film

I Swear

I honestly think I woke up this morning with a new film added to my favourites category. John and I went to watch I Swear yesterday evening, and I don’t think I have been to a more powerful, rewarding film in a long, long time. It is the story of a man with Tourettes syndrome in the eighties, and as such it is essentially a film about disability and disability acceptance: we watch a young man with fairly severe Tourettes, John Davidson, growing up in a small Scottish town. It would be impossible not to find the amount of discrimination and bullying we see John face compelling, from the arrogant mockery he gets from other kids to loosing an opportunity to play football as a goalkeeper.

It becomes clear quite early in the film that John faces a hard, marginalised life. But where the film succeeds, rather magnificently, is in the emphasis it puts on the fact that all John really needs is understanding. He doesn’t need to ‘get better’, he doesn’t need a cure; all he needs is for people to understand his Tourettes (he refuses to call it a disability). He just needs people to understand that he can’t help his involuntary tics, they are just part of who he is, and are nothing to mock or worry about. As such, I Swear is one of the best pieces of disability representation and inclusion I have seen in a long, long time. It avoids the nasty temptation to make fun of John’s condition, handling the subject tenderly and with great humanity.

The film indeed opens with a shot of John receiving his MBE in 2019, a testimony to his fortitude, and all in all the film leaves the viewer extremely gratified and uplifted. There is sometimes a tendency for films like this to wallow in pity, but I Swear quite expertly avoids it, leaving the viewer uplifted, satisfied and enlightened. It is the story of a man overcoming horrendous persecution to achieve his potential, as well as his education of those around him to achieve enlightenment, and as such I now think it is definitely one of the ‘must see’ films of the season.

A Breaking Bad Film?

I suppose it is fair to say that it has been a bit of a rough week. Not just generally, where international affairs seem to be steadily progressing from bad to worse, but for me personally. Due to a bug or something I haven’t felt at all myself, and at one point was in fact beginning to get rather worried. However, I’m glad to say that has now passed – as I knew it would – and I once again feel like my usual, curious self.

One of the best things about this week, on the other hand, was that I’ve been continuing to enjoy Breaking Bad. As I wrote a few days ago, until very recently I was completely ignorant of it, I suppose having previously dismissed it as just another American mass entertainment franchise. Just a few days later, though, and I can’t get enough of it. I’ve been binge-watching it, and am already well into the second season.

I think it might well be the ‘something new’ I was looking for – after all, there are only so many times you can watch James Bond films or Star Trek episodes. It seems fresh and novel, like completely uncharted territory: new characters to get to know, as well as new ideas and themes to explore. To be honest, knowing there’s still so much to find out is quite a wonderful feeling.

However, I must admit that there is one nagging question which has already occurred to me: did Breaking Bad ever get a cinematic outing? Did it ever have a filmic manifestation? Obviously, I could simply google whether a Breaking Bad film was ever made or not, but the question nonetheless seems quite interesting in itself. For one, how might the highly complex characters I’m now watching being developed slowly over several seasons be translated into film? And how could you get the same balance of scientific gravitas and criminal transgressiveness?

Structurally of course, films and episodic franchises are very different things: one is self contained where the other is spread out over several hours. Yet fictions created as one can be adapted for the other, the obvious example being Star Trek. As a cinephile, I would be intrigued to find out if there ever was a film adaptation of Breaking Bad, or see what one might look like. It has a combination of academic intelligence and outright subversiveness I have never come across before – a dynamic which I would absolutely love to see transposed to the big screen. I’m now really looking forward to digging a little deeper.

And to think, all this came about due to my shave at the weekend!

Fantasising About Filmmaking

You know, the problem with filmmaking is the filming. Writing is a comparatively straightforward task: in my case at least, I can just bash out a few words, post it online, and anyone can read what I have to say. Its probably why I have kept my blog going for so long. Making a film, on the other hand, is far more complex: cameras need to be set up and actors organised; even the act of using a film camera requires a dexterity which I physically do not have. This is probably why, despite calling myself a filmmaker, I have made so few films.

The thing is, this is now becoming increasingly frustrating. Film, especially short online film, is becoming ever more popular. As a means of communication, films on the web have become almost a default. As I began to explore a few months ago in this entry, where fifteen years ago blogs and blogging were at the cutting edge, these days so-called influencers just talk into their camera phones and upload their ramblings to YouTube. Whatever they say is delivered far more directly than any piece of writing.

The thing is, where does that leave guys like me? I long to make films, but making films is not just a matter of sitting down and bashing a few words out. Yet I know film can be used to say things often far more effectively and convincingly than writing. This afternoon, for example, I had an idea for a piece which, presented through film, would probably be quite compelling and revelatory; but if confined to writing might well just come across as gossip, mud-slinging or worse. What, then, should I do with this idea? I could obviously write it out as a script in the hope that It could one day be made into a film; but as always happens, that would ultimately mean it gets saved on my computer and read by no one.

