Shortbus

USA | 2006 | Directed by John Cameron Mitchell

Logline: Several gay and straight characters struggle for sexual inspiration and a deeper understanding of love and commitment within their respective relationships.

The title takes its inspiration, perhaps a little obscurely, from the shorter yellow American school bus that often follows the longer traditional one. On board the main bus sit the “normal” kids, while segregated and trailing behind in the short bus are the outsiders; the emotionally-disturbed, dysfunctional misfits. In the movie Shortbus is the name given to an underground salon, infamous for its blend of art, music, politics, and carnality, where the main characters, immersed in their lurid subterfuge, all converge.

The whole look and feel of the film is very NYC; the Big Apple stretching as Grace Jones once crooned. From the brilliant animation sequences that inter-cut the stories – camera flying over a painterly model Manhattan, diving down through the trees of Central Park and zooming into the window of some lower eastside apartment block – to the biting, self-depreciating sense of humour, the nonchalant polysexual tone, and of course, the mischievous, no-holds-barred explicit sex.

Shortbus embraces sexuality with a bear hug and a reach around, part of the mid-noughties' boundary-pushing splurge that included Michael Winterbottom’s tenuous 9 Songs and Catherine Breillet’s contemptuous Romance and Anatomy of Hell. These were movies that featured unsimulated sex (or "actual sex", as the Australian Classification Board prefer to label it). Certainly not the first time in "mainstream" cinema (see 1975's In the Realm of the Senses for one of the early pioneers), but probably with a wider cinema audience than ever before.

Shortbus is one of the first to combine all orientations under one roof. In between the soul-searching and body-issues all proclivities get serviced, including a scene of rather impressive auto-fellatio!

The successful hardcore porn directors of the 70s had pipe dreams that the adult movie industry and Hollywood would eventually merge, but thirty years down the track and the contemporary provocative left-field Tinseltown directors can continue to dream away, as Hollywood will never make a film like this. Thankfully we have a clutch of independent filmmakers who are willing to push the envelope.

Shortbus is the kind of transgressive, genre-bending “mainstream” filmmaking that only rears its head periodically. Many stick-in-the-mud viewers will see it as nothing more than elevated porn, but hey, sex and art have always tangoed. Mitchell elicits performances that are surprisingly solid, injecting the film with intelligence, honesty, and a genuinely emotional edge. While the narrative meanders from time to time, its central themes of self-acceptance and open-mindedness anchor the movie.

Vividly colourful and frequently funny, it's an outrageous melting pot of underground styles ejaculating over the mainstreet. Think Federico Fellini meets John Cassavetes meets Nicole Holofcener meets Richard Linklater meets Robert Altman meets Jack Smith meets Woody Allen at a swingers club in downtown New York City, and you’ll get Mitchell's acquired taste. Whether you spit or swallow is up to you.

Don's Party

Australia | 1976 | Directed by Bruce Beresford

Logline: On the night of the 1969 Australian election, Don holds a party in his Sydney home, where his crass middleclass friends discuss sex and politics, get drunk, and try to seduce each other’s wives.

Arguably playwright David Williamson’s finest hour-and-a-half, Don’s Party is a superbly sustained comedic treatise on suburban wankery, macho hoohah, feminine guile, sociopolitical diatribes, and other shambolic party shenanigans. It worked brilliantly (and still does) as a play, and Bruce Beresford turned it into a classic of Aussie 70s cinema, complete with more bush and tackle than you shake a cold Coors tinnie at.

The feature was honoured six times at the 1977 AFI Awards with Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, Best Editing, Best Sound, Best Actress (Pat Bishop), and Best Supporting Actress (Veronica Lang). Williamson’s screenplay adaptation loses none of its finely-honed satire, and Beresford’s casting is top notch, the cream of Australian drama and comedy together under one roof and having a ball.

The male players; John Hargreaves as opportunist school teacher Don, Graham Kennedy as amateur pornographer Mack, Ray Barrett as sleazy embittered Mal, Greame Blundell as mild-mannered, safari-suited Simon, Harold Hopkins as cowboy Cooley, and Kit Taylor as grumpy lawyer Evan. The female players; Claire Binney as hot-to-trot Susan, Candy Raymond as adulteress Kerry, Pat Bishop as long suffering Jenny, Veronica Lang as impressionable Jody, and Jeanie Dryan as Don’s wife Kath, at the end of her tether.

Don’s and his democrat mates are confident of a win, and the election news early in the night suggests they’re celebrations won’t be in vain. But booze and boorish behaviour go hand-in-glove for these grotesque characters, and it’s not long before the layers start to peel back and reveal the beasts beneath the polyester shirts and flared slacks.

The dialogue spits and crackles like a dozen bangers on the barbie, and with the fine performances, baring more than just bad behaviour, the scene is raucous affair of competitive bullshitting and ill-conceived social commentary. The wives are the occasional bystanders, but eventually get their hands dirty. The wild card, nineteen-year-old free-sexpot Susan, is the springboard for temptation and corruption, but sultry Kerry knows a thing or two in the bedfellow stakes.

The background is very much Australian, but the true colours exposed are universal. There is a soft underbelly waiting to be slit open, the entrails of hypocrisy and fear of failure ripe for plucking and roasting, which Williamson and Beresford achieve with casual perfection. The narrative arc is terrific in exploiting the kind of chaos and disorder that swings at a party full of adults keen to shed their inhibitions, yet pathetically tied to their shortcomings.

Don’s Party is essential viewing for all well-read young Australians, and yet, dare I suggest it, but an intelligently cast remake set in this equally volatile, over-sexed modern age of too much information, too little political savvy, and ethical over-spill, could well be in order. But before that happens, indulge in a little lusty, hilarious distraction with the crackin' original.

The Wrestler

USA | 2008 | Directed by Darren Aronofsky

Logline: A middle-aged professional wrestler struggling with drug addiction, thankless gigs, and being estranged from his daughter, is told to retire by his doctor, yet he’s reluctant to throw in the towel.

This was the comeback gig that touched Hollywood’s heart - but not quite enough to win Mickey Rourke the Oscar everyone thought he should get, although it must be said Sean Penn’s performance as Harvey Milk was equally deserving. In one of those art-imitating-life curiosities, The Wrestler reflected much of what Rourke had been through in the past fifteen years; a wilderness of drug and alcohol addiction, a sport that left him dazed and battered, and a confrontational attitude that caused him to burn every bridge he crossed.

Visionary director Aronofsky originally had Nicolas Cage in mind for the role of Randy “The Ram” Robinson, but Cage out-priced himself. Legend has it Aronofsky tracked Rourke down and made him a proposal whilst prodding him in the chest, offering him a lead role, with fee deferred, but absolutely no prima donna bullshit and wastrel shenanigans, and he’d guarantee him an Academy Award nomination. Rourke wondered who the hell kind of arrogant hotshot had the balls to make demands of him like that?!

Rourke accepted, and found the initial going tough, especially with Aronofsky demanding take after take. But the director was bang on. Rourke delivered the performance of his career; a warts-and-all, heartbreaking portrait of a man lost in his own arena, a man emotionally scarred, physically wrecked, and psychologically unstable, yet a man desperate to get back on track, to right some family wrongs, and to earn the stable love of a decent woman, even if she does lap dance and strip for a living.

The Wrestler’s naturalistic production values and raw visual narrative harks back to the gritty, uncompromising stylistics of the classic filmmaking of the 1970s. In fact the whole movie almost feels like it was made and set several decades ago. The cold New Jersey climate, the cinema verite style camerawork, the method-style acting: both Rourke and Marisa Tomei, as Stephanie aka Cassidy, bare their souls, with Tomei baring quite a bit more - and looking in damn fine shape to boot! In a supporting, but pivotal role, Evan Rachel Wood, as Randy’s embittered teenage daughter, is excellent. Their scenes together, especially around the weathered, rundown boardwalk and derelict gambling palaces of Coney Island, are incredibly poignant.

