Cannes 2014 - What will happen, and what to look for.

Cannes is rarely unpredictable on the surface, certain names regularly crop up in main competition. I will make a few predictions on the likely receptions the films in the main competition will receive, followed by some films that I am excited about, or shake up Cannes to an extent.

After the announcement of the main competitions at Cannes, the British media focused on the obvious, Leigh and Loach. Sadly, these two represent the past of British cinema, and perhaps we should be looking at why there is a lack of young British talent at Cannes this year. These two will be solidly received at Cannes, but have little impact on any awards. Loach may however receive some token gesture if this is to be his last feature. Goodbye to Language, the latest by Jean-Luc Godard, shot in 3D also inevitably received a lot of attention, however will just as inevitably split audiences and not win much. Other big names, Cronenberg, the Dardenne's and Miller are all likely to be well received, but unlikely to win the main prize (in the Dardenne case, largely because of fear of criticism they can 'do no wrong' in Cannes eyes). Hazanavicius, director of The Artist, is likely to face heavy backlash with The Search that always meets directors after Oscar success. I will revisit these after the awards have been handed out, just to see how predictable these all are...

Now, to the ones that have something exciting about them:

Palme d'Or

Winter Sleep - Nuri Bilge Ceylan

Perhaps the most likely winner of the Palme d'Or, Ceylan has been one of the most exciting directors that Cannes seemed to have plucked from nowhere for a long time. Ceylan has won awards at Cannes regularly, including with his last feature, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, and as long as it isn't below par (Three Monkeys being the only slightly poor feature out his current six features), Cannes look likely to reward him for his whole filmography. Will receive criticism in some parts who complain it is too slow and long, coming in at 196 minutes.

Mommy - Xavier Dolan

Dolan is easy to hate, but his rate of high-quality features is impossible to ignore. Five features at the age of 25 is incredible, and Mommy has made a leap up into main competition. Tom at the Farm is the only feature of his I am yet to see, however many commentators have stated of the maturity of this work, and the Cannes selection panel seem to agree with this if it has continued into his newest feature. Dolan will face criticism of shallowness, however the talent and consistent quality cannot be ignored. Dolan will be around for a long time, and make genuine works of important cinema. Is unlikely to receive any award, as I am sure Cannes sees the fact that he is even in the main competition as reward enough. Will have to wait a few more features into his career before he has 'earned' the right.

Timbuktu - Abderrahmane Sissako

The token African film that is starting to become a regular feature in main competition, and will receive absolutely nothing in terms of awards, and more than likely receive little attention in the press. However, although even if it is a token gesture, Cannes need to be congratulated for forcing this into the mainstream. Sissako does have a track record in film festivals, as well as links with France, which helps ease him into acceptance with Cannes. Sadly though, this will be the most ignored film in the main competition.

Un Certain Regard

Lost River - Ryan Gosling

Sadly changed its name from How to Catch a Monster. Has an extremely interesting premise. I would normally be weary of big name Hollywood actors being entered into Un Certain Regard, believing it is likely purely for the chance of another star name at Cannes, while also being able to hide the film if it is poor, however Gosling has a good track record with directors he has worked with, and hopefully some of it will rub off.

Snow in Paradise - Andrew Hulme

The one British director to come out of nowhere really into Cannes, it is fair to say there really is no idea of how this will turn out. Hulme has worked as an editor on a fair number of big films in the past, including the well received films of Anton Corbijn. The slow, steady pace of Corbijn is likely to follow through with Hulme's work.

Fantasia - Wang Chao

Has previously won Un Certain Regard, and is likely to be among the favourites again. Sadly Chinese cinema is under-represented this year. Hopefully however, this will make a strong impression on the jury.

Others

The Rover - David Michod

Suprising that The Rover was not up for the Palme d'Or, however still extremely likely that recieve positive reviews. Interesting to see what step Michod makes after the universal acclaim for his debut, Animal Kingdom.

Whiplash - Damien Chazelle

The fact that the winner of Sundance, Whiplash, is so far down the pecking order at Cannes this year, shows just how poor the festival was this year. However, Chazelle making it into the Directors Fortnight is still a great step for perhaps the least likely Mumblecore film-maker to make it big. The fun and playful  Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench seemed like a one off that would sink into obscurity, however Chazelle has seemingly made a niche for himself.

