner #1059, Laura (Aprella), a blonde bombshell, all teeth and as sweet as pie, her new cell mate, to stoke the fire of desperation further and to add to Prisoner #1031's growing paranoia. Who is #1059, her executioner? Her saviour? Her guardian? Just another prisoner?  Keeping it simple, Condemned offers no easy answers, dialogue, due to the nature of Prisoner #1031's plight, is unreliable to say the least, our protagonist so far gone that she's hardly credible, the cinematography, atmospherics and set design are at contrast to Prisoner #1059's sweet nature and Prisoner #1031's reasoning to her cell mates motives.  Who's to be trusted here?

It's a wonderful film of the moment made by a rare stylish talent that has the depth and real cinema knowledge to back up the technique, make no mistake Oren Shai is one to watch for the future. I look forward to tracking his career as it bounds along, which it surely will on the back of something as grounded, mature and unique as Condemned, which I'm pleased to announce, you can now watch the whole film below.


CONDEMNED from Oren Shai on Vimeo.

Whilst you're at it, be sure to check out Shai first short, Heavy Soul.

Another Year - Life's not always kind, is it?

(Mike Leigh, 2010)

Ah, Another Year, if ever there were a title ripe for mocking it would be Mike Leigh's accomplished , intimate and craftily assembled drama about the slow movement of time, the disappointments, the assembly of those nearest and dearest, the aching chasm of life not turning out as you hoped and the relentless way every year folds into the next. The minutiae of everyday pointless chit-chat (the workings of a car engine, the weather, how the allotment is doing...) whilst drinking tea from a flask or around the family kitchen table; the lamentations about missed opportunities, dreams of new possibilities, the planning of holidays, the nostalgia of old photos, is of course Mike Leigh's bread and butter, the little things said/unsaid which carry more weight than at first glance.

It's this detail to the mundane that stoke the fire of his detractors, that mocking group who fail to grasp this attention to the little things, who will view Another Year as Another Mike Leigh film, which to do, I think, is to miss one of his quietest yet boldest films to date.  To temper the pain, the loneliness, the quiet resentment for the life that fate has dealt, Another Year has at its nucleus a happy, solid and loving married couple in the guise of Tom (Jim Broadbent) and Gerri (Ruth Sheen); another of those thrown away witticisms that Leigh is want to do to juxtapose with the all too serious surroundings.  With their home acting as a safe zone, Another Year has a grounded turf for which those encircling Tom and Gerri's contented lives, friends and family, who's lives are less self-assured, have somewhere to rest before walking out into that world again.

So far, so common territory for Mike Leigh; after all Leigh is not known for his wide departures form the themes and worlds he helps to create in workshops with his ensemble cast, but there is a grounding here, in character, in tone, in pacing that hasn't always been present and, (has it come with age?), Another Year is all the more bewitching for it.  The sensation of the film sneaks up on you, from the oust we're given a haunting, tight-lipped, anxiety filled cameo from another Leigh stalwart, Imelda Staunton, playing out Another Year's key theme, that of middle aged depression - "on a scale of 1 to 10, how happy would say you are?" asks Gerri, in her role as a medical counsellor, "one" comes the curt reply.  There is something uniquely Leigh about this scene, who else would decide to open a film thus?, and its bluntness sets the tone for this involving, intelligent and compassionate drama.

Of those surrounding the world Tom and Gerri is an array of characters in desperate need of something equating stability, guidance and compassion; there's a hope of whatever Tom and Gerri have got may just rub off on them.  Amongst the gallery is Ken (Peter Wight) Tom's old friend from his childhood home of Hull, who's reliance on booze, food and cigarettes to numb his life seems certain to shorten it. Ronnie (David Bradley), Tom's older, now widowed brother, who's mute, lifeless presence speaks volumes for a life missing a heartbeat and then there's Mary in what turns out to be the films stand out performance by Lesley Manville, a tidal wave of a wreck, a guiding beacon for all those that make wrong decisions and take the wrong exits of the motorway of life. Add Joe (Oliver Maltman), Tom and Gerri's son, who seems to have inherited his dad's sarcastic relaxed look at the world, who doesn't worry his parents in the slightest that he's still not married at the turn of 30.