This is a profound character study and one, like Lars Von Trier’s Breaking the Waves, that is determined, provocative, stubborn, and whilst uplifting, is ultimately bruised in tragedy. This is a movie that contrasts – in a clever, but understated way – grotesque brutality with touching sensitivity. The power of love doesn’t always conquer the fragility of institution.

Even if wrestling leaves you cold, you’ll definitely be stirred by this sad, beautiful tale; The Wrestler is unique, powerhouse filmmaking; the kind I didn’t think Hollywood could make anymore. And not to forget the striking poster design, hilarious glam-rock soundtrack and impressively-staged, “realistic” wrestling sequences! The Wrestler is a slam-down tour-de-force!

12 Years A Slave

US/UK | 2013 |  Directed by Steve McQueen

Logline: In pre-Civil War America a free black man is kidnapped and sold into slavery.

Based on the slave memoirs of Solomon Northup, first published in 1853 (and authenticated in 1968), 12 Years a Slave is a grim and powerful drama that seethes with violence and cruelty, but is sheathed with a sense of beauty and hope. It is one of the most authentic and affecting portraits of American slavery ever put to film (yes, director McQueen eschewed digital in favour of 35mm!)

Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is a well-read musician with wife and young daughter, living a privileged life in upstate New York. His skill on the violin earns him a visit from two talent scouts, Moon (Taran Killam) and Hamilton (Scoot McNairy), who offer him lucrative work in Washington D.C. He is wined and dined, but much to his horror and dismay wakes with a splitting hangover, and chained to the floor in a dark wooden cell.

For the next twelve years Northup is forced to work on two Louisiana plantations. He is re-identified as Platt, a runaway slave from Georgia, and is bought by Ford (Benedict Cumberbatch). A violent confrontation with an overseer (Paul Dano) results in him being sold to another plantation owner, the sociopathic, alcoholic Epps (Michael Fassbender), who believes it his God-given right to abuse black people.

The elegance with which McQueen directs this heart-wrenching, and at times stomach-churning, drama is exquisite. Utilising striking tableaux and stunning landscape imagery, cinematographer Sean Bobbitt (McQueen’s regular lensman) strokes the South in painterly fashion. It makes for an interesting contrast to the sweat and toil, the blood and fury, the tears and outrage of Northup’s predicament.

An excellent support cast of established names, some in very small roles, brings much weight to the production, despite their familiarity. Paul Giamatti plays a slaver opportunist who first sells Platt to Ford. Sarah Paulson plays Epps’ wife who, rightly so, suspects her husband of desiring one of the young slave girls, Patsey (Lupita Nyong’o). Bard Pitt, who was instrumental in getting the production financed, plays an abolitionist who listens attentively to Northup’s plight whilst helping him build a gazebo.

Fassbender is typically superb, but it is Ejiofor who delivers the most notable performance, in the central role, and it is a demanding piece as he is in almost every scene. Extraordinary to learn that the actor hails from Britain, as his diction and accent for the role of Northup was perfect. It must be noted, the period dialogue for the entire movie is as authentic as possible, but it doesn’t make for easy audience consumption.

McQueen feels 12 Years a Slave is an American version of The Diary of Anne Frank. He was compelled to make it, and to be as honest as humanly possible, and even though it features Hollywood actors and has an upbeat ending (although its very emotional), he refuses to compromise in order to appease Hollywood audiences. The result is a painfully resonant, unexpectedly poetic, and richly satisfying drama.

12 Years a Slave is released in Australia by Icon Home Entertainment.

Tyrannosaur

UK | 2011 | Directed by Paddy Considine

Logline: A lonely middle-aged man battling with his own penchant for violence is drawn toward a Christian woman trapped in an abusive relationship.

Joseph (Peter Mullan) has anger issues. In a small English town he plods along, a widower, cursing at the world, and taking his extreme bitterness out on the innocent and the guilty. Within the first few minutes of the movie Joseph, in a paroxysm of rage against those who administer his dole money, and kicks his dear dog to death. He loved that mutt.

Drowning his sorrows in a pint of ale his tolerance is further tested by several obnoxious youths playing pool. One of the lads threatens him and he retaliates by assaulting the boy and scaring off the other two. Later as he stumbles into his front yard he’s set upon by the youths and has the living daylights kicked out of him. Dawn sees him crossing the path, or storefront to be precise, of Hannah (Olivia Colman), who runs a charity op shop.

Tyrannosaur is a tale of redemption, a baptism by fire, a scalding of the soul. It is the debut feature from the talented actor Paddy Considine, who joins the ranks of Gary Oldman (Nil by Mouth) and Tim Roth (The War Zone), two exceptional actors who dug deep down into the bowels of their nightmares and made two of the most disturbing, distinctly English studies of family, violence and abuse, of the past twenty years. Tim has never directed since, and Gary has only just announced his second feature (perhaps the cinematic exorcisms of thier demons proved too harrowing an experience?), but something tells me we’ll be seeing more movies from Paddy Considine.

Considine is no stranger to violence on screen having played an adult bully of boys in Shane Meadows A Room for Romeo Brass and a psychopathic returned soldier in Dead Man’s Shoes, as well as a sociopathic religious freak teetering on the edge in My Summer of Love. Considine as all the acolytes and fuel to burn and thus elicits a stunning turn from Peter Mullan. But he pulls an extraordinary – and heartbreaking – performance from Olivia Colman.

Tyrannosaur is essentially a two-hander, but there is a third wheel to this dark and disturbing tale of dysfunctional love and twisted vengeance, in the form of Eddie Marsen as Hannah’s grotesque husband James. Marsen’s work is almost as impressive as Mullan and Colman, and that’s still very high praise.

Tyrannosaur is a difficult movie to recommend to sensitive souls, it’s an emotionally-wrenching movie, but also there are several genuinely upsetting scenes of violence (including two scenes of animal cruelty) and a nasty rape, as well as an appalling confession, but it is made and delivered within a powerful quest for justice, as surprising, disquieting and controversial as that search may be. The title plays on the concept of Joseph as some kind of marauding beast, but is referenced in one of the movie’s few moments of (dark) comic relief when Joseph explains to Hannah how his dead wife was so fat that he nicknamed her "Tyrannosaur"(in itself a reference to the movie Jurassic Park).

Subway

France | 1985 | Directed by Luc Besson

Logline: A cocky safe-cracker evading police finds an escape haven in the Metro of Paris and is befriended by a ragtag group of musicians and misfits, while an elusive romance beckons.

“To be is to do” – Socrates, “To do is to be” – Satre, “Do be do be do” – Sinatra.

Luc Besson is a style merchant extraordinaire. He became the ciné vogue du jour, at just twenty-five, with the release of this breezy riff of a tale that slides and floats and drifts and skedaddles from one moment to the next. Actually it is the moments within Subway that make it so irresistible, not the plot itself which is threadbare at best. Besson is more interested, and excels, at providing arresting images and a distinct rhythm, both in the mise-en-scene and the soundtrack.

Subway pulses with an infectious 80s Euro-pop-funk score courtesy of Besson regular Eric Serra, who plays a small part as the bassist (and songwriter) of the subterranean funkster outfit. The band is never named, and neither are the musicians. In fact only two of the movie’s characters are given names: Fred (Christophe Lambert in the most endearing and least irritating performance of his career) and Héléna (Isabelle Adjani). Fred is the thief, and Héléna is the frustrated wife of the man Fred robbed. Héléna has her own agenda, whilst Fred seems more interested in pursuing her, and in the chase given by the underground authorities.

