Remember When You Bought CD's?

Another slightly straying blog entry today, but one that holds some nostalgia to those who used to wait for new releases and save up your pocket money to buy them. Those days are gone my friends, and here are my thoughts on why.

HMV have been dominating the headlines and water-cooler chit chat for a couple of days now as it faces going in to administration. Even though hope is on the horizon for the ‘Top Dog’ music retailer, one can’t help wonder where it all went wrong?

HMV certainly was Top Dog back in the 80’s and 90’s when it first opened and was the place to buy music vinyls. The introduction of CD’s only fuelled their already booming music selling business. The company went global and opened up stores all over the world, the biggest being in Oxford Street in 1986. In the early 2000’s HMV bought Waterstones and Dillons and grew bigger than ever before, but in an article written by Philip Beeching, an accountant for HMV for 25 years, he says HMV were blind to the threats on the horizon. In a meeting with HMV’s Managing Director Steve Knott, he recalls pitching the ideas that HMV could suffer from online shopping, supermarket chains and music downloads. Ideas that were dismissed completely and unfortunately, it was this that eventually led to its downfall.

Major online retailers like Play.com and Amazon are by an large cheaper than HMV, I often see something for sale in HMV for say…£12 and I know I can get it for less on Amazon and Play.com, second hand. The only problem with buying it online is I have to wait for it to arrive, HMV have a shoe in there, especially for DVD’s. However, there are countless avenues to go down if you want to watch a film without leaving the house, the first and most taboo is obviously pirating. It takes a matter of minutes to find anything you want and you could be watching it on your TV in full DVD quality later on that day without even putting your coat on or counting out your pennies. The majority of people will risk the mythical fines that claim the bank accounts of some unfortunate downloaders because it feels so legal to do it. It easy, its heavily used and the websites are well known and established. If you want to go to heaven however, there are other  legal ways and means of watching movies with the help of LoveFilm and NetFlix, which if you have an internet connection and a game console, you have access to hundreds of films and television shows on your TV which you can access anytime you want for a small monthly fee that comes straight out your bank account. The case is the same for music. If you don’t mind the odd advert you can download Spotify for free where you have instant access to thousands of songs. Or, if you want to buy a digital album you can get one from iTunes for less than you’d pay in the shops and with only a couple of clicks of the mouse.

Films and music are so easy to obtain without leaving the house it’s no wonder that it’s the traditionalists who like the idea of a CD or DVD being a material possession, or those who enjoy browsing the isles of shiny new products that were keeping the business alive. However, even this can still be done in the form of other retailers such as CEX, the multimedia company who buy your old stuff off you and sell in in the'r shops for a very reasonable price, including videogames. So that’s the big three, CD’s, DVD’s and games all available online or for a lot less than being sold in HMV or Game, even with the addition of pre-owned products in both major retailers, it’s just not working.  HMV even sell other products; books, t-shirts, headphones, posters, iPod docks and all manner of accessories but the problem again is that they can be bought for less online, or in other places.

People don’t have the money they used to and things are so expensive if bought new when second hand are just as good. There isn’t even the promise of a new fangled multimedia system on the horizon that will replace blu-rays. Everything is digital, even the cinema is slipping from our fingers as being a materialised projection. The art of film itself is so old and so forgotten that if it were to make a comeback it would probably be considered retro, even though its only been gone for a couple of years. Paul Thomas Anderson’s revival of the 70mm film for his film The Master was certainly a promising move, and perhaps other film makers, the ones with an emotional attachment to film work, will follow in his footsteps.

