A Doll’s Housedir Tom Littler15 – 18 NovemberThe MoserYou are requested not to mention Ibsen’s Doll’s House!” – such was the cry of many a social invitation in 1879, where even discussing the Norwegian playwright’s classic treatmentof a woman’s role in a patriarchal society was enough to incite scandal. In this production, however, director Tom Littler consciously shifts the emphasisaway from a female struggle in a male-dominated world to the universal struggle to assert personal freedom, and fulfil our “duty to ourselves.” What so shocked spectators in the nineteenth century – the idea that a heroine could lie to her family, and even put herself before her husband – is not what shocks audiences in the twenty-first century. However, Littler creates a fresh impact by bringing the human condition, and not social conditions, to the fore, questioning the motivations of Ibsen’s characters while investigating the relationshipbetween loyalty and liberty.The staging reflects the contemporarynature of such themes; the action is wrenched firmly away from the stuffy Victorian lounges in which it is normally found and thrown firmly into the present day, presenting us with a meticulously recreated present day living room. With the play also being performed outside Oxford, designer Pip Swindall has a far greater budget to work from than we would expect from a Moser production, and it shows. The lavish set, carpeted and fully decorated, creates a perfect naturalistic backdrop, encouraging the audience to lose themselves in the confines of Nora’s domestic world. The realism restores the immediacy that would have greeted original audiences by placing Nora Helmer’s distressing story within the comfortable surroundings of an average middle-class home. A doll’s house itself sits ominously among the possessions, a reminder of Nora’s trapped state, merely a toy to be played with, as and when her family chooses, while the merry Christmasadornments stand in stark contrast to the increasingly fraught emotions of the various characters. Christmas carols drift disquietingly through the play, their joyfulness ravaged by white noise, or by the creak of a door, a leitmotif that hints menacingly at the play’s shattering conclusion. The naturalistic set is punctured by a projection screen, doubling as a window, where shifting images convey the internal worlds of Ibsen’s characters, helping to clarify their inner thoughts and desires.The acting is almost invariably excellent, a high degree of naturalism meaning we often forget we are watchinga theatrical performance. Claire Palmer beautifully captures Nora’s conflict of loyalties, and provides a powerful and intensely empathetic focus for the play, carrying herself wonderfullyin an incredibly draining role. Kane Sharpe, as her husband Torvald, creates the archetypal modern professional;charming, condescending and reputation-obsessed, he is not simply a fierce misogynist but a loving husband, albeit one to whom a wife is a pet. Their initial playful exchanges, where Torvald teasingly reprimands his little “squirrel” for being a spendthrift, make their later exchanges all the more devastating, the contrast between the superficially happy family and Nora’s horribly constrained relationship with her husband brought into even sharper relief.The couple are well supported by Ben Galpin as the blackmailing Krogstadt, not presented as a one-dimensional evil but as a sympathetic character with understandablemotives, and Caz Brown, a world-weary, compassionate Kristine. The freshness of Ibsen’s dialogue makes it seem almost contemporary, and the cast approach it as such, with electrifying results. The staging can at times become overly static but the constantly engaging naturalism of the characters means it rarely becomes tedious.A Doll’s House is an emotionally exhausting piece of theatre, but a truly rewarding one, and while we may not be scandalised by this production, it provides a unique exploration into what our duty is to ourselves and to others. You are encouraged to discuss it.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Opera
Don GiovanniCarte Blanche Opera Co.25 – 29 OctoberJacqueline du Pré Music Building, St Hilda’s CollegeIt is a sad fact that the general attitude towards opera at the momenttends to be unfavourable, especially among younger audiences, who choose to dismiss it as a rather inaccessible art form, deeply rooted in elitist high culture. Aimingto Aiming to destroy these misconceptions and widen opera’s appeal is the Carte Blanche Opera company with their production of one of Mozart’s most famous pieces, Don Giovanni..More familiar for their raunchy cabaret show Burlesk, and recent performancesof The Rocky Horror Show at the OFS, the company has taken it upon themselves to update Mozart’s classic, with the hope of drawing in a modern audience