Autism friendly cinema screenings

A couple of weeks ago I blogged on the work of the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign, campaigning about the poor access that disabled people encounter during something as taken for granted as going to the cinema.

As I noted at the time:

[I]t’s the things that non-disabled people wouldn’t even think of that often scupper the opportunities for disabled people to have the same opportunity to participate equally – in this case, going to the cinema.

In the spirit of sharing good news as well as bad, I was taken by this: Autism Friendly Cinema Screenings

Cinemas are to start staging monthly autism friendly screenings of top films. The move comes after the hugely successful summer pilot which saw more than 3,000 people affected by autism attend special morning screenings.

Sensory friendly screenings will now be taking place monthly in 55 cinemas.

Admittedly, the screenings – the result of a partnership between Dimensions and ODEON – will only be monthly. But at least the particular barriers faced by people with autism have been identified, and the organisations involved should be congratulated for their work on this.

For information: the next screening will be of Johnny English Reborn (during week commencing 14 October), followed by Arthur Christmas (during week commencing 18 November).

Hallowe’en Special: Blog Of Blood!

At the end of Mark Gatiss’ excellent three-part A History of Horror series, which ends, appropriately, with a review of the power and impact of John Carpenter’s first Hallowe’en film, released in 1978, Mark explains his decision to stop the series in the late seventies.

He says that whilst he feels there have been ‘standout single films’, too much modern horror seems like ‘more of the same fare, spiced up with pointless torture’. Mark ends by saying that he thinks this is partly due to growing older: as you do you ‘fear your own mortality’ and your tastes shift as a result, in the case of horror ‘towards ghosts and spookiness and away from blood and gore’.

Like Mark, I’m also a fan of horror films, and these comments caused me to reflect on why certain films in the genre feel groundbreaking despite of, or in some cases even because of, the extremity of the images they show, and why others seem gratuitous and almost entirely unnecessary. I was also reminded of Quentin Tarantino’s comments made in London at the start of this year: he said that ‘[violence in films] affects audiences in a big way. You know you’re watching a movie.’

There’s obviously a difference between horror films and films containing horrific things (and most of Tarantino’s films fall into the latter category), but for what it’s worth I think there are three key ingredients which mark out a brilliant horror film with violent imagery from a shoddy one.

First and foremost: realism. I can’t be the only person who’s had the pleasure of watching Peter Jackson’s 1992 film Braindead (yes, Peter Jackson the over-sized hobbit), which has levels of blood, guts and general goo that, if they were in any way realistic, would’ve prevented the film from ever being released. But as it is, Braindead is so over-the-top, silly and, crucially, funny, that not for a minute do you ever entertain the possibility that what you’re seeing is real. Also in this category: later George A. Romero zombie films, the Evil Dead series, and plenty more besides.

But of course realism does have a place in horror, so what does a realistic, violent, but really good horror film look like? This is where key ingredient number two comes in: impact. By the time we’ve got to the third in the Saw series (or, in fact, halfway through the first film) the increasingly horrible images are having no impact at all on our deadened brains.

Impact is usually a factor of the originality of the image, its unexpectedness, and the way suspense has been built (or not). So when, in one of Gatiss’ favourites the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the first teenager is offed upon entering the house where the serial-killing redneck family live, the sequence is brilliantly effective because of the way suspense has been amped up and because of the gruesome originality of the style of the attack and, actually, for its brevity: it’s all over before you know it and you’re left wondering what exactly you’ve seen.

You can, however, have realism and real impact without having a good horror film: they can still be horrid rather than horrific. I think it’s when genuine nastiness enters a film – misogyny, explicit torture, sexual violence – and when there’s either a focus on that over everything else or no actual point to it beyond displaying the act itself (because we can!) that a horror film falls down.

There are, few and far between, exceptions that prove the rule: the scene of torture in Eden Lake is one of the examples of genuine nastiness which serves a purpose; in this case parodying the Daily Mail style demonisation of the nation’s youth.

At its best, to come back to the Tarantino quote, really good horror can – sometimes literally – jolt you out of the everyday and make you feel more alive. It’s when you find yourself wondering ‘what’s the point?’ that you know something’s gone horribly wrong.

Am I missing something crucial? Have I got it completely wrong? Let me know on Twitter @philblogs.

