Story-telling : By juxtaposition - or free association ?

Some responses to watching Little Women (2019) (twice) (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)

10 January

Some responses to watching Little Women (2019) (twice) (work in progress)

¹ Too many to distract oneself with (clumsily trying to note them in the dark), and it may be that they have some origin in the source text(s)² ?

² It has been suggested to the unknowing #UCFF that Good Wives is also being adapted, here, under this title.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 11, 2020

Thanks for the recommendation, Jim - just *watched* the responses to the question which part of film-making they like most, and then with Greta Gerwig, fascinatingly going off piste, remarking that all of them have made films about faith, and about not wasting what time one has.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 12, 2020

More magnificent still, on a re-watch :

It bloomed again, in the way that all good film-making will, even though - and because - the overall arc and shape is known :

An earlier scene, anticipating what is to come, has its place - and the tenderness between Laura Dern and her screen-daughter Saoirse Ronan touches more.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 12, 2020

It seems that Watson was born in Paris, but Florence Pugh (Amy) and she are British. When Eliza Scanlen (Beth) is Australian by birth, one can only look to Saoirse Ronan for a daughter of Concord, MA, as cast by Greta Gerwig who is of American origin... :https://t.co/oapgdgn1hX

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 13, 2020

[...]

In a brand new interview for the New Beverly blog, @SunsetGunShot talks to writer-director Greta Gerwig about Little Women: https://t.co/1ciDfxVFSy pic.twitter.com/EJm3zkPK24

— New Beverly Cinema (@newbeverly) January 13, 2020

If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here

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

Some Tweets about Knives Out (2019)

Some Tweets about Knives Out (2019)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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30 December

Some Tweets about Knives Out (2019)

VLADIMIR : That passed the time.

ESTRAGON :It would have passed in any case.

VLADIMIR : Yes, but not so rapidly.

Samuel Beckettt ~ Waiting for Godot

* Surprisingly, the film's Wikipedia page says 'Principal photography began on October 30, 2018, in Boston, Massachusetts and wrapped on December 20, 2018' [https://t.co/jPrvcbtgbC, citing references, and exterior / interior locations] - as its on-screen look / feel belies that

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 31, 2019

¹ Probably Ransom Drysdale (Chris Evans) refers to Benoit Blanc's (Craig's) 'drawl', and mentions Kentucky, but did Craig sound Tennessee or Louisiana ? (Still, scene to scene, Ana de Armas' accent wandered far more as Marta Cabrera³.)

² Steve Yedlin [https://t.co/3vaPjIO6dH]

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 31, 2019

³ Harlan Thrombey's (Christopher Plummer's) largely unconcerned family casually refer to her as at least Paraguayan, Uruguayan and Brazilian (which has misled some, with questions about the film, not to doubt their sincerity, but to ask where she is 'really from')

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 31, 2019

Postlude(s) :

Rian Johnson’s film "Knives Out" tells a political tale within the genre of murder mystery.
https://t.co/ekZtmpGzcD

— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) January 5, 2020

KNIVES OUT.... spoilers?

Marta looking at Thrombey's portrait at the beginning of the film, when the investigation into his death is taking place, a stern look on his face.

Marta looking at the portrait at the end of the film, when she takes over the house, his face now warm. pic.twitter.com/vcaTS87bTf

— Luke Ryan (@RazorwireRyan) January 17, 2020

Yep

Did spot that

It's part and parcel of the film-making whether character-presentations cohere (as well as location-scouting for a suitably quirky interior). isn't it ?

Maybe just me...

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 17, 2020

Yep

Did spot that

It's part and parcel of the film-making whether character-presentations cohere (as well as location-scouting for a suitably quirky interior). isn't it ?

Maybe just me...

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 17, 2020

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

'Thoughtful' violence in Drive (2011) and You Were Never Really Here (2017) - or the principal elements of film noir ?

Responding to 'Thoughtful Violence in Drive & You Were Never Really Here'

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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Lines of thought sparked off by 'Thoughtful Violence in Drive & You Were Never Really Here' [Nancy Epton, writing for TAKE ONE]

Driver (D) and Joe (J) are, as one recalls, [capable of] being exploited

Drive says little or nothing why D does 'jobs' outside his mechanic's, etc., duties or does not seek better reward (from Shannon)

Allusively, Lynne Ramsay shows us much more about J, but both are film noir

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 25, 2019

* Ah, but I's car has over-heated - and she has shopping, and her son...

