Top Ten Christmas Films - By The Writer
1. It’s A Wonderful Life (1946)
Come on, what else was it going to be?! It may be as predictable as your uncle telling an off-colour joke at Christmas dinner, but It’s A Wonderful Life is quite simply the best Christmas film ever made, quite simply because it’s the only one that’s good at any time of year. Take out the Bedford Falls snow and Christmassy-setting of the final scenes and this is an evergreen tale of one man’s personal struggles - and a bloody depressing one it is too. Sure, you may remember Frank Capra’s classic for it’s ‘every time a bell rings an angel gets its wings’ mantra, but deep down this is really a dark, depressing tale of an ambitious young man finding the hopes and expectations of his youth battered into submission by the Dickins-esque spectre of real life. No wonder the poor guy wanted to kill himself. Thankfully, guardian angel Clarence swoops down to remind Jimmy Stewart’s George Bailey that it is indeed a wonderful life and creates a beautiful finale into the bargain. I once saw this on the big screen in a packed auditorium a few weeks before the big day. If you get the opportunity to do the same take it. It’s one of the best cinematic experiences I have ever enjoyed.
2. Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)
Here’s another film that’s not just for Christmas. It is also regularly viewed at Halloween. Indeed, one of the finest pleasures of my youth was in seeing just how badly ITV would bugger up the scheduling of Nightmare Before Christmas (I was a very lonely child). Halloween? Christmas? Morning? ‘Noon? Night? They never got it right of course (they are ITV, after all), but it’s really not too difficult to work out. Despite its ghoulish stars and ‘Created by Tim Burton’ credit (Henry Selick, we should remember, is the man who toiled in the director’s chair), this is really all about Christmas and its heartwarming magic, as witnessed in Danny Elfman’s magnificent song ‘What’s This?’. “There's children throwing snowballs, instead of throwing heads. They're busy building toys and absolutely no-one’s dead.” Is it just us or is this the most weirdly perfect description of Christmas ever?
3. How The Grinch Stole Christmas (1966)
Here’s the story that inspired Burton’s Nightmare. Dr Seuss’ How The Grinch Stole Christmas is, of course, a classic in book form. However, in taking it to the animated arena, Looney Tunes legend Chuck Jones added something extra to it. Extending it slightly to fit 25 minutes, he and Seuss managed to craft a sweet but not sentimental tale of a grumpy green ghoul who attempts to ruin Christmas for all the innocent Whos in Whoville. Of course, he sees that Christmas “can’t be bought in a store” and that “maybe it means a little bit more”, but it’s Jones animation that shines just as much as the message. The whitish-blue snow, the primary colours of Whoville and the marvellous scene where the Grinch’s mouth spreads and spreads and spreads into the world’s wildest villainous smile make this a true classic.
4. Gremlins (1984)
Does this count? It’s not strictly a Christmas film, and even if it were, it’d be a damn nasty one, but therein lies the charm of Joe Dante’s demonic inversion of Wonderful Life. This is the anti-Christmas film, in which a load of nasty beasties run riot, the nice boy doesn’t get to keep the cute little critter at the end and his charmingly mad next door neighbour appears to die (he doesn‘t, but he is run over by a gremlin in a snow plough). Yet, despite this, it’s still chock full of ingenious comedy which adds levity to the anarchy. See, for example, the Gremlin being chucked in blender, the Gremlins hanging out in the bar, drinking smoking and flashing, and the evil Mrs Deagle riding her malfunctioning stairmaster out the window…Okay, maybe they’re not quite jolly little slices of silly comedy, but everyone needs a bit of cynicism at Christmas…and Dante delivers it in spades.
5. Die Hard (1988)
The best action film ever made is also one of the best Christmas films ever made. Sure, it may only be tenuously set at Christmas and, considering the events take place in LA, it’s a fairly sunny Christmas. However, the whole point of Christmas is to conquer work/the traffic/irritating relatives to get to the people you love. The only difference for Bruce Willis’s John McClane (still his best performance) is that he must stop an evil German terrorist and his gang of Teutonic henchmen from blowing up Nakatomi Plaza before he can get to the woman he loves. Cue big explosions, flying limbs and swear words galore. Yipee-kay-yay motherfudger!
6. A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)
As someone who grew up mostly watching the 1980s Charlie Brown Specials I was shocked to see how dark and neurotic the character was back in the 60s. Sure, when I was a kid he was a bit depressed, but back when he first made the jump from Charles Schultz’s comic strip to moving animation, he and Snoopy made Scrooge look like a happy little camper and had the evil angry eyes and growly voices to prove it. So why is this one in here if its so depressing? Well, while it is quite sad, its message (Christmas is about more than flashy trees and presents) is spot on and frankly there’s something classic, almost Norman Rockwell-esque, about the animation that screams Christmas. Come on, what would the yuletide be without the Peanuts gang skating on a frozen lake as the snow falls?
7. The Muppet’s Christmas Carol (1992)
This was only the second Muppets feature film to be released after the death of Jim Henson and it‘s one of the best. Christmas Carol remakes are ten a penny at this time of year, but Brian Henson’s version stays surprisingly close to the source to make for bizarrely one of the most faithful adaptations of any book ever. As if that isn’t enough, you also have the fact one of the greatest stories ever told is being played out…by Muppets. Kermit takes on Bob Cratchit, the Marleys are, of course, Statler and Waldorf and Charlie Dickens himself is played by none other than Gonzo. He should be flattered.
8. The Apartment (1960)
You’re going to have to bear with me on this one. Billy Wilder’s masterpiece The Apartment isn’t strictly a Christmas film. It takes place over the festive season and it’s big finale happens on New Year’s Eve, but it’s not technically a Christmas film. So, why is it here? Because I’m the one writing this list and you’re not, so sod off. The Apartment is my favourite film of all time, boasting one of Jack Lemmon’s best performances as the down-and-out Bud Baxter and one of the most well-rounded screen romances in the shape of his infatuation with Shirely McLaine’s Fran Kubelick, an elevator girl at Bud’s office who tries to kill herself when her own relationship goes down the pan. Not very Christmassy, you may think, but then there’s that New Year’s finale. Hearing that Bud has done the right thing and told the bosses who rent his apartment to have extra-marital affairs to go hang, Fran goes to find him just as he’s about to leave town. Do they get together? I won’t ruin it for you, but the answer includes the finest closing line since Wilder’s Some Like It Hot, so check it out.
9. Scrooged (1998)
Christmas is great. Bill Murray is great. Christmas plus Bill Murray is simply magnificent. Scrooged is arguably one of the most under-rated Christmas films ever. Directed by Harold Ramis before he and Murray found a bit of critical respectability with Groundhog Day, it’s a bitter and cynical reworking A Christmas Carol with Murray installed in the Scrooge role, re-imagined here as a heartless TV executive. It doesn’t scrimp on the horror, with the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future really quite nasty. However, the heart is still very much there and, simply because its Murray, it’s probably one of the funniest Christmas films ever made even if, as The Editor told me a few weeks back, it does get slightly less amusing with each viewing.
10. Elf (2005)
Here’s another festive treat that doesn’t really get the respect it deserves. Will Ferrell is a fine comic talent, but his wide-eyed naivety and aptitude for slapstick has only really been exploited fully in this tale of an human who was raised as an elf and finds himself thrust out into the real world in a bid to find his real father. Former Swinger Jon Favraeu makes an impressive directorial debut, showing all the zest and vigour he would later display in the also-underrated Zathura and will hopefully bring to next summer’s Iron Man, while the Christmas Eve-set finale is a heart-warmingly sweet moment that never descends into sentimentality. And as Zooey Deschanel dressed up as an elf? Well, I know what I want to find in my stocking on Christmas morn...
Top Ten Christmas Albums - By The Editor
1. A Christmas Present For You From Phil Spector (1963)
Phil Spector made so many incredible records in his time as the best pop producer in the world, but the best album he ever made was this one, which is also the best Christmas album of all time by a distance. Ironically, it wasn't a success at the time, with festive spirit rather sapped by it being released on the day of JFK's assassination, but it's grown in popularity ever since, and with so many definitive versions of Christmas classics by the likes of The Crystals and The Ronettes as well as the awesome Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) by Darlene Love, this is the best present anyone's ever given us.
2. A Charlie Brown Christmas - Vince Guaraldi (1965)
The Writer quite rightly cited the first Peanuts cartoon as one of the best Christmas films of all time, and the soundtrack from it is just as great. Vince Guaraldi's piano jazz music became synonymous with the Peanuts cartoons down the years and his Linus and Lucy theme is instantly recognisable, but the rest of the music here is just wonderful and smooth Christmas music. The opening song of the show, Christmastime Is Here is delightful and so are all of the tunes here that aren't even in the TV special (after all, this album is longer than that was)...
3. The McGarrigle Christmas Hour - Kate & Anna McGarrigle (2005)
The McGarrigle Hour was a landmark album for the Canadian folk sister act, bringing in their family and friends for an album that sounded like the best party you never got invited to, so it was only fitting that they should repeat the formula for a Christmas record. With family like Rufus and Martha Wainwright and friends like Teddy Thompson and Emmylou Harris, it's not difficult to see why this is such an awesome record, and the mixture of old Christmas tunes, new Christmas tunes and the vast array of talent make this a Christmas album for people who don't want to listen to Slade.
4. Barenaked For The Holidays - Barenaked Ladies (2004)
Not ones to just cash in on the festive spirit, Barenaked Ladies give value for money on their Christmas album with a collection of carols (all delivered in their trademark jokey way), festive favourites and original tracks. Being polite Canadian types, they also through in a few Hanukkah songs as well and it all makes for an album that is fun and intelligent and while at times it can get a little irritating, the positives outweight the negatives.
5. Songs for Christmas - Sufjan Stevens (2006)
When you get a Sufjan Stevens album, you know that you're going to get a lot for your money and you also know that it's going to take a while to really get into because it's so long. Clocking in at over two hours of material, Songs For Christmas is actually a compilation for a few different festive EPs recorded between 2001 and 2006, and features all the usual songs plus a whole load of original songs. It doesn't all work, but it's certainly the best album you can get for that indie kid.
6. Dig That Crazy Christmas - The Brian Setzer Orchestra (2005)
His second collection of Christmas tunes in three years, this is probably the best of Setzer's holiday albums, mainly because of the song choices. Jingle Bell Rock, Zat You Santa Claus? and Cool Yule all benefit from his big-band-meets-surf-rock style of music, while originals like Santa Drives A Hot Rod make this a very cool and very fun alternative at Christmas.
7. The Beach Boys' Christmas Album - The Beach Boys (1964)
A rather rushed cash-in album, this doesn't come close to standing up to the kind of music that the Beach Boys were making at this time,but there's enough great stuff here to make it worthwhile. The best part is the first half, with original tracks like Little Saint Nick, Santa's Beard and Merry Christmas Baby all having that Brian Wilson magic, and while the second half - arranged by Dick Reynolds and featuring carols and Xmas favourites - is a bit dreary, it's still a decent album altogether.
8. One More Drifter in the Snow - Aimee Mann (2006)
Aimee Mann and Christmas shouldn't really go together, but somehow this works. Perhaps it's because she was inspired to make it by A Charlie Brown Christmas, or perhaps it's just the sheer wonder of hearing her and Grant Lee Phillips sing You're A Mean One, Mr Grinch. But whatever it is, One More Drifter In The Snow manages to tread the line between depressing Christmas and merry Christmas well and with plenty of class.
9. Winter Carols - Blackmore's Night (2006)
Those who haven't heard Blackmore's Night before might be rather surprised if they get Winter Carols on the basis of Ritchie Blackmore's work with Deep Purple and Rainbow, because this is a world away from those rock bands. This group is basically a Rennaissance folk group (seriously) with Blackmore on acoustic guitar and Candice Night (get it?) on vocals. However, this works perfectly for a collection of carols and a couple of original tracks, as the music sounds like what Christmas music was before Wizzard or even Bing Crosby were around. Lord Of The Dance is never a good thing, but there's plenty of other good stuff to make up for it.
10. A Christmas Together - John Denver & The Muppets (1979)
I've changed this one since we posted the blog, mainly because A Christmas Together appeared on my iPod's shuffling about ten minutes later and reminded me why it should be in the list. It's from a TV special by country legend Denver and those crazy Muppets, where they sing a bunch of Christmas tunes together, making for a real contrast between his sweet vocals and some of the more 'colourful' singing voices of the various characters. Musically, it's sublime and the presence of the Muppets helps cut through the treacle to make it an album with heart and a sense of fun. Sorry Jethro Tull...
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Friday, November 23, 2007
WATCHING, READING AND LISTENING TO
THE EDITOR
WATCHING: I don't go to the cinema often, but I've not seen many films this year better than Into The Wild. Sure, Chris McCandless was selfish, cocky and reckless, but his journey and eventual fatal stay in the Alaskan wilderness still makes for a haunting tale and it's very well told by Sean Penn, who stays remarkably faithful to the book (which I've since started reading). The cinematography is sublime throughout, with stunning scenery as Chris wanders around the fringes of American life, and Eddie Vedder's soundtrack is good on its own and awesome in the context of the film. Penn rightly realised that the true tragedy of this story comes from the people that Chris meets, charms and then walks away from, not least the poor old man (played with class by Hal Holbrook) whose heart is clearly breaking when he has to say his goodbyes. A gorgeous road movie that cuts deep and leaves a mark.
READING: Like I said, I've been tearing through the Into The Wild book, written by journalist Jon Krakauer in 1996, inspired by an article he wrote about McCandless. It's a great book, particularly as it fills in all the gaps around what you see in the film and sticks to the hard facts of what we can know about what happened, while obviously some of the film is fictionalised, not least the parts where he is in Alaska on his own. When I finish that, it'll be back to Anna Karenina, appropriately as Tolstoy was one the authors who inspired McCandless' adventures. Then when I finish that, it'll be back to Wild Swans by Jung Chang. Only three books on the go at the moment then...
LISTENING TO: Erm, Into The Wild! Seriously though, the soundtrack has taken on a whole new depth since seeing the film, and all the short songs that didn't make much impact on their own have suddenly developed a real spine-tingling quality. Good work Vedder! As well as that, I've been listening to lots of very good albums from 2007 to start trying to finalise my Top 20 lists. Some albums haven't sounded as good as I first thought they were, and have fallen down or out of the list, while some have shot up the rankings. And I think we have a winner, unless something special comes out in the next few weeks...
THE WRITER
WATCHING: Frankly, it's not been a great week for films. I've only watched two flicks this week and both have been pretty rotten. Firstly, I watched High School High, a John Lovitz-starring Dangerous Minds parody whose jokes were so lame it came off as more of a bad drama than a good comedy. The second film I watched was Cannonball Run, which was marginally better, but did feature Burt Reynolds at his most irritating and Roger Moore parodying his James Bond, which is quite an achievement really seeing as his Bond was a parody anyway. Meanwhile, on a random point, I saw that Coca Cola ad with the people chanting 'Holidays are coming' that hasn't been showed for the past few years, but appears to have made a comeback. Evil company, great advert.
READING: I'm back on the Bonds. Earlier in the year, I embarked upon a literary James Bond marathon by reading some of Ian Fleming's original novels. They're all really enjoyable reads (especially Moonraker, which only make the unrecognisable film 'adaptation' even more unforgivable), but I struggled to get through Diamonds Are Forever and have only just returned to it. It's widely regarded as one of the weaker 007 books, and it's not hard to see why, with its slow-moving plot and un-engaging villains. Still, in emotionally scarred Bond girl Tiffany Case, Fleming has created a rich, grounded femme fatale who would fit well in the Casino Royale sequel.
LISTENING TO: Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack. I've never been quite as convinced by Danny Elfman's score writing talents as most other people are. He‘s certainly very talented, but his work has a trademark to it that makes it sound fairly uniform and, despite my enjoyment of both scores, its sometimes difficult to differentiate his work on the Batman and Spider-Man films. Having recently listened to the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack, though, I am now well and truly in the Elfman camp. This is a rich, textured score that is not only good enough to be ranked up there with any of the truly great musical soundtracks, but also displays his sadly unexplored talent with lyrics. What's This perfectly describes the childlike wonder of Christmas and This Is Halloween has the phrase 'tender lumplings' in it. No real analysis to add to that, I just think it's a phrase that should come in to more common usage.
THE EDITOR
WATCHING: I don't go to the cinema often, but I've not seen many films this year better than Into The Wild. Sure, Chris McCandless was selfish, cocky and reckless, but his journey and eventual fatal stay in the Alaskan wilderness still makes for a haunting tale and it's very well told by Sean Penn, who stays remarkably faithful to the book (which I've since started reading). The cinematography is sublime throughout, with stunning scenery as Chris wanders around the fringes of American life, and Eddie Vedder's soundtrack is good on its own and awesome in the context of the film. Penn rightly realised that the true tragedy of this story comes from the people that Chris meets, charms and then walks away from, not least the poor old man (played with class by Hal Holbrook) whose heart is clearly breaking when he has to say his goodbyes. A gorgeous road movie that cuts deep and leaves a mark.
READING: Like I said, I've been tearing through the Into The Wild book, written by journalist Jon Krakauer in 1996, inspired by an article he wrote about McCandless. It's a great book, particularly as it fills in all the gaps around what you see in the film and sticks to the hard facts of what we can know about what happened, while obviously some of the film is fictionalised, not least the parts where he is in Alaska on his own. When I finish that, it'll be back to Anna Karenina, appropriately as Tolstoy was one the authors who inspired McCandless' adventures. Then when I finish that, it'll be back to Wild Swans by Jung Chang. Only three books on the go at the moment then...
LISTENING TO: Erm, Into The Wild! Seriously though, the soundtrack has taken on a whole new depth since seeing the film, and all the short songs that didn't make much impact on their own have suddenly developed a real spine-tingling quality. Good work Vedder! As well as that, I've been listening to lots of very good albums from 2007 to start trying to finalise my Top 20 lists. Some albums haven't sounded as good as I first thought they were, and have fallen down or out of the list, while some have shot up the rankings. And I think we have a winner, unless something special comes out in the next few weeks...
THE WRITER
WATCHING: Frankly, it's not been a great week for films. I've only watched two flicks this week and both have been pretty rotten. Firstly, I watched High School High, a John Lovitz-starring Dangerous Minds parody whose jokes were so lame it came off as more of a bad drama than a good comedy. The second film I watched was Cannonball Run, which was marginally better, but did feature Burt Reynolds at his most irritating and Roger Moore parodying his James Bond, which is quite an achievement really seeing as his Bond was a parody anyway. Meanwhile, on a random point, I saw that Coca Cola ad with the people chanting 'Holidays are coming' that hasn't been showed for the past few years, but appears to have made a comeback. Evil company, great advert.
READING: I'm back on the Bonds. Earlier in the year, I embarked upon a literary James Bond marathon by reading some of Ian Fleming's original novels. They're all really enjoyable reads (especially Moonraker, which only make the unrecognisable film 'adaptation' even more unforgivable), but I struggled to get through Diamonds Are Forever and have only just returned to it. It's widely regarded as one of the weaker 007 books, and it's not hard to see why, with its slow-moving plot and un-engaging villains. Still, in emotionally scarred Bond girl Tiffany Case, Fleming has created a rich, grounded femme fatale who would fit well in the Casino Royale sequel.
