One of the best trailers I’ve seen in ages. No dialogue for 53 seconds, and then only a sparse two lines. Cat Power’s jangly, mournful Sea of Love getting stuck like an old-fashioned record; signalling breakdown and fracture better than any scripted voiceover. Everything else left to our imagination, unlike almost every other trailer you [...]
Archive for the ‘Watching’ Category
Trailer of the Week: Revolutionary Road
Posted in Watching, tagged kate winslet and leonardo dicaprio, revolutionary road, richard yates, sam mendes, trailer of the week on January 12, 2009 | 2 Comments »
The colour of tragedy in Waltz with Bashir
Posted in Thinking, Watching, tagged ari folman, tragedy, waltz with bashir on December 4, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
When was the last time you noticed colour in a film? Perhaps it’s been a while, because rather like perfect dialogue or sound design, the best use of colour is often characterized by it’s very unobtrusiveness. In such cases, the cinematographer wants to nurture the illusion that you’re watching reality in all its winter grays [...]
Picturing Iraq
Posted in Watching, tagged iraq photo essay, the frontline club, time magazine, yuri koyzrev on November 12, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
The Frontline Club, a hub for independent journalists in London, today announced the winner of its 2008 award: the Russian photographer Yuri Kozyrev, “for his exceptional coverage of the Iraq war.” Even as the conflict has faded from the headlines amid global financial meltdown and hopes that the “surge” of 2007 had established the foundations [...]
Coalfinger
Posted in Watching, tagged coalfinger, david mitchell, e.on, greenpeace, kingsnorth, quantum of solace on November 8, 2008 | 2 Comments »
Last night I saw Quantum of Solace. I’d been warned that the latest Bond movie consisted of sheer action devoid of narrative substance, but as light entertainment it turned out to be suprisingly enjoyable. I’m learning that with action movies it’s all about low expectations. Anyway, David Mitchell – the dark-haired one from Peep Show [...]
As Aladdin would say, a whole new world
Posted in Watching, tagged alexandra matzke, obama election night pictures, obama michelle, zillycakes on November 5, 2008 | 3 Comments »
Waking up this morning felt like Christmas Day, when you open your eyes to find Santa has left the exact present you wanted under the tree. I don’t really have anything else to say, except that pictures seem to tell the story best today. I love this one by Alex Matzke. It’s from a very [...]
Trailer of the Week: Wendy and Lucy
Posted in Watching, tagged kelly reichardt, michelle williams, trailer of the week, wendy and lucy on November 2, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
The first glimpses of Michelle Williams’ stricken, timid beauty in this trailer make it look like a film that is sure to beget tears. It also seems to be a truly independent movie; shot in twenty days, highly textured with an unfamiliar, meditative rhythm. The kind of film that evokes such an authentic landscape you [...]
Trailer of the Week: Twilight
Posted in Watching, tagged robert pattinson, stephanie meyer, trailer of the week, twilight on October 26, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Could there be a Dracula Global PR company somewhere, and if so, are its staff working overtime? Because there’s a slew of vampire-driven entertainment coming out, and the common theme is that vampires aren’t all bad. Evidently some of them are still nasty old blood-suckers, but then there are the ones who are apparently just [...]
Trailer of the Week: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Posted in Watching, tagged bfi tennessee williams, elizabeth taylor, paul newman cat on a hot tin roof, trailer of the week on October 20, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
There’s a worrisome dearth of fun trailers around. So, in honour of the late, great Paul Newman, I thought we could all sip on a shot of good strong melodrama. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is showing in London from November 8 – 29 as part of the British Film Institute’s Tennessee Williams season. [...]
Trailer of the Week: Rachel Getting Married
Posted in Watching, tagged anne hathaway, jenny lumet, jonathan demme, rachel getting married, trailer of the week on October 5, 2008 | 1 Comment »
I’ve had a soft spot for Anne Hathaway ever since her good-natured, witty performance in the cheeky fairytale Ella Enchanted. She also provided strong support in Brokeback Mountain. But apart from that, her career thus far has been a bit, well, lite – characterised by the sort of low-calorie fluff that gives momentary sweetness but [...]
Trailer of the Week: Waltz with Bashir
Posted in Watching, tagged ari folman, max richter, trailer of the week, waltz with bashir on September 28, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Greeted with a standing ovation at this year’s Cannes, at once poetic and horrifying, Waltz with Bashir depicts the true-life experience of its director, Israeli documentary maker Ari Folman, as a young soldier during the first Lebanon war of 1982. Four years in the making, the animated documentary examines the trauma of war through the [...]