* The lift again, and her apartment

* The immediate dialogue :

I : So, have you just moved to LA ?

D : No, I've been here a while.

I : You're just new here [the building] ?

D : H'mm, m'mm.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 27, 2019

When Standard (Oscar Isaac) has been beaten up, and D finds B and him, he hears - as a man already hooked - the story of the mushrooming protection-money, and the job at 'the pawn shop in the valley' :

D has even driven B and I

Afterwards, I feigns not to know what S has told D

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 27, 2019

A whole other debate opens up, when one takes the nobility of the cause into account in cases of explicit revenge, as to whether the violence is justified, e.g. The Villainess (2017) [https://t.co/5OwELtTujd], or Tarantino's stylized fountains of blood in Kill Bill Vol. 1 (2003).

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 27, 2019

If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here

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

Restored, maybe revived, but what does The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) have to say to us ?

Restored, maybe revived, but what does The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) have to say to us ?

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

Restored, maybe revived, but what does The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) have to say to us ?

Prelude :

It wasn't to-day (or even this week) - The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Screen 2 to-night, c. 6.10) might well make up for the non-Italianate snack...

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 9, 2019

Not so much rage over a lost penny as 'a rant during an interrupted bed-time' ? :

The theme's recurrence is, in itself, insufficient to give the film the coherence that it otherwise lacks, when it spends so much of 91 mins just being about time's passing, and not The Algerian War, the effects of military service, Madame Emery's story, or even who Madeleine is.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 21, 2019

We pan up, and it's as close as we get to dance or real movement, or Umbrellas of Cherbourg except as implausible boutique (whose Mme Emery expresses angst in violent wallpaper) :

Nothing much suggests, say, that she really deals dope, or that Roland Cassard will shaft them all.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 21, 2019

* Whatever the initial ('mystical') appeal when he set it, it seems that, according to Peter Gutmann's 'Classical Notes', Schoenberg may later have come to see the sentimentality of Richard Dehmel's text as 'repulsive' [https://t.co/j7Kq7D81bV].

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 21, 2019

Postlude / reflections :

Singin' in the Rain (1952) was aptly and succinctly introduced at @camfilmfest 2019 by @NeilKBrand [Day 2], so is one really 'saying as one found it' that it seems a worthier object of restoration'n'revival - or did Neil make a case that then informed / transformed our viewing ?

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 21, 2019

¹ Excepting being aware (from decades earlier, on t.v.) of the sequences with Gene Kelly² and Cyd Charisse, or Michael Parkinson's much-referenced avowal ? [So, not the whole film, watched as / in a cinema.]

² Neil certainly asked us to regard Donald O'Connor as Kelly's equal.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 21, 2019

If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here

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

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

To be watching for 207 mins in a venue that I didn't know before (my first time at @RoystonPictureP - not my last !), I tried to make sure of booking an aisle-seat (only to find that I mistook the layout...) :

It really was no endurance for me whatever, as Scorsese knows pacing.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 27, 2019

The scenes when Frank Sheeran (De Niro) is being honoured at a testimonial, and Jimmy Hoffa (Pacino) presents him with his award, may not be the chronological centre of The Irishman (2019), but – placing those scenes, on a re-watch – the rest of the film spirals out from there...

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 7, 2020

With much hindsight, this is where Russell Bufalino (Joe Pesci) sees that tempers and tensions spiralled out of control - for the film, it's where the Bufalinos' and Sheerans' road-trip and this other narrative converge, and the long haul of De Niro's performance richly pays off.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 8, 2020

¹ Although reacquiring the means to get there was just before @camfilmfest (agonizingly too close not to be thoroughly exhausted by then...)

² First seen at @RoystonPictureP, now run and programmed by Saffron S.