‘It’s all for the best!’ They all keep saying, but is it? Do we have to kill one thing in order for something else to flourish? In the case of multimedia high street retailers vs. The Internet, I think we have an obvious winner. HMV will be saved but how long will it last? In answer to my original question, I think it’s clear to say that even though it is sad another high street retailer has sadly fallen into the depths containing Woolworths, Dixons and Comet, it’s not really going to have much of an impact on the entertainment industry. It’s easier to showcase and publish your work online be it a film, a song or even writing and instantly access millions of people with it. It’s easy for those people to get your work and even easier if they just want to sample it. The box office reached an all-time high last year with record numbers of people flooding into our multiplexes to watch the latest flick in all kinds of different formats, does Bilbo Baggins look better in HFR, IMAX or 3D I wonder? The industry is very much alive, but the retailers need to adjust to that. Trying to flog the ‘Friends’ box set for £50 is preposterous when it is shown on repeat every single day, 4 or more times a day on Comedy Central. HMV should stick to new releases, special editions, exclusive editions and pre-owned goods to be in with a chance of making it. Hit the online retailers where it hurts and sell something they don’t. People will still go to HMV, the queues at Christmas are enough for you to question this administration business, as the majority of people over the age or 25 will still want to buy a hard copy of a film or a song, to play on their CD players, HiFi systems or, hold your breath, turntables.

Here’s hoping the buyer of HMV will allow it to succeed, as our high streets really wouldn’t look the same without it. Where will we all go and kill some time on Sunday afternoons if HMV has closed down? EH?

Getting Nostalgic for The Oscars.

I have a real gripe with the Academy Awards, I thought I would stray slightly from my path of reviewing something old, and instead discuss the misfortunes faced by so many talented souls at the great big popularity contest that is The Oscars. I'm quite new to this game, and so far, i'm not sure I like what I see.



Brad Pitt in Fight Club

As an appreciator of fine film work, I have often found myself watching some incredible films and thinking to myself ‘Why hasn’t this won any awards?!’ The perfect example of this is David Fincher’s Fight Club – a film that was nominated for TWO Academy Awards for Best Effects and Best Sound Editing and in terms of notable statuettes to claim, this was pretty much it for a film that appears in most institutions lists of top 100 films of all time. I suppose the obvious reason why this happened was the competition of that year, so 1999 lets see…The Academy Awards only had 5 slots for Best Picture back then belonging to American Beauty, Cider House Rules, The Green Mile, The Insider and The Sixth Sense. Fair enough, American Beauty, The Green Mile and The Insider were great movies, deserving a place here but Cider House Rules?! How could ANYTHING starring Toby Maguire even get a sniff in?  Moving on to Best Actor, a category that Edward Norton deserved recognition for Fight Club, with his portrayal of ‘The Narrator’ AKA Tyler Durden? Alas, it isn’t so. Losing out on even a nomination to Kevin Spacey (American Beauty), Russell Crowe (The Insider), Sean Penn (Sweet and Lowdown), Denzel Washington (The Hurricane) and Richard Farnsworth (The Straight Story) - the slot surely should have gone to Norton instead of Farnsworth but I’m pretty sure he only got it because he was about to die. Fair enough, he was outstanding in The Straight Story.

How about Director then? Undeniably, Fight Club is exceptionally directed by David Fincher helped in the most part by the critically acclaimed novel to which the film is based upon by Chuck Palahniuk.  The intensity of the fighting scenes, the emotional struggle for Norton’s character to adapt to the soap fuelled lifestyle of his alter ego, the pacing, the slow motion sex scenes, the filthy energy that fills their crooked house is nothing short of pure genius and at the time was so refreshing to see. So why didn’t he even get nominated? Again, the addition of Cider House Rules, The Insider, The Sixth Sense and American Beauty were real sticklers, but not even Frank Darabont got nominated here for The Green Mile – a film that so deservedly appeared in the Best Picture category which is a serious miss judgement on the Academy’s part. Yeah,  Being John Malkovich was good but was it as good as The Green Mile? Absolutely NOT.

Jude Law in The Talented Mr Ripley

Surely Brad Pitt, the Hollywood Heart Throb would get a nomination for Supporting Actor as the good-looking, sweet talking, womanising soap maker Tyler Durden? What’s that you say? Not even nominated? What a surprise. Pitt lost out on a nomination to Jude Law (The Talented Mr Ripley), Michael Caine (Cider House Rules), Michael Clarke Duncan (The Green Mile), Holey Joel Osment (The Sixth Sense) and Tom Cruise (Magnolia). Jude Law most certainly does not deserve to be here instead of Brad Pitt which for me is the final and most disappointing shun I’m allowing myself to discuss. Oh, by the way, it didn’t even get nominated for Adapted Screenplay…

