Only Lovers Left Alive.

I sit here in my darkened room listening to the soundtrack recording of the film that I’m just about to write about. I not sure whether it’s the hypnotic vibes from this collaboration by SQURL and the Dutch lute player Jozef van Wissem or perhaps it was the fact that ‘breakfast’ was not delivered today but I can’t get Jim Jarmusch latest movie out of my head?

 

Adam and Eve....

A darkly comic tale of a long-term relationship between husband and wife is the main theme of Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)[1]. The average marriage today is said to be only 7 years (barely worth the expense!) so very few marriages last for hundreds of years, with the exception of the aptly named Adam (Tom Hiddleston) and Eve (Tilda Swinton) a vampire couple whose relationship could conceivably last for ever if they can continue to obtain a supply of good quality blood. Adam lives in the run down backwaters of Detroit while Eve lives in the romantic confines of Tangiers.

 

Christopher Marlowe.

Similar to Thomas Alfredson’s Let the Right One In (2008) this is not a tale about vampires but a love story between two people who happen to be vampires albeit with heightened perceptions from having lived for such a long period of time. A character study that Jarmusch claimed is a metaphor for the decline of 21^st century America. Note the bankrupt and run down city of Detroit and compare it to the vibrant and mystical Moroccan city of Tangiers.  

 

Sister Ava and Ian.

The biosphere of our two lovers varies. Whereas Eve accepts the present with her mobile phone and modern cultural attitude, Adam seems to be stuck in the culture of the 1960’s and 70’s producing his music on vintage equipment, collecting guitars from that period and driving a vintage Jaguar. He dislikes what he calls ‘zombies’; his only human friend is Ian (Anton Yelchin) who, along with the musical instruments and recording equipment, provides him with a wooden bullet! His only other contact with the zombie world is Doctor Watson who works in a hospital and who provides the clean blood that guarantees Adams survival. Eve, who has come back to join her lover in America, has previously got her ‘supply’ from the English Elizabethan dramatist and poet Christopher Marlowe (John Hurt), the man who allegedly influenced William Shakespeare and died at the age of 29 in 1593, little do the historians know? She also has a younger sister Ava (Mia Waslkowska) whose actions are not appreciated by Adam.

The Taste of Blood is playing again and I’m feeling a little faint……….

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[1] Shown as part of the Robert Burns Centre Film Theatre Film Club and hosted by Julie and Connor McMorran.

I, Anna

Anna Welles is a lonely woman in late middle age, separated from her husband Simon; she works at Peter Jones West End department store as a salesperson and spends her leisure time attending speed-dating events. It's at one of these occasions she meets George Stone and returns with him to his flat in the Barbican. But the evening takes a turn for the worse when Stone assaults her and she, in an attempt to save herself, batters him to death with a heavy sculpture. After a swift departure from the flats she realises that she has left her umbrella in the lift and returns to the building to retrieve it. Coincidently she runs into DCI Bernie Reid who is investigating the murder. It's this meeting that triggers the Detectives fascination with this vulnerable women that eventually leads to his involvement with a murder suspect. 

This British/German co-production, which premiered at 2012 Berlin Film Festival is the directorial feature film debut of Barnaby Southgate who is best known for working in television on such series as Footballers Wives, Bad Girls and Waterloo Road. This modern film noir was also written by Southgate, which he adapted from the New York based novel of the same name by Elsa Lewin. Now set mainly in a timeless London, which is given a similar disaffecting treatment that can be found in Eran Creevy’s Welcome to the Punch (2012). It stars the director’s mother, Charlotte Rampling as the femme fatale Anna with Gabriel Byrne as Bernie Reid.  It’s a psychological thriller about two lonely alienated characters, an isolated policemen and a mysterious women, who, we are led to believe, hide secret dark pasts.

 

Charlotte Rampling.

Gabriel Byrne.

Influenced by the noir relationships found in the French cinema of the 1970’s and 80’s the movies strength is in the elegance of Charlotte Ramplings performance and the atmospheric cinematography of Ben Smithard (My Week with Marilyn 2011, The Damned United 2009) but the problem with the film is that the narrative is obscure, it involves a tragic incident in Anna’s life that’s never fully explained, in fact its rather muddled ending spoils what could have been an excellent underlying study of the fear of solitary old age. 