Subway exudes character, even the subway system itself takes on a personality, as Fred delves deeper and deeper into its rabbit warren maze of tunnels and chambers. There are only a couple of scenes set above ground; the very opening car chase sequence where Fred in his little Peugeot is being pursued by several policemen in a large Mercedes-Benz. The other scene is an hilarious situation where Héléna finds herself at a dinner with her indifferent husband and numerous stuffy guests, and can’t help but insult them all with expletives and a fast exit.

Subway oozes style and fashion; from Fred in his tuxedo and platinum blonde hair brandishing a neon tube for illumination in the dim light of the tunnels, to Héléna’s wild spiked punkette hair-do, Euroasian eye makeup, and bellowing black dress. They make a fabulously attractive pair, even if they don’t get it together until the very end (and even then their romance is thwarted by tragedy).

Adjani had already garnered a strong reputation for being a difficult diva and although Besson was yet the star director he warned her that if she walked off his set in one of her infamous tantrums her career would be over. She promised she wouldn’t act like a prima donna, and she kept her word. Truth be told, one of the main reasons Subway is so memorable is Adjani's ravishing otherworldly beauty and that snobbish allure. Apparently in France she is held in such high esteem that she is only known only as Adjani.

Besson frequently uses elaborate fast dollying shots weaving in and out of bystanders waiting for trains amidst the supporting subway pillars, or close-up wide-angles that enhances the charisma of his ensemble supporting cast: a very young-looking Jean-Hughes Anglade plays The Roller, a nervous lost soul perpetually rollerskating, the always excellent Richard Bohringer plays The Florist, a spanner in the works and a cog in the criminal wheels, and Jean Reno (sporting the most hair I’ve seen him with) plays The Drummer of the band, drumsticks always in hand, tapping away on anything, much to the annoyance of Fred.

Finally near movie’s end Fred manages to recruit a busking saxophone player and a singer, and his band are ready to perform to the public. They highjack a small stage designated for a festival orchestral performance and Eric Serra and The Drummer begin a slap-happy groove. Fred breaks into his radiant grin, Héléna has come to realise she actually has feelings for the reckless scoundrel who ripped off the husband she no longer loves. But a determined policeman in the background has his pistol poised …

Ultimately Subway is a drama romp tinged with melancholy, laced with melody, and underpinned with a steady throb. Ricki Lee Jones’ Lucky Guy plays on a ghettoblaster in the middle of the movie, seemingly incongruous, yet utterly fitting. But it’s the final song, a gorgeous pop tune, It’s Only Mystery, that encapsulates the essence of Subway’s mood and tone.

Bronson

UK | 2009 | Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn

Logline: The prison life story of Michael Peterson, Britain’s most notorious criminal, who spent thirty years in solitary confinement.

The true story of one of the most violent, unruly, and headstrong prisoners of the British penal system who systematically sabotaged his own future, and yet made a name for himself via his alter-ego, Charlie Bronson, the prison raconteur extraordinaire, the cuckoo that flew over the clockwork orange, Bronson is a docu-drama-biopic unlike anything you've seen before.

A tour-de-force of narrative delivered in unconventional stylistics and driven by a central performance that seethes and blisters with a powerhouse charisma and volatile intent; Tom Hardy is Michael Peterson, who in 1974 was charged with the armed robbery of a post office and slapped with a seven-year sentence in one of England’s harsher gaols. Seven years stretched out to thirty-four, and Peterson adapted to life inside by licking the dish of bittersweet vengeance.

Authorities realised it was costing too much of the Queen’s resources to keep Peterson locked up as he repeatedly damaged prison property and injured prison security, not to mention the grievous bodily harm to himself and subsequent time in the prison infirmary. While he was briefly on the outside he hooked up with an illegal fight club, earned the nickname Charlie Bronson (after the gruff vigilante Hollywood actor), became romantically involved with a young woman (who subsequently duped him), but eventually landed himself back in the insular, oppressive realm he knew best.

Refn’s sound and vision is brilliantly executed, at times surreal, at times frighteningly realistic. Early 80s electro, synth-pop, and opera music adds distinct flavour, and the production design is very authentic. Presented like a pantomime flashback told as if Peterson, aka Bronson, is delivering a one-man stage show, his self-assurance dominates everything, as does his aggressive stranglehold on his destiny. Violence is his natural form of communication. He’s not dumb, but he’s no smart cookie either. He’s scuttled his options and seems resigned to the consequences of his actions.

What elevates this seemingly grim and savage portrait is the black sense of humour that permeates the entire movie. It’s dark and grotesque, coal black, boys from the blackstuff material. It leers and jeers and slaps and tickles in equal measures. One scene in particular will push a few scatological buttons! Apparently the real Michael Peterson is quite proud of the movie, especially excited about his legacy continuing on after his death, his toil and trouble immortalised on celluloid. British authorities were apparently none too impressed with Refn's liberal portrait.

The movie is filled with great supporting performances; too many to mention here, but suffice to say Refn’s natural talents in casting serves him well. Like his brilliant Pusher trilogy Bronson bristles, barks and bites like a dangerous dog (“You just pissed on a gypsy in the middle of nowhere, that’s hardly the hottest ticket in town.”) You can pat the mongrel, but be wary, Peterson was renowned for biting that hand that fed him. Bronson is an acquired taste, like warm beer or black pudding.

Bronson is the kind of pure cinema that polarises audiences. Dramatically it falters on occasion, but the source material has furnished a fascinating tale, and there’s more than enough incident, detail and nuance of performance to lift the illegal game and place it on a subversive pedestal.

Halloween

USA | 1978 | Directed by John Carpenter

Logline: An escaped psychopath returns to his childhood neighbourhood, terrorising and killing several people whilst his doctor desperately tries to warn the local sheriff of the killer’s intent.

“Black cats and goblins and broomsticks and ghosts
, covens of witches with all of their hopes,
 you may think they scare me, you’re probably right,
 black cats and goblins on Halloween night . . .
 trick or treat!”

For nearly three decades Halloween was the most profitable independent low-budget feature ever made (excluding the porn feature Deep Throat). Then The Blair Witch Project was released in 1999 and blitzed the box office with its clever marketing campaign. Then along came Paranormal Activity, another "found footage" flick made on the whiff of an oily rag, to became the most successful low-budget horror movie ever produced.

As genuinely frightening as both The Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity are (actually the third in the PA series is the scariest), and as “realistic” as both those supernatural movies are, neither of them possess that elusive, but utterly resonant, slick uber-chill factor that exudes from Halloween’s effortlessly spun nightmare fabric. Halloween is the ultimate boogeyman bad dream. Forget all the ludicrous sequels (though I’ll admit that Halloween 2 - more of the night He came home - is a guilty pleasure), and the less said about Rob Zombie's travesties the better!

A small cast on a small budget with style to burn; cinematographer Dean Cundey’s creeping Panaglide (the precursor to the Steadicam) camerawork and deep shadowy lighting, Carpenter’s shocking use of Nick Castle as The Shape (mostly Michael Myers in silhouetted long-shot, or edging into close-up frame), and, of course, the movie’s most memorable element; Carpenter’s brilliant and unnerving piano/electronic score.

Laurie Strode (played with hysterical aplomb by Janet – Psycho – Leigh’s daughter Jamie Lee Curtis) is our Final Girl, Donald Pleasence is Dr. Loomis, a man driven by the fear of what Michael Myers is capable of. And therein lies the beautiful rub; Michael Myers is the boogeyman. “That was the boogeyman?” Laurie mumbles in a shocked stupor, “As a matter of fact, that was.” Loomis states matter-of-fact, then walks across to the balcony where Myers has just tumbled over after having been shot at point blank range several times in the chest. Loomis peers over the over edge, and stares in disbelief at the impression on the grass where Myers had landed. He’s gone. Vanished. Into the night. The nightmares isn’t over … This man is evil incarnate.