Members of the Academy choose who wins what, and these members are a combination of people from every aspect of film making; Actors, Directors, Cinematographers, Producers etc.  I guess they can’t nominate everyone, and there certainly is such a thing as an ‘Academy Friendly Film’ whether a film be successful or not, if it is ‘Academy Friendly’ it will get nominated. This years Oscar nominations are a great example of this, as the greatest and biggest films of 2012 – Prometheus and The Avengers received a nod for their visual effects but The Dark Knight Rises received a grand total of ZERO Oscar Nominations, but that’s just the tail end of a long line of snubs for Inception director Christopher Nolan. Innovative and original film making just gets you nowhere these days, eh Nolan?

However, we all knew Spielberg’s Lincoln would walk into an Oscar nomination because its about the achievements of a great American President, which is fine. I guess. The rest of this years Best Picture nominations create a competitive lists of 2012 great films including Haneke’s Amour and Benh Zeitlin’s debut Beasts of the Southern Wild, which were two surprise additions to the list of nominees, but we all know that Lincoln will probably win. We’d love to see Silver Linings Playbook win or even Tarantino’s Django, but it’s just not going to happen because why would the Academy not let a film about Abraham Lincoln win? It stars Daniel Day Lewis, is directed by Stephen Spielberg and has Oscar written all over it.

The category suggests clearly the best film of 2012 will walk home with a gold statue, and I agree that a compilation of professional film artists are best equipped to make such decisions.  Which is why Argo should win, but Ben Affleck has been denied a slot in the Best Director category which is a huge injustice for him.  I suppose that’s the trouble with having 10 best picture slots and only 5 best director slots, there is always going to be serious upsets here, but regrettably I think Affleck’s spot was stolen by Zeitlin. The Academy probably feels pretty stupid this morning though after Affleck deservedly and defiantly won Golden Globes last night for Best Director and Best Drama Film. In your FACE Academy!

Perhaps winning an Oscar isn’t the be all and the end all for Directors and Actors alike, but it is the ultimate recognition for doing a good job.  But sometimes its bewildering to see the Academy offer nominations to people like Denzel Washington for his emotionless and shallow portrayal of a vulgar Pilot in Flight and to ignore the brilliance of Rian Johnson’s original screenplay for the time travelling marvel Looper.  However, as frustrating as some of the categories are, others are spot on perfect. Especially Best Actress comprising of Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty), Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook), Naomi Watts (The Impossible), Emmanuelle Riva (Amour) and Quvenzhane Wallis (Beasts of the Southern Wild). Chastain has this one locked down, but the category certainly hails the great actresses of the year, which is exciting.  If I had my way though, I would sort out these lists and make a couple of worthy additions (Looper, Lawless) and remove the pointless, meaningless, emotionless trash that is Flight.

Here is my personal list of unsung heroes from 2012, take note Academy.

Writers/Directors:

 

·         Rian Johnson – Looper

·         William Freidkin – Killer Joe

·         Ridley Scott – Prometheus

·         Christopher Nolan – The Dark Knight Rises

·         Stephen Soderburgh – Magic Mike

·         John Hillcoat – Lawless

·         Paul Thomas Anderson – The Master

·         Martin McDonagh – Seven Psychopaths

Actors/Actresses:

·         Michael Fassbender  - Prometheus

·         Tom Hardy – Lawless & The Dark Knight Rises

·         Guy Pearce – Lawless

·         Matthew McConaughey – Magic Mike & Killer Joe

·         Joseph Gordon –Levitt – Looper

·         Javier Bardem – Skyfall

·         Scoot McNairy – Killing Them Softly & Argo

Yeah – kicking yourselves aren’t you?

 

Un Chien Andalou (1929)

I thought I would kick off 2013 with a sureealist avant-garde film from the 1920's. Why not eh?   Here goes...