Post-bureaucratic age, the #BigSociety and Ace Ventura

There’s a moment in the first Ace Ventura (Pet Detective) film when Jim Carey’s character realises that the male sports star he’s been searching for is actually the same person as the female police chief he’s been battling with.

With disbelief, he cries to himself:

Ray Finkle is Lois Einhorn. Lois Einhorn is Ray Finkle. Oh my God.

The realisation makes him sick.

I’ve just had a similar experience.

For reading Ian Birrell’s account of his role on David Cameron’s speechwriting team, he asserts

So what is the big society? First of all, I must confess that I am no fan of the slightly fuzzy title… But it is better than its predecessor, the clunky “post-bureaucratic age”.

That is, the Big Society is the post-bureaucratic age. The post-bureaucratic age is the Big Society.

But such things are totally different in conception.

One is a (seeming) positive. The other is a negative – it defines itself by what it isn’t.

One relates to community and how everyone should take a role in it, irrespective of the state. The other starts with the premise of a state and the officials it contains, and moves away from it.

One is expansive in its scope and looks to what the future will be. The other narrows and limits in its scope and ties itself irrevocably to a past.

If – and it’s a big if – the Big Society is the post-bureaucratic age, then Cameron’s in more trouble with the idea than I thought. Because previously, I’d assumed the vision was sound and the details were lacking. This makes me think that the idea may be a bit lacking as well.

A short post that has absolutely nothing to do with football

Having provoked the eloquent tribalist ire of my fellow blogger, I think it’s time to leave posts about the kicking of a many-panelled spherical object to one side, at least until the World Cup begins (and I find that Stef is actually Dutch, or something).

As a salve for the still-bitter sting of the Robins’ defeat on Saturday, last night I went to see the film Bad Lieutenant, starring Nicolas Cage and Eva Mendes and directed by Werner Herzog. It’s a loose remake of the 1992 Abel Ferrara movie which had Harvey Keitel in the lead role.

My cinema of choice? The world’s poshest screening venue, the unintentionally hilariously-named ‘Everyman’ in Hampstead, where you sit in sofas surrounded by the most horrendously self-entitled, over-privileged, late-middle-aged audience you can imagine: grey-haired women with ‘funky’ trainers and men with faces weathered from too much time on yachts, their bellies swollen by excessive consumption of cheese. Still: once the lights go down you forget they’re there, and I must admit to enjoying the chance to drink a G&T at the cinema. And anyway the ODEON on Holloway Road wasn’t showing the film. Alright?

Back to the film: it’s slick, sexy, mildly deranged and atmospherically charged (almost literally: the director does a great job of evoking the muggy closeness of the Deep South, not least with an outstanding soundtrack). I wish other reviews hadn’t flagged up one particular reptile-related scene, because its shock and surreality would’ve been more effective if they hadn’t. There are brilliant turns amongst the supporting cast from such under-rated actors as Brad Dourif, Jennifer Coolidge (Stifler’s ‘Mom’) and, yes, Val Kilmer.

Many of the reviews rightly focus on Cage’s central performance, which is certainly mesmerising. For some reason I went into the film expecting a kind of Pacinoesque scenery-chewer of grandstanding and excess. But actually I think the secret of Cage’s success is that he keeps the physical and verbal tics and minor explosions to the bare minimum required, and delivers a portrayal that’s actually quite sad and often subdued. So go see it. Just not at the Everyman.

Game-legged old man and the drunk

Vote. Obviously.

There are lots of other bloggers out there who will tell you who they are voting for and why, so I don’t need to add to that. But I will tell you about the 3 main things I’m feeling today.

The first is apprehension about the result and what it could mean not for politics in this country, but for people. There are some big choices that will need to be made in the next parliament, and if those decisions aren’t called correctly, significant numbers of people will be much worse off. This whole general election campaign has focused on the process of politics, especially through things like the leaders’ debate. But the campaign should have been about the content, because that’s what will make the difference in the next 5 years.

The second is bemusement. How on earth we don’t know the outcome of this election is actually beyond me. In his last party conference speech, Tony Blair said this of the Tories:

If we can’t take this lot apart in the next few years, we shouldn’t be in the business of politics at all

and

They think it is all about image… the next election won’t be about image unless we let it be.