I thus find myself longing for some way to make film: some means of manipulating pictures, shots and sound into a coherent argument or narrative using only my computer. I fear animation would be too cumbersome and appear too frivolous for what I want to make. Yet these days there must surely be some solution to this problem; otherwise, as online communication moves more and more in the direction of the moving image, those of us who still need to use the written word risk being left behind.

Are They Filmmakers?

Film is such a strange, beguiling artform when you think about it: to a unique extent, it is at the same time supremely democratic and eye-wateringly exclusive. Unlike any other art form or mode of expression, it is something just about anyone can ‘do’, simply by holding up a camera and pressing ‘record’; yet on the other hand the film industry is notoriously difficult to get into, and making a proper, professional film for cinematic release takes years of work, dizzying amounts of networking (and luck), and obscene amounts of money. Thus in these days of camera-phones and Youtube, we find ourselves at a point where anyone can make a film by pointing a camera at something and recording it, before uploading it to make it available to the entire online world.

The question is, does that mean that they are filmmakers? At university I learned what an extremely sophisticated artform film is: Contemporary cinema is an amalgamation of techniques and styles, all of them having evolved over the last century or so, to form a rich, intriguing filmic language. You only have to read guys like Andre Bazin or Christian Metz to get an idea of just how beautiful and complex it is. Now, however, all that is being bypassed: online, film in the broader sense is becoming simply the recording of moving images, devoid of any art, style, technique or appreciation of film in any philosophical sense. It is as if what came before has been bypassed and ignored, akin to someone throwing paint haphazardly onto a canvas in roughly the shape of a woman, and proclaiming themself the next da Vinci. The result might express someone’s thoughts and feelings clearly enough, but can you call it art?

I suppose I shouldn’t complain. Film, like any other artform, is constantly evolving. The way it is accessible to anyone makes it hugely democratic. Yet, as a cinephile, part of me worries that the door has been opened to luddites with no idea what they are doing or any real appreciation of the artistry of film, resulting in the slow yet gradual wilting of the quality of films as a whole. To put it another way, it is not that difficult to write a few sentences to convey a message; but to write something with any deeper meaning or nuance, to say something meaningful about life, the universe and everything, it helps to have a knowledge of literature more broadly. That is the point at which writing, film or any other art gains true intellectual weight; without such context, it is just a few pictures or words, void of any real meaning.

Villeneuve is a Good Director, But…

You might be wondering why I haven’t said anything about the selection of Denis Villeneuve as the director of the next Bond film. It’s not that I haven’t noticed it, or that I’m not interested: I am of course intently interested in the future of one of my favourite film franchises. The thing is, it seems to me that whoever they choose faces an almost impossible task.

No Time To Die left the Bond franchise on a high. Daniel Craig had taken 007 to another level: at least four of his five films had been outstanding successes. Prior to the opening of Casino Royale in 2006, expectations for him had been wretchedly low, but as the Americans say, Craig hit it out of the park. The problem now is, his departure has now left a gaping chasm which it will be almost impossible for anyone to fill. What Craig gave us was phenomenal, so we now expect nothing less.

Many people are now saying that the only solution would be a complete change in tone for the franchise. That is, where Craig gave us a gritty, realistic Bond, the new era of Bond films should be lighter and more jovial, along the lines of what Roger Moore gave us. That way, any uncomfortable comparisons can be avoided. I certainly think this is a good idea, although I think that that will in turn give rise to it’s own questions, issues and problems: too serious and you’ll risk comparisons with what went before; too comic and you risk turning people away for being too different to what we’re used to. The balance will therefore need to be absolutely right.

The thing is, it seems to me that the chances of anyone striking that pinpoint balance are now more unlikely than ever. Were the 007 franchise still owned by EON, with Michael Wilson and Barbara Broccoli still producing, I would not have ruled it out. Wilson and Broccoli had weight and experience behind them, with over thirty years’ experience dealing with this cultural behemoth. With Amazon now in control, promising the complete reinvention of the franchise, no doubt opening it up to the same American hyper-commercial forces which have already been the bane of so many wonderful fictions, I frankly can’t see anything other than the Bond series becoming just another piece of derivative mass-market fluff. The executives at Amazon don’t know the first thing about James Bond, the Bond Phenomenon or it’s unique cultural position; they just see it as a set of big action films which will make them money.

Thus, as much as I respect Villeneuve, I think he’s in an impossible situation which I don’t see how any director could get out of. Bond films will always intrigue me, but I can’t help thinking that it may be wiser to call time on the phenomenon, and let them end on the high of Daniel Craig, than see it become subjected to the commercial, Amazonian pressures I now fear it will become opened up to.

