Body but no police or lawyers - Film and the Law: No 14 - Stiffs Fuzz and Briefs

Saw two films recently. They had nothing in common except they both featured a stiff (dead body), but no fuzz (police). Neither were there any briefs (lawyers) shooting the breeze

The first film The Ides of March, is the work of producer/writer/director/leading thespian and all-round Renaissance man George Clooney taking the lid off US political skulduggery. Remind you of anyone? Ealing’s adopted son Charlie Chaplin, once the most famous man in the world, was in fact the first person to do the whole caboodle himself- film wise that is. His autobiography makes no mention of his brief sojourn in the Queen of the Suburbs, but then why should it? He was just a toddler at the time, forcibly separated from his beloved mum who had just been incarcerated in the Kennington work house, whilst he was spirited away to Ealing- in -the -Setting -Sun, for the crime of having no visible means of support.

The other film with a stiff and no fuzz, had the puzzling title of Tyrannasau. Written and directed by actor Paddy Considine, it has won many awards including the Grimmest Film of the Year. It is also seen as forming part of the Second Golden Age of British Cinema. The First Golden Age of course was the 1940’s when Ealing Studios reigned supreme culminating in 1949 when the studios achieved their apotheosis with the outstanding comedies Passport to Pimlico, Whisky Galore, and Kind Hearts & Coronets being released to both critical and public acclaim. No problem finding a cinema to screen these masterpieces with Ealing boasting at least five cinemas at the time and all of them on the studios’ doorstep. A different story today though for Tyrannasau. As every Ealing resident can confirm, all the old Picture Houses have been turned into offices, churches or unseemly building sites. One of them, the Walpole which was one of the country’s first talkie palaces, is now a nondescript block of offices in

Bond Street

. Of course it’s worth recording that talking pictures spelt the end of Chaplin’s career – another reason perhaps for him to air spray out any mention of the leafy suburb in his memoirs.

Whilst Ealing now has a pub The Sir Michael Balcon dedicated to the driving force behind the Studios, one wonders what the great man’s thoughts would be about the present dearth of film venues in his old stomping ground. Another fine mess you’ve got me into. But who is to blame? The local authority, the major film exhibitors or a general malaise about an art form of which we should be justly proud? Whilst it’s true to say no local flea pits  operate any more, at least Ealing Studios are still churning out films which makes them the oldest functioning film studios in the world.

Tyrannasau starts with a man kicking his dog to death whilst Ides of March features a political speech being recited by an aide as a sound check. No prizes there for guessing the more shocking opening? The respective endings are the dog killer after some porridge, gets ensconced with a charity shop worker who incidentally is still doing bird for killing her husband, whilst in Ides , George Clooney, blackmailed by the aide, is adopted as the presidential candidate after he seduces and impregnates a young intern who subsequently kills herself. I suspect apart from acting as a spoiler this dodgy summary has put you in a bit of a quandary about which film you want to catch first, but take it from me they are both worth a viewing

In 1955 Ealing produced a film with the ambivalent title The Ship That Died of Shame, about wartime colleagues who buy up their old Navy boat to indulge in a bit of smuggling activities that subsequently turn sour. The ship at the time could be read as a metaphor for Ealing Studios which finally sank under the waves four years later. However, with the benefit of hindsight the ship could just as easily be seen as the Borough of Ealing that has shamelessly bequeathed to its citizens a cinema-less town centre.

Given our on-going sub-narrative of the lack of cinemas in Ealing, one can only speculate how Ealing Studios at their height would have tackled a possible film.

Group of people watch as the last local cinema in the area closes its doors for the last time. They decide to take action, and set up their own cinema in a church hall. Whilst they get support from local people the powers that be give them hassle, with the result that they are ordered to close down During their last screening of Passport to Pimlico, the ceiling collapses and amongst the rubble is a sealed casket containing gold sovereigns and an ancient parchment, which declares that the hall is to be used in perpetuity as a theatre for the benefit of the community and to be funded by the Duke of Bergundy, and the City of Lon…………

Sound a tad familiar? True, but I am sure you agree that in the hands of the legendary Ealing screen-writer T. E. B.Clarke it could well form the basis of another classic Ealing Comedy? But what about real life?

Well apart from the gold sovereigns, the parchment, the Duke of Bergundy, and a few other bits and bobs, everything else is true. A group of Ealing enthusiasts have indeed set up a cinema in their local church hall, and it’s right to say that so far, there are no stiffs ,and no fuzz but given the target readership of this esteemed organ , there could well be flurry of briefs in the offering.

For more information contact:-

Pitshanger Pictures

St Barnabas Millenium Hall,

Pitshanger lane

http://www.barnabites.org/social/pitshanger-pictures

FilmNite presentation - Tuesday 25 October 2011

Tonight's presentation at Soho house 7-9pm will be given by Richard Dacre. Richard will be giving a presentation on last week's FilmNite film, TYRANNASAUR. Richard will also be addressing the question of whether we are, as some commentators claim, currently in British Cinema's second Golden Age. Even if class members didn't manage to see TYRANNASAUR still come along as he will be talking about a lot of films/directors that you will have already have seen at FilmNite.