The inevitable conclusion is that Labour did let it all be about image and that they didn’t take the Tories apart. And yet, despite this, the public has still figured it out for themselves: from a 28-point lead in one poll in September 2008, the Tories are averaging an 8-point lead in the final polls yesterday. My bemusement is therefore that both Labour and the Tories lost this election.

And the third is excited. The sad thing is that, when the dust has long settled on this general election, my excitement will remain.

As the exchange goes at the end of Rio Bravo:

Pat Wheeler: A game-legged old man and a drunk. That’s all you got?
John T. Chance: That’s what I got.

Alas. Politics is that game-legged old man and the drunk.

Equality matters

Two issues of equality to cover today.

1. Kathryn Bigelow has become the first female director to win the Best Director Oscar. For all you men out there who think women don’t face any sort of institutional or societal barriers, I’ll just re-emphasize that Bigelow is the first female director ever to win, in nearly 80 years of the awards.

2. The Vatican has been hit by a gay sex scandal, with a chorister there being sacked for allegedly procuring male prostitutes for papal gentleman-in-waiting. Notwithstanding the obvious problem with the words that follow (as if women could ever be involved in the church!), the only way this could be funnier or more ironic is if it were lesbian prostitutes being procured for women bishops.

What About Bob? (1991)

Note: this review was first published at Not Coming To A Theater Near You

The question from which this witty, manic 1990s comedy takes its title — “what about Bob?” — can be interpreted in several different though essentially similar ways, the theme being: how will Bob — a highly phobic, potty, frenetic, obsessive-compulsive loser — get by in the real world? That the doyen of potty, frenetic loserdom known as Bill Murray plays Bob makes the question all the more worth asking.

The story is a simple one: just before leaving for a one-month vacation, award-winning psychiatrist Dr Leo Marvin sees new patient Bob Wiley for their one and only session. Assuming he has established enough of a doctor-patient relationship to sustain his new patient, Dr Marvin leaves for vacation only to be plagued by the highly-dependent Bob, who turns up on the psychiatrist’s holiday doorstep and proceeds to demand the attention of all those he encounters, including the long-suffering and occasionally neglected Marvin family.

It is an interesting set-up: an essentially serious subject matter (mental health) dealt with in a wholly comic manner. Considering briefly other well-known films to deal with mental health, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest had its moments of humour but remained serious, whilst Memento negated almost any humour for dramatic effect. What does the reference frame of humour in What About Bob? therefore provide us with?

Primarily, it removes the focus from Bob’s mental problems and establishes in the viewer’s mind the relationship between patient and doctor. Far from the orthodox relationship of enquiring, controlling doctor and on-the-couch, out-of-control patient, the tables are turned and Bob begins to control the situation, bringing with his control the break-down of the doctor-patient relationship.

To find some possible meaning in this, let us consider the way in which psychiatry, specifically psychoanalysis, functions. In the psychoanalyst’s room, psychoanalysis works because the counseled seeks reality in their relationship with counselor, despite the artificiality of the circumstance. To function at all, psychoanalysis depends on the ability of the counseled to suspend belief and disbelief simultaneously such that they can explore their problems and (hopefully) remedy them. To put this another way, the analytic relationship belongs simultaneously to two frames of reference: the inner frame in which the analyst and the patient communicate, and the outer frame in which two people who have otherwise no connection agree to engage in a very specialised extended conversation.

From the perspective of film, this is all faintly familiar: indeed, the analogy between psychoanalysis and film needs hardly to be drawn. To enjoy a film — to get anything out of it at all — we have to subdue our literal mind in two ways: we have to forget that the characters are actors while not believing the action to be real. Thus, What About Bob? can be seen as a meditation on the relationship between the film-maker (or psychiatrist) and the film-viewer (or patient), in which the film-maker/psychiatrist leads the film-viewer/patient to greater awareness through his skill and training as a practitioner.

Directed by Frank Oz, who — aside from the fun he must have had making The Little Shop of Horrors and Bowfinger (both with Murray’s one-time Saturday Night fellow star Steve Martin) amongst others — has contributed his own bit of sage advice as the voice of Yoda in the Star Wars series, What About Bob? is an amusing offering whose serious undertones reflect on the relationship between film and viewer through the analogous relationship of psychiatrist and patient. As a comedy, however, What About Bob? also satisfies the obvious prerequisite — which is to say it succeeds in being funny. As such, it is far from being only a high-minded meditation on the intricacies of film and its audience, but also another wonderful display from the archetypal loose cannon in need of some help, Bill Murray.

