Room 237 (15)

This curious documentary about arguably the greatest horror film of all time is out in cinemas today!

Room 237 (15) (This review on FilmJuice.com)

Some films stay with you forever, and ever, and ever.  So reads the cleverly referential tagline for Room 237, a whistle stop tour of nine conspiracy theories surrounding Stanley Kubrick’s horror masterpiece, The Shining.  Many films have been pored over in search of hidden meanings, but apparently none more so than Kubrick’s ode to terror, with interpretations ranging from the bizarre (it’s really about the moon landings!) to the almost believable.

Documentary filmmaker and horror fanatic Rodney Ascher has assembled a film that essentially consists of audio interviews accompanied by visuals from Kubrick’s films.  There is also the occasional filler footage, which is largely unimaginative and borderline amateurish.  This is kept to a minimum however, and Kubrick’s peerless imagery is allowed to speak for itself, making Room 237, more than anything else, a reminder of how breathtaking Kubrick’s cinematography is.

The soundtrack is an array of tributes to 1970s horror music, which works for the film but isn’t quite on topic, as The Shining featured an innovative mix of contemporary classical music and Wendy Carlos’ dread inspiring electronic compositions.  Few of the interviewees are notable, all apparently experts in very obscure fields (hermetic and alchemical traditions for example!), the exception being ABC news correspondent Bill Blakemore, one of the few contributors with anything bordering on plausible to say.

The so called ‘hidden meanings’ are mostly absurd to the point of being comical.  Ascher presents his subject matter with tongue-in-cheek, pokerfaced gravity, helping make the film palatable to a wider audience as a humourous insight into the minds of conspiracy theorists.  One theory stands out as being true however, as The Shining is to an extent a metaphorical allegory of the genocide of the Native Americans.  Throwing a little truth into the mix of madness makes the audience sensitive to the possibility that there might be shreds of truth in the other explorations, helping to keep you engaged and open minded with the thought that Room 237 might not just be a kaleidoscope of rambling nutters.

Die Hard film buffs and Kubrick devotees will get the most out of the film, as it directly appeals to the obsessive mindset of the kind of cineaste who likes nothing more than to slip film quotes into conversation, or to tell you that in Casablanca nobody ever actually says “Play it again, Sam”.  The market for this film isn’t quite that limited however, as conspiracy theories are brain food for some and outlandish entertainment for others.  Ascher’s film cleverly taps both these points of view, making it an amusing curiosity for all.  Even if you can’t swallow the ideas presented there is still fun to be had.  Now why not read this review backwards and find out what it was really about.

Hitch & Welles

My timely article on two of the greatest directors of all time!

Hitch & Welles

Alfred Hitchcock.  Orson Welles.  Two names that instantly inspire admiration, mystery and fascination in the heart of any self-respecting cineaste.  How could they ever be compared?  Welles’ titanic achievement Citizen Kane suffered a rude awakening recently at the hands of Hitchcock’s psychological masterpiece Vertigo, when the latter was voted the greatest film of all time in Sight & Sound’s once a decade poll of directors and critics, ending Kane’s unprecedented fifty year reign.  What better occasion could there be to explore these two universally lauded filmmakers than that?

Hitch

Alfred Hitchcock, affectionately referred to as Hitch, is well known as ‘The Master of Suspense’ because he directed a wealth of tension filled thrillers.  He is quoted as saying “Always make the audience suffer as much as possible”, and from the agonising and eerie tension of his best films like The Birds and Rear Window, to the non-stop chases of his apparently ‘lesser’ films such as Saboteur and Torn Curtain, the man certainly knew how to put his punters through the mill.

He was raised Catholic in the then largely Protestant London, and there is a well known story of how at the age of five his father sent him to a police station with a note, which he handed to an officer, who promptly locked him in a cell for five to ten minutes saying, “This is what we do to naughty boys”.  Who knows what terrible act of mischief Hitch had committed to deserve such a harrowing punishment, but we can be almost certain that he never did it again!  From the outset he felt an outsider, afraid to do wrong and yet fascinated by those who commit evil.  This fed into his films, giving them a distinctly voyeuristic flavour as he often forced his audience into the perspective of an unseen outsider looking in, an innocent bystander bearing witness to all sorts of heinous doings.  His penchant for the macabre and a dark and sometimes perverse sense of humour stemmed from his formative years, leading Hitch to effectively psychoanalyse himself for more than five decades via his chosen form of expression.

Among his technical innovations is the now overused Hitchcock Zoom, also known as the Vertigo Effect, as it was pioneered specifically for that film, to exaggerate the perception of depth and to produce vertigo-like giddiness in the viewer.  And if you think that 3D is a recent invention then think again: Hitchcock was an early pioneer of the device, using it with striking restraint in Dial M for Murder.

His legacy is immeasurable.  From pioneering cinematic grammar and techniques to fighting for cinemas legitimacy as a worthy art form, and with countless major directors citing him as an influence there is no telling what cinema today would be like had that Bobby kept poor Hitch locked up forever.

A film about his time making Psycho is in the works, for which renowned actors the world over vied for the chance to play him.  The simply titled ‘Hitchcock’ is due out in 2013, with Anthony Hopkins landing the prize role.  Amazingly, despite all his success and influence Hitchcock never won an Oscar.  Perhaps Hopkins will win one on his behalf!