Film to see - Tuesday 18 October

Tyrannasaur dir Paddy Considine
Curzon Soho
Shafts Avenue
Tel: 0330 500 1331
7.25
 
Also on Odeon Covent Garden
Shafts Avenue Tel:0871 224 4007
sat/sun/weds/thurs 6.15
 
There have been a lot of references in the press to a NEW GOLDEN AGE OF BRITISH CINEMA (as opposed to the 1940's) Golden Age). As members of Film Nite you are already familiar with the films of Andrea Arnold (Fishtank, Red Road), Joanna Hogg (Archipeligo, Unrelated) Lynn Ramsay (Ratcatcher), Steve McQueen(Elephant) and others. RICHARD DACRE the following tuesday 25th Oct at SohoHouse will not only give a presentation on TYRANNASAUR but he will also give his take on the this new renaissance in domestic cinema. This is a not to be missed presentation, and so if you want to bring someone along as an introduction to Film Nite then please Let me know so that I can put them on the guest list. 

Tues 4th Oct 7-9pm @ Soho House Ealing Melo/Dramas

Ealing is famous for COMEDIES but what was Ealing doing when not thus engaged? The answer is that it was making some very interesting non-Comedies, such as dramas, melodramas, war films, issue-films, love stories etc.

San Dimitrio London (1943) is engaging not just because it is a war film, based upon a true story about the merchant navy, but also because it demonstrates to audiences an alternative way of making decisions to that of the officer-men variety. We clearly witness men in a lifeboat coming to a decision by a show of hands. This collaborative process of course to some extent reflects the way that films were being made at Ealing studios under the leadership of Sir MICHAEL BALCON.  Everyone was involved and everyone's opinions were respcted. The rushes/dailes were open to anyone to wander in and express an opinion.

Whilst Cavalcanti in 1942 was depicting the perfect English village being invaded by German soldiers dressed as British ones (Went the Day Well?), the king of the issue-film Basil Deaden (Sapphire, Victim) in 1947 had a similar village receiving in different ways the German wife of David Farrar (Frieda). Only 2 years after the end of the war British audiences were being asked to challenge their quite understandable antipathy to their former enermy.

In 1946 the woman the country loved to hate, Googie Withers, with the help of Gordon Jackson, can you believe, was poisoning her drunkard husband in respectable Brighton (Pink String & Sealing Wax). Ealing was capable of pushing the boundaries even further showing a less than healthy interest in the occult (Halfway House1944, Dead of Night 1945 & The Night my Number Came up, 1955).

All this and more when you attend Soho House @ 7pm on Tues 4th Oct.

Look forward to  seeing you there.
Vincent

Ealing Comedies – 11 October 2011

British Film historian/ lecturer and friend of FilmNite, Richard Dacre, will give a presentation on Ealing comedies on 11 October 2011 7-9pm at Sohohouse.

Some of Britain’s best loved film comedies were made at Ealing Studios – no other studio is so associated with the genre.   Richard’s presentation will focus on the following points:

·         How did this come about?

·         What unites the films?

·         What, indeed, is an Ealing comedy?

It’s not simply films made at Ealing studios– they’ve been making films there since 1902 and are still making films there. The genre of Ealing comedies refers to a much more limited period.  Most people consider the first Ealing comedy in the popular sense to be the 1947 HUE AND CRY. In the next 10 years, 12 more comedies emerged from the studios that are generally talked about as Ealing comedies:  

o   ANOTHER SHORE

o   PASSPORT TO PIMLICO

o   WHISKY GALORE!

o   KIND HEARTS AND CORONETS

o   A RUN FOR YOUR MONEY

o   THE MAGNET

o   THE LAVENDER HILL MOB

o   THE MAN IN THE WHITE SUIT

o   THE TITFIELD THUNDERBOLT

o   THE MAGGIE

o   THE LADYKILLERS

o   BARNACLE BILL

·          What sets these films apart? Not just from other comedies of the day, but also from other comedies made at Ealing studios during the period.  

Join us at FilmNite when all these questions will be answered.  

Discover the forerunners, see the legacy, and understand why we still talk about Ealingesque comedy.

It has been 60 years since Alec Guinness, Sid James, Stanley Holloway and Alfie Bass shot the Ealing comedy, The Lavender Hill Mob. To celebrate, Optimum has re-released the film.  Watch Richard Dacre saddle up with Tally Ho Cycle Tours to show fans the film’s London locations. http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/video/2011/jul/27/lavender-hill-mob-cycle-tour-video

3 x Cheap & Cheerful Tuesdays - film & meal £18

Three very different films. World aclaimed Black Comedy Kind Hearts & Coronets, Mike Nicholl's version of Alben's play Who's Afraid of Virgina Wolf? and Malick's extraordinary second feature Days of Heaven.

