In Rachel Maclean’s deeply strange film, the voice of historian Kenneth Clark haunts a virtual reality world of Stepford Wives and robotic Barbie dolls
Here’s something straight out of left field: a surrealist critique and freaky satirical nightmare on the subject of feminism, female body image and social media, with something of Lewis Carroll, Terry Gilliam and maybe a little of Clio Barnard in its subversive use of lip-sync.
We are plunged into a disturbing virtual reality world, or maybe an online gaming arena full of migraine-inducing colours, where a number of women are dressed like robotic Barbie dolls or Stepford Wives, with names like Siri and Alexa, responding to commands and presided over by a deeply weird and disapprovingly haughty madame, who speaks only in dubbed phrases cut up and mashed up from, of all people, Kenneth Clark, presenter of the high-minded and unashamedly western-oriented TV classic from the 60s,...
Here’s something straight out of left field: a surrealist critique and freaky satirical nightmare on the subject of feminism, female body image and social media, with something of Lewis Carroll, Terry Gilliam and maybe a little of Clio Barnard in its subversive use of lip-sync.
We are plunged into a disturbing virtual reality world, or maybe an online gaming arena full of migraine-inducing colours, where a number of women are dressed like robotic Barbie dolls or Stepford Wives, with names like Siri and Alexa, responding to commands and presided over by a deeply weird and disapprovingly haughty madame, who speaks only in dubbed phrases cut up and mashed up from, of all people, Kenneth Clark, presenter of the high-minded and unashamedly western-oriented TV classic from the 60s,...
- 10/12/2018
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
As we pass the halfway mark, several new developments of the Cannes International Film Festival seem to have more importance in some ways than the traditional Films in Competition which so far are “interesting” if lacking a bit in luster…
A jury of international critics gathered together by the top international trade paper, Screen International, keeps its own score of the 20 Competition Films as does Film Francais whose critics are all French. Thus far 13 have screened and on a scale of 4 (Excellent) to 0 (Bad), Screen’s highest scoring film so far is 3.2 for the French-Russian coproduction “Loveless” about a bitterly out-of-love couple going through a divorce who must team up to find their son who has disappeared during one of their brutal arguments. Directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev and funded independently because the Russian government so disliked his 2014 Competition Film, “Leviathan” ( for which it had put up 35% of the funding), that...
A jury of international critics gathered together by the top international trade paper, Screen International, keeps its own score of the 20 Competition Films as does Film Francais whose critics are all French. Thus far 13 have screened and on a scale of 4 (Excellent) to 0 (Bad), Screen’s highest scoring film so far is 3.2 for the French-Russian coproduction “Loveless” about a bitterly out-of-love couple going through a divorce who must team up to find their son who has disappeared during one of their brutal arguments. Directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev and funded independently because the Russian government so disliked his 2014 Competition Film, “Leviathan” ( for which it had put up 35% of the funding), that...
- 5/29/2017
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Angelina Jolie takes on Sleeping Beauty while Terry Gilliam tackles Berlioz as the stars come out to confound our expectations in the coming year
Film
Angelina Jolie in Maleficent
Hollywood's most formidable leading lady is back after a relatively quiet spell, in a role playing on her scariness and seniority. This reinvented fairytale is a twist on The Sleeping Beauty, and Jolie is not playing the insipid dormant heroine with her crybaby attitude to finger-pricking but the evilly magnificent Maleficent, the sorceress who casts a spell on the demure young Princess Aurora. How did she get that way? Everything will depend on the script – but Jolie is always a great turn. Peter Bradshaw 30 May.
Natalie Portman in Jane Got a Gun
Natalie Portman is a Hollywood A-lister who first came to prominence in George Lucas's Star Wars prequel trilogy. She was compellingly vulnerable in Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan,...
Film
Angelina Jolie in Maleficent
Hollywood's most formidable leading lady is back after a relatively quiet spell, in a role playing on her scariness and seniority. This reinvented fairytale is a twist on The Sleeping Beauty, and Jolie is not playing the insipid dormant heroine with her crybaby attitude to finger-pricking but the evilly magnificent Maleficent, the sorceress who casts a spell on the demure young Princess Aurora. How did she get that way? Everything will depend on the script – but Jolie is always a great turn. Peter Bradshaw 30 May.