and breathing new life into this genre.Based on a legend that dates back to the Middle Ages, Don Giovanni is a depiction of hedonism in a fundamentallyCatholic Spanish society.. The opera tells the story of a man who is driven by his sexual desire, emotionallyabusing women in his pursuit of pleasure. ThroughouttheoperaThroughout the opera his behaviour and his conversations with servant and friend Leporello, establish Giovanni’s character and reveal the extent of his infidelities..In one infamous aria Leporello lists his friend’s sexual partners, informing the audience that Giovanni has slept with 2065 women. ToaneighteenthTo an eighteenth century audience, unaccustomed to modern, sexually-charged soap plotlines, his exploits would have been particularly deplorable, justifyingthe opera’s ending in which the protagonist is dragged down to hell. However, such behaviour does not carry the same charge as it did in its time and therefore the company have introduced elements of bondage and sadomasochism, in order for Giovanni’s exploits to make more of an impact on a modern-day audience. Furthermore, a “Goth” aesthetic has been used, locating the characters firmly within 21st century social culture. These significant changes are certainly successful in updating the piece, but it is important to note that even without such adaptation, the opera is still accessible to current audiences. Ddrawing on universal and timeless themes of love and fidelity, the opera remains as relevant today as it was in the Middle Ages.The production is successful not only in terms of interpretation, but also because of the performances of the company. This is a strong ensemblepiece, the orchestra and the performers working together to evoke Mozart’s powerful score. Although the acting is good throughout, the cast profess themselves to be singers before they are actors, a definite emphasis being placed on the musical aspects of performance. Indeed, the orchestra includes a member of the National Philharmonic and musicians from other top London orchestras. In terms of vocal performances, Jordan Bell is particularly outstanding as Leporello, immediately establishing a relationship with the audience, allowinghim to guide us through the piece. James Balance is also excellent in his role as the self-assured Ddon Giovanni, creating an air of arrogance from the moment he steps on the stage.The production itself is minimal with regard to props, the emphasis being on performance and, most importantly,Mozart’s music. Its impact is enhanced in the intimate venue of the Jacqueline Ddu Pré Building at St Hilda’s, the acoustics of which are particularly good. The size of the space also allows the company to draw the audience further into the story, making the performance more powerful. In essence, this is an excellent update of a classic opera, in which Mozart’s strong, multi-faceted characters are portrayed by a strong cast. It is not too difficult to follow, its main themes being easily recognisable. Those people who are unsure of the opera should take this opportunity to see an accomplished performance without having to pay Covent Garden prices.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Performing in the shadows of Pyramids
On a July evening in Cairo, Hussein Omar and I walked into “The place” or “Makan” as it is known to Egyptians. Outside, through the tiny window in the office of the director,policemen march up and down the street chatting loudly. The air is heavy and warm. It is here that we hear the Zar, an ancient female exorcism ritual still considered superstitious by many. A huge woman variously called Fatma, Azza or one of her other names, tells a story about love, backed by seven drummers and a tamboura (a kind of harp) player. Her job is to banish bad spirits through music, dance and song.When we saw this, we knew that we had found something rare, an art-form that speaks to the audience regardless of whether they understand what is said. I’ve always hoped that it is possible to be touched deeply by something in an act of theatre, regardless of the language one speaks, the culture one is embeddedin, and the politics one holds. We set off to Egypt, without a great deal of money, but with Mike Lesslie’s adaptationof Caldéron de la Barca’s The Constant Prince and an idea: to make a piece of theatre that would be a positive collaboration with Eegyptian musicians, and to present our work to an audience we had no knowledge of. I cast dancers, singers, actors and musicians all in the same piece in an attempt to broaden what we were offering, who we could speak to, to open up possibilities, and to try and forget what kind of thing we should be doing with a play, not least because we had no idea what to expect. I had originally hoped to devise a piece without set, lights or music, reliant on simply creating