 

This year marks the 30 year anniversary of the death of Spanish director Luis Bunuel. A unique film maker who lead the avant-garde surrealist movement with his work with the moving image.  While in education he became very close with surrealist painter Salvador Dali who he would later work with to make one of the most respected short films of the surrealist movement called Un Chien Andalou, translated as ‘An Andalusian Dog’. Don’t be fooled by its romantic title which falsely promises the tale of a Spanish pooch, what lies within is something quite different; a hand crawling in ants, a woman having her eyeball sliced open and a man dressed  as a nun riding a bike. It is definitely the work of two avant-garde artists and has been persistently studied by academics since its creation in 1929. Chiming in at only 16 minutes long, it certainly packs a punch and is not for the faint hearted.

A consistent feature of the film is a pattern of black and white stripes which appears in almost every scene, whether it be on some clothing or an object in a room or furniture. It was used by Bunuel as a device for creating some sort of solidarity and consistency throughout the film for the sake of the audience. Bunuel also used a series of title cards stating a progression of time, however these jump around from ‘eight years later’ to ‘around three in the morning’ to ‘sixteen years later’ which in itself is confusing. This kind of narrative structure, where an audience is shown a sequence of images loosely linked together was known as ‘dream logic’ and was favoured by surrealists at the time.

Time frames and narratives aside, there are reasons why this film is so famous, the number one reason probably being the infamous eyeball scene. At the beginning of the film, we see a man sharpening a cut throat knife while gazing at the moon. A woman is sitting looking straight into the camera and the man takes the knife, pulls open her eyelid and brazenly slices her eyeball in half, spilling all kinds of horrible fluid on to her cheek. For years people speculate how Bunuel and Dali constructed this scene arguing about where the eyeball came from, but in 1975 Bunuel came out with the truth and said it was the eye of a baby calf and he bleached the fur of the calf so much that it would look like human skin. He certainly did a good job of making this look convincing, even now almost 90 years on it looks real and is probably just as harrowing as the day it was premiered. 

As famous as this scene may be, it is probably not the weirdest thing you’ll see in Un Chien Andalou. How about a man pulling on some ropes with the tablets of the Ten Commandments attached? What if the ropes were also attached to two priests being dragged along the floor? Better still, what if they were then attached to a piano with a dead donkey laying on it? Yes, this all happens. Bunuel and Dali were certainly on a roll when they came up with that little sequence of events.  Overlapping frames and bizarre images makes Un Chien Andalou interesting viewing, whether you like it or not, you certainly won’t see anything else akin to it. Unique in name and nature and edited in Luis Bunuel’s kitchen, he deserves a round of applause for creating such an unforgettable film which has gone down in film and art history.

Did You Know...?

As well as talking about old movies, i also like take photographs. Here are a few i'm quite proud of...

A Window at Kettle's Yard, Cambridge.

Some Chimneys, Cambridge

My Family

Blazing Saddles (1974)

Is Blazing Saddles a Western? I suppose thats the question that needs answering before a film like this can be discussed. 

I guess the short answer is Yes, it is a Western. Its set in the desert plains of America, there are Cowboys, Indians, guns, shoot outs, saloons and a town whereby everyone is called 'Johnson'. Aesthetically, it possesses everything that a film requires to be considered a Western, but why does it not feel like one?

The long (and correct) answer, is No. Blazing Saddles references some of the greatest Westerns ever made like Once Upon A Time in the West and High Noon and rather than being a spoof of these movies, it becomes more of a western satire. An  example of this would be when the newly appointed Sheriff rides gallantly across the desert on a horse to some triumphant, heroic music and he rides past a full brass band and conductor in the desert playing the music he's riding to. Brooks plays about like this quite a bit in Blazing Saddles and breaks the codes and conventions that films should follow and taking something that should be off screen and invisible to the protagonist and placing it so brazenly in the shot like this was new to audiences. How about the ending? Need i say anymore? If thats not messing about with conventions of cinema, then i don't know what is. Tarantino did the exact same thing a few years later with From Dusk Til Dawn, whereby what started out as a typically Pulp Fictionesque 'gangster movie' turned in to a gruesome vampire movie about halfway through. Just as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid did in 1969, Blazing Saddles just has fun with the genre, so much so, it stops being of that genre and seemingly creates a super-genre of its own. Lets not forget that Blazing Saddles is as much a satire of Westerns as it is an allegory of the Civil Rights Movement, so brashly displayed in its language and liberal use of the word Nigger. Inter-racial relations was still considered to be taboo and the KKK were just ironing their hats at the time Blazing Saddles was made. Brooks was obviously poking fun at the absurdity of peoples distaste for African -American's during this time. 