LISTENING TO: Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack. I've never been quite as convinced by Danny Elfman's score writing talents as most other people are. He‘s certainly very talented, but his work has a trademark to it that makes it sound fairly uniform and, despite my enjoyment of both scores, its sometimes difficult to differentiate his work on the Batman and Spider-Man films. Having recently listened to the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack, though, I am now well and truly in the Elfman camp. This is a rich, textured score that is not only good enough to be ranked up there with any of the truly great musical soundtracks, but also displays his sadly unexplored talent with lyrics. What's This perfectly describes the childlike wonder of Christmas and This Is Halloween has the phrase 'tender lumplings' in it. No real analysis to add to that, I just think it's a phrase that should come in to more common usage.
Tuesday, November 06, 2007
WATCHING, READING AND LISTENING TO
THE EDITOR
WATCHING: Since last time, The Sopranos has come to an end on E4 and I'm still really digesting THAT ending (I won't spoil it here for anyone who is waiting for C4) and deciding whether it was the best thing ever or the worst thing ever. And indeed, what actually happened. But one thing for sure is that the show itself was awesome from start to finish, though I'm resisting the temptation to watch it from the start on More4 in the hope that someone will buy me the DVD box-set for Christmas and I can watch at my own pace. It's certainly the kind of programme that deserves much closer attention than you can pay to it over the course of six series in eight years. The plot-lines and characterisation are so intricate that I'm sure there's going to be loads that I missed first time around.
READING: As I had a week away recently I managed to read Michael Palin's Diaries: The Python Years, which much more interesting than reading one man's diaries from ten years of his life might sound. For one thing, it runs from 1969 when the Pythons were starting out, to 1979 when they had made Life Of Brian and were very famous and important and coming to the end of their work as a team. It's very interesting to read about the inner workings of it all and while Palin is as fair-minded as you'd expect from him, there's still some snide digs at Eric Idle and John Cleese to keep things ticking over nicely. Through in all of his trips to work on Saturday Night Live and all the famous and talented people he meets, and you've got a great antidote to the blog culture (yes, this is being written in a blog, so what?) of mediocre people writing about their mundane daily lives...
LISTENING TO: A bit of a hangover from WATCHING, but having seen the original Godzilla (Gojira if like) at the weekend, I bought off iTunes a compilation soundtrack of music from the Godzilla films between 1954 and 1975. With around 40 tracks, I did worry that it might be a bit repetitive, with lots of uses of the main theme, but instead it was quite the opposite, with Akira Ifukube using all kinds of different music for the various films in the series, making it very fun listening throughout. The only pity is that I now want to rent the rest of the films and virtually none of them are out on region 2 DVD. Sort it out someone, there's so much tripe out there on DVD that surely no-one ever watches, so why can't these be released?
THE WRITER
WATCHING: The last thing I saw at the cinema was In the Shadow of the Moon, a majestic documentary about the Apollo moon missions of the late 60s and 70s that pays fitting tribute to the men involved without descending into the overbearing patriotism or trite spiritualism that might have been expected. On TV, I’m currently enjoying Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman’s travel chronicle Long Way Down, which occasionally becomes a little too laddish but remains an engagingly intelligent watch. And on DVD I’m working my way through the magnificent third season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Which leads us nicely onto…
READING: Buffy Season 8. I had put off buying this official comic book continuation of the Buffy story until recently because I wasn’t too keen on the team of potential slayers that emerged at the end of season seven or the idea of them now being a sort of military organisation scattered across the world. However, just seven issues in, this is shaping up to be one of the finest seasons in the series’ history. The military idea is working surprisingly well, the various slayers are all getting enough page time to give them all individual personalities, and, best of all, the Scooby Gang has been reunited. Seeing Buffy, Willow and Xander together again for the first time since 2003 is one of my highlights of the year so far.
LISTENING TO: Amid all the hype over the download-only release, I struggled to get to grips with Radiohead’s In Rainbows on the first few listens. While I enjoyed it, it seemed to lack the stand out songs of their other albums. However, after a few weeks of solid listens, it emerges as one of their finest records, arguably challenging OK Computer and The Bends for all-time classic status. Bodysnatchers finds them rocking out in a way they haven’t done since National Anthem. Nude and Videotape are haunting little pieces filled with the band’s usual melancholia. And All I Need builds to the kind of ethereal crescendo of noise that only Radiohead can pull off. All in all, it’s a classic and I can’t wait for my discbox thingy to arrive next month.
THE EDITOR
WATCHING: Since last time, The Sopranos has come to an end on E4 and I'm still really digesting THAT ending (I won't spoil it here for anyone who is waiting for C4) and deciding whether it was the best thing ever or the worst thing ever. And indeed, what actually happened. But one thing for sure is that the show itself was awesome from start to finish, though I'm resisting the temptation to watch it from the start on More4 in the hope that someone will buy me the DVD box-set for Christmas and I can watch at my own pace. It's certainly the kind of programme that deserves much closer attention than you can pay to it over the course of six series in eight years. The plot-lines and characterisation are so intricate that I'm sure there's going to be loads that I missed first time around.
READING: As I had a week away recently I managed to read Michael Palin's Diaries: The Python Years, which much more interesting than reading one man's diaries from ten years of his life might sound. For one thing, it runs from 1969 when the Pythons were starting out, to 1979 when they had made Life Of Brian and were very famous and important and coming to the end of their work as a team. It's very interesting to read about the inner workings of it all and while Palin is as fair-minded as you'd expect from him, there's still some snide digs at Eric Idle and John Cleese to keep things ticking over nicely. Through in all of his trips to work on Saturday Night Live and all the famous and talented people he meets, and you've got a great antidote to the blog culture (yes, this is being written in a blog, so what?) of mediocre people writing about their mundane daily lives...
LISTENING TO: A bit of a hangover from WATCHING, but having seen the original Godzilla (Gojira if like) at the weekend, I bought off iTunes a compilation soundtrack of music from the Godzilla films between 1954 and 1975. With around 40 tracks, I did worry that it might be a bit repetitive, with lots of uses of the main theme, but instead it was quite the opposite, with Akira Ifukube using all kinds of different music for the various films in the series, making it very fun listening throughout. The only pity is that I now want to rent the rest of the films and virtually none of them are out on region 2 DVD. Sort it out someone, there's so much tripe out there on DVD that surely no-one ever watches, so why can't these be released?
THE WRITER
WATCHING: The last thing I saw at the cinema was In the Shadow of the Moon, a majestic documentary about the Apollo moon missions of the late 60s and 70s that pays fitting tribute to the men involved without descending into the overbearing patriotism or trite spiritualism that might have been expected. On TV, I’m currently enjoying Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman’s travel chronicle Long Way Down, which occasionally becomes a little too laddish but remains an engagingly intelligent watch. And on DVD I’m working my way through the magnificent third season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Which leads us nicely onto…
READING: Buffy Season 8. I had put off buying this official comic book continuation of the Buffy story until recently because I wasn’t too keen on the team of potential slayers that emerged at the end of season seven or the idea of them now being a sort of military organisation scattered across the world. However, just seven issues in, this is shaping up to be one of the finest seasons in the series’ history. The military idea is working surprisingly well, the various slayers are all getting enough page time to give them all individual personalities, and, best of all, the Scooby Gang has been reunited. Seeing Buffy, Willow and Xander together again for the first time since 2003 is one of my highlights of the year so far.
LISTENING TO: Amid all the hype over the download-only release, I struggled to get to grips with Radiohead’s In Rainbows on the first few listens. While I enjoyed it, it seemed to lack the stand out songs of their other albums. However, after a few weeks of solid listens, it emerges as one of their finest records, arguably challenging OK Computer and The Bends for all-time classic status. Bodysnatchers finds them rocking out in a way they haven’t done since National Anthem. Nude and Videotape are haunting little pieces filled with the band’s usual melancholia. And All I Need builds to the kind of ethereal crescendo of noise that only Radiohead can pull off. All in all, it’s a classic and I can’t wait for my discbox thingy to arrive next month.
Friday, November 02, 2007
Top Ten... Alternative 90s
Concluding our (mini) series of Top Tens, we're looking over the alternative classic of the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s. So, what do we mean by alternative? Well, alternative, for the purposes of these entries, means anything that is critically derided, overlooked by the public or just generally under-rated. Ultimately, though, it all comes down to how we argue it, so if you disagree, let us know!
FILMS - By The Writer
1. A Simple Plan (1998)
Sam Raimi may be best known for his Evil Dead and Spider-Man trilogies, but his finest film is this low-key drama from 1998. Starring Bill Paxton as a man who finds his senses of morality and loyalty challenged when he stumbles across thousands of dollars hidden in a downed aeroplane, A Simple Plan is a mini-masterpiece of a film that was nonetheless ignored upon release because its snowy landscapes and crime-oriented story were similar to the earlier Fargo. But while the Coens’ film was a blackly comic one that ultimately left you with a feeling of warmth, this is a dark exploration of the evil that men can do in the pursuit of money and power.
2. That Thing You Do (1995)
Tom Hanks is already one of America’s best-loved actors, but if this directorial debut is anything to go by he could well become one of its best-loved personalities behind the camera too. Telling the story of fictional 60s pop group The Wonders, That Thing You Do is a snappy tale of love and fame that’s sweet and nostalgic without being sentimental or cheesy. Liv Tyler and Tom Everett Scott give great performances, but its Hanks' zipping direction (and his surprising talent for writing a toe-tapping pop song) that makes this trip into nostalgic pop culture really fly.
3. Romeo + Juliet (1997)
From the plus sign of the title to the use of guns instead of swords, Baz Luhrmann's modern-day adaptation of William Shakespeare's timeless play was attacked on release for not paying enough respect to the much-loved original text. If anything though it's actually more in tune with the Bard’s work than Franco Zeffirelli’s more-lauded 1968 version. By communicating in the modern language of guns, pop music and the media, Luhrmann heightened the feelings of lust, revenge and violence that the play revolves around, and in doing so returned the passion to a timeless piece of work that had become twee through decades of rubbish school productions.
4. Alien 3 (1992)
Following on from Alien and Aliens is difficult enough already, but doing so with the interference of producers and a script made up of fragments from several earlier drafts just makes the creative process even trickier. Yet that was exactly what David Fincher had to put up with while making Alien 3 and, predictably enough, the results are messy. Still, there's enough here to show just how impressive a director Fincher would go on to be, from the dark religious subtext to the stunning set design and cinematography. The new, non-Fincher-endorsed, cut on the Alien Quadrilogy DVD set promised much but delivered little, meaning this is likely to be a flawed masterpiece that will remain under-appreciated for many more years to come.
5. Hard Eight (1996)
Here's another debut film wracked with production problems. Or rather, one big one. Paul Thomas Anderson's first feature, a low key story of a down on his luck gambler played by John C. Reilly, was originally going to be called Sidney, after the father figure Reilly's character finds in Vegas. Then the studio got involved and re-branded it the far less meaningful (and vaguely pornographic-sounding) Hard Eight. Controversy or no though, this is a sterling debut that features some wonderful performances from Samuel L Jackson and Gwyneth Paltrow and shows all Anderson's usual themes in their embryonic stages.
6. Meeting People Is Easy (1998)
Grant Gee's OK Computer era Radiohead rock documentary is remarkable for two reasons. First, the band are notoriously shy around the media and the idea of Thom Yorke and co allowing a camera crew to record the making of In Rainbows or any future albums is almost unthinkable. Secondly, and most importantly, it's not really a typical rock documentary. We see very little of the band performing, with Gee instead choosing to show how the worldwide success of OK Computer affected the band personally. Throw in some rare glimpses of the band working in the studio and snippets of still-unfinished songs (the biting Big Boots among them) and you have a fascinating insight into the defining band of the 90s.
7. Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990)
Joe Dante is one of the least appreciated directors of the 80s and 90s and Gremlins 2 is one of his least appreciated films. Sure it's not as good as the original and sure it just becomes a procession of gags about half-way through, but who cares? This is all about Gizmo acting cute and his gremlin siblings tearing stuff up, which they do very well indeed. Throw in endless film references, Tony Randall voicing the sophisticated Brain gremlin and a closing rendition of New York, New York that’s arguably the finest musical sequence ever committed to celluloid and you have an hour and a half of raucous Dante entertainment.
8. Heavenly Creatures (1994)
Like Sam Raimi, Peter Jackson is best known for his work in the fantasy and horror genres. And, just as Raimi did, he also directed a stunning drama in the mid-90s that proved him more than just a one-trick pony. Heavenly Creatures is based upon the Parker-Hulme murders of 1954 in which two young girls’ friendship grew to such an intense state that they plotted murder when their parents tried to separate them. It’s dreamily shot and sensitively written, making for a unique piece of filmmaking that bodes well for Jackson's return to drama: next year's adaptation of Alice Sebold's novel The Lovely Bones.
9. Pi (1998)
Darren Aronofsky attracted massive critical acclaim for his 2000 adaptation of Hubert Selby Jnr's novel Requiem for a Dream. But it's his self-written debut Pi that is arguably the better film. Shot in striking black and white, it’s the story of a maths whizz whose calculations land him in hot water with Wall Street and some Jewish zealots who believe he can bring them closer to their god. Sean Gullette gives a stunning turn, while Clint Mansell, in his first slice of soundtrack work, creates a haunting score. However, it's Aronofsky who shines the brightest here, making a big impact in his first attempt as so many others on this list did.
10. The Iron Giant (1999)
Brad Bird is once again wowing audiences at the moment with the amazing Ratatouille, so it’s as good a time as any to revisit this, his debut feature. Stunningly rendered in 2D animation at a time when everyone was busting their pixels for CGI, The Iron Giant is a faithful adaptation of Ted Hughes' short story The Iron Man that remains one of the best and most under-appreciated animated films of the decade.
ALBUMS - By The Editor
1. The Crocketts - We May Be Skinny And Wirey (1998)
I'm showing my age with my choices, which are all from within three years of 90s rock music (basically when I was first really getting into music and everything was the best thing ever). The Crocketts' debut album still stands out from pretty much anything else with its mixture of angry folky rock music and some beautiful and memorable guitar-playing on the slower tunes. Singer Davey is still around with The Crimea, but he's never quite lived up to the awesome potential of this album.
2. Baby Chaos - Love Your Self Abuse (1996)
One of the common themes of this list is that most of these bands aren't around anymore, with Scottish pop-rockers Baby Chaos having turned into the less infectiously-wonderful (but still pretty good) Deckard. Debut album Safe Sex, Designer Drugs And The Death Of Rock 'n' Roll was fantastic, but the follow-up was even better, particularly singles like Hello and Ignoramus. They were sometimes called Baby Wildhearts for their use of crunching guitars and soaring melodies, but that's no bad thing when it's done as well as this.
3. Joyrider - Be Special (1996)
They appeared from Northern Ireland at about the same time as Ash, and had just as many catchy pop rock tunes, like All Gone Away, Vegetable Animal Mineral and their cover of cheesy 80s hit Rush Hour, but for some reason Joyrider were left behind. Every track on here is great, from the fast ones like Fabulae to the slower ones like That Tired, but like so many fantastic bands, Joyrider missed the bus to superstardom and ended up getting the one to obscurity instead.
4. Silver Sun - Silver Sun (1997)
One of the few on here to be still going, Silver Sun did disappear for a while, but reemerged a couple of years ago and have released a couple of albums since then. Obviously none of them have done very well, but at least they are still around, because their Beach Boys-esque harmonies and incredibly catchy power pop songs are well worth hearing. Their debut album was a classic, with singles like Golden Skin, Julia, Far Out, Last Day and the icky sexual exploits of Lava. Quite how it wasn't the biggest album of all time, god only knows.
5. Brad - Interiors (1997)
Like many people no doubt, I first got into Brad through their guitarist Stone Gossard, of Pearl Jam, but the real appeal of them is vocalist Shawn Smith. They are a side project at best of course, with Smith also recording with Pigeonhed, Satchel and as a solo artist, but Interiors ranks up there with the best that any of them have recorded. Smith's soulful voice shines through on tracks like The Day Brings and some darker material like Funeral Song and Some Never Come Home, and Interiors is one of the best albums to come out of Seattle since grunge's heyday.
6. Bullyrag - Songs Of Praise (1998)
Quite probably the most un-Beatles like rock band to have ever emerged from Liverpool, Bullyrag were possibly also a bit too different to fit into any convenient box, which is why they were mostly ignored. Kerrang! tried calling them 'raggametalpunkfunk' for their mixture of all those genres, and even included singer Robbie Awork in their Top 100 Coolest Rock Stars list, but despite awesome ragga-rock tracks like Jump Up In A Fashion, Frantic and Learn To Live, they never really made it big.
7. Kerbdog - On The Turn (1998)
Having a lead singer with a name as cool as Cormac Battle and songs as heavy and memorable as Sally, JJ's Song, Severed, Pledge and On The Turn should have been enough to catapult these Irish lads into the kind of league that the likes of Foo Fighters and Silverchair occupied at the time, but for some reason they were pretty much ignored by the British rock press in favour of 'the next big thing'. They turned into the poppier (but still very good) Wilt, but still got ignored.
8. Groop Dogdrill - Half Nelson (1998)
Sometimes impulse purchases are the best ones and sometimes you can judge a book (or a single) by its cover. Finding their single Gracelands looking cool as hell in my local Omega Music for 50p, I decided to check it out and was rewarded. A real rock 'n' roll swagger, with oil-slicked hair and the constant threat of physical violence, Groop Dogdrill were the best thing to come out of Yorkshire, with lots of film references in tracks like Oily Rag.
9. Shelter - Mantra (1995)
Not many rock albums start off with some Krisna chanting, but not make rock bands were like Shelter. A New York 'krishnacore' band who mingled their spirituality with a straight edge ethos and hardcore rock music, Shelter were much more fun than that sounds, and Mantra was a very catchy album indeed. Not only were the songs great, but the message in all of them was too, which certainly helps convince your mum to put the tape on in the car despite the heavy guitars...
10. Veruca Salt - Eight Arms To Hold You (1997)
One of the all-time greatest music videos was Veruca Salt's Volcano Girls. Rock girls plus guitars plus bungee cords = awesomeness! What? They should be naked too? Tsk... Anyway, Veruca Salt were a great American alternative rock band with two great female singers Louise Post and Nina Gordon. Cracking rock songs, great pop songs and the knowledge that they were already starting to hate each other and ended up splitting up not so long after this. Post still carries on with the Veruca Salt name, but with the magic partnership with Gordon, there's not the same kind of thrill.
Concluding our (mini) series of Top Tens, we're looking over the alternative classic of the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s. So, what do we mean by alternative? Well, alternative, for the purposes of these entries, means anything that is critically derided, overlooked by the public or just generally under-rated. Ultimately, though, it all comes down to how we argue it, so if you disagree, let us know!
FILMS - By The Writer
1. A Simple Plan (1998)
Sam Raimi may be best known for his Evil Dead and Spider-Man trilogies, but his finest film is this low-key drama from 1998. Starring Bill Paxton as a man who finds his senses of morality and loyalty challenged when he stumbles across thousands of dollars hidden in a downed aeroplane, A Simple Plan is a mini-masterpiece of a film that was nonetheless ignored upon release because its snowy landscapes and crime-oriented story were similar to the earlier Fargo. But while the Coens’ film was a blackly comic one that ultimately left you with a feeling of warmth, this is a dark exploration of the evil that men can do in the pursuit of money and power.