Catch Me Daddy - Daniel Wolfe

Very little is known about this feature, however the work of his previous shorts suggests that Wolfe may become a big name in cinema in the future.

Under The Skin and Cinematic language

Under The Skin (2013) has been met with such a wide range of opinions, from disgust to amazement, that it is almost impossible not become intrigue by what you will see once you take your seat. Under The Skin, for me, is simply one of, if not the, best film made by a British director.

Under The Skin maintains a sense of transparency and opaqueness, letting you get close, inviting the cliché that it gets ‘under the skin of the audience’, while also refusing to be easily defined. Glazer clearly understands cinematic language, and knows how to play with it. Glazer’s previous film, Birth (2004), is full of audience manipulation, making you believe the impossible, letting it and wanting it to convince you, before revealing the mundane fact that it is exactly what it seems like. However Under The Skin sees Glazer creating new ways of using film, creating new ways to use language, which goes some way to explaining how some have been so incredibly repulsed by the film.

 Visually Glazer is willing to experiment more than most, layering images upon each other for symbolism. At one stage, Johansson is shown beneath a collection of images with a yellowy hue. As images flash by, melt into each other, drift out of the screen, we are seeing how Johansson sees the world, a confusing mix of flashes. Never has Earth seemed so alien. We can barely understand what we are being shown, and nor can Johansson. We later get a more defined image layered image, Johansson sleeping in an ocean of trees. It provides a strange, startling image as Johansson slowly melts into the image of the forest. Glazer could have left us with the image of her asleep in the cabin, however Glazer chooses something far more alien, something that not only shows her asleep, but connotes a whole host of simultaneous meanings. Does it mean she is starting to understand and become part of Earth as the image literally shows us? Or is it saying the opposite, that the fact she is looks so strange that she could never be part of this world? We have seen how she has struggled to assimilate with humans, and her strangely floating in the forest seems to symbolise something similar. I would go with the latter, but there is an interesting case for both, especially in light of the ending.

During the first half of the film, some of the most creative set-pieces involve men Johansson has picked up being drawn into the black ectoplasm. Watching the men sink into it, only for Johansson to walk back over it moments after are powerful images, but the moments prior to these events are perhaps just as interesting. A lot of the first half of the film involves people watching from her white van. Her inviting men into her van, men who had no idea they were even being filmed. Glazer has purposefully flipped the infamous ‘male gaze’ here. The men are completely objectified by Johansson, they have one purpose only for her, and she will spend hours just watching, hunting around, to find the right man. Johansson becomes an incredibly powerful creature, partly sexually, partly for her otherworldliness. When the men are instead ‘gazing’ at her (one man with a fully erect penis), they literally walk straight into their death without even noticing. There is no struggle, no fight, just the inevitable sinking into blackness. Their gaze is made impotent, so hollow that they eventually become just skin floating around in the ectoplasm. This intentional change of gaze again may explain why many critics have perhaps felt uncomfortable watching Under The Skin, with male critics suddenly finding themselves the objectified, rather than the one objectifying. It is, after all, more fun watching, than being watched.

A slightly more traditional, but just as creative sequence is during the ‘creation process’ during the opening. The opening is comparable to scenes in The Tree of Life (2011) creation sequence, or the Star Child in 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). We are shown confusing images of things we can only assume are parts of DNA or blood cells floating and merging, creating Johansson into the alien being that she is. Images quickly shift from CGI images into an extreme close-up of an eyeball, the process of creation being completed at that moment. As well as these images, we hear her practicing sounds, words, in order to complete her transformation. We are left to piece together the meanings of these images and sounds, as it is not clearly explained at all, with only the harsh-cut to the eyeball giving any form of explanation. Glazer is brave enough to throw the audience into the deep-end straight away, throwing in questions a load of existentialist questions from the first moment about what it means to be human. Throwing these questions straight at the audience right at the start is bound to put people off, but it sets up an incredibly deep and unique film, full of images and sounds that will haunt of days.

British Indie Film Renaissance? Maybe not…

MaryAnn Johanson recently wrote an interesting piece for indiewire, entitled ‘Why British Film is in the Middle of an Indie Renaissance’[1]. It was widely shared, receiving attention all the way up to the BFI who were quick to jump on an unbiased appraisal of British Cinema. I have also written about the strong state of British cinema[2], which has also incidentally been my most viewed written piece on this blog. There is obviously a strong interest in current British cinema. However, I do have a major problem with the writing of Johanson with this piece, and that is the term, ‘indie’.

