I haven't blogged for a while. I haven't seen a film I've disliked for even longer. Actually, that's a little unfair on The Ghost (or is that The Ghost Writer?) because for me to dislike it would have required me to care about it and I can't say that I did.
I read the Robert Harris novel on which the film is based about two years ago and while I quite enjoyed it, I didn't think it was anything special; it was a solid political thriller and an interesting alternate history of Tony Blair (or was it alternate?) but I preferred Enigma and Fatherland. I didn't pay much attention to the film version until it was lauded at the Berlin Film Festival and I thought it might actually be quite good. Some good reviews were somewhat cancelled out by the negative review I got from my parents (who could have been jet-lagged). I quite like Ewan McGregor and I quite like Pierce Brosnan and I was quietly optimistic about the film that has been described as perfectly "Hitchcockian."
No. I'm sorry but Hitchcock would turn over in his grave at the thought of that film being compared to his own. If a film weighs in at over two hours, it damn well better justify its length in some way: with great characters, a clever script, style or (preferably) suspense. The Ghost was one of the least suspenseful films I've seen in a long time. Sure, there are moments of action--in the one car chase sequence, McGregor's character, a ghost writer hired to write the memoirs of a very Blairesque former British PM, even pushes his car above 80 miles per hour for a couple of seconds! The book, for all all its failings (mainly it's failure to create sympathy for any of the characters) had some great tense moments--there were thrills and there was excitement. Even the denouement, which should have been highly dramatic and shocking, only left me yawning.
It could just be that because I had read the book, I wasn't on the edge of my seat because I knew what was going to happen but in many cases, reading the book (or even having seen the film before) doesn't mean the film leaves you cold. At least, it shouldn't, if the film has been well made.
I'm sorry, Roman; Chinatown was great but your latest film just seems like a ghost of your former self.
20 April 2010
10 April 2010
Love in a Mist
Luca Guadagnino's latest film Io sono l'amore is beautiful--of course it is; that much is obvious from the poster and the fact that it is set in Italy. It is a lyrical film and an intense one. It is often surprising and funny, sad and clever. Tilda Swinton is particularly beautiful and she's also very good; without her strong, central performance, the threads probably wouldn't have held together well enough.
[Usually, I try to keep spoilers to a minimum but there are some below so you should look away now if you don't want to know what happens.]
She plays Emma Recchi, a Russian woman who has married into a a rich Italian dynasty. With her blonde coolness and appearance of perfection, she is the Kirsten Cohen of Milan. Married to Tancredi, the elder son and heir to a textiles millionaire, and mother to the handsome, eager Edoardo and the secretive, sensitive Elisabetta (originally, I thought there was a second son but either Emma comes from the Betty Draper school of parenting or the other guy must have been a cousin), she lives in a large, modern house, complete with servants, a swimming pool and anything else she might desire. She lacks nothing. Or does she?
The film opens with an elegant family dinner at the house to celebrate the grandfather's birthday and his handing over the company to his son Tancredi and his grandson, Edoardo. Elisabetta presents Grandpa with a beautiful photograph she took while they were out walking one day but he is just disappointed that she hasn't done another one of her excellent drawings--Grandpa, it seems, does not like change, as is later evident from his running of the textiles factory. Edoardo, meanwhile, is a running star and the family are surprised to find out he actually came second in his latest race. Later that evening, the guy who beat him, a chef called Antonio, comes to the house. As the dinner was so tense and I had a feeling everything was going to go pear shaped quite quickly, I thought the chef was going to kill Edoardo--and to some extent he does, although not that night and not with a gun or by lacing the cake he brought round for Edoardo with posion.
Instead, we jump forward several months and the two have become friends and even plan to open a restaurant together in the hills above San Remo. Elisabetta, meanwhile, is busy finding herself--and a girlfriend--at Central St Martins. Edoardo marries the beautiul girlfriend he brought to the birthday meal and Tancredi tries to run the company by doing the opposite of what his father would have done, but then he's not around much. Suddenly, it becomes clear that Emma is not happy or satisfied with her seemingly perfect life. She appears to be haunted by events that happened in Russia before she was "saved" by Tancredi. Indeed, we find out later that Emma isn't even her real name; instead it is the name Tancredi gave her although she can't remember her real name, only that her nickname was Kittieth. I suspect he wasn't thinking of Madame Bovary when he came up with that although perhaps the screenwriter was.
