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23 May
Apologies that, at the time of the Vaughan-Williams-focused preview of this concert at Cambridge’s Corn Exchange (@CambridgeCornEx), it was overlooked that The Royal Philarmonic Orchestra (@rpoonline) is the Orchestra in Residence.
Under the baton of rising conductor Nicholas Collon (increasingly guesting with big orchestras, as well continuing The Aurora Orchestra), we had a programme of Britten, Elgar, and Vaughan Williams. (And the RPO return next season with highlights such as Stravinsky’s Suite* from The Firebird, and Brahms’ Symphony No. 2…)
Four Sea Interludes – Benjamin Britten
The programme note tells us that Britten resembled Stravinsky*, in conducting the Interludes as a separate entity days after Peter Grimes’ premiere.
Titled ‘Dawn’, ‘Sunday Morning’, ‘Moonlight’, and ‘Storm’, they evoke not only moods, which crucially punctuate the opera, but also a location in time and space : Collon was wisely unhurried with ‘Dawn’, not led on by its beautiful surface appeal, and getting an unfussy, clean, but sweet, sound from the RPO – allowing the resonant brass and rumble, as of swell, both to contrast with the rest of the ensemble, and come together.
In the next portrait, the cross-beats and near-dissonances were a delight, with the chromatic slide excitingly brought off, and filling the moment both with energy, and that trio of bell-notes, doom, and dread. ‘Moonlight’ was again controlled, daringly awaiting those fresh piercings of light from space : yet the xylophone that – with the harp – captures them ends with tortured motifs against the strings.
Finally, Collon built not the noisiest ‘Storm’, but with the strong natural suggestion of possibly going higher. He brought out the laughter in the brass, and ended crisply and exactly. A refreshing first course !
Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85 – Edward Elgar
Another work (as the symphony is) in four movements, but a good contrast with the Britten, because of the different emotive qualities of the solo cello part, not least under Guy Johnston (who was playing because of Julian Lloyd Webber’s unlucky forced retirement), who, amongst other things, expressively brought to this well-known work :
* Pacing, and an inward interpretation, of the first main theme, but reaching out for brighter things, and bring it back with electricity
* Unforced string-tone, and a plaintive, guitaristic feel to plucking strings
* A teasing tremolo, as if of a young animal playing
* A lightness of touch in sustained passage-work
* Singing, not shouting, the famous melody-line, with Johnston leaning into the instrument, as if hearing the music within it
* Moments of quiet, leading to a different mode of projection, where some single notes just spoke volumes
* The physicality, and swaying, of playing after a theme that felt full of weariness and preoccupation
* A sense of rumination, and ending with a voice resolved to follow its own counsel before reprising the main theme and a momentary tutti at the close
Symphony No. 3 [no stated key, and first entitled A Pastoral Symphony] – Ralph Vaughan Williams
At the outset, a light, floral feel is weighted by the bass, then joined by Vaughan Williams’ beloved obbligato violin. Nicely balanced playing and phrasing suggested the magical, yet tinged with something indefinably other. Collon ran the first two movements together, which, when the Molto moderato ends (after sensations of a gently drifting swell) with the moving, plangent reediness of the oboe, makes sense for introducing the horn sonority.
In the strings, Collon brought out hesitancy, uncertainty, which developed into an uneasy sense of anxiety. Whatever exactly the trumpet calls may mean, the pianissimo was pregnant, and reminded of the composer’s words (describing Boult’s conducting**) : it was a positive, sensitive pianissimo, full of meaning and tension.
Next, the Moderato pesante seems to break through the tension, rising to its lovely main theme, but Collon held course, allowing no slackness in the brass theme (accompanied by cymbals). Gloriously sonorous brass intervals then heralded the carol-like coda.
For the Lento finale, Collon had soprano Sally Harrison placed off stage, singing wordlessly in an unshowy but haunting way. After the well-located harp melody came feelings of richness, an excitement that gave way to tenderness, revisiting previous themes, and a soaring sense of pride. The song recurred, and the strings faded away.
However many knew this work, people seemed both quietly attentive to it and appreciative of the RPO and Collon’s skill.
End-notes
* Though unclear whether it is that from 1911, 1919, or 1945 (as Stravinsky, as an ambitious composer, was forever making arrangements).
** The final movement of Symphony No. 6.
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Saturday 24 May 2014
Wednesday 21 May 2014
By way of an introduction to Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 3 (originally A Pastoral Symphony)
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22 May
Cambridge Corn Exchange is to be praised for giving us, in Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 3 to-night, something out of the ordinary. For, despite Sir Adrian Boult’s still impressive recordings*, and championing by Andrew Manze (such as Boult did : he premiered this work) with Symphonies 4 to 6 at The Proms two years ago (and previously with The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra), the knowledge of Vaughan Williams is not, where it should be, in people’s minds, and the music in their hearts.
The works speak for themselves, if given the opportunity, and it is the composers whose reputation needs championing, in fact. But we must beware of switching one orthodoxy about what was originally called A Pastoral Symphony (and, as with A London Symphony, only numbered later, as well as not seeming to be expressed to be in any key), which is now that it is a form of relection on war :
Perhaps we did not know, as Martin Furber’s brief sleeve-notes for the CD release of the Boult recording* tell us, that Vaughan Williams had served in France, and that it was there, in 1916, that he first made sketches for the symphony (A London Symphony had been first performed in 1914). The question is : does it add to, or detract from, the symphony to try to connect it to the war, since Vaughan Williams had stated that its predecessor was absolute music, and in 1920 suggested, in a prgramme note, that it might better be called Symphony by a Londoner.
By all means, we want to listen to what broadcaster Stephen Johnson says that he has researched about Vaughan Williams and his time, but, most of all, we want to listen to the music…
So here is a suggestion for those new to this symphony. If one had to pick out an instrument that is redolent of each of the symphony’s four movements (although Vaughan Williams always loves trombones and writes stunningly well for solo violin) they would be, respectively, oboe, trumpet, flute and harp (as well as human voice). See the contributions being made by each instrumentalist (vocalist) at the time, and hear where they fit into the whole, both the whole of the movement, and of the accruing piece, and what Vaughan Williams is expressing by them.
Listen hard, though, for Wikipedia informs us that ‘It is scored for a large orchestra including:
* Woodwinds: 3 flutes (3rd doubling on piccolo), 2 oboes, cor anglais, 3 clarinets (in B♭ and A; 3rd doubling on bass clarinet), 2 bassoons
* Brass: 4 horns (in F), 3 trumpets (in C, 1 doubling on natural Trumpet in E♭), 3 trombones, tuba
* Percussion: timpani, triangle, cymbals, bass drum, celesta,
* Strings: harp, and strings.'