Halloween (which had the working title of The Babysitter Murders) was influenced by a couple of earlier 70s movies that featured an unknown, or masked killer who offed numerous people in creative fashion over the course of a night or so; Bob Clark’s Black Christmas and Mario Bava’s Twitch of the Death Nerve, but Halloween was the movie held responsible for spearheading the stalk’n’slash genre; at the very least making the term “slasher flick” a household phrase used by concerned parents as their impressionable teenagers head off to the local drive-in to make out under the reflected light of a flashing blade.

In the wake of Halloween came Friday the 13th, Terror Train, Prom Night, My Bloody Valentine, Hell Night, and dozens more. But what sets Halloween apart from all of its imitators (putting aside for a moment that Halloween isn’t wholly original) is its palpable mood and atmosphere and that it actually features very little on-screen bloodshed, as well as a relatively small body count. The horror that permeates the movie is more about terror than graphic violence. Carpenter cleverly eschewed having to spend money on elaborate special effect set-pieces so he could afford to play with the fancy camera equipment, and much of the movie’s overall effect is the result of the prowling, fluidity within the mise-en-scene.

And that mortifying musical motif that re-occurs throughout the movie; da-duh-duh, da-duh-duh, da-duh, da-duh, da-duh-duh, da-duh-duh, da-duh, da-duh …

As Sheriff Brackett says to Dr. Loomis, “It’s Halloween, everyone’s entitled to one good scare.”

“Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream …”

The Ballad Of Genesis And Lady Jaye

USA/Germany/UK/Netherlands/Belgium/France | 2011 | Directed by Marie Losier

 Logline: A documentary portrait of the career and relationship between experimental musician and performance artist Genesis P-Orridge and his wife and collaborator Lady Jaye.

Like him or loathe him Neil Andrew Megson, who changed his name to Genesis P-Orridge in 1971, has got balls. These days he also has breasts. He’s a widower now, and this scattered, but fascinating and affecting documentary tells part of his story and a little of his partner and soul mate, Jacqueline Mary Breyer a.k.a Lady Jaye’s story and influence and inspiration in his life. The ballad that is their love life is as strange and bizarre as the avant-garde music and theatre that have been instrumental in Genesis’s career.

Genesis P-Orridge experimented with COUM Transmissions during the late 60s pushing the boundaries of performance art with their sexual/intellectual projects. They were deemed “the wreckers of Western civilization” by an English MP, much to their amusement. Throbbing Gristle (local Brit slang for erection) evolved from the debris of COUM and the four-piece went on to pioneer industrial music. In 1981 Genesis formed Psychic TV, a broader, but no less experimental group, which achieved wider success.

In 1993 whilst Genesis was living in America on a self-imposed exile, following a bitter divorce, and indulging heavily in the club and ecstasy scene, he met Ms. Breyer. It was love at first sight. She was a beautiful young woman, working as a fetish performance artist and dominatrix, which appealed to Genesis immensely. He had found his soul mate. They married, Jaye becoming stepmother to Genesis’s young daughter and son, Caresse and Genesse.

What makes this documentary particularly fascinating is the project of pandrogyny that Genesis and Lady Jaye had been so fervently involved in. It was a years-long pursuit, undergoing numerous plastic surgery procedures in order to become gender-neutral humans that looked like each other.

“We started out, because we were so crazy in love, just wanting to eat each other up, to become each other and become one,” explains Genesis, “And as we did that, we started to see that it was affecting us in ways that we didn’t expect. Really, we were just two parts of one whole; the pandrogyne was the whole and we were each other’s other half.”

“We view Breyer P-Orridge as a separate person who is both of us,” Lady Jaye explains, “Neither of us take credit for the work, the work is a melding of both of our ideas which we would not have had singly. Both of us are in all of our art. That third being, Breyer P-Orridge, is always present.”

Transgressive transmogrifications aside, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge and Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge shared a genuine love and it is evident. His childish behaviour is irritating and it’s frustrating that the documentary doesn’t examine Jaye’s life and her role in the partnership in more depth. She remains more of an enigma than her husband. She died in 2007 from a heart condition exasperated by a long battle with stomach cancer. One can only imagine the acute grief Genesis would have felt after losing his “other half”.

While it fails as an equal opportunity portrait of its titular couple, as a time capsule (there is lots of archival footage) and as an observation on left-field body modification philosophy and avant-garde artistry The Ballad of Genesis and Lady Jaye is essential viewing. There aren’t too many exotic exploits like those of Genesis P-Orridge and Lady Jaye’s.

Monsters

2010 | USA | Directed by Gareth Edwards

Logline: After a returning space probe has inadvertently deposited alien organisms on Earth, a journalist reluctantly agrees to escort a tourist through the infected zone to safety.

A truly remarkable endeavour; An ex-pat Englishman shooting an American feature movie with almost no script, only two actors (the rest of the cast are real people being used as featured extras), no storyboard, a skeleton crew, shot entirely on location in a non-English speaking country. The result is a modern classic; ordinary boy meets ordinary girl amidst extraordinary times in unfamiliar landscape, laced with intrigue and danger, melancholy and ultimately a profound sense of tragedy, despite the thread of connection and possibility of love.

Scoot McNairy plays Andrew Kaulder, a twenty-something American photojournalist in Mexico, hoping for the scoop of his career thus far (capturing one of the monstrous alien creatures within the infected zone, or victims - especially dead children). He’s instructed to locate his boss’s daughter, Samantha (Whitney Able), who’s roughly the same age and on a vacation of sorts, and bring her safely back home across the US border. Kaulder isn’t too happy to be pulled from his potentially lucrative opportunity into a rescue mission. He finds Sam with an injured wrist in a local hospital, and they embark on the journey north.

What begins as a road movie transforms into an elusive science fiction thriller, and ends abruptly as a romantic drama. But there is a deep sadness that permeates the narrative. This is instigated in a prologue sequence depicting the US military on a search and rescue mission, which culminates in an airstrike on one of the massive alien “octopus-spider” creatures, which involves Kaulder and Samantha as casualties. This isn’t immediately apparent, but can be confirmed upon repeat viewing.

Apart from the superb performances from McNairy and Able (and the great work elicited from the non-professionals), what makes Monsters such a powerful and intelligent movie is Gareth Edwards’ approach to tone and atmosphere. The narrative isn’t so interested in the bigger picture, although that is addressed, albeit ironically, even cryptically, by the movie’s title, but by the little moments within scenes, the nuances of the characters' expressions, through body language and reflection of thought. This is one of the most moving and unassuming love stories I’ve ever seen, exquisitely heightened by Jon Hopkins beautifully atmospheric, hugely emotive, ambient electronic score.

The vivid cinematography is often raw and urgent, and in places beautiful, even mesmerizing. Gareth Edwards not only camera-operated (on a consumer-level digital camera) and edited, but also designed all the CGI effects, including the amazing creature design, and the clever adjusting of existing signage, plus adding military vehicles, ruined buildings, etc. The dreamy mood and languid pace of the movie (although it's not a long film) may be uninteresting to viewers expecting a horror-action picture, but it is precisely this unusual hybrid of elements (especially for a Hollywood-looking movie, and I mean that in the best possible way) that makes Monsters such an affecting experience, both emotionally and psychologically. Not only my favourite movie of 2010, but it has secured a place as one of my very favourite movies of all-time.

Henri-Georges Clouzot's Inferno

L’enfer d’Henri-Georges Clouzot | France | 2009 | Directed by Serge Bromberg & Ruxandra Medrea

Logline: A documentary about the making of an ill-fated feature by a legendary French director and starring a legendary Austrian actress.

French director Henri-Georges Clouzot had an illustrious career, with two brilliant movies in particular; The Wages of Fear and Diabolique. In 1964 he began work on what promised to be his most adventurous and profound piece, Inferno, a study of jealousy and madness. It was a big budget affair and was to utilize a plethora of wildly inventive camera and photographic techniques in order to capture the internal machinations of the lead male character; his psychological breakdown and descent into paranoid, irrational behaviour as he becomes convinced his gorgeous young wife is cheating on him.

