Through a glass, darkly

One of the interesting things about cinema is the way it allows us the chance to arrive at a mediated view of our unpleasant past. By that I mean that it gives us the distance to be objective and with that distance comes insight.

For example, with the exception of The Hurt Locker and In the Valley of Elah, there have been no films that deal with 9/11 and the war it prompted in any meaningful way. They also tend to fail at the box office because people generally insist it's just too soon and memories are too raw. They may have a point because, with the exception of The Deer Hunter, the first film to engage with Vietnam in a meaningful way was Platoon which came out more than ten years after the end of the war. Given that there is no serious end to America's middle eastern conflicts in sight then we may have to wait a while before we see it dealt with on the cinema screen.

In Europe however we are going through what I think of as 'second generation syndrome' and this has led to a number of interesting films about the Second World War. From Holland we have Black Book, from Germany Downfall and Sophie Scholl, from France Days of Glory, Female Agents and most recently Army of Crime. Each of these films examines different, not always pleasant, aspects of the wartime experience with candour and frankness and the results are often touching and always powerful. What is most interesting, it seems to me, is that these subjects were left largely untouched by the generation that was most directly involved in the war; it was simply too painful for them to deal with. Generally they have been made by the generation that came after - I accept that Paul Verhoeven lived through the war but he was very young - and as such they are able to take a detached look at events which may only seem shameful with the passage of time.

These musings are prompted by just having watched Katyn which is a stunning piece of cinema from the Polish director Andrzej Wajda which was deservedly Oscar nominated this year. Wajda is one of the most underrated of European directors and perhaps the least celebrated of the greats, but he is still making films at the age of 83 and his talent remains undiminished.

Katyn is the story of the titular massacre of Polish soldiers in the early days of the Second World War. Twelve thousand officers were killed and that's a big number to get your head around; Wajda's inspired device is to tell the story through their families waiting anxiously for news of loved ones. The background may be epic but the story in the foreground is intimate and affecting - Richard Attenborough does it all the time.

Katyn is actually what cinema is all about. It highlights a story which is an absolute outrage but it also makes important points about identity and nationalism and the ultimate tragedy of all of those people caught in the middle. And even though the story takes place almost seventy years ago I couldn't help but feel contemporary resonances which is the real power of cinema in the hands of a genius such as Wajda.

Pride and the importance of performance

The London Film Festival starts tomorrow and for the first time our DFTV course is represented. The Search is a film directed by Mark Buchanan and written by Gregor Barclay, who were graduates of the first DFTV course. It has been selected as an official entrant in the LFF Short Film section which is something of a coup for us. And it is a double celebration for the course because Believe, a short film by Paul Wright who graduated the year after Mark and Gregor is also being screened at the LFF. This comes in a year in which Believe was also selected for Edinburgh and won a prize at Locarno. The industry is already predicting great things for Paul http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/london_film_festival/article6867715.ece

Obviously with a new cohort of first year students taking their initial steps into the industry the achievements of their predecessors - and recent predecessors at that since the course has only been running for six years - can hopefully act as an inspiration.

What is so inspiring about both The Search and Believe is the quality of performance. These are great looking films but, within reason, a lot of people can do that. What sets them apart are the nuanced shaded performances that Mark and Paul have drawn from excellent casts. And in a year when so many Scottish films are blighted by weak scripts and performances barely worthy of the name, it is genuinely encouraging to see work such as this. I remember when Paul's graduation film Hikikomori screened at the RSAMD and at the end there was that wonderful beat of awed silence as the audience realised they had seen something special before the Concert Hall erupted into sustained applause. I overheard someone afterwards saying 'You know with most student films you wonder when it will end, with that one I wondered how it would end'. That's a rare compliment.

Both Believe and The Search deal with big themes - almost epic in fact - but they also deal with real people and that's why they are so accessible and so successful. You will wonder how they are going to end but you will be haunted and touched by the way that they do.