Whatever Blazing Saddles is, its undeniably hilarious, clever, different, stupid, witty and did is say hilarious? Gene Wilder is the star for me as Jim AKA The Waco Kid, fastest hands in the world, and his first meeting with Sheriff Bart is unforgettably funny. Sheriff Bart is the towns first black Sheriff, although his presence there is purely to be hated by the townsfolk, as is the plot of drunken Governor Petomane (Brooks) and his crooked counterpart Hedley Lemarr. He hires Bart as the new Sheriff so the townsfolk abandon their town from fear and Lemarr can demolish it for his new railroad. However, after a shaky beginning, the townsfolk come round to the idea of Bart and he is accepted. Jim is hanging upside down in a jail cell when Bart first meets him and after gettig him down, they play a game of chess together. The dialogue in this part is as much stupid as it is genius, as Wilder is drunk, Bart is curious of his desire to be so drunk. We learn he was humiliated as The Waco Kid when he was challenged by a small child and his reputation was ruined, since then he turned to the bottle and hasn't crawled out since. All emotion is taken out of this moment by Wilders delivery of the story, you really can't help but snigger at his sad, depressed little state.. I promise, its funny. 

Along with Wilder, Brooks is equally as hilarious as Governor Petomane, who is also very drunk and very interested in women rather than the running of his state. Hence the influence of nasty Lemarr being so strong in his decision making. Finally, it would be rude not to mention the lady of this film, the beautiful, sexy, seductive singer Lili Von Shtupp hire by Lemarr to seduce Bart and corrupt him, but Bart's naturally smooth sexual capabilities sends Lili wild for him, thus thwarting Lemarrs plans. Played by Madeline Kahn, Lili is completely talentless as her song proves, but he long legs, tight little bottom and inability to pronounce her 'r's gives her a sexy but adorable edge. 

The films finale leaves me lost for words every time, as Lemarrs plans are consistently being ruined by Sheriff Bart, he hires a huge gang of thugs to attack the town and Bart has 24 hours to come up with a master plan. They build a fake town riddled with dynamite and try to find a way to slow the thugs down, so the construct a tollbooth whereby the thugs have to queue up and pay to cross into Rock Ridge, no one things t just ride around the tollbooth....but this only holds them off for so long and they ride into the fake Rock Ridge and explosions send the thugs flying. The townsfolk then attack the thugs and the rabble explodes through the walls of the Warner Brothers Studio right into a Musical being directed by Dom DeLuise. I'll stop there, but trust me when i say it is COMPLETE madness. 

Blazing Saddles is one of a kind and the madness of Brooks is ever present and channelled through Wilder's Waco Kid. A must watch for anyone, remember, its not a Western. 

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

November sees in the release of the highly anticipated film The Master. Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson who has brought us such films as Magnolia and There Will Be Blood, The Master is set to be one of the films of the year. What’s so special about it? Probably the most exciting thing is that it has been shot on 70mm film and will be shown in this format, which means that the resolution will be higher, clearer and much crisper. To put it simply, it has been shot on a much larger piece of film within the camera than most other films, so its double the size and double the quality. For those of you who thought IMAX was the best picture quality you were going to see, think again!

This swiftly brings me on to today’s film, 2001: A Space Odyssey, which was famously, shot on 70mm, just like The Master, but way back in 1968. This didn’t stop it being a spectacular looking film which earned the film’s director, Stanley Kubrick, an Oscar for visual effects. What perhaps is most remarkable about 2001, is that audiences marvelled at what it was creating as a future world, showing huge space ships spinning through space, high tech gadgets, special anti-gravity shoes and futuristic furniture that no one had really seen before, as science fiction films were not particularly well established at the time. The visual effects were so breath takingly realistic and Stanley Kubrick created them without even using a computer. He used models and manipulation of the film cells to create his effects, an art which has long since bitten the dust. Before Man had even landed on the moon, Kubrick had made a convincing and technologically accurate film about space travel.