Serge Reggiani was cast as suspicious Marcel the husband and Romy Schneider was cast as his carefree wife Odette. Jean-Claude Bercq was cast as Martineau, the handsome temptation, while Dany Carrel was cast as the sly fox flaunting herself in between. After weeks of test-shoots and experimentation with lens and gels and projections and all manner of cinema tricks principal photography got under way on location at a stunning hotel riverside resort with nearby aqueduct and railway line.

Clouzot, being the meticulous perfectionist that he was, had painstakingly storyboarded the entire movie, not an entirely unusual process in the mid-60s, but Clouzot made sure his camera compositions matched the storyboards precisely. He employed three different camera crews, but was reluctant to leave one set-up to go to another in case the one he left wasn’t perfectly realised. Quickly the production got behind schedule. Reggiani began to have clashes with the director, Clouzot would shout back. One simple shot would take a whole day to shoot. Clouzot would then insist on re-shooting.

185 cans of film later and Reggiani walked off the production claiming illness, but in reality it was despair and frustration, and Clouzot had replaced him with Jean-Louis Tritignant (although he didn’t even screen test). Shortly later Clouzot suffered a heart attack. That was the end of Inferno. Clouzot only made one other feature before dying in 1977. His wife held the archived rolls of film captive finally disclosing them to the public in 2005.

This superb and fascinating documentary-cum-reconstruction features several key players from the original production talking candidly about the experience of working on the movie. Also two contemporary actors, Berenice Bejo and Jacques Gamblin read from the original script, to extrapolate from the existing original scenes which were shot, but without sound. It’s a crying shame Romy Schneider wasn’t able to offer her own thoughts (she died tragically in 1982 aged 44), as the documentary uses her seemingly co-operative presence (despite her reputation as a prima donna) from the movie as a focus point. Such a radiant, exquisite beauty she was, in a way this doco is a beautiful tribute - a paean - to her.

Who knows how well Inferno would have turned out, but certainly the extravagant, expressionistic, prismatic use of cinema techniques including the juxtaposition of black and white for the main story and colour reversal for the sequences depicting Marcel’s hallucinatory madness would have ensured the movie a firm place in cult classic history. The colour footage, in particular shots of Romy bathing, the turquoise water against her flawless tan skin just looked sublime. That fact that the movie was never finished makes it all the more tantalizing.

Clouzot’s widow sold the rights to Inferno to another famous French director, Claude Chabrol in 1992 and two years later he made his own version of the movie starring Emmanuel Beart and Francois Cluzet. I must check it out as I admire Beart’s work, and I’m curious as to how provocative Chabrol’s version is considering how provocative Clouzot’s was going to be, in terms of raw sensuality and uncompromising narrative structure.

Incendies

Canada/France | 2010 | Directed by Denis Villeneuve

Logline: The perplexing request of a mother’s will sends her adult son and daughter into the dark heart of the Middle East to discover their tangled roots amidst hatred and love.

The French word “incendies” translates roughly as “destruction by fire” or “scorched”. And indeed, this is a searing, slow-burn drama that quietly crackles like a murder mystery, blisters like a thriller, and scars like the best tragedies of love and despair. Yet it also offers a unusual sense of reward, a kind of baptism by the flames of inhumanity that results in a movie that has you emotionally battered and bruised, but complete.

Incendies tells two journeys and runs their narrative concurrently, jumping back and forth between two timelines. There is the path of discovery a brother and sister are forced to take after they are read their mother’s last wishes. Two envelopes reveal a father they thought was dead, and a brother they didn’t know existed. Jeanne (Melissa Desormeaux Poulin) and Simon (Maxim Gaudette) will only be granted their mother’s burial rights by her notary (Remy Girard) once they’ve solved this enigmatic “inheritance”.

The second narrative arc is that of their mother Nawal (Lubna Azabal), her story from the hardships of her young adult life to her posthumous mind games. She is revealed as an exceptional woman who endured the most heart-wrenching twists of fate, right up to her final days. Jeanne and Simon must travel into a harsh and unforgiving landscape, an unnamed Middle Eastern country (Beirut?) where their mother struggled to survive.

Incendies is a study of violence and resilience. Denis Villeneuve elicits stunning performances from his three leads, especially Luban Azabal, a tour-de-force from her. There is a stark and desolate beauty to the mise-en-scene, cinematography and score. Each scene builds on the last taking the audience deeper into this intriguing, but ominous family mystery. There is a brooding sense of menace that lingers through much of the second half of the movie.

Based on a play by Wajdi Mouawad, Denis Villeneuve has fashioned a superbly cinematic adaptation with striking imagery and a powerfully affecting mood. Politics riddles the movie, but never does it feel like propaganda or a socio-political lecture. There is complexity, nothing is black and white, and there is a beautiful narrative core that transcends any language limitations. Incendies delivers its dual stories with minimal dialogue.

Incendies is harrowing, but ultimately a movie of rare fractured beauty. Denis Villeneuve made one of my favourite French-Canadian movies of the past twenty years with Maelstrom (2000), with Incendies he tackles a similar sense of loneliness and quest for knowledge, but bravely ventures outside of his comfort zone; in geography, origin, and language.

Withnail and I

UK | 1986 | Directed by Bruce Robinson

Logline: It’s 1969 and two disheveled, unemployed London actors decide to spend a rejuvenating weekend in the country only to have their escapade turn into a series of embarrassing incidents and disasters.

"We want the finest wines available to humanity. And we want them here, and we want them now!"

Quite frankly I think Bruce Robinson’s semi-autobiographical yarn is one of a rare handful of perfect screenplays. It’s also one of the most moving and affecting films about friendship. And it also happens to be exquisitely funny. I’ve watched this movie more times than any other, except maybe Blade Runner, Apocalypse Now, and Alien.

Story goes that Robinson has circulating a manuscript for a novel he’d written, based on his experiences with a fellow thespian and raving alcoholic named Vivian (whom the character of Withnail is based on). The script ended up in the hands of George Harrison who decided it was suitable for his Handmade Films production company. Robinson was then offered the director’s role. He’d never directed anything before.

During principal photography producers who were viewing some of the rushes complained that there weren’t any gags, and that the movie wasn’t going to be funny enough. They wanted Robinson off the picture. Bruce became enraged, insisting that the comedic effect was cumulative, and based on character, not one-liners (although the movie is endlessly quotable). He was kept on, only after demanding that the producers were not allowed on set under pain of death.

The casting is sensational. Paul McGann is terrific as Marwood (never actually named in the movie and credited only as “… and I”), the more earnest  and prospective of the pair, whilst Richard E. Grant’s portrayal of Withnail is a calibrated stroke of genius. As crazy as it seems Grant was a teetotaler, yet delivers arguably the finest depiction of a desperate drunk ever put to celluloid. Then there’s Michael Elphick’s wily poacher Jake (“I’ve been watching you, prancing like a tit, you need working on lad!”), Ralph Brown’s irrepressible drug fiend Danny (“If I spike you, you’ll know you’ve been spoken to!”), and last, but not least, Richard Griffith’s blisteringly camp Uncle Monty (“There is, you’ll agree, a certain je ne sais quoi oh, so very special about a firm, young carrot!”).

Apparently Daniel Day-Lewis was offered the role of Withnail, but declined (he’s great, but no). Kenneth Branagh was tested (eeek!), as was a young Bill Nighy (interesting). In the end, there’s no one else who could’ve pulled off what Grant did with the role. And McGann was the perfect foil.

I could describe the elements in Withnail and I like a beautiful marriage. Every scene compliments the last, every line of dialogue is pitch-perfect, every nuance of character shimmers, and every moment is to be savoured like a 1953 Margeaux or thrown back like a pair of quadruple whiskies and a pair of pints. The original score by David Dundas and Rick Wentworth is magical, and there’s the now infamously inspired use of two Jimi Hendrix tracks; All Along the Watchtower and Voodoo Chile (Slight Return), which prompted the Hendrix family estate to change their licensing policy because they were dismayed over the continued association with drug culture.