a space where we happenedto be. It soon became clear that this wasn’t to be. Instead, we created a show that was adaptable, but that clearly belonged on a stage. Lighting became a necessity, especially when we met with Saad Samir, a young Eegyptian lighting designer. He lit the show with a dance piece in mind, leaving only the musicians in a small flood the whole way through. They became witnesses to what the actors were doing, occasional participants, always commentators, accompanying the action throughout. This is a model of performance in some way borrowed from the Zar, in which the musicians get up and dance with their drums, joining the narrator, who has been standing throughout. The idea, presented in the show, of a stage needing “feeding” also grew out of our experiences in Eegypt: at the beginning of the piece, the musicians walk on and start playing to the empty space. Ragab Sadek, one of our musicians, explained that this prepares it for the story to take place.The tour was exhausting in many ways. Producing theatre in is a fraught business, and Avery Willis, in a superhuman feat, made the whole thing possible. We played in Cairo and Alexandria, always using independent venues, partly to avoid censorship, but also to make the play more accessible and to ensure that tickets were either free or cost next to nothing. The problemwith this was that some venues considered four hours to be ample get-in time, and whole diplomatic missions had to be undertaken to change this.The most grueling experience was perhaps our trip to Eel Minia. Ddescribed by Lonely Planet as the most dangerousplace in Egypt, we were required to have an escort, though this turned out to be not so much a motorcade as the local policeman. Run by a wonderful group of people, the theatre is the only cultural space in a town of one million, though this didn’t seem intimidating at all. On our way back we looked at our scant water supply and listened to our driver swearing on his mobile, and began to worry. Though in the end the play wasn’t allowed to travel to Minia, one day I hope to return, to meet the audience that packs out the tiny theatre in the desert every time a show comes to town.The company perform in London, 21-27th November. www.arcolatheatre.comARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Music
In the Wake of DeterminationStory of the Yearout now« « «Extremo. Metalcore. Post-hardcore. As the boundaries between punk, metal and emo gradually blur, music journalists become ever more inventive in the terms they use to classify the emerging sounds. In the past couple of years, bands such as Thrice and Funeral For A Friend have combined the aggression of hardcore with metallicriffs and the melody of emo, to both critical acclaim and commercial success.In the US, Story Of The Year are one of the leading exponents of this new genre. Ddespite having formed nearly a decade ago, it is only recently that they have made their mark on the record industry. Their debut, 2003’s Page Avenue, sold nearly a million copies, and the band have spent the past two years touring extensively, with this album attemptingto capture the intensity of those live performances. Tracks such as the driving Our Time Is Now, or the pure hardcore punk of Meathead, are truly ferocious, combining heavy, grindingguitars with singer Ddan Marsala’s impressive guttural howls.Ddespite their new found aggression,the production is still slick, and ultimately it is melody that remains Story Of The Year’s undeniable forte. Particular highlights include superblyinfectious album opener and first single We Don’t Care Anymore, the hook-laden Taste The Poison, and the punk rush of Take Me Back. It is this gift for melody that sets Story Of The Year apart from their contemporaries and is clearly key to their immense success on the other side of the Atlantic.However, towards the end of the album the listener’s attention begins to wander. Although In The Wake Of Determination is a relatively consistentalbum, its fundamental weakness is its lack of variation. Later tracks on the album, although not inherently bad, feel repetitive and formulaic, with identical song structures and predictable chord changes. Only a hidden track at the end of the album, a subtle acoustic number, indicates that Story Of The Year have the potential to be more than a one trick pony. Whereas other post-hardcore bands, such as Thrice, have pushed themselves artistically as their career progresses, Story Of The Year are already beginning to sound stagnant. For an album that started so promisingly,it is frustrating that the band’s creativity seems to run out half way through. The band are also occasionallylet down lyrically. In particular, the earnest and autobiographical Five Against The World, despite being one of the strongest melodies on the album, is the sound of a band that is taking themselves too seriously.Overall, this is an impressive sophomore effort, and there is no doubting the musicianship or songwriting capabilities of the band. It remains to be seen whether over time Story Of The Year can develop further, and produce something truly worthy of the hype.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Morrisette for glory