WATCH THIS SPACE FOR MORE FILMNITE CHEAP & CHEERFUL EVENTS.

Cheap and Cheerful Tuesday - 6th Sept 11

The third Cheap 'n Cheerful Tuesday. By going to NFT on a Tueday you pay half the usual ticket price.

 

This offering: DAYS OF HEAVEN (1978) dir: Terrence Malick With Richard Gere, Brooke Adams, & Sam Shepard. Score by Ennio Morricone, photography by Nestor Almendros & Haskell Wexler. @ NFT3 tues 6th Sept 6.30 Book ur £5.00 tkt NOW. Tel 0207 928 3232 bfi.org.uk.

 

Malick's first film BADLANDS (1973) with Sissy Spacek & Martin Sheen is generally considered to be the most remarkable first feature film ever made in the US. The director  then waited 5 years to make his second, namely DAYS OF HEAVEN which the the doyen of  film critics,  David Thomson proclaimes to be the most beautiful film ever made. Made  over several years, due to the director's insistence on shooting only at the magic hour, Thomson maintains that the film set a new standard in cinema aesthetics.Malick then waited a further 20 years before making his third feature THE THIN RED LINE (seen at Film Nite), and his latest offering THE TREE OF LIFE  was also seen at Film Nite last term.

 

DAYS OF HEAVEN is generally spoken of in reverential terms and given the tag masterpiece. Pete Bradshaw in Friday's Guardian gives it 5 stars. The print to be screened on tuesday is a spanking brand new one using all the latest digitilised technology. So we are in for a real treat. MISS IT AT YOUR PERIL

 

"Malick is an American visionary and cinematic poet. All his movies are set in the past and they are deeply spiritual stories of escape. They concern the land we walk on and the world we inhabit. Ravishing new print. His finest film." Philip French, Observer film critic.

Afterwards we can go for a pizza/ drinks at Pizza Express at 8.30pm.

FILM NITE STARTS UP AGAIN ON TUESDAY 4TH OCT @ SOHOHOUSE @ 7pm

The first two sessions will be on EALING STUDIOS with THE DRAMAS  being covered on 4th Oct, and the COMEDIES  being covered at the second session on 11th Oct by Richard Dacre.

Prices: NEW MEMBERS £135.00; Previous/existing members £125.00

 

GREAT OFFER: Get a new member to join at the full rate and you only pay £100.00

Tinsel Town's Crazy Women

Uncomplicated girls can't act - Joe Pasternak, film producer

Catherine Zeta-Jones enters a clinic suffering from bipolar disorder (aka manic depression), and she is congratulated for going public about her mental disorder.

It then transpires that her action was in anticipation of a scoop in the following day’s National Enquirer. Furthermore she maintained her condition had only developed because, she had been so preoccupied with looking after her sick husband, Michael Douglas. So her PR advisers wouldn’t even allow her to be just ill per se – instead there had to be an extraneous cause, and in this case it was the stress induced in an A-lister having to play Florence Nightingale in real life.

Whilst male stars in Hollywood have been able to get away with murder (almost literally in some cases), the lot of female stars has been far from easy. The young Robert Mitchum can get arrested for drugs, and more recently Hugh Grant, Mel Gibson and Robert Downey Junior to say nought of the Sheen boy, can get up to all  kinds a shenanigans, without their careers being effected. In fact it could be argued that appearances on tabloid front pages may even have enhanced the middle-aged delinquents’ job prospects. But woe betide any female star who gets a yen for developing similar proclivities.

Tinsel town, we are told is run by cigar chomping men who have a clear idea of how their female commodities should act both on and off the screen. Perhaps a bit neurotic on the screen can be de rigueur, as that is what producers think constitutes acting, but off screen the key word has to be normal – whatever that is. Apart from being crazy in real life the next worse thing an actress can do is play a crazy. Take the case of the amazing Ronee Blakley who steals the show in the brilliant Nashville (1975). She plays a country singer who has what my mother used to call in hushed tones a nervous breakdown. By now her name should be tripping off our tongues, but these days she is virtually forgotten. Why? Because apart from having her head blown off in the first 20mins of The Driver (1978), she didn’t get much work after Nashville. One wonders if this could have possibly had anything to do with her playing a troubled singer?

The concept of the perfect woman was taken to extreme lengths in Mars Attacks (1996), where popping out of the invading flying saucer is Hollywood’s dream woman – a perfectly formed electronic one no less. Little chance there of anything untoward, except that the gizmos went a wee bit off message, with the result that the Earth invader developed an obsession with Tom Jones, can you believe? The 1950’s was a rich vein for space travelling women with the scariest of scaries (from a man’s point of view) being The Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (1958), which not surprisingly had followed on from The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957). But my favourite has to be every woman’s nightmare, and in some cases, sad to say, their reality - I Married a Monster from Outer Space (1958). Such films, whilst dismissed at the time by broadsheet critics would have been subconsciously read by audiences as metaphors for the changing roles and expectations of women in society. Bit disappointing therefore when we move on to the sleep-inducing 2001 Space Odyssey (1971) and the macho The Right Stuff (1983) – not a cookie woman in sight anywhere.