Superbly filmed (the location shooting in the Lakeside District is highly memorable, especially in the scene where Marwood in his magnificent leather trench coat steps out of Crow Cragg cottage into the frosty early morning air and has a look around), and deeply poignant, Withnail and I lingers like vintage wine and fond memories. Poor Bruce Robinson has never made any money from the movie, and to rub salt in his wounds, it has one of the strongest cult followings of any English comedy, challenging even Monty Python.

I could write a bloody thesis on this movie – maybe one day I will – but for the meantime I’ll simply bookend my review with another reference to the movie’s key themes of fraternity and loneliness, streaked with irony, where Withnail turns to a few bedraggled, disinterested zoo wolves and recites Act II from Hamlet; “I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth …”

NB: Feel free to try the associated drinking game. You drink whatever and whenever they do.

Dead Man's Shoes

UK | 2004 | Directed by Shane Meadows

Logline: A soldier returns to a small country town to seek revenge on the local wastrels who amused themselves years earlier by teasing, humiliating, and terrorising his younger mentally handicapped brother.

A deeply sombre and disturbing tale, more resonant than a dozen hack horror movies, yet inhabits its own nightmare realm; a dramatic thriller of controlled rage which inexorably reaches critical mass and finally explodes with a precision that fractures into the abstract.

Shane Meadows is a unique talent, having proved himself with several gritty and powerfully emotive dramas each laced with a unique streak of coal black humour. Dead Man’s Shoes is his darkest film in tone and execution, yet there is humour to be found lurking uncomfortably just below the movie’s surface. Like the best practitioners of cinema comedy, Meadows understands that the most intelligent and resonant comedic edge comes from vividly-etched characterisation and irony, rather than forced gags or throwaway lines of pithy dialogue.

Paddy Considine, who co-wrote the screenplay with Meadows, is revelatory as Richard the returned paratrooper - simultaneously protagonist and antagonist - with one hell of a bone to pick. His brother Anthony (Toby Kebbell) floats around anxious to see what Richard’s true agenda is as he loiters around the township's watering holes observing the wideboy shenanigans; the men who appear absurd, yet dangerous and unstable. But their disparate energy is nothing against the velocity of a troubled, trained assassin, a man on a rogue mission.

On what appears to be a very modest budget, Dead Man’s Shoes is both artful and economical in its narrative with its striking, yet fluid, unassuming camerawork. A superb cast support Considine’s knockout central performance, but of particular note are Kebbell and Gary Stretch as the charismatic gang leader Sonny. The soundtrack of mostly modern folk and western songs is another standout, with the addition of some broody electronic stuff from Aphex Twin and Laurent Garnier during a pivotal scene of drug-induced mental disintegration.

All these elements, handled with consummate skill, push the movie into strangely mythical territory etching a concise parable about the violence of the mind, body and soul. Revenge is a savage, unruly beast capable of sudden and extreme violence, leaving emotionally discordant repercussions lingering.

Like a deconstructed merging of slasher and vigilante flick Dean Man's Shoes takes all the familiar elements and turns them on their heads. Then severs the head, and kicks the body in the gutter. This is the kind of terrifying darkness that post traumatic stress disorder threatens to unleash, and in this case, explodes into a Jacobean-style tragedy, as a deeply-scarred soul furiously wipes the blood of rage and redemption from his disturbed eyes.

Bound

US | 1996 | Directed by The Wachowski Brothers

Logline: An ex-con and her new lover concoct a scheme to steal a large stash of cash from the lover's gangster boyfriend.

Bound is a neo-noir, a modern gangster tale, told in tight economical form with lashings of style and wit, and liberal splashings of ultra-violence. There’s also some hot and heavy petting between the moll and the femme fatale, which gives Bound a chic lipstick lesbian meets butch dyke edge. A bold move, but the brothers, in their feature debut, pull it off.

Corky (Gina Gershon) is an ex-con hired to work in an apartment as a plumber. She meets Violet (Jennifer Tilly) who lives in a swish pad next door with her mobster boyfriend Caesar (Joe Pantoliano), who launders money for the Mafia. The two women begin a clandestine affair and Violet convinces Corky to help her steal $2,000,000 that Caesar has in custody before he gives it back to Mafia boss Gino Marzone (Richard C. Sarafian). As the money is already stolen loot, it can only go pear-shaped from there. The long arm of Murphy's Law reaches in to the crime scene and grabs the misfits by the short and curlies, and proceedings begin to go seriously awry.

Bound is a superbly constructed screenplay that slowly tightens the knot and screw in classic Hitchockian fashion, except this is more lurid and nastier than what Hitchcock would’ve been able to get away with, although it owes much to the master of suspense in its visual stylistics and plot devices. Even the uber-stylish opening title credit sequence would have made Hitchcock titles regular Saul Bass nod with warm approval.

The movie boasts sensational work from the cast, especially the three leads; Gershon, Tilly and Pantaliano. Gershon delivers one of her finest performances (along with her other leather turn in Prey for Rock & Roll). Tilly - whom normally annoys the pants off of me with her whispery high-pitch - is perfect as the mischievous seductress. Other top notch support comes from Christopher Meloni (TV’s Law & Order: SVU) as obnoxious, hotheaded Jonnie and John Ryan as the unctuous hitman Mickey.

The movie takes place almost entirely within the two apartments (Violet’s pad and Corky’s flat). There is an early scene establishing Corky’s nonchalant swagger in a dyke bar where she tries to pick up an older, more butch woman, but has a “cop” intervene. Curiously, the older butch woman is played by literary luminary Susie Bright, who also served as “technical consultant” (read: lesbian supervisor). At scene's end Corky delivers one of the movie’s many memorable lines: “When you get tired of Cagney & Lacey, find me.”

The camerawork and production design in Bound is marvelous. From the disorientating opening set-up tracking down through a wardrobe full of plush coats and jackets to the pulling out of a snub-nosed .38 Special in extreme close-up, with a tumbler of whiskey beside it, to the very conscious decision of using mostly black and white art direction makes Bound a most artful noir construction. The image of deep red blood splashing over thick white paint is as visceral and perverse as it is darkly sensual.

Bound is a movie that has aged well, like a smoky whiskey, and, like any great cult projection, rewards from repeat viewings. Grab a squeeze, and a malty slug, ease back into the Chesterfield, and wrap yourself up in the silky forbidden.

Breaking The Waves

Denmark/Sweden/France/Netherlands/Norway/Iceland/Spain | 1996 | Directed by Lars Von Trier

Logline: A naive young newlywed is forced to adjust to adult life within the confines of a strict religious community.

I first saw this movie by myself at the Wellington Film Festival in New Zealand after it was first released. It was the final film of the festival with a festival party scheduled directly after the screening. It was a full house in the Embassy cinema (around 800 people), and during the last fifteen or so minutes I was sobbing. So were the people to left and right of me. In fact I believe most of the audience was in tears. 

Straight after the screening I staggered out into the foyer and ordered a straight whiskey from the bar, then wondered around in a daze. Someone asked if I was alright and I replied that I had just seen Breaking The Waves and was an emotional wreck. From memory I didn’t last long at the after party I was too fragile. 

I finally watched the movie for a second time a few years ago and it still packs a huge emotional wallop, perhaps not quite the sledgehammer I was anticipating, but then I knew what to expect. Part of the movie’s incredible strength and potency lies in not knowing what happens and with this in mind I am very reluctant to provide any kind of detailed synopsis. Still, half an hour in I turned to my fiancé and said somberly, “This is going to ruin me again.”