Of Morris Dancing, Cricket And Zombie Apocalypses

In a way, yesterday was one of those pleasant days which I just spent trundling around the Borough of Greenwich, but it resulted in three quite interesting things to record here this morning. I set out at about eleven, after a good breakfast and plenty of coffee. It was already quite warm, so I was keen to get some fresh air, heading through Kidbrooke, over Blackheath and then down into Greenwich. Greenwich Market is always bustling on Saturday mornings, but yesterday it was heaving, and I could barely move for all the people as I navigated my way through it towards the river.

Once by the Thames, though, I found something which struck me as very peculiar: a Morris Dancing festival! Morris Dancing is something I associate with rural England and small towns and villages, so to suddenly happen upon such an event there, in the shade of the masts of the Cutty Sark, was quite a surprise. There were several groups of performers dancing, so I stayed to watch a few of their rather impressive routines, reflecting to myself that it was probably worth blogging about, before continuing my walk.

From Greenwich I continued along the River up to the O2, and then decided to head up to Charlton to see if there was a cricket match being played in the park. I still have extremely warm, happy memories of watching cricket in Charlton Park: it is a fantastic spot for the sport, with it’s wide green fields and friendly little cafe, all overlooked by the majestic Charlton House. I was very pleased to find a match already in play yesterday afternoon, with none other than the Mighty Eights, a team I have grown to know and love over the years, batting. From there, it became clear that the afternoon would just be a matter of sitting there, chatting to my friends, watching the cricket, and sipping non-alcoholic beer. If you ask me you can’t get a better Saturday afternoon than that.

However, the day was far from over. Unfortunately I had to miss the end of the match as I was eager to get home ahead of what promised to be an interesting evening: John and I had plans to go to a zombie apocalypse! That is to say, we were going to go watch 28 Years Later, Danny Boyle’s new film. I’m not usually a fan of zombie horror films, but John seemed keen to go, and I still think Boyle is a demi-god for what he did in 2012, so I thought I’d give it a go.

What I found myself watching, though, was far from pleasant: the film was scary, unnerving and grotesque, set in a post-apocalyptic Britain where people have to stave off ‘the infected’ with bows and arrows. I’d like to review it properly, but to do that I’d need to give it at least a second viewing. It’s a frightening, disorienting film full of unnecessary gore. What I will say, though, is that it is chock-a-block with iconography and references: religious references, references to films like Kes, and even – although I’m not completely sure – a few references to Tolkien. For example, there is one shot if a group of people walking in file, silhouetted, over a brow of a hill, recalling the similar, famous shot in Peter Jackson’s adaptation of Fellowship Of The Ring. Also, the main protagonist of the piece, a young boy called Jimmy, is always shot wearing a pendant on a necklace around his neck, recalling Frodo wearing the Ring.

Going deeper will, however, have to wait for another time. The day is starting, and the coffee is brewing. Yesterday was a great day at the end of an awesome week. It can only make me wonder what next week will bring.

Avatar, Then and Now

Dom suggested we watch Avatar last night. Believe it or not, I don’t think I had ever seen it before – I think it had crept under my radar somehow. Now that I have though, I think James Cameron’s 2009 film is certainly worth saying something about, especially in the light of all that has happened since it was released. At it’s heart, Avatar is a narrative of imperialism, especially American imperialism: it is a story about humans colonising another planet to exploit it for it’s resources, and in doing so decimating the homes of the indigenous people. Obviously, this could be taken as an allegory for the invasion of Iraq being invaded for oil, the colonisation of North America, or many other real-life situations. Yet what I was most struck by, watching the film last night, wasn’t so much the combination of live action or CGI the film was famous for; nor the weird intellectual issues rising from having humans control these avatars, seemingly entering into a completely different CGI space which was nonetheless supposed to be the same planet. What I was struck by was the sheer brashness with which the colonisers were acting: they seemed to think they had a god-given right to the planet’s resources, that the natives were inherently inferior to them and were just getting in their way.

Of course, as you would expect from a Hollywood blockbuster, the ending of the film has the native people’s all joining together and showing the invaders what for; but that is only a great deal of semi-covert imperial justification. Indeed, the central love story of the film has a disabled human in his able-bodied avatar fall in love with one of the native people, whose community he has infiltrated. Even leaving aside the fairly sickening anti-disabled, ‘able-bodied is better’ nonsense, at the end of the day humans had no right to be exploiting the planet in the first place, so having the two characters fall in love, like some saccharin romantic justification for the entire premise of the film was just nauseating. No amount of romance can make imperialism right; such love stories are simply attempts to distract us from the fact that one group of people is invading another in order to exploit their country’s resources. The fact that the guy is shown to switch sides in the end and ‘become a native’, does nothing to change that.