Shell.

At this weeks Robert Burns Centre Film Theatre Film Club we where fortunate to have in attendance David Smith one of the producers of Shell (2012) and Managing Director of the production company Brocken Spectre based in Scotland. Regular visitors to the RBC may remember the original short film version of Shell (2007)  and you may also remember another short film Native Son (2010) that was also produced by David and shown here in September 2010. The director and writer of both these very well received short films, Aberdeen born Scot Graham, has now expanded Shell into a full-length feature film. It was nominated for three awards at the 2012 BFI London Film Festival including the Best Newcomer Award for Chloe Pirrie and Scott Graham.  It also won the Sutherland Award, which is an award presented for the most original and imaginative feature debut at the festival.

 

Director Scott Graham on set.

Like the short, the feature length film was shoot near Little Loch Broom in Dundonnell, Wester Ross situated in the Highlands of Scotland and again its overriding theme is loneliness. Shell is a 17-year-old girl, played by the wonderful Chloe Pirrie, who lives and works at a desolate run down petrol station with her withdrawn and softly spoken father Pete (Joseph Mawle). Her mother left them on a passing truck when Shell was only four years old. While Shell serves petrol to infrequent customers her father dismantles wrecked cars for scrap. Their relationship has always been good but now Shell is turning into an attractive young woman she reminds Pete of the woman that left and broke his heart.

The isolated petrol station above Little Loch Broom.

After the film had finished David was invited to take part in what turned out to be a very informative question and answer session expertly conducted by Richard Ashrowan who is the Creative Director for the Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival[1] in Hawick which incidentally was set up as an annual festival focusing on screening work that in some way relates to the natural world, to landscape and to mankind’s relationship with natural forces.

 

with David Smith and Richard Ashrowan.

David explained his role of producer as developing the production along with the director/writer and making sure that the project was brought in on time and within budget. Another of his responsibilities was arranging the finance. He told us that it came from various sources including the BFI, Creative Scotland and the German TV Company ZDT/Arte, a representative of whom he had met at Cinemart in Rotterdam. The tie up with the TV Company meant that it could be shown on European television. The final budget was in the region of £1.035 million this enabled them to build the garage on a steel deck on the Tim Rice estate, although obviously as a temporary structure it had to be demolished at the end of filming. Which, as David explained to me afterwards, the locals were a great help removing anything of use to them! As the story was contained in one place all the filming was done on location with the inside of the structure being designed for ease of access and made the logistics a lot easier. David agreed with Richard that the weather, the background and the beautiful wild landscape were characters in there own right adding a hushed and haunting feel to the production but giving a strange claustrophobic impression to the wide open spaces. The penetrating cinematography of DOP Yoliswa Gartig takes full advantage of the sights and sounds of its bleak isolated setting, which was a metaphor for the loneliness of Shell and her father. Shot in September and October on digital rather than film for cost reasons; our guest described the movie as a roadside movie rather than a road movie because neither of the protagonists really leaves the garage.

 

Shell as played by Chloe Pirrie.

Taking questions from the floor David went on to explain how it was decided to turn a twenty-minute short into a 90-minute debut feature film. He said that once the short and its companion piece (Native Son) was made they knew that there was potential for a bigger, and slightly different, story to tell and that Scot Graham’s writing was so good that they could adapt and improve the story to fit the format of a feature film. There was however a scene deleted from the finished film, which involved two deer hunters who came into the garage and threatened Shell, because it was felt that it would spoil the poetic feel of the story.  As normal with the film club the soundtrack, or lack of in this case, was raised. It was made quite clear by Scot Graham from the beginning that he would only use natural sounds because he did not want to impose, or encourage, the audience to have emotion’s that were forced upon them, the intention was to rely on what was actually happening on screen and portrayed by the actors which I must say worked.

 

Shell with her father Pete (Joseph Mawle).