It is the mid-70s and Bess McNeil (Emily Watson) is a naïve young woman living in a very strict Calvinist community in northern Scotland. She has met a Danish man, Jan (Stellan Skarsgård), who works on an oil rig, and the two of them are married at the beginning of the movie. 

Bess’s older sister-in-law Dodo (Katrin Cartlidge) looks out for Bess (Dodo has been hardened by the death of her own husband, Bess’s brother), as she knows Bess to be a very impressionable and emotionally vulnerable woman. Some would say Bess is stupid, but her psyche is more complex than that. Bess’s parents are deeply religious and are concerned about her union with an outsider. 

Lars Von Trier, who wrote the screenplay, is a true maverick, notable for his experimental Dogma manifesto, he started pushing the boundaries of mainstream filmmaking with this movie. There are many elements in Breaking The Waves which he would use when formulating the Dogma rules; the use of entirely handheld camera (apart from the chapter cards), the extensive use of improvised acting, using only available light, and the reliance on a raw, uncompromising presentation of the narrative. 

Von Trier applies a Brechtian approach with the character of Bess frequently breaking the fourth wall (the camera) by gazing into the lens at various moments during the course of the movie. This can be interpreted as Bess’s contact with God, along with her almost “saintly” aura reflecting an inner voice which guides and cajoles her. 

Playwright Bertolt Brecht also used tableaux in his plays and Von Trier employs a similar convention with the chapter cards which punctuate the movie. There are eight of these over the course of the two-and-a-half hour film, each one a stunning landscape composition which looks like a painting, until you notice the subtle movements of water, cloud and light. These chapter stops are accompanied by an excerpt of music from the period, each one loaded with passion and melancholy for maximum emotional impact (I remember tears rolling down my cheeks whilst Elton John’s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and David Bowie’s Life On Mars were used).

Breaking The Waves is a film of devastating power. The themes of love, grief and hope are treated in a most unique and extraordinary way; one long beautiful tragic poem, but presented like a cinematic novel. The performance of Emily Watson is astounding. Quite possibly one of the most brilliantly sustained performances of the past twenty years or more (interesting to note that Helena Bonham Carter was first cast as Bess, but as great an actor as Carter is I doubt she would’ve been able to capture the unbridled innocence that Watson does). Stellan Skarsgård (who would go on to a very successful international career) and the late Katrin Cartlidge are excellent, as is Adrian Rawlins as Dr. Richardson. 

Apart from Emily Watson, the other star of the movie is, probably, my favourite director of photography, Robby Muller. His work on this movie is outstanding. This was one of the early features to be shot entirely on video. During the final post-production stages the video edit was recorded back onto 35mm film, giving the movie its striking grainy look, with the exception of the chapter cards which were obviously treated in a more ethereal, painterly fashion. 

If you’ve never seen Breaking The Waves prepare yourself for an intense emotional journey. Resist learning too much of what happens before you watch it. It is a film that demands an open mind, an empathic heart, a curious soul. And a box of tissues. In one light a revisionist melodrama, but more emphatically I’d champion Breaking The Waves as a true masterpiece of modern cinema. 

Frank

Ireland | 2014 | Directed by Lenny Abrahamson

Logline: A wannabe songwriter inadvertently joins an eccentric band and attempts to lead them to fame.

Loosely based on the character known as Frank Sidebottom by late British comedian Chris Sievy, but probably also inspired by Sievy’s band that was on the fringes of the late-70s Manchester music scene, Frank tells the tale of young Jon (Domhnall Gleeson), an aspiring keyboardist songwriter, stuck in a rut, until he happens to be in the right place at the right time (or maybe the wrong place at the wrong time) and finds himself hired by Don (Scoot McNairy), the band manager of Soronprfbs (yes, intentionally unpronounceable) after witnessing the band’s keyboardist attempting to commit suicide.

Enter: Frank (Michael Fassbender), the band’s enigmatic frontman, with a large papier-mâché fake head. Frank is a genius, it seems. But initially not perhaps so tortured as Don, or Frank’s possessive sidekick Carla (Maggie Gyllenhaal), and synth/Theremin player. Two other band members, drummer (Nana (Carla Azar) and bassist Baraque (Francois Civil), sift in the background, but say very little. This is Frank’s band, and despite Jon’s best intentions, the left-field musical musings are very much from Frank’s twisted mind.

This is a drama with a strong sense of black humour, but there is an element of mystery that permeates much of the movie, simply because Frank never removes his fake head. Just who is this person really? Is he as crazy as he seems, or is he saner than everyone else? Certainly Don, who was institutionalised for fucking mannequins, and Clara, whose abject disliking of Jon leads them into hot water, seem the more unhinged. Jon abandons his ordinary life to spend months on end #livingthedream with the band in a remote cabin whilst they attempt to record an album.

As Jon grows a beard and continues to blog, tweet, and youtube his experiences he seeks further exposure for the band. The social media tagging pays off and the band find themselves heading to the famous SXSW festival in New Mexico to perform. But just like that lonely tuft of armchair fabric, things will become frayed. There will be tears before bedtime.

Abrahamson has made a delightful movie; part off-beat character study, part zany comedy, but most intriguingly, a drama that deals with mental illness, loneliness, and that dangling carrot called #elusivefame without ever once feeling earnest, ponderous, arrogant, or patronising. The screenplay is Jon Ronson and Peter Straughan. Ronson was one of the members in Frank Sidebottom’s original band; so much of what unfolds on screen must surely have been inspired from his own first-hand experiences. It’s a great script with cracking dialogue.

Hats off to the cast for all-round great performances, especially Domhnall Gleeson and Maggie Gyllenhaal, but a special nod to Michael Fassbender who animates the fake head to perfection through his subtle body language. The few original band songs, penned by Stephen Rennicks, especially the haunting I Love You All, are superb. All of them were performed live by the actors. Frank rocks.

Frank screens as part of the 61st Sydney Film Festival, Tuesday 10th June, 7pm, Event Cinema 4.

Jodorowsky's Dune

USA/France | 2013 | Directed by Frank Pavich

Logline: The story of cult film director Alejandro Jodorowsky's ambitious but ultimately doomed film adaptation of the seminal science fiction novel.

I’ve been waiting for this documentary for many, many moons. I didn’t know if it would be made. But it has. Thank you Frank Pavich. Thank you for delivering one of the most fascinating and inspiring documentaries in a long time. The story of Mexican director Jodorowsky’s attempt to make the ultimate science fiction movie from what is often regarded as the ultimate science fiction novel (arguable, yes, but undeniably one of the most acclaimed, respected, influential, and certainly the biggest-selling sf novel).

Frank Herbert’s Dune was published in 1965. Less than ten years later Jodorowsky  was looking for his next project with French producer Michel Seydoux who had been very impressed with the directors previous works, El Topo and The Holy Mountain. Alejandro decided it was Dune he wished to make into a movie, even though he hadn’t read the epic 400-page novel (did he ever read it??) Hollywood sold the filmmakers the rights for very little (probably because they suspected they would never be able to pull it off), and so Jodorowsky, determined to make the a mind-expanding piece of cinema unlike anything ever made before, set off on his quest to find his band of spiritual warriors.

Jodorowsky’s version of Dune would be like an LSD trip, but without actually dropping the lysergic acid. His vision would be an extraordinary psychotropic experience that would hypnotise, mesmerise, and transform its audience’s consciousness. First crew secured was Jean “Moebius” Giraud, the brilliant comic book artist, famous for his Heavy Metal strips and numerous graphic novels. Not only did Moebius design much of the costume design and look of the characters, but also he storyboarded the entire 300-page script to Jodorowsky’s exact descriptions.

