… Except it’s not,not really. This Brent Huff documentary from 2016 looks great on paper, purporting to look at the rockabilly subculture in all its sassy glory. Instead, it focuses on the Viva Las Vegas convention, with lots of hipster types with sleeve tattoos, blue hair and brothel creepers. It’s colourful enough, and everyone looksContinue reading “Film Review: It’s A Rockabilly World”
Category Archives: Film
Overlooked Classics: Hail The New Puritan (1987)
“Michael! Michael! “ I’m trying not to get too nostalgic here, as any nostalgia suggests there’s nothing worth dipping into in contemporary culture, but Charles Atlas’ fictionalised account of Michael Clark was like a firework going off in my soul. Something just sparked within me. Epiphany is an understatement. This was something I wanted inContinue reading “Overlooked Classics: Hail The New Puritan (1987)”
Put Blood In The Music: Sonic Youth and John Zorn
This film, directed by Charles Atlas for The South Bank Show in 1989, was what made me fall in love with SY, and admire Zorn. Using a fanzine type approach to his montage – talking heads floating in front of New York street scenes, it’s a typically playful approach from Atlas (more of whom, later).Continue reading “Put Blood In The Music: Sonic Youth and John Zorn”
Worth Revisiting: Wild Man Blues
‘Grumpy Old Man B!ues’, more like. What a miserable old git Woody Allen is. That’s the takeaway from Barbara Kopple’s 1997 documentary on the legendary but controversial film director. Holding forth on his favourite subjects: New York; himself, jazz, himself, Paris, himself, travel, himself, and, mostly, himself, the camera follows him, alongside his very youngContinue reading “Worth Revisiting: Wild Man Blues”
Favourite Cover Versions: Tonight You Belong To Me (The Jerk)
The Jerk is in essence a silly film, showcasing the slapstick comedy of Steve Martin. He’s Navin, a classic doofus, a guy who, raised by a poor Black family, believes himself to be Black also. But also central to this runs the relationship between Navin and Marie. Bernadette Peters is Marie, and is a ClaraContinue reading “Favourite Cover Versions: Tonight You Belong To Me (The Jerk)”
Overlooked Classics: Niagara
Henry Hathaway ‘s 1953 thriller was a radical departure for rising star Marilyn Monroe. She portrays Rose, an ice cool newlywed just hitched to George (Joseph Cotten) who’s just been discharged from an army mental hospital, having served in Korea. She befriends the sweet if vapid Polly and Ray (Jean Peters and Casey Adams) alsoContinue reading “Overlooked Classics: Niagara”
Film Review: Beau Is Afraid
Pitched between hysterical mayhem and an eerie calm, Beau Is Afraid makes Get Out look like The Wiggles. This almost three hour epic is trippy indeed, with all the logic of a fever dream.Although written and directed by Ari Aster it’s like a Kafka compendium created by Paul Thomas Anderson, with a soupcon of DavidContinue reading “Film Review: Beau Is Afraid”
Overlooked Classics: Night On Earth (1991)
Among Jim Jarmusch’s many films, I feel two are often overlooked, Ghost Dog (Way Of The Samurai) and Night On Earth. The former, I’ll get to later, but I often wonder why this is the case. Night On Earth has all of the JarmuschIan qualities you’d expect: deadpan humour; strangers thrown together by circumstances outContinue reading “Overlooked Classics: Night On Earth (1991)”
Film Review: #Unfit
Directed by Dan Partland, #Unfit :The Psychology of Donald Trump is a compelling, thoroughly absorbing and sobering documentary from 2020, which posits that the Orange Menace may in fact be, as many have long suspected, a malignant narcissist, who is not merely unfit for office, but a global threat. It does allude to The GoldwaterContinue reading “Film Review: #Unfit”
Film Review: Hail, Satan?
There is a HELL of a lot to unpack in Penny Lane’s brilliant documentary Hail, Satan? as it seems quite jocular at first, even rather silly. As it develops though, it seems that tone is a trick to wrong -foot any audience expectations, and a more thoughtful film emerges.Essentially, it’s all a battle of willsContinue reading “Film Review: Hail, Satan?”
Hit The North 