I felt that David was put on the spot when asked why Scottish film is so miserable and bleak? But quite rightly he pointed out that it is normally the debut film from a Scottish director that warrants this description and he gave the examples of Peter Mullan’s Orphans (1998) and Lynne Ramsey’s 1999 debut Ratcatcher. While on the subject he told us that the movie takes as its reference point’s the Scandinavian cinema of Lukas Moodysson, Scott Grahams favorite director Andrei Tarkovsky, American cinema of the 1970’s and the Bill Douglas Trilogy 1972-1978. He was then asked about the cast and although Edinburgh born Chloe Pirrie was always the first choice for the role of Shell, her debut feature film, a long casting process did take place. He went on to say that the other actors involved may not be household names but they are very experienced and you may have seen Joseph Mawle, who plays the epileptic Pete, in many TV productions like HBO’s Game of Thrones or the BBC drama Five Daughters as well as feature films that include The Awakening (2011) and Made in Dagenham (2010). Others involved include Michael Smiley (Hugh) who is best known for his role as a hit man in Ben Wheatley’s Kill List (2011) and the wonderful Scottish actress Kate Dickie (Claire) who has appeared in many TV productions and feature films including Red Road (2006), Donkeys (2010) and Prometheus (2012).

 

Will Shell ever escape from the confines of the garage?

A general examination of the film followed where the era was discussed and it was agreed that it was timeless although some of the audience believed it to be based in the late 1980’s because of the Dire Strait track played on a radio. It was also felt that the delicate balance of Shell’s growing sexuality and the constant threat of an incestuous relationship between her and her father gave the film a hint of the thriller genre. It was also agreed that the deer included in the movie were identified with our leading lady especially her eyes, she is I believe the beating heart of the film and an actress that’s quite capable of expressing feelings without the use of dialogue. It was pretty unanimous that Shell was a fine piece of work that grips its audience in a minimalist way at the same time demonstrating the effects of loneliness and isolation.  

 

Theres a strange similarity between Edward Hoopers painting and Shell and Pete's garage?

Another memorable night at the RBC in Dumfries where we were fortunate to witness the beginning of promising career for both the director Scott Graham and actress Chloe Pirrie and I’m sure we can look forward to seeing future work from both of them. Also I would like to thank David Smith for taking time out to attend the Q&A and for Richard Ashrowan for doing such a great job of conducting it.

Photo used with permission from Alec Barclay.

       

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[1] Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival was initiated as a collaborative project between Borders Arts Trust, Heart of Hawick and Creative Arts Business Network (CABN) in 2010.  The first Alchemy festival was held in September 2010. Richard Ashrowan, a Scottish Borders based moving image artist, is Creative Director of the festival.

Anonymous.

I did write the plays, i don't care what Looney said!!!

And now for something completely different, or so John Orloff would have us believe. A certain Elizabethan playwright who went by the name of William Shakespeare did not actually write the plays and sonnets he had been credited with, instead the speculation our American screenwriter would have us believe is that they were written by the Lord Great Chamberlain Edward de Vere 17^th Earl of Oxford. A theory originally put forward in 1920’s by the aptly named John Thomas Looney, an English schoolteacher in his book Shakespeare Identified. The idea of someone else writing these works probably stems from the belief that a working class jobbing actor whose parents were illiterate would not have the where be all to write such prolific works, but a well educated courtier, playwright and poet would have been far more likely to have turned out the 38 plays, 154 sonnets and a couple of narrative poems!!!

German film director Roland Emmerich, best known for disaster, or should I say disastrous movies, has taken Orloff’s screenplay and turned out a very entertainingly absorbing historical thriller! Anonymous (2011) as well as questioning Shakespeare’s right to claim authorship, deals with the political and sexual intrigue in the Elizabethan court and who would succeed the Queen for the crown of England upon her death.

These things never end well!

The film, without doubt, raises interesting questions about the Bard’s identity and succeeds in bringing history to life and even makes his plays seem relevant. Produced with a combination of CGI and sets, including the glorious Rose Theatre and surrounding London Streets, purpose built at Berlins Babelsberg Studios were Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will (1935) was made. Emmerich film has a first class British cast that adds gravitas to the story. Rhys Ifans shines as the Earl of Oxford as does Vanessa Redgrave as Queen Elizabeth with her own daughter Joely Richardson playing the younger Elizabeth. Other actors of note involved in this bizarre twist of history include David Thewlis, Rafe Spall and Mark Rylance. Not the turkey the critics would have us believe.

Whose a naughty girl then?