Showing posts with label Silence. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Silence. Show all posts

Wednesday 16 September 2020

Comments on Pinter : Landscape (1968 / 1969) (work in progress)

Comments on Pinter : Landscape (1968 / 1969) (work in progress)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


15 September

Comments on Pinter : Landscape (1968 / 1969) (work in progress)

1. A woman (Beth) is being reflective about both the past, and herself and her qualities, in relation to it.

2. Pinter may not have intended this play for radio, but it was first given there by the BBC¹. Has that earlier identity as - one might think of it - 'a play for voices' been subsumed since Peter Hall, within months of that first production, directed it (alongside Silence) at the RSC ?

3. Peggy Ashcroft played Beth in both productions, Dorothy Tutin in the BBC production directed by Kenneth Ives in 1983 (with Colin Blakely as Duff).

4. The title evokes :

(i) The outside, which the man (Duff) and she largely 'live in' while speaking ;

(ii) The 'landscape of their lives' as a terrain (minefield ?) that they physically, and mentally, occupy ; and

(iii) Who they are (or were) in relation to it - and, through it, to each other.


5. It is also a clue to the word 'rape', which is not at all far from the surface - here, in the short Night¹, or in The Collection (1961 / 1962²).

6. What Duff gives with one hand (That nice blue dress he [Mr Sykes] chose for you, for the house, that was very nice of him), he takes with the other³ (Of course it was in his own interests to see that you were attractively dressed about the house, to give a good impression to his guests) : in the latter, he is arguably as much trying to make facts suit him as needle Beth (again) about her worth.

7. Beth does not need, or does / can not benefit from, his version of encouragement (You should have a walk with me one day down to the pond, bring some bread. There's nothing to stop you.) or, more significantly, his of approbation :

Mr Sykes took to us from the very first interview, didn't he ?

Pause

He said I've got the feeling you'll make a very good team. Do you remember ? And that's what we proved to be. No question. [...]


8. [...]

9. When Beth sets out 'the basic principles of shadow and light' (Shadow is deprivation of light, etc.), we know, of course, that she means something else - as well as telling us, she is seeking comfort, by relating them to herself and to her past, to who she is :

But I always bore in mind the basic principles of drawing.

Pause

So that I never lost track. Or heart.

Pause



[...]



End-notes :

¹ On 25 April 1968 and 2 July 1969, according to the information in the Eyre Methuen edition Landscape and Silence (A Methuen Modern Play), which includes the text of Night, first performed on 9 April 1969.

² Another play that, again according to its Methuen edition, was first presented elsewhere than on the stage (on Associated Rediffusion Television on 11 May 1961).

³ Duff had done so, straightaway in the next sentence, with ?, but 'cannot let it lie' - he has to worry it, because, unspoken, it worries him.




Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)

Friday 20 December 2019

Frank, we did all we could for the man ~ Russell Bufalino (Joe Pesci)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


20 December







Need we really consider Joker (2019) as some sort of Scorsese film – or The Irishman (2019) as Scorsese’s contribution to the film universe of Marvel ? :



Meanwhile, in some other universe (when it is Phillips who grossly steals from Scorsese's films, but not in any way to justify the theft), does someone seriously suggest that the indebtedness is the other way around, in 'Why 'The Irishman' Is Scorsese's MCU Movie' !


[...]


Postlude :






Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)

Tuesday 26 December 2017

Cinema-going in 2017, an illustrated round-up

#UCFF's most-esteemed films, as seen during 2017

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2017 (19 to 26 October)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


Christmas Eve

#UCFF's most-esteemed films, as seen during 2017 :
or, available here in a plain-text version


Dedicated to Neil White of everyfilm.co.uk (as pictured)




In alphabetical order (with date of viewing), and - unless stated otherwise - seen at The Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge (@CamPicturehouse) :


* A Quiet Passion (2016) ~ 12 March




* Baby Driver (2017) ~ 3 July




* Becoming Cary Grant (2017) ~ 29 July [seen at The Watershed* / @wshed]




* Cameraperson (2016) ~ 8 March




* Citizen Jane : Battle for the City (2016) ~ 8 May




* Elle (2016) ~ 10 March




* Happy End (2017) ~ 1 December




* Jackie (2016) ~ 22 February




* Missing (Sarajin Yeoja) (2016) ~ 24 April




* Prevenge (2016) ~ 31 March [seen at Saffron Screen / @Saffronscreen]




* Silence (2016)





* Souvenir (2016) ~ 28 August [seen at Saffron Screen]




* The Villainess (Ak-Nyeo) (2017) ~ 11 September




So, March turns out to have been a good time to be at the cinema (not just because it is the time of year for bait for BAFTA, or The Academy Awards)...



Honourable mentions :


* Aquarius (2016) ~ 23 November



* Chi-Raq (2015) ~ 5 February [seen at Saffron Screen]



* Dispossession : The Great Social Housing Swindle (2017)





* Freesia (2017) ~ 26 September



* Half Way (2015)



* Loving Vincent (2017) ~ 10 November [seen at The Watershed]



* On the Road (2016) ~ 9 October



* The Seasons in Quincy : Four Portraits of John Berger (2016) ~ 18 July



* The Journey (2016) ~ 16 July [seen at Saffron Screen]




End-notes :

* In conjunction with Cary Grant comes Home for the Weekend Festival (@carycomeshome).




Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)

Sunday 24 December 2017

Cinema-going in 2017, a round-up

#UCFF's most-esteemed films, as seen during 2017

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2017 (19 to 26 October)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


Christmas Eve

#UCFF's most-esteemed films, as seen during 2017 :
or, available here in a jazzed-up version






Dedicated to Neil White of everyfilm.co.uk (as pictured)




In alphabetical order (with date of viewing), and - unless stated otherwise - seen at The Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge (@CamPicturehouse) :

* A Quiet Passion (2016) ~ 12 March

* Baby Driver (2017) ~ 3 July

* Becoming Cary Grant (2017) ~ 29 July [seen at The Watershed* / @wshed]

* Cameraperson (2016) ~ 8 March

* Citizen Jane : Battle for the City (2016) ~ 8 May

* Elle (2016) ~ 10 March

* Happy End (2017) ~ 1 December

* Jackie (2016) ~ 22 February

* Missing (Sarajin Yeoja) (2016) ~ 24 April

* Prevenge (2016) ~ 31 March [seen at Saffron Screen / @Saffronscreen]

* Silence (2016)

* Souvenir (2016) ~ 28 August [seen at Saffron Screen]

* The Villainess (Ak-Nyeo) (2017) ~ 11 September


So, March turns out to have been a good time to be at the cinema...



Honourable mentions :

* Aquarius (2016) ~ 23 November

* Chi-Raq (2015) ~ 5 February [seen at Saffron Screen]

* Dispossession : The Great Social Housing Swindle (2017)

* Freesia (2017) ~ 26 September

* Half Way (2015)

* Loving Vincent (2017) ~ 10 November [seen at The Watershed]

* On the Road (2016) ~ 9 October

* The Seasons in Quincy : Four Portraits of John Berger (2016) ~ 18 July

* The Journey (2016) ~ 16 July [seen at Saffron Screen]


End-notes :

* In conjunction with Cary Grant comes Home for the Weekend Festival (@carycomeshome).




Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)