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 7, 2020

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 ? :

Todd Phillips, in 122 mins, outstays his welcome and wastes his chances in Joker (2019), whereas Martin Scorsese (in his film-adaption of Charles Brandt's book) stays the course in the 209 mins of The Irishman (2019) (another film with Robert De Niro), and makes the run-time tell

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 21, 2019

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 :

'Kathrine Narducci, Kevin O'Rourke, Jesse Plemons, Welker White, Stephanie Kurtzuba, Gino Cafarelli, Marin Ireland, Michele Cannon, and Robin Kerbis in The Irishman (2019)'

Their agents must have been working over time to secure such a pointless accreditation ! ;)

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 27, 2019

If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here

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

The 100 greatest films directed by women : A critique of method and / or purpose¹ (work in progress)

The 100 greatest films directed by women : A critique of method and / or purpose¹

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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The 100 greatest films directed by women : A critique of method and / or purpose¹ (work in progress)

BBC Culture polled 368 film experts from 84 countries in order to find the best films from female film-makers – here’s the top 100

One had already heard that BBC Culture introduced its list this year by saying There was one stark statistic that jumped out from the results of last year’s BBC Culture poll to find the 100 greatest foreign-language films of all time : just four out of that 100 were directed by women :

However, despite at least one list with a deficiency, does it seem that BBC Culture has been intent, in setting up this new list of 100 films, in not learning lessons ? In other words, rather than a list that recommends as many as six films directed by the lately deceased Agnès Varda (and another five of Kathryn Bigelow's, so more than 10% of the 100 between them), maybe it could have been limited to just one film each (a maximum of two) by the best 100 or so female directors...

At #UCFF, with a paucity of film-writing¹ in 2019, we're instead astounded to realize that, when we saw Desperately Seeking Susan (1985) on release, or Sleepless in Seattle (1993), they would be nos 58 and 83 in @bbcCultureShow's new list², respectively :https://t.co/YlqO6QJ3UV

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 19, 2019

And, if one looks at the list by decade² (tallying them by release-date), how well is the history of film-making really represented ? As the second set of figures in square brackets shows below : 23% of these greatest films were released in or after 2011 (which rises to 43% of the films, when one adds those from the preceding decade) ; the majority are from the last three decades ; and only 16% were released before 1971.


By decade² (number of films chosen per decade, and an increasing / decreasing tally in square brackets) :

* 1910s : 1 [1 / 99]

* 1920s : 2 [3 / 97]

* 1930s : 2 [5 / 95]

* 1940s : 3 [8 / 92]

* 1950s : 1 [9 / 91]

* 1960s : 7 [16 / 84]

* 1970s : 13 [29 / 71]

* 1980s : 12 [41 / 59]

* 1990s : 16 [57 / 43]

* 2000s : 20 [77 / 23]

* 2010s : 23 [100 / 0]



[...]



Enough of the Tweets, etc. ! Here (with needful changes³) is the list of 100 films [as annotated⁴] :

1. The Piano (1993) ~ Jane Campion (1) [English, British Sign Language, Maori]

2. Cléo from 5 to 7 (Cléo de 5 à 7) (1962) ~ Agnès Varda (1) [French]

3. Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles ~ Chantal Akerman (1) [French]

4. Beau Travail (1999) ~ Claire Denis (1) [French]

5. Lost in Translation (2003) Sofia Coppola (1) [English, Japanese, German, French]

6. Daisies (Sedmikrásky) (1966) ~ Věra Chytilová [Czech]

7. The Hurt Locker (2008) ~ Kathryn Bigelow (1) [English, Arabic]

8. Toni Erdmann (2016) ~ Maren Ade [German, English, Romanian]

9. Fish Tank (2009) ~ Andrea Arnold (1) [English]

10. Daughters of the Dust (1991) ~ Julie Dash [English, French]

11. The Ascent (Voskhozhdenie) (1977) ~ Larisa Shepitko [Russian, German]

12. Zero Dark Thirty (2012) ~ Kathryn Bigelow (2) [English, Arabic]

13. Vagabond (Sans toit ni loi) (1985) ~ Agnès Varda (2) [French, Arabic, English]

14. Point Break (1991) ~ Kathryn Bigelow (3) [English]

15. La Ciénaga ( The Swamp) (2001) ~ Lucrecia Martel (1) [Spanish]

16. Wanda (1970) ~ Barbara Loden [English]

17. Seven Beauties (Pasqualino Settebellezze) (1975) ~ Lina Wertmüller [Italian, German, Neapolitan, Spanish]

18. American Psycho (2000) ~ Mary Harron [English, Spanish, Cantonese]

19. Orlando (1992) ~ Sally Potter [English, French]

20. Clueless (1995) ~ Amy Heckerling [English, Spanish]

21. Winter’s Bone (2010) ~ Debra Granik [English]

23¹. We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011) ~ Lynne Ramsay (1) [English]