Next on board was Dan O’Bannon, who moved to Paris to begin work on pre-visualising the movie’s special effects. Then Swiss surrealist H. R. Giger was employed to create the look of House Harkonnen and its people. British sf illustrator Chris Foss joined the team to design spacecraft and further architecture, as did Pink Floyd to score some of the movie’s music. The cast included Salvador Dali (to be paid $100,000 for each minute of screen time), Mick Jagger, Udo Kier, Amanda Leer, and Jodorowsky’s 12-year-old son Brontis, whom he (cruelly) forced to train in various combat skills for numerous hours every day for two years!

Fifteen million dollars was what the movie’s budget demanded. Jodorowsky and Seydoux had their complete storyboard and all the design sketches and paintings bound into an awesome book, which was then photocopied, and the two men did the rounds of the major Hollywood studies pitching their project. The studies were impressed with everything, except the director whom they deemed too crazy to risk all those millions on a three-hour art film.

Cult directors Richard Stanley and Nicolas Winding Refn are included in those who offer their thoughts on the plight of Jodorowsky’s Dune, but it is the 84-year-old man himself who provides the documentary’s cosmic aura of fascination. His English may be broken, but his communication has its own articulate clarity. One can’t help but feel utterly inspired about the creative process, despite how utterly disappointing it is that his extraordinary vision never came to cinematic fruition. The movie’s tagline may be “The story of the greatest science fiction movie never made,” but after you’ve watched his doco you’ll agree this is simply the tale of the greatest MOVIE never made.”

Big props to Kurt Stenzel’s awesome score, and it must be also noted, just as various interviewees mention, that much of Jodorowsky’s vision for Dune has fragmented and been absorbed into numerous other science fiction movies of the past forty years. The influence this shelved project has had is as epic as the source material. Jodorowsky’s Dune is the mélange you need to fuel your creative machine.

Jodorowsky’s Dune screens as part of the 61st Sydney Film Festival, Saturday 14th June, 2:15pm, State Theatre

Unlawful Killing

UK | 2011 | Directed by Keith Allen

Logline: A documentary about the allegedly conspiratorial killing of Diana, Princess of Wales, and her lover Dodi Fayed.

Actor-cum-director Keith Allen, who also happens to be the father of pop star Lily Allen, took a gamble, a big gamble. After making an hour long television doco on business magnate Mohammad Al-Fayed, father of Dodi Fayed, Allen returned to the subject matter of Al-Fayed’s dead son; more precisely the conspiracy surrounding the death of Diana, the Princess of Wales, on 31 August August 1997 and the subsequent Royal Inquest.

In Britain an unlawful killing is the verdict that is delivered by an inquest into the death of a person by one or several unknown persons, specifically that the killing was done without lawful excuse, is in breach of criminal law, and, most importantly, that the inquest does not name any person(s) as responsible. Most cases occur within a military context.

Whether you believe the conspiracy theories or not, Unlawful Killing paints a pretty damning portrait of the Royal family, especially Prince Philip whose adolescence is revealed as a Nazi sympathizer, or at the very least guilty-by-guardianship-association, his, it appears, is quite the sociopathic, racist personality, or worse. I’ve never paid much attention to the Royal family, but after watching this documentary I felt very saddened at how Diana Spencer became caught like a butterfly in an enormous web of deceit, betrayal, ridicule, cruelty, and finally, murder.

I use the term “allegedly” loosely, only because no one was ever brought to justice. The French paparazzi were heavily criticized for aggressively pursuing Diana and Dodi on the night they died. Many wanted them used as scapegoats. The truth will probably never surface, just like the deaths of Marilyn Monroe and the assassination of President Kennedy remain as cloudy as ever.

Lawyers insisted on 87 changes to the finished documentary before Allen would be “safe” to release it. He refused, and the film was not released in the UK. Allen hoped the American market would be more interested, given their perverse fascination with conspiracy theories, but alas, the doco failed to pick up any distribution for fear of possible litigation.

Instead, Unlawful Killing floats in the purgatory waters of raw truths and dangerous deception, the perfect limbo for the Sydney Underground Film Festival, which is where the documentary screened in 2013, with the festival directors muffling quiet anxiety that dark forces might descend on the festival cinema and seize the film on the grounds of subversive intent.

And it is a powerful and compelling documentary put together with intelligence and wit, punctuated with candid interviews from those involved in and around the official inquest, which, absurdly, took place nearly ten years after the event. It’s the inquest of the inquest, if you will. And while one can argue the documentary, funded by Mohammad Al-Fayed, is a vehicle driven from the backseat by the grieving father to push his overwhelming belief about a terrible cover-up, one cannot deny that there is something very dark and insidious behind the glittering veneer of the Royal family.

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre

USA | 1974 | Directed by Tobe Hooper

Logline: Whilst on a visit to a relative's old house several friends become victim to a strange, murderous family from a nearby property.

“The film which you are about to see is an account of the tragedy which befell a group of five youths, in particular Sally Hardesty and her invalid brother, Franklin. It is all the more tragic in that they were young. But, had they lived very, very long lives, they could not have expected nor would they have wished to see as much of the mad and macabre as they were to see that day. For them an idyllic summer afternoon drive became a nightmare. The events of that day were to lead to the discovery of one of the most bizarre crimes in the annals of American history, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.”

One of the most influential modern horror movies ever made, Tobe Hooper’s seminal nightmare continues to shock and amaze audiences with its raw and oppressive atmosphere, its grotesque imagery, and its emotionally visceral tone. Made on the smell of a blood-soaked rag and delivered like a baptism of fire, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre celebrates its 40th anniversary with a 4k digital restoration and inclusion in the 61st Sydney Film Festival (including a special late night Friday Drive-In presentation in Sydney’s western suburbs).

The movie demands a big screen viewing, even though it was only shot on 16mm. It is a cinema master class in narrative efficiency, editing, sound, score, and most importantly, nightmare mood and tone. Hooper had made the firm decision for his second feature to make the subject matter the star, and so, with his screenplay collaborator Kim Henkel, they devised a scenario inspired by the true crimes of the notorious Wisconsin serial killer Ed Gein, a necrophile and cannibal.

None of what happens on screen is true, except some of the art direction of the Sawyer family’s home that includes armchairs made of human bones (Ed Gein had a penchant for that kind of interior decoration), but the movie’s presentation exudes an authenticity that makes one’s skin crawl. The low-budget ingenuity, combined with the unctuous shroud of sweat and grime, adds spitting fuel to the nightmare fire.

Originally called Leatherface, then Head Cheese, finally the simple, yet staggeringly effective title The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Yet, only one person is killed with a chain saw; the others are either bludgeoned by sledgehammer or hung on a meat hook. Curiously, Hooper was intended on getting a PG rating (?!), but no amount of cutting back on the on-screen moderate violence could get the MPAA to approve a general exhibition. What was Hooper thinking?! The movie was simply too intense for anything but an R.

Indeed, one of the movie’s extraordinary features is just how little graphic violence is actually depicted for a movie of its intent. Only John Carpenter’s Halloween comes to mind, bearing a similar intensity through minimalism, and another landmark modern horror. Hooper's "violence" is in the cinematic sub-text; the camera angles, the use of sound, the suggestion.

Plucky Marilyn Burns plays Sally, one of the all-time great scream queen final girls, her ordeal reaching a fever pitch during the protracted and incredibly macabre scene in the Sawyer family’s dining room. It is this interior sequence – along with the first reveal of the Sawyer family’s ivy-covered homestead – that lingers long and hard in the mind. The extreme close-ups of Sally’s petrified green eyes should’ve been used in the movie’s poster campaign.

From the disturbing opening montage, flash-photographing the crime scene of the grave-robbing, to the final images of a blood-streaked, hysterical Sally huddled in the back of an escaping ute, whilst an enraged, mentally-retarded freak swings a roaring chain saw around and around in the burning haze of a Texas sunset, Tobe Hooper’s lean, mean killing machine will remain deeply etched in the annals of modern horror history.

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre screens as part of the 17th Revelation - Perth International Film Festival, Saturday 12th July, 11:15pm, Luna Cinema.