Category Archives: Week 9

On Radiohead

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♪ music for your reading pleasure ♪

Here I am, sitting at my desk with coffee in hand, body teeming with that surge of irritability that a lack of sleep pushes out, headphones in, Apple Music on and delivering to me what I’ve been waiting for so eagerly for the past few days; A Moon Shaped Pool. Radiohead’s ninth record.

It’s an odd predicament because I would hardly even call myself a die hard fan, yet last night I attempted to sleep from 9:30pm until the album’s release at 4:00am. It just felt right (at the time at least). There are large portions of their discography that I haven’t even come close to listening to (I downloaded their last 3 LPs only this week) but something about the very prospect of a new Radiohead album at this point in time just drew me in. It’s possible that it came right at a time when I was at the peak of my music-listening period (James Blake, Skepta, Car Seat Headrest and Death Grips all released albums (/had albums leak) this week) and I’ve dedicated a lot more time than usual to tuning into these entries.

And of course, part of this plenitude of excitement is due to their release methods; hiatus following their last album tour until a little something something I like to call their greatest contribution to cinema that never existed, their rejected Spectre theme song. The radioplay this got (among my repetition of the song that came every time I opened iTunes) could definitely be attributed to creating this deep-seeded enthusiasm towards the band. Following that, another period of silence until May 1st, where complete social media extermination from the band gave a few hints towards something new, and BANG BANG: May 3rd we got Burn the Witch and May 6th we got Daydreaming and an album release date. And here we are now, May 9th with the entirety of A Moon Shaped Pool in our unworthy ears. First new Radiohead LP in 5 years and it’s over like that.

My 4am alarm-setting venture didn’t work out in the end–I slept briskly from 9:30 to ~10:40, pissed around on my laptop from then until 1:30 with the idea of a 4am start still swirling through my mind. When it came down to business, I unconsciously hit snooze on my alarm, woke up at 4:10, checked their Facebook page and saw that it was out, checked Apple Music and saw that it wasn’t, and dozed back off. Mission partly accomplished. Big ups to the boys at Radiohead HQ for somehow convincing me through their musical endeavours and marketing genius that it was a good idea in the first place.

Movies I’ve watched this week – 06/05/16

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Week #9. This week, I passed up the opportunity to see Salo, The Grand Illusion, and Foolish Wives all in 35mm and chose to go see a 70-minute long jazz session and a drunken screening of American Psycho played on a projected through a laptop in the backyard of a bar. I don’t regret it.

 

The Secret of Nimh (1982) dir. Don Bluth
02/05/16
rewatch

Written for Letterboxd: 

A film which by name alone reminds me so much of my time at primary school; I vividly remember my teacher reading the original book to us as we lazed on the classroom floor in the afternoons. It seems I took a particular interest in it, and somehow convinced mum or dad to rent this out (more than likely on VHS). My childhood was no short of haunting, animated tales of the animal kingdom’s underbelly (I’m looking at you, Watership Down). As a kid, I remember this differing greatly from the book, and oddly enough now I barely have any recollection of the majority of events that unfold here (I saw scenes in my head that don’t even happen; I guess I’ll take that as a testament O’Brien’s original writing). Moments that struck me with that sweet, sweet nostalgia tended to surround Jeremy the Crow and his jerky, almost dance-like animation (“If I was anywhere near a cat, I’d be sneezing my brains out” and his subsequent sneezing fit is permanently imprinted in my mind) and the rat’s transformation sequence. I think I can attribute my first knowledge of pneumonia to Timmy’s case of it too, this plot point stays lodged in my brain. Radiating confidence from its very first frame, throughout its well-rounded ~80 minute runtime, and keeps this light on until its very last. ★★★★

Jazz ’34 (1997) dir. Robert Altman
02/05/16

Written for Letterboxd:

In one of my previous Altman reviews, I likened his films to a live concert:

a profound sensory experience, loud and unforgiving, and always inhabited by some of the most absurd people you’ve ever seen–and you can’t help but savour every moment

and here, the film literally is just that. 70 minutes of unstoppable, unshakable, foot-tapping, free-flowing jazz deliciousness interspersed with fleeting anecdotal jazzy (for lack of a better word) voiceover so silky smooth it could melt your ears right off the sides of your face. When a director has the power to house a ~100-person strong cinema with a film like this, it can truly be said that he is a maverick and master of American cinema. Bless you, Robert Altman. ★★★★★, I don’t give a damn.