23¹. The Hitch-Hiker (1953) ~ Ida Lupino (1) [English, Spanish]

24. Lady Bird [IMDb page (2017) ~ Greta Gerwig [English, Spanish]

25. The House is Black (1963) ~ Forugh Farrokhzad [Persian]

26. Stories we Tell (2012) ~ Sarah Polley [English]

27. Selma (2014) ~ Ava DuVernay (1) [English]

28. Le bonheur (1965) ~ Agnès Varda (3) [French]

29. Monsoon Wedding (2001) ~ Mira Nair (1) [Hindi, English]

30. Zama (2017) ~ Lucrecia Martel (2) [Spanish, Portuguese]

31. The Gleaners and I (Les glaneurs et la glaneuse) (2000) ~ Agnès Varda (4) [French]

32. The Night Porter (Il portiere di notte) (1974) ~ Liliana Cavani [English]

33. You Were Never Really Here (2017) ~ Lynne Ramsay (2) [English]

34. Morvern Callar (2002) ~ Lynne Ramsay (3) [English, Spanish]

35. The Matrix (1999) ~ Lana and Lilly Wachowski [English]

36. Wendy and Lucy (2008) ~ Kelly Reichardt (1) [English]

37. Olympia Part One : Festival of The Nations (Olympia 1. Teil - Fest der Völker) (1938) / Olympia Part Two : Festival of Beauty (Olympia 2. Teil - Fest der Schönheit) (1938) ~ Leni Riefenstahl (1) [German, English, Italian, French, Japanese, Portuguese] / [German]

38. Paris is Burning (1990) ~ Jennie Livingston [English]

39. Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Portrait de la jeune fille en feu) (2019) ~ Céline Sciamma (1) [French, Italian]

40. Boys Don’t Cry (1999) ~ Kimberly Peirce [English]

41. Capernaum (Capharnaüm) (2018) ~ Nadine Labaki [Arabic, Amharic]

42. The Adventures of Prince Achmed (Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed) (1926) ~ Lotte Reiniger [Silent]

43. The Virgin Suicides (1999) ~ Sofia Coppola (2) [English]

44. American Honey (2016) ~ Andrea Arnold (2) [English]

45. Triumph of the Will (Triumph des Willens) (1935) ~ Leni Riefenstahl (2) [German]

46. Near Dark (1987) ~ Kathryn Bigelow (3) [English]

47. An Angel at my Table (1990) ~ Jane Campion (2) [English, Spanish]

48. The Asthenic Syndrome (Astenicheskiy sindrom) (1989) Kira Muratova (1) [Russian]

49. Salaam Bombay ! (1988) Mira Nair (2) [Hindi, English]

50. Outrage (1950) Ida Lupino (2) [English]

51. Harlan County U.S.A. (1976) ~ Barbara Kopple [English]

52. Happy as Lazzaro (Lazzaro felice) (2018) ~ Alice Rohrwacher [Italian]

53. The Headless Woman (La mujer sin cabeza) (2008) ~ Lucrecia Martel (3) [Spanish]

54. Bright Star (2009) ~ Jane Campion (3) [English, French]

55. Monster (2003) ~ Patty Jenkins [English]

56. 13th (2016) ~ Ava DuVernay (2) [English]