“Frances who?” chorused the film press when Hollywood doyen Howard Hawks proclaimed FRANCES FARMER (1913-1970) to be "the best actress I have ever worked with.” Some praise indeed coming from no less a person than he, who had directed Louise Brooks, Carole Lombard, and Katherine Hepburn, to name but three. The daughter of a poor man’s lawyer and an anti-communist feminist, Frances gained fame if not fortune as a drama student in 1935 by winning a prize to visit the USSR. Her later collaboration with Hawks, Come And Get It (1936), is generally thought to be her best performance and it was predicted that she would become the next Garbo. Sadly she wasn’t able to live the dream. She couldn’t or wouldn’t conform and contemptuously described Hollywood as a nuthouse. The combination of prescribed drugs and alcohol, led to arrests and eventually incarceration in a nuthouse – not the kind of nuthouse she had in mind, just up the road from the Sunset Strip, but close - the Screen Actors’ Sanatorium where she was subjected to insulin shock treatment, and many other ghastly procedures over the next seven years. Eventually it is said, she was lobotomised for behaviour that would hardly raise an eyebrow today.

There is footage of her later in her later life, presenting her own TV show Frances Farmer Presents where her appearance bears a freaky resemblance to the computer generated woman in Mars Attacks. In recent times she has become a cult figure, even getting the ultimate accolade of a song about her by fellow Seattle-ite Kurt Cobain (deceased). Conspiracy theories abound not least of which is that the American establishment never forgave her for accepting the prize to visit the USSR and then conspired to have her harassed by the police and eventually incarcerated. Frances died aged 56 of cancer. An above average biopic on her, Frances (1982) starring Jessica Lange is well worth a viewing.

JEAN SEBERG (1938-1979) who in a sense can be considered to be the soul sister of Frances, became the defining icon of the French New Wave in Breathless (1959), when she strolled down the Champs Ellysee calling out in an American accent, “New York Herald Tribune. New York Herald Tribune”. It is said that the petite elfin should be grateful to the film’s director, Jean-Luc Godard for giving her the part, but others maintain that the maestro of the jump cut should be even more grateful to the troubled Hollywood expatriate for kick starting his career.

Picked out from 18,000 wannabees in a nation-wide contest to play the lead in St Joan (1957), the 17yr old was deemed to have failed to live up to expectations. In the 1960’s she became active in left wing political groups including the Black Panthers, and moved to France. Such was her influence especially in Europe that FBI director Edgar J Hoover ordered her to be neutralised, notwithstanding the fact that she was seven months pregnant at the time. Needless to say her child has still-born. So enraged was she at the role of the FBI which had been spreading rumours that the child’s father was a Panther, she called a press conference producing the body of her dead white child, as exhibit A.

By 1979 her mental health was deteriorating rapidly and eventually after a severe bout of depression and an attempted suicide on the anniversary of her child’s death, she went missing. At the end of an 11 day nation-wide search, her body was found in the boot of her car in a Paris suburb. She was just 40 and had died of a massive overdose of barbiturates. As with Frances, conspiracy theories surround her life and whether directly or indirectly it does seem that the US law enforcement agencies played some part in the deaths of these two talented and outspoken young women. A few years ago the National Theatre produced an engaging play about Jean’s sad and painful life. Should the NT ever decide to put it on again then I’d definitely recommend you to book up early. Buried in Montparnasse cemetery Paris, metres away from Jean Paul Sartre & Simone de Bouvoire who had attended her funeral, her grave has become a place of pilgrimage.

By the time Catherine Zeta-Jones reads this piece I trust that she is out of the clinic and on the mend. Whilst Hollywood’s prejudice towards mental illness among its female stars has shifted somewhat since the days of Frances & Jean, it has still a long way to go. Similarly in the real world, where at best mental illness is seen as a guilty secret, much work still needs to be done, as any reader will testify if they or a member of their family has or has had the misfortune to suffer a (sotto voce) NERVOUS BREAKDOWN.

So how about another CHEAP TUESDAY?

Many thanks to those who came along last Tuesday to see KIND HEARTS & CORONETS plus pizza/drinks. All for £17.50. Bargain of the year, and a very enjoyable evening it was as well. If you still havn't yet seen KIND HEARTS then get to see it NOW as it is still on @ the NFT.Must be one of the greatest and most enjoyable films ever.

