Tribute to John Williams

Gomorrah by Matteo Garrone

In the Bible, God decides to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah for the sin of their inhabitants. In Roberto Saviano’s book and its adaptation for the screen by Matteo Garrone, the sin is responsible for destroying the city, and God is nowhere to be seen.

Gomorrah is a real-life flick: its shaky hand-held camera shows tired and craggy faces at close range, making us the first-row witnesses of a society’s implosion. The story follows six broken destinies through the filthy streets of depressing housing projects in Naples. Some of them have a  direct relation to the criminal organisation: a teenager learns that being with them equals being against innocent people, two other kids realize that they can’t be freelancers in this world, a man whose role is only to distribute money finds himself in the middle of a war between two clans… The demonstration makes even more sense when other characters with less obvious links to the Camorra (like a tailor who betrays his boss or a young professional who discovers appalling toxic waste management processes) see their life affected or destroyed by the mafia’s blind tentacles.

Garrone’s direction is probably really close to the style of the book, skinned and brutal. The movie’s point and ending are dark, uncompromising  and leave the viewer with a mixture of helplessness and hopelessness. This vision of the mob is worlds apart from the glamourous American mafia mythology built by Coppola, Scorcese or the Sopranos. Just like in David Simon’s the Wire, the individuals of Gomorrah are powerless and crushed by a dehumanized and merciless institution. Naples doesn’t seem so far from Baltimore.

Vote Doom or Skrulls?

Nice take on the famous Obama poster by JonD.

On this other one it looks like Sarah Palin is a Skrull. It makes it even harder to “embrace change”, but it certainly explains a lot.

September Playlist

Albums& Compilations:

Nobody Knows Anything / DFA presents Supersoul Recordings

This compilation of the Supersoul label is the finest techno I’ve heard in ages, subtle and powerful. How come we didn’t hear of these guys before!?

The Hacker – X – Diferrent

Cold War Kids – Loyalty to Loyalty – Vertigo/Co-Op

Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip – Angles – SFR

Tracks:

Metronomy – Trick or Treatz (South Central Rmx) Holiphonic Records

Mickey Moonlight – Interplanetary music – Ed Banger Records

Systemic – Sentinel - Jactation Records

Kidda – Under the Sun (Herve Rmx)

Electric Rescue – You’d Better Stop – BTrax Records

Intrusion – Intrusion (Phase90 Reshape) – Echospace

Omaha Bitch – Orgasmic Troopers

Mean lil’ dark ballet dancers. Grrr.

Vote Mc Clane

I’m sure John Mc Clane knows how to solve the financial crisis.

When the Bat goes down

Eric Esculier sees Batman from a new angle.

New Nike Women campaign by Wieden + Kennedy Amsterdam

The five new Nike films featuring a famous woman champion are all great, but this one is a particularly stunning piece of work in terms of both idea and execution:

See the other films here.

It’s raining man

The good thing about this great weather is that it lets you stay inside and watch movies.

The Bank Job by Roger Donaldson

Adapted from a true story, the Bank Job is (as its name points out) a film about a bank robbery. I’m afraid I don’t have much to say about it, except that it was pretty conventional and not as entertaining as expected. I was truly ready to see a nice English thriller/comedy, in a 70s background and with a few good lines. Instead all I got was a pretty dull story, with tired actors and a lazy direction. Jason Statham being the main actor should have given me a clue, but sometimes you just want to believe.

Spirited away by Hayaho Miyazaki

I saw this masterpiece by Hoayo “Japanese Disney” Miyazaki when it was released in the cinemas and hadn’t had a chance to watch it again since then. My first impression is confirmed: Spirited away (aka le voyage de Chihiro en French) is an intelligent and poetic tale on teenagehood, full of Japanese traditions and visual creativity and weirdness. Sadly we miss a lot of symbols as a non-Japanese audience, but I would still recommend this movie especially to people not interested in Anime (hoping it might change their mind). And if you have a chance show this movie to some kids, it will amaze and entertain them while respecting their intelligence.

The man who shot Liberty Valance by John Ford

My western culture is pretty poor, with the Sergio Leone movies as a central (and lonely) piece. I saw some 50s/60s American westerns in “La dernière séance”, a show that my French fellows probably remember. In the 80s this Tuesday night  TV program presented by singer Eddy Mitchell was offering to the French audience two American classics with a cartoon in between. I was generally too tired for the second one (and couldn’t be bothered yet by the English original version), but I saw quite a few of the first ones, and never missed the cartoon.

I can’t remember seeing The man who shot Liberty Valance at that time, and I probably wouldn’t have been interested anyway as it doesn’t have enough gun fights and action for an 8-year-old boy. In this movie John Ford tells the story of the old manly west (impersonated by John Wayne) being replaced by modern society. On top of being a more cultured, mild-manered and even more effeminate man that the Duke, James Stewart symbolizes modernity. The woman between these two chooses civilization, but always keeps the brutal and lout west in her heart. It’s brilliantly directed and the acting is superb.

The Proposition by John Hillcoat

Funny how this Australian western released in 2005 escaped my radar and all my mates. In spite of my many Australian acquaintances I don’t know much about Asutralian movies. The Proposition is a pretty dry western, written by Nick Cave, who of course also composed the music with Warren Ellis (homonym of the English comic writer). This team also created the soundtrack of The assassination of Jesse James… and both movies share a certain slowness and a deep relationship between the characters and nature. The magnificent Australian landscapes and the work of French DOP Benoît Delhomme are undoubtedly the main subject of fascination in the proposition. The story about blood-ties and the necessity of civilising young countries (again) was less convincing, despite a good bunch of actors (Guy Pearce, Ray Winston, Emily Watson, John Hurt…). This said, director John Hillcoat is gifted and his next movie the road, an adaptation of a Pulitzer winning post-apocalyptic Cormac McCarthy novel looks promising (see image below) and has Viggo Mortensen and Michael K. Williams (Omar in the Wire).

Michael Bay has a great sense of humour

One might like or dislike Michael Bay’s movies. I generally enjoy a few sequences in each one of them( I’ve never seen  Pearl Harbor).

But even if the director of Transformers is not the most subtle movie maker in Holywood, you can’t deny he has a sense of humour after seeing the commercials he plays himself in. This one was sent to me by my friend Eric Esculier. Awesome.