57. The Babadook (2014) ~ Jennifer Kent [English]

58. Desperately Seeking Susan (1985) ~ Susan Seidelman [English]

59. The Long Farewell (1971) ~ Kira Muratova (2) [Russian, English]

60. A League of their Own (1992) ~ Penny Marshall (1) [English]

61. India Song (1975) ~ Marguerite Duras [French]

62. Strange Days (1995) ~ Kathryn Bigelow (4) [English]

63. Marie Antoinette (2006) ~ Sofia Coppola (3) [English, Latin, French]

64. The Rider (2017) ~ Chloé Zhao [English]

65. Leave no Trace (2018) ~ Debra Granik [English]

66. Ratcatcher (1999) ~ Lynne Ramsay (4) [English]

67. The German Sisters (Die bleierne Zeit) (1981) ~ Margarethe von Trotta [German, Italian]

68. Eve’s Bayou (1997) ~ Kasi Lemmons [English]

69. The Connection (1961) ~ Shirley Clarke (1) [English]

70. Whale Rider (2002) ~ Niki Caro [English, Maori]

71. The Seashell and the Clergyman (La coquille et le clergyman) (1928) ~ Germaine Dulac [Silent]

72. Europa Europa (1980) ~ Agnieszka Holland [German, Russian, Polish, Hebrew]

73. On Body and Soul (Teströl és lélekröl) (2017) ~ Ildikó Enyedi [Hungarian]

74. Chocolat (1988) ~ Claire Denis (2) [English, French]

75. Meek’s Cutoff (2010) ~ Kelly Reichardt (2) [English]

76. Girlhood (Bande de filles) (2014) ~ Céline Sciamma (2) [French]

77. Tomboy (2011) ~ Céline Sciamma (3) [French]

78. The Apple (Sib) (1998) ~ Samira Makhmalbaf [Persian]

79. Shoes (1916) ~ Lois Weber [Silent]

80. Big (1988) ~ Penny Marshall (2) [English]

81. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014) ~ Ana Lily Amirpour [Persian]

82. At Land (Szárazföldön) (1944) ~ Maya Deren (1) [Silent]

83. Sleepless in Seattle (1993) ~ Nora Ephron [English]

84. Portrait of Jason (1967) ~ Shirley Clarke (2) [English]

85. One Sings, The Other Doesn’t (L'une chante l'autre pas) (1977) ~ Agnès Varda (5) [French]

86. Wadjda (2012) ~ Haifaa Al-Mansour [Arabic]

87. 35 Shots of Rum (35 rhums) (2008) ~ Claire Denis (3) [French, German]

88. The Silences of the Palace (Samt el qusur) (1994) ~ Moufida Tlatli [Arabic, French]

89. The Beaches of Agnès (Les plages d’ Agnès) (2008) ~ Agnès Varda (6) [French, English]

90. Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982) ~ Amy Heckerling [English]

91. White Material (2009) ~ Claire Denis (4) [French]

92. Raw (Grave) (2016) ~ Julia Ducournau [French]

93. Red Road (2006) ~ Andrea Arnold (3) [English]

94. News From Home (1977) ~ Chantal Akerman (2) [French]

95. Ritual in Transfigured Time (1946) ~ Maya Deren (2) [Silent]

96. The Meetings of Anna (Les rendez-vous d'Anna) (1977) ~ Chantal Akerman (3) [French]

97. Adoption (Örökbefogadás) (1975) ~ Márta Mészáros [Hungarian]

98. Somewhere (2010) ~ Sofia Coppola (4) [English, Italian]

99. The Souvenir (2019) ~ Joanna Hogg [English]

100. The Kids are All Right (2010) ~ Lisa Cholodenko [English]



To indicate another absurd bias, a tally of language(s)⁵ spoken in the 100 list [five films are silent] :


English (only) : 37 [37 = running total]

French : 13 [50]

Therefore, one-half of this greatest 100 is, if not in English, then in French - very inclusive


English (as principal language⁵) + Spanish : 5 [55]

English + French or French + English : 5 [60]

English + Arabic : 2 [62]


English + other languages : 6 [68]

French + other languages : 3 [71]

Then, when one has added in where English or French is the principal language⁵, but others are spoken, one has accounted for more than 70% of the films


Silent : 5 [76]

Persian : 3 [79]

German : 1½ [81½]

Hungarian : 2 [83½]

Spanish : 2 [85½]


Hindi + English : 2 [87½]


Other sole languages, or combinations of languages : 12½?? [100]



Twitter end-notes :

¹ '100 greatest films directed by women', correcting a bias, in its earlier list of foreign-language films, of few directed by women - with one where just 19 directors made 56% of the films (Agnès Varda and Kathryn Bigelow = 11%)

² Since the decade doesn't end for another year

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) December 19, 2019

End-notes :

¹ Put another way, one suspects that BBC Culture polled its 384 people will little idea why, but to end up with a ranked list, because it could, and did not have one - this list seemed to acknowledge no joint placings, which would have been odd in one of such compromise and of such length, but the task of re-ordering has found two placed at no. 23 (and no no. 22) [again, one would normally expect, if this is not a typo, both to be placed at 22, with no 23].