Obviously, Avatar has clear parallels with stories about Pocahontas and early American colonists falling in love with Native Americans. On this level, Avatar can be read as an allegory for the European colonisation of North America. Thus, no matter how much James Cameron may have attempted to depict the invading humans as brazen, arrogant and ignorant, the fact remains the film does not question their right to be there, even depicting a love story between members of the two communities. Although it is mentioned somewhere in the film that the invaders had to be there because Earth was dying, such justification seems half-hearted at best. It is very telling that the text does not end with the colonising forces all realising the error of their ways and going back to Earth or finding another planet to live on. While most are shown to return to Earth, some – the ‘good ones’ – were allowed to remain, the implication being that the creators of the film thought the invaders had an overarching right to be there, in spite of all the destruction and suffering they are shown to inflict.

Hence, at it’s heart and as much as it’s director might try to deny it, Avatar essentially justifies imperialism. In it we can clearly read the American ‘we come first’ mindset, which was an integral part of their culture in 2009 and is even more evident now. Obviously in it we can read a justification of the invasion of Iraq, but we can now also make out far more about what has happened since then, about the American mindset, it’s urge to dominate, and it’s unwavering, unquestionable attitude that it’s needs come first. If Avatar is a story about one group of people dominating, bullying and exploiting another, it is now more relevant than ever.

One From Shives’ Heart

I think I really need to flag this Steve Shives video up today. As you may know, I’ve been watching Shives’ videos for a while: I think he’s one of the best film and TV analysts on Youtube, especially when it comes to franchises like Star Trek. In this vid, however, he discusses his adoration for Superman, particularly he earlier Superman films when he was played by Christopher Reeve. What interests me about this video is how, as Shives himself admits, he forgoes any in-depth discussion and instead just tries to convey his love and fascination with what he sees on screen. He knows that what he is watching is silly, campy and far fetched, but that somehow does not matter: Shives feels intrigued and compelled to watch. He does not use the term, but to me that is instantly recognisable as cinephilia, the discourse of filmic love I spent seven years analysing and writing about.

In a way this is cinephilia in it’s purest form. The way Shives picks out films, actors or just moments of film and speaks about them so adoringly is quintessentially cinephiliac. I was particularly struck by the moment when, two and a half to three minutes into the piece, Shives deviates slightly and starts talking about the moment he first saw Atticus Finch appear on screen. He had apparently been studying Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird at school, but this was the first time Shives had seen the film adaptation. Shives describes how he was struck by how Gregory Peck’s portrayal of Finch looked uncannily like he had imagined the character; how he had to stop himself ‘audibly gasping’; how amazed he felt at the sight of a character he had previously only imagined brought to life on screen. Shives might not use the term – or even know it – but what he is describing is a cinephiliac moment: a moment in a film when the viewer is absolutely taken by what they are seeing, although they can’t quite articulate why. It touches them on a deep, personal level; they feel compelled to explain and talk about it, even though it somehow seems to go beyond words.

To be honest I find it incredible to see one being expressed so clearly and obviously. Shives probably hasn’t read the literature surrounding cinephilia, let alone my zarking thesis, but this is a primary example of it’s development, and how it is emerging online more and more. The thing is, until Shives and commenters like him recognise what they produce as such, and start to talk about their love of film in and of itself, what they produce will always remain a form of fandom.

DVDs Still Rule

By rights I should love streaming: it makes films and television programs so easy to watch. All you need to do is sit down at your computer, and you can now watch virtually anything you can think of, no matter how obscure. There is no need to muck around hunting down rare videos or DVDs, and no need to store them on shelves and put them into drives whenever you want to watch them. From my perspective, streaming should be awesome.

The thing is, I still don’t think it actually is. Of course, as I wrote here, streaming has many advantages, especially if like me you can’t physically use things like DVDs. Yet it seems to me that the rise of streaming has brought about an entirely new paradigm in how we consume film. Before now, if you wanted to watch a specific film, you just either went to the cinema or bought a video or DVD from a shop. It would then be yours to keep. It wouldn’t matter which shop you bought it from or the chain of cinemas you went to; the same films were available anywhere.

What bothers me these days, however, is the way in which certain streaming services are effectively the gatekeepers of certain films or programs. Instead of owning a film on disk which I could then watch whenever I wanted, Ad Infinitum, these days to watch certain films you have to subscribe to certain streaming services. The only way you can maintain access to that film is to keep up your subscription to the streaming service it is hosted by, of which there are now several.

I can’t help thinking that this is a fundamental change in how we consume and access film. Whereas we might previously have had a shelf of videos or DVDs alongside our shelves of books, to watch certain films we now need to be subscribed to certain streaming services. They are now no longer texts which we can get off the shelf whenever we want, but the products of streaming platforms without which we cannot access certain films. In a way this renders them products, like forcing people to keep buying bottles of water when previously it had been always available through taps.