Unhappiness and unease duly established, then, Emma's affair is inevitable and giving the paucity of characters in this bourgeois, Milanese universe, Antonio is about the only male around to whom she isn't related. Although he serves posh food in his restaurant, he is still low-class in the eyes of Emma's mother in law when the two eat dinner there one day. Emma is irresistibly attracted to Antonio, however, and is soon making excuses to visit San Remo and then travelling up to Antonio's hilltop farm to make love on the grass and conjure up new recipes.
As a symbol of her newfound sense of freedom and release, she gets him to cut her long, blonde hair to chin length, the long locks that remain on the earth outside the farm later playing their own role in the tragedy that is to come, although not as big a role as the soup. In fact, I've never seen a film where a bowl of soup is indirectly responsible for such a big tragedy without anyone having consumed a single mouthful. You see, although Emma can't remember her real name, she can remember a special fish soup recipe she used to make in Russia. When she was missing home, she would make the soup for Edoardo, the child to whom she is closest. She tells this story to Antonio, thus setting in motion the dramatic events at the end of the film.
The ending is filled with sadness, grief and guilt but, right at the end, there is a brief moment of forgiveness and freedom, love and redemption. The film ends rather abruptly, leaving me craving more--more resolution and more of Swinton's great performance--but, of course, it also seemed to end exactly where it should.
[Usually, I try to keep spoilers to a minimum but there are some below so you should look away now if you don't want to know what happens.]
She plays Emma Recchi, a Russian woman who has married into a a rich Italian dynasty. With her blonde coolness and appearance of perfection, she is the Kirsten Cohen of Milan. Married to Tancredi, the elder son and heir to a textiles millionaire, and mother to the handsome, eager Edoardo and the secretive, sensitive Elisabetta (originally, I thought there was a second son but either Emma comes from the Betty Draper school of parenting or the other guy must have been a cousin), she lives in a large, modern house, complete with servants, a swimming pool and anything else she might desire. She lacks nothing. Or does she?
The film opens with an elegant family dinner at the house to celebrate the grandfather's birthday and his handing over the company to his son Tancredi and his grandson, Edoardo. Elisabetta presents Grandpa with a beautiful photograph she took while they were out walking one day but he is just disappointed that she hasn't done another one of her excellent drawings--Grandpa, it seems, does not like change, as is later evident from his running of the textiles factory. Edoardo, meanwhile, is a running star and the family are surprised to find out he actually came second in his latest race. Later that evening, the guy who beat him, a chef called Antonio, comes to the house. As the dinner was so tense and I had a feeling everything was going to go pear shaped quite quickly, I thought the chef was going to kill Edoardo--and to some extent he does, although not that night and not with a gun or by lacing the cake he brought round for Edoardo with posion.
Instead, we jump forward several months and the two have become friends and even plan to open a restaurant together in the hills above San Remo. Elisabetta, meanwhile, is busy finding herself--and a girlfriend--at Central St Martins. Edoardo marries the beautiul girlfriend he brought to the birthday meal and Tancredi tries to run the company by doing the opposite of what his father would have done, but then he's not around much. Suddenly, it becomes clear that Emma is not happy or satisfied with her seemingly perfect life. She appears to be haunted by events that happened in Russia before she was "saved" by Tancredi. Indeed, we find out later that Emma isn't even her real name; instead it is the name Tancredi gave her although she can't remember her real name, only that her nickname was Kittieth. I suspect he wasn't thinking of Madame Bovary when he came up with that although perhaps the screenwriter was.
Unhappiness and unease duly established, then, Emma's affair is inevitable and giving the paucity of characters in this bourgeois, Milanese universe, Antonio is about the only male around to whom she isn't related. Although he serves posh food in his restaurant, he is still low-class in the eyes of Emma's mother in law when the two eat dinner there one day. Emma is irresistibly attracted to Antonio, however, and is soon making excuses to visit San Remo and then travelling up to Antonio's hilltop farm to make love on the grass and conjure up new recipes.