Trailer of the Week: Synecdoche, New York
Posted in Watching, tagged charlie kaufman, philip seymour hoffman, synecdoche new york, trailer of the week on September 20, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
When you want a dose of the strange, go to Charlie Kaufman. His scripts for Being John Malkovich, Human Nature, Adaptation, and my personal favourite, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, all play at the puckered seam where the unconscious meets the real; where unspeakable desires and spoken lies get mixed up. His characters -subtle [...]
Trailer of the Week: Milk
Posted in Watching, tagged harvey milk, milk poster, oscars, sean penn, trailer of the week on September 14, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Sometimes movies sound Oscar-worthy even before you see them. The Academy likes biopics, unconventional heroes, historical drama and political martyrs. Somewhat like Richard Attenborough’s Gandhi (1982) Milk ticks all those boxes. And what’s more, it stars the always-exceptional Sean Penn: three times Oscar-nominee (Dead Man Walking; Sweet and Lowdown; I Am Sam) and Best Actor [...]
God on Trial
Posted in Watching, tagged bbc drama, god on trial, rupert graves on September 5, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
It is the rallying cry of atheists and a familiar challenge to the faithful. If there is a God, why does he allow such terrible suffering? The BBC’s single episode drama, God on Trial, written by Frank Cottrell Boyce, grapples compellingly for 85 minutes with this question. Many of us will spend a lifetime wondering, [...]
Trailer of the Week: The Duchess
Posted in Watching, tagged bullet boy, keira knightley, saul dibb, the duchess, trailer of the week on August 31, 2008 | 2 Comments »
I wouldn’t normally flag up a Keira Knightley film; her publicity machine is quite efficient enough to do that without extra help, and her performances almost always fail to live up to the enormity of her profile. But the outsize ringlets of her newest role surely deserve some kind of acclaim, and, more importantly, The [...]
Trailer of the Week: Frost/Nixon
Posted in Watching, tagged frost/nixon, london film festival opening film, michael sheen, peter morgan on August 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
I am so excited about this film. Frost/Nixon dramatises the real-life story behind David Frost’s landmark TV interviews with Richard Nixon in 1977, just three years after the Watergate scandal forced Nixon’s resignation as President. As a dramatic scenario, the lead-up to some TV interviews and then the enactment of those interviews – which you [...]
Trailer of the Week: The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
Posted in Watching, tagged heyday films, john boyne, the boy in the striped pyjamas, trailer of the week on August 17, 2008 | 1 Comment »
There have been so many extraordinarily powerful films about the Holocaust that it’s hard to imagine one more telling us anything new. The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas might, because it proffers a view from the other side: from the eyes and ears of a child whose father runs a concentration camp behind their back [...]
Trailer of the Week: W.
Posted in Watching, tagged josh brolin, Oliver Stone, trailer of the week, W. on August 10, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
There aren’t many movies with just one letter for a name. In fact, I couldn’t think of any. Listology says there are at least 50, though their list was last updated in 2004, so who knows. Here’s a tip. The title W. makes most sense when you say it outloud. With a deep southern accent. [...]
Trailer of the Week: Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
Posted in Watching, tagged daniel radcliffe, david yates, harry potter and the half blood prince, tom riddle on August 2, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Let the hubbub commence: Warner Bros. have released a teaser for the sixth Harry Potter film, The Half-Blood Prince. It’s the second film directed by the brilliant, inimitable David Yates; the second-to-last of the entire series (they’re getting scarier); and the one where we find out just how Voldemort got so evil. Galloping gargoyles it [...]
Darker knights: Batman and terror
Posted in Watching, tagged agent of chaos, batman and 9/11, batman and terror, heath ledger as the joker, the dark knight on August 1, 2008 | 4 Comments »
There is very little redemption in Chris Nolan’s The Dark Knight. There are only different degrees of pain. Pretty much everyone is stoic about it; not everyone survives. It’s certainly the darkest superhero film I’ve ever seen. The Financial Times last week noted that The Dark Knight was “the fourth big movie about a superhero [...]
Trailer of the Week: You Don’t Mess with the Zohan
Posted in Watching, tagged adam sandler, you don't mess with the zohan on July 27, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Hairdressing; a traditional source of comedy. Israel-Palestine; less so. Owing a seemingly not insignificant debt to Borat, Adam Sandler’s Zohan promises to unite the two in a blissfully politically incorrect union. The New Yorker said it’s “occasionally very funny”, A.O.Scott in the NY Times named it “the finest post-Zionist action-hairdressing sex comedy I’ve ever seen.” [...]