Natalie Portman in Jane Got a Gun
Natalie Portman is a Hollywood A-lister who first came to prominence in George Lucas's Star Wars prequel trilogy. She was compellingly vulnerable in Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan,...
- 1/1/2014
- by Peter Bradshaw, Tim Jonze, Sean O'Hagan, Mark Lawson, Andrew Dickson, Lyn Gardner, Jonathan Jones, Adrian Searle, Tom Service, Andrew Clements
- The Guardian - Film News
Camille Claudel 1915
Written and directed by Bruno Dumont
France, 2013
Camille Claudel 1915 is a 3-day portrait of great sculptress Camille Claudel and her life in an institution. A rarity in art history, Claudel found success during her lifetime and was often exhibited alongside male contemporaries. Emblematic of larger issues plaguing art history and criticism, academically, she is most often referred to in relation to sculptor Auguste Rodin, rather than on the merits of her own work. His lover, muse, and student for over a decade, her relationship with him was a source of great inspiration and turmoil over the course of her life. An incredibly emotive and imaginative artist and sculptor, she was heralded by famous art critic Octave Mirbeau, Claude Debussy was passionate about her work, and Henrik Ibsen apparently based one of his plays on her tumultuous relationship with Rodin.
Standing the test of time, her art remains powerful and raw.
Written and directed by Bruno Dumont
France, 2013
Camille Claudel 1915 is a 3-day portrait of great sculptress Camille Claudel and her life in an institution. A rarity in art history, Claudel found success during her lifetime and was often exhibited alongside male contemporaries. Emblematic of larger issues plaguing art history and criticism, academically, she is most often referred to in relation to sculptor Auguste Rodin, rather than on the merits of her own work. His lover, muse, and student for over a decade, her relationship with him was a source of great inspiration and turmoil over the course of her life. An incredibly emotive and imaginative artist and sculptor, she was heralded by famous art critic Octave Mirbeau, Claude Debussy was passionate about her work, and Henrik Ibsen apparently based one of his plays on her tumultuous relationship with Rodin.
Standing the test of time, her art remains powerful and raw.
- 9/6/2013
- by Justine Smith
- SoundOnSight
"First shown in 1972, John Berger's BBC television series Ways of Seeing radicalized the way an entire generation looked at art," writes Jackie Wullschlager in the Financial Times:
Before Berger, painterly detail, the development of a style, attributions and authentications, were the tools of an art historian's trade, and those practicing it most successfully in the 20th century — Bernard Berenson in the splendor of his Florentine villa, Kenneth Clark, who bought himself Saltwood Castle in Kent and was knighted for his stately TV series Civilisation — had always been unashamedly elitist in both their work and their lives. Then came Berger, born in Hackney, east London, in 1926, educated not at Harvard or Oxford but at London art schools, hanging out not with collectors and dealers but with the revolutionary Black Panther Party, to which he donated half the money from his 1972 Booker Prize-winning experimental novel G., about a rich Italian's journey to class consciousness.
Before Berger, painterly detail, the development of a style, attributions and authentications, were the tools of an art historian's trade, and those practicing it most successfully in the 20th century — Bernard Berenson in the splendor of his Florentine villa, Kenneth Clark, who bought himself Saltwood Castle in Kent and was knighted for his stately TV series Civilisation — had always been unashamedly elitist in both their work and their lives. Then came Berger, born in Hackney, east London, in 1926, educated not at Harvard or Oxford but at London art schools, hanging out not with collectors and dealers but with the revolutionary Black Panther Party, to which he donated half the money from his 1972 Booker Prize-winning experimental novel G., about a rich Italian's journey to class consciousness.
- 4/3/2012
- MUBI
The Observer's critics pick the season's highlights, from Degas to Depp, and Britney to the Bard
September
1 Theatre: Decade In a former trading hall on London's St Katharine Docks, Rupert Goold's production evokes the legacy of 9/11, with the help of Simon Schama and Abi Morgan. Until 15 October.
4 Pop: Adele After her summer to die for (No1 album, ubiquitous single), Adele starts her UK tour in Plymouth. She's in London on the 19th and 20th and ends in Glasgow (25).
6 Dance: Tezuka New evening-length piece by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, inspired by the work of renowned Japanese manga artist Osamu Tezuka. Starring Daniel Proietto, the piece features a specially commissioned score by Nitin Sawhney. At Sadler's Wells until 10 September.