 

Tuesday 30th Aug NFT1 6pm. Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf? (1964) dir Mike Nichols £5.00 ONLY. Book 0207 928 3232 http://www.bfi.org.uk/

 

The film is based upon an Edward Albee play first performed on Broadway in 1961. Starring Liz Taylor, Richard Burton George Segal & Sandy Dennis. Controversial at the time due to its strong language. Thought to mirror the real life stormy relationship of the two stars. Won lots of awards. They were queuing roung the block in London when it first came out and it was the performance of Sandy Dennis that caught the eye.

 

Afterwards we can go for a pizza/pasta @ South Bank Pizza Express. Please let me know as soon as possible if you are coming to the restaurant. I need to know numbers.

FilmNite Autumn Term - From Tuesday 4 October

FilmNite re-commences on Tuesday 4th October @ Sohohouse 7-9pm.

The first two sessions will cover EALING COMEDIES.

British Film is known the world over for, The British Documentary movement, Hammer Horror, the James Bond franchise and of course Ealing Comedies. As the title suggests these were a clutch of comedies made at Ealing studios over a relatively short period namely early 1940's to late 1950's.These highly inventive and genuinely funny films owe their genius to a small clutch of talented people. Whilst Sir Michael Balcon is generally seen as the driving force behind the Ealing output, he did have around him a group of directors such as Robert Hamer (Kind Hearts & Coronets), Alexandre MacKendrick (Whisky Galore) coupled with TEB Clarke (writer of The lavender Hill Mob) and a family of actors, Alec Guinness (Kind Hearts, The ladykillers), Stanley Holloway (the Lavender Hill Mob), Dennis Price (Kind Hearts) Katy Johnson (The Ladykillers) and so on. Between them great films surfaced which stand the test of time. John Cleese loved them so much that he persuaded Charles Chrichton (The Titfield Thunderbolt) to come out of retirement in 1988 to direct A Fish Called Wanda.

Ealing studios still exist on Ealing Green and are still producing films. 

            The films are so good that you never tire of seeing them

The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) dir Charles Chrichton

I first saw this Ealing Comedy when it came out and I would have been 8 at the time. I recall the nitric acid test on a gold Eiffel tower, but I didn't understand it so had to get my older brother to explain on the way home.  I was pleased with this newly acquired knowledge and was able to sneak it in from time to time at school, which made me look clever.

I just loved Ealing Comedies and used to beg my dad for money to see the latest one. I would usually succeed, as he quite liked them as well. He was particularly fond of Alec Guinness so I knew I was on to a winner if I mentioned the great actor's name.

Ealing Comedies (Source: Wikipedia)

• Hue and Cry (1947)
• Another Shore (1948)
• Passport to Pimlico (1949)
• Whisky Galore! (1949)
• Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949)
• A Run for Your Money (1949)
• The Magnet (1950)
• The Lavender Hill Mob (1951)
• The Man in the White Suit (1951)
• The Titfield Thunderbolt (1953)
• Meet Mr. Lucifer (1953)
• The Love Lottery (1954)
• The Maggie (1954)
• The Ladykillers (1955)
• Who Done It? (1956)
• Barnacle Bill (1957)
• Davy (1957)

Highlights this FilmNite term include:

• British Film lecturer Richard Dacre will give a presentation on Ealing Comedies including Passport to Pimlico, Whisky Galore and Peter Bradshaw's favourite film Kind Hearts & Coronets.
• We will see four recently released films - every other week in various cinema locations in the West End (i.e. Curzon Soho, Renoir, Mayfair, Odeon Covent Garden, Odeon West End etc).
• The following week there will be a presentation (7-9pm at Sohohouse, Soho, London) on the film seen the previous week. Class discussion on the film seen is encouraged. 

• £135 per term (£125 for former class members) - best value in town to attend a unique film class.
• For more information, contact Vincent on vmfilmnite@googlemail.com.

Lies, Damn Lies and Film

The good book posed the question, What is truth? 2,000 years later radical and all-round contrary film-maker Jean-Luc Godard posited an answer.  Truth he said, is 24 times per second – a reference to how the illusion of movement and reality is re-produced on the silver screen by the passing of 24 frames of film per second through a film projector.

As every film student knows the stirring Odessa Steps sequence in Eisenstein’s masterpiece BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN (1926) never happened, although it clearly happened for the benefit of the director’s cameras. If you are privileged enough to visit the location of the steps then you can join a tour that is conducted on the basis that you are visiting the hallowed ground of a real event, made famous by the film. No harm there you make think. Just an amusing little con by the tour operators. What’s new?

NANOOK OF THE NORTH (1922) depicts an Eskimo building an igloo, fishing through a hole in the ice and other folksy activities associated with the intriguing life of a people who are at home in the frozen North. Explorer/director Robert Flaherty turned young Nanook into an international celebrity and gained kudos for his documentary style.  Only problem was that Nanook and his contemporaries had long since given up such a way of life by the time Bob came along with his camera, and what you see is a re-creation of a collective memory that had joined the mists of time. Nanook with his engaging smile became an icon overnight but had trouble coping with fame. Eventually he took to the bottle and died long before his allotted three score and ten.

