Wow it's been a while

But, I have just closed my Facebook account. What an insidious thing that is! So, I fully intend to work on this more...

I Don't Want Nobody Baby

A music born out of the social despair of the seventies. An existential cry. A true working class musical movement, whose influence is still felt today. Encompassing not only music, but also fashion, cinema and drug culture.

No. Not punk rock. That middle class art school pseudo movement, which in reality was a cynical marketing ploy. I’m talking, of course, about Disco.

Yes. Disco. As with almost all of the true working class movements, it was concerned less about ennui and despair, than it was about the escape from it. Derided by the intelligentsia who, in embracing Punk as the real working class music merely showed themselves to be as out of touch as ever. I’m talking about you NME.Punk was spawned in the four bedroom detached houses of the Home Counties, and in the Universities which, then, were for a privileged few.
On a Friday night, in council estates, trailer parks and suburbs in America and Europe, indeed the world, young people were getting dressed ready for a night of sex, dancing and drugs, listening to Earth Wind And Fire and Yvonne Elliman, not The Clash and The Sex Pistols.

Punk did of course spawn some fantastic music. Some of the bands were wonderful. But don’t kid yourself. The true soundtrack of the seventies has a backbeat, soaring strings and a killer chorus. And the dance is The Hustle, not The Pogo.

"I've always loved dance music, it's always been part of me, so I'm always checking out for that stuff." There was a time when one had to take sides - if you liked punk music you couldn't like disco. "Yeah, I know. [Laughs] You must be aware that this caused me great difficulty in the early years, because I loved disco, and I see no shame at all in admiring the Bee Gees and being a Sex Pistol. And, well, the Carpenters, there's another band that I absolutely adored." John Lydon

Zombieland.

I finished work early today. The plan was to go to The Baltic art gallery, just to hang out, and hopefully be approached by a girl with glasses, clutching a book on pop art to her ample bosom. We would get chatting, and would end up falling for each other, because she could see through the loser call centre worker facade to the erudite and charming man inside.
But then I read a magazine, and a film called Zombieland was showing. And Bill Murray has a cameo in it. So I went to the flicks instead.
It was two thirty in the afternoon, so there was me, and about half a dozen other people.
And you know what? I really enjoyed it. From the genuinely inventive and witty credit sequence, to the barnstorming ending. Sure, the characterisation was paper thin. The dialogue cliche ridden. But it was funny, scary, thrilling, and had moments of genuine pathos.
Some of the scares were telegraphed a mile off. I mean, when one character states in a voiceover that the only thing more scary than zombies are clowns, you know a zombie clown is gonna shuffle on to the screen at some point.
By the way, I don't believe people are really scared of clowns. It's just a knee jerk thing to say. For everyone person who is actually scared, there are ten people who just say it.
Anyhow, having the climatic zombie showdown set in an amusement park was a great idea. Bill Murray was genius. And I swear I saw Tom Cruise as a zombie. For the whole running time, I was engrossed. I even forgot about the coffee I'd bought.

The only thing is, on the bus ride home, the whole film started to slip away. I kind of struggle now, three hours after, to remember a whole lot about it. But so what. This film was made purely to keep you entertained. The violence was tongue in cheek. Never nasty or spiteful. Characters you actually grew to like. The action scenes, of which there are many, were filmed with a locked down camera, no shaky cam bollocks here.
Then I read the paper, and North Korea have launched another missile. So I suggest you go and see it soon, before the planet really is a barren wasteland, and we are the only survivors.

Why I Like Movies. In Three Minutes Four Seconds

Okay, so Ella Raines is undercover, acting all femme fatale sleazy. Elisha Cook Jr takes her to this jazz bar. The scene was shot by Siodmak, and he shot it in the expressionist style that he brought to America with him from his native Germany.
It is so crazy. All tilted angles and strange compositions. And very risque for the time as well. Easily one of my favourite ever scenes.

Saving The Planet

Everyone seems to want to save the planet. But they aren't are they? The planet will get on quite well without us. What they are really saying is save the humans. But is it worth the bother, even if it's not too late?
By my calculations, humanity reached it's peak about fifty years ago. It's been downhill since Marnie was released. There has been the odd bright spot of course. Hammers Gothics. The space shuttle. Some flicks from the movie brats in the seventies. Grunge.
Hell, even the fashions have been getting worse. Walking around the city centre, just about everyone is a fat fuck wearing sportswear, or laddish blokes with shit Oasis haircuts. And thank God that band have called it a day. And why do all these thuggish looking people always decide to act thuggish when I'm around?

Remember the last part of AI, that Spielberg movie? These alien types are sifting through the artifacts of a disappeared humanity. They are probably carting stuff off to their home planet to flog on their version of E-Bay. A-Bay or something. I reckon anything from before 1965ish fetches loads, anything after ends up going cheap.The scene below would be a prize artifact.

I mean, would you rather have a copy of Rear Window or Transformers? Would you rather bring back Orson Welles for a chat or Michael Bay? Have dinner with Grace Kelly or Lindsay Lohan?

So, next time someone asks you to sponsor them for some planet saving endeavor, ask yourself if the planet really needs us any more. We've already given it the best we have to offer.

A Lost Art

It seems almost impossible to believe. But once films were made with such skill. With such love and artistry. It's all but disappeared from screens now. A minor Fox classic like Daddy Long Legs, watched now, is so beautifully lit, framed, dressed and acted that it makes most modern movies look like the badly edited mess they are. Filming something with six cameras, then using Avid to seemingly piece together footage at random does not make a film one can admire. What happened to composition?
But of course musicals are deeply unfashionable. Looked down on by movie lovers who should really know better. For aren't musicals an expression of almost pure cinema? I mean, people suddenly bursting into song and dancing around the place is deeply weird if you stop to think about it. Take a few minutes out of your life and watch eight minutes of beautiful Leslie Caron and suave Fred Astaire. And then tell me the world isn't a better place for having them around. Look below.

Why I Like Movies. In One Minute Thirty Seconds

Orson Welles made a movie called The Lady From Shanghai. It is not considered one of his greatest. It certainly isn't as good as Kane or Ambersons. Made as a favor to the studio, and then butchered.
Truffuat said Welles made some films with his left hand, some with his right hand. The right hand films always had snow. The left hand films gunfire. This is a left hand film.
But there is a scene in this film, about a minute and a half long, which is as good as anything ever committed to celluloid. When people write about or discuss this film, the climatic scene in the house of mirrors is always mentioned. And it is a technical tour de force.
But the scene on the boat, when Rita Hayworth sings Please Don't Kiss Me is hardly ever mentioned. And it should be.

We see Hayworth, in a halter top bikini, at night smoking a cigarette, lying down on the deck. We then see below decks, with the crew including Welles himself. Shot from below in a typically meticulous Wellsian composition. Hayworth starts to sing, quietly, sadly, and her face is framed at an angle, and you can't help but tilt your head slightly to the right. The camera slowly moves in and just watches her sing for a few seconds. Then the camera cuts away to Welles coming up the ladder, then back to Hayworth for just a few more precious seconds. Then all too quickly the scene is over. The magic is gone. But the sadness of the scene, Hayworths melancholy voice and the perfect framing of the scene is something that will stay with you forever.

You can check out the scene on the right, I have no idea who the other guy is on the second video, but they seemed to come as a deal so there you go.