2. That Thing You Do (1995)
Tom Hanks is already one of America’s best-loved actors, but if this directorial debut is anything to go by he could well become one of its best-loved personalities behind the camera too. Telling the story of fictional 60s pop group The Wonders, That Thing You Do is a snappy tale of love and fame that’s sweet and nostalgic without being sentimental or cheesy. Liv Tyler and Tom Everett Scott give great performances, but its Hanks' zipping direction (and his surprising talent for writing a toe-tapping pop song) that makes this trip into nostalgic pop culture really fly.
3. Romeo + Juliet (1997)
From the plus sign of the title to the use of guns instead of swords, Baz Luhrmann's modern-day adaptation of William Shakespeare's timeless play was attacked on release for not paying enough respect to the much-loved original text. If anything though it's actually more in tune with the Bard’s work than Franco Zeffirelli’s more-lauded 1968 version. By communicating in the modern language of guns, pop music and the media, Luhrmann heightened the feelings of lust, revenge and violence that the play revolves around, and in doing so returned the passion to a timeless piece of work that had become twee through decades of rubbish school productions.
4. Alien 3 (1992)
Following on from Alien and Aliens is difficult enough already, but doing so with the interference of producers and a script made up of fragments from several earlier drafts just makes the creative process even trickier. Yet that was exactly what David Fincher had to put up with while making Alien 3 and, predictably enough, the results are messy. Still, there's enough here to show just how impressive a director Fincher would go on to be, from the dark religious subtext to the stunning set design and cinematography. The new, non-Fincher-endorsed, cut on the Alien Quadrilogy DVD set promised much but delivered little, meaning this is likely to be a flawed masterpiece that will remain under-appreciated for many more years to come.
5. Hard Eight (1996)
Here's another debut film wracked with production problems. Or rather, one big one. Paul Thomas Anderson's first feature, a low key story of a down on his luck gambler played by John C. Reilly, was originally going to be called Sidney, after the father figure Reilly's character finds in Vegas. Then the studio got involved and re-branded it the far less meaningful (and vaguely pornographic-sounding) Hard Eight. Controversy or no though, this is a sterling debut that features some wonderful performances from Samuel L Jackson and Gwyneth Paltrow and shows all Anderson's usual themes in their embryonic stages.
6. Meeting People Is Easy (1998)
Grant Gee's OK Computer era Radiohead rock documentary is remarkable for two reasons. First, the band are notoriously shy around the media and the idea of Thom Yorke and co allowing a camera crew to record the making of In Rainbows or any future albums is almost unthinkable. Secondly, and most importantly, it's not really a typical rock documentary. We see very little of the band performing, with Gee instead choosing to show how the worldwide success of OK Computer affected the band personally. Throw in some rare glimpses of the band working in the studio and snippets of still-unfinished songs (the biting Big Boots among them) and you have a fascinating insight into the defining band of the 90s.
7. Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990)
Joe Dante is one of the least appreciated directors of the 80s and 90s and Gremlins 2 is one of his least appreciated films. Sure it's not as good as the original and sure it just becomes a procession of gags about half-way through, but who cares? This is all about Gizmo acting cute and his gremlin siblings tearing stuff up, which they do very well indeed. Throw in endless film references, Tony Randall voicing the sophisticated Brain gremlin and a closing rendition of New York, New York that’s arguably the finest musical sequence ever committed to celluloid and you have an hour and a half of raucous Dante entertainment.
8. Heavenly Creatures (1994)
Like Sam Raimi, Peter Jackson is best known for his work in the fantasy and horror genres. And, just as Raimi did, he also directed a stunning drama in the mid-90s that proved him more than just a one-trick pony. Heavenly Creatures is based upon the Parker-Hulme murders of 1954 in which two young girls’ friendship grew to such an intense state that they plotted murder when their parents tried to separate them. It’s dreamily shot and sensitively written, making for a unique piece of filmmaking that bodes well for Jackson's return to drama: next year's adaptation of Alice Sebold's novel The Lovely Bones.
9. Pi (1998)
Darren Aronofsky attracted massive critical acclaim for his 2000 adaptation of Hubert Selby Jnr's novel Requiem for a Dream. But it's his self-written debut Pi that is arguably the better film. Shot in striking black and white, it’s the story of a maths whizz whose calculations land him in hot water with Wall Street and some Jewish zealots who believe he can bring them closer to their god. Sean Gullette gives a stunning turn, while Clint Mansell, in his first slice of soundtrack work, creates a haunting score. However, it's Aronofsky who shines the brightest here, making a big impact in his first attempt as so many others on this list did.
10. The Iron Giant (1999)
Brad Bird is once again wowing audiences at the moment with the amazing Ratatouille, so it’s as good a time as any to revisit this, his debut feature. Stunningly rendered in 2D animation at a time when everyone was busting their pixels for CGI, The Iron Giant is a faithful adaptation of Ted Hughes' short story The Iron Man that remains one of the best and most under-appreciated animated films of the decade.
ALBUMS - By The Editor
1. The Crocketts - We May Be Skinny And Wirey (1998)
I'm showing my age with my choices, which are all from within three years of 90s rock music (basically when I was first really getting into music and everything was the best thing ever). The Crocketts' debut album still stands out from pretty much anything else with its mixture of angry folky rock music and some beautiful and memorable guitar-playing on the slower tunes. Singer Davey is still around with The Crimea, but he's never quite lived up to the awesome potential of this album.
2. Baby Chaos - Love Your Self Abuse (1996)
One of the common themes of this list is that most of these bands aren't around anymore, with Scottish pop-rockers Baby Chaos having turned into the less infectiously-wonderful (but still pretty good) Deckard. Debut album Safe Sex, Designer Drugs And The Death Of Rock 'n' Roll was fantastic, but the follow-up was even better, particularly singles like Hello and Ignoramus. They were sometimes called Baby Wildhearts for their use of crunching guitars and soaring melodies, but that's no bad thing when it's done as well as this.
3. Joyrider - Be Special (1996)
They appeared from Northern Ireland at about the same time as Ash, and had just as many catchy pop rock tunes, like All Gone Away, Vegetable Animal Mineral and their cover of cheesy 80s hit Rush Hour, but for some reason Joyrider were left behind. Every track on here is great, from the fast ones like Fabulae to the slower ones like That Tired, but like so many fantastic bands, Joyrider missed the bus to superstardom and ended up getting the one to obscurity instead.
4. Silver Sun - Silver Sun (1997)
One of the few on here to be still going, Silver Sun did disappear for a while, but reemerged a couple of years ago and have released a couple of albums since then. Obviously none of them have done very well, but at least they are still around, because their Beach Boys-esque harmonies and incredibly catchy power pop songs are well worth hearing. Their debut album was a classic, with singles like Golden Skin, Julia, Far Out, Last Day and the icky sexual exploits of Lava. Quite how it wasn't the biggest album of all time, god only knows.
5. Brad - Interiors (1997)
Like many people no doubt, I first got into Brad through their guitarist Stone Gossard, of Pearl Jam, but the real appeal of them is vocalist Shawn Smith. They are a side project at best of course, with Smith also recording with Pigeonhed, Satchel and as a solo artist, but Interiors ranks up there with the best that any of them have recorded. Smith's soulful voice shines through on tracks like The Day Brings and some darker material like Funeral Song and Some Never Come Home, and Interiors is one of the best albums to come out of Seattle since grunge's heyday.
6. Bullyrag - Songs Of Praise (1998)
Quite probably the most un-Beatles like rock band to have ever emerged from Liverpool, Bullyrag were possibly also a bit too different to fit into any convenient box, which is why they were mostly ignored. Kerrang! tried calling them 'raggametalpunkfunk' for their mixture of all those genres, and even included singer Robbie Awork in their Top 100 Coolest Rock Stars list, but despite awesome ragga-rock tracks like Jump Up In A Fashion, Frantic and Learn To Live, they never really made it big.
7. Kerbdog - On The Turn (1998)
Having a lead singer with a name as cool as Cormac Battle and songs as heavy and memorable as Sally, JJ's Song, Severed, Pledge and On The Turn should have been enough to catapult these Irish lads into the kind of league that the likes of Foo Fighters and Silverchair occupied at the time, but for some reason they were pretty much ignored by the British rock press in favour of 'the next big thing'. They turned into the poppier (but still very good) Wilt, but still got ignored.
8. Groop Dogdrill - Half Nelson (1998)
Sometimes impulse purchases are the best ones and sometimes you can judge a book (or a single) by its cover. Finding their single Gracelands looking cool as hell in my local Omega Music for 50p, I decided to check it out and was rewarded. A real rock 'n' roll swagger, with oil-slicked hair and the constant threat of physical violence, Groop Dogdrill were the best thing to come out of Yorkshire, with lots of film references in tracks like Oily Rag.
9. Shelter - Mantra (1995)
Not many rock albums start off with some Krisna chanting, but not make rock bands were like Shelter. A New York 'krishnacore' band who mingled their spirituality with a straight edge ethos and hardcore rock music, Shelter were much more fun than that sounds, and Mantra was a very catchy album indeed. Not only were the songs great, but the message in all of them was too, which certainly helps convince your mum to put the tape on in the car despite the heavy guitars...
10. Veruca Salt - Eight Arms To Hold You (1997)
One of the all-time greatest music videos was Veruca Salt's Volcano Girls. Rock girls plus guitars plus bungee cords = awesomeness! What? They should be naked too? Tsk... Anyway, Veruca Salt were a great American alternative rock band with two great female singers Louise Post and Nina Gordon. Cracking rock songs, great pop songs and the knowledge that they were already starting to hate each other and ended up splitting up not so long after this. Post still carries on with the Veruca Salt name, but with the magic partnership with Gordon, there's not the same kind of thrill.
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
THE BIG DEBATE: Downloads vs CDs
Welcome to our latest blog feature, The Big Debate. With Radiohead releasing their new album in digital form before a physical release, we approach the subject of downloads from the position of a fan who is resisting the digital world and one who has embraced it. Where do YOU stand?
THE WRITER: No Way, Computer
I, not to put too fine a point on it, am a geek. Some people see this as an insult, but I wear it as a badge of honour. I collect things, hoard them and proudly display them around my bedroom, living room, hell even my kitchen. Posters, DVDs, comic books, graphic novels, action figures, magazines... they’re all neatly organised and stored in their right place in my otherwise messy flat.
By and large, the same can't be said about my music collection. I've never really gotten into music in the same way I have my other passions and my pitifully small CD collection can be found in the corner of my living room dangling off the shelves, out of order and usually not even in the right case. My collector instincts, therefore, have not been particularly offended by the recent boom in downloading music. Until, that is, Radiohead decided hop on the bandwagon this week.
Now, I don't just like Radiohead, I love them. They, along with the Manic Street Preachers, helped mould me into the person I am today. Without them I wouldn't have read some of my favourite books, seen some of my favourite films or listened to some of my favourite albums. When one of their records is released, I build up the anticipation, read the reviews and scour the web for interviews (always difficult with Radiohead) before rushing out to buy it, always, of course, in its most collectible form: the road map edition of Hail to the Thief; the battered library book version of Amnesiac and both the regular and apocalyptic storybook incarnations of Kid A.
I was therefore looking forward to the release of new album In Rainbows. But then, upon a lazy visit to an entertainment website on Monday, I read these terrifying words: Radiohead are set to release their new album next week... on download only. The first part of that sentence felt like a dagger in my heart (how can I build up sufficient anticipation in a little over a week!? There‘ll be no reviews, no interviews, no nothing!!!) but the second part, well, that twisted the knife, pulled it out, poured salt in the wound and then repeated the move several times over.
The blow was softened somewhat by the news that while the album will be released via the great big cyber abyss that is the internet next week, a deluxe 'disc box' featuring CDs, vinyl and special artwork will emerge in December. Naturally I'll be forking out the £40 for that little baby (I'll never play the vinyl, but that's the price of being a collector...) but that doesn't make up for the fact that the early online release (along with the 'name your price' cost) is clearly a dry run and, if successful, it could encourage more bands to release their music online well ahead of its release in physical form.
Call me a luddite, but when I buy music, I don't want to do it over the web. I want to go into the record store, pay an actual human being for the album, go home and stick it in my CD player while thumbing carefully through the inlay, reading the lyrics and admiring the artwork. Then, when I'm done, I want to place it on (the neat part of) my shelf. There's a geeky thrill to this, a ritualistic enjoyment. Like smelling that great odour of a new book, or seeing the flecks of dust pass across the light of a projector in the cinema, it's a vital part of enjoying the art form.
Downloading simply doesn't have this. Where's the joy in accessing a website and coldly clicking on the album you want? Where's the joy in seeing a white bar slooooowly filling up with little green rectangles? Where's the joy in uploading the music to your MP3 player? Where, in other words, is the love? If this experiment proves a success all these little rituals, all this love and enjoyment will be as doomed as one of Thom Yorke's protagonists. And then, we'll be facing a world more drab and desolate than the one in my Kid A storybook.
THE EDITOR: OK Computer
Much like The Writer, I am a geek, but only really when it comes to music. My entire life can be shattered by a bad football result (well, for a few days anyway), but despite making a living from writing about the sport, I'm not obsessive about the stats or collecting memorabilia or anything like that. Up until about three years ago, collecting was definitely something I did a lot of when it came to music though, and my CD collection was enormous.
Not only was it enormous, but, entirely unlike The Writer's music collection (believe me, I've seen it), it was meticulously arranged, alphabetised by artist and then chronological within each artist. Not much gave me greater pleasure than seeing all the Beatles albums lined up on a shelf, running from Please Please Me to the Anthologies. So why is my CD collection now all but non-existent?
Simple, after initially rejecting the concept of digital music as being something that went against the whole point (the artwork, the thrill of holding it in your hands, etc, etc) of it all, I realised that music is music and having a little machine in your pocket that contains your entire collection (or at least most of it) is just indescribably wonderful, not to mention more convenient than lugging around about 20 CDs a day so that you've got a choice of what you want to listen to.
Do I miss having a massive cupboard-full of CDs to look at, stroke and feel superior about? Not at all, because I can still admire my music collection in iTunes, which nowadays has the cover art with the albums anyway. Buying music digitally is much quicker, more convenient and cheaper than going into HMV, even with their seemingly never-ending BIGGEST SALE EVER. If you want, you can select which tracks you want to have, though I'm too much of a geek to not want the whole album anyway.
But anyway, having crossed over to the dark side of no packaging and no cupboard full of stuff, what about this new Radiohead album. Even I think that it's a strange decision to launch it in this way, but no stranger than leaving messages in code on your website or a band as good as they are making an album as tedious as Hail To The Thief. So, I've ordered In Rainbows from their website as a download and decided to pay £0.00 for the privilege.
Apparently lots of people have been selecting their own price by paying a regular price for the download, which seems bizarre, but those people probably try to pay their family for their birthday presents. The discbox thing seems ludicrously overpriced for the album, plus another CD, two vinyl LPs plus some photos and a no doubt entirely pretentious and pointless book, so I don't feel that I'm missing out on anything by only getting the music.
If the music is good enough, then you don't need all the packaging or the 'experience' of buying it. I'm not sure if that makes me more or less of a music geek, but it's the way it is. Downloading is quicker, easier and cheaper, while using a quality music store like emusic opens up a whole world of amazing music that you simply wouldn't be able to find in HMV or even one of the disappearing indie shops out there. Like everything else, the music world is evolving and downloading is just a step forwards, like CDs were back in their day. I've chosen to take that step and I've never regretted it. On the contrary, it's one of the best I've ever made.
Welcome to our latest blog feature, The Big Debate. With Radiohead releasing their new album in digital form before a physical release, we approach the subject of downloads from the position of a fan who is resisting the digital world and one who has embraced it. Where do YOU stand?
THE WRITER: No Way, Computer
I, not to put too fine a point on it, am a geek. Some people see this as an insult, but I wear it as a badge of honour. I collect things, hoard them and proudly display them around my bedroom, living room, hell even my kitchen. Posters, DVDs, comic books, graphic novels, action figures, magazines... they’re all neatly organised and stored in their right place in my otherwise messy flat.
By and large, the same can't be said about my music collection. I've never really gotten into music in the same way I have my other passions and my pitifully small CD collection can be found in the corner of my living room dangling off the shelves, out of order and usually not even in the right case. My collector instincts, therefore, have not been particularly offended by the recent boom in downloading music. Until, that is, Radiohead decided hop on the bandwagon this week.
Now, I don't just like Radiohead, I love them. They, along with the Manic Street Preachers, helped mould me into the person I am today. Without them I wouldn't have read some of my favourite books, seen some of my favourite films or listened to some of my favourite albums. When one of their records is released, I build up the anticipation, read the reviews and scour the web for interviews (always difficult with Radiohead) before rushing out to buy it, always, of course, in its most collectible form: the road map edition of Hail to the Thief; the battered library book version of Amnesiac and both the regular and apocalyptic storybook incarnations of Kid A.
I was therefore looking forward to the release of new album In Rainbows. But then, upon a lazy visit to an entertainment website on Monday, I read these terrifying words: Radiohead are set to release their new album next week... on download only. The first part of that sentence felt like a dagger in my heart (how can I build up sufficient anticipation in a little over a week!? There‘ll be no reviews, no interviews, no nothing!!!) but the second part, well, that twisted the knife, pulled it out, poured salt in the wound and then repeated the move several times over.
The blow was softened somewhat by the news that while the album will be released via the great big cyber abyss that is the internet next week, a deluxe 'disc box' featuring CDs, vinyl and special artwork will emerge in December. Naturally I'll be forking out the £40 for that little baby (I'll never play the vinyl, but that's the price of being a collector...) but that doesn't make up for the fact that the early online release (along with the 'name your price' cost) is clearly a dry run and, if successful, it could encourage more bands to release their music online well ahead of its release in physical form.
Call me a luddite, but when I buy music, I don't want to do it over the web. I want to go into the record store, pay an actual human being for the album, go home and stick it in my CD player while thumbing carefully through the inlay, reading the lyrics and admiring the artwork. Then, when I'm done, I want to place it on (the neat part of) my shelf. There's a geeky thrill to this, a ritualistic enjoyment. Like smelling that great odour of a new book, or seeing the flecks of dust pass across the light of a projector in the cinema, it's a vital part of enjoying the art form.
Downloading simply doesn't have this. Where's the joy in accessing a website and coldly clicking on the album you want? Where's the joy in seeing a white bar slooooowly filling up with little green rectangles? Where's the joy in uploading the music to your MP3 player? Where, in other words, is the love? If this experiment proves a success all these little rituals, all this love and enjoyment will be as doomed as one of Thom Yorke's protagonists. And then, we'll be facing a world more drab and desolate than the one in my Kid A storybook.
THE EDITOR: OK Computer
Much like The Writer, I am a geek, but only really when it comes to music. My entire life can be shattered by a bad football result (well, for a few days anyway), but despite making a living from writing about the sport, I'm not obsessive about the stats or collecting memorabilia or anything like that. Up until about three years ago, collecting was definitely something I did a lot of when it came to music though, and my CD collection was enormous.
Not only was it enormous, but, entirely unlike The Writer's music collection (believe me, I've seen it), it was meticulously arranged, alphabetised by artist and then chronological within each artist. Not much gave me greater pleasure than seeing all the Beatles albums lined up on a shelf, running from Please Please Me to the Anthologies. So why is my CD collection now all but non-existent?