² #UCFF is stubbornly insisting that, for example, the 1940s begin with 1941 and end with 1950.

³ #UCFF's needful changes :

(1) The preference for a descending list has been imposed, because an ascending list is a convention, which does not make sense when one can fully scroll through it (as against when one has, at least, to click a link to progress from, say, the section for films 100-91 to that for those numbered 90-81.

(2) It is not a convention to give the release-date as the original list did, so that has also been changed.

(3) The insistence on persisting in putting film titles IN CAPITALS, not italicizing them, is a mistake that has meandered on from when putting on the Shift key in copy was the simplest way to denote a title.


⁴ Directors' names are in italic, with the increasing tally of their films in parentheses afterwards (i.e. where they are from the 19 on whose work the list calls for 56% of its 100 entries). Where #UCFF has a review, the title links to it ; where it has watched the film and approved, TBC ???

⁵ These have been accepted as given by the IMDb-page for each page (to which the non-underlined film-titles link), the language (or languages) : IMDb confirms that the first language, where two or more are given, should be the principal language : it specifiesto those submitting this information that ‘If more than one language was spoken, please enter them in order of frequency such that the main language is entered first’.


If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here

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

Michael Berkeley's Private Passions on Radio 3 - with Ken Loach (work in progress)

Michael Berkeley's Private Passions on Radio 3 - with Ken Loach

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

10 November

Comments on film, music in film, and film-making from Michael Berkeley's Private Passions on Radio 3 - with Ken Loach (work in progress)

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

Despite not liking what #UCFF heard, at least we know what Fauré Quartett's recording of Pictures at an Exhibition is

Fauré Quartett's recording of Pictures at an Exhibition

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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28 November

Despite not liking what #UCFF heard, at least we know what Fauré Quartett's recording
of Pictures at an Exhibition is : it may all become clear here...

Sadly, whosesoever arrangement that was, on @BBCInTune, of Mussorgsky's pf original¹, one's immediate response - having mentally placed what was being heard - was not to wish to hear it ever again !https://t.co/XouIEwcotB

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 28, 2019

*Not* meaning @BBCInTune's Sean Rafferty himself (who, one now hears, was billed at the top of the show - and not unfairly - as 'The host with the absolute most' !), but now eludes us [at 1 : 53 : 40], too...

Fauré Quartett with pf [Dick ??**]https://t.co/OSGD5dQDvB

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 28, 2019

** So we go in search of the new CD, and find the desired explanation on Amazon :

'More than 80 years later, Dirk Mommertz, a member of and pianist with the Faure Quartett, has arranged both of these works anew - this time for piano quartet'

Endlich ! pic.twitter.com/LsYNg9tMQ1

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 28, 2019

It may all become clear here...

To quote @eziolunedei's 'Angel Song' [Black Boots on Latin Feet], 'An empty head, when I go to bed, is all I'll ever need'...

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 29, 2019

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

Up here is where it really matters [?] ~ Amelia Wren*

Responses to The Aeronauts (2019) [as seen at The Light Cinema, Cambridge]

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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27 November

Responses to The Aeronauts (2019) [as seen at The Light Cinema, Cambridge]

Only Dreams are in The Cloud ~ Jung

But Carl didn't mean @AeronautsFilmUK

'Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones reunite to tell the story of balloon pilot Amelia Wren and scientist James Glaisher' :

Unlike The Theory of Everything (2014), a story in which Glaisher only existed

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 28, 2019

The early scene for Amelia and her sister's carriage - or later re-purposing locations (Lancaster Gate or Holland Park ?) to resemble the period - had been set up more carefully than the actual words uttered :

In 100 mins, trying symbolically what Locke's ambitions were in 85 ?