The CollectionAlanis MorissetteOut 14 November« « « « «Since the glory days of her hugely successful debut, Jagged Little Pill, Alanis Morissette has been splitting opinion. Many only claim to like the fantastically accessible though dictionary defying Ironic, but still her albums sell in the millions. Ten years on from this, Morissette has decided its time to do what all good musicians do, especially in the run-up to Christmas, and release a singles compilation.The Collection boosts Alanis’ “hand picked” selection of songs from the past ten years of her career. Admittedly this has turned out to be an almost complete list of her single releases, but full marks for taking the time to pick out the bad ones.Still, this album will be an essential addition to the CDd collection of any Morissette fan, encompassing a range of classics from the mid and late-90s as well as newer material. Her sassy interpretation of Cole Porter’s Let’s Do It (Let’s Fall In Love), from the 2004 film De-Lovely about Porter’s life, acts as a nice complement to Morissette’s own rather more hard hitting list songs, as well as her more recent cover of Seal’s Crazy.The Collection begins with the unfailingly familiar opening strains of Thank U, the only note-worthy single success from second album Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie. The core of the album, however, comes mainly from Jagged Little Pill and her surprisinglygood 2004 album So Called Chaos. The five singles taken from Jagged Little Pill are immediately recognisable to anyone who listened to music in the late 90s. Still, they represent a mixed bag, from You Oughta Know, the ultimate song for the dumped, through to the flowing and simple You Learn.More surprising to those who haven’t followed Morissette’s more recent releases will be the two tracks taken from So Called Chaos. Eight Easy Steps is a racing blast of pop rock simple splendour. Simple in structure it lyrically satirises self-help, while musically capturing the sweeping momentum of new ideas. Meanwhile, Everything shows that Morissette can carry off the slow, quiet, last-track type of rock – but only just. This is in stark contrast to the edgier Uninvited, which bubbles from solitary piano and vocals to splintering string accompaniedrock fullness.However, for all its fine songs this new Morissette anthology contains a few mistakes. It drifts towards the end into strained instrumentals and downright weirdness. Such an exampleis Mercy, which is a cross between a choral hymn and West African gospel, sung in Hungarian. Also, Morissette’s core fans will probably not appreciate the straight joy and fun of The Porter. In a world where she is now increasingly having to compete with musicians like fellow angry Canadian female rocker Avril Lavigne, Morissette must continue to produce the deeply felt personal and moody lyrics which this compilation celebrates.Still, the album as a whole captures the essence of Morissette over the past ten years and neatly shows the development of her angsty rock songs of the 1990s and an ever more eclecticrange in the early 2000s. With her lyrics, always a mix of the profane and the profound, she has become one of the sounds of the post-grunge style. An entertaining, engaging and all-together great eighty minutes listening.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Singled out
Amarantine,Enya,Out 14 November««««I like Enya. There, I’ve admitted it. I now prepare to be bombarded by invitations to join the Oxford University Celtic Appreciation Society, and maybe even have rocks thrown at me as I walk down Broad Street. However, if you, like myself, have a penchant for New Age Celtic Folk, then I could not recommend Eenya, and her latest single, more enthusiastically.Amarantine embodies her characteristically rich and complex layers of harmonies. It is powerfully haunting, and can only be described as narcotic in its ability to produce an out of body experience. It admittedly suffers from the comparative banalityof singing in Eenglish as opposed to Eelvish, as she did for the Lord of the Rings soundtrack. Nevertheless, it’s a gem.Hypnotize,System of a Down,Out 14 November«««Loud, outspoken, and often just a little bit bonkers, System of a are undoubtedly one of the biggest and best metal acts around. Hypnotize is the title track of their forthcoming fifth album, and though overall a good song, it seems a very odd choice for a first single. A quiet, moody beginning gives way