Simple, after initially rejecting the concept of digital music as being something that went against the whole point (the artwork, the thrill of holding it in your hands, etc, etc) of it all, I realised that music is music and having a little machine in your pocket that contains your entire collection (or at least most of it) is just indescribably wonderful, not to mention more convenient than lugging around about 20 CDs a day so that you've got a choice of what you want to listen to.
Do I miss having a massive cupboard-full of CDs to look at, stroke and feel superior about? Not at all, because I can still admire my music collection in iTunes, which nowadays has the cover art with the albums anyway. Buying music digitally is much quicker, more convenient and cheaper than going into HMV, even with their seemingly never-ending BIGGEST SALE EVER. If you want, you can select which tracks you want to have, though I'm too much of a geek to not want the whole album anyway.
But anyway, having crossed over to the dark side of no packaging and no cupboard full of stuff, what about this new Radiohead album. Even I think that it's a strange decision to launch it in this way, but no stranger than leaving messages in code on your website or a band as good as they are making an album as tedious as Hail To The Thief. So, I've ordered In Rainbows from their website as a download and decided to pay £0.00 for the privilege.
Apparently lots of people have been selecting their own price by paying a regular price for the download, which seems bizarre, but those people probably try to pay their family for their birthday presents. The discbox thing seems ludicrously overpriced for the album, plus another CD, two vinyl LPs plus some photos and a no doubt entirely pretentious and pointless book, so I don't feel that I'm missing out on anything by only getting the music.
If the music is good enough, then you don't need all the packaging or the 'experience' of buying it. I'm not sure if that makes me more or less of a music geek, but it's the way it is. Downloading is quicker, easier and cheaper, while using a quality music store like emusic opens up a whole world of amazing music that you simply wouldn't be able to find in HMV or even one of the disappearing indie shops out there. Like everything else, the music world is evolving and downloading is just a step forwards, like CDs were back in their day. I've chosen to take that step and I've never regretted it. On the contrary, it's one of the best I've ever made.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Top Ten... Alternative 80s
Continuing our new (mini) series of Top Tens, we're looking over the alternative classic of the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s. So, what do we mean by alternative? Well, alternative, for the purposes of these entries, means anything that is critically derided, overlooked by the public or just generally under-rated. Ultimately, though, it all comes down to how we argue it, so if you disagree, let us know!
FILMS - By The Writer
1. The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)
Widely thought of as a weaker Scorsese effort (probably due to Judas’s curious New Yoik accent), The Last Temptation of Christ is, for my money at least, right up there with his finest works. Rather than Passion of the Christ-style unquestioning dogma, Scorsese made a deeply personal film (that’d explain the accents) which depicted Jesus not as a divine, untouchable deity, but an ordinary man tempted from his destiny by a normal life with Mary Magdelene. Naturally, the church complained, but this is urgent, heartfelt cinema, with a magnificent central performance from Willem Dafoe.
2. Supergirl (1984)
Supergirl scared me as a kid. Not the character herself, but the film in general. You may laugh, but how could it not scare kiddies? First, it’s got Faye Dunaway at her most insane as an evil witch who’s in cahoots with Peter Cook. Second, we see inside the Phantom Zone for the first and only time in a Super-film. And third, Supergirl bleeds. She bleeds actual, factual blood. Talk about no more heroes, I was flippin’ petrified. Gladly Helen Slater was on hand with her magical colour-changing hair and tiny Super-suit to ease the pain. It’s a shame the film flopped, because she has a natural charm which would have made her perfect for the numerous rom-coms which flooded our screens in the 90s.
3. Short Circuit (1986)
John Luc-Godard once said all you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun. He was wrong. All you really need to make a movie is a girl and a robot, as Short Circuit proves. The mechano man in question is Johnny 5, a clanking mess of metal and googly eyes designed by Steve Guttenberg and a comedy Asian fellow as a weapon of war. Gladly, he becomes intelligent and chooses to flirt with kindly animal lover Ally Sheedy instead (well, who wouldn‘t?). Hijinks, power ballads and child-friendly discussions on the nature of existence ensue. Screw Godard and his French New Wave. This is where the action’s at.
4. The Right Stuff (1983)
Looking back now, it’s amazing that Phillip Kaufman’s epic space-race drama has been lost in the sands of time. With its ground-breaking visuals, star performances and focus on a vital moment of American history, it should be remembered as one of the all-time biggest Oscar winners. But Kaufman has rarely been the kind of filmmaker to play things straight and while The Right Stuff is a respectful chronicle of the historic Mercury missions of the 50s and 60s, it retains a satirical edge which means it’s much, much more than a simple history lesson.
5. Day of the Dead (1985)
Although generally considered the weakest of George Romero's Dead films, Day is still a worthy and unusual addition to the cannon. Lacking the fear factor of Night and satirical brilliance of Dawn, this third entry into what is soon to be a five film franchise (Diary of the Dead is currently doing the festival rounds) is a surprisingly low key affair, with brightly lit malls and secluded cabins replaced by an underground bunker storing a host of frustrated scientists and irritable military men. It all ends with the zombies once more winning. For most this would be a downbeat finale. However, for Romero, ever the nihilistic social commentator, it’s a happy ending, with our heroes finding peace from society’s destruction on a secluded tropical island.
6. The Howling (1981)
In different hands, The Howling would have been just another dumb horror film, made at a time when the genre was becoming overly gory and more concerned with shock tactics than genuine scares. In Joe Dante's hands, however, it proves one of the wittiest and smartest horrors of the decade, thanks also to the script by indie god John Sayles. Sadly though, the film has become overshadowed both by the success of 82’s similarly-themed American Werewolf in London and the endless list of sequels, the first of which was called: The Howling II: Stirba - Werewolf Bitch. Sigh...
7. Empire of the Sun (1987)
This adaptation of JG Ballard's 1984 novel was Steven Spielberg's second stab at 'serious' filmmaking and still stands as one of his most underrated works. Set during the Japanese invasion of Shanghai in the Second World War, it follows young English aristocrat Jim (an astonishing Christian Bale making his screen debut), as he is separated from his parents and winds up in an internment camp. While Colour Purple felt like Spielberg going out of his way to impress critics, Sun is a more natural transition which focuses on his usual father-son themes and, in the scene in which an awestruck Jim gazes up at a fighter plane, hands him an image as vital to his cannon as Elliot passing across the face of the moon in E.T.
8. 1984 (1984)
It's a shame the Eurhythmics were asked to make the music for this adaptation of George Orwell's reality-TV-spawning novel, because their pretentious Vangelis-lite warblings make Michael Radford's otherwise impressive film sound like a cut-price version of Blade Runner. Still, there's a lot to enjoy here, from John Hurt's magnificently decrepit turn as Winston Smith to the non-showy, special-effects-free depictions of totalitarian Britain. The film was Richard Burton's last and his creepy performance as Party member O'Brian is a fitting tribute to his immense talents.
9. The Company of Wolves (1984)
Based on the work of magical-realist writer Angela Carter, The Company of Wolves was always going to be a difficult work to put on screen, but director Neil Jordan does a commendable job in this unique fantasy film. Taking inspiration from the Grimm fairy tales (Little Red Riding Hood especially), The Company of Wolves is an intoxicating and inventive story of puberty and maturation that makes up for its lack of Freudian subtlety with some groundbreaking effects and winning performances.
10. Tron (1982)
Alas, it seems Tron will forever be remembered as the film nobody in The Simpsons had heard of. It’s a shame too, because while it may be pitifully light on story and look tragically dated now, Tron was genuinely ground-breaking in its time and had a sense of geeky fun that kids films rarely do today. It also features light-cycles, which is enough to get it on this list on its own.
ALBUMS - By The Editor
1. Meat Puppets - Meat Puppets II (1983)
An album that didn't really do much business when it came out, Meat Puppets II achieved more fame a decade later when Curt and Cris Kirkwood joined Nirvana for their MTV Unplugged in New York performance and helped them perform Oh, Me, Plateau and Lake Of Fire. After the raging white noise of their debut, the Meat Puppets invented cowpunk music by introducing some country influences into their music, and MP II is a simply stunning record and one of the best alt.rock albums, not just from the 80s, but ever.
2. Faith No More - Introduce Yourself (1987)
Two years later, Faith No More were on top of the rock world with their awesome The Real Thing album, but Introduce Yourself is almost as good, despite having Chuck Mosely on vocals instead of Mike Patton. Mosely wasn't a good singer by any stretch of the imagination, and it's easy to see why they only became famous after he left. However, Introduce Yourself is a great album, with twisted pop hooks, heavy guitars and psychedelic songs. They were moving towards legendary status and would only achieve it after they'd chucked Chuck, but this is still very good.
3. Mano Negra - Patchanka (1988)
Parisien anarchists Mano Negra started with this incredible debut album and lead singer Manu Chao is still pretty much ploughing the same furrow now and sounding innovative. That's how unusual their blend of Euro-rock and punk and rockabilly and reggae and skiffle and hip-hop and country and flamenco and it goes on and on. Their list of influences ran into the thousands almost, though none were as prominent as The Clash. The best way of summing up the diversity and genius of this album would be their version of Rock Island Line, which shifts genre three or four times in the space of a few minutes. Madness, utter, brilliant, madness.
4. Mick Fleetwood - The Visitor (1981)
Mick Fleetwood? The massive drummer from Fleetwood Mac? The guy who, along with Sam Fox, made bad awards show hosting look like an art form? Yep. He's not exactly well known for his solo work, hardly surprising as he's one of only two people to have been in Fleetwood Mac throughout the band's lengthy and turbulent history. However, in 1981, he made a solo album in Ghana, using traditional African rhythms alongside Western rock with help from the likes of George Harrison and Mac bandleaders Peter Green and Lindsay Buckingham. And it's really, really good.
5. Lindsay Buckingham - Go Insane (1984)
Speaking of Buckingham, here's another Fleetwood Mac solo album. His second release and the last before he left the band a couple of years later, Go Insane had an album cover that looks like a prototype for John Turturro in Barton Fink, while the contents were classic Buckingham tunes, full of hefty production values and quirky, catchy songs. The best bit though is the experimental D.W. Suite, where he takes his Brian Wilson fetish to a whole new level while paying tribute (hence the name) to the recently deceased Dennis Wilson.
6. Scientist - Scientist Rids The World Of The Evil Curse Of The Vampires (1981)
An acolyte of dub legend King Tubby, Scientist specialised in epic but minimalist dub albums with fantastic song titles and themes, from Space Invaders to the World Cup to this evil curse of the vampires. The songs all have horror movie titles and some 'spooky' effects, but the music is essential dub reggae and reached a whole new audience when used as the K-Jah radio station in Grand Theft Auto III.
7. Neil Young - Trans (1982)
The early 80s were hardly Neil Young's finest years, with a load of sub-standard albums being churned out as he put music on the backburner while caring for his son, who had been born with cerebral palsy. However, he hadn't given up trying, and Trans is his most experimental and daring release, as well as his strangest. If you've ever wondered what Neil Young songs would sound like performed by The Buggles, then things like Transformer Man, Computer Thing and Computer Cowboy show you exactly that. Amazingly, it works really well, with some more traditional songs through in there too.
8. Soul Asylum - Hang Time (1988)
And finally, we have Soul Asylum, caught halfway between wanting to be The Replacements and being massive superstars for five minutes with Runaway Train in the early 90s. Hang time sharpened up their sound and brought elements of a more radio-friendly sheen to their sloppy country-punk music, but keep things rocking and never loses its alt.rock credentials. Every song is great and it's just a shame that they couldn't always have maintained the balance between their two sides as well as they did here.
9. REO Speedwagon - Hi Infidelity (1980)
REO Speedwagon may be one of those arena rock 80s power ballad bands who everyone loves to laugh at, but Hi Infidelity is a classic album of that rather maligned genre. With the awesome Keep On Loving You at its heart, it's more than just soppy radio hits, because there's some cracking pop rock on here too while the lyrics aren't even as bad as you might expect. We've seen it called 'arena rock's Blood On The Tracks', which is pushing it a bit, but it's the perfect example of why 'guilty pleasures' can be really good as well as really cheesy.
10. Meat Loaf - Blind Before I Stop (1986)
His last release before reuniting with Jim Steinman for Bat Out Of Hell II, this album is generally considered to be Meat Loaf's weakest, and it's true that the very 80s production is certainly different to his best OTT rock music. However, as a pop rock album, it's full of fun songs like Rock n Roll Hero, Rock n Roll Mercenaries (they're pretty much the same song really), Special Girl and the title track, while One More Kiss (Night Of The Soft Parade) is a very nice ballad.
Continuing our new (mini) series of Top Tens, we're looking over the alternative classic of the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s. So, what do we mean by alternative? Well, alternative, for the purposes of these entries, means anything that is critically derided, overlooked by the public or just generally under-rated. Ultimately, though, it all comes down to how we argue it, so if you disagree, let us know!
FILMS - By The Writer
1. The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)
Widely thought of as a weaker Scorsese effort (probably due to Judas’s curious New Yoik accent), The Last Temptation of Christ is, for my money at least, right up there with his finest works. Rather than Passion of the Christ-style unquestioning dogma, Scorsese made a deeply personal film (that’d explain the accents) which depicted Jesus not as a divine, untouchable deity, but an ordinary man tempted from his destiny by a normal life with Mary Magdelene. Naturally, the church complained, but this is urgent, heartfelt cinema, with a magnificent central performance from Willem Dafoe.
2. Supergirl (1984)
Supergirl scared me as a kid. Not the character herself, but the film in general. You may laugh, but how could it not scare kiddies? First, it’s got Faye Dunaway at her most insane as an evil witch who’s in cahoots with Peter Cook. Second, we see inside the Phantom Zone for the first and only time in a Super-film. And third, Supergirl bleeds. She bleeds actual, factual blood. Talk about no more heroes, I was flippin’ petrified. Gladly Helen Slater was on hand with her magical colour-changing hair and tiny Super-suit to ease the pain. It’s a shame the film flopped, because she has a natural charm which would have made her perfect for the numerous rom-coms which flooded our screens in the 90s.
3. Short Circuit (1986)
John Luc-Godard once said all you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun. He was wrong. All you really need to make a movie is a girl and a robot, as Short Circuit proves. The mechano man in question is Johnny 5, a clanking mess of metal and googly eyes designed by Steve Guttenberg and a comedy Asian fellow as a weapon of war. Gladly, he becomes intelligent and chooses to flirt with kindly animal lover Ally Sheedy instead (well, who wouldn‘t?). Hijinks, power ballads and child-friendly discussions on the nature of existence ensue. Screw Godard and his French New Wave. This is where the action’s at.
4. The Right Stuff (1983)
Looking back now, it’s amazing that Phillip Kaufman’s epic space-race drama has been lost in the sands of time. With its ground-breaking visuals, star performances and focus on a vital moment of American history, it should be remembered as one of the all-time biggest Oscar winners. But Kaufman has rarely been the kind of filmmaker to play things straight and while The Right Stuff is a respectful chronicle of the historic Mercury missions of the 50s and 60s, it retains a satirical edge which means it’s much, much more than a simple history lesson.
5. Day of the Dead (1985)
Although generally considered the weakest of George Romero's Dead films, Day is still a worthy and unusual addition to the cannon. Lacking the fear factor of Night and satirical brilliance of Dawn, this third entry into what is soon to be a five film franchise (Diary of the Dead is currently doing the festival rounds) is a surprisingly low key affair, with brightly lit malls and secluded cabins replaced by an underground bunker storing a host of frustrated scientists and irritable military men. It all ends with the zombies once more winning. For most this would be a downbeat finale. However, for Romero, ever the nihilistic social commentator, it’s a happy ending, with our heroes finding peace from society’s destruction on a secluded tropical island.
6. The Howling (1981)
In different hands, The Howling would have been just another dumb horror film, made at a time when the genre was becoming overly gory and more concerned with shock tactics than genuine scares. In Joe Dante's hands, however, it proves one of the wittiest and smartest horrors of the decade, thanks also to the script by indie god John Sayles. Sadly though, the film has become overshadowed both by the success of 82’s similarly-themed American Werewolf in London and the endless list of sequels, the first of which was called: The Howling II: Stirba - Werewolf Bitch. Sigh...
7. Empire of the Sun (1987)
This adaptation of JG Ballard's 1984 novel was Steven Spielberg's second stab at 'serious' filmmaking and still stands as one of his most underrated works. Set during the Japanese invasion of Shanghai in the Second World War, it follows young English aristocrat Jim (an astonishing Christian Bale making his screen debut), as he is separated from his parents and winds up in an internment camp. While Colour Purple felt like Spielberg going out of his way to impress critics, Sun is a more natural transition which focuses on his usual father-son themes and, in the scene in which an awestruck Jim gazes up at a fighter plane, hands him an image as vital to his cannon as Elliot passing across the face of the moon in E.T.
8. 1984 (1984)
It's a shame the Eurhythmics were asked to make the music for this adaptation of George Orwell's reality-TV-spawning novel, because their pretentious Vangelis-lite warblings make Michael Radford's otherwise impressive film sound like a cut-price version of Blade Runner. Still, there's a lot to enjoy here, from John Hurt's magnificently decrepit turn as Winston Smith to the non-showy, special-effects-free depictions of totalitarian Britain. The film was Richard Burton's last and his creepy performance as Party member O'Brian is a fitting tribute to his immense talents.
9. The Company of Wolves (1984)
Based on the work of magical-realist writer Angela Carter, The Company of Wolves was always going to be a difficult work to put on screen, but director Neil Jordan does a commendable job in this unique fantasy film. Taking inspiration from the Grimm fairy tales (Little Red Riding Hood especially), The Company of Wolves is an intoxicating and inventive story of puberty and maturation that makes up for its lack of Freudian subtlety with some groundbreaking effects and winning performances.
10. Tron (1982)
Alas, it seems Tron will forever be remembered as the film nobody in The Simpsons had heard of. It’s a shame too, because while it may be pitifully light on story and look tragically dated now, Tron was genuinely ground-breaking in its time and had a sense of geeky fun that kids films rarely do today. It also features light-cycles, which is enough to get it on this list on its own.
ALBUMS - By The Editor
1. Meat Puppets - Meat Puppets II (1983)
An album that didn't really do much business when it came out, Meat Puppets II achieved more fame a decade later when Curt and Cris Kirkwood joined Nirvana for their MTV Unplugged in New York performance and helped them perform Oh, Me, Plateau and Lake Of Fire. After the raging white noise of their debut, the Meat Puppets invented cowpunk music by introducing some country influences into their music, and MP II is a simply stunning record and one of the best alt.rock albums, not just from the 80s, but ever.
2. Faith No More - Introduce Yourself (1987)
Two years later, Faith No More were on top of the rock world with their awesome The Real Thing album, but Introduce Yourself is almost as good, despite having Chuck Mosely on vocals instead of Mike Patton. Mosely wasn't a good singer by any stretch of the imagination, and it's easy to see why they only became famous after he left. However, Introduce Yourself is a great album, with twisted pop hooks, heavy guitars and psychedelic songs. They were moving towards legendary status and would only achieve it after they'd chucked Chuck, but this is still very good.