The term Independent Cinema since the 1990s has entered, in an almost paradoxical way, the mainstream. Quickly big budget studios were attempting to push films with an indie tag, selling it as unique, fresh, and interesting. It has become almost a genre within itself. People would not flinch at someone saying “I saw this fantastic indie movie the other day!”, just as that wouldn’t flinch at someone saying they saw a fantastic horror film. But people are easily duped into believing it is an Independent production, when it rarely is.

A discussion of what is truly independent is an impossible task, as it is an almost impossible criteria to attain. If we are to take it at its most literal sense, this would mean a film made with no restrictions whatsoever, and therefore we would be limiting ourselves to a small handful of films. I, therefore, do not wish to attempt to state a firm definition of what ‘indie’ cinema is, but a few broad statements that can help place films within this context. I do think it is fair to say that if a film receives financial support from an major outside source, one that often runs into the millions, the film is more than likely not a true independent movie. This obviously rules out American studio-productions, but becomes slightly more tricky in non-American movies, where the studio system is not the same. I would therefore like to suggest that if a film is made for more than ten times the average yearly wage of an average citizen in that country, the chances are again that it has received a fair amount of outside support. If we are to take the UK as an example of this, where the average yearly wage is £26,500[3], this gives a fairly large budget of £265,000. This is obviously open for criticism, as it is a very cheap and quick barometer to measure by, but does give some sort of range to consider.

We could delve deeper into this, to investigate with whom final cut was with, if outside support was provided unconditionally, and so on, but this would then require a film by film investigation. I rather, for now, provide the shorthand approach mentioned before to the films MaryAnn Johanson has discussed.

My two main problems with the films mentioned by her are, firstly, the broad usage of ‘British film’, and broad usage of ‘indie’. Here, we can look at each film mentioned by Johanson, and use the term broad ideas I have also used. In her opening paragraph we are presented with a strange selection of films to use as an introduction for British indies:

Gravity (2013)– As Johanson acknowledges, is studio backed, and is therefore a strange example by Johanson in an article about independent cinema.

Les Misérables(2012) –Budget of $61mil, and heavy studio support.

World War Z (2013) – A mind-boggling budget of $190mil, not exactly indie cinema range…

Fast and Furious 6 (2013)– Another massive budget of $160mil, and with very little British involvement.

Rush(2013) – Johanson stats that its budget of $38mil is ‘paltry’ (for who exactly?!), as well as acknowledging its Hollywood money, instead claiming that its British cinematography and location of sets makes it a perfect example.

We are then taken onto how the Harry Potter series has drawn big productions to British shores (again, this is clearly true, but I struggle to see its relevance to an article about independent cinema?). We are also teased with the future big budget American films that are shot in the UK, Fury (2014) and the new Star Wars (2015) films.

Johanson then presents us with some core films of her argument.

Locke (2013) – Made on a budget of under $2million[4] is a more realistic example of British Independent cinema. However this is another cross-country production, joint with American support through American production company IM Global.

Dom Hemingway (2013) – Although I failed to find the budget for this film, it did receive a large amount of studio support from the likes of BBC Films,  as well receiving distribution from major faux-indie companies, Lionsgate and Fox Searchlight Pictures.

Filth (2013) – Another slightly too high budget at £3million, but can fairly be classed as a purely British (Scottish?) film with about as little interference a film of that budget that could expect.

A Fantastic Fear of Everything (2013) – Again, I struggled to find the exact budget, but it was financed by a Pinewood Films initiative to help low-budget British films[5]. Although a positive thing, it would be silly to claim that no interference or ideology would have been placed on this film.

The Selfish Giant (2013) – Clio Bernard is one of the key British film-makers today, but The Selfish Giant received huge support (and rightly so) from both the BFI and Film4.

Sightseers (2012) and A Field in England (2013) – This pair of films are both fantastic, and provide examples of fresh British cinema. A Field in England is perhaps the closest example of independent cinema. However, it became a flagship film for Film4, as it was released simultaneously by them in Cinema, Television, VOD and DVD. A lot of money was pumped into the release of it in this experiment. The film however is unarguably unique.