A couple of days ago I bought all three seasons of Picard on DVD. I have seen all the episodes before of course, and it was little more than an impulse buy. Yet I think the purchase is something I will now cherish. Obviously, to watch the episodes I will need to ask someone to put them in my DVD drive. Yet simply to own them as a physical artefact, just as I own box sets of James Bond and The Lord of the Rings, is something I find very satisfying: simply to know the episodes are there, ready for me to access and indulge in whenever I want, without having to update a membership or keep paying a subscription, gives me a sense of contentment.

I love film, of course: I love how it really ignites the imagination, taking us to a plethora of different places. I love how different directors use it to express their selves and say different things. Yet instead of being the expression of directors, film now seems to be the product of online platforms, without which we cannot watch certain films. This renders them commercial products rather than works of art; pieces of entertainment to pay for rather than meaningful expression of thought. 

Ocean with David Attenborough

It was turning into quite a dull day so this afternoon I decided to take myself up to the cinema to watch Ocean with David Attenborough. I was, of course, extremely eager to watch it, although a (small) part of me was hesitant as I tend to associate Attenborough with the BBC, and he didn’t work with them on this film. However, what I found myself watching a couple of hours ago was truly, truly remarkable. First of all, Ocean is a beautifully shot piece of non-fiction cinema: some of the scenes we are treated to as an audience are jaw-dropping. More to the point, it is a highly compelling film. As many others are noting, unlike Sir David’s TV work, this film has a clear agenda: in large part it is about the damage we are doing to the oceans, mostly through over-fishing. We glimpse the ruin trawlers inflict on the seas, which it would be hard not to find compelling. In this sense it was clear to see why this film could not have been made by the beeb as it couldn’t have had such an overt agenda. At the same time it does not go too far or slip into dogma: it is not anti-fishing, but emphasises how balanced, sustainable methods could benefit everyone.

However, the aspect of the film I was most drawn by was how it highlighted Attenborough’s own incredible career. We are treated to clips of him diving as a young man fifty or sixty years ago. This allows the film to highlight how much the oceans have changed over that time, and how they also have a remarkable capacity to recover if we allow them to. Thus we are treated to a view of the oceans very much through Attenborough’s own wise, compelling eyes, and the film is all the richer for it.

The vast majority of us have spent our entire lives with David Attenborough on our television screens, treating us to insights into the natural world nobody else comes close to. I think I have said here before that I regard him as the greatest broadcaster ever. To my knowledge this is his first foray into cinema, and the result is an absolute pleasure. If I had a single criticism of the film, however, it is that it does not touch upon how the damage we are currently doing to the seas has it’s underlying roots in economics, or what causes it socio-economically. The issue is essentially one of capitalism. After all, people are compelled to catch fish to make a living; if this motivation was got rid of, surely over-fishing would be far less of a problem. The only way the issue of over-fishing can be dealt with is if we address our appetite for seafood. The film does not focus on this broader aspect of the issue though, but seems to shy away from the underlying economics. That aside, we are treated to a wonderful piece of natural history cinema – one which I would passionately encourage everyone to go and watch on the big screen as soon as you can. David Attenborough has treated us to yet another delightful insight into the world around us; but then, we expect nothing less from this great, great man.

A Sickening Spectacle Nobody Wants To Watch

A couple of days ago I looked up when Danny Boyle was selected to direct the London 2012 Olympic opening ceremony. The answer was 2010, obviously two years ahead of the ceremony itself. I was wondering when we might hear that Los Angeles had selected someone to direct its opening. I know it’s still some time away, but believe it or not I’m already becoming curious about what LA might do.

Such events still fascinate me. It seems to me that Olympic opening ceremonies are unique artistic events in that they draw the entire world’s attention onto one city for a few hours. They thus give a city and the country it represents the once in a lifetime opportunity to show itself off before the entire world. When else do we see incredible spectacles like James Bond meeting queen Elizabeth, a huge flotilla of boats gliding down the Seine or Eric Idle (apparently) being shot out of a cannon, before bursting into Always Look On The Bright Side of Life?

What, then, could we see happen in LA in three years time? To be honest it’s a question which I’m beginning to feel nervous about. I keep hearing that Trump is now trying to turn VE Day in the US into some kind of birthday parade for himself. Frankly, it sounds a bit far fetched but I wouldn’t put it past the self important prick. The question is then, assuming Trump is still in office in 2028, to what extent could he try to turn the ceremony into some kind of sickening spectacle of self-aggrandisement? Again I wouldn’t put it past him; but imagine how utterly repugnant it would be to see the world’s most awesome cultural event commandeered by such a vainglorious charlatan? I’m sure nobody wants to watch that! That’s why I am already so keen to know who might direct the ceremony; it’s something that I plan to keep a fairly close eye on.