2001 starts off on Earth in prehistoric times where we watch a family of Apes or ‘hominids’ as they would rather be known, with the help of a tall, black oblong, learn how to use rocks and sticks as weapons to kill other animals for food, kick starting our rapid evolution into Man. We then hop forward a few thousand years to Dr Heywood Floyd who is travelling through space in a large, rotating vessel travelling to the moon. We learn that something has been discovered on the moon which is remarkably similar to the object that appeared before the hominids. A great amount of mystery surrounds this object – the monolith - which is assumed to be extra-terrestrial intelligence which is millions of years old and Dr Floyd and his team are sent to the moon to examine it, only to be deafened by a high pitched noise omitting from it. 18 months later Dave Bowman and Frank Poole, two young astronauts, are travelling on board the ‘Discovery’ – a spaceship bound for Jupiter sending them on a so called ‘training mission’. Little do they know, they are following up the discovery on the moon 18 months previous.  Their space ship is controlled by super computer HAL-9000 who has been programmed to behave and speak like a human, and to act as a friend to Bowman and Poole.  HAL suddenly starts behaving strangely and reporting that communication devices are broken when they are not. Things rapidly go from bad to worse when HAL completely turns on Bowman and Poole and tries to kill them. Bowman escapes in a small pod and travels through a psychedelic tunnel of lights and flies over strange foreign lands in a spiralling, trippy sequence that is quite un-nerving to watch. Eventually he is spat out of this vortex of light and he finds himself orbiting Jupiter, along with our old friend the Monolith. It’s about to get very strange now as Bowman lands in a baroque, French style bedroom. There are no windows, no doors and the floor is made out of light. Bowman goes through a series of stages in the room, when he lands he has aged slightly and when he is outside of his pod he has aged even more.

He hears a noise and investigates where he sees himself as an old man, eating dinner. He turns into his aged self and then sees himself on the verge of death lying in his bed. He then becomes this man and the monolith appears before him. He is transported through the monolith as a foetal baby where he is reborn as a master of the universe. I know this may sound like I am making it up, but I promise you this is what happens.

Kubrick and Clarke had a vision to create the ultimate science fiction movie and this one has it all. Its meaning is hard to decipher, especially of the end, but Kubrick didn’t want everyone to been spoon-fed meanings and philosophies. He left the whole thing completely open to interpretation and when asked about the meaning of 2001 he would skirt around the question without really giving an answer. It was a well known fact that Kubrick and Clarke had serious reservations about the possibility of man creating artificial intelligence, like HAL, and that we would never be able to fully understand what we create. So what do they do? They turn HAL completely evil for seemingly no reason at all, thus making their point.  

2001 is essentially a depiction of the evolution of Man from our most primitive form to our most intelligent, predicting what Man could be capable of doing in the year 2001. Throw in a murderous computer, a few reprises of Strauss’ Thus Spake Zarathustra and a horse painted like a zebra and you’ve got yourself something really quite special.

Paving the way for great science fiction movies of the future like Bladerunner, The Alien Trilogy and even Prometheus, 2001: A Space Odyssey is a ground-breaking piece of cinema that is replicated time and time again in modern culture. If I had a penny for every time I saw an inter-textual reference of 2001 in The Simpsons, I’d have enough to buy myself a Freddo bar.  Unfortunately, it’s not for everyone. It was poorly received when it was released and gained its fame from a cult following of 60’s youths who found it ‘trippy’ and has been splitting audiences for the past 44 years. I highly recommend it to science fiction fans, Kubrick fans and those of you who enjoy something a little bit different.

The nights are drawing in and the weekends are predominantly rainy, so why not give it a try? Snuggle up in the warm and prepare yourself for the ultimate Stanley Kubrick experience…

Breaking the Chain

Following on from my last post, here is a rather good movie poster, courtesy of Minimal Movie Posters, who have quite a vast back catalogue of simple and clever movie posters.