As a symbol of her newfound sense of freedom and release, she gets him to cut her long, blonde hair to chin length, the long locks that remain on the earth outside the farm later playing their own role in the tragedy that is to come, although not as big a role as the soup. In fact, I've never seen a film where a bowl of soup is indirectly responsible for such a big tragedy without anyone having consumed a single mouthful. You see, although Emma can't remember her real name, she can remember a special fish soup recipe she used to make in Russia. When she was missing home, she would make the soup for Edoardo, the child to whom she is closest. She tells this story to Antonio, thus setting in motion the dramatic events at the end of the film.
The ending is filled with sadness, grief and guilt but, right at the end, there is a brief moment of forgiveness and freedom, love and redemption. The film ends rather abruptly, leaving me craving more--more resolution and more of Swinton's great performance--but, of course, it also seemed to end exactly where it should.
05 April 2010
This Lovely Springtime Glow
London in April is highly Yankified. The Tube yesterday was teeming with Americans on spring break (the most amusing were a group who sounded like they came from Louisville or somewhere and who were having problems with the Tube map ("we don't have a Tube (pronounced toob) back home. We have cars"); to be fair, as there were only about three and a half Tube lines working yesterday, the crises de navigation were understandable.
There were no Americans in Regent's Park when I went running this morning and nor were there any in Hix Soho at lunchtime. Actually, there wasn't anyone else in Hix until we had been there for about half an hour, but when your restaurant is filled with Damien Hirst works and friendly if somewhat too ubiquitous wait staff, you don't really need many fellow diners. After a couple of oysters, I opted for the posh fish fingers with chips and the Hix version of mushy peas (beautiful, bright green, crushed garden peas--a far cry from anything you might find in a chippie but far tastier). I couldn't manage a pudding but I sampled Papa's chocolate mousse, which was rich and tasty.
We swung quickly through the Tudors section of the National Portrait Gallery, where I saw lots of paintings I've seen many times before and lots of historical facts I already knew. I did, however, discover that John Donne is really hot, especially for someone from the 16th century. We then walked up to Covent Garden for some Stanfords, Paul Smith and Banana Republic purchases for Maman, Papa and me respectively. Thankfully, Easter is a bank holiday that the London shops pretty much ignore so we were able to get to Selfridges, long before it closed at eight. I fondled some Mulberry bags longingly but my wallet remained in my bag. To make me feel better, I played spot the Mulberry bag; yes, when I am in a bag lust phase, this is how sad I can become.
And so concluded a highly satisfactory and surprisingly American-free Easter Monday. Not that the presence of Americans is enough to spoil an Easter Monday, by any means; it's just that when there are lots of them around, it makes me wish I was in their country instead of my own. Yes, even when they are loud groups of drunk teenagers, who are by no means the best advocates for their country!
There were no Americans in Regent's Park when I went running this morning and nor were there any in Hix Soho at lunchtime. Actually, there wasn't anyone else in Hix until we had been there for about half an hour, but when your restaurant is filled with Damien Hirst works and friendly if somewhat too ubiquitous wait staff, you don't really need many fellow diners. After a couple of oysters, I opted for the posh fish fingers with chips and the Hix version of mushy peas (beautiful, bright green, crushed garden peas--a far cry from anything you might find in a chippie but far tastier). I couldn't manage a pudding but I sampled Papa's chocolate mousse, which was rich and tasty.
We swung quickly through the Tudors section of the National Portrait Gallery, where I saw lots of paintings I've seen many times before and lots of historical facts I already knew. I did, however, discover that John Donne is really hot, especially for someone from the 16th century. We then walked up to Covent Garden for some Stanfords, Paul Smith and Banana Republic purchases for Maman, Papa and me respectively. Thankfully, Easter is a bank holiday that the London shops pretty much ignore so we were able to get to Selfridges, long before it closed at eight. I fondled some Mulberry bags longingly but my wallet remained in my bag. To make me feel better, I played spot the Mulberry bag; yes, when I am in a bag lust phase, this is how sad I can become.
And so concluded a highly satisfactory and surprisingly American-free Easter Monday. Not that the presence of Americans is enough to spoil an Easter Monday, by any means; it's just that when there are lots of them around, it makes me wish I was in their country instead of my own. Yes, even when they are loud groups of drunk teenagers, who are by no means the best advocates for their country!