A Brave New World of Soulless Exploitation

I have written here before about how I have three major obsessions when it comes to film and the media: The Lord of the Rings and the work of JRR Tolkien; Star Trek; and James Bond. All three are major cultural phenomena in their own right, and I have adored all three since childhood. I still have fond memories of dad reading Tolkien’s books to me and my brothers before we went to sleep. My memories are equally warm of watching Star Trek The Next Generation on BBC2 every Wednesday evening. And who grew up without adoring the James Bond films?

Yet, it seems to me that all three are being torn to shreds in the contemporary mediascape. As I said a few days ago, Peter Jackson’s adaptations of The Lord Of The Rings twenty years ago were cinematic masterpieces, but what followed quickly descended into mass-media pap. The very act of adapting Tolkien’s novels for the screen – giving it ‘the Star Wars treatment‘ – virtually invited charlatans with little respect for the source material to mine it for every penny they could. The Hobbit was just about okay, but did not need to be stretched over three films; but I’m afraid Amazon’s Rings of Power is an unwatchable insult to anyone who loves and respects the work of Tolkien.

Sadly, exactly the same thing has happened to Star Trek: since the end of Enterprise and the advent of the Kelvin timeline, it has been reduced to confused, meaningless pap. I admittedly watched Picard largely for nostalgia’s sake, but series like Strange New Worlds are so cheesy and crammed with fan-service and self-referential bollocks that it hasn’t seemed worth bothering with. These days the Star Trek franchise lacks the captivating intrigue of humanity going out to explore the galaxy which made me fall in love with it in the first place, and has become just another piece of commercial mass entertainment, designed to entice viewers to watch it but essentially meaning and saying nothing.

I now fear this is what is going to happen to James Bond too. Since Amazon acquired the rights to Bond on Thursday, there has of course been a plethora of online speculation about where they will take the franchise. Many are saying that we can expect to see something quite soon. That is obviously good news after the 007 drought of the last few years. However, I now worry that the Bond franchise will now be open to the same commercial forces which Lord of the Rings and Star Trek have succumbed to. Whereas before now we have been used to watching a new Bond film every to or three years, full of action, intrigue, international escapism and wonderful locations, I suspect Bond too will be sucked dry. We’ll see spin-offs and television series, loosely related to the source material but lacking any of the cinematic aura which made Bond so popular in the first place. It too will just become commercial, mass-market, meaningless pap.

This obviously makes me very sad indeed. I may just be getting old, bitter and cynical, but all three of the franchises I have adored since childhood have now been or are going to be reduced to mass market bits of fluff, lacking any of the things which made them so compelling in the first place. I suppose it’s just a result of the contemporary corporate world: the more popular a franchise becomes, the more likely it is to be bought and sucked dry by a massive American company. I find myself wishing that all three could have remained the wonderful, bespoke pieces of fiction I fell in love with, but ultimately in this brave new capitalistic world of soulless exploitation, that is rather naive.

When James Bond Becomes Public Domain

I just came across something very, very interesting indeed regarding James Bond. I know I shouldn’t just blog about the first video I come across on Youtube on a given day, but I think this one is worth a watch. In it, the dude explains that the Bond franchise is due to enter the public domain in about ten years: that means that, rather than being confined to EON and the official Bond films, just about anyone will be able to make a film based around the character. Whereas we currently have to wait for official Bond films, other studios and directors will be able to use the character. Obviously, the danger of that is that a lot of crap will be made, but I must admit part of me finds the prospect intriguing.

I suppose over the last sixty years James Bond has become part of our culture and a bit of a tradition. As I wrote here, we’re used to going to see a new Bond film at the cinema every few years before discussing it with our friends. But could it be time for that to change? ‘All good things’ and all that. Opening the Bond character out gives rise to endless possibilities: Black Bonds; gay Bonds; even Bonds with disabilities. Naturally, a lot of crap stands to be made, lacking a shred of the quality or professionalism of the ‘official’ Bond films; yet I must admit the concept of seeing a franchise and character we’re all so used to taken in a plethora of new directions intrigues me. After all, keeping any intellectual or artistic property in the hands of a select few people means it will inevitably eventually stagnate; but opening it up to as many creative minds as possible will inject it with fresh creative vigour.