8 Pop: Bestival The Isle of Wight weekender always has a hefty line-up: this yearboasts new kids James Blake and Odd Future alongside the Cure, Brian Wilson and Björk.
9 Theatre: We are Three Sisters...
September
1 Theatre: Decade In a former trading hall on London's St Katharine Docks, Rupert Goold's production evokes the legacy of 9/11, with the help of Simon Schama and Abi Morgan. Until 15 October.
4 Pop: Adele After her summer to die for (No1 album, ubiquitous single), Adele starts her UK tour in Plymouth. She's in London on the 19th and 20th and ends in Glasgow (25).
6 Dance: Tezuka New evening-length piece by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, inspired by the work of renowned Japanese manga artist Osamu Tezuka. Starring Daniel Proietto, the piece features a specially commissioned score by Nitin Sawhney. At Sadler's Wells until 10 September.
8 Pop: Bestival The Isle of Wight weekender always has a hefty line-up: this yearboasts new kids James Blake and Odd Future alongside the Cure, Brian Wilson and Björk.
9 Theatre: We are Three Sisters...
- 8/27/2011
- The Guardian - Film News
Civilisation
Blu-ray, 2 Entertain
Out on 9 May
Historian Kenneth Clark introduces this landmark documentary series with a quote from John Ruskin about how the key to understanding a great nation is to look at their deeds, words and art, the last being "the only trustworthy one".
So begins an epic voyage around the historical culture of western civilisation, taking in the greats such as Da Vinci, Mozart, Dante, Shakespeare, etc, working backwards from their art to discover how it was formed by their lives. Overseen by David Attenborough (when he was head of BBC2) and still as bright and informative as it was when first transmitted in 1969, Civilisation has yet to be bettered. Shot on film (the remastered Blu-ray looks stunning) and in colour (when most TV sets were still black and white), it's a precursor to many of the great shows from the golden era of factual TV such as Life On Earth,...
Blu-ray, 2 Entertain
Out on 9 May
Historian Kenneth Clark introduces this landmark documentary series with a quote from John Ruskin about how the key to understanding a great nation is to look at their deeds, words and art, the last being "the only trustworthy one".
So begins an epic voyage around the historical culture of western civilisation, taking in the greats such as Da Vinci, Mozart, Dante, Shakespeare, etc, working backwards from their art to discover how it was formed by their lives. Overseen by David Attenborough (when he was head of BBC2) and still as bright and informative as it was when first transmitted in 1969, Civilisation has yet to be bettered. Shot on film (the remastered Blu-ray looks stunning) and in colour (when most TV sets were still black and white), it's a precursor to many of the great shows from the golden era of factual TV such as Life On Earth,...
- 4/29/2011
- by Phelim O'Neill
- The Guardian - Film News
With Robert Downey Junior's inspired reinventing of the role in Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Homes (2010) and the BBC effectively bringing Holmes to the 21st Century in the popular TV series Sherlock (2010) starring Benedict Cumberbatch, the crime-solving antics of the Great Detective and his loyal colleague Dr Watson seem in good hands, and remain as popular as ever. Among the screen actors who have effectively brought Holmes to life include Arthur Wontner, Basil Rathbone, Peter Cushing, Douglas Wilmer, Ian Richardson and Jeremy Brett. As an amazing and complex role to play, the right actor can add great depth to it.
But then there are others who turned out to be Not-So-Great-Detectives, either through miscasting or just being plain bad. One does not need the power of deductive reasoning to see why the following ten actors fell way off the mark...
Roger Moore - Sherlock Homes in New York (1976)
"My name is Holmes,...
But then there are others who turned out to be Not-So-Great-Detectives, either through miscasting or just being plain bad. One does not need the power of deductive reasoning to see why the following ten actors fell way off the mark...
Roger Moore - Sherlock Homes in New York (1976)
"My name is Holmes,...
- 2/14/2011
- Shadowlocked
One of the greatest, and most influential of all TV documentary mini-series is the 1969 classic of televised art history Civilisation: writer-narrator Kenneth Clark’s survey of western art and its meaning and impact throughout the ages -- beginning in The Dark Ages and progressing through the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Age of Reason to the Twentieth Century.
- 4/7/2010
- Movie City News
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