Radiohead credits

Radiohead have written a closing track for a film before. “Exit Music (For A Film)” was the track; Romeo and Juliet was the film.

Fight Club is a great film adaptation of a Chuck Palahniuk novel with an amazing track over the closing credits: Where Is My Mind, by the Pixies.

Now comes the news that a Radhioead track is to close the latest film adaptation of a Palahniuk novel. What could be better?

Film(ing) in London

The London Film Festival will be starting on 17 October, which I’m looking forward to and hope to be able to get along to on at least a couple of occasions (and especially for Mataharis).

London is one of the major film cities in the world, and it is great to live here and be able to be involved in the “scene”. Some facts and figures about film in London, from, erm, Film London, show the scale of the film industry in London:

London is the third busiest filming production centre in the world, behind only Los Angeles and New York

In 2005 there were over 12,600 shooting days in London, on average almost 35 crews shooting in the capital every single day of the year; this was an increase of 18% from 2004

Two thirds of all permanent jobs in the industry are based in London.

One recent example of London on film was in The Bourne Ultimatum. There was an incredible sequence at the start of this film based in and around Waterloo station, in which Jason Bourne tries to get information from a Guardian journalist whilst chased by people from the cia. Sitting in a cinema looking at something so familiar was faintly weird, though not as weird as hearing a train announcement for Southampton Central in the background. Nevertheless, to see how the production had used Waterloo station so well gave me a real buzz, and I’m pleased to be able to do that for so many films.

More about filming in London, and especially locations used in London, can be found on the Film London website.

The Manchurian Candidate (1962)

Note: This is an old review of The Manchurian Candidate, written at the time of the 2005 US presidential election, which is being posted here after recently seeing the remake. Some thoughts on that remake will follow soon.

Jonathan Demme’s current remake of The Manchurian Candidate was released the day after the Democractic convention finished in Boston, a coincidence that could happily be attributed to clever marketing and a prescient analysis of the sort of entertainment Americans may want in their election year. But the further coincidence associated with the Democratic candidate’s wife, Theresa Heinz Kerry, is one that those who haven’t seen the 1962 original are unfortunate to miss. For should it not be forgotten that it is only when he dollops his food with a massive portion of tomato ketchup — the very product that saw Heinz-Kerry to a multi-billion dollar inheritance — that anti-Communist Senator Joe Iselin can fix on the number of ‘Commies’ in the American Defence Department, a claim that prompts his appointment as the candidate for Vice President in the upcoming election.

Clearly, with all eyes turned towards the election in November and the current remake (starring Denzel Washington), there could not be a better time to remember John Frankenheimer’s paranoid, cold war dream.

Frank Sinatra stars as Captain Ben DiMarco, a veteran of the Korean War who keeps having nightmares concerning the brainwashing of his regiment by the Russians. Sure that one of his soldiers, Raymond Shaw (played by Laurence Harvey), has been programmed as an assassin, DiMarco attempts to warn the army that something terrible might happen. Meanwhile, Shaw’s mother and step-father, Senator Joe Iselin, cause controversy with their claims of Communist inflitration which acts as a conduit for Iselin’s ascendency to the top of American politics. Once Shaw reveals himself to be an assassin under the control of his mother, DiMarco has to unlock the Russian mind-tricks that control Shaw and prevent him from carrying through the Russians’ grand plan.

Released in the year of the Cuban missile crisis, The Manchurian Candidate was a conspiracy fantasy that for many wasn’t far from the truth: simply put, Senator Iselin was Senator McCarthy. Using the novel of Richard Condon, director Frankenheimer and screenwriter George Axelrod (who also wrote the screenplay for The Seven Year Itch amongst many others) created a narrative that turned out, with the assassination of JFK one year later, to be remarkably prescient — a prediction of the future that actually came true. It was alarming, it was reactionary and it was controversial. And it had Frank Sinatra in it!

