Father Geek here with Latauro's latest edition of our regular weekly Downunder Report... Latauro brings up an interesting problem (falling behind in viewing the classics, our filmic roots) in his intro.
Ol' Father Geek here has seen 10's of thousands of motion pictures throughout the years, but I am constantly made aware of great ones that I have missed for some reason or another... saw THE MORTAL STORM the other day for the first time, and PAT AND MIKE a couple of days earlier... I try to view a NEW (to me) old classic every day, as well as re-visit a great vintage film friend everyday (recent examples are THE SEARCHERS and KEY LARGO). I also try to discover a newer "future" classic daily on DVD like the 70's Euro-sleaze gem FLAVIA THE HERETIC that I just saw. Its hard to do I know with all the new product that is presented to us (I've seen in the last few days T3, SWIMMING POOL, PIRATES OF..., LEAGUE OF..., SINBAD, CHARLIE'S... and I've got SPY KIDS 3 tomorrow, and BAD BOYS 2 the next day), buuuuuuut we owe it to ourselves to keep things in perspective by seeing as many older films as we see new ones...
Now here's Latauro... I'm off to see PIRATES etc for the second time. Harry and I are taking his sister (sistersatan) and my grandson (KublaKhan) to experience Depp & Co. this afternoon, and then to Rodriguez's 3-D adventure's World Premiere tomorrow...
I met Death today. We are playing chess.
AICN-DOWNUNDER
I finally saw Ingmar Bergman’s 1957 film THE SEVENTH SEAL last night. I won’t bore you by adding my superficial comments when wiser heads than mine have already waxed over every frame (okay, my one sentence review: rip-off of BILL AND TED and LAST ACTION HERO... kidding), but it got me thinking about something.
Films are being churned out at an incredible rate. I remember hearing about how studios only make twelve films a year, and I was amazed at how difficult it must be to get them made at such a rate. Then I realised how many studios there were, how many sub-studios there were (the Fine Lines, the Dimensions, the Fox Searchlights, etc), how many independently financed films there are, how many countries there are making films... We get about five films released a week, give or take, and we don’t even get everything ever made. We don’t get every French film, every Korean film, every Iranian film. Oh, and there’s the endless stream of straight-to-video/DVD fodder I didn’t mention... but let’s not drag Mary-Kate, Ashley and David Caruso into the argument.
What struck me was that, after more than two decades of film watching, it was only now that I was seeing SEVENTH SEAL, a film that always appears on the ‘I can’t believe you haven’t seen that!’ list. And I have many more films on that list. I’m trying to get through them all, but it’s getting harder.
I’m thinking about future generations of film geeks who aren’t going to be able to recite silent Russian shorts from 1924 the way Harry can, because there’s just too much out there. In ten years there’s going to be literally thousands more films out there, and at least a third of those are going to be better-than-average. (Statistically, half of those or more, but let’s not get bogged down in semantics.)
It doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s going to be a better selection for people to choose from, just as it doesn’t necessarily mean that the old classics will be lost (if anything, they’re getting a second wind through DVD restorations). It may mean that we’re going to see more specialised groups, even more than we see now. There are horror buffs, romantic comedy buffs, science fiction buffs at present time (damn, I swore I wouldn’t use the word ‘buff’ in this article... oh well, too late now), but it could well be even more specialised in the future. No one’s going to be able to watch *everything*, although many may try.
Or perhaps I’m just being too George Orwell. Yes, it’s probably that.
NEWS
* The Screen Producers Association of Australia (or SPAA, as they chummily insist Lat calls them) has asked for a withdrawal of strike threats by Australian film and TV performers. But, cunningly, SPAA have not left it with a simple “please don’t” request! No – at a quarter past the eleventh hour they offered to have the situation mediated by the Industrial Relations Commission (IRC). Viewers will cautiously await the next few installments of BLUE HEELERS to see if said mediation was successful.
* As AICN-D reported, like, a gazillion years before anyone else did, the big-screen adaptation of UK sf-comedy RED DWARF will lens in Australia. Co-creator Doug Naylor is currently in Queensland scouting for locations. (Oy, Doug! Shoot at Pacific Fair! They’ve got this place that sells apple flavoured Chupa Chups! No shiznit!)
* Time to get our knickers in a twist (so to speak). Police have halted two further attempts to screen KEN PARK in both Sydney and Melbourne. At the moment, there’s no way to buy KEN PARK on Ebay, but AICN-D will provide a link the moment one becomes available.
* Shock! Horror! A couple of weeks ago we reported on Victorian filmmaker Andrew Merkelbach and his determination to make a DOCTOR WHO feature film. Well, those pesky rights-holders (the BBC) have put a halt to these plans, so we may never get to see DRAMAS OF THE ALTERNATE on the screen, big or otherwise. Instead, Merkelbach will concentrate on an original film, CURSE OF THE DEMENTED, a much-anticipated sequel to his 2002 feature VORTECH: THE TRAVELLER.
* The Premiers of Victoria, NSW, Queensland and South Australia (that’s Bracks, Carr, Beatty, and... other... guy...) are backing AusFILM’s submission to the Federal Government calling for an expansion to Australia’s tax incentives for features to also apply to big budget TV projects. It will be interesting to see how this political back-and-forth will play out, given all the states are led by the Labour party while the country is led by the Liberals (a fun fact worth mentioning at all opportunities).