Metro Manila (2013) – Is just as Filipino as it is English, and can be claimed as either. I do however feel this is perhaps the truest out of all the films mentioned as being British indie cinema.

Philomena (2013) - $12mil budget staring Judi Dench and Steve Coogan?

The Invisible Woman (2013) – Another big name project, all the way from director, writer and cast.

Under the Skin (2013) – Another joint production with America, staring Scarlett Johansson, and despite its strange story is unlikely to have received little interference.

The Double (2013) – Big names in cast, big financial support, and big distribution.

What MaryAnn Johanson has attempted to write about is fantastic, and a lot of the films mentioned by her deserve more recognition. However these are nearly all not really independent films by any stretch. British mainstream cinema is currently in a fantastic place, and great films are often being made by British people, and big productions are being drawn to Britain. However, independent, low to no-budget cinema is almost non-existent.

Collective film-movements, or film websites, discussion, or festivals are few, and far between in the UK. The Raindance Film Festival is perhaps the only festival that gets any sort of recognition that takes any risks with the types of no-budget films it shows. However, very few of these films or those involved take a step-up into the mainstream. The bridge between these two worlds is not there sadly, despite the talent obviously being there. Despite it never being easier to watch films for cheap, no truly low-budget film has exploded onto the British scene in the way it has often done in American cinema. There is no, and will be no British Indie Renaissance until that bridge can be made stable, and sustainable.

---

[1] http://www.indiewire.com/article/why-british-film-is-in-the-middle-of-an-indie-renaissance

[2] http://whatsthepointofcinema.blogspot.com/2013/11/new-british-cinema-post-2000-cinema-in.html

[3] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20442666

[4] http://www.screendaily.com/reviews/the-latest/locke/5059867.article

[5] http://collider.com/fantastic-fear-of-everything-image-simon-pegg/

New British Cinema - Post 2000 Cinema in Great Britain

‘British’ and ‘Cinema’ are incompatible – Truffaut

Great British cinema has endured a rather up and down history. Although seen as light-weight and predictable in themes (social-realism after social-realism), it has produced some of the most respected directors in cinema history, stretching throughout the cinematic story. Chaplin, Hitchcock, Loach, Leigh, Roeg, Scott, are just a few of that have stood-out for various reasons, and often their shadows have loomed large over British cinema, making others unable to escape their work. These names, however, are normally the exception to the rule. British cinema has historically not been considered on a par with others on a global scale. Often the poor-relation in European cinema, it has looked westwards towards Hollywood, rather than eastwards towards mainland Europe. This influence is understandable, a shared language and similar culture has meant it is a far more accessible form of cinema to understand to the average cinema-goer. It would be easier to watch the latest American film, than the newest Italian one. This has been exacerbated by a fear of mainland Europe from Britain, which can be tracked through historical wars for hundreds of years. This unavoidable influence can be seen in the shocking statistic that only 7 European countries (which includes the likes of Monaco and the Vatican) have escaped attack from Britain[1]. Distrust of the European is an inbuilt fear within British culture that however has been slowly eroded in the post-WW2 era. This has perhaps culminated with the joining of the E.U in 1973 (although it has frequently faced opposition, including a proposed referendum on the matter in the near future), which has led to the opening of boarders within the E.U, and the growth of globalisation. Naturally, closer neighbours such as France and Spain are bound to influence from Western Europe where the ease of travel and tourism has meant many British citizens have frequently visited. The playful and challenging natures of their national cinemas have gradually left its footprints on British cinema. Just like this influence from the West, rise of immigration from Eastern Europe, increasingly that of Poland and Romania, has been also taken on the slower-paced nature of Eastern Europe. The influences of directors such as Puiu or Mungiu are clear to see in the works of Andrea Arnold, for example. This slow shift towards Europe, and away from isolation (and America) has had a slow knock-on effect on British cinema as well. While this by no means is saying that Hollywood is irrelevant to British cinema (far from it), we are now looking at change of view, from where before the British watched Europe through mistrust, it is now watched for direction.