There is now an outline review of the concert, too, here
End-notes
* The one of this symphony, from 1952, with soprano Margaret Ritchie providing the wordless solo in the last movement and The London Philharmonic Orchestra takes some beating. Boult had given the premiere thirty years earlier (on 16 January 1922).
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22 May
Cambridge Corn Exchange is to be praised for giving us, in Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 3 to-night, something out of the ordinary. For, despite Sir Adrian Boult’s still impressive recordings*, and championing by Andrew Manze (such as Boult did : he premiered this work) with Symphonies 4 to 6 at The Proms two years ago (and previously with The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra), the knowledge of Vaughan Williams is not, where it should be, in people’s minds, and the music in their hearts.
The works speak for themselves, if given the opportunity, and it is the composers whose reputation needs championing, in fact. But we must beware of switching one orthodoxy about what was originally called A Pastoral Symphony (and, as with A London Symphony, only numbered later, as well as not seeming to be expressed to be in any key), which is now that it is a form of relection on war :
Perhaps we did not know, as Martin Furber’s brief sleeve-notes for the CD release of the Boult recording* tell us, that Vaughan Williams had served in France, and that it was there, in 1916, that he first made sketches for the symphony (A London Symphony had been first performed in 1914). The question is : does it add to, or detract from, the symphony to try to connect it to the war, since Vaughan Williams had stated that its predecessor was absolute music, and in 1920 suggested, in a prgramme note, that it might better be called Symphony by a Londoner.
By all means, we want to listen to what broadcaster Stephen Johnson says that he has researched about Vaughan Williams and his time, but, most of all, we want to listen to the music…
So here is a suggestion for those new to this symphony. If one had to pick out an instrument that is redolent of each of the symphony’s four movements (although Vaughan Williams always loves trombones and writes stunningly well for solo violin) they would be, respectively, oboe, trumpet, flute and harp (as well as human voice). See the contributions being made by each instrumentalist (vocalist) at the time, and hear where they fit into the whole, both the whole of the movement, and of the accruing piece, and what Vaughan Williams is expressing by them.
Listen hard, though, for Wikipedia informs us that ‘It is scored for a large orchestra including:
* Woodwinds: 3 flutes (3rd doubling on piccolo), 2 oboes, cor anglais, 3 clarinets (in B♭ and A; 3rd doubling on bass clarinet), 2 bassoons
* Brass: 4 horns (in F), 3 trumpets (in C, 1 doubling on natural Trumpet in E♭), 3 trombones, tuba
* Percussion: timpani, triangle, cymbals, bass drum, celesta,
* Strings: harp, and strings.'
There is now an outline review of the concert, too, here
End-notes
* The one of this symphony, from 1952, with soprano Margaret Ritchie providing the wordless solo in the last movement and The London Philharmonic Orchestra takes some beating. Boult had given the premiere thirty years earlier (on 16 January 1922).
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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
Can you just put the tops back on these jars, please ?
This is a review of The Trip to Italy (2014)
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22 May
This is a review of The Trip to Italy (2014)
* NB A very crude headline, from The Trip (2010), is quoted *
There were things riding on The Trip to Italy (2014), where they had not been earlier at Cambridge Film Festival for The Trip (2010), and it easily won the double.
The Q&Awas wonderful, @CamPicturehouse, and, if possible, made the pleasure of The Trip to Italy (2014) even greater. Thanks, all !
— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) May 21, 2014
Afterwards, in the Q&A broadcast by satellite from one of the London Picturehouses, Steve Coogan gave credit to director Michael Winterbottom for the whole being greater than the sum of the parts (though Coogan twice succeeded in avoiding that classic formulation), which Rob Brydon (@RobBrydon) humorously undercut by saying that he disagreed, and that it was just a matter of pressing play and record. (Winterbottom was in the audience, but was not taking part, which Coogan impishly attributed to wishing to appear profound, and so not saying anything that might give a contrary impression.)
What Winterbottom has done with both films is to craft something in cinematic terms whose essential premise has also given rise to six-part series of thirty minutes : for the films feel like films, not cut down in any way from something else, and it appears that there is material in the film that is not in the series and vice versa, alongside what is in both (at any rate, that was what seemed to have been said when The Trip screened at Cambridge).
Thank you Italy, Winterbottom, Cooganand @RobBrydon for a lovely combination via @CamPicturehouse : as great to watch as The Trip (2010) !
— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) May 21, 2014
This film reverses the roles a little from the earlier one, with Coogan not so much the know-all who has learnt facts and quotations to throw into the conversation and impress, but a man with ‘a hiatus’ that conveniently leaves him free to accompany Brydon (one which, it turns out, he hopes will not extend into winter), whereas we see the latter succeed with wooing and work. [We should, however, be calling these semi-fictionalized sides to Coogan and Brydon by the names Steve and Rob, so that when we can tell at a glance whether actor or role is meant…]
For the Steve who pontificates triumphantly in the abbey ruins in The Trip, or who wondrously meets someone with a newspaper bearing the startling headline STEVE COOGAN IS A CUNT, bears a resemblance to Coogan, but only as a starting-point for bringing friends Rob and Steve together for a week of driving, joking, eating and thinking in an invented newspaper commission to cover some culinary hot-spots. The Steve of that film definitely wants to impress more, but, when Coogan said in the Q&A that he tried to learn a couple of quotations from Byron each night to throw into the next day’s improvisation, there is little knowing which is Winterbottom’s creating a persona for Steve, or Coogan embellishing it.
What, though, is clear is that Steve is perfectly de Niro at the lunch on Thursday, and that, in reverse role, Rob truly cracks him up with his inventiveness as Parky : in the Q&A, Brydom let us into the knowledge that he had done it so well, because he had been fired up by some antagonism with Coogan, and, when he felt it just working out, went with it. Who says that it is just oysters that can be irritated to produce pearls ?
When asked about how making the two films compared, Brydon said that this one had been more convivial, and Coogan readily agreed with him, repeating the word. Brydon also said that he had been surprised, in the first one, that Coogan would just suddenly declare We’re not using this !, and so seek to gain control over the material – from which we gathered that there was none (or less) of that this time.
In giving the pair Alanis Morissette’s debut album Jagged Little Pill from 1995 to have with them in the car (though skipping the already much-ridiculed track ‘Ironic’), Winterbottom* seemed, they thought, to be off key. However, they then realized that it worked, and that, in 2014, men of their age would be revisiting it** – simply the resource of that album gave them scope, over several car journeys, for :
* Speculations about how to say ‘Alanis’ (because Steve, with his flat in LA, says that names are pronounced in the States as one chooses) – and then Rob points out that she AM is Canadian
* Then wondering whether, if the name Alan made it there, it would be stressed on the second syllable, and making it long vowel-sound – ‘My name is Alahn’
* Singing along to a track, or interjecting comments between the words, or wondering where Avril Lavigne stands in relation to AM
* Steve’s comment about the sort of interesting woman whom Morisette once represented, but to whom one would now say Can you just put the tops back on these jars, please ?…
The delightful thing is that, when Steve overlooks that Morisette is not from the same part of North America, it is so seamless that we do not know whether Steve has been led astray by Coogan or by Winterbottom. Likewise, when they are boarding the ferry in the direction of Capri, Steve makes a comment about what an instrument-case is made of – as if, from his reply, Rob could care. It may be Steve / Coogan showing off his knowledge, but he is calling what is obviously too small to be anything other than a case containing a cello a double-bass.