3. Mano Negra - Patchanka (1988)
Parisien anarchists Mano Negra started with this incredible debut album and lead singer Manu Chao is still pretty much ploughing the same furrow now and sounding innovative. That's how unusual their blend of Euro-rock and punk and rockabilly and reggae and skiffle and hip-hop and country and flamenco and it goes on and on. Their list of influences ran into the thousands almost, though none were as prominent as The Clash. The best way of summing up the diversity and genius of this album would be their version of Rock Island Line, which shifts genre three or four times in the space of a few minutes. Madness, utter, brilliant, madness.
4. Mick Fleetwood - The Visitor (1981)
Mick Fleetwood? The massive drummer from Fleetwood Mac? The guy who, along with Sam Fox, made bad awards show hosting look like an art form? Yep. He's not exactly well known for his solo work, hardly surprising as he's one of only two people to have been in Fleetwood Mac throughout the band's lengthy and turbulent history. However, in 1981, he made a solo album in Ghana, using traditional African rhythms alongside Western rock with help from the likes of George Harrison and Mac bandleaders Peter Green and Lindsay Buckingham. And it's really, really good.
5. Lindsay Buckingham - Go Insane (1984)
Speaking of Buckingham, here's another Fleetwood Mac solo album. His second release and the last before he left the band a couple of years later, Go Insane had an album cover that looks like a prototype for John Turturro in Barton Fink, while the contents were classic Buckingham tunes, full of hefty production values and quirky, catchy songs. The best bit though is the experimental D.W. Suite, where he takes his Brian Wilson fetish to a whole new level while paying tribute (hence the name) to the recently deceased Dennis Wilson.
6. Scientist - Scientist Rids The World Of The Evil Curse Of The Vampires (1981)
An acolyte of dub legend King Tubby, Scientist specialised in epic but minimalist dub albums with fantastic song titles and themes, from Space Invaders to the World Cup to this evil curse of the vampires. The songs all have horror movie titles and some 'spooky' effects, but the music is essential dub reggae and reached a whole new audience when used as the K-Jah radio station in Grand Theft Auto III.
7. Neil Young - Trans (1982)
The early 80s were hardly Neil Young's finest years, with a load of sub-standard albums being churned out as he put music on the backburner while caring for his son, who had been born with cerebral palsy. However, he hadn't given up trying, and Trans is his most experimental and daring release, as well as his strangest. If you've ever wondered what Neil Young songs would sound like performed by The Buggles, then things like Transformer Man, Computer Thing and Computer Cowboy show you exactly that. Amazingly, it works really well, with some more traditional songs through in there too.
8. Soul Asylum - Hang Time (1988)
And finally, we have Soul Asylum, caught halfway between wanting to be The Replacements and being massive superstars for five minutes with Runaway Train in the early 90s. Hang time sharpened up their sound and brought elements of a more radio-friendly sheen to their sloppy country-punk music, but keep things rocking and never loses its alt.rock credentials. Every song is great and it's just a shame that they couldn't always have maintained the balance between their two sides as well as they did here.
9. REO Speedwagon - Hi Infidelity (1980)
REO Speedwagon may be one of those arena rock 80s power ballad bands who everyone loves to laugh at, but Hi Infidelity is a classic album of that rather maligned genre. With the awesome Keep On Loving You at its heart, it's more than just soppy radio hits, because there's some cracking pop rock on here too while the lyrics aren't even as bad as you might expect. We've seen it called 'arena rock's Blood On The Tracks', which is pushing it a bit, but it's the perfect example of why 'guilty pleasures' can be really good as well as really cheesy.
10. Meat Loaf - Blind Before I Stop (1986)
His last release before reuniting with Jim Steinman for Bat Out Of Hell II, this album is generally considered to be Meat Loaf's weakest, and it's true that the very 80s production is certainly different to his best OTT rock music. However, as a pop rock album, it's full of fun songs like Rock n Roll Hero, Rock n Roll Mercenaries (they're pretty much the same song really), Special Girl and the title track, while One More Kiss (Night Of The Soft Parade) is a very nice ballad.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT... SAUL BASS
If we were to ask you to name some of Alfred Hitchcock’s greatest collaborators you’d be likely to mention people like James Stewart, Grace Kelly and Cary Grant. However, one person whose name may not slip off the tongue quite as freely as those luminaries is title designer Saul Bass.
Born in New York in 1920, Bass was a keen artist from an early age and found his first film work in Otto Preminger’s urban opera Carmen Jones. The Austrian director asked him to produce the titles for the 1956 film and, at a time when most title designs were mere processions for the cast’s names, Bass produced the iconic image of a single printed rose, wilting in the shadow of a roaring flame.
It proved a sensation, not only looking aesthetically-pleasing, but also clueing the audience into the film's theme of destructive passion. This is what Bass did best, and Preminger was immediately impressed, inviting him back to design the titles for more of his films.
For heroin addiction drama The Man With The Golden Arm, Bass created a staccato-style arm reaching obsessively into the centre of the frame; for romantic melodrama Bonjour Tristesse he produced a solemn, weeping eye and for the groundbreaking Anatomy of a Murder he made a cut-out of a dismantled body.
But Bass didn't just excel at dramas. Comedy capers Ocean’s 11 and It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World showcased his more playful side and so synonymous are the bold, colourful designs of these films with the 1960s that the titles of modern movies such as Paul Schrader's Auto Focus, Steven Spielberg's Catch Me If You Can and Casino Royale have echoed them to evoke their retro milieu.
These complex mini-movie sequences also highlighted Bass’s desire to move into direction himself. But, despite winning an Oscar for his 1968 short Why Man Creates, his ambitions were quelled by the failure of little-seen 1974 killer ant movie Phase IV. Instead, his directorial legacy lives on in the shape of his work with Alfred Hitchcock.
For the auteur’s Vertigo, Bass was called upon to create a dream sequence as well as the titles. Homing in on the film’s themes of fear and obsession, Bass created a claustrophobic nightmare, using multi-coloured spirograph vortexes, black backgrounds and Bernard Hermann's haunting score to lure the audience into the central character's obsession and create an effect just as disorienting as Hitchcock's much-vaunted dolly zoom.
A thrilling sequence for North by Northwest followed, but it wasn’t until 1960 that Bass’s reputation was cemented with his work on Psycho, for which he received his first 'pictoral consultant' credit after storyboarding the infamous shower scene (rumours still abound that he directed it) and designing the minimalist cutting lines of the iconic title sequence.
With gritty realism taking hold of American cinema in the 1970s and the star reigning supreme in the 80s, Bass’s stylish sequences gradually fell out of fashion. He therefore spent his time designing logos for big corporations until he was invited to create the titles for Martin Scorsese‘s Goodfellas, Cape Fear, The Age of Innocence and Casino, the latter using computer technology to capture the neon-lit dystopia of Las Vegas.
Bass died of non-Hodgkins related lymphoma in 1996. His final design was for documentary A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies. It was fitting end for a man who had contributed so much to the subject at hand.
If we were to ask you to name some of Alfred Hitchcock’s greatest collaborators you’d be likely to mention people like James Stewart, Grace Kelly and Cary Grant. However, one person whose name may not slip off the tongue quite as freely as those luminaries is title designer Saul Bass.
Born in New York in 1920, Bass was a keen artist from an early age and found his first film work in Otto Preminger’s urban opera Carmen Jones. The Austrian director asked him to produce the titles for the 1956 film and, at a time when most title designs were mere processions for the cast’s names, Bass produced the iconic image of a single printed rose, wilting in the shadow of a roaring flame.
It proved a sensation, not only looking aesthetically-pleasing, but also clueing the audience into the film's theme of destructive passion. This is what Bass did best, and Preminger was immediately impressed, inviting him back to design the titles for more of his films.
For heroin addiction drama The Man With The Golden Arm, Bass created a staccato-style arm reaching obsessively into the centre of the frame; for romantic melodrama Bonjour Tristesse he produced a solemn, weeping eye and for the groundbreaking Anatomy of a Murder he made a cut-out of a dismantled body.
But Bass didn't just excel at dramas. Comedy capers Ocean’s 11 and It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World showcased his more playful side and so synonymous are the bold, colourful designs of these films with the 1960s that the titles of modern movies such as Paul Schrader's Auto Focus, Steven Spielberg's Catch Me If You Can and Casino Royale have echoed them to evoke their retro milieu.
These complex mini-movie sequences also highlighted Bass’s desire to move into direction himself. But, despite winning an Oscar for his 1968 short Why Man Creates, his ambitions were quelled by the failure of little-seen 1974 killer ant movie Phase IV. Instead, his directorial legacy lives on in the shape of his work with Alfred Hitchcock.
For the auteur’s Vertigo, Bass was called upon to create a dream sequence as well as the titles. Homing in on the film’s themes of fear and obsession, Bass created a claustrophobic nightmare, using multi-coloured spirograph vortexes, black backgrounds and Bernard Hermann's haunting score to lure the audience into the central character's obsession and create an effect just as disorienting as Hitchcock's much-vaunted dolly zoom.
A thrilling sequence for North by Northwest followed, but it wasn’t until 1960 that Bass’s reputation was cemented with his work on Psycho, for which he received his first 'pictoral consultant' credit after storyboarding the infamous shower scene (rumours still abound that he directed it) and designing the minimalist cutting lines of the iconic title sequence.
With gritty realism taking hold of American cinema in the 1970s and the star reigning supreme in the 80s, Bass’s stylish sequences gradually fell out of fashion. He therefore spent his time designing logos for big corporations until he was invited to create the titles for Martin Scorsese‘s Goodfellas, Cape Fear, The Age of Innocence and Casino, the latter using computer technology to capture the neon-lit dystopia of Las Vegas.
Bass died of non-Hodgkins related lymphoma in 1996. His final design was for documentary A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies. It was fitting end for a man who had contributed so much to the subject at hand.
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Say What?!: Ridley's Right
Talking up his latest movie, American Gangster, at the Venice Film Festival last weekend, Sir Ridley Scott was surprisingly downbeat on the future of movies. The British director insisted that science-fiction, the genre in which he made his name with the likes of Alien and Blade Runner, has run its course and that modern Hollywood is "three per cent good, ninety-seven per cent stupid".
"I'm not criticising Hollywood because I work there, I partly live there," he explained. "But I'm saying this is the way it is, commerce is taking over art. Commerce has become the most important thing in the film industry. Hollywood is an industry, it's not an art form, therefore they have to address the bottom line.”
But Tinsel Town money-grubbing wasn‘t the only thing on Scott‘s mind. “People sit there watching a movie on a tiny screen," he grumbled of the increasing use of small-screen gadgetry to watch films on. "We try to do films which are in support of cinema, in a large room with good sound and a big picture. I'm sure we're on a losing wicket but we're fighting technology. Whilst it is wonderful in many aspects, it also has some big negative downsides."
Indeed, those downsides will be keenly felt for a director of Scott’s pedigree. From Blade Runner and Alien to The Duellists and Gladiator, Scott’s films are the work of a visual genius. He uses the full screen to tell the story, utilising its grandeur to highlight the freedom Thelma and Louise felt in the deserts of America or the isolating boredom the crew of the Nostromo suffered against Alien’s deathly silent starscapes.
But Scott isn’t the only one to see the fruits of his labour squashed by the onslaught of technology. Could you imagine how Stanley Kubrick would feel seeing The Shining‘s Overlook Hotel turned from an agoraphobic nightmare into a cozy motel. For that matter, what would Martin Scorsese think seeing the bruising boxing sequences of Raging Bull reduced to a bar room bust up, or Steven Spielberg witnessing the menacing underwater sequences in Jaws rendered no more threatening than a casual dip at the local leisure centre?
Of course, I can see the convenience of such gadgets and I‘m certainly not saying that a film can only be correctly viewed on a giant screen. But there’s a limit. Directors shoot their films with aspect ratios and resolutions in mind. Every frame, every angle, every cut is mulled over and thought through, crafted lovingly to give the viewer as good an experience as possible.
To take that craftsmanship and squeeze it onto a mobile phone screen is tantamount to reproducing the Mona Lisa on the back of a postage stamp or watching the RSC perform the abridged version of Macbeth. Sure it’s convenient, sure it’s shiny and new and exciting, but by watching films on these things you’re denying yourself the chance to see a great piece of art in the form it was meant to be seen in.
Of course, the people who want to do that should be allowed to, after all, they‘re not doing anything but ruining it for themselves. But there’s a wider risk here. If UMDs, PSPs and mobile phones continue to sell as quickly as they are now (and they‘re selling pretty fast), then we’ll have a generation of kids - of future filmmakers - who have grown up watching films without appreciating the unique visual sensation that only cinema can supply, and that can only be a damaging thing for the British - perhaps world - film industry.
In the end, Ridley’s right: Films should be enjoyed in a quiet, darkened room on as big a screen as possible, not on the back of a postage stamp on your way into work on a Monday morning.
Talking up his latest movie, American Gangster, at the Venice Film Festival last weekend, Sir Ridley Scott was surprisingly downbeat on the future of movies. The British director insisted that science-fiction, the genre in which he made his name with the likes of Alien and Blade Runner, has run its course and that modern Hollywood is "three per cent good, ninety-seven per cent stupid".
"I'm not criticising Hollywood because I work there, I partly live there," he explained. "But I'm saying this is the way it is, commerce is taking over art. Commerce has become the most important thing in the film industry. Hollywood is an industry, it's not an art form, therefore they have to address the bottom line.”
But Tinsel Town money-grubbing wasn‘t the only thing on Scott‘s mind. “People sit there watching a movie on a tiny screen," he grumbled of the increasing use of small-screen gadgetry to watch films on. "We try to do films which are in support of cinema, in a large room with good sound and a big picture. I'm sure we're on a losing wicket but we're fighting technology. Whilst it is wonderful in many aspects, it also has some big negative downsides."
Indeed, those downsides will be keenly felt for a director of Scott’s pedigree. From Blade Runner and Alien to The Duellists and Gladiator, Scott’s films are the work of a visual genius. He uses the full screen to tell the story, utilising its grandeur to highlight the freedom Thelma and Louise felt in the deserts of America or the isolating boredom the crew of the Nostromo suffered against Alien’s deathly silent starscapes.
But Scott isn’t the only one to see the fruits of his labour squashed by the onslaught of technology. Could you imagine how Stanley Kubrick would feel seeing The Shining‘s Overlook Hotel turned from an agoraphobic nightmare into a cozy motel. For that matter, what would Martin Scorsese think seeing the bruising boxing sequences of Raging Bull reduced to a bar room bust up, or Steven Spielberg witnessing the menacing underwater sequences in Jaws rendered no more threatening than a casual dip at the local leisure centre?
Of course, I can see the convenience of such gadgets and I‘m certainly not saying that a film can only be correctly viewed on a giant screen. But there’s a limit. Directors shoot their films with aspect ratios and resolutions in mind. Every frame, every angle, every cut is mulled over and thought through, crafted lovingly to give the viewer as good an experience as possible.
To take that craftsmanship and squeeze it onto a mobile phone screen is tantamount to reproducing the Mona Lisa on the back of a postage stamp or watching the RSC perform the abridged version of Macbeth. Sure it’s convenient, sure it’s shiny and new and exciting, but by watching films on these things you’re denying yourself the chance to see a great piece of art in the form it was meant to be seen in.
Of course, the people who want to do that should be allowed to, after all, they‘re not doing anything but ruining it for themselves. But there’s a wider risk here. If UMDs, PSPs and mobile phones continue to sell as quickly as they are now (and they‘re selling pretty fast), then we’ll have a generation of kids - of future filmmakers - who have grown up watching films without appreciating the unique visual sensation that only cinema can supply, and that can only be a damaging thing for the British - perhaps world - film industry.
In the end, Ridley’s right: Films should be enjoyed in a quiet, darkened room on as big a screen as possible, not on the back of a postage stamp on your way into work on a Monday morning.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
WATCHING, LISTENING TO AND READING
THE WRITER:
WATCHING: Breakfast at Tiffany's. The 1960s was full of bitter-sweet romantic-comedies and this effort from Pink Panther director Blake Edwards is the second best of the decade (after, of course, the peerless The Apartment). Obviously, you all know the story by now (and if you don't, what have you been doing with your life?), but familiarity does not breed contempt, mostly because of Audrey Hepburn's adorable performance as the iconic Holly Golightly. We'll gloss over Mickey Rooney's incredibly offensive Chinese neighbour Mr Yunioshi...
LISTENING TO: Bond songs. Okay, there are a few duffers (The Man With The Golden Gun, All Time High and License to Kill, mostly), but there's surprising quality to the 007 title songs. Monty Norman's theme is, of course, seminal, while the more modern numbers such as Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not Enough and You Know My Name are also toe-tapingling pleasing, mostly, it has to be said, because David Arnold is such a fan of John Barry. So, it's no surprise that the best songs belong to the man himself, with Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice and the peerless On Her Majesty's Secret Service still sounding as fresh and funky as they did back in the 60s.
READING: The Call of the Weird, Louis Theroux. Originally published in 2004, Theroux's first book doesn't tread any new ground - in fact, it's nothing more than a catch up with the people he met during his Weird Weekends series back in the late 90s. But so sensitive and unexploitative is Theroux in his reporting that it feels fresh and invigorating, and it speaks volumes for him as both a human and a professional that the majority of his subjects are happy to see him return.
THE EDITOR:
WATCHING: The last film I saw was Clerks II, which I didn't particularly have high hopes for (hence not bothering to see it at the cinema) but I was very pleasantly surprised. The vulgar humour and geeky dialogue of the first is all still there, but the theme of 'growing up' is much more urgent second time around because Dante and (to a lesser extent) Randal are now really getting to the point where merely getting by isn't what society expects of them and they know this. What makes it a more satisfying experience than the first film is that there is a heart and a soul to it and for the last 20 minutes or so (basically after the donkey-sex scene finishes) we care what happens to them and credit Smith for achieving that for the first time since Chasing Amy.
LISTENING TO: As usual it's a strange and eclectic bunch. New albums by The Go! Team and Alabama 3 are up there and both of those are pretty good. However, you can't beat the two great older albums I've been listening to, Live Rust by Neil Young & Crazy Horse and The Future by Leonard Cohen. Great songs, great lyrics, great performances and just great artists at work. Speaking of which, we'll have an interview with Terrorvision's Tony Wright soon and their albums have been on rotation too. Not quite the same, but good fun and lots of teenage memories nonetheless.
READING: To be honest I've not really had time to read much recently so I'm still on the Jung Chang book, which is still very good. Not much more to say really.
THE WRITER:
WATCHING: Breakfast at Tiffany's. The 1960s was full of bitter-sweet romantic-comedies and this effort from Pink Panther director Blake Edwards is the second best of the decade (after, of course, the peerless The Apartment). Obviously, you all know the story by now (and if you don't, what have you been doing with your life?), but familiarity does not breed contempt, mostly because of Audrey Hepburn's adorable performance as the iconic Holly Golightly. We'll gloss over Mickey Rooney's incredibly offensive Chinese neighbour Mr Yunioshi...
LISTENING TO: Bond songs. Okay, there are a few duffers (The Man With The Golden Gun, All Time High and License to Kill, mostly), but there's surprising quality to the 007 title songs. Monty Norman's theme is, of course, seminal, while the more modern numbers such as Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not Enough and You Know My Name are also toe-tapingling pleasing, mostly, it has to be said, because David Arnold is such a fan of John Barry. So, it's no surprise that the best songs belong to the man himself, with Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice and the peerless On Her Majesty's Secret Service still sounding as fresh and funky as they did back in the 60s.