The Age of Innocence (1993) dir. Martin Scorsese
03/05/16

Written for Letterboxd:

Cinema of the voice, where dialogue is constant, always veiled in lies and irises, and clouded head to toe in elaborately layered attires in a film which feels at once the most and least Scorsese-y. Moves at a pace which burns so swiftly though its runtime that I can’t help but harbour an eternal appreciation for long-time Scorsese collaborator Thelma Schoonmaker whose editing and pacing truly shines right here and now. Rapid, successive dissolves add to the film’s flourishing visual tone which is so obviously (and not particularly detrimentally) a 90s rendition of late 19th century America. More cinematic than its illusory poster would suggest.

Written for my blog, now: 

I was the only person in my cinema class who ‘liked’ this? I’ve read criticisms that say that this film is just 3 blocks of wood talking, which is a great laugh, and I can totally understand why people would struggle to find enjoyment in this. I’m still confused as to why it appealed to me so much; I had to wake myself up for the 8:30am screening, breakfast-less, totally not in the mood for a 140-minute period piece drama (my least favourite genre) and I loooooooooooved it. They’re screening this in about a month’s time at ACMI in 35mm, so you’ll be seeing me there. ★★★★

American Psycho (2000) dir. Mary Harron 
04/05/16

Shoutout to Nighthawks Open Air Cinema in Collingwood for delivering the goods; attended this free, cutesy little screening in the back garden/patio area of the bar with some mates and had a ball. You’ll be seeing me in a fortnight’s time, Nighthawks. I kinda love American Psycho. For a fleeting period it sat as my all time favourite, and while my tastes have definitely expanded tenfold it still holds a little sweet spot in my heart. And it’s hilarious; the effect that watching something with an eager crowd has on your enjoyment is revolutionary. Marry me, Christian Bale, you handsome psycho you. ★★★★★

The Sounds of Silence

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Sound–the underappreciated little brother of video, of image. Just yesterday I helped a friend out on his short film, a situation where I was in control of sound recording, and I’ve since come around (in combination with another interview project I completed for class) to the importance of the medium. It’s a fidgety, delicate element of cinema and one that requires the greatest of care–as anyone who’s worked on anything surrounding it is sure to know.

As a Robert Altman devotee, I can speak for the value of the medium; Altman was renowned for his accomplishments in sound in cinema, producing a multitrack recording technique which presented overlapping dialogue from his multiple actors, wholly emphasising a balance between style and realism in the sonic area. It wasn’t uncommon in an Altman production for all actors on set to be hooked up to a mic, and many never knew whether they were being recorded or not.

A small note from Bordwell and Thompson’s reading this week struck me as particularly interesting, something I had possibly noticed in passing when watching big action blockbuster films: “Most contemporary sound mixers drop in about a half-second of silence just before explosions and other loud noises.” It seems like a deathly obvious thing but its ingenious power can truly be felt in films like Fury Road or Blackhat.

Vivre sa vie‘s sound strikes a balance between naturalistic (dialogue, environmental sound–many French New Waves catered to this style) and highly artificial (scoring), and this contrast has only left me wanting to follow Godard’s works only more.

“My body is an ugly masterpiece that lives off the beauty of sound.” – Chad Sugg

Serendipity: I’ll allow it

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Well, well, well: never thought I’d find myself here.

Today I had planned to grind through some serious research, note-taking and other general uni related study in order to leave time tomorrow for a shoot my friend had asked me to help out on for his short film (Film & TV course at Swinburne) when BANG BANG he hits me up at 11:39am with a message: “MIGHT NEED YOU TO COME HELP WITH SOUND LATER TODAY IF YOU FINISH YOUR WORK SOMEONE DROPPED OUT”. And here I am now, 8:50pm, home sweet home, more fulfilled than ever (I even tried Korean food). How’s that for serendipity.

Even then, that’s not the serendipitous part I was intending to write about; this came when it started raining after we arrived on location. And BANG BANG, we found ourselves shooting downstairs, in one of Swinburne’s cute little cafes. The new location was perfect, better than it ever could have been in the gray-walled prison-esque original rooftop area of campus that the original shooting had intended to occur at. Thanks, Media One. Thanks, rain. Thanks in advance, chiropractor who will fix my back after the pain it suffered through holding up a shotgun mic for extended durations.