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 28, 2019

End-notes :

* An amalgam of people, there was no Amelia Wren as such - to quote the IMDb entry for the film :

With [James Glaisher's] co-pilot aeronaut Henry Tracey Coxwell, they broke the world record for altitude on September 5, 1862. Coxwell is omitted from the film, and replaced with the fictional Amelia Wren.


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#UCFF's favourite moments at Cambridge International Jazz Festival 2019 (an accreting posting)

#UCFF's favourite moments (an accreting posting) at Cambridge International Jazz Festival 2019

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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24 November

#UCFF's favourite moments (an accreting posting) at Cambridge International Jazz Festival 2019

That list, started at a time when - rushed because of the risk of being timed out at any moment (and so panicked into pressing 'Tweet') - it was far from ideal, should've read, Tony ! :

* @AntonEger

* @BrassFunkeys

* @ElliotGalvin

* @Ivoneame

* @RollerTrio

* @tonykofi https://t.co/oQ1kzFixkZ

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 27, 2019

Absolute certainty of composure : The Elliot Galvin Trio :
Darwin College on Tuesday 19 November 2019 (after Sam Leak Trio as support from 7.30 p.m.)


[...]



Other mentions :

#UCFF heard some of their set - the sax-player to the right of that photo played an amazingly good solo !

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 28, 2019

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Don't look - just go : Internally, Joker (2019) gives advice to those watching ?

Responses to Joker (2019) [as seen at The Light Cinema, Cambridge]

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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25 November

Responses to Joker (2019) [as seen at The Light Cinema, Cambridge]

Until the much-trailed scene where Phoenix dances down, and prances on, the steps*, Todd Phillips and Lawrence Sher (DoP) largely starved our eyes of visuals, let alone anything cinematic

* Heavy groan, when first presented with these steps as some gross symbol of upward battle pic.twitter.com/4ct8IPhAHt

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 3, 2020

Only 'a little' - not enough to make it :

* Feel like the best role by Joaquin Phoenix - which isn't even You Were Never Really Here (2017), Lynne Ramsay's film (on which this 'leans')

* Resemble a worthy successor to Roma (2018)

* Any more than Psycho (1960)'s insights

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 25, 2019

Or The Master ?

Or Peter Lorre (as Hans Beckert) ?

Or https://t.co/NyrFLwQB9G

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) February 19, 2020

The time is 11.10 - at the start / at Ha Has

Time on Murray Franklin show is c. 10.40

Don't look - just go, almost certainly a quotation from (or reference to) many a film (in a film that deliberately invokes Travis Bickle (Taxi Driver (1976)) and Norman Bates (Psycho (1960)) - yet does so with unimaginative cinemtography (deliberately)

There's something special about you ~ Murray Franklin to Arthur Fleck

P. Fleck (box 37 ?)
Penny / Arthur Fleck

Laboured and unsubtle as the solo** cello-line

** Doubling / electronics ?

Joker Light

A film with his name all over it (co-writer and producer as well as director), it is not as if @thetoddphillips repays even interest on the debt to Ramsay (and nor does Joaquin Phoenix ?) in @jokermovie, which hardly matches the psychological insight of Hitchcock's Marnie (1964). https://t.co/22yQr2IIGt

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 26, 2019

Lynne Ramsay - You were Never Really Here (2017) - be angry at JP for taking all her best ideas and doing them over for Todd Phillips ?


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A de facto attempt at live Tweeting : Gods of Apollo at Cambridge International Jazz Festival 2019

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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23 November

Gods of Apollo at Cambridge International Jazz Festival 2019

Well, at The University Centre wine-bar - the venue for this gig, and run by Cambridge Wine Merchants* - the race was on (as well as The Space Race evocation from Gods of Apollo) to set up the laptop and the phone to make some notes : they ended up, being made on the phone, e-mailed, opened on the laptop and copied and pasted into Twitter - at which point, the connection with real-time reporting had been lost...

¹ The home of the @camjazz bi-monthly, regular gigs.

² Reviewed (work in progress) at :https://t.co/JTakxBahE1

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 23, 2019

Hints, on sax, of ragtime melody ?