* AICN-D reader Anthony has passed on some links to a local film I must admit I’ve never heard of. A BULLET IN THE ARSE is being billed as an “explosive independent action movie unlike anything in Australia”, and some of the photography looks pretty good. Lat didn’t get a chance to look at the trailer, so if anyone wants to post some trailer reviews in talkback, the link is: http://www.neteffective.com.au/bullet/trailers.html Site link: http://www.neteffective.com.au/bullet/ .
* Oh, and for Australians wanting to see the much-mentioned zombie flick UNDEAD, we’ll be getting a theatrical release on September 4th. To check on screening specifics, visit the official site at www.undeadmovie.com.
AWARDS AND FESTIVALS
4TH SYDNEY ASIA PACIFIC FILM FESTIVAL
This year’s SAPFF (ten times fast, GO!) will be postponed until 2004, due to the outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome.
BRISBANE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL July 29 to August 10
Editor-turned-producer Anthony Buckley will be the recipient of the Chauvel Award on July 4 at BIFF. Buckley has produced TV movies THE POTATO FACTORY and HEROES’ MOUNTAIN as well as big screen feature DAD AND DAVE: ON OUR SELECTION. For more info on BIFF, go to http://203.58.62.105/biff2003/home/default.asp.
MELBOURNE UNDERGROUND FILM FESTIVAL
The appropriately-acronymed MUFF has succeeded in a legal battle to screen controversial THE SEARCH FOR TRUTH IN HISTORY and THE ISRAEL-PALESTINE CONFLICT: A PALESTINIAN PERSPECTIVE. Both films’ subject matter outraged Melbourne’s Jewish community, which tried to get a court to stop the festival showing them. Judge Higgins ruled in favour for MUFF.
BOX OFFICE
SINBAD only just failed to break into the top five in its first week of wide-release, while HULK got shunted down by God, the Angels, and the Work of the Devil.
Here's this week's top grossers...
- 1. CHARLIE’S ANGELS: FULL THROTTLE
- 2. BRUCE ALMIGHTY
- 3. DADDY DAY CARE
- 4. HULK
- 5. THE LIZZIE MCGUIRE MOVIE
RELEASED THIS WEEK
Hogan does some more tunneling, Rose Byrne plays a girl called Rose, and a secret conspiracy successfully kills off the reality movie genre before it even takes off.
Now for the new (to Australia, anyway) babies on the block...
- AUTO FOCUS
- I CAPTURE THE CASTLE
- THE REAL CANCUN
REVIEW
AUTO-FOCUS
I have no idea who Bob Crane is. I have no idea who John Carpenter is. I’ve just spent over two equally enjoyable/uncomfortable hours with both of them and I don’t believe I know who they are.
This is not a slur on the film; it’s merely my own opinion on biopics, and how I don’t believe you can condense *anyone’s* life into a two hour movie and truly get to know them. That said, there are some biopics I like. There are some that go so far beyond bad that they honestly slip into ‘offensive’ territory (A BEAUTIFUL MIND, I’m looking in your direction), but it’s not like I condemn the genre or anything.
That said, I came out of AUTO-FOCUS with two sensations: the sensation that I’d just seen a really solid, terrifically-made film, and the feeling of being really, really seedy.
The film is about the love affair between Crane and Carpenter. About how no woman can completely satisfy them, yet they’ve both found the one man that can. When Bob fights with a woman, they divorce him. When he fights with John, they make up. They have to. They’re in love, they’re co-dependent, and they’re thoroughly aware of the fact. They’re also aware they can’t do anything about it. But it’s not an evil love. John seems aware of his own feeling from the beginning, whilst Bob – who mocks what he perceives as John’s homosexuality – takes twenty years to realise that he reciprocates this love. He agrees to an open marriage with his second wife, but tells John he has to choose between himself and another man.
Greg Kinnear plays Crane as a man who can’t understand why his career and his family can’t be reconciled with his sexual ‘normality’, and for the purposes of this particular biopic, it works. Paul Schraeder is trying to sell us on the idea that this sitcom star we’ve known and loved had a sexual deviancy, and the only way to sell this to an audience of HOGAN’S HEROES watchers is to play him as Hogan. How would Hogan be if he were awakened to this side of himself and drawn into this world? How would Ward Cleaver react?
But it’s really Willem Dafoe that stands out. Carpenter is a man who is so eagre to please, who wants to express his love for Crane but can only do so through intercourse with women. Portraying Carpenter is a different exercise entirely, because he’s not playing against preconceptions. Dafoe has been handed a blank slate, and perhaps it was that which permitted him to play up to the subtext in such a perfectly overstated way.
Quick note: the one thing that I was expecting (based on US reviews of the film) was the computerised blocks covering the first blow-job scene involving Crane. Unless I missed it, the international (or, at least, the Australian) print didn’t have this random moment of censorship. Thought you’d like to hear that, given our sudden need to ban anything that mentions sex... one of those current events that the film unintentionally comments on, much like the fortuitous timing of the WAG THE DOG release.
So, no, I don’t feel like I know the real Bob Crane. Or the real John Carpenter. But I do know the characters I saw on screen, and they are two of the most complicated and fascinating portrayals I’ve seen in a long time.
NEXT WEEK
- Renee Zellweger, Joey Lauren Adams and Jewel [Kilcher] to play the same person in an UNTITLED ROM-COM for David Lynch
- Christopher Eccleston, David Thewlis and Thom York to play three cer-razy brothers in THREE MEN AND A PLASTIC SURGEON for Richard Curtis
- John Malkovich, Patrick Stewart and Michael Stipe to play three snooker balls in the computer-animated comedy BALLS IN THE HOLE for Pixar