 

While the film chapters the seasons, each segment beginning with a laconic, well framed shot by cinematography Dick Pope over Tom and Gerri's beloved allotment, we observe this dynamic over the year, how it works, doesn't work, infests, feeds and collaborates, how lives are governed and relationships fostered by the choices we make or by the chances we ignore.   Through Tom and Gerri's contentment we see how easy it is to find yourself on the other side, Mary's wild and out of control mania becomes Another Year's defining tragedy, hopelessly bounding from one mistake to the next; her infatuation with Tom and Gerri's son, Joe, in another misleading attempt to bound herself to the comforts of their world, leads to a scene so excruciatingly embarrassing that you'll be hard pressed to make it through the scene without gritting your teeth.

No scene better conflicts with Tom and Gerri's world than the funeral of Ronnie's late wife back in Lancashire, whereas Tom is assured, comfortable and alive with possibilities, Ronnie and that of his bitter son, Carl (Martin Savage) are dormant, stifled and estranged.  Ronnie just stares as his son throws accusations and insinuations at him during the wake, it's left to Tom to fight back, Ronnie having given in years ago.  It's a truly violent scene in terms of what has gone before, whilst at once being extremely moving; the masked tears in Ronnie's eyes, Tom's attempts to control and temper the situation, Gerri's insistence that there is plenty of food and the lack of people at the wake.  It's one of those scenes that Leigh may have been inclined to have gone bigger in the past, (see Timothy Spall's outburst in Secret & Lies or Eddie Marsan's breakdown in Happy-Go-Lucky), here, in keeping with the film, it's grounded, controlled and any sort of resolution is quickly forgotten.

This is a new benchmark for Leigh, and let's admit it the benchmark was pretty high to begin with, Another Year is a small slice of a realised, observed world, better than he has done before.  There are times in the past where caricature would overtake character, where shrill voices and diluted worlds didn't quite fit, Another Year feels casual in comparison with say Secret & Lies or All or Nothing, this is a restrained jewel from a director, at the tender age of 67, who seems to have crafted his most complete film yet.

So Another Mike Leigh film then?  Oh, most definitely, and they try and make that sound like a bad thing.

Coming To A Cinema Nowhere Near Me - 4th Mar 11'

A weekly rundown of the must see UK Cinema Releases

Archipelago (Joanna Hogg)

Again Joanna Hogg gives us a middle/upper class family holiday from hell which, just like her directorial debut Unrelated, has polarised critics and audiences alike in the UK.   For the likes of Anthony Quinn in 'The Independent', Archipelago lacks bite, ' As a study in strangled English politesse this film has something to say; I only wish its voice carried a little more vigour'  whilst for Peter Bradshaw of 'The Guardian', states that although ' It's a difficult watch and a difficult sell' Joanna Hogg's follow up feature 'is quietly outstanding.'

As a fan of Unrelated I can only state how much I'm looking forward to this and since I've waited 9 years for Lynne Ramsay to release another film ('We Need to Talk About Kevin' is slated for a September release), I'm just glad there's someone alongside Andrea Arnold to fly the flag for female British directors. 

Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzman (Alex Gibney)

I will purely watch this on the strength of Alex Gibney's previous documentaries 'Taxi to the Dark Side' and 'Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson'.

Client 9, as the subtitle suggests, centres on Eliot Spitzman, the New York State Governor who attempted to get tough with Wall Street 'fat cats' but was thwarted by own meteoric rise and belief that he was somehow impenetrable to scandal. Once Spitzman's sexual peccadilloes were exposed the enemies he made on the way up converged to take him down; a political hit or self-destruction?  I can't wait to watch to find out.



That's two more films for the must see list, how about you? How about elsewhere in the world, anything coming to the UK across the channel that I should keep an eye out for?