Kim Longinotto and Ziba Mir-Hosseini are film makers who were granted unrestricted access to an Iranian divorce court. Their fly on the wall DIVORCE IRANIAN STYLE (1998) is a fascinating insight into what in many ways appears to be a fair and open albeit idiosyncratic system. However there exists a troubling moment when the amiable judge turns to the film makers and asks them their recollection of an incident that took place outside the court room when they were filming the woman who was a party to the matter. They gave an answer that was clearly at variance with what we the audience had already seen. In other words they lied. Admittedly, they were not under oath or acting as officers of the court. Such film makers would have you believe that their raison d’etre is to document events, not make an intervention. Yet when questioned about the matter they volunteered that they felt they had an obligation to support the woman as she was in danger of losing her child. As it turned out the judge found in the woman’s favour but we will never know to what extent the film-makers’ evidence influenced the court.

One wonders if they would have acted any differently, had they been granted similar access to an English Family court. One can only speculate although I suspect the answer would be in the negative, which then raises the question of how they viewed the quality of law obtainable in Iran, and just as importantly how they viewed their role as documentary film makers.

So we have a conundrum. Whilst on the one hand Godard with film in mind, says that truth is 24 times a second, he also memorably uttered that, every edit is a lie and that cinema is the most beautiful fraud in the world. Perhaps Byron should have the last word when he said that truth can sometimes be stranger than fiction. Although come to think of it, if film had been around when the lad was tagging the Parthenon for posterity, he may well have added the rider,

except for film, where truth is fiction, and fiction is truth.

The Biggest erection in Cinematic history Or, how Douglas Sirk circumvented the law

Hollywood. 1943: A preview film theatre.

A German language film is being screened, and a middle aged man sits alone fixated by the flickering black and white images. Suddenly he sits up and shouts,

Stop. Rewind. freeze frame  

He gets up and goes close to the screen, where he lovingly caresses the image of a blonde haired young man in a nazi uniform. Tears are streaming down his face, as the image of the young man is superimposed on his face. Eventually, the frozen frame starts to disintegrate, and burn .

Fast Forward

Hollywood studio 1956

An older version of the above man is directing a key scene from the classic weepie ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS. Posh widow Jane Wyman has had to give up her younger lover, gardener Rock Hudson, for the sake of her selfish teenage children.

Christmas Eve, and there’s a knock on the front door.

A man walks in with a large parcel that looks uncannily like, what used to be called a console television set. It’s a present from the ghastly children to their mother and they unexpectedly announce that this will be their last Christmas in the family home. News to mum who is framed in the television screen looking rather fearful.

                                             TELEVISION MAN

                       Merry Christmas, and a happy new year Mrs Scott.

                       All you have to do is turn that dial.

                       All the company you want.

                        Right there on the screen.

                        Drama, comedy.

                        Life’s parade at your fingertips.

No longer will Jane be a participant in life. All that’s left now, is for her. to be a lonesome spectator of television melodramas. Such a scene with its ambivalent meaning was to become the hallmark of the director Douglas Sirk.

Whilst Sirk was developing his directorial career in pre-war Germany, his wife was embracing the nazi doctrine. She enrolled their son in the Hitler Youth and his good looks quickly attracted attention from the nazi propaganda machine. Very soon he was a national film star playing the definitive Ayrian hero. Being of a totally different persuasion, Sirk had no option but to leave his homeland unaccompanied by his beloved son.

Hollywood beckoned but the only work he could get was at Universal working on melodramas for the millions of American housewives with sufficient time on their hands to attend matinees at their local cinema. Known in the trade as weepies, they were considered to be the lowest form of cinematic life. But the intellectual Sirk grabbed the opportunity and his success in the genre would eventually earn him the accolade, King of the Weepies.

Prior to ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS Sirk made MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION which had playboy Rock being responsible for Jane losing her sight in an accident. Seeing the error of his ways, so to speak, Rock trained as an eye surgeon in record time and then gave Jane her sight back after a state of the art operation. Fantastic you may think? But not quite as fantastic as Sirk’s life. With the advent of peace, the flow of nazi films to Hollywood dried up, which meant that he could no longer savour those bitter-sweet images of his son in that lonely film theatre. So at the height of his career he left Universal, and returned to Germany to start his filial search, which would prove to be fruitless, and eventually he had to accept that the happy ending which defines his work would not apply to his own real life melodrama.

And as for Jane and Rock? Yes of course they got back together again after Rock had an accident. Jane rushed to his side and her mere presence not only brought him out of his coma but also, it activated the biggest erection ever seen on the silver screen. Erection? 1950’s? But sex hadn’t been invented yet, and anyway there were laws against such apparitions, weren’t there? Mind you, that slow rising blanket could after all have been Rock’s knee, couldn’t it? But that doesn’t quite explain the stag in the garden sniffing around in the snow, now does it? Over to you Mr Freud for a quick gloss if you may.