The 2000s in Great Britain represented a great shift in view, specifically towards that of America. Post-9/11 and the outcome (or lack of) of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq focused a lot of animosity to America. Statistics such as 41% of the British population saying they ‘mistrusted’ America, or 40% using ‘bully’ to describe the country[2], are regularly pumped out by the media. This ‘mistrust’ inevitably spreads into forms of media and art, and an irrational avoiding of works that have come before from America. This, alongside the growth of accessibility of more obscure European (as well as other) cinema, leads to an expected influence upon the film-makers that have developed their works during post-2000s. The ease of which people are able to find foreign films through DVDs, both released within Britain, as well as those imported, have meant that it is just as easy to watch a film by Tarkovsky, as it is to watch a film by Coppola.

Finally, the failure of New Labour, and the arts cuts that followed during the recessions, has forced filmmakers to become more creative with their works. With supporting money becoming harder to obtain, films are forced to stand-out from the crowd, and thus forced to challenge expectations. British cinema has found itself at its most creative, just like many national cinemas, when it has faced some of its hardest times to gain support.

These combining factors have created a melting pot for Britain to create some of its most interesting and challenging films, as well as most interesting filmmakers, in its history. Since the end of the 2000s, British cinema has entered into a golden era that has encompassed many different types of film, ones that have reached across to America, but also towards Europe. What separates these filmmakers is not only the fact they are far more European than those of the past, but also the sheer numbers of filmmakers who are now creating pieces that are respected by their peers. Whereas in the past, a few may make it, now a whole host are continuing to break through year on year. Each director that is to be mentioned in this piece is only touched upon within the respect of what is their most important work within this wave, however each director has a deep and interesting catalogue of films that can almost equally be considered. Many directors that are extremely important figures as well have not been mentioned, but their films will be noted additionally to this piece with an accompanying list of films[3].

The First Seeds

Although extremely early in the growth of New British Cinema, 2000 saw two key films appear, key for conflicting reasons. Memento (2000) by Christopher Nolan, a joint citizen of the United States and Great Britain, received acclaim at its premier at the Venice Film Festival. It became a film that managed to jump the independent boundary in America, and become a part of American culture of the 2000s. The story-telling method used by Nolan, one that is far removed from that of traditional Hollywood mainstream, seems far more European than most American independent hits. With the success of Memento, Nolan was given the chance to delve deeper into American cinema, while being able to maintain a form of distance from it due to his close affiliation with Great Britain. What Memento showed, as well as the subsequent success of the Batman films, is the ability to move into the Hollywood mainstream, while maintaining a strong voice. Nolan, more than anyone in recent years, has managed to harness his position in Hollywood to use their power and money to demonstrate that audiences can handle new and changeling ideas. This leap from independent filmmaker to Hollywood director, although peaking in the 90s American cinema, was arguably taken to a new level by Nolan, as would later be seen with Inception (2010), a form of companion piece to Memento.

Just over a week afterwards the other key British film of 2000 was released, Sexy Beast (2000). The debut feature by Jonathan Glazer, takes a tired British format, the London gangster flick, takes a regular gangster actor, Ray Winstone, and relocates it to Spain. What grows from this is a stylish picture that stands out from the traditional dark and grungy gangster film that became the calling-card for many British film makers. Glazer plays with genre expectations, not through subverting, but through embracing and using them in fresh and creative ways. The sunburnt skin of Winstone is something that is not uncommonly seen on the beaches in Spain, as tourist from Britain regularly flock to the Spanish coasts during the summer. Sexy Beast is one of the first to replicate this common holiday image. British cinema had become far too comfortable churning similar types of films that it had become associated with. The cheeky-chappy East End gangster guy, or the social-realism cinema of Ken Loach. These comfortable expectations became limiting to filmmakers who felt this type of film was to be aspired to, rather than to challenge. Sexy Beast uses the expectations of the gangster film, and gives them a new lease of life. Playing with genre without mocking has become a regular theme in New British Cinema, fully embraced by one of the best directors to come out of Great Britain, Edgar Wright.