James Bond And Streaming

I just came across this Youtube video speculating about the future of the James Bond franchise. It’s quite interesting and fairly detailed, and worth a watch for anyone interested in the future of film’s greatest series. As many people are now noting, we’re into by far the longest gap ever between Bond films, and a new one is certainly overdue. As the video explains, the reasons for this depressing pause are quite complex, mostly having to do with tensions between Amazon and EON. Yet what it touches upon but doesn’t quite go into is the fact that Bond films are fundamentally cinematic, and these days, since the rise of online streaming, we don’t go to the cinema to watch films any more. The release of a new Bond film used to be a big cultural event: we used to watch royalty go to the premiere on the news; personally, I used to make an effort to arrange to go to see new Bond films with my friend Charlotte.

These days, though, we just watch films on our computers and mobile phones. Consuming film has become far more casual and less reverent. Instead of making an effort to go out to the cinema, now we just pop a film on our computer screens, often letting it run in the background. I have to wonder, can a phenomenon as fundamentally cinematic as Bond survive this new landscape? Imagine watching one of the awesome, classic James Bond action scenes or car chases on a tiny mobile phone screen – it just wouldn’t work! Thus, as loathe as I am to say it, I don’t see how something as quintessentially cinematic as Bond can survive in this new era, and think it might be time he is put to rest. As I wrote here a couple of weeks ago, rather than try to drag the franchise out and fit Bond into this new online, post-COVID media landscape, it may now be wiser to consign the character to history.

25 Films May Be Enough

This morning I thought I’d try to get up to speed on what is happening with James Bond. I’d heard there was some kind of spat between EON Productions and Amazon, but other than that I was at a loss. However, I think I need to flag this excellent Den Of Geek article which I just came across up. It looks into what is going on with arguably cinema’s greatest series, and if you ask me it isn’t pretty. Amazon execs apparently want to turn Bond into a kind of Marvel franchise, with spin off film and TV series about characters like Miss Moneypenny and other Double-O agents. Now, as the article points out, there have always been Bond Spin offs in various media like novels, graphic novels (comics) and computer games; but arguably the phenomenal fifty year success of the Bond films boils down to the fact that they all centre around one character. That character, while retaining certain key aspects such as a liking for Martinis and his specific style of introducing himself, changes over time, acting as a kind of cultural barometer for over half a century. Any such spin-off media would probably distract or divert from that, missing the point entirely.

As much as I regret to say this, but I must admit that as I read this article it occurred to me that it may now be time to call an end to the Bond phenomenon: if this is indeed the way things are going, with disputes between film studios and the gradual abandonment of what has made James Bond James Bond, it may be wiser to consign it to history. After all, in this infuriating post-Brexit, Donald Trump era, we no longer live in the world either Ian Fleming or Cubby Broccoli placed Bond in. Many point to Bond’s misogyny, yet he is ultimately a character from a world in which Britain never lost it’s standing as a global imperial power – a delusion which will inevitably grow harder and harder to maintain. Especially after 2016, the over-simplified, good-vs—bad, Britannia rules the Waves world Bond inhabits does not exist any more, and both character and franchise will start to seem increasingly anachronistic and absurd.

Attempting to continue the franchise would surely just draw it out, exposing it to many contemporary sociopolitical pressures which I don’t think it could withstand. Such pressures would pull it in so many different artistic and commercial directions it would ultimately be torn apart. Thus rather than go through the rigmarole of selecting yet another actor, seeing that selection debated ad nauseam, and then waiting to see whether the resulting film lives up to the legacy, perhaps it would be best to consign these twenty-five films to history. After all, one of the greatest skills any artist can have is knowing when to finish a piece.

Monty Python Is Being Misread

Late last night just before I went to bed I saw that, on one of the Monty Python fan pages on Facebook, someone had posted a link to the Military Fairy sketch, along with a comment like ‘How long before a snowflake takes offence at this?’ I didn’t react at the time, but of course that immediately struck me as staggeringly, breathtakingly ironic. The entire point of that hilarious sketch was to poke fun at the military; it was supposed to mock the martial status quo which had been present in Britain for the twenty years before it was broadcast. The irony is, whoever made the comment on the Facebook page obviously thought it was making fun of gay people, misinterpreting the sketch as somehow supporting their anti-woke, intolerant views when in fact it did precisely the opposite.

These days, more and more people seem to be claiming Monty Python and period comedies like it were right wing, anti-woke and politically incorrect. They say that they would never be allowed to air today, but that is a flagrant, deliberate misreading of what programs like Python were all about. As I wrote here, Python was left wing, not right wing; it was about poking fun at authority and the status quo, and everything that the right holds sacred. It irritates me that these reactionary morons now claim it as their own, using it as some kind of justification for intolerance. That totally warps what Monty Python was about, effectively hijacking to say exactly the opposite of what it was originally meant to. After All, the only people who would possibly offended by the Military Fairy sketch are the right wing nutcases to whom the army is above ridicule.

Bring Back Brosnan?