With beautiful scenery and cinematography, Steve grumping at having to take photos of Rob with various Byronic or Shelleyean inscriptions (until, that is, the photographer from last time turns up again), and the sheer good-humoured balance of reflecting on mortality*** and enjoying the present, there is plenty enough to enjoy – with all the references to films and stars, with even a Mafia vignette woven in as Rob’s guilty, vengeful dream towards Steve****, The Trip to Italy is a delightful way of enjoying two men being together against the backdrop of history, their usual lives, and their desires, summed up in the shimmering waters off Capri into which Steve and his son dive.
What a shame no one asked whether the Andrew Graham Dixon Italy series ripped off The Trip (2010) / influenced The Trip to Italy (2014)...
— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) May 21, 2014
End-notes
* Who had made the car a Mini so that they could make reference to The Italian Job – and, of course, to Michael Caine, on imitating whom Steve delights in giving Rob a masterclass in The Trip…
** Coogan insisted on correcting Brydon that they are not both 49, because he has not yet reached his birthday (Happy birthday for 14 October, Steve !).
*** With Brydon even, to Steve’s feigned / Coogan’s real disgust, giving his Small Man Trapped in a Box voice to a supine figure in a plastic box at Pompeii, and then having the Small Man agree with him about Steve being square (This is a real person, Steve says) : as the scene goes on, the humour wins through, at Steve’s expense. (Steve had the last laugh, because, in the Q&A, Brydon realized that his vocal chords would not let the Small Man out just then…)
**** A question by Tweet, via host Boyd Hilton, asked what each man thought most of the other. Brydon said that he had grudging respect for Coogan, who, hesitating to reciprocate, said (and seemed genuine) being at ease with what he has / who he is, amplifying that this is something that he has improved on, but Brydon is still better at doing.
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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
Tuesday 20 May 2014
Money well spent ?
Passport to Poland
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20 May
Got your Zubrowka passport, and ready to stick up for somebody else... ? pic.twitter.com/bdZc7OXnmM
— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) May 17, 2017
Passport to Poland
To @UKIP with [g]love - with a silent 'g', more of a gauntlet really...
UK border control. A man stands in front of an official, who is behind a desk.
MAN
(Indignantly.) What do you mean, I’m Polish ? (With pride.) I was born in Braintree !
BORDER OFFICIAL
Do you have proof of that, sir ? (Man goes to interrupt, silenced by a finger.) By which I mean, are you carrying your birth-certificate with you… ?
MAN
No, but if you let me through, I could go home and get it. (The official just looks at him, almost pityingly.) But I suppose everyone says that… (Pause. Suddenly.) I know – what if I called my boss !
BORDER OFFICIAL
Sorry, sir – your passport states that you’re Polish (Man goes to interrupt, silenced by a finger.) – and so, I suspect, are the people I take to be your wife and daughters behind you. (A look silences a further attempt.)
Next in the queue, a woman in a cardigan and sandals, with a five-year-old pulling on her arm, and an eleven-year-old standing bored beside her, idly playing with her pigtails (as her iPad had to be switched off).
BORDER OFFICIAL
(Sing-song voice.) How is 'your boss' going to change that ?
(Abruptly, and without compassion.) Do you think that ‘your boss’ would prefer to deny knowing you to facing any 'difficult' questions ?
MAN
(Thinks, hesitates.) But…
BORDER OFFICIAL
Please ask your family – in your own language, if you like (The man looks surprised, but says nothing.) – to come over here with me. (He gestures to a waiting-area to one side, set out with a desk and chairs, and goes over to it with the passport.)
MAN
(Turns and speaks to them. Under his voice. Failing to interject any feeling of calm.) Don’t worry, dear – or you, or you. As you’ve heard, just some new procedure – picked out at random for some stringent checks – (As they approach.) just need to humour this chap, who’s pretending to think we’re Polish.
BORDER OFFICIAL
I’m not (The woman hands the other passports to him. He glances at them.) – pretending – to think that – you’re all Polish. You are all Polish !
WOMAN
(Indignantly.) But I’m a vicar’s daughter – from Brentwood ! (As the official looks at her.) And, no, I don’t have my birth-certificate, either…
BORDER OFFICIAL
Doesn’t matter, ma’am – you’re Polish now, and, to be frank, you need to accept going back to your homeland, rather than trying to sneak into England to set up a car-wash ! (Woman goes to say something, but cannot think what to say.)
Unless, although you’ve all got Polish passports, there is something that you can tell me to change my mind…
(Looks directly at the man.) And, no, I don’t mean that little question about what my wife likes to drink – or have I ever been to Norfolk, where you’ve got a lovely second home… !
MAN
(Getting up courage.) Now, look here – I’m going to complain to my MP !
BORDER OFFICIAL
Well, sir… (Flicks through the passport.) You can, of course, do that, but it seems that your MP is in Gdansk, where you now live.
WOMAN
But I’ve never even been to Gdansk ! (On the edge of tears.) Who would have thought that our holiday in Venice would end like this !
YOUNGER DAUGHTER
(Cackling.) Venethia, Venethia ! (Woman hushes her. Nonetheless.) Grand–ay, Grand–ay ! Venethia !
WOMAN
(To elder daughter.) Please take Ruth for a little walk – to explore that corner. (In angry response to elder daughter’s malevolent stare.) Or something ! Go ! ! (Over the top, the younger daughter babbles a convincing case for obeying.) Can’t you see how serious this is ! (Elder daughter trails her off, shoulders hunched.)
MAN, WOMAN
(Together.) But what has happened ? (She alone.) How did we leave with British passports… (He alone.) but they’re Polish ones when we come back. (Suddenly. Together.) Someone at the hotel !
BORDER OFFICIAL
(Shakes his head.) Let me explain it to you. (They nod. Baldly.) Do you remember that you decided – as you only had four months left to run on them – to renew your passports for this trip ?
MAN
Yes, but--- (The official puts his finger to his lips.)
BORDER OFFICIAL
Your wife had noticed that they were actually cheaper than a year ago (She nods.), and you thought it as well to renew them now, just in case (He nods.) – you both thought that it ‘made sense’.
(They both nod.)