03 April 2010
Diabolical Saturday
After Good Friday, it seems appropriate that Diabolical Saturday should come next. I went to see Les diaboliques at the BFI, which I have been wanting to rewatch for quite some time. I first saw the film at the Phoenix in Oxford, during my A-levels, but at the time, black and white films and those films made before 1990 were not my thing and so the film failed on both counts. Nonetheless, I have read numerous good things about the film since then and I knew that a second viewing was required.
And I came out grinning at the diabolical cleverness of the whole thing, even though it's not exactly a pleasant film. Much of the film comes out as a sort of Fatal Attraction meets Thelma & Louise, only with a lot more gruesome plot details. Michel Delassalle is the headmaster at a small, French boarding school in the 1950s. He is also a huge asshole. His wife Christina, the headmistress, owns the school and it is clear that he married his submissive, fragile wife largely for her money. Michel is also screwing one of the other teachers, Nicole, who is a combination of Alex Forrest and Sue Sylvester from Glee. He treats both women badly, battering them, bullying them and coercing them into having sex.
So, the two women come up with a plot to get rid of him. Actually, Nicole, the bossier, more confident one of the two, comes up with a plan and convinces Christina to go along with it. They will both drive to Nicole's house in the country and then Christina will call Michel and ask for a divorce, knowing he will come to get her. They will then slip some sleeping pills into his whiskey and drown him in the bath before driving back to the school and dumping Michel's body in the dirty, sludge-filled swimming pool, which appears, Chekhov-style right at the start of the film. They will make sure Nicole's lodgers, living upstairs, see them both in the house so they have an alibi.
All goes to plan until the swimming pool is drained...and all that remains of Michel is his lighter. Oh noes! Actually, not so oh noes as pretty much everyone at the school is delighted that Michel has gone walkies. It means the teachers don't have to drink plonk with their dinner and the pupils have to stand in the corner when they are naughty rather than getting beaten. Of course, Christina starts to wonder whether someone has moved the body and is on to her or whether Michel has risen from the dead and as she has a heart problem, this cannot end well.
The film is remarkably suspenseful throughout. On the morning when Christina runs away with Nicole, the camera follows her around her bedroom, getting ready and gathering her things, for about five minutes. Even in this scene, the tension is high: will Michel wake up or will she get away? Again, during the murder scene and, indeed, from the moment Michel arrives at Nicole's house until the end of the film, I was on edge: will something go wrong? Will they get caught? There is a finely executed twist at the end (two twists, really), which was what led to me grinning, although the idea had crossed my mind at several points earlier in the film.
The acting is generally superb, although Christina's repeated fainting episodes, look spectacularly hammy. Like Sue and Alex, though, Nicole steals every scene she is in with those cool, icy stares and her calm calculations. According to IMDb, Hitchcock only lost out to Henri-Georges Clouzot for the film rights to the novel on which Les diaboliques is based by a matter of hours. I think the resulting film would be something Hitchcock would be proud to put his name to.
And I came out grinning at the diabolical cleverness of the whole thing, even though it's not exactly a pleasant film. Much of the film comes out as a sort of Fatal Attraction meets Thelma & Louise, only with a lot more gruesome plot details. Michel Delassalle is the headmaster at a small, French boarding school in the 1950s. He is also a huge asshole. His wife Christina, the headmistress, owns the school and it is clear that he married his submissive, fragile wife largely for her money. Michel is also screwing one of the other teachers, Nicole, who is a combination of Alex Forrest and Sue Sylvester from Glee. He treats both women badly, battering them, bullying them and coercing them into having sex.
So, the two women come up with a plot to get rid of him. Actually, Nicole, the bossier, more confident one of the two, comes up with a plan and convinces Christina to go along with it. They will both drive to Nicole's house in the country and then Christina will call Michel and ask for a divorce, knowing he will come to get her. They will then slip some sleeping pills into his whiskey and drown him in the bath before driving back to the school and dumping Michel's body in the dirty, sludge-filled swimming pool, which appears, Chekhov-style right at the start of the film. They will make sure Nicole's lodgers, living upstairs, see them both in the house so they have an alibi.
All goes to plan until the swimming pool is drained...and all that remains of Michel is his lighter. Oh noes! Actually, not so oh noes as pretty much everyone at the school is delighted that Michel has gone walkies. It means the teachers don't have to drink plonk with their dinner and the pupils have to stand in the corner when they are naughty rather than getting beaten. Of course, Christina starts to wonder whether someone has moved the body and is on to her or whether Michel has risen from the dead and as she has a heart problem, this cannot end well.