Shaun of the Dead (2004) was the first feature by Wright, and the first of his ‘Cornetto trilogy’, followed by Hot Fuzz (2007) and The Worlds End (2013), all of which were met with critical acclaim. Wright’s visual playfulness which is supported by regular cast members, engages and plays with genre. Wright is self-schooled with American genre films, but relocates them to Great Britain for comical effect. Shaun of the Dead takes the zombie film, and relocates it to the Winchester Pub, where survivors fight off zombies with cricket bats while dancing to Queen. Hot Fuzz takes the action flick to rural Gloucestershire, where Hollywood obsessed cops fight the mundane, and finally The Worlds End taking on the alien invasion, alongside the commercialisation of British culture and it being water downed by American. Wright though, is also clearly educated in European cinema, regular mixing it with the more obvious American influence. The ‘Cornetto’ idea itself is a play on the ‘Three Colours’ trilogy of Kieslowski, which helps connects the three films. He is just as happy to play on this influence, as he is to play with the likes of Evil Dead II (1987). Wright is perhaps the most visually distinctive filmmaker working in Britain today, and his wide film knowledge that pulls references from America and Europe, while using Great Britain as the mixing pot, gives his work a unique style.

These three films show the seeds in which British cinema started to expand, by influencing Hollywood, by reaching towards Europe, as well as the merger of the two. Each film represents the start of these three strands, which started to fully blossom towards the end of the 2000s.

Festival Recognition

2008 saw a shift in tone in British cinema with, Hunger (2008), by Steve McQueen. A former artist, who had experimented with short films, Hunger was shown at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival in the Un Certain Regard section, where McQueen won the Camera D’or for best debut feature by a director. Hunger pushed away traditional narrative and instead focused on the hunger strike mainly through the use of visuals. This shunning, and its end result is undeniable European in style, and undeniable successful in doing so. McQueen has said that he “could never make American movies”[4], and his free-wheeling style of narrative and technique supports this statement. Leaving film school in America, because “they wouldn’t let you throw the camera up in the air”[5] is a strong shift away from the tradition look of British cinema, which while often willing to follow characters around dirty streets, has been scared to push and experiment with limitations. His comfort in showing the human body in all of its beauty and ugliness, something which can be seen as well in the follow up, Shame (2011), is none too dissimilar to much the French New Wave, where the body has never been a taboo. This has traditionally been the case in Great Britain, where modesty must be kept at all times. McQueen has become, alongside Wright, the outstanding figure in modern British cinema, remaining uniquely British, embracing European style, while projecting onto America. Recognition for a new British director had been extremely rare on the European mainland, and to receive it at the most prestigious of festivals kicked off a stream of British films that were picked up at festivals.

Fish Tank (2009), the second feature film of Andrea Arnold, followed a similar path of McQueen. Showing at Cannes, and winning the Prix du Jury prize (a prize she also won for debut feature, Red Road (2006)), Fish Tank takes the average social realism film, and adds the wondering camera and looseness of European cinema into the council estates of Britain. Similar to Sexy Beast, Fish Tank takes a tired staple of British cinema and adds a refreshing feel to it. Symbolism is embraced, rather than grimy back-alleys, and an admiration for nature which is contrasted to the ‘concert jungle’ of the estate. Her follow-up feature, Wuthering Heights (2011) is an incredible bare-bones adaptation of the Emily Bronte novel. Previous adaptations had taken on a literary approach, attempting to stick as close to the novel as possible. Arnold however takes a Malickan approach to the novel, using little dialogue and uses nature to re-tell the story. Wuthering Heights could be Days of Heaven(1978) if it was relocated to Yorkshire. Her revisionism of a key British text ignores all that has come before it, and rather allows for the cinematic language to take over. Her willingness to use silence and wondering camera work, supported by DoP Robbie Ryan, creates a fresh style that embraces the Yorkshire Moors for all of its ugliness and beauty. Arnold herself has become a regular on festival juries, including working for Cannes in 2012, and Venice in 2013, and a regular feature on the European film circuit.

The Arbor (2010) takes another culturally important text from British history, and implants a creative and unique spin on it. The Arbor is a documentary by Clio Bernard, which uses actors to mime over the voices of people involved in the life of play write, Andrea Dunbar and her time in Bradford. Dunbar, who wrote Rita, Sue and Bob Too, is used to show the dangers of life in poverty as well as racism that can often be bred from it. Bernard is clearly interested in representing the life of the marginalised, as can be seen with her follow-up feature The Selfish Giant (2013), but just as with Andrea Arnold, she is willing to embrace new ways for British cinema to represent the council estates of Great Britain.