WOMAN
But what’s this got… ? (Loudly.) I just want to go home to our house in Brent Pelham – and unpack our cases !
ELDER DAUGHTER
(Decides to join in. Calls out.) I’ve got to be back at six – Naomi’s calling for me. (Unfortunately for her, her sister has swept some things off a desk onto the floor, and is in more need of her attention.)
BORDER OFFICIAL
(Sternly.) Just listen to me. Who filled in the passport renewals ? (Man raises his hand.) And you read the guidance booklet ?
MAN
Yes, yes I did. (Hesitates.) Maybe not all of it, but I did. (Explains.) I had to.
BORDER OFFICIAL
What about the footnote to the footnote on page 38 ? (Man looks blank.) It says, in layman’s terms, that you need to tick the box underneath where you sign, in section 11, if you do not wish to retain British nationality. (Man looks sheepish, woman reproachful.)
People who tick that box get allocated to countries with ‘spare capacity’, and, again under the policies that you voted for, you then have to prove an extremely good reason to be allowed back into the UK.
(To the woman.) Did neither of you (To the man.) look at these passports, (Back to her.) along with your itinerary and other travel documents (Back to him.) before you made ready to go ?
MAN
(Shakes his head.)
Didn’t you even wonder why the colour of your passports was different, or they had a different crest on the front ? Too embarrassed by the photo… ?
MAN
(Pause. Disbelieving.) So you mean that our own country has kicked us out – given us a different nationality – in a country where we have no (Judders with each thought.) friends – job – family – school – home !
WOMAN
(Grief-stricken.) Oh, George – what have you done ! Was this because you skimped, and didn’t get the form checked at the post office ?!
MAN
(Ignores the accusation.) No… – wait a moment, she was a bit knowing at when I asked for the forms over the counter – said was I sure that… in case… I didn’t want more than one for each of us…
BORDER OFFICIAL
If you’d paid to have the forms checked, they would have been bound to ask you whether you no longer wanted to be British…
(Folds his arms. Sighs.) As it is…
WOMAN
(Not really believing all this.) But this is ridiculous ! When we voted not to have so many East Europeans here, we didn’t mean us !
BORDER OFFICIAL
Well, ma’am… (Momentary pause. Slightly condescendingly.) It’s not for me to say that no one learns lessons from history, but…
MAN
(With venom.) Oh, spare us your analysis of the origins of Kristallnacht ! (Official shrinks, for the first time thinking anything of his prey. Very loudly.) God, there must be some way through this Nonsense !! (To the woman.) Have you ever heard anything so crazy : they deem us no longer British because, on a form to renew a British passport, I tick some bloody stupid box that apparently says I’d rather be Croatian – or Czech !
BORDER OFFICIAL
Now that you put it like that, sir---
WOMAN
(With fury.) Yes, we do put it like that !
(Gesturing wildly, and overacting just a little bit.) We’re not about to let everything that we have be stolen – just because some dimwit government thought it a clever wheeze to let us leave the country, travelling on some gimcrack set of bogus papers !
BORDER OFFICIAL
Well---
MAN, WOMAN
(Together.) Aha ! (Man.) There’s nothing that you can say now, man – (Woman.) we know that your heart’s not in it !
BORDER OFFICIAL
(Sobs.) It’s true – I thought that I was better than this – tough as old boots. (Heaves his heart out.)
MAN
(Bracingly.) This is all very well, man, but pull yourself together –
(Gestures to the border.) or none of us will get out of here with honour.
BORDER OFFICIAL
(Self-pityingly.) You’re right, you’re right – it’s just that I thought that it would be a cinch to enforce these new rules…
WOMAN
Look, never mind that – we don’t want an apology, we---
ELDER DAUGHTER
(Calls out. To woman.) Look, I’m not even a registered child-minder, you know, and how much longer do I have to---
MAN
We’ll be with you in a minute – just stop Ruth playing with whatever she’s got in---
WOMAN
Wait a moment ! That’s the passports – we don’t want her eating those !
BORDER OFFICIAL
Don’t worry, ma’am. The passports are quite safe here (Gestures.), for what they’re worth, but… – do you mind if I see what she’s got ?
MAN, WOMAN
(Together.) Be my guest !
WOMAN
(Calls out. To elder daughter.) Go back and join your sister a moment. (To man.) He’s won over… but where do we go from here ?
BORDER OFFICIAL
(Returning.) Sir, what did you do with the old British passports when they were returned to you ? (Woman looks quizzical.) Put them somewhere safe ?
MAN
No, I don’t honestly remember seeing them – they didn’t come at the same time as (Gesturing at the Polish ones.) these.
WOMAN
(Uncertainly.) But didn’t Ruth ask if she could have them… ? And you said Yes, they were no use to us… ?
MAN
Yes, that’s possible…
BORDER OFFICIAL
I think that you’re right, ma’am, and that you did say so, sir. (Pause.) At any rate, your daughter must have put them in her bag before you went to Venice – and has just taken the opportunity to play with them (He waves them in the air.) now !
MAN, WOMAN
(Hesitantly.) Do you mean… ?
BORDER OFFICIAL
Yes, although they’ve been cancelled, I have a discretion to consider the unexpired portion of ‘your Britishness’ still valid, and, of course, I shall !
WOMAN
(Approaching the daughters with the man. To elder daughter.) Come, Abigail – we need to get back for that lift---
MAN
(To younger daughter. Catching her up in his arms.) And you, Ruth, can have that pony thing you’ve been wanting !
They re-join the official, and shake hands and exchange hugs all around.
BORDER OFFICIAL
Take care of these, now, and book an appointment with your MP as soon as you can – if you’ve got a good one, they’ll want to know all about it, sir, ma’am ! (He leads them back to the border, and lets them through.)
(As they walk away. Shakes head.) I’m just too soft-hearted, me – they were Polish, bang to rights !
ENDS
© Copyright Belston Night Works 2013
#UCFF sent Passport to Poland to @rocliffeforum - an evaluator missed the #EU point (the report's kept somewhere) :https://t.co/Et6IzG1aRo
— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) October 31, 2017
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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
Monday 19 May 2014
An edited review of Dennis Russell Davies conducting Pärt, Glass and Adams in Cambridge
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19 May
At full strength, Basel Symphony Orchestra has fifty string-players. Cambridge Corn Exchange has had many a huge orchestra occupy its stage, but it has probably never before entertained a programme comprising works such as those by Arvo Pärt, Philip Glass and John Adams in its regular concert series, as it did on Sunday 27 April – and rarely under a conductor as distinguished in his field as Dennis Russell Davies.
Whatever the three composers featured may have in common (Pärt, at least, rejects the popular description of minimalism), there is assuredly more that makes each one distinctive, as this review hopes to show.