If I can just put my James Bond fan hat on, yesterday I came across an idea which struck me as interesting enough to flag up here. The speculation over who will be cast as 007 next is still rumbling on, of course. As I touched upon here a few months ago, it has been so long since we have seen a new Bond film that I have almost given up hope, quite frankly. Browsing Youtube yesterday evening, however, I watched a video which laid out an idea which I think could have legs.

As I understand it, the problem the guys at EON currently have is the massive gap left by Daniel Craig: Craig’s five Bond films had such an impact on the Bond series that whoever is next cast as 007 will have bigger shoes to fill than anyone before them. That is not to say that I think Craig himself did not have a lot to live up to – when he was cast as Bond in 2005, he certainly did – but the expectations will now be bigger than ever before. Whoever they cast will be under a huge amount of pressure to step into cinema’s greatest role.

The intriguing solution I came across last night struck me as quite left field, but I think it could work: Could Pierce Brosnan be recast as 007? As bizarre as that might initially sound, I honestly think it has legs. The problem is, at the end of the last film, No Time To Die, we saw Bond as played as Daniel Craig get blown up. Not only did that put an end to his tenure but also effectively brought an end to the character in general. After all, how can you continue a film franchise about a man who we saw die in the last film? The answer this video suggests is to return the role to it’s last-but-one actor – an incarnation of Bond which we didn’t see die, thereby bypassing his screen death.

Admittedly this idea is rather far fetched. Brosnan is 71, and could be well past playing James Bond. Yet, as the guy in the video says, his four Bond films didn’t really have a satisfying conclusion; he just sort of lost the role and was just chucked out on his ear. Bringing him back, perhaps for just one more Bond outing, could be a way to redress that. It would also bring back the 007 many Bond fans, including myself, know from our childhoods or adolescences, thus tapping in to an element of nostalgia. Giving the role back to him would thus reset the Bond franchise post Daniel Craig, clearing the way for an entirely new actor to be cast as 007.

Das Idioten and Disability Rights

Just before breakfast this morning, I was talking about film with John: we were checking out some of Mark Kermode’s reviews, and his interview with Lars Von Trier cropped up. Von Trier is a director I first came across at university, but he hadn’t crossed my intellectual path since then. However, his name rung a bell as the guy who directed Das Idioten.

I vaguely remember trying to watch Das Idioten back in my room at university, but being so appalled by it that I gave up about twenty minutes in. This morning, though, I decided to give it another go: uni was over fifteen years ago, and I was kind of curious about it. Luckily, I found it on Amazon, and put it on while enjoying a delicious omelette.

Having just finished the film, it would seem that I have a lot of work to do and a lot to write. Watching as both a cinephile and disability rights activist/blogger, Das Idioten is a highly, highly problematic film, as provocative as it is troubling. It’s essentially about a commune of able-bodied people who see imitating people with learning difficulties as a form of social rebellion or even art. I mean, where do I even begin with that? The characters – and, by extension, the director – seem to think that what they are doing is socially right and justified, rather than a crass, repugnant form of mockery of one of the most oppressed sections of society. The film framed it as commentary or political expression rather than discrimination.

I have known people with conditions like severe autism or PMLD who behaved in the way the characters in the film were trying to imitate. Many live difficult, confused lives barely being able to comprehend the world around them. To see such people being mocked, imitated and caricatured as they were in the film was gut-wrenchingly vile. Yet, when they wanted to, the characters were shown to revert to their normal, able-bodied selves, as if ‘spazzing’ was just something they could step in and out of. They were then shown to use this behaviour to manipulate others into things like paying for meals. The problem is, there seemed to be very little criticism of this repugnant behaviour, but instead the film seemed to present it as somehow political or artistic.

Let’s put it this way: if this film was focussed on any other minority – if these people were shown to be mimicking black or gay people for example, and justifying it as political activism – there would rightly be public outrage. Why, then, should I as a disabled man allow it to go unchallenged? Das Idioten may be about thirty years old, but when viewed in the light of contemporary civil rights activism, there is a hell of a lot which can and should be said about it. The question is, where do I start?

First things first, I need to go for a walk.

Cinema Screenings should have Subtitles

I omitted a rather important detail from my entry yesterday which I decided warrants it’s own post. When we went into the screening room, I noticed that the film had subtitles. At first this struck me as pretty strange: the film was in English, so there was no reason for them. I initially thought they would just be a distraction. But then my brain kicked in: The Barbican obviously wanted the film to be accessible to everyone, including Deaf and hard of hearing people. Why shouldn’t the film have subtitles? In fact, when I came to think about it, why shouldn’t film screenings in general have subtitles? After all, it’s pretty unfair on people who need subtitles to watch films to only be able to go to certain, very limited, screenings. If subtitles distract or bother the rest of us, then surely it would be up to us to get used to them; that would be preferable than continuing to exclude Deaf people from cinemas.