100 Minutes I'll Never Get Back

Although it wasn't my first choice I was sufficiently intrigued by The Invention of Lying to think it might be a worthwhile night at the pictures. Reviews had been mixed but the premise was intriguing.
The film allegedly does what it says on the tin; Ricky Gervais is the man who invents a lie in a world where everyone tells the truth. Except that it's not really; this appears to be set in a world where people are so naive they believe everything they are told which is an entirely different prospect.
The film lost me about ten minutes in, after it had expended all of the predictable blunt spoken gags. After that it became an exercise in deconstruction to try to work out just how awful it is and where it goes wrong; the answers are 'very' and 'everywhere'.
Let's leave aside the notion that Ricky Gervais is a very limited actor - this character, as are all his others, is a retread of David Brent and Andy Millman - but whatever appeal he has is limited to the small screen. Projected on a big screen he is a charisma vacuum leaving a large hole where his character ought to be. Let's hear it for co-stars Jennifer Garner and Rob Lowe who do what stars are supposed to do and twinkle as if their lives depend on it.
The frustrating thing about the film is that it has the potential to be a very powerful satire but bottles it in the end. Gervais seems to be making a point about organised religion when one of his fabrications - the only well-intentioned one - becomes an article of faith for a desperate populace. How sad are their lives when they latch on to this one shred of hope, an interesting point which isn't explored.
Incidentally only when Gervais becomes the new Messiah do the people start to question things. Why don't they just accept what he tells them as they do in every other part of the film.
The notion of religion being the ultimate lie is similarly intriguing but it is discarded without much examination once it has served Gervais's short term comic purpose. Rather than explore this issue we go for a sappy rom-com ending which relies on almost everything we have seen before being turned on its head.
However given this film's capacity for somersaults that should come as no surprise.

Is it that time already?

On the basis of doing as I say and not as I do this blog has been neglected while I have been encouraging students to maintain their own contributions. However with a new cohort of students it seems reasonable to take virtual pen in hand once more.

Looking back on this summer has been a discouraging cinematic experience - there were so few films that I felt I wanted to see and with those for which I did express mild interest, the feeling soon passed. I find myself more and more waiting for the joys of Sky Movies, especially Sky Movies Classics.

Just this week I found myself in something of an Eighties nostalgia fest in watching Point Break and 48 Hours back to back. A couple of things occurred to me. First, how watchable Patrick Swayze could be when he was on top form, second how Eddie Murphy squandered the potential to be one of the greats, and finally why does no one rave about Walter Hill.

Hill is a writer turned director who also does a bit of producing - a sort of two-fisted Renaissance man. As a director his work includes The Warriors, The Long Riders, Southern Comfort, and The Driver - each of them a masterclass in economy of narrative and providing the maximum bangs for the studio's buck . 48 Hours is in the same mould; tough, red-blooded and unremittingly macho but at the same time capturing a fundamental sweetness at the heart of the relationship between tough cop Nick Nolte and released convict Eddie Murphy.

Relationships are also at the heart of Point Break with FBI agent Keanu Reeves torn between surf guru Patrick Swayze and petite Lori Petty. But we know which one he really loves - he didn't travel halfway round the world for her! Like Hill's work on 48 Hours, Kathryn Bigelow directs the action scenes in Point Break with commendable and almost reckless vigour, especially surfing scenes which even now are jaw-dropping in their spectacle. It's interesting to consider what a modern director would have made of either of these movies. I suspect they would have taken comfort in digital technology but the physical effects of the pre-digital era take a lot of beating.

Looking back after almost thirty years these films seem cheesey but it is important to remember that we are looking back through a window that they created - the buddy movie may seem tired now but these two films along with Richard Donner's Lethal Weapon franchise created the genre.

As for Bigelow, her time has come again with The Hurt Locker - still on my must-see list - which is being touted as an Oscar contender. Hill hasn't directed a film for ten years but he did give us Deadwood as a producer and for that alone we should be grateful.