Arvo Pärt – These Words…
This short piece was composed at the end of the last decade, and apparently (according to the publishers) uses material from a Slavonic Prayer, as well as alluding to Hamlet. The reference is not made explicit, but, just before the scene with the play performed by the theatrical troupe, Hamlet’s uncle Claudius says to him I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet. These words are not mine. (Act 3, Scene 2).
With the connivance of the leader of the players, Hamlet had interpolated the text with material designed to bring out guilty behaviour in Claudius. Yet afterwards, when Hamlet confronts his mother Gertrude, she says O, speak to me no more! These words like daggers enter in my ears. No more, sweet Hamlet. (Act 3, Scene 4).
All of these works employ percussion in a persuasive way. In These Words…, it is triangle, xylophone (marimba ?), cymbals, drums, and bell-sounds (not obviously tubular-bells), and, with them, strings. After a beginning filled with suspense, Pärt sets out his thematic material in the percussion instruments, and then introduces the bell-notes, with a descending interval between them.
With, at times, an oriental feel to the writing, he moves between plucked and bowed strings, evoking a sense of eeriness in the ensemble, and returning to the contrasting bell-notes, letting the second one sing – and then a pause / silence in which it lingers as part of the music. So is a fade to almost nothing, after which, in the spirit of Pierre Boulez, he puts the xylophone / marimba into the texture, not as an interjection, but an inner statement.
We seem to be tracing a very slow, but clear, life-sign, with the music conforming to its own measure. The strings swell, then diminish – momentarily (no more than a bar or two), the material has a different rhythm, then it ends, again with the sound of the bell. An excellent choice to open the concert !
Here, it is essential that the gesture of sounding a bell is germane and has poise : Davies so works with orchestras that the atmosphere that Pärt is seeking is wholly present. Likewise, a large group of strings bows together, yet playing piano, with the density of the texture, but not the immediacy of the sound.
Philip Glass – Cello Concerto No. 2 (‘Naqoyqatsi’)
Four times, Philip Glass has worked with director Godfrey Reggio on a film (the latest being Visitors (2013)), and turned the score for the previous film, Naqoyqatsi (2002) into his seven-movement Cello Concerto No. 2, thus subtitled.
Davies has recorded the work with the same soloist, Matt Haimovitz, but conducting the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. Its movements all have titles, which may be those of cues from the film’s score, but they are not always self explanatory.
The concert performance had a moment of additional drama in that, at around the end of the sixth movement, one of Haimovitz’s strings – under a lot of pressure – broke. With aplomb and a string from a fellow cellist to hand, he effected the repair there and then in front of us, whilst Davies stood guard over the mood of the piece…
As mentioned, percussion is important in these pieces, but Glass also writes for tam-tam, struck cymbals, wood-blocks, and snare-drum : as the percussionists were at the back, and largely standing, one had a perfect view of what they were adding to the sound, and how carefully. In addition, the concerto is scored for harp, bassoon, horns, and other brass.
1. Naqoyqatsi
Strings and ‘parping’ horns open the work, before the soloist enters with intense drums and cymbals, and weighty cellos / double-basses. Straightaway, Haimovitz demonstrated a lovely sound with the ensemble, his part encompassing a variety of moods, including yearning.
A feature is the shifting tonality, and a tutti section features tubular-bell, and thrilling modulations. Later, cellos alone, then with basses, bring what is almost a trademark of Glass’ music : with, for want of a better term, circle-sounds, he does not literally inscribe a circle with complementary pairs of descending triplets, but it feels like it. He ends the movement with low-register cellos, joined by basses, brass, and percussion.
2. Massman
The second movement had Haimovitz playing sharpened notes, a tremolo effect, and even, later, quarter-tones. The orchestra interjects tutti, but overall that it feels a little like a trudge. Glass then writes high for the cello, and, with percussion giving an oom-pah effect, he momentarily seems to parody Shokstakovich’s own ‘ironic’ parodies. High-energy tutti, rich in brass, herald ‘circle-sounds’ again – now with a slightly sickening feel to the solo part. Before Haimovitz ended, at the bottom of his register, we had a fleeting evocation of Viennese style.
3 – 5. New World / Intensive Times / Old World
Taking these movements together, as they feel linked, we find (3) that tam-tam beats lead to suggestive solo-writing, resembling a gypsy fiddler. Now resembling a solo cello with an orchestra behind him, Haimowitz evoked not only tuning the instrument and the Bach solo cello Suites, but also harmonics, slide-notes, and ghostly tremolos by the cello’s bridge. Next (4), prominent tutti passages, featuring wood-blocks and snare-drum, which leads to haunting brass-writing in its ‘peachy’ register, accompanied by struck cymbals.
The movement develops to vary between driving inevitability and harmonic uncertainty, but bedding down before the end. Finally, (5), as with New World, another opening with the soloist - high, aetherial lines, followed by harp chiming in with an emerging phrase by sounding a descending interval. Generally, the movement feels similar to New World, but instead exploiting a rising interval.
6. Point Blank
A bouncy, but sinister, theme opens the movement, coarsened by a rasp from the brass. Yet it develops by seeming to pitch a descending minor third against a rising major third (?) from the soloist, with lurking snare-drum rhythms. After tutti sections, Haimowitz had writing that demanded intense slurring and sawing. Adamsian ‘Circle-sounds’ follow, but are undercut by descending, sneering brass and strings. Though the cello reaches out, it simultaneously feels constrained by brass and percussion, and ends meditating on one note.
7. The Vivid Unknown (when the broken string was being replaced, described by Davies as ‘the epilogue’)
The movement opens with a very expansive theme for solo cello, which, whilst it generally strives upwards, moves downwards. Cellos and basses contribute ‘circle-sounds’ as the cello has a vivid outpouring, only brought back to earth by the violins’ purity. The bassoon, there in the general texture, makes a weighty contribution, which gives way to more solo material. The bassoons then contributed, with a rising interval (a third ?), and, on beats from the tam-tam – in conjunction, with the other percussion ¬– the concerto came to an end.
The concerto’s origins may mean that the movements are necessarily more delineated than, say, in the work by John Adams after the interval : several began with the soloist introducing thematic material, or of a different character. Haimowitch gave a highly engaged performance. He had hesitated about premiering the work, but Glass had assured him that repeated matter could be varied according to context and his judgement.
All in all, with Pärt and Glass, a good first half, and one that introduced a post-modern approach to compositions that explore the dimensions of a small chosen realm in depth, but without much of the vividly atonal or even twelve-tone approaches that many composers of the last forty or fifty years have embraced.
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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
19 May
Dennis Russell Davis was brought back to the rostrum at @CambridgeCornEx at least three times after his programme of Pärt, Glass and Adams.
— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) April 27, 2014
At full strength, Basel Symphony Orchestra has fifty string-players. Cambridge Corn Exchange has had many a huge orchestra occupy its stage, but it has probably never before entertained a programme comprising works such as those by Arvo Pärt, Philip Glass and John Adams in its regular concert series, as it did on Sunday 27 April – and rarely under a conductor as distinguished in his field as Dennis Russell Davies.
Whatever the three composers featured may have in common (Pärt, at least, rejects the popular description of minimalism), there is assuredly more that makes each one distinctive, as this review hopes to show.
Arvo Pärt – These Words…
This short piece was composed at the end of the last decade, and apparently (according to the publishers) uses material from a Slavonic Prayer, as well as alluding to Hamlet. The reference is not made explicit, but, just before the scene with the play performed by the theatrical troupe, Hamlet’s uncle Claudius says to him I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet. These words are not mine. (Act 3, Scene 2).
With the connivance of the leader of the players, Hamlet had interpolated the text with material designed to bring out guilty behaviour in Claudius. Yet afterwards, when Hamlet confronts his mother Gertrude, she says O, speak to me no more! These words like daggers enter in my ears. No more, sweet Hamlet. (Act 3, Scene 4).
All of these works employ percussion in a persuasive way. In These Words…, it is triangle, xylophone (marimba ?), cymbals, drums, and bell-sounds (not obviously tubular-bells), and, with them, strings. After a beginning filled with suspense, Pärt sets out his thematic material in the percussion instruments, and then introduces the bell-notes, with a descending interval between them.
With, at times, an oriental feel to the writing, he moves between plucked and bowed strings, evoking a sense of eeriness in the ensemble, and returning to the contrasting bell-notes, letting the second one sing – and then a pause / silence in which it lingers as part of the music. So is a fade to almost nothing, after which, in the spirit of Pierre Boulez, he puts the xylophone / marimba into the texture, not as an interjection, but an inner statement.
We seem to be tracing a very slow, but clear, life-sign, with the music conforming to its own measure. The strings swell, then diminish – momentarily (no more than a bar or two), the material has a different rhythm, then it ends, again with the sound of the bell. An excellent choice to open the concert !
Here, it is essential that the gesture of sounding a bell is germane and has poise : Davies so works with orchestras that the atmosphere that Pärt is seeking is wholly present. Likewise, a large group of strings bows together, yet playing piano, with the density of the texture, but not the immediacy of the sound.
Philip Glass – Cello Concerto No. 2 (‘Naqoyqatsi’)
Four times, Philip Glass has worked with director Godfrey Reggio on a film (the latest being Visitors (2013)), and turned the score for the previous film, Naqoyqatsi (2002) into his seven-movement Cello Concerto No. 2, thus subtitled.
Davies has recorded the work with the same soloist, Matt Haimovitz, but conducting the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. Its movements all have titles, which may be those of cues from the film’s score, but they are not always self explanatory.
The concert performance had a moment of additional drama in that, at around the end of the sixth movement, one of Haimovitz’s strings – under a lot of pressure – broke. With aplomb and a string from a fellow cellist to hand, he effected the repair there and then in front of us, whilst Davies stood guard over the mood of the piece…
As mentioned, percussion is important in these pieces, but Glass also writes for tam-tam, struck cymbals, wood-blocks, and snare-drum : as the percussionists were at the back, and largely standing, one had a perfect view of what they were adding to the sound, and how carefully. In addition, the concerto is scored for harp, bassoon, horns, and other brass.
1. Naqoyqatsi
Strings and ‘parping’ horns open the work, before the soloist enters with intense drums and cymbals, and weighty cellos / double-basses. Straightaway, Haimovitz demonstrated a lovely sound with the ensemble, his part encompassing a variety of moods, including yearning.
A feature is the shifting tonality, and a tutti section features tubular-bell, and thrilling modulations. Later, cellos alone, then with basses, bring what is almost a trademark of Glass’ music : with, for want of a better term, circle-sounds, he does not literally inscribe a circle with complementary pairs of descending triplets, but it feels like it. He ends the movement with low-register cellos, joined by basses, brass, and percussion.
2. Massman
The second movement had Haimovitz playing sharpened notes, a tremolo effect, and even, later, quarter-tones. The orchestra interjects tutti, but overall that it feels a little like a trudge. Glass then writes high for the cello, and, with percussion giving an oom-pah effect, he momentarily seems to parody Shokstakovich’s own ‘ironic’ parodies. High-energy tutti, rich in brass, herald ‘circle-sounds’ again – now with a slightly sickening feel to the solo part. Before Haimovitz ended, at the bottom of his register, we had a fleeting evocation of Viennese style.
3 – 5. New World / Intensive Times / Old World
Taking these movements together, as they feel linked, we find (3) that tam-tam beats lead to suggestive solo-writing, resembling a gypsy fiddler. Now resembling a solo cello with an orchestra behind him, Haimowitz evoked not only tuning the instrument and the Bach solo cello Suites, but also harmonics, slide-notes, and ghostly tremolos by the cello’s bridge. Next (4), prominent tutti passages, featuring wood-blocks and snare-drum, which leads to haunting brass-writing in its ‘peachy’ register, accompanied by struck cymbals.
The movement develops to vary between driving inevitability and harmonic uncertainty, but bedding down before the end. Finally, (5), as with New World, another opening with the soloist - high, aetherial lines, followed by harp chiming in with an emerging phrase by sounding a descending interval. Generally, the movement feels similar to New World, but instead exploiting a rising interval.
6. Point Blank
A bouncy, but sinister, theme opens the movement, coarsened by a rasp from the brass. Yet it develops by seeming to pitch a descending minor third against a rising major third (?) from the soloist, with lurking snare-drum rhythms. After tutti sections, Haimowitz had writing that demanded intense slurring and sawing. Adamsian ‘Circle-sounds’ follow, but are undercut by descending, sneering brass and strings. Though the cello reaches out, it simultaneously feels constrained by brass and percussion, and ends meditating on one note.
7. The Vivid Unknown (when the broken string was being replaced, described by Davies as ‘the epilogue’)
The movement opens with a very expansive theme for solo cello, which, whilst it generally strives upwards, moves downwards. Cellos and basses contribute ‘circle-sounds’ as the cello has a vivid outpouring, only brought back to earth by the violins’ purity. The bassoon, there in the general texture, makes a weighty contribution, which gives way to more solo material. The bassoons then contributed, with a rising interval (a third ?), and, on beats from the tam-tam – in conjunction, with the other percussion ¬– the concerto came to an end.
The concerto’s origins may mean that the movements are necessarily more delineated than, say, in the work by John Adams after the interval : several began with the soloist introducing thematic material, or of a different character. Haimowitch gave a highly engaged performance. He had hesitated about premiering the work, but Glass had assured him that repeated matter could be varied according to context and his judgement.