to some thumping drums and familiar wailing vocals, but this is surprisinglyrestrained stuff. It never really gets going, though the sporadic eerie guitar janglings are very effective. Intriguing but slightly dull, this lacks the energy that we’ve come to associatewith System of a Ddown over the years. We can only hope that the albumitself will provide an altogether more rewarding proposition when it comes out later this month.I Caught Fire,The Used,Out Now«««This Utah-based quartet has taken a decisive step towards a pop-punk sound, with new single I Caught Fire. They have skilfully managed to createa song that has a softer edge, but doesn’t sacrifice the passion of their older, more vitriolic tracks. Granted the vocals have a teeny-bop quality to them, but McCracken redeems himself in the climactic third chorus. The penetrating guitar rides with the nuances of the verse, and makes up for what the simple bass lacks in punch. Steineckert’s drumming keeps the song’s momentum, not to mention the mind blowing hi-hat blasts. The song’s delicate ending is refreshingly poignant, keeping them away from dangerous Sum41 territory.With this major step forward, we can expect to hear much more of The Used.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Live
Stephen Hough (piano)The Jacqueline du Pré Music Building4 November« « « «For their tenth anniversary year, the organisers of the Jacqueline du Pré music building have wooed a number of illustrious artiststo perform there, among them Stephen Hough, a world-renowned pianist who has won Gramophone’s Record of the Year twice in the past ten years. His programme consisted of a diverse selection on a theme of Mozart, for the composer’s 250th birthday in 2006.The evening began with Mozart’s dark Fantasia in C minor K475. Hough emphasised the piece’s suddenchanges of mood, highlighting its possible origins as a notated improvisation. After briefly leaving the stage, he returned to further applause and burst straight into Schumann’s Fantasy in C major Op.17. His stentorian delivery of the opening theme, accompanied by the smoothest ripple of left-hand semiquavers, gripped the audience from the outset. The second movement,a march based on an obsessive dotted rhythm, was dispatched with ease (even the notorious leaps in the coda), drawing a smattering of applause before he began the final movement. The undulating arpeggios throughout were beautifully pedalled and his carefully graded dynamics gave the perfect degree of shading to the bass melodies. He calmly ended the first half of the concert to raptuousapplause, returning to the stage three times.The second half began with a return to Mozart, with the Sonata in B flat major K333, of which Hough gave an elegant reading. Resisting the common urge to oversentimentalise Mozart’s music, Hough’s playing was fleet throughout, with notably clean passagework and ornamentation in the graceful rondo. Next, he played a set of his own pieces, entitled Three Mozart Transformations (after Poulenc). The first, a subversively seductive, even bluesy, version of the Minuet K1, was followed by the Klavierstück K33, now a prickly futurist work, replete with punchy dissonances. The final piece, based on Sehnsucht nach dem Frühlinge K596, was elaborated in a lusciously romantic fashion. Hough’s playing was exceptional, and he communicatedthe humour of the pieces as only the composer himself could.The final piece was Liszt’s Fantasy on Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, as completed by Ferruccio Busoni. This rare paraphrase, played by such greats as Gilels and Horowitz, is seldom heard due to its length and complexity. Stephen Hough possessesample technique to deal with its accumulation of virtuoso devices, not to mention the delicacy required in its central section based on Voi che sapete, sung out amidst whirling accompaniment above and below. In the closing minutes, Hough developedNon più andrai to a devastating climax leading to the final descent of the keyboard in alternating chords, which left the man next to me shaking his head in disbelief at the speed and accuracy of Hough’s playing. The rapturous applause was calmed by two encores, Mompou’s Young Girls in the Garden, delicately played, and Stephen Hough’s own Osmanthus’ Romp, an exhilarating way to conclude one of the most memorable concerts seen in Oxford for some time, by one of the greatest pianists of the current generation.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Film
Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bangdir Shane Blackout nowIt starts with a low saxophone note and ends with a shootout, but Shane Black’s modern homage to film noir tends to subvert the rules rather than follow them. In a plot that initially sounds like a mediocre mid-career Eddie Murphy film, Harry Lockhart (Robert Downey Jr) is a thief mistaken for an actor who finds himself in the LA of Eelmore Leonard novels. Taking ‘detective lessons’ with Val Kilmer’s aptly named Gay Perry, Lockhart soon finds himself drawn into a world of corruption and cocktail parties.This is Black’s directorial debut, and it is immediately more stylish and subtle than other action flicks. The dialogue is snappy and often hilarious,illustrating Harry’s initiation into the Hollywood underworld. The influence of Raymond Chandleris clear: the film is split into chapters named after his books, and Ddowney Jr’s commentary takes its cues from Philip Marlowe’s inner monologues. Where Marlowe was cool and poetic, though, Lockhart is as confused now as he was when the events that he recollects happened. He often stops or even rewinds the action in order to explain what he thinks is going on, or to fill in bits that he’s forgotten to tell us. This is used early on in the film but is abandonedtowards the end; probably for the best, as after a while it does start to grate.The principal actors are all very convincing, but Kilmer in particular shines as Perry, a private detective who isn’t ashamed to use other’s negative opinion of his homosexualityto get what he needs. Having said this, there seems to be a lack of remorse on the part of all the characters;Lockhart, for example, gets over the brutality that he encounters in his four days of gangster life curiouslyeasily.It seems that the film tries to be two things at once, action-thriller and realistic comedy. This is particularly evident when a Farrellybrothers-esque sub-plot about Harry’s severed finger emerges, distracting the audience from the otherwise intriguing detective story happening around it. If you can live through these distractions, though, at the heart of this film lies a truly innovative interpretation of the detectivemovie; an interpretation that is well worth seeing before it is copied by countless others.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
What goes on tour…
The English music scene is a bizarre beast. To be sure, the market suffers from its pap bands that have endless sunshine blown up their rear ends and enough tuning done with their hair and imagethat the kids can’t help but give in to their charms. One only has to refer to last week’s feature on “Hurricane Pop!” to find examples of musically frail superstars.But there are, equally, hundreds of bands that can play away admirably, keeping tight and rocking hard without ever making any ground in our fundamentally retentive market. We as a nation seem to struggle with taking a risk. Bristol based Transition are exactly the type of band that could be put into this bracket.Here are a band that have been togetherfor their entire formative years, as frontman Jesse Eedbrooke was keen to emphasise during our conversation.Yet most are still to hear from these home-grown rock gents. “We met when we were all ten, eleven, or twelve, when the Ddunne brothers (Niall, guitar, and Steve, bass) moved from Ireland to Bristol.” He sniggers embarrassedly as he tells me “we actuallymet up playing cricket and doing long jump!” It only took the friends a couple of years to realise their potential.“We’ve had the same line up for eight and a half years now, so we have a good understanding, we can change things musically without having to talk about it too much.”When I asked Jesse to describe their style in his own words, for those intrigued, he said, “We’re energetic, we work hard on our arrangement, but the genre is hard to define, there are lots of harmonies and melodic phrases. It’s original stuff. We want to create something that emotionally engages people.”“So you’re pop?” I guess. No. They’re not. “Hopefully we’re unique. All the music we like is different, the only thing we can agree on is U2. Other than that we hate each other’s music! We try to incorporate everyone’s music tastes.”This man’s laid-back friendly banter thus far had certainly won me over, but it would appear that Jesse and his band members realised at university that single converts wouldn’t propel them to success before their fret-bashingfingers ceased up completely. It was time to go further a field.“We suddenly discovered how many international students there were in Bristol and we became friends with these two Taiwanese students, who said ‘Come and tour Taiwan’ and we took them seriously!” He laughs again as he clearly feels a welling of pride over his boys’ achievements so very far away. His voice perks up audibly out of its chilled drawl as he says, “Our first gig was crazy, the Spring Scream in Taiwan. We only got the invitation two weeks before we went so it was miraculous that we got there…we had to get together five grand.”Spring Scream, it would appear, was no mean feat. “Our friends were really excited. The tour went really well and we had one to two thousand people at our first gig. They gave us a Saturday night on stage one, which was perfect timing.”The foursome had somehow landed themselves a slot at the Taiwanese Glastonbury. It didn’t stop there either. The Far Eeast has proven to be a hot bed of Transition lovers. They were soon being interviewed on MTV Asia and appearing on radio in Japan. So why has opportunity come so much more readily abroad? Why is this link with the Land of the Rising Sun so very strong now?