More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2013
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
17 December
Simply put, five favourite films from each of the last three Cambridge Film Festivals (in alphabetical order, ignoring 'The')...
That said, the list has now been enhanced by These are some of my favourite things..., which teases out some of the common themes for you
As if I am not There (2010) - from 2011
Black Butterflies (2011) - from 2011
Dimensions (2011) - from 2011
Eyes on the Sky (2008) (Catalan) - from 2013
Formentera (2012) (German) (Festival review) - from 2012
The Idiot (2011) (Estonia) - from 2012
Kosmos (2010) - from 2011
Marius (2013) (shown with Fanny (2013) - from 2013
The Night Elvis Died (2010) (Catalan) - from 2012
Postcards from the Zoo (2012) (Festival review) - from 2012
The Redemption of the Fish (2013) (Catalan) - from 2013
The Snows of Kilimanjaro (2011) (Opening film) Festival review - from 2012
The Taste of Money (2012) - from 2013
Tirza (2010) - from 2011
Upstream Color (2013) (Young Americans) - from 2013
That said, the list has now been enhanced by These are some of my favourite things..., which teases out some of the common themes for you
Showing posts with label Black Butterflies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Black Butterflies. Show all posts
Sunday, 15 December 2013
Monday, 19 September 2011
Philipp and Philip
More views of - or at - Cambridge Film Festival 2011
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
20 September
I can only guess that the end of Philipp was meant to shock, but, as we had been in that location before, and I had thought then of what happens, it didn’t. I also didn’t feel that it necessarily fitted (although it could have done), and that what was a very well-played portrayal by Max Hegewald of acute embarrassment and pain at the pretences and stupidities of life (largely because of being at home with his parents) could have had some other resolution.
The scenes between Christa (Vanessa Krüger) and Philipp, when allowed to be themselves (and not involved in silly family rubbish at the ice-cream parlour, almost inevitably the place to go to with a new person in polite German society), are very telling, and went well, as a pairing, with snatches of intimacy in what followed, Above us Only Sky (Über uns das All).
I found the heart of Philipp there, and, by contrast, recalled only all too well how a significant birthday in my own life had to be spent with not only my family, but my parents’ friends, and their jokes, attitudes, etc. – I felt unsure whose birthday it was (whose needs are met by this coming-of-age stuff?), and, at a later stage in life (when leaving a job), really didn’t want it marked by a present that I didn’t want just because that was the protocol of moving on.
For some of us, such feelings of awkwardness stay part of life, and many other films in this festival feed into each other’s themes in this regard: Black Butterflies, Tomboy, and Tirza seem to do this, too. Philip Larkin, not with any great insight, enlivened a pretty unremarkable poem with his well-known opening line ‘They fuck you up, your mum and dad’.
Tweet away @TheAgentApsley
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
20 September
I can only guess that the end of Philipp was meant to shock, but, as we had been in that location before, and I had thought then of what happens, it didn’t. I also didn’t feel that it necessarily fitted (although it could have done), and that what was a very well-played portrayal by Max Hegewald of acute embarrassment and pain at the pretences and stupidities of life (largely because of being at home with his parents) could have had some other resolution.
The scenes between Christa (Vanessa Krüger) and Philipp, when allowed to be themselves (and not involved in silly family rubbish at the ice-cream parlour, almost inevitably the place to go to with a new person in polite German society), are very telling, and went well, as a pairing, with snatches of intimacy in what followed, Above us Only Sky (Über uns das All).
I found the heart of Philipp there, and, by contrast, recalled only all too well how a significant birthday in my own life had to be spent with not only my family, but my parents’ friends, and their jokes, attitudes, etc. – I felt unsure whose birthday it was (whose needs are met by this coming-of-age stuff?), and, at a later stage in life (when leaving a job), really didn’t want it marked by a present that I didn’t want just because that was the protocol of moving on.
For some of us, such feelings of awkwardness stay part of life, and many other films in this festival feed into each other’s themes in this regard: Black Butterflies, Tomboy, and Tirza seem to do this, too. Philip Larkin, not with any great insight, enlivened a pretty unremarkable poem with his well-known opening line ‘They fuck you up, your mum and dad’.
Tweet away @TheAgentApsley
Saturday, 17 September 2011
Not waving, but drowning
More views of - or at - Cambridge Film Festival 2011
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
17 September
As expected, Liam Cunningham (as Jack Cope) was excellent in Black Butterflies, but Carice van Houten, playing poet Ingrid Jonker, was a revelation. To those in the know, she perfectly carried out a role that betrayed the traits of impetuosity, feeling abandoned, blaming others, promiscuity, drinking too much in order to feel safe and able to cope, and becoming overwhelmed by conflicting emotions, which characterize some common personality disorders (they would probably have called them neuroses then).
Yet, as is by no means inconsistent, her character was delightful, and she filled the screen with feeling, from seducing Jack, and showing the characters’ hunger for each other in the very beautiful sex-scenes, to hurling objects at him with extreme force. There are claims that she was had other lovers, but Eugene and Jack, the ones who are definite, both find her draining, as well they would. A force for life is hard to live with, after all.
Rutger Hauer as Ingrid’s father (eerily resembling my former university tutor facially) has a harsh love (eventually, on account of her alleged sleeping around, he dismisses her as a slut), likely to have been one of the things that contributed to how she reacts to life and, through doing so in later life, the three psychiatric admissions that we see (or hear of), the last of them leading to electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). Although it is not always true that people are never the same after it, she is damaged.