READING: The Call of the Weird, Louis Theroux. Originally published in 2004, Theroux's first book doesn't tread any new ground - in fact, it's nothing more than a catch up with the people he met during his Weird Weekends series back in the late 90s. But so sensitive and unexploitative is Theroux in his reporting that it feels fresh and invigorating, and it speaks volumes for him as both a human and a professional that the majority of his subjects are happy to see him return.
THE EDITOR:
WATCHING: The last film I saw was Clerks II, which I didn't particularly have high hopes for (hence not bothering to see it at the cinema) but I was very pleasantly surprised. The vulgar humour and geeky dialogue of the first is all still there, but the theme of 'growing up' is much more urgent second time around because Dante and (to a lesser extent) Randal are now really getting to the point where merely getting by isn't what society expects of them and they know this. What makes it a more satisfying experience than the first film is that there is a heart and a soul to it and for the last 20 minutes or so (basically after the donkey-sex scene finishes) we care what happens to them and credit Smith for achieving that for the first time since Chasing Amy.
LISTENING TO: As usual it's a strange and eclectic bunch. New albums by The Go! Team and Alabama 3 are up there and both of those are pretty good. However, you can't beat the two great older albums I've been listening to, Live Rust by Neil Young & Crazy Horse and The Future by Leonard Cohen. Great songs, great lyrics, great performances and just great artists at work. Speaking of which, we'll have an interview with Terrorvision's Tony Wright soon and their albums have been on rotation too. Not quite the same, but good fun and lots of teenage memories nonetheless.
READING: To be honest I've not really had time to read much recently so I'm still on the Jung Chang book, which is still very good. Not much more to say really.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Top Ten... Alternative 70s
Continuing our new (mini) series of Top Tens, we're looking over the alternative classic of the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s. So, what do we mean by alternative? Well, alternative, for the purposes of these entries, means anything that is critically derided, overlooked by the public or just generally under-rated. Ultimately, though, it all comes down to how we argue it, so if you disagree, let us know!
FILMS - By The Writer
1. Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979)
One of the few remakes to rival the original, Werner Herzog's haunting 1979 interpretation of Nosferatu ranks as one of the great director's classics. Herzog takes the vampire mythos back to Bram Stoker's 19th century, creating a haunting, almost otherworldly, atmosphere out of the gothic architecture of Germany and Transylvania. Regular star Klaus Kinski puts in one of his most magnetic performances and although Herzog made it simply to pay homage to the original (which he considers the finest German movie ever made), it stands on its own as a tribute to what a truly great director can create, even when working from someone else's film.
2. Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)
The 1970s saw the rise of American greats such as Coppola, Scorsese and Spielberg, but it also witnessed the first films from Peter Wier. Now best known for his work in Hollywood (Truman Show, Master and Commander) the Australian director made his name with this small-scale tale of three Aussie schoolgirls who disappear on a field-trip to the titular beauty spot. The film is an adaptation of Joan Lindsay's novel of the same name which, for a long time, was considered to be based on a true story. Of course, it isn‘t, but watching the haunting realism of Weir's film, you'll believe it is.
3. Network (1976)
Although well-regarded by film critics, Network is surprisingly overlooked by the general public considering how prescient it is. Telling the story of a news anchorman who becomes a ratings sensation after threatening to kill himself live on air, the film investigates and condemns the soulless TV executives who’ll do anything and exploit anyone to get the gullible public to tune into their channel. You get the feeling Simon Cowell is not a fan…
4. The Conversation (1974)
Made between Godfathers 1 and 2, Francis Ford Coppola's taut, paranoid thriller stars Gene Hackman as a surveillance expert who finds himself dragged into a deadly game of cat and mouse when he discovers a couple he is spying on may be about to be murdered. Sound familiar? It should, because The Conversation is basically Blow Up with sound instead of photos. But Coppola's direction, Hackman's tetchy performance and Walter Murch's revolutionary sound design make this film an overlooked and surprisingly original classic which perfectly reflects the post-Watergate paranoia of its time.
5. Logan's Run (1976)
Thanks to Star Wars, the 70s was packed with dodgy, cash-in sci-fi films. Logan's Run, however, is not one of them. Sure it's light and fluffy considering it depicts a dystopian society in which you're shot when you hit the age of thirty, but there's a sense of intelligent fun to it that so many sci-fis lacked at the time. Michael York makes for a cracking leading man, Jenny Agutter gets some entirely gratuitous nudity and the sets look superb, despite being very, very 70s.
6. The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
If you've only seen the fun but dumb remake of The Hills Have Eyes, rent this original. Though lacking the brutal terror of Last House on the Left and mainstream appeal of Nightmare on Elm Street, Wes Craven's sophomore effort is probably his most accomplished film to date, merging, as it does, the social concerns many horror films at the time investigated with genuine white knuckle fear that the remake simply couldn't touch.
7. Suspiria (1977)
Italian director Dario Argento has always been one of world cinema's most edgy horror directors, but this brutal tale of a young woman who discovers the ballet academy she is studying at is actually run by witches pushes him so close to maverick madman territory you wonder how it ever got made. The answer, of course, is that it's bloody scary, with Argento generating a bizarre sense of creeping fear through his use of colour, score (Goblin's soundtrack is the best any horror film has ever boasted) and good old fashioned scares - the one at the window at the start is a doozy.
8. Barry Lyndon (1975)
I can't say I particularly love Barry Lyndon. It's the only Kubrick film I struggle to sit through and I’ve only seen the whole thing in stages, rather than in one long go. Most people agree, feeling the film is too stately and slow to really grip. However, if Clockwork Orange showcased Kubrick the social critic and 2001 was Kubrick as philosopher, this is Kubrick the artisan as the late, great director crafts some of the most gorgeously shot and beautifully lit period scenes ever committed to celluloid.
9. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)
Like the titular monsters, Invasion of the Body Snatchers is one of those films that just won’t go away. Already remade in 1993 as Body Snatchers and set for another reboot this year under the name The Invasion (I eagerly await the next film, ‘Of The’), the first attempt to modernise Don Siegel’s 1955 B-Movie classic was helmed by Right Stuff director Phillip Kaufman. Being made in the late 70s, it reflects the paranoia and general mistrust of the time perfectly and handed a first big role to Jeff Goldblum. For that alone it deserves legendary status.
10. King Kong (1976)
Yes, of course, the 1976 remake of King Kong is terrible. Jeff Bridges and Jessica Lange look hopelessly out of their depth, the attempt to update the classic story simply shows how silly the idea of a giant ape is and Kong himself, well, best leave poor Kong alone. But there's still something stupidly entertaining about the 76 remake. It’s like watching a primary school child’s interpretation of a great Shakespeare play and, although I know it‘s wrong, I just can’t help but be charmed by it every time I watch it.
ALBUMS - By The Editor
1. Dennis Wilson - Pacific Ocean Blue (1977)
Dennis was the great enigma of the Beach Boys and of the Wilson brothers. The only one in the group who was actually a surfer, he only became their drummer because Mrs Wilson made Brian and Carl include him. Often more interested in the partying and girls than the music, he still went on to be one of the most talented songwriters in the group. Pacific Ocean Blue was his only solo album and lives up to all the promise of the songs he wrote for the band in the 70s. It sounds nothing like the Beach Boys and is all the better for it.
2. Gene Clark - No Other (1974)
David Crosby and Gram Parsons may be two better known former Byrds, but Gene Clark still produced one of the best albums of any of them. Unfortuately, when No Other was released in 1974, its baroque-pop stylings and rather pretentious-sounding lyrics were pretty much laughed at, and hardly anyone bought it. More than 30 years on, we can see that they were all missing out on not just one of the most underrated albums of the 70s, but also one of the best.
3. Lou Reed - Lou Reed (1972)
An example of an album that is not only underrated by the critics and fans, but also by the artist themselves. At a time when the Velvet Underground were starting to achieve some fame after they had split, there was plenty of interest in Lou Reed's solo career. He seemed to be a little unsure of himself at this stage and ended up re-recording some forgotten VU tracks and the end result was largely ignored by critics and fans, with Transformer arriving later in the year to proper launch Reed upon the world. However, his debut is still very enjoyable.
4. George Harrison - George Harrison (1979)
By the late 70s, Harrison's patchy solo career was already drifting into obscurity and this excellent self-titled release was 'just another George Harrison album', overshadowed by the impending return to the limelight of John Lennon and the commercial successes of Paul McCartney and Wings. However, with great tracks like Love Comes To Everyone, Blow Away, Faster and the beautiful Your Love Is Forever, this is a real underrated masterpiece from the former Beatle.
5. Steve Cropper - With A Little Help From My Friends (1971)
Steve Cropper was a member of Booker T And The MGs and played guitar on some of the greatest hits by Stax superstars like Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett and Sam & Dave. In 1971 he finally got the chance for some solo action of his own, and despite the hints from the title that there might be some famous names providing vocals for him, it's his guitar that shines through in a load of excellent instrumental soul tracks.
6. Betty Davis - Betty Davis (1973)
She married Miles Davis and had alleged 'liaisons' with Jimi Hendrix, so it was no surprise that Betty Davis had a few tricks of her own when it came to music. Hard-edged funk was the name of the day on her solo release, with the lyrics focusing on sex and sleaze and just having a good time (all of which was a bit much even for her wild husband) and with a great rhythm section backing her up, it's a shame she didn't get the chance to really grow and live up to the promise of this album.
7. Kiss - Ace Frehley (1978)
In 1978, Kiss came up with the idea of expanding upon their individual characters by allowing each member to release a 'solo' album under the general Kiss brand. All on the same day. Of the four records, Ace Frehley provided the best, even though he didn't push the envelope quite as much as Gene Simmons or Peter Criss when it came to moving away from the kind of music Kiss were making at the time. He was always the coolest member of the band and songs like Rip It Out and Snow Blind just demonstrate why he should have been given more chances to shine by the two leaders of the group.
8. Frank Sinatra - Trilogy (1979)
Having released some of the best albums of the 50s and 60s, Sinatra hardly released anything at all in the 70s, spending most of his time performing instead. So when he returned with a three-record set called Past - Present - Future, eyebrows were raised. It provided him with one of his signature tunes, New York New York, and the Past and Present sections are very easy for fans to enjoy. What makes it interesting though is the Future, where he does sci-fi, singing songs by Gordon Jenkins all about space travel. It's madness, but it works. Not that you'll many people who agree.
9. Frank Zappa - Joe's Garage (1979)
Another lengthy album, Joe's Garage is one of the best examples of Zappa's mixture of cautionary tales of groupies and government censorship with his wacky toilet humour. At times it can go off the rails and the sheer length of it can be off-putting, but it's one of Zappa's best and most cohesive albums and the narration by the Big Brother-esque Central Scruntiniser is hilarious.
10. Bunny Wailer - Blackheart Man (1976)
Never as renowned as either of the other two original Wailers (Bob Marley and Peter Tosh), Bunny Livingstone was arguably just as talented and while his solo debut remains a critical rather than commercial triumph, he has at least gone on to become one of roots reggae's elder statesman purely by outliving the other two. Closing track This Train is one of the best songs of the genre ever and there's no weak tracks here.
Continuing our new (mini) series of Top Tens, we're looking over the alternative classic of the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s. So, what do we mean by alternative? Well, alternative, for the purposes of these entries, means anything that is critically derided, overlooked by the public or just generally under-rated. Ultimately, though, it all comes down to how we argue it, so if you disagree, let us know!
FILMS - By The Writer
1. Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979)
One of the few remakes to rival the original, Werner Herzog's haunting 1979 interpretation of Nosferatu ranks as one of the great director's classics. Herzog takes the vampire mythos back to Bram Stoker's 19th century, creating a haunting, almost otherworldly, atmosphere out of the gothic architecture of Germany and Transylvania. Regular star Klaus Kinski puts in one of his most magnetic performances and although Herzog made it simply to pay homage to the original (which he considers the finest German movie ever made), it stands on its own as a tribute to what a truly great director can create, even when working from someone else's film.
2. Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)
The 1970s saw the rise of American greats such as Coppola, Scorsese and Spielberg, but it also witnessed the first films from Peter Wier. Now best known for his work in Hollywood (Truman Show, Master and Commander) the Australian director made his name with this small-scale tale of three Aussie schoolgirls who disappear on a field-trip to the titular beauty spot. The film is an adaptation of Joan Lindsay's novel of the same name which, for a long time, was considered to be based on a true story. Of course, it isn‘t, but watching the haunting realism of Weir's film, you'll believe it is.
3. Network (1976)
Although well-regarded by film critics, Network is surprisingly overlooked by the general public considering how prescient it is. Telling the story of a news anchorman who becomes a ratings sensation after threatening to kill himself live on air, the film investigates and condemns the soulless TV executives who’ll do anything and exploit anyone to get the gullible public to tune into their channel. You get the feeling Simon Cowell is not a fan…
4. The Conversation (1974)
Made between Godfathers 1 and 2, Francis Ford Coppola's taut, paranoid thriller stars Gene Hackman as a surveillance expert who finds himself dragged into a deadly game of cat and mouse when he discovers a couple he is spying on may be about to be murdered. Sound familiar? It should, because The Conversation is basically Blow Up with sound instead of photos. But Coppola's direction, Hackman's tetchy performance and Walter Murch's revolutionary sound design make this film an overlooked and surprisingly original classic which perfectly reflects the post-Watergate paranoia of its time.
5. Logan's Run (1976)
Thanks to Star Wars, the 70s was packed with dodgy, cash-in sci-fi films. Logan's Run, however, is not one of them. Sure it's light and fluffy considering it depicts a dystopian society in which you're shot when you hit the age of thirty, but there's a sense of intelligent fun to it that so many sci-fis lacked at the time. Michael York makes for a cracking leading man, Jenny Agutter gets some entirely gratuitous nudity and the sets look superb, despite being very, very 70s.
6. The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
If you've only seen the fun but dumb remake of The Hills Have Eyes, rent this original. Though lacking the brutal terror of Last House on the Left and mainstream appeal of Nightmare on Elm Street, Wes Craven's sophomore effort is probably his most accomplished film to date, merging, as it does, the social concerns many horror films at the time investigated with genuine white knuckle fear that the remake simply couldn't touch.
7. Suspiria (1977)
Italian director Dario Argento has always been one of world cinema's most edgy horror directors, but this brutal tale of a young woman who discovers the ballet academy she is studying at is actually run by witches pushes him so close to maverick madman territory you wonder how it ever got made. The answer, of course, is that it's bloody scary, with Argento generating a bizarre sense of creeping fear through his use of colour, score (Goblin's soundtrack is the best any horror film has ever boasted) and good old fashioned scares - the one at the window at the start is a doozy.
8. Barry Lyndon (1975)
I can't say I particularly love Barry Lyndon. It's the only Kubrick film I struggle to sit through and I’ve only seen the whole thing in stages, rather than in one long go. Most people agree, feeling the film is too stately and slow to really grip. However, if Clockwork Orange showcased Kubrick the social critic and 2001 was Kubrick as philosopher, this is Kubrick the artisan as the late, great director crafts some of the most gorgeously shot and beautifully lit period scenes ever committed to celluloid.
9. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)
Like the titular monsters, Invasion of the Body Snatchers is one of those films that just won’t go away. Already remade in 1993 as Body Snatchers and set for another reboot this year under the name The Invasion (I eagerly await the next film, ‘Of The’), the first attempt to modernise Don Siegel’s 1955 B-Movie classic was helmed by Right Stuff director Phillip Kaufman. Being made in the late 70s, it reflects the paranoia and general mistrust of the time perfectly and handed a first big role to Jeff Goldblum. For that alone it deserves legendary status.
10. King Kong (1976)
Yes, of course, the 1976 remake of King Kong is terrible. Jeff Bridges and Jessica Lange look hopelessly out of their depth, the attempt to update the classic story simply shows how silly the idea of a giant ape is and Kong himself, well, best leave poor Kong alone. But there's still something stupidly entertaining about the 76 remake. It’s like watching a primary school child’s interpretation of a great Shakespeare play and, although I know it‘s wrong, I just can’t help but be charmed by it every time I watch it.
ALBUMS - By The Editor
1. Dennis Wilson - Pacific Ocean Blue (1977)
Dennis was the great enigma of the Beach Boys and of the Wilson brothers. The only one in the group who was actually a surfer, he only became their drummer because Mrs Wilson made Brian and Carl include him. Often more interested in the partying and girls than the music, he still went on to be one of the most talented songwriters in the group. Pacific Ocean Blue was his only solo album and lives up to all the promise of the songs he wrote for the band in the 70s. It sounds nothing like the Beach Boys and is all the better for it.
2. Gene Clark - No Other (1974)
David Crosby and Gram Parsons may be two better known former Byrds, but Gene Clark still produced one of the best albums of any of them. Unfortuately, when No Other was released in 1974, its baroque-pop stylings and rather pretentious-sounding lyrics were pretty much laughed at, and hardly anyone bought it. More than 30 years on, we can see that they were all missing out on not just one of the most underrated albums of the 70s, but also one of the best.
3. Lou Reed - Lou Reed (1972)
An example of an album that is not only underrated by the critics and fans, but also by the artist themselves. At a time when the Velvet Underground were starting to achieve some fame after they had split, there was plenty of interest in Lou Reed's solo career. He seemed to be a little unsure of himself at this stage and ended up re-recording some forgotten VU tracks and the end result was largely ignored by critics and fans, with Transformer arriving later in the year to proper launch Reed upon the world. However, his debut is still very enjoyable.
4. George Harrison - George Harrison (1979)
By the late 70s, Harrison's patchy solo career was already drifting into obscurity and this excellent self-titled release was 'just another George Harrison album', overshadowed by the impending return to the limelight of John Lennon and the commercial successes of Paul McCartney and Wings. However, with great tracks like Love Comes To Everyone, Blow Away, Faster and the beautiful Your Love Is Forever, this is a real underrated masterpiece from the former Beatle.
5. Steve Cropper - With A Little Help From My Friends (1971)
Steve Cropper was a member of Booker T And The MGs and played guitar on some of the greatest hits by Stax superstars like Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett and Sam & Dave. In 1971 he finally got the chance for some solo action of his own, and despite the hints from the title that there might be some famous names providing vocals for him, it's his guitar that shines through in a load of excellent instrumental soul tracks.
6. Betty Davis - Betty Davis (1973)
She married Miles Davis and had alleged 'liaisons' with Jimi Hendrix, so it was no surprise that Betty Davis had a few tricks of her own when it came to music. Hard-edged funk was the name of the day on her solo release, with the lyrics focusing on sex and sleaze and just having a good time (all of which was a bit much even for her wild husband) and with a great rhythm section backing her up, it's a shame she didn't get the chance to really grow and live up to the promise of this album.
7. Kiss - Ace Frehley (1978)
In 1978, Kiss came up with the idea of expanding upon their individual characters by allowing each member to release a 'solo' album under the general Kiss brand. All on the same day. Of the four records, Ace Frehley provided the best, even though he didn't push the envelope quite as much as Gene Simmons or Peter Criss when it came to moving away from the kind of music Kiss were making at the time. He was always the coolest member of the band and songs like Rip It Out and Snow Blind just demonstrate why he should have been given more chances to shine by the two leaders of the group.