All in all, with Pärt and Glass, a good first half, and one that introduced a post-modern approach to compositions that explore the dimensions of a small chosen realm in depth, but without much of the vividly atonal or even twelve-tone approaches that many composers of the last forty or fifty years have embraced.
If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here
Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
Six short films from Watersprite 2014
More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2014
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
19 May
This is a review of a screening at the bar of The Arts Picturehouse of the top films from Watersprite (the international festival for student film-makers, @WaterspriteCam) – it fell in two parts, the first being on Monday 12 May 2014
1. Wind [link to the film on Vimeo]
Much has been written about this inventive film already by TAKE ONE, which covered the Watersprite Festival. As with the one that followed at this screening, it plays with being the wrong side of safe, and some have said that it is about adapting to extreme conditions.
Yet, although one can have a stylized haircut that depends on the wind blowing, one gets one’s nose cut off, it is not. The adaptation itself seems to be to something that is of these people’s own making, for we see shifts being changed at the plant where the wind is being generated, and where the outgoing worker has had time to grow a lengthy beard before being relieved : a symbolic depiction, but we need reminding that we sometimes create a problem, sometimes psychologically, and then learn to live with it, rather than seeking a proper solution.
2. Border Patrol [link to the film’s IMDb page]
This is a story that does not quite take one where it might, when it has the potential of the older officer Franz having ‘got one over’ on his dismissive younger colleague Carl, but instead settling on a relatively modest and benign punch-line (if at the cost of an unfortunate victim).
It is well resourced and acted, and there is tension, but director Peter Baumann seems to have reckoned that the latter is dissipated by the film ending as it does, whereas it really ends as a sick comment on people in authority passing the buck (and at the expense of the person who suffered).
3. Echo [link to a ‘teaser trailer’ on Vimeo]
There was disagreement, following the screening, whether Caroline ends, through having cried wolf, in a different place from where she began. Even if she did, it is not obvious enough that she is not just ‘up to her old tricks’, and they are really what is more interesting, for she reminds of Jeune et Jolie (2013)’s Isabelle (Marine Vacth) in acting / seeming to act immorally.
At first, Caroline appears to be the one in danger, because she has strewn the contents of her bag on the floor and we fear that she may come to regret being so trusting. As things develop, and, when she is at home, it is clear that her mother had no message from her, it seems like a scam on her part, but maybe one to which she is addicted as Isabelle is. It turns out to be rooted in truth, whatever weight the ending bears : is Caroline, as Lady Macbeth does, repeating the distressing experience over again, because she can do nothing else, and not for gain ?
* * * * *
4. How to Count Sheep [link to the trailer on Vimeo]
After the interval came what felt the least effective film – not for the visual quality, or for the imagery of such moments (which spoke volumes) of tracks going towards and right up to a tree (a disappearance seemed implied, rather than a tree-climbing sheep), but for the lack of overall coherence.
Maybe it came from being in the invidious position of the first after the break, when concentration was not at its greatest, but it never seemed to come together to say something : was it life striving to imitate dreams, or dreams that were too rooted in the over-worked idiom of the folklore of going to sleep – or did we, despite its title, mistake, if we though that it had either aim in mind ? The title may simply have been an over-reaching claim, for it seemed like exploring being awake, but with a forced notion of what dream and its elements are…
5. Born Positive [link to the trailer on Vimeo]
Forget who mimes best to the real voices*, who have been disguised by having actors stand in for them : this is a powerful piece of film-making, well edited and treating of the three stand-in actors together and individually. It is a way of engaging with people who want to speak, but remain hidden, that proves very impressive here, not just because of the subject-matter.
At first, the three actors are on a roof-top space together (as can be seen in the trailer, talking in turns (and a place to which we return)), and we become used to them as a group with the unfamiliarity that this face is not really speaking these words – though all that links those speaking is having found out that HIV had been passed on to them (and the film ends with remarkable figures about how low the incidence now is amongst babies born to mothers in the UK with HIV).
One suspects that no more than with exact age that the ethnic origin may not have been kept the same as that of the speaker, to add a greater level of making the voices difficult to recognize, for Zachariah Fletcher (as Mark) did not sound as he looked, and Trevon Paddy (as Blake) seems older as an actor than the role that he was playing. The important thing about the film is, of course, what it tells us, but that it has Zachariah owning an outdoor location gives a vividness to what his character is telling us.
Blaming others for what happened, then finding, with reflection, that maybe they had guessed at what they did not know when a parent had not been around to ask, and working out how to tell others that they have HIV, and who needs to know – these strong questions that people ask about themselves and their identity in all sorts of contexts have a special poignancy in the context of statistics given at the end.
6. A Man Came From The Sea [link to the film at The University of York]
This was another film that seemed less strong : it is preceded by the incongruity of a tango reconstructed in arrangement (score by Kattguldet), a cynical evaluation by the well-played pair who find The Man unconscious, and a beautiful location, but – unless it meant to draw attention to itself – also a title-song in no way as convincing as those are in The Wicker Man (1973).
Here, because there was not the uncertainty inherent in How To Count Sheep, it was evident that the plot was wafer thin, dwelling on the theme of the refugee, and what makes, or does not make, someone worth while in the eyes of those who do not know him or her : not a skit on Yorkshire hospitality, but on all forces that will have someone ‘sent back’ because his or her ‘story’ has been discredited (albeit in an impressive long shot, and to what is now the stridency of tango-writing).
Unfortunately, the political staginess of a man made welcome and as soon rejected, was matched by the inevitability of what happened. With opening and closing sequences so long (1:23 and 1:34, respectively, out of an overall 10:28), and so no time for conflict where we might feel something more for this man with Scandinavian tones, we might just condemn the instance, but can overlook it as happening there – as if it could never happen / does not happen here.
End-notes
* After all, there must have been some matching of lip-movements to the target audio in the editing process. (One may also fear for the speakers that, from his or her voice alone, someone might know who he or she is, and so know things about him or her that were only being shared anonymously – one hopes not…)
If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here
Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
19 May
This is a review of a screening at the bar of The Arts Picturehouse of the top films from Watersprite (the international festival for student film-makers, @WaterspriteCam) – it fell in two parts, the first being on Monday 12 May 2014
1. Wind [link to the film on Vimeo]
Much has been written about this inventive film already by TAKE ONE, which covered the Watersprite Festival. As with the one that followed at this screening, it plays with being the wrong side of safe, and some have said that it is about adapting to extreme conditions.
Yet, although one can have a stylized haircut that depends on the wind blowing, one gets one’s nose cut off, it is not. The adaptation itself seems to be to something that is of these people’s own making, for we see shifts being changed at the plant where the wind is being generated, and where the outgoing worker has had time to grow a lengthy beard before being relieved : a symbolic depiction, but we need reminding that we sometimes create a problem, sometimes psychologically, and then learn to live with it, rather than seeking a proper solution.