Steps into Hollywood – Off Kilter Mainstream

Christopher Nolan and Edgar Wright, perhaps the two directors from the wave of British directors most versed in American cinema, are unsurprisingly the two that have made greatest inroads into American cinema. Inception, the £100million project awed audiences and won a number of plaudits for its refusal to dumb itself down, a common complaint of Hollywood blockbusters. Released as the big summer film of 2010, Inception is refreshing in simple fact it’s a big budget film, made for adults, and rather than shying away from the complexities of Memento, he runs with its idea and transforms them into a big budget puzzle. The more thought-out blockbuster, films such as Prometheus (2012) or Gravity (2013), may not have been able to happen with Inception taking the first leap. The influence of Inception is still reverberating around Hollywood, and looks set to be continued with his next project, Interstellar (2014).

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (2010) in many ways is the anti-Nolan film, however, and influence on Hollywood is a lot less great, but is a unique take on the comic book film. Nolan changed how the comic film was made with his Batman trilogy, he took on an extremely serious tone, and located it into the real world, a style that would be replicated in most comic book films that followed. Wright’s Scott Pilgrim vs. the World however would go and celebrate the comic book in all of its glory. Its over-the-top humour, mixture of comic book and video game references, and the non-stop action, Wright maintains a constant onslaught on the audience. Although not as widely well received in America as within Britain, it did secure him the directing duties for Marvel’s newest feature, Ant Man, due out in 2015. Marvel has grown into one of the most powerful studios in the American system, and entrusting Wright to front one of their films can be seen as his integration into the American system. The work of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, however suggest that there is little chance of him losing his distinctive style in order to win American audiences over. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World draws many of its influences from the computer games world, one of which is dominated by Japan and America. Wright is extremely versed within this language just as much as that of cinema’s, and is sure to be seen as one of the first directors to openly display this influence in cinema.

Perhaps one of the strangest examples of the British cinema in Hollywood is the fantastic Les Misérables (2012), by Tom Hooper. The follow-up to his extremely Hollywood-friendly The Kings Speech (2010), Les Misérable is a strange, challenging, and eclectic piece of cinema that refuses to limit itself in order to please audiences. In many similar ways to Nolan and Inception, Hooper used his Hollywood pulling power that he gained after winning Best Director at the Oscars for The Kings Speech[6] , in order to go even bigger with his next project. Les Misérables is unashamedly big, brash, and European in style, with its subject matter, and themes. The extremely successful musical has never translated well onto the screen due to this size, but Hooper manages to keep a hold of all the strings in the story, and fills it with his distinctive composition of images. The influences of Fellini and his encompassing compositions of life in Italy run in a similar way to how Hooper shows the rich and poor in early 1800s Paris. At the core of all of this however, Hooper maintains a strong, emotional pull that as soon as it has hold of the audience, refuses to let go. Despite its Oscar nominations, Les Misérables was unsurprisingly better received on the continent than in America. Much bewilderment was met by many who were expecting a far more easy-going The Kings Speech follow-up, which follows the more traditional lines of British cinema. However, what was produced was arguably the best films from Great Britain of 2012.

2013,Beyond and the Others– The Strange and the Unexpected.

Reaching the conclusion of 2013, the original set of directors who started to come into the limelight in the late 2000s have continued to make challenging films, with directors crisscrossing between acceptance in Hollywood, many of whom maintain their distinctive styles, while others continue genre revisionism. By returning to two of the key directors in the wave, Steve McQueen and Jonathan Glazer, we can see exactly how far British cinema has come in a short space of time.