8. Frank Sinatra - Trilogy (1979)
Having released some of the best albums of the 50s and 60s, Sinatra hardly released anything at all in the 70s, spending most of his time performing instead. So when he returned with a three-record set called Past - Present - Future, eyebrows were raised. It provided him with one of his signature tunes, New York New York, and the Past and Present sections are very easy for fans to enjoy. What makes it interesting though is the Future, where he does sci-fi, singing songs by Gordon Jenkins all about space travel. It's madness, but it works. Not that you'll many people who agree.
9. Frank Zappa - Joe's Garage (1979)
Another lengthy album, Joe's Garage is one of the best examples of Zappa's mixture of cautionary tales of groupies and government censorship with his wacky toilet humour. At times it can go off the rails and the sheer length of it can be off-putting, but it's one of Zappa's best and most cohesive albums and the narration by the Big Brother-esque Central Scruntiniser is hilarious.
10. Bunny Wailer - Blackheart Man (1976)
Never as renowned as either of the other two original Wailers (Bob Marley and Peter Tosh), Bunny Livingstone was arguably just as talented and while his solo debut remains a critical rather than commercial triumph, he has at least gone on to become one of roots reggae's elder statesman purely by outliving the other two. Closing track This Train is one of the best songs of the genre ever and there's no weak tracks here.
Friday, August 10, 2007
ENTERTAINMENT ESSENTIALS: ANTHONY WILSON
On the front cover of the 24 Hour Party People soundtrack album Ian Curtis is described as a GENIUS, Shaun Ryder is a POET and Tony Wilson is a TWAT. This pretty much sums up the appreciation of Wilson for his contribution to Manchester music, even from a film that pretty much tells his side of the story. Of course, a lot of this is a typically Mancunian lack of pretension or nostalgia, but it's always seemed a little unfair.
At last year's Manchester Vs Cancer gig, when he introduced New Order's storming Joy Division set, Wilson was roundly booed by a crowd who didn't really know why they were booing him other than that he was a TWAT. Even Bernard Sumner chastised them for it during the show. The great tragedy of it was that just over a year and a half later, it is cancer that today killed him.
While he wasn't a music genius and his business sense was questionable to say the least, Madchester quite probably wouldn't have happened without him, Joy Division/New Order might never have become famous, the Happy Mondays might never have got round to releasing anything at all and the Hacienda wouldn't have existed. What kind of musical heritage would this city have had?
And it wasn't just the music either, Wilson's day job was in the media and worked on local news shows like Granada Tonight as well as having a show on Radio Manchester. Whatever you think of him, he was a Manchester legend and while it's very sad to have to put this up so soon after our obit feature on Lee Hazlewood, Wilson was much more important to Manc music and hopefully one good thing to come from his death (apart from perhaps some soul-searching about cancer treatment - the NHS refused to pay for the drug he needed to beat the disease) will be that the city he loved will finally start to love him back.
On the front cover of the 24 Hour Party People soundtrack album Ian Curtis is described as a GENIUS, Shaun Ryder is a POET and Tony Wilson is a TWAT. This pretty much sums up the appreciation of Wilson for his contribution to Manchester music, even from a film that pretty much tells his side of the story. Of course, a lot of this is a typically Mancunian lack of pretension or nostalgia, but it's always seemed a little unfair.
At last year's Manchester Vs Cancer gig, when he introduced New Order's storming Joy Division set, Wilson was roundly booed by a crowd who didn't really know why they were booing him other than that he was a TWAT. Even Bernard Sumner chastised them for it during the show. The great tragedy of it was that just over a year and a half later, it is cancer that today killed him.
While he wasn't a music genius and his business sense was questionable to say the least, Madchester quite probably wouldn't have happened without him, Joy Division/New Order might never have become famous, the Happy Mondays might never have got round to releasing anything at all and the Hacienda wouldn't have existed. What kind of musical heritage would this city have had?
And it wasn't just the music either, Wilson's day job was in the media and worked on local news shows like Granada Tonight as well as having a show on Radio Manchester. Whatever you think of him, he was a Manchester legend and while it's very sad to have to put this up so soon after our obit feature on Lee Hazlewood, Wilson was much more important to Manc music and hopefully one good thing to come from his death (apart from perhaps some soul-searching about cancer treatment - the NHS refused to pay for the drug he needed to beat the disease) will be that the city he loved will finally start to love him back.
Monday, August 06, 2007
THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT... LEE HAZLEWOOD
Some velvet mornin' when I'm straight
I'm gonna open up your gate
And maybe tell you 'bout Phaedra
And how she gave me life
And how she made it end
Some velvet mornin' when I'm straight
So begins one of the strangest pop songs of all time, Some Velvet Morning by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood, one of the most amazing and completely surreal pop duos ever. Frank Sinatra's sweet-voiced little girl and a big ugly country singer with a DEEP voice and a quirky sense of humour made for a potent and unique combination and while Nancy was a big part of that success, it was mostly down to Lee, who sadly died at the weekend.
Hazlewood wrote Nancy's biggest hit - and girl power anthem - These Boots Are Made For Walkin' as well as writing, producing and singing with her on classic tracks like Summerwine, Sand and Ladybird. He also discovered and gave Duane Eddy and Gram Parsons their first big breaks, but what made him so special was his quirkiness and darker edges.
Famously, he instructed Sinatra to sing These Boots 'like a 14 year old who fucks truck drivers', while the sweet and innocent-sounding Sugartown was actually an ode to LSD. Fittingly, when he discovered that he was dying of cancer, Hazlewood was spurred into action and recorded one last album called Cake And Death after an Eddie Izzard joke. Idiosyncratic to the last, he even did a new version of Some Velvet Morning sung by his young granddaughter Phaedra.
It's a hit and miss collection, as are almost all of his albums, simply because Hazlewood has always been an artist who works to his own beat and makes music for himself. With Cake And Death he started into the abyss and still found something to laugh at and something to make you smile. There was no-one else like him in the music industry and there probably never will be again and that's why he will be sorely missed even if he was always too offbeat for the mainstream.
But ask Jarvis Cocker, Richard Hawley or Nick Cave who inspired them to get into music and they'll all say Lee Hazlewood...
Some velvet mornin' when I'm straight
I'm gonna open up your gate
And maybe tell you 'bout Phaedra
And how she gave me life
And how she made it end
Some velvet mornin' when I'm straight
So begins one of the strangest pop songs of all time, Some Velvet Morning by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood, one of the most amazing and completely surreal pop duos ever. Frank Sinatra's sweet-voiced little girl and a big ugly country singer with a DEEP voice and a quirky sense of humour made for a potent and unique combination and while Nancy was a big part of that success, it was mostly down to Lee, who sadly died at the weekend.
Hazlewood wrote Nancy's biggest hit - and girl power anthem - These Boots Are Made For Walkin' as well as writing, producing and singing with her on classic tracks like Summerwine, Sand and Ladybird. He also discovered and gave Duane Eddy and Gram Parsons their first big breaks, but what made him so special was his quirkiness and darker edges.
Famously, he instructed Sinatra to sing These Boots 'like a 14 year old who fucks truck drivers', while the sweet and innocent-sounding Sugartown was actually an ode to LSD. Fittingly, when he discovered that he was dying of cancer, Hazlewood was spurred into action and recorded one last album called Cake And Death after an Eddie Izzard joke. Idiosyncratic to the last, he even did a new version of Some Velvet Morning sung by his young granddaughter Phaedra.
It's a hit and miss collection, as are almost all of his albums, simply because Hazlewood has always been an artist who works to his own beat and makes music for himself. With Cake And Death he started into the abyss and still found something to laugh at and something to make you smile. There was no-one else like him in the music industry and there probably never will be again and that's why he will be sorely missed even if he was always too offbeat for the mainstream.
But ask Jarvis Cocker, Richard Hawley or Nick Cave who inspired them to get into music and they'll all say Lee Hazlewood...
Saturday, August 04, 2007
WATCHING, READING AND LISTENING TO
THE EDITOR:
WATCHING - The Da Vinci Code on DVD was the last thing I saw. Never read the book, but was slightly disappointed that the 'plot twists' were all sign-posted way off by Ron Howard. However, I'm fascinated by history, so I found the whole thing quite interesting even if it was trying to pass a load of speculation off as 'FACTS', so it was quite enjoyable really. Also recently seen The Break-Up (alright, but not very funny) and The Holiday (VERY sappy and had Jude Law in it, but otherwise ok). Bring on The Simpsons Movie on Sunday night!
READING - Back to Jung Chang's Wild Swans. After reading her Mao biography I've become very interested in China's 20th Century meltdown, so it's very moving to go back to Chang's tale of the same period of history as told through the lives of her grandmother, her mother and herself. At the moment, her mother is a young radical Communist in a country ready for revolution and a better future under men like Mao. Sadly, the reality won't exactly match up to the idealogy and this book is set to get a whole lot darker...
LISTENING TO - As usual a really wide range of music, but things that have been going down well recently include: REM's Life's Rich Pageant and Reckoning, both awesome early albums, though I also really enjoyed Around The Sun, so I'm not one of those tiresome people who don't like their modern music just because you can understand what Michael Stipe says nowadays; Death Cab For Cutie; the new Josh Rouse album; Al Bowlly, a great pre-war British singer probably best known now for a song used a couple of times in The Shining, called Midnight, The Stars And You. Lovely music.
THE WRITER:
WATCHING - The last thing I watched at the cinema was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which is ok but overloaded with plot and simplistic political subtext (especially in the Dolores Umbridge character). On DVD, I last watched Zathura, which is Jumanja in space but highly enjoyable and directed with real zest by Jon Favreau. And on TV, I'm still struggling to get into Heroes. It's perfectly ok, but the plot relies too heavily on tenuous mystery instead of genuine character development, something not helped by the fact that most of them are intechangable hunks who do little else but muse on fate and destiny.
READING - Essential X-Men Volume 2. Now, this is what you want if you're looking for intelligent superhero stories. The Dark Phoenix saga, the Days of Future Past and the introduction of Kitty Pryde are all included in this collection of classic Chris Claremont and John Bryne X-stories from the 1980s. Obviously some things (Banshee's incredibly silly Irish accent for one) don't really stand up to the test of time, but anything that has evil goddesses, space fights and alternate futures ruled by the Sentinals is ok by me.
LISTENING TO - Raiders of the Lost Ark score. In celebration of the fact Indiana Jones 4 seems to be proceeding quite nicely (with added Karen Allen - hurrah), I've been listening to the score for Raiders of the Lost Ark. Obviously, the Raiders March is the best and most memorable piece, but the less well known cuts are also impressive, especially the romantic Marion's Theme and that great shift from elegant elegy to apocalyptic poundings that happens when the Nazis open the Ark and all hell (and face-melting special effects) break loose.
THE EDITOR:
WATCHING - The Da Vinci Code on DVD was the last thing I saw. Never read the book, but was slightly disappointed that the 'plot twists' were all sign-posted way off by Ron Howard. However, I'm fascinated by history, so I found the whole thing quite interesting even if it was trying to pass a load of speculation off as 'FACTS', so it was quite enjoyable really. Also recently seen The Break-Up (alright, but not very funny) and The Holiday (VERY sappy and had Jude Law in it, but otherwise ok). Bring on The Simpsons Movie on Sunday night!
READING - Back to Jung Chang's Wild Swans. After reading her Mao biography I've become very interested in China's 20th Century meltdown, so it's very moving to go back to Chang's tale of the same period of history as told through the lives of her grandmother, her mother and herself. At the moment, her mother is a young radical Communist in a country ready for revolution and a better future under men like Mao. Sadly, the reality won't exactly match up to the idealogy and this book is set to get a whole lot darker...
LISTENING TO - As usual a really wide range of music, but things that have been going down well recently include: REM's Life's Rich Pageant and Reckoning, both awesome early albums, though I also really enjoyed Around The Sun, so I'm not one of those tiresome people who don't like their modern music just because you can understand what Michael Stipe says nowadays; Death Cab For Cutie; the new Josh Rouse album; Al Bowlly, a great pre-war British singer probably best known now for a song used a couple of times in The Shining, called Midnight, The Stars And You. Lovely music.
THE WRITER:
WATCHING - The last thing I watched at the cinema was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which is ok but overloaded with plot and simplistic political subtext (especially in the Dolores Umbridge character). On DVD, I last watched Zathura, which is Jumanja in space but highly enjoyable and directed with real zest by Jon Favreau. And on TV, I'm still struggling to get into Heroes. It's perfectly ok, but the plot relies too heavily on tenuous mystery instead of genuine character development, something not helped by the fact that most of them are intechangable hunks who do little else but muse on fate and destiny.
READING - Essential X-Men Volume 2. Now, this is what you want if you're looking for intelligent superhero stories. The Dark Phoenix saga, the Days of Future Past and the introduction of Kitty Pryde are all included in this collection of classic Chris Claremont and John Bryne X-stories from the 1980s. Obviously some things (Banshee's incredibly silly Irish accent for one) don't really stand up to the test of time, but anything that has evil goddesses, space fights and alternate futures ruled by the Sentinals is ok by me.
LISTENING TO - Raiders of the Lost Ark score. In celebration of the fact Indiana Jones 4 seems to be proceeding quite nicely (with added Karen Allen - hurrah), I've been listening to the score for Raiders of the Lost Ark. Obviously, the Raiders March is the best and most memorable piece, but the less well known cuts are also impressive, especially the romantic Marion's Theme and that great shift from elegant elegy to apocalyptic poundings that happens when the Nazis open the Ark and all hell (and face-melting special effects) break loose.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Top Ten Simpsons episodes
1. Homer the Heretic
When Homer oversleeps and misses church one Sunday, he discovers the joys of butter-filled waffles and finding one penny coins hiding under the sofa in this excellent episode that displays the show at its satirical height. The issue here is religion and writer George Meyer manages to strike a perfect balance by highlighting its good side (through Marge’s genuinely despairing pleas) while all the time showing how frustrating it is ("I'm not a bad guy,” Homer tells God. “I work hard, and I love my kids. So why should I spend half my Sunday hearing about how I'm going to Hell?"). That such issues could be raised in a prime-time animation underlines why The Simpsons was such an important show in the 90s.
2. Cape Feare
Nobody can do movie parodies quite like The Simpsons and this send-up of Martin Scorsese's Cape Fear remake is the best the show has produced. Having made a mockery of America's judicial system (“nobody who speaks German can be evil” says one lawmaker) Sideshow Bob makes his first concerted attempt to kill his mortal enemy Bart, forcing the family to relocate to a houseboat in the scenic and ironically-named Lake Terror. Mixing short and subtle gags (Homer proudly wearing a Witness Relocation Program t-shirt), with long, drawn-out sketches (one word: rakes), it’s relentlessly funny and contains a classic Chief Wiggum line (“Bake him away, toys”).
3. Homer: Bad Man
That Homer's inventive use of a bag of fizzy candy and can of cola is far from the best thing in this episode speaks volumes for its quality. A razor sharp satire on TV news, this season five classic finds our porcine hero accused of sexual harassment after he peeled a gummy Venus di Milo off the backside of a babysitter. Kent Brockman reports scurrilous rumours and hearsay as fact and newsmagazine Rock Bottom makes savage use of the editing machine to further condemn poor Homie. Thankfully, 'Rowdy Roddy Peeper' Groundskeeper Willie comes to the rescue, but alas the ordeal has had no effect whatsoever on Homer: "Listen to that music, Marge, he's evil!"
4. Last Exit to Springfield
Matt Groening has often said the audience loves a slow-thinker and this classic episode proves that theory. Lisa develops tooth problems at the same time Mr Burns decides to ditch the power plant's dental plan. Thankfully, Homer is on hand to act as union representative, but is quickly tempted to comply with Burns' plan after being bribed by a keg of beer. In the queue for a pint, Homer tries to put two and two together ('Lisa needs braces/DENTAL PLAN' go his insistent thoughts), but it's a good thirty seconds and a well-placed pencil in the ass-crack before the penny drops. Classic, relevant Simpsons satire with the bonus of having some classic Lenny and Carl moments. What more could we ask for?
5. Duffless
One of the most impressive things about The Simpsons and the reason why imitators like Family Guy and South Park have never quite matched its popularity, is the sense of love and morality that the series produces. ‘Homer vs Lisa and the Fifth Amendment’ and ‘Lisa Goes to Washington’ are both episodes with serious moral points, but the one issue that was rarely tackled in the early years is alcoholism - until this 1996 episode, that is. Having been reprimanded for driving while under the influence, Homer swears off the devil's juice for a month, losing weight and spending more time with his kids as a result. Once the month’s up, of course, he's tempted back to Moe's, but chooses a sunset bike ride with Marge instead. What other show could make alcoholism so moving?
6. Mother Simpson
Grandpa Simpson may be a crotchety old man with a penchant for telling stories nobody wants to hear, but what about Grandma Simpson? In this bitter-sweet episode from season seven, Homer meets up with his long lost mother but eventually has to wave goodbye when Mr Burns seeks revenge for her nuclear power protests some thirty years earlier. The show is dedicated to a late animator, and the closing credits featuring a lonely Homer sat on the bonnet of his car watching the star-lit sky drift by are appropriately melancholic.
7. Treehouse of Horror V
The Treehouse of Horror episodes are often erratic, but they do contain some of the most spot-on movie parodies ever created. The King Kong, Tron and numerous Twilight Zone references are top notch, while the interpretation of Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven remains very special indeed, especially as it came so early in the show‘s history. However, it's Treehouse of Horror V that takes the crown with three wildly inventive segments, the best of which, of course, is The Shining parody, in which virtually every frame contains a joke, reference or cunning aside. Stanley Kubrick was apparently a huge fan of the show and you get the feeling he would have approved of this episode.
8. A Fish Called Selma
And speaking of superb movie parodies, this is the episode that satirises Planet of the Apes via the awesome power of Falco's Rock Me Amadeus. One of those great episodes which doesn't centre on Homer, but still gives him the best lines ('ooooh, I love legitimate the-atre'), A Fish Called Selma finds everybody’s favourite B-movie legend Troy McClure marrying Marge's sister in a bid to quash rumours of his sordid sex life and resurrect his long-dead Hollywood star. Sad and funny in equal measure, its poignancy has only been added to since the tragic demise of voice artist Phil Hartman.
9. Two Cars in Every Garage and Three Eyes on Every Fish
No film is referenced quite as frequently (or quite as well) on The Simpsons as Citizen Kane and this politically-charged episode is full of spot-on parodies of Orson Welles’ 1941 classic. Obviously, it’s Mr Burns who’s the stand-in Kane here as he runs for Governor against Mary Bailey. Homer supports his boss, but Marge is 'a Bailey-booster', making this typical of the kind of intelligent and grounded family drama the now too-wacky show has moved away from in recent years.
10. One Fish, Two Fish, Blow Fish, Blue Fish
Mr Sulu makes a cameo, Bart and Lisa sing Shaft, the five stages of grief appear, the title puns on an old Dr Suess book, Mr Burns gets a telling off and Larry King reads the bible on tape…That this episode has all that comedy genius and still finds time for a genuinely moving plot that sees Homer think he’s going to die after eating some bad blowfish, makes it one of the best episodes of the first few series and the perfect way to end this top ten rundown.
