Grace Notes @ Snarkattack

I hate films that make me cringe. That might seem odd, but don’t worry, I know that therein lies an artistic work’s merit – if it moves you, it’s doing something right. In the Loop makes me cringe in a similar manner to watching Ricky Gervais in The Office or Extras.

Basically, America wants to start a war. So they latch onto a comment made by an insignificant British MP (Simon Foster, played by Tom Hollander) and whilst various governmental departments go into public relations damage control, a few UK politicians are sent to Washington to apparently fix the mess. Foster, as is proven by Toby (Chris Addison) and by Malcolm Tucker (Peter Capaldi) and his sailor’s mouth is more than incompetent. There are folks in the US who seek to capitalise on this. Naturally, the personal lives of the various characters is haplessly intertwined in their professional lives, but not in an obstructive way.

It’s so hard to single out who makes this film. So many of the actors just get their roles right. Toby (Addison), the newly employed British aide is so delightfully awkward that you can’t but help and grimace whenever he interacts with someone who isn’t his partner. Foster is such a boob that you want to hit him. James Gandolfini and Steve Coogan are just brilliant and I craved more of them on screen.

What’s really worrying about this film is how much of it is actually true? Are the people running our countries dunderheads (my cynicism says yes)? If you want a fast-paced thinking person’s comedy, I suggest you see this film.

Of course I was sceptical when I learnt that Tom Ford was the director for this film which is based upon a novel by British author Christopher Isherwood. I don’t think you should hold that against me: Ford belongs to a very glitzy, polished world, and the artform we associate him with is different enough to filmmaking.

I knew nothing about the film but good friend @coliwilso had mentioned that he loved it, and he watches a lot of film. I figured it would have stood out for him for very good reasons.

An English expat literature professor living in LA is coping with the sudden death of his partner Jim. We learn about Jim through flashbacks that George (Colin Firth’s character) has – his tragic death, their meeting, their love.

George is an isolated man. He has one close friend Charley (Julianne Moore), who is a link to his past in London. Naturally, the loss of his life partner has taken a toll on his mental and physical health. The surroundings filmed appear very monochromatic or contain little colour variation to reflect this.

In what seems to me a very Death In Venice-type theme (both Thomas Mann’s novella of the same name and Visconti’s glorious film), George is partially restored to life and vigour by a young, somewhat inquisitive student of his, Kenny. This youth looks like he’s stepped out of a Tom Ford fashion shoot, and this is exploited in the film. But rather than just looking like a model, Kenny is a pensive young man, and he seems genuinely concerned for his teacher’s well-being.

There is so much in this film that normally I would dismiss as indulgent, and clichéd: the colour saturation when the camera closes up on beautiful young faces. The dullness of the environs to help us better perceive George’s despair. So much care has gone into the composition of this film – in what the characters wear, lighting – in fact, I find myself wanting to use the term mise-en-scène. Just when the film starts to feel or look excessive, the excessiveness stops, as if to trick you into thinking that it couldn’t possibly be perceived as corny.

I’ve personally never seen Colin Firth in anything appalling (no, not even Bridget Jones’ Diary or St Trinian’s) and this film is a fantastic reminder that he is a consummate actor. My only real complaint was that ageing him for his role was a tad unconvincing. I need more than a dab of grey in his mop! But still, I might even be compelled to get the film on DVD…virtually unheard of for me.

I was lucky enough to see it in the Sun Theatre in Yarraville. It’s ages away from where I live, but so worth the trip. The cinemas are so sumptuous. We were in the Davis room, which has a beautiful leadlight above.

Sadly, I do not think Disney and Tim Burton are two entertainment institutions meant to coexist. I didn’t actually realise that this new venture of Burton’s was a Disney flick.

As an Alice lover, the film disappointed on a few fronts. Yes, it was utterly gorgeous, surreal and visually sumptuous, but I went in thinking it would be a fairly straight-but-awesome adaptation of Carroll’s book Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Not so. The ideas are, however, unmistakably original – a girl named Alice Kingsley is plunged back into a world that she thinks is part of her dreams after trying to escape societal pressures placed upon her.

When she falls down the rabbit-hole, she seems to spend a lot of her time proving that she is indeed an Alice, not necessarily the Alice, in a very confused mish-mash of Carroll’s oeuvre – both the Alice books, and the delicious poem ‘Jabberwocky’. I’m trying to determine whether or not Burton has any references to ‘The Hunting of the Snark’ but I think I’d need to rewatch the film.

It’s definitely worth a watch if you enjoy the Alice mythos as of course there are some brilliant bits. Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter is spot-on, though I really adored Alice. Helena Bonham-Carter’s Red Queen seems to have shades of Miranda Richardson’s Queenie (from Blackadder II).

I like that it raises a few interesting issues or concepts for consideration, though perhaps to a very specific (read: wanky) audience. For instance, what is in a name? By extension, what is in the name of an author? Alice constantly has to prove herself, and acknowledges that she is not the Alice this Wonderland wants, or needs. A scroll telling of the ‘Frabjous Day’ has already ‘written’ Wonderland’s history and fate. As a former lit student, I was naturally reminded of Roland Barthes’ ‘Death of the Author’ and Michel Foucault’s ‘What is an author’ essays – both of which are shoved down every first-year lit student’s throat.

