New Perspectives
Once a
routine started forming, I started to really reflect on what the next year is
going to look like here. I'm kind of getting used to online studying, now the
ice has somewhat broken, the Zoom meetings which constitute the majority of my
9K education are a bit more comfortable and much more useful. I've got a
shopping and laundry rota, planning meals for the week, putting aside a night
for doing the University thing of drinking an unhealthy amount and above all
getting my head around having this as a home. The only thing I'm really missing
is that ounce of witnessing creativity that I'm missing. A week wouldn't go by
where I would say no to watching a new film with people and talking about it,
see a band perform live or even sometimes go see a new play. But that isn't as
easy these days, a mix of a global pandemic being handled by a bunch of greedy
idiots and a lack of money on my half makes it virtually impossible to go to
all the stuff that is right on my doorstep. Weirdly moving from my tiny hometown
to London, there (at least in my perspective) seems to be less to do here than
up north. Perhaps I'm just missing my regular spot and my friends and
everything that came with that, but London feels like a busy place with lots of
people that is actually an empty and lonely city in many ways. You blend in
when walking here, even with my ridiculous choices of clothes, you are a speck
of dust going through London, whilst up North, everyone you see is somebody you
vaguely know from somewhere. It is by no means a bad thing, but it is different,
and I feel like I'm still getting my head around it. Anyway, I digress, here's
what I was subjected to this week!
You Only Live Once
I often
try and separate my preconceptions of a film before going in, but this film was
almost exactly what I knew it would be from the opening titles. It is a Fritz
Lang crime noir starring Henry Fonda from 1937. That is exactly what it is and
everything else is everything you think it will be. It's just not my kind of
thing, it is bread and butter that I understand why we would study, but there
is certainly something about watching an 83-year-old film that you can’t help
but think you might have seen it done better since. Well, this is loosely based
on the real-life Bonnie and Clyde, and the film 'Bonnie and Clyde' just about
does everything this film is trying to do a million times better. I'm probably
being a bit dismissive and arrogant by throwing this film to the curb, but I
don't think the excuse 'it's a classic old film' is enough to validate its
quality in a modern-day perspective. It just falls into so many stereotypes of
this era of filmmaking that I can't quite take it seriously, the acting is
ridiculous, the plot is simple but loses focus every five seconds, the
characters are two dimensional in a way that is there to conveniently pretend a
moral discussion. It isn't anything I enjoyed stretching to try and analyse and
it certainly isn't a film I enjoyed watching.
Festen (The Celebration)
When I
found out we were spending a week on Dogma 95 my heart sank. It is one of my
least favourite cinema movements(?) and is genuinely incredibly frustrating to
discuss. Started by Lars Von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg, Dogma 95 was a set of
rules intended to start a trend in how films are made, arguing that uniformity
encourages more creative ways to work through restrictions. Arguably the
incredibly strict rules were more of a statement than anything to be taken seriously,
but how Von Trier went about this statement was so coy and inconsistent, often
shifting his opinion to suit whatever film he wanted to make, which was usually
a crude mess. I just fundamentally disagree with putting any rules in place for
art and especially when those rules seem like an arbitrary excuse to allow you
to make softcore pornography. 'Festen' is one of the first Dogma 95 films and
is everything I don't like about the idea, it is arrogant, disguises horrific
content as drama and is one of the most visually unpleasant films ever made,
for absolutely no thematic or narrative reason. Realism isn't just awful things
happening filmed with a handheld camera.
Something Different
This is
the film I actually enjoyed this week! I know I've been probably exhaustingly
negative this week, but nothing makes you dislike a film that you already
dislike more, than having to study it. 'Something Different' however is an
incredible Czechoslovakian film about that follows the lives of two women
frustrated in their own completely separate worlds. It follows the story of a
domestic housewife acting out by having an affair outside of her unhappy
marriage and struggling to find the joy she so needs in her life. The other
half of the film is a documentary look at a gymnast as she grows increasingly
disillusioned by her career and the stress it is putting on her. The film is
beautiful, it's quiet and meticulous whilst also thought provoking and
fascinating, I genuinely really enjoyed my time with it. There's so much going
on within the film, it actually addresses quite revolutionary gender politics
in a society fighting through soviet rule whilst still managing to tell a
humane and relatable story. I found myself entranced, the two stories work
together beautifully and when I got to really dissect the film I had so much
fun digging into their connections and patterns. I would strongly recommend
checking this out if you can.
Everything Else
This was
actually quite a quiet week in terms of what I have been watching separate from
my studies. The main thing I have been joyously re-watching is the best show
ever made: Taskmaster. I started a couple weeks ago in anticipation for the
arrival of Series 10 and it has been an absolute delight re-watching the show.
The beautiful insanity that emerges through the simplicity of Alex Horne's
creation is something that doesn't often emerge in other British Comedy, it
just works so fundamentally well, and the formula has kept the show running
strong for 10 series. I wrote a bit about it here but I think the show deserves every
amount of recognition and love it has garnered over the years. Series 10,
although we are only on episode one in looks to still manage to make me cry
with laughter, the cast is phenomenal and I'm putting money on a Katherine
Parkinson victory right here, I'd love Richard Herring to win but the man is so
competitive it is going to backfire extremely. Other than that, I've been quite
busy this week, I enjoyed catching up on 'Ghosts' as that show is always a
delight, but Taskmaster has dominated my free time and to be honest, I'm not
really complaining.
And that
just about does it! Another week in and I'm really enjoying doing these little
write-up things. Hopefully, I will be able to keep it going and not
procrastinate so much that doing this makes me feel guilty. Thanks for sticking
through and reading, if you've got any recommendations for anything, I'm always
happy to hear.
Thanks
for reading!