1. Homer the Heretic
When Homer oversleeps and misses church one Sunday, he discovers the joys of butter-filled waffles and finding one penny coins hiding under the sofa in this excellent episode that displays the show at its satirical height. The issue here is religion and writer George Meyer manages to strike a perfect balance by highlighting its good side (through Marge’s genuinely despairing pleas) while all the time showing how frustrating it is ("I'm not a bad guy,” Homer tells God. “I work hard, and I love my kids. So why should I spend half my Sunday hearing about how I'm going to Hell?"). That such issues could be raised in a prime-time animation underlines why The Simpsons was such an important show in the 90s.
2. Cape Feare
Nobody can do movie parodies quite like The Simpsons and this send-up of Martin Scorsese's Cape Fear remake is the best the show has produced. Having made a mockery of America's judicial system (“nobody who speaks German can be evil” says one lawmaker) Sideshow Bob makes his first concerted attempt to kill his mortal enemy Bart, forcing the family to relocate to a houseboat in the scenic and ironically-named Lake Terror. Mixing short and subtle gags (Homer proudly wearing a Witness Relocation Program t-shirt), with long, drawn-out sketches (one word: rakes), it’s relentlessly funny and contains a classic Chief Wiggum line (“Bake him away, toys”).
3. Homer: Bad Man
That Homer's inventive use of a bag of fizzy candy and can of cola is far from the best thing in this episode speaks volumes for its quality. A razor sharp satire on TV news, this season five classic finds our porcine hero accused of sexual harassment after he peeled a gummy Venus di Milo off the backside of a babysitter. Kent Brockman reports scurrilous rumours and hearsay as fact and newsmagazine Rock Bottom makes savage use of the editing machine to further condemn poor Homie. Thankfully, 'Rowdy Roddy Peeper' Groundskeeper Willie comes to the rescue, but alas the ordeal has had no effect whatsoever on Homer: "Listen to that music, Marge, he's evil!"
4. Last Exit to Springfield
Matt Groening has often said the audience loves a slow-thinker and this classic episode proves that theory. Lisa develops tooth problems at the same time Mr Burns decides to ditch the power plant's dental plan. Thankfully, Homer is on hand to act as union representative, but is quickly tempted to comply with Burns' plan after being bribed by a keg of beer. In the queue for a pint, Homer tries to put two and two together ('Lisa needs braces/DENTAL PLAN' go his insistent thoughts), but it's a good thirty seconds and a well-placed pencil in the ass-crack before the penny drops. Classic, relevant Simpsons satire with the bonus of having some classic Lenny and Carl moments. What more could we ask for?
5. Duffless
One of the most impressive things about The Simpsons and the reason why imitators like Family Guy and South Park have never quite matched its popularity, is the sense of love and morality that the series produces. ‘Homer vs Lisa and the Fifth Amendment’ and ‘Lisa Goes to Washington’ are both episodes with serious moral points, but the one issue that was rarely tackled in the early years is alcoholism - until this 1996 episode, that is. Having been reprimanded for driving while under the influence, Homer swears off the devil's juice for a month, losing weight and spending more time with his kids as a result. Once the month’s up, of course, he's tempted back to Moe's, but chooses a sunset bike ride with Marge instead. What other show could make alcoholism so moving?
6. Mother Simpson
Grandpa Simpson may be a crotchety old man with a penchant for telling stories nobody wants to hear, but what about Grandma Simpson? In this bitter-sweet episode from season seven, Homer meets up with his long lost mother but eventually has to wave goodbye when Mr Burns seeks revenge for her nuclear power protests some thirty years earlier. The show is dedicated to a late animator, and the closing credits featuring a lonely Homer sat on the bonnet of his car watching the star-lit sky drift by are appropriately melancholic.
7. Treehouse of Horror V
The Treehouse of Horror episodes are often erratic, but they do contain some of the most spot-on movie parodies ever created. The King Kong, Tron and numerous Twilight Zone references are top notch, while the interpretation of Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven remains very special indeed, especially as it came so early in the show‘s history. However, it's Treehouse of Horror V that takes the crown with three wildly inventive segments, the best of which, of course, is The Shining parody, in which virtually every frame contains a joke, reference or cunning aside. Stanley Kubrick was apparently a huge fan of the show and you get the feeling he would have approved of this episode.
8. A Fish Called Selma
And speaking of superb movie parodies, this is the episode that satirises Planet of the Apes via the awesome power of Falco's Rock Me Amadeus. One of those great episodes which doesn't centre on Homer, but still gives him the best lines ('ooooh, I love legitimate the-atre'), A Fish Called Selma finds everybody’s favourite B-movie legend Troy McClure marrying Marge's sister in a bid to quash rumours of his sordid sex life and resurrect his long-dead Hollywood star. Sad and funny in equal measure, its poignancy has only been added to since the tragic demise of voice artist Phil Hartman.
9. Two Cars in Every Garage and Three Eyes on Every Fish
No film is referenced quite as frequently (or quite as well) on The Simpsons as Citizen Kane and this politically-charged episode is full of spot-on parodies of Orson Welles’ 1941 classic. Obviously, it’s Mr Burns who’s the stand-in Kane here as he runs for Governor against Mary Bailey. Homer supports his boss, but Marge is 'a Bailey-booster', making this typical of the kind of intelligent and grounded family drama the now too-wacky show has moved away from in recent years.
10. One Fish, Two Fish, Blow Fish, Blue Fish
Mr Sulu makes a cameo, Bart and Lisa sing Shaft, the five stages of grief appear, the title puns on an old Dr Suess book, Mr Burns gets a telling off and Larry King reads the bible on tape…That this episode has all that comedy genius and still finds time for a genuinely moving plot that sees Homer think he’s going to die after eating some bad blowfish, makes it one of the best episodes of the first few series and the perfect way to end this top ten rundown.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
WATCHING, READING AND LISTENING TO
THE WRITER:
WATCHING: Two rubbish 80s films in the shape of Robert Altman's Popeye and Police Academy 2. Yeah, not even the original, the second one! Of course, it's rubbish, but it still has the fella who can make the sound effects with his mouth and I could watch him in anything. Meanwhile, Popeye is surprisingly entertaining in an insane kinda way. Robin Williams and Shelley Duvall give impressively physical performances and Altman directs the whole thing with a madcap swagger that makes the film an entirely watchable flop.
LISTENING TO: Generation Terrorists, Manic Street Preachers. Having not listened to the Manics’ 1992 debut since I was about 17, I was surprised to hear that it still stands up - though only just. Little Baby Nothing is still cringe-inducing cheesy (if only they’d been given clearance for Kylie like they wanted!), while the Damn Dog cover and remix of Repeat add nothing. Still, with Motorcycle Emptiness, You Love Us and Condemned To Rock and Roll it can’t really fail.
READING: Warlord of Mars, by Edgar Rice Burroughs. I do love a good bit of pulpy science-fiction and you can't get any better than Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars series. Written in 1918, this third entry displays massive imagination and attention to detail. Sadly, that doesn’t stretch to character development, with our hero John Carter displaying all the personality of a plank of wood. Still, who needs characterisation when you've got hot naked Martian chicks and love-struck space heroes running around in zero gravity with guns. This is what the English language was made for!
THE EDITOR:
WATCHING: Supergirl. Yes, it's as bad as you remember. Also watched new TV Dexter, about a serial killer who helps the police track down serial killers and, in his spare time, tortures and murders serial killers. It's like CSI directed by Rob Zombie and stars Michael C Hall (from Six Feet Under) and while it's not exactly great on the basis of the first episode, it's certainly unusual and much better than Brothers And Sisters, which also features one of the stars of SFU. Actually, if you combined the domestic stories of that with the gruesome dead people and black humour of Dexter, you'd probably have Six Feet Under...
LISTENING TO: The Incredible Moses Leroy/The Softlightes, a great band who make lovely quirky pop music. Also Japanese band Acid Mother's Temple And The Cosmic Inferno's album Starless And Bible Black Sabbath, which has the great title track, over half an hour of crunching mindlessly repetitive riffs. And it's even better than that sounds. On the flipside, there's a modern album by the Temptations which I enjoyed recently even though it's just mainstream soul music with none of the classic edge of the REAL Temptations of the 60s and 70s...
READING: I was reading Wild Swans by Jung Chang, which I'm enjoying very much, but then at the weekend I discovered Transformers: Ghosts Of Yesterday by Alan Dean Foster for £2.99 in a bookshop in Chester. It's the prequel novel to the new film, so as someone whose entire life revolved around Transformers for most of my childhood, I figured it might help me enjoy the film a bit more. So far it's pretty good, lots of familiar names (I still love Starscream) and best of all, I can imagine them looking like the original characters instead of the grey shapeless lumps that Michael Bay's team have produced. But, to be fair, the characterisations are pretty faithful and if the film is as good as the prequel novel, it should be ok.
THE WRITER:
WATCHING: Two rubbish 80s films in the shape of Robert Altman's Popeye and Police Academy 2. Yeah, not even the original, the second one! Of course, it's rubbish, but it still has the fella who can make the sound effects with his mouth and I could watch him in anything. Meanwhile, Popeye is surprisingly entertaining in an insane kinda way. Robin Williams and Shelley Duvall give impressively physical performances and Altman directs the whole thing with a madcap swagger that makes the film an entirely watchable flop.
LISTENING TO: Generation Terrorists, Manic Street Preachers. Having not listened to the Manics’ 1992 debut since I was about 17, I was surprised to hear that it still stands up - though only just. Little Baby Nothing is still cringe-inducing cheesy (if only they’d been given clearance for Kylie like they wanted!), while the Damn Dog cover and remix of Repeat add nothing. Still, with Motorcycle Emptiness, You Love Us and Condemned To Rock and Roll it can’t really fail.
READING: Warlord of Mars, by Edgar Rice Burroughs. I do love a good bit of pulpy science-fiction and you can't get any better than Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars series. Written in 1918, this third entry displays massive imagination and attention to detail. Sadly, that doesn’t stretch to character development, with our hero John Carter displaying all the personality of a plank of wood. Still, who needs characterisation when you've got hot naked Martian chicks and love-struck space heroes running around in zero gravity with guns. This is what the English language was made for!
THE EDITOR:
WATCHING: Supergirl. Yes, it's as bad as you remember. Also watched new TV Dexter, about a serial killer who helps the police track down serial killers and, in his spare time, tortures and murders serial killers. It's like CSI directed by Rob Zombie and stars Michael C Hall (from Six Feet Under) and while it's not exactly great on the basis of the first episode, it's certainly unusual and much better than Brothers And Sisters, which also features one of the stars of SFU. Actually, if you combined the domestic stories of that with the gruesome dead people and black humour of Dexter, you'd probably have Six Feet Under...
LISTENING TO: The Incredible Moses Leroy/The Softlightes, a great band who make lovely quirky pop music. Also Japanese band Acid Mother's Temple And The Cosmic Inferno's album Starless And Bible Black Sabbath, which has the great title track, over half an hour of crunching mindlessly repetitive riffs. And it's even better than that sounds. On the flipside, there's a modern album by the Temptations which I enjoyed recently even though it's just mainstream soul music with none of the classic edge of the REAL Temptations of the 60s and 70s...
READING: I was reading Wild Swans by Jung Chang, which I'm enjoying very much, but then at the weekend I discovered Transformers: Ghosts Of Yesterday by Alan Dean Foster for £2.99 in a bookshop in Chester. It's the prequel novel to the new film, so as someone whose entire life revolved around Transformers for most of my childhood, I figured it might help me enjoy the film a bit more. So far it's pretty good, lots of familiar names (I still love Starscream) and best of all, I can imagine them looking like the original characters instead of the grey shapeless lumps that Michael Bay's team have produced. But, to be fair, the characterisations are pretty faithful and if the film is as good as the prequel novel, it should be ok.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
ENTERTAINMENT ESSENTIALS: Batman
For this week’s Entertainment Essentials, we’re taking you back to the summer of 1989. Jive Bunny's at number one, Seinfeld has made its debut on US TV and one word dominates the minds of filmgoers: Batman. One of the most successful films of the 1980s, Tim Burton’s delve into the world of the caped crusader brought the blockbuster bang up to date and remains hugely popular among twenty-somethings keen for a blast of sweet nostalgia. However, the rose-tinted glasses can be funny old things, and just as they’ve opened the door for Take That to make their horrifying return, so to have they worked their curious magic on Batman.
In the works for well over a decade, the film was originally scheduled for release in the late 70s/early 80s when it could take advantage of the overwhelming success of the first Superman flick. However, production problems kept the movie on hold and by the time it finally emerged in 1989, the fairy tale innocence of post-Vietnam blockbuster cinema (Superman, Star Wars et al), had hardened into the violent cynicism of Rambo and Die Hard.
Thankfully for producers, the comic book industry had kept up with the times. Titles such as The Dark Knight Returns (Frank Miller) and The Killing Joke (Alan Moore) had turned Batman from a campy caped crusader into a brooding detective looking for justice on the rain-drenched streets of Gotham. Mixing realism, emotion and sometimes horror, these books were wildly popular and their success inspired studio bosses to turn earlier scripts that had included Robin, The Penguin and Batgirl into something altogether more dark and adult.
Though bold and daring at the time, this decision can now be seen as the film's biggest problem. In trying to make a movie that had both darkness and mass-appeal, the filmmakers turned Batman 1989 into a mess of competing styles. Is it a gritty comic ripped straight from the work of Moore and Miller? Is it a dark, gothic fantasy with a brooding hero and deranged villain? Or is it a straight-up summer blockbuster with celebrity cameos and Prince soundtrack?
In truth, it’s all of the above, but what it most certainly is not is a Tim Burton film. Though the odd shot (the Batwing hauling away the Joker's ghastly parade balloons), idea (the Joker's teeth giggling post-death) or scene (The Joker's much parodied creation), are distinctly Burton-esque, the script, characters and themes are imported straight from Blockbuster 101 and you can almost see the maverick director wince as he limply shoots his way through Vikki Vale‘s love scenes with Bruce Wayne.
The one aspect of the film that does seem true to his style is Gotham itself. However, even this is misleading as the city was designed not by the director, but the late Anton Furst. One of the greatest production designers cinema has ever been blessed with, his career was short (he committed suicide in 1991) but brilliant, having also turned a disused British gasworks into Vietnam for Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket. Batman’s Gotham is his Gotham, not Burton’s, a fact that further adds to the film’s confused sense of authorship and is especially underlined when you compare it to superior sequel Batman Returns.
With Furst no longer around, Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands designer Bo Welsh was enlisted to build the Dark Knight’s dark city and the differences are clear to see. Whereas Furst’s Gotham is one of menace and darkness, ripped from the pages of Miller and Moore; Welsh’s is one of whimsy and colour, ripped from his director‘s imagination. It’s Vincent. It’s Edward Scissorhands. It’s The Corpse Bride. It’s totally in tune with Burton who, for all his quirks and twists, is simply not dark enough to accommodate Furst’s masterfully macabre Gotham.
Indeed, looking back now, the city also seems too dark for producers, because rather than complimenting Furst’s murky aesthetics with an equally grim script, they keep the rest of the film light and almost fluffy. The love story between Wayne and Vale feels tokenistic; we never get any real sense of our hero’s pain over his parents’ death (a flaw only exacerbated by the brilliant Batman Begins) and Jack Nicholson’s Joker is so over-the-top he makes Cesar Romero look like Marlon Brando.
Batman 1989 will forever have its place in history for not only that ridiculous performance, but also its groundbreaking marketing campaign and sensational design. But it’s a film lacking cohesion, substance and a clear sense of authorship and, with The Joker set to return to our screens in next year’s The Dark Knight, perhaps it’s time to let Burton’s film sail off into the past where it belongs.
For this week’s Entertainment Essentials, we’re taking you back to the summer of 1989. Jive Bunny's at number one, Seinfeld has made its debut on US TV and one word dominates the minds of filmgoers: Batman. One of the most successful films of the 1980s, Tim Burton’s delve into the world of the caped crusader brought the blockbuster bang up to date and remains hugely popular among twenty-somethings keen for a blast of sweet nostalgia. However, the rose-tinted glasses can be funny old things, and just as they’ve opened the door for Take That to make their horrifying return, so to have they worked their curious magic on Batman.
In the works for well over a decade, the film was originally scheduled for release in the late 70s/early 80s when it could take advantage of the overwhelming success of the first Superman flick. However, production problems kept the movie on hold and by the time it finally emerged in 1989, the fairy tale innocence of post-Vietnam blockbuster cinema (Superman, Star Wars et al), had hardened into the violent cynicism of Rambo and Die Hard.
Thankfully for producers, the comic book industry had kept up with the times. Titles such as The Dark Knight Returns (Frank Miller) and The Killing Joke (Alan Moore) had turned Batman from a campy caped crusader into a brooding detective looking for justice on the rain-drenched streets of Gotham. Mixing realism, emotion and sometimes horror, these books were wildly popular and their success inspired studio bosses to turn earlier scripts that had included Robin, The Penguin and Batgirl into something altogether more dark and adult.
Though bold and daring at the time, this decision can now be seen as the film's biggest problem. In trying to make a movie that had both darkness and mass-appeal, the filmmakers turned Batman 1989 into a mess of competing styles. Is it a gritty comic ripped straight from the work of Moore and Miller? Is it a dark, gothic fantasy with a brooding hero and deranged villain? Or is it a straight-up summer blockbuster with celebrity cameos and Prince soundtrack?
In truth, it’s all of the above, but what it most certainly is not is a Tim Burton film. Though the odd shot (the Batwing hauling away the Joker's ghastly parade balloons), idea (the Joker's teeth giggling post-death) or scene (The Joker's much parodied creation), are distinctly Burton-esque, the script, characters and themes are imported straight from Blockbuster 101 and you can almost see the maverick director wince as he limply shoots his way through Vikki Vale‘s love scenes with Bruce Wayne.
The one aspect of the film that does seem true to his style is Gotham itself. However, even this is misleading as the city was designed not by the director, but the late Anton Furst. One of the greatest production designers cinema has ever been blessed with, his career was short (he committed suicide in 1991) but brilliant, having also turned a disused British gasworks into Vietnam for Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket. Batman’s Gotham is his Gotham, not Burton’s, a fact that further adds to the film’s confused sense of authorship and is especially underlined when you compare it to superior sequel Batman Returns.
With Furst no longer around, Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands designer Bo Welsh was enlisted to build the Dark Knight’s dark city and the differences are clear to see. Whereas Furst’s Gotham is one of menace and darkness, ripped from the pages of Miller and Moore; Welsh’s is one of whimsy and colour, ripped from his director‘s imagination. It’s Vincent. It’s Edward Scissorhands. It’s The Corpse Bride. It’s totally in tune with Burton who, for all his quirks and twists, is simply not dark enough to accommodate Furst’s masterfully macabre Gotham.
Indeed, looking back now, the city also seems too dark for producers, because rather than complimenting Furst’s murky aesthetics with an equally grim script, they keep the rest of the film light and almost fluffy. The love story between Wayne and Vale feels tokenistic; we never get any real sense of our hero’s pain over his parents’ death (a flaw only exacerbated by the brilliant Batman Begins) and Jack Nicholson’s Joker is so over-the-top he makes Cesar Romero look like Marlon Brando.
Batman 1989 will forever have its place in history for not only that ridiculous performance, but also its groundbreaking marketing campaign and sensational design. But it’s a film lacking cohesion, substance and a clear sense of authorship and, with The Joker set to return to our screens in next year’s The Dark Knight, perhaps it’s time to let Burton’s film sail off into the past where it belongs.
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