Ol’ Blue Eyes is actually very good — after a certain amount of time you stop expecting him to lurch into “My Way” and concentrate on the plot instead. The role of Sinatra is just one sign of the unorthodox approach used to cast the lead characters: Angela Lansbury, that sickly-sweet American belle, future star of Murder She Wrote, as a wicked, Communist conspirator mother? Laurence Harvey, that famously robotic actor known for his lack of feeling and emotion, as a robotic, pre-programmed assassin? Janet Leigh, pin-up model, siren of the screen and face on the cover of magazines (including the one read by a soldier at the start of the film) as an eccentric, vaguely unsettling walk-on lover? Frank Sinatra as an army captain? Right from the very start, the film-makers were searching for the uncomfortable and unfamiliar, in this case challenging the audience’s perception of a given star. And when the reputations of those you know and admire are suddenly reversed and their darker sides are revealed, who knows what else might be lurking below the surface?

From remarkably early on the audience is aware of what is going on, thanks to a tremendously edited sequence that cuts between what appears to be an old-ladies gardening meeting and a sinister mind-control demonstration by the Russians. As the two ‘realities’ merge, complete with grannies holding bayonets and making recommendations as to who should be killed next, it becomes clear that this is a film willing to distort any reality to suit its outlook. Be sure of one thing, the editing is saying to you: we have turned through 360degrees and everything you see before you is real.

Perspective is an integral part of conveying the uneasiness. From Raymond’s perspective, everything is full of shadows, of the cloud that hangs over his mind. As he lies in the hospital bed whilst his operators discuss his potential, we see him at his most vulnerable: literally a puppet on a string, ready to be manipulated by his operators for the good of the Communist cause. In contrast, DiMarco — once assured that he isn’t losing his mind — becomes the analytical protagonist with a mind that must put the clues together. As such, his view is one of doors being opened, of observations through windows and of lights being switched on. When the spotlight finally falls on him, DiMarco is the one to react the quickest. As for Raymond’s mother and Senator Iselin, what is the reality they are trying to create: the one on the television screens or the real scene in which the cameras and television sets actually exist? Either way, the reality of their deaths at the end, as viewed through the cross-hairs of Raymond’s viewpoint, is a sure end to the chopping, tension-building edits that are juxtaposed with the entire length of the national anthem as Sinatra chases to Raymond’s vantage point.

What of the trigger-line, oft-repeated throughout the film: “Say, Raymond, why don’t you pass the time and play a little solitaire?” and the second trigger, the queen of diamonds? So far as the suit of the card is concerned, the colour surely matters very little — it is a black and white film, after all — so the association must be something to do with the sex of the card. There is no question that Lansbury’s lingering, incest-laden kiss planted on Raymond is a sign that something Oedipal is afoot. But if Raymond is courting his mother, who is the father figure he is to murder? Since he stresses his relationship with Iselin is only one as a result of marriage, the father figure must be the parent of his bride: Senator Jordan. With the murder of his father-in-law, Raymond breaks any remaining bridges to any normal life that he may subsequently lead, leaving the way clear to the finale of the film. But as an extension of what Jordan represents — which is to say wholesome politics and a sound, rational mind that rejects Communist conspiracies — Shaw’s Oedipal complex stretches as far as the fatherhood of his homeland: nothing less that the slaying of democracy is at hand.

The remake of The Manchurian Candidate cannot, of course, take Communism and the knee-jerk reaction of McCarthyism as the basis for its conspiracy theory. Instead, it lists as the brains behind the scheme one Manchurian Global, an international conglomerate probably based on any one of Halliburton, Enron, Lockhead Martin etc. This company has implanted a chip into Liev Schreiber to secure representation at the very highest level and to ensure its interests are always protected. But far from being a paranoid fantasy, this Manchurian Candidate has already made it to the top. As David Thomson points out:

Even George W. Bush would see [sic]… there’s no need for implants and all that conspiratorial fuss. Thanks to [the] Supreme Court we do have such a sitting president, wired in to all the corporate globals you can think of.

Extending this thought, Thomson hypothesises what George W. was really thinking after the second plane crashed into the twin towers whilst the story-reading continued around him:

…he was into his little game of solitaire, just waiting for the queen of diamonds to turn up.

Now there is a conspiracy theory Michael Moore would kill to get his hands on.