She is also damaged by the child whom she wished she had kept, and by the one fathered by Eugene, and which led her to desperate steps in Paris and that last admission. Whereas the film does not pretend to portray Ingrid’s life or that of others who were close to her faithfully, hearing Carice (and, against his judgement, her character’s father) read her verse will encourage a journey to look out her writing, not least given that is was allowed such a prominent place in the new South Africa.
Maybe the real Ingrid wrote on the walls, maybe she didn’t, but it set up a world in which desperate words written in the condensation in Paris were hurtingly real, and also tragically echoed her having made love to Jack in her old room at her father’s house (the old servants’ quarters), their bodies touching and mingling with her script.
Not exactly a love-story, through she clearly does love Jack (but cannot be ‘faithful’), but one about what it is to feel, love and live, and to write faithfully what one believes in, whatever the cost.
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
17 September
As expected, Liam Cunningham (as Jack Cope) was excellent in Black Butterflies, but Carice van Houten, playing poet Ingrid Jonker, was a revelation. To those in the know, she perfectly carried out a role that betrayed the traits of impetuosity, feeling abandoned, blaming others, promiscuity, drinking too much in order to feel safe and able to cope, and becoming overwhelmed by conflicting emotions, which characterize some common personality disorders (they would probably have called them neuroses then).
Yet, as is by no means inconsistent, her character was delightful, and she filled the screen with feeling, from seducing Jack, and showing the characters’ hunger for each other in the very beautiful sex-scenes, to hurling objects at him with extreme force. There are claims that she was had other lovers, but Eugene and Jack, the ones who are definite, both find her draining, as well they would. A force for life is hard to live with, after all.
Rutger Hauer as Ingrid’s father (eerily resembling my former university tutor facially) has a harsh love (eventually, on account of her alleged sleeping around, he dismisses her as a slut), likely to have been one of the things that contributed to how she reacts to life and, through doing so in later life, the three psychiatric admissions that we see (or hear of), the last of them leading to electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). Although it is not always true that people are never the same after it, she is damaged.
She is also damaged by the child whom she wished she had kept, and by the one fathered by Eugene, and which led her to desperate steps in Paris and that last admission. Whereas the film does not pretend to portray Ingrid’s life or that of others who were close to her faithfully, hearing Carice (and, against his judgement, her character’s father) read her verse will encourage a journey to look out her writing, not least given that is was allowed such a prominent place in the new South Africa.
Maybe the real Ingrid wrote on the walls, maybe she didn’t, but it set up a world in which desperate words written in the condensation in Paris were hurtingly real, and also tragically echoed her having made love to Jack in her old room at her father’s house (the old servants’ quarters), their bodies touching and mingling with her script.
Not exactly a love-story, through she clearly does love Jack (but cannot be ‘faithful’), but one about what it is to feel, love and live, and to write faithfully what one believes in, whatever the cost.
Wednesday, 7 September 2011
Popular items
8 September
There was no need to guess that - as the Festival web-site announces has happened - the opening film would sell out, but also:
* Black Butterflies has been lifted out of the German strand into the main listing of features
* Gerhard Richter: Painting has been moved out of the screen that it was in (Screen 3, the smallest) into Screen 2 (the middle-sized screen) for the screening that I booked
* Dimensions, for which there was little choice when I came to book (and had to, because the other screening gave rise to a clash), has also sold out
A useful feature to keep an eye on, and it would be even better if a section of that web-page gave an alert when tickets are selling fast for a particular film or one (if more than one) of its screenings...
There was no need to guess that - as the Festival web-site announces has happened - the opening film would sell out, but also:
* Black Butterflies has been lifted out of the German strand into the main listing of features
* Gerhard Richter: Painting has been moved out of the screen that it was in (Screen 3, the smallest) into Screen 2 (the middle-sized screen) for the screening that I booked
* Dimensions, for which there was little choice when I came to book (and had to, because the other screening gave rise to a clash), has also sold out
A useful feature to keep an eye on, and it would be even better if a section of that web-page gave an alert when tickets are selling fast for a particular film or one (if more than one) of its screenings...
Those CFF events (so far...)
7 September
Friday 16
Saturday 17
Sunday 18
Monday 19
Tuesday 20
Wednesday 21
Thursday 22
Friday 23
Staurday (?) 24
Sunday 25
Thursday 15
4.45 Ace In The Hole
8.00 Opening film: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (sold out)
Friday 16
12.45 Tomboy
3.15 Rembrandt Fecit 1669 (Jos S.)
8.00 The Illusionist (Jos S.)
11.00 The Day The Earth Caught Fire - decide on the night
Saturday 17
12.45 Jess + Moss
3.00 Black Butterflies
8.15 Jos Stelling in Conversation (Q&A)
10.30 Don't Be Afraid Of The Dark
Sunday 18
3.15 No Trains No Planes (Jos S.)
5.45 White White World
8.15 Burnout
Monday 19
1.00 Bombay Beach
3.30 The Camera That Changed The World + another
5.45 A Useful Life
10.30 Sympathy For Mr Vengeance - decide on the night
Tuesday 20
8.15 Drive
11.00 Red State - decide on the night
Wednesday 21
3.15 As If I Am Not There
8.15 Dimensions (sold out)
11.00 Wild Side - decide on the night
Thursday 22
12.30 The Seventh Seal
11.00 Bullhead - decide on the night
Friday 23
3.30 Jo For Jonathan
6.00 The Nine Muses
8.15 Gerhard Richter: Painting
10.30 Red White & Blue - decide on the night
Staurday (?) 24
12.30 Kosmos
8.00 Tyrannosaur
10.45 Guilty Of Romance - decide on the night
Sunday 25
3.15 Sleeping Beauty
6.00 Surprise Movie (probably sold out)
8.30 Closing film: The Look
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