We also get a dose of watered-down Freudian psychoanalysis with the Red Queen’s obsession with decapitation (which one supposes translates to Freudian castration). Yawn, yes, I know, this has been pointed out ad nauseum in relation to Carroll’s text. It is extended to include the rather surreal and grotesque practice of pricking in this particular film, and the taking out of various characters’ eyes – this to me reeks of Burton proper, none of this candy Disney stuff. Poking out eyes is disturbing, and its use in the film is deliberate.

The Red Queen makes an interesting point to her knave (who accuses the object of his desire, ‘Um’ of making an unwanted sexual advance towards him), about how one must decapitate or kill those whom she fears, so that she cannot be let down by them. Both of these characters have very unusual and unconventional modes of acknowledging their sexualities. A straight Freudian reading would intimate that they fetishise, and therefore are deviant in their sexuality.

A very sad way to live one’s life, killing those we fear, but not dissimilar to America’s modus operandi in regards to world politics. Yes, yes, us arts grads are an annoying lot when it comes to reading metaphor in any text.

Edit: @coliwilso has kindly pointed out to me that the poem ‘Jabberwocky’ is in fact in Through the Looking Glass, or, What Alice Found There. Cheers, old man!

I was lucky enough las year to go to some Melbourne Writers’ Festival events. Apparently Melbourne is a designated City of Literature by UNESCO. I understand one has to bid and pay an exorbitant amount for this privilege.

The first event I went to with Ryan & T was a special screening of The Leopard at ACMI, directed by Visconti, and based on the novel by Lampedusa. Italian neo-realist cinema is quite a treat and I’d been wanting to see this film for ages but it rarely shows (and you can tell by the print, it’s not in fab condition). The Leopard is about a time in Italy when the aristocracy no longer enjoys the prestige it once used to – the working classes are tired of all the corruption and privileges afforded to this social class when in effect, they do so little for it and are lucky merely to be born in the right circumstances. The main character, played by an exceedingly debonair Burt Lancaster, is in an odd position in that he realises his nobility is on the way out.

I was hoping to read the novel before I saw the film, but time did not afford me that pleasure. Nevertheless, the film is an excellent piece on social history. A few of the ball scenes were a little long, but to be honest it’s hard to fault Visconti.

The second event was an all-day workshop with the American poet Emily Ballou, who has written a verse novel about Darwin. The workshop was held at RMIT City campus, which is pretty easy to get to via public transport.

This is probably one of the best workshops I’ve been to – she introduced me to so many exercises and prompts which is perfect for people who go through terrible bouts of writers’ block. We wrote poems based on…

- words plucked out of the dictionary at random
- picture prompts – a magazine page from National Geographic as inspiration
- taking an existing piece of literature and creating a ‘found’ text by striking out words from the given passage
- writing a stanza in addition to one written by the participant next to us

I have at least three poems from this workshop that I can work on, so I was pretty chuffed.

Last event, which I had so much fun at was the official launch of McSweeney’s 32, at The Toff In Town, in the city. All eventgoers got a copy of the beautiful quarterly – and they’ve never, ever launched outside of the States! Everyone seemed pretty excited.

The editor, Eli Horowitz was in attendance to talk to us, as were two of the contributors to read passages from their stories. Then there were a few acts – Suitcase Royale (surreal comedy act), The Bent Leather Band (instruments of electronic and leather-bound manipulation), and a fellow who read a cyberpunk manifesto (even though I swear one already exists, by Donna Haraway). There were some really cool steampunk furnishings on stage, too.

I didn’t get to go to as many events as I wanted, but the MWF was ridiculous fun. Bonus for being able to give Emily Ballou a lift to another MWF event, and she was adorably clad in Emily Dickinson-inspired attire (I believe she was reading her work). I really need to track down a copy of her verse novel on Darwin and recommend other poetry-inspired folk do so too.

I did so much in 2009, and I’m a bit ashamed that I didn’t really blog much. I’m especially ashamed I don’t really have a record of it (as previous readers will know, having a record of what I do helps me a lot when I’m ill – to remember what I did, and when). So this is my attempt to redeem that, especially as now, seeing films is something I’m in the habit of doing.

Last night, I went to see Bright Star in Carlton, not far from my old uni. Very briefly, it focusses on the love affair between Fanny Brawne and the celebrated English poet John Keats.

Much to the disapproval of Keats’ best friend and colleague Brown, Brawne and Keats meet and become quite attracted to one another. It isn’t exactly welcomed on Brawne’s side either – she is very well-to-do and is expected to marry someone worthy of her social rank and standing. Her heart has other ideas.

I don’t want to give too much away, so I’ll just state what how I found the film to be. It is rather slow and somewhat stilted in parts, particularly in the first half. It is gorgeous to look at – the costumes, the countryside and such, but comes off as a bit clinical. Ben Whishaw as Keats is far warmer than Abbie Cornish as Brawne. The chemistry is not always convincing. What is more convincing is the family Brawne – the siblings and mother seem to love each other dearly and are very close. Also, amazing to think that Whishaw played a psychopath in the ghoulish but brilliant Perfume: The Story of a Murderer.

Though I am not sure how true to historical fact this film is, Brawne and her mother really do have a wonderful, loving relationship and this is evidenced in how she eventually gives her daughter her blessing to take a man under her social class, despite how shocking this might have been at the time. I was drawn to it due to my (bleeding obvious) interest in poetry, and it might just force me to pull out my copy of the collected Keats. Might…