Nightjars / cicadas / shriek-owls (the telemetry now having been processed up, to a prominent pulse)

Then that Presidential piece of poise, posturing and pose...

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 23, 2019

Hints, on sax, of ragtime melody ?

Nightjars / cicadas / shriek-owls (the telemetry now having been processed up, to a prominent pulse)

Then that Presidential piece of poise, posturing and pose...

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 23, 2019

In a through-in-one-sequence gig as Rob introduced (although, as a rule, he dislikes speech before the first number), preceding Armstrong's famous words, those other famous words of Mission Control : The Eagle has Landed

A sense of peace [Sea of Tranquillity], next take-off... ?

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 23, 2019

Postlude :

So, that's three gigs at @storeysfield on Sunday afternoon and evening (and closing with @BrassFunkeys), and that - as they say - would be a wrap !

[To-day was @Roblcope's Gods of Apollo (https://t.co/CnFej6Wd4b), then @MariusNeset's quintet gig, and ending up doing the merch]

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 24, 2019

End-notes :

* Also, no mean purveyors of Scotch, through their outlets on Bridge Street, Kings' Parade, etc.


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Riffing from the soul : Roller Trio at Cambridge International Jazz Festival 2019 (rough gig-notes)

Fairly unadulerated gig-notes for a review of Roller Trio at Cambridge International Jazz Festival

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
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21 November

For those who want to try #UCFF gig-notes, fairly pure and unadulterated by further editing than decipherment, let alone turning them into would-be fluent prose, here are what should become this review :

This is a review of Roller Trio at Cambridge International Jazz Festival 2019 on Thursday 21 November 2019 at 9.30 p.m. (with support from Noya Rao)

Personnel :

* James Mainwaring ~ sax(es) / electronics
* Luke Reddin-Williams ~ drums
* Chris Sharkey ~ electric bass-guitar / electronics


Transcribed raw notes (more or less, as is) :

(1) Giant noise to open
Left-handed guitar
Wa)iling, full of energy and passionate life
Repetitions / iterations and effects
Modular
Riffing from the soul
Bass-and-drum iterations under
Free-flying sax
Slight decrescendo and fragments of melody
Slowed to the rate of a heart-beat, with floral and statementful sax
Always moving
Shimmering and exuding light, as if a live aqueous stream
An unanswered phone-call ?
Bass and drums in a jamming duo – pulsing, energetic
Metallic, howly sounds from effects-pedals
Sampling the horn + growls and mumble
DJing the audio
Really spacey, aquatic, submarine – expansive sax
-> flares and distortions as of a whale, dying
-> opening up, texturing
-> spectacularly large sound with attractive, gaelic-themed chord-sequences and mood
Falling, doubled-note bass-line + clear and evanescent sax-sound
Gtr solo – sounding clavichord or prepared piano
Interrupted statement – more and more like weaponry, strikes it down (small-arms fire)
Dulcimer (or mandolin ?)
-> genre-defying drum-solo (sounds like an ambush or incursion
Now it’s palpations and patting
-> Effect warbles and waves
Ground-bass of satellites or machine-language –
Into danceable rhythms and sax-overlay
- understated sax coments
- slight flare / blare
Sanitizig, good feel
-> segue into a danceable, Latin-style theme that mutates to North-African timbres and runs and repeats
- highly danceable, driven by whines and howls
Up, to intense
Applaud tune
- boppy??, then missed / re-arranged beat-patterns
2nd drum-solo + whoops


* * * * *


Wholly improvised [Reddin-Williams introduced Roller Trio, and told us that they were doing something unusual for them]


(2) Tenderness and insistent and / or staggered rhythms
- threads or filaments of material on which the sequence continues, as its seed or base
– or not


* * * * *


(3) Bluesy sax riff – laid-down ostinato with effects on sax to extend or broaden / coarsen the element of horn / tempo switch (dim.) and, with it, a change of guitar-line -> a more-usual free-sax style with rock gtr / drums -> multi-divided note-lengths, accelerating and with staccato sax-puffs or pouts – down into lower register – danceable again and compelling


* * * * *


(4) [encore] Bonkers cow-bells & electronic bubbles & tapping of cymbals – aerial bass + JB vocalize = keening / pleading – slow decrescendo and a heart-beat slowing



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