2. Border Patrol [link to the film’s IMDb page]
This is a story that does not quite take one where it might, when it has the potential of the older officer Franz having ‘got one over’ on his dismissive younger colleague Carl, but instead settling on a relatively modest and benign punch-line (if at the cost of an unfortunate victim).
It is well resourced and acted, and there is tension, but director Peter Baumann seems to have reckoned that the latter is dissipated by the film ending as it does, whereas it really ends as a sick comment on people in authority passing the buck (and at the expense of the person who suffered).
3. Echo [link to a ‘teaser trailer’ on Vimeo]
There was disagreement, following the screening, whether Caroline ends, through having cried wolf, in a different place from where she began. Even if she did, it is not obvious enough that she is not just ‘up to her old tricks’, and they are really what is more interesting, for she reminds of Jeune et Jolie (2013)’s Isabelle (Marine Vacth) in acting / seeming to act immorally.
At first, Caroline appears to be the one in danger, because she has strewn the contents of her bag on the floor and we fear that she may come to regret being so trusting. As things develop, and, when she is at home, it is clear that her mother had no message from her, it seems like a scam on her part, but maybe one to which she is addicted as Isabelle is. It turns out to be rooted in truth, whatever weight the ending bears : is Caroline, as Lady Macbeth does, repeating the distressing experience over again, because she can do nothing else, and not for gain ?
* * * * *
4. How to Count Sheep [link to the trailer on Vimeo]
After the interval came what felt the least effective film – not for the visual quality, or for the imagery of such moments (which spoke volumes) of tracks going towards and right up to a tree (a disappearance seemed implied, rather than a tree-climbing sheep), but for the lack of overall coherence.
Maybe it came from being in the invidious position of the first after the break, when concentration was not at its greatest, but it never seemed to come together to say something : was it life striving to imitate dreams, or dreams that were too rooted in the over-worked idiom of the folklore of going to sleep – or did we, despite its title, mistake, if we though that it had either aim in mind ? The title may simply have been an over-reaching claim, for it seemed like exploring being awake, but with a forced notion of what dream and its elements are…
5. Born Positive [link to the trailer on Vimeo]
Forget who mimes best to the real voices*, who have been disguised by having actors stand in for them : this is a powerful piece of film-making, well edited and treating of the three stand-in actors together and individually. It is a way of engaging with people who want to speak, but remain hidden, that proves very impressive here, not just because of the subject-matter.
At first, the three actors are on a roof-top space together (as can be seen in the trailer, talking in turns (and a place to which we return)), and we become used to them as a group with the unfamiliarity that this face is not really speaking these words – though all that links those speaking is having found out that HIV had been passed on to them (and the film ends with remarkable figures about how low the incidence now is amongst babies born to mothers in the UK with HIV).
One suspects that no more than with exact age that the ethnic origin may not have been kept the same as that of the speaker, to add a greater level of making the voices difficult to recognize, for Zachariah Fletcher (as Mark) did not sound as he looked, and Trevon Paddy (as Blake) seems older as an actor than the role that he was playing. The important thing about the film is, of course, what it tells us, but that it has Zachariah owning an outdoor location gives a vividness to what his character is telling us.
Blaming others for what happened, then finding, with reflection, that maybe they had guessed at what they did not know when a parent had not been around to ask, and working out how to tell others that they have HIV, and who needs to know – these strong questions that people ask about themselves and their identity in all sorts of contexts have a special poignancy in the context of statistics given at the end.
6. A Man Came From The Sea [link to the film at The University of York]
This was another film that seemed less strong : it is preceded by the incongruity of a tango reconstructed in arrangement (score by Kattguldet), a cynical evaluation by the well-played pair who find The Man unconscious, and a beautiful location, but – unless it meant to draw attention to itself – also a title-song in no way as convincing as those are in The Wicker Man (1973).
Here, because there was not the uncertainty inherent in How To Count Sheep, it was evident that the plot was wafer thin, dwelling on the theme of the refugee, and what makes, or does not make, someone worth while in the eyes of those who do not know him or her : not a skit on Yorkshire hospitality, but on all forces that will have someone ‘sent back’ because his or her ‘story’ has been discredited (albeit in an impressive long shot, and to what is now the stridency of tango-writing).
Unfortunately, the political staginess of a man made welcome and as soon rejected, was matched by the inevitability of what happened. With opening and closing sequences so long (1:23 and 1:34, respectively, out of an overall 10:28), and so no time for conflict where we might feel something more for this man with Scandinavian tones, we might just condemn the instance, but can overlook it as happening there – as if it could never happen / does not happen here.
End-notes
* After all, there must have been some matching of lip-movements to the target audio in the editing process. (One may also fear for the speakers that, from his or her voice alone, someone might know who he or she is, and so know things about him or her that were only being shared anonymously – one hopes not…)
If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here
Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
Saturday 17 May 2014
Unaltered appreciation
This is a review of Advanced Style (2014)
More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2014
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
17 May
This is a review of Advanced Style (2014)
One does not immediately place the phrase, but the title of Lina Plioplyte's film (and of Ari Seth Cohen’s book, which gave rise to it, and his blog before it) plays upon the hackneyed words 'at [my / your, etc.] advanced age'.
The film tells the story of the older women whom Cohen made it his project, after he had been advised to come to New York City to find his inspiration, to feature on his blog (and we see him approaching new candidates on the street) : although he is present a fair bit to help the ones whom he featured earlier on ‘manage’ what is happening, it is their story, and nothing in this Dogwoof documentary takes away from that.
In several cases, these well-dressed women on the street already had their own boutiques, which featured the fashions that they liked and which they wanted to preserve for others to buy, whereas others had been models in earlier times, but the thing that they had in common was enjoying wearing the clothes out and about and them being seen, which is where Cohen had found them.
With a little help from his blog and then from the resultant book, things had begun to happen in the fashion world, with t.v. appearances and modelling work. Although each showed taste, self-belief and talent, probably each of us will have a favourite for her look and what she aspires to, whether Tziporah Salamon, showing off her clothes on her bicycle, or Ilona Smithkin, teaching art, and making her own eyelashes.
Maybe the colour balance had been slightly shifted so that the functional establishing street-shots shone less than the scenes, full of colour, when outfits were bursting out of the screen. However, the whole choice of foils to the moments of flowering of fashion was equally a very good one, and the film also pulled no punches in addressing rivalry, disability and decline.
The connection and caring between these women, with their sense of style, was the most heartening, alongside seeing them gain recognition that they may not have expected : they are, of course, a paradigm for people of all kinds who may no longer be seen for who they are or what they can do, but who are there to be recognized…
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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
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