There’s a point where, if you happen to be eating a chocolate bar in a movie, and you feel a bit fall off, you’ve just got to resign yourself to the consequences, since they’re going to be bad, no matter how thoroughly you try to surreptitiously try to brush yourself off. Just, you know, something that occurred to me for no reason. 😉
Film #47: Side By Side
It was interesting and weird to see stuff that I’ve lived through in a documentary. We’re still in the process of trying to work out how to deal with the huge volume of data that film-makers can generate, now that they aren’t restricted to working in 10 minute bursts, and now that they’re generating twice as many frames that are more than twice as big (for 4k/5k shot in stereo).
But I’m a little annoyed that the film didn’t challenge some of the more ridiculous statements – that the explosion of film-making is somehow a bad thing, which arguments that sound as if society would somehow have been better off if that pesky printing press hadn’t democratized words. Why, the monks worked on vellum, not cheap paper – think of the archival consequences! And without the abbots as taste-makers, no-one will ever be able to find anything worth reading ever again! No, the magic of being able to envision how the page will look after it is written and the difficulty in fixing any mistakes force you to really think about what you’re copying, and result in occasional happy accidents that are much more important than being able to print off a test sheet and check for errors!
Having a fetish for celluloid is all very well, but some of the justifications are a bit ridiculous. On the other hand, we might end up in a similar situation to winemakers – everyone is used to the taste from the wood that you used to have to make & store wine in, so people add wood chips to the stainless-steel vats that they use. In a similar way, we may see people continuing to add grain, just because it’s always been there. Of course, we might also see film grain go the way of the cork-made-of-cork – in other words, with an initial stigma, followed by widespread acceptance by the general public.
Anyway, an interesting film – shot, incidentally, digitally.
Film #48: Step Up To The Plate
A son is taking over an important French restaurant from his father. They are both focused perfectionists, and are occasionally a little prickly towards each other, but seem to have mutual respect; to me, the father’s affection for his son only really came out when he was talking to the mother. The scenes where they are cooking or working out new dishes were really interesting; the lingering landscapes put me to sleep. Basically, it was okay, but towards the end, I found it too slow.
Film #49: The Ambassador
This was a little crazy. Financed by the Danish Film Institute, a reporter constructed a businessman persona, and went about buying the position of honorary consul from Liberia, and pretend to be setting up a match-making factory in the Central African Republic, while organizing to buy blood diamonds (which he would be able to transport in his diplomatic luggage). It was not smooth sailing, exactly, but it showed that anyone with a bit of a bankroll and doggedness could quite easily buy their way into trading on diplomatic privileges. I knew that the film-maker was present to speak, but from some of the things he said in the film, I thought that he was going way too far.
I was surprised at how many people he got to talk to him, but I guess that they thought that a reporter wouldn’t have the money to spend on bribes in the same way, and in the Q&A he mentioned (a little sadly) that they had drawn up a business plan for the fake match factory, and it would have been very profitable… if it wasn’t for the corruption. He mentioned that he sold the diamonds that he got as part of his investigation within the CAR, and gave the money to the pygmies he’d hired as workers; they’d bought the gear to make matches by hand, but he didn’t think it would go anywhere.
He also talked about how involved the French government is (still!) in making sure that the country stays weak, corrupt, and haemorrhaging resources that are easily transformed into cash into various clandestine French organisations. It’s kind of crazy to think of that stuff still going on, but it’s certainly true that there’s still a 400-strong Foreign Legion force, well equipped with modern weaponry, encamped near the airport; they would almost certainly eliminate the 2000-strong CAR army (who are poorly trained and armed with Kalashnikovs).
A scary film, but good.
Film #50: Pictures of Susan
This was a good film of a sad story. One of the things I found weird, though, was that I didn’t get a strong feeling of story happening during the film, even though it was filmed over four years. Instead, it felt more like we were seeing how things are now, and how they happened. Nevertheless, I enjoyed it, and wished that I didn’t have to scoot out and charge across town to Te Papa.
Film #51: In Another Country
The audience was happy to laugh at this, and having the actors communicate cross-culturally in English was, I think, a good idea; but bits of it felt clumsy (including the cinematography), and the subtitles were plain white, which meant they often disappeared against light backgrounds. Having the girl running the guest house writing in her journal to quickly set up each of the three scenarios was an acceptable device, but they didn’t do anything interesting with it, and she seemed to know some details that she was not present for. If I knew then what I know now, I would’ve probably blown off this film, and stayed for the previous Q&A session instead.
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