Hurling the little streets on the great – Gorbaciof
Saturday, February 18th, 2012While everyone’s getting caught up in the buzz about The Artist, I have a shameful confession to make: silent movies have always bored the bunions off of me – as a child I gnashed my teeth in despair when Charlie Chaplin or, god forbid, Harold Lloyd came on the television. That’s not to write off [...]
Mute Points: A Love Letter to Silent Artists
Tuesday, January 17th, 2012I remember the first time I saw Nosferatu. I was 15 and in the full throws of gothic angst – complete with importance, poetry and pianos. The dramatic German Expressionist stylings of Murnau’s Carpathian landscape, therefore, offered the ideal genre –especially when it came to an extremely teen-friendly subject…..vampires. Made in 1921 in the extremely [...]
Volver by Don Pedro from La Mancha
Monday, August 1st, 2011“In a place in La Mancha, whose name I don’t wish to remember, not long ago lived a gentleman…” a gentleman of revolutionary art and innovative cinema, a gentleman armed with a camera. It’s not the first time that Almodóvar has immersed us in a world that, through being so real, seems unbelievable. In [...]
V for Vendetta – a film by James McTeigue and the Wachowski brothers
Tuesday, January 1st, 2008Many may have dismissed V for Vendetta (2006) as yet another film adaptation of a graphic novel with a vaguely ridiculous title. However the film deals with far more complex issues than your average comic book movie fare. The story itself was developed from a series of engaging, multi-layered graphic novels published in Britain in [...]
Cristi Puiu’s The Death of Mr Lazarescu
Wednesday, November 1st, 2006There was an advertisement for a mobile phone company before this film in the London cinema where I saw it. It presented a sequence of life-changing moments. A father stares from the screen and falteringly embarks upon a momentous confession, to a child 'old enough to know now'. Or an actress, fixing the camera with [...]
Viva Zapatero! – Towards a new type of information in Italy?
Saturday, October 1st, 2005Viva Zapatero! opens a door on a new shameful anomaly (or anomalous shame) typical, and exclusive to Italy, with regard to European norms in relation to satire. It is staggering, during the course of the film, to notice and to reflect on the different modes of organisation and development of satire in the Countries neighbouring [...]
Filming the Occupation. Director Saverio Costanzo presents Private
Thursday, September 1st, 2005This article first appeared in Italian. To read the original click here It’s unfair, everyone knows, to blame the sins of the father on the son – and thirty year old Saverio Costanzo must at least be aware that his surname carries a history like a trademark. Mediaset, da daa da daan, P2, the shirt [...]
The Making of MirrorMask
Thursday, September 1st, 2005“It’s an original project, and the way that it came about was like this,” starts writer Neil Gaiman, addressing an audience of devoted fans, in the Italian city of Bologna, eager to hear about his new film collaboration MirrorMask. “In the summer of 2001, I got a phone call from Lisa Henson, Jim Henson’s daughter, [...]
Battling the Past – an encounter with Michael Cimino
Monday, August 1st, 2005How would you picture Michael Cimino, director of The Deer Hunter and Heaven’s Gate? Sitting, sipping a beer in the courtyard of Bologna’s elegant Lumière Cinema, it’s a question that occupies my mind while waiting for the arrival of the celebrated American director. A question, because I don’t know the answer. There are photos of [...]
Cinegael Paradiso, The story of a second generation Irish film director. Robert Quinn in interview
Friday, July 1st, 2005Irish film maker Robert Quinn grew up in the Cinema. That's not a clichéd way of saying that he liked movies, and spent all his pocket money going to the local cinema. No, Robert Quinn actually did grow up in the Cinema. His father, film maker Bob Quinn, in the 1970s set up the independent [...]