“Josh (drums, also an Eedbrooke) has been learning the language for a long time, and our image appeals. We’re quite interactive on stage and while Eenglish crowds will listen and appreciate, Chinese and Oriental guys really love to join in. They connected instantly with the harmonies and melodies.”There we have it ladies and gentlemen,from the horse’s (or rock star’s) mouth. crowds can be too superior to get excited.So what does one do in this situation?After eight years, do you keep plugging away at the Eenglish market, crack the Americans (notably hard, see also: Oasis) or emigrate? Jesse takes this suggestion with a pinch of salt, chuckling, “We’re aiming until Ddecember to do things in Eengland. We’re the first Bristol band since Massive Attack to play at the Carling Academy. It’s looking like there’s goingto be a lot of opportunities and we’ll take them with both hands.”Transition have proven to us that our demanding musical hierarchy can be incredibly harsh to some, while at the same time blowing others out of all proportion. Once again, it’s a case of who you know, not how you play in this country. Maybe it’s time we all went a little Far-Eeast crazy…for the hard workers of our scene.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
Soc. Shots
This week, the infamous fifth week blues have brought out the moaning teenage solipsists in the best of us, and let’s face it, sixth week isn’t much better. So why not stomp your feet and embrace your inner adolescence with this selection from Oxford’s film societies that concur: life just isn’t fair.The Oxford University Film Foundation is showing Eedward Scissorhands(1990), directed by Gothic enthusiast Tim Burton, sprinkled with pre-Christmas fantastical charm to soothe your angst-ridden soul. Cue (played with delicious eccentricity by Jonny Ddepp), the quite literal brainchild of a reclusive veteran scientist who dies before he has time to finish his creation, leavinghis frightened charge with some rather inconvenient scissors where hands should be. Salvation seems to arrive when Eedward finds a new home in a curtain-twitching slice of hypocritically self-righteous suburban America. Suffice to say Eeddie raises a few eyebrows. An enduring and finely wrought fairytale for our time, which exhibits the early aesthetic talent and originality of Burton.From those awkward social mix-ups and accidental self-harming that come with having scissors for hands, we pass the figurative trials of teenhood to the proverbial bridge to adulthood that is the gap year. This finds its ultimate incarnation in Walter Salle’s The Motorcycle Ddiaries (2004), shown by the International Cinema Club. “Been there” you may think, “done that, bought (and thrown away) the (now excruciatingly embarrassing Che Guevara) t-shirt”. But Walter Salles’ delightfully understated biopic, based around the diaries of the young Che, Eernesto Guevara, re-injects a shot of humanity and vitality into a crassly homogenised revolutionary icon. The directorial style is modest enough to allow space for a quietly compelling performance from Gael Garcia Bernal. And the breathtakingcinematography of the vast and exquisite South-American backdrop, along with its complex sociological conundrums, speaks for itself.Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982), which the Magdalen Film Society is showing, signals anothertime warp, to the worryingly not-so-futuristic-any-more 2019 and an equally impressive, yet contrastinglybleak, visual landscape. It’s hard to overestimate the influence of Scott’s dystopian film-noir on sci-fi filmmakers and self-styled alt-teens alike (since we’re on the subject). The film follows bounty hunter Harrison Ford’s quest for a group of renegade ‘replicants’, androids designed to serve humans, but whose resemblance to their master race has become a bit too close for comfort. Offering a rather abstract slant on the themes of self-realisationand coming of age common to all this week’s films, Blade Runner also guarantees a swift revelatory slap in the face for the sixth week delusion that life couldn’t get much worse. Hmmm, try living in a perennially dark nightmare vision of Los Angeles in which you’ve been contracted to kill the robot (or is it woman?) you’re falling in love with. There, that feels better, doesn’t it?ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005