Welles

Consistently voted the greatest director of all time, both by fellow director’s and his adoring critics, in his day Orson Welles was one of the most obviously talented but famously frustrated filmmakers in Hollywood.  Terry Gilliam excepted, no director is better known for having his artistic visions thwarted at every turn (post-Kane of course), usually due to studio re-edits or lack of funding.  From his butchered masterpiece The Magnificent Ambersons, to perhaps his most famous unfinished project, Don Quixote (making more comparisons to Gilliam inevitable, see Lost in La Mancha) Welles’ filmography contains far more films than are actually available to view in a finished form.  Were there such a thing as a no strings attached limitless budget, who knows what other influential masterworks the man could have unleashed on the world.

Though born into an affluent family, Welles learnt self-reliance and to work hard from an early age.  His parents separated when he was four, and at the age of ten he ran away from home with his half-sister Marjorie, only to be found a week later busking with song and dance.  Welles’ creativity and passion for performance flourished as he later staged his own plays during his early teen years at school, and he soon found work as a theatre actor, with a particular flair for Shakespeare.  By the mere age of twenty he was also working as a radio actor, during which time he met many of the collaborators with whom he would soon begin his film career.

For his debut - and best - feature film in 1941, Welles was granted for the first and only time the holy grail of every film director: total artistic control.  That film was Citizen Kane, the legendary picture that as of 2012 is supposedly inferior only to Vertigo!  It is an embellished exposé of the life of William Randolph Hearst, a powerful newspaper baron and sometime politician.  The twenty five year old Welles’ first feature length film was in many ways decades ahead of it’s time, making it’s mark forever on the way films are made.  Welles’ ingenious innovations spanned every department, from the way depth of field is used in cinematography to lighting techniques that allowed sets to have ceilings.

Welles may have changed cinema forever, but he was still never able to make as big a splash as he had the potential to.  Sometimes it was his own fearless impulsivity that left his work open to tinkering (the studio reworked the ending of The Magnificent Ambersons while he was AWOL in South America).  His brilliance spilled over into everything he turned his hand to, and he died the envy of everyone and anyone with an admiration for the art of moving pictures.

Alfred Hitchcock.  Orson Welles.  Rather than attempt the impossible and compare the two, we can be glad they were both blessed with the opportunity to make such good movies, and us with the chance to see them.  It’s meaningless to call the one ‘better’ than the other, and at the end of the day such polls are there to renew awareness of these must-see classics.  To borrow from Citizen Kane’s audacious tagline, ‘they’re terrific!’

(This article was originally written for FilmJuice.com and can be found here).

Les Enfants du Paradis (PG)

Timeless classic of French cinema, available on Blu-ray and DVD from Monday 17th September.

Les Enfants du Paradis (PG) (This review on FilmJuice.com)

Voted ‘The best French film ever made’ by the French Film Academy, this stunningly restored edition of Les Enfants du Paradis (1945) is a sumptuous cinematic treat.  Garance, a courtesan and actress iconically played by Arletty, one of the great beauties of the twentieth century, is pursued by four very different yet equally amorous gents.

Principal among them and the only one for whom Garance has any reciprocal feeling, is the unappreciated but brilliant mime-artist Baptiste.  At their first meeting, the mime uses his performance skills to demonstrate Garance’s innocence when she is falsely accused of pickpocketing.  Their paths diverge however when Baptiste hesitates in wooing her, and they each settle for loveless relationships whilst longing that their paths might cross again.

Jean-Louis Barrault plays Baptiste, a character modelled on real life nineteenth century mime-artist Jean-Gaspard Deburau, whom Barrault had been fascinated by ever since hearing how he had beaten a street-boy to death for taunting him in front of his family.  The other male characters are largely also based on real people, such as intellectual criminal Pierre-François Lacenaire, who stakes his own claim to Garance’s heart.  The romance is a catalyst allowing these disparate characters to be explored in one story.

Director Marcel Carné is known for his affinity with the working classes, and though Les Enfants du Paradis is about the theatre, it is also about the paying masses on who’s dreams and fantasies actors and writers live.  The cheap-ticket holding common folk are even affectionately referred to as ‘the gods’, as their laughs and gasps at whatever drama unfolds on stage is acknowledged as the theatre’s true lifeblood.  The balconies where these ‘gods’ are seated were referred to colloquially as ‘paradis’, hence the actors are their dependent offspring.

The Oscar nominated script by Jacques Prévert is a soul-searching, despairing treasure-trove of wit and humour, with dazzling dialogue full of memory-branding lines.  The soft, abstract-shadow filled cinematography is an interesting contrast to the razor-sharp imagery that is in fashion today, and Maurice Thiriet’s fabulously restored score is a frenzy of orchestral emotion.

Many will likely be daunted at the prospect of an old black and white French film that runs over three hours and takes place largely in the confines of a theatre setting, but anyone who gives it a half a chance is sure to have their hearts won over.  It is unashamedly melodramatic but uproariously entertaining, not to mention technically dazzling and even something of a miracle, given that it was shot during the years of France’s Nazi occupation.

The anguish filled finale is every bit as much a sledgehammer to the heart as those of better known dark classics like The Third Man and Brazil.  At one point a character muses “Audiences want something new... novelty, what does that mean?”  Les Enfants du Paradis could be that something for present day audiences, a rediscovered relic of cinema from another time and place.

Blu-ray & DVD extras: Theatre, Love and War: Making Les Enfants du Paradis, Once Upon a Time... Les Enfants du Paradis, The Restoration, The Restoration - Before and After, Trailer