The Oscars, even in Great Britain, has been seen as the pinnacle of filmmaking. Britain has not been unaccustomed to winning the prestigious Best Picture, or Best Director (9 directors in total) awards. These films have nearly always been the stereotypic British film that shows off its regal-ness, or by someone who has been assimilated into American cinema[7]. However, Steve McQueen newest feature, 12 Years a Slave (2013) takes an incredible sensitive subject, slavery in America, and examines it in great detail. Whereas a more recent example of slavery in America, Django Unchained (2012), attempted to retell its history, 12 Years a Slave shows it in all of its gory-detail, without the distancing nature that Django Unchained creates through its use of humour and comedy. A Brit coming in as an outsider[8] to examine has created a strange reaction in American media, perhaps most controversially seen in an article by actor James Franco, “Funny that McQueen and many of his actors are non-Americans telling America history. Not that he shouldn’t, but it’s funny to think about it” [9]contains hints of an uneasiness of an outsider portraying American history in such a brutal way. By taking on such a negative story of American history, McQueen demonstrates the newfound self-confidence that is currently evident in modern British cinema. In the past, British directors were stuck in a routine of costume dramas and gangster flicks, McQueen has paved the way to a more challenging type of cinema. McQueen has managed to show a progression however in his work, which has surprisingly seen him accepted into the mainstream conciseness of America. His previous feature, Shame, was discussed as an outsider for awards season, though was unsurprisingly ignored. A film with hardcore sex and unabashed showing of the human body was always extremely unlikely to get approval from Hollywood, dealing with a subject matter typically European. 12 Years a Slave, however, has managed to avoid this same fate, dealing with a topic that undeniably intertwined with American history. It has managed to receive award recognition for its style and approach, winning the People’s Choice Award at the Toronto Film Festival, thus making it almost a shoe-in for Best Film and Director Nominations at the least. McQueen, perhaps one of the most European-like directors to come out of Britain, has become one of the most unlikely to become accepted into the Hollywood world. McQueen has managed to force his way purely through the quality of his films, rather than then through its subject matter. He has taken on topics that are extremely un-commercial, but allowed himself the freedom to explore such themes.

Where McQueen has moved towards Hollywood acceptance, Glazer has moved away from Hollywood, with his latest and third feature, Under the Skin (2013). Starring A-lister Scarlett Johansson, Under the Skin switches the gender role of the male gaze, and places Johansson in Scotland as an alien who preys on hitchhikers. The slow, strange pace and subject matter has received reviews that have stretched from it being referred to as a masterpiece, while others call it “laughably bad”[10]. Met with a split of cheers and boos at the Venice Film Festival, reviewer Xan Brooks commented in his five star review that “When a strange and unclassifiable beast walks into the world, the public has a tendency to split down the middle. One camp is beguiled and the other repulsed”[11]. This type of controversial film has been an all too rare phenomenon in British cinema, nearly always more comfortable aiming shooting for the middle, rather than taking the risk to aim high and failing. Glazer has seemingly taken on the idea of genre revisionism again, as seen in Sexy Beast, and given a fresh lease of life.

The films discussed only represent a small section of filmmakers who have had a major influence in British cinema, and I have ignored many purely due to the sheer amount of directors. Ben Wheatley, clearly influenced by Edgar Wright (who produced Wheatley’s third feature, Sightseers (2012)) and his mixtures of violence and mergers of genre have sparked the low-budget scene in Britain. Another disciple of Wright, Joe Cornish, also demonstrated similar themes with his mixture of sci-fi and the London estate in Attack the Block (2011). Richard Ayoade has displayed his love for the French New Wave in his debut Submarine (2010) and Russian literature with The Double (2013). Lynne Ramsey throughout the 2000s has been at the end of critical praise, most recently with the adaptation of the extremely successful novel, We Need To Talk About Kevin (2011). A seemingly never ending stream of directors seem to be cropping up at regular intervals within British shores, each offering fresh takes on tired genres, new influences from Europe, and in general, really good films.

DANNY MOLTRASI

---

[1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/9653497/British-have-invaded-nine-out-of-ten-countries-so-look-out-Luxembourg.html

[2] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/sep/11/distrust-us-middle-east-poll

[3] http://mubi.com/lists/new-british-cinema-post-2000

[4] http://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2012/jan/08/steve-mcqueen-shame-sex-addiction-interview

[5] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/544419.stm

[6] It should be noted that 2010 had Inception and The Kings Speech as its two most award pictures at the Oscars

[7] One notable recent exception is Slumdog Millionaire (2008) by Danny Boyle, whose fusion of Bollywood and MTV sensibilities won out in a fairly weak year.

[8] McQueen has spent time studying and living in America, but does see himself as British.

[9] http://www.vice.com/read/fassy-b-heats-up-twelve-years-a-slave

[10] http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/film-review-under-the-skin--even-scarlett-johansson-cant-save-jonathan-glazers-laughably-bad-alien-hitchhiker-movie-8796596.html

[11] http://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/sep/03/under-the-skin-review