You see Sirk was a bit of a wag and his low art melodramas can be seen as subversive critiques of American society. So all you widows out there, be warned of children bearing gifts this Christmas, particularly if one of the gifts is a console television set, circa 1956.

                               A Happy Sirkian Christmas to my reader(s)

How 2 Fugitives from Justice gave us 2 of Britain’s greatest films

The good doctor asks felicitously after his patient’s health.

“Excellent” replies the young American who also happens to be chained to his bed. The immaculately dressed doctor moves over to the bathroom in the bombed out house and pours the contents of a hot-water bottle into the bath. It is 1948 and US émigré Edward Dmytryk is directing Obsession in post-war London. Loosely based upon the real life acid bath murders the story finds Robert Newton playing an obsessively jealous husband who kidnaps a US serviceman after discovering the latter ensconced with his wife - played by the hugely talented but now largely forgotten Sally Gray.

This intriguing film forms part of The Morbid Cycle– a clutch of previously little known films that explore the darker side of life as the country re-emerged into peace.

Dmytryk was recuperating in London after spending 6 months in a US penitentiary for refusing to co-operate with the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).

Meanwhile over the pond in Hollywood, Connecticut- born Jules Dassin’s career had never been better His prison drama Brute Force had catapulted him from B-feature director to an A-lister.

In order to get back to Hollywood Dmytryk, who had been secretly co-operating with HUAC, suddenly announced that that his fellow director Dassin was in fact a fully paid-up member of the communist party. So whilst Dmytryk was leisurely booking a first class flight to LA poor Dassin was scrambling on board the first flight out in the opposite direction. Poetic licence dictates that their Stratocruisers must have crossed somewhere over the Atlantic.

It didn’t take long for Dassin to get work in London. With Richard Widmark on board and together with a host of home-grown talent he busied himself with Night and the City which turned out to be the definitive British film noir. Largely eschewing the studio, in favour of war damaged locations he produced a perfect depiction of low life crime in 1940’s London. Tiring of this pursuit, he hopped across the channel to the land of his forebears and made the legendary heist movie Rififi. Then to Greece and a comedic re-make of Rififi, called Topkai with his new wife Melina Mercouri. It did well at the box office but the critics gave it the thumbs down, which marked the beginning of the end of a glittering career.

Things weren’t much better for Dmytryk in sunny Hollywood. The director of the much admired film noir portrait of anti-semitism, Crossfire, was now reduced to directing a British-financed western Shalako, starring Sean Connery and Brigitte Bardot.

Oh how the mighty had fallen. But thanks to the extreme right winger Senator Joe McCarthy and his HUAC we in the UK now have two great movies in our National Pantheon of Cinema, and it is right to say that we definitely benefited at the expense of others. Without America’s paranoid scare of reds under the beds we would never have had, Cy Endfield’s Zulu, Joseph Losey’s The Servant, and can you believe, the 50’s ITV series Robin Hood?

So if, or rather when a HUBAC (House of Un-British Activities Committee) is set up, and you are ordered to appear, and are asked the time-honoured question, “Are you, or have you ever been a member of the Middlesex Law Society?”, you must answer “No, but, actually I could name a few names and now you mention it, I just might be able to throw in a couple of fellow travellers to boot.” Then do a bunk to Panama city where according to Canoe Man you can buy a cosy 2-bedroom flat for £30,000.00.

Now that the dreaded Oscar’s are upon us once more, my thoughts turn to which films in my opinion were worth the inflated entrance fee. How about:-

Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon, Jacques Audiard’s A Prophet , Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank, Armando Iannucci’s In the Loop, Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr Fox.

But my favourite film of the year was made in Japan in 1960 by Yasujiro Ozu. Late Autumn - a film about match-making - is now regarded as a masterpiece. A must see.Out on DVD from the 24^th April if you can’t get along to the BFI Southbank to see it in its full glory on the big screen By the way, few Kleenex just might come in handy.

The Magistrate who became President

Having just completed three years teaching in a Zambian rural school, and with my weight down to 9 stone after countless bouts of malaria and a minimalist diet, it was of some interest that the British Government was offering me a sponsored year at a University Dept of Education – a prospect that I viewed as a sort of rehabilitation programme for returning neo-colonialists. A course in West Wales sounded just the ticket.

Whilst there I had one of those road to Damascus moments. I’d heard that the Society of Law Students screened a certain film every year to packed houses. A Greek film, can you imagine, and it had one of the shortest titles in cinematic history, Z. Intrigued, I ambled along.