The film is remarkably suspenseful throughout. On the morning when Christina runs away with Nicole, the camera follows her around her bedroom, getting ready and gathering her things, for about five minutes. Even in this scene, the tension is high: will Michel wake up or will she get away? Again, during the murder scene and, indeed, from the moment Michel arrives at Nicole's house until the end of the film, I was on edge: will something go wrong? Will they get caught? There is a finely executed twist at the end (two twists, really), which was what led to me grinning, although the idea had crossed my mind at several points earlier in the film.
The acting is generally superb, although Christina's repeated fainting episodes, look spectacularly hammy. Like Sue and Alex, though, Nicole steals every scene she is in with those cool, icy stares and her calm calculations. According to IMDb, Hitchcock only lost out to Henri-Georges Clouzot for the film rights to the novel on which Les diaboliques is based by a matter of hours. I think the resulting film would be something Hitchcock would be proud to put his name to.
01 April 2010
Hypercorrecter Than Thou
I've been called a grammar nutter before (a pedant too, although I take that as a compliment) but the truth is I am, like many linguists, a descriptivist rather than a prescriptivist. Still, it irritates me more when people make grammatical mistakes when trying so hard to avoid "things wot they've heard iz wrong." The classic example of this is when people say "I" instead of "me" because they've heard that saying "me" is bad (saying "Alex and me went to the cinema" instead of "Alex and I..." is supposedly bad therefore one should also say "he came to the cinema with Alex and I" --technically, one shouldn't). This is hypercorrection. It doesn't just happen in English either, although is common in the speech of those who wish to sound as though they are from a higher social class.
As a child, I was precociously good at spelling. So much so that at age ten, I was pointed towards the Oxford English Dictionary and told to pick my own spellings to learn each week. No one taught me IPA, however, which meant that although I could spell Madagascar, chlorofluorocarbon and other similarly lengthy and/or difficult words, I never found out how to pronounce them. I was fifteen before I found out that Madagascar isn't pronounced ['mah-duh-guh-''saah-kuh] and that [in-dikt-munt] is usually pronounced [in-dite-munt]. Even now, from time to time, I will say a word I've seen in writing but never heard in speech before and will be me with stares and then laughter.
Most recently, though, I've been a victim of orthographical hypercorrection. On the radio, I've often heard people mentioning [mef-uh-drone] and as many people in southern England pronounce th as f, I assumed this drug was spelled methedrone. I was hypercorrecting, of course, and am clearly a massive snob for assuming that everyone else is just labialising their dental fricative (th is pronounced by pushing air past the tip of the tongue against the teeth; f involves blowing air past the teeth against the lower lip).
On the other hand, mephedrone has been in the news a lot recently. Both methadone and methedrone are also drugs and I have potentially heard them mentioned on the news in the past. I have definitely been hypercorrecting recently but this error may have been reinforced by having heard the other two words in the past.
As a child, I was precociously good at spelling. So much so that at age ten, I was pointed towards the Oxford English Dictionary and told to pick my own spellings to learn each week. No one taught me IPA, however, which meant that although I could spell Madagascar, chlorofluorocarbon and other similarly lengthy and/or difficult words, I never found out how to pronounce them. I was fifteen before I found out that Madagascar isn't pronounced ['mah-duh-guh-''saah-kuh] and that [in-dikt-munt] is usually pronounced [in-dite-munt]. Even now, from time to time, I will say a word I've seen in writing but never heard in speech before and will be me with stares and then laughter.
Most recently, though, I've been a victim of orthographical hypercorrection. On the radio, I've often heard people mentioning [mef-uh-drone] and as many people in southern England pronounce th as f, I assumed this drug was spelled methedrone. I was hypercorrecting, of course, and am clearly a massive snob for assuming that everyone else is just labialising their dental fricative (th is pronounced by pushing air past the tip of the tongue against the teeth; f involves blowing air past the teeth against the lower lip).
On the other hand, mephedrone has been in the news a lot recently. Both methadone and methedrone are also drugs and I have potentially heard them mentioned on the news in the past. I have definitely been hypercorrecting recently but this error may have been reinforced by having heard the other two words in the past.