Set during the colonels’ regime, it depicts the murder investigation of a democratic politician (Yves Montand) by a seemingly pliable examining magistrate (Jean Louis Trintignant). Directed by darling of the left, Costa-Gavras, the film is constructed in such a way that you fully expect the magistrate to acquiesce to the powers that be, and do zilch. Instead, can you believe, he does his duty, and upholds the rule of law. In one of those great moments of cinema, he orders the arrest of the main suspects – a squalid group of senior police officers, who are clearly in cahoots with the leaders of the coup. The audience of pimply- nosed aspirant lawyers jumped for joy, and why not? Agenuine life affirming moment, and I left the auditorium pondering the meaning of life and wondering whether I needed a career change.

However the story doesn’t end with the credits. The magistrate was initially sent on state sponsored educational leave – bit like me really. But there the similarity ends. He was subsequently arrested and savagely tortured by the Greek military police. However, his fame had spread and it soon became apparent that there was no option for the colonels but to release him. Such was the esteem and the affection that he engendered in the Greek people, that he was eventually elected to the position of President of Greece.

And as for the colonels? Like all bullies they met their match and the home of democracy was democratic once more.

Few films have affected me as much as Z. It manages to raise fundamental quandaries such as, ‘How would I have acted?’ Not so long ago, our tv screens were showing us footage of demonstrating lawyers being viscously attacked by police in Pakistan and Zimbabwe, and yet when legal aid, so fundamental to the upholding of human rights, was heavily cut at around the same time, our response was muted to say the least.

We all have our own reasons for becoming lawyers, but I suspect deep down a lot of us could be persuaded to own up to motives that are on a slightly higher plane than merely the acquisition of common and garden lucre, and to that end, a film like Z is an uncomfortable but important reminder.

The significance of the film’s title? In Greek Z means he is alive. During the time of colonels, it was a crime punishable with imprisonment to display the letter in public. And the magistrate? Christos Sartzetakis is still alive and if you are sufficiently competent you can google into his web site, though it helps if you are fluent in Greek.

The Rules of the Beautiful Game

THE RULES OF THE GAME (La Regle du Jeu) directed in 1939 by French maestro Jean Renoir took a battering at the box office and also got the thumbs down from the critics. The complex farce about the upper class was then cut by the producers and eventually banned! Can you imagine? With war looming, Renoir felt he had no choice but to flee to Hollywood. Poor chap!

30 years later our own national treasure Ken Loach directed his first feature, the much loved KES, to national and international acclaim. The main narrative is about a young delinquent’s love for a bird – a kestrel that is! However within this film there is another film trying to get out - a film that could almost share the same title as Renoir’s

THE RULES OF THE BEAUTIFUL GAME aptly describes the football vignette that comes in the middle of our hero’s doomed attempts to escape the limiting opportunities on offer for a school leaver in the grimy North. Teacher turned actor Brian Glover, in a memorable performance demonstrates clearly why young people should never trust the word of an adult with a bit of authority to wield. Playing a PE teacher with a tad conflict of interest in that he not only appoints himself to be the referee but also elects to play captain, centre forward and Bobby Charlton to boot, Glover creates the definitive template on how to win at sport. He disallows opposition goals, blatantly fouls opponents, indulges in unwarranted sendings-off and to cap it all, awards himself a penalty. A hilarious metaphor for the unfairness of life as seen through the eyes of an adolescent.

As our heroes wile away their time between games, in their luxurious Southern Hemisphere surroundings, one would hope that Fabio has to the good sense to take my advice and screen the above sequence every night to our pampered 23 before they are tucked up into bed with their play stations. Apart from putting a smile on their darling little faces, the nation’s crème de la crème may just learn from Brian Glover the subtle and not so subtle art of cheating with style and, if I was of cynical disposition which I hasten to add I am not, then a little nudge here and a little push there might, just might, get us past the quarter finals. Better still of course if England’s referee representative to the Rainbow World Cup, Howard Webb, already of some notoriety, was invited to the screenings as well, then he could bone up on his infamous refereeing skills. All we would need then of course is for FIFA’s computer to slate in Howard for the England v Germany final, and the trophy would then be ours again.

And what of Renoir’s film after all these years? It is now considered to be a masterpiece of cinema, though when I show extracts to my film class, such an accolade is not usually greeted with unified agreement. Still, I convince them in the end. And KES? Sadly the bird gets killed in the film and outrageously no one is brought to book. David Bradley who plays our young hero pops up now and again in the press moaning (justifiably I’d say) that his career never really took off despite the rave reviews he got. Similarly Brian Glover’s career also didn’t full fill expectations and sadly he passed away last year. Ironically KES will always be remembered for their fabulous debut performances.

It is interesting to note that I have yet to see the legendary KES footy match screened on television during a World Cup series. Could it be that those who run our TV Sport would see it as irrelevance or they just don’t appreciate their own culture?

If on the other hand, YOU appreciate your own culture, and would like to know more - in particular film – then join FILM NITE at London’s celebrated media club, SOHOHOUSE. The first two sessions will be presentations while the rest of the 11 week term will be given over to seeing contemporary films from all over the world followed by presentations/discussions.

Come On England. Come On England.

Kindly note that FILM NITE is not an official England team sponsor