CineSkinny – 19 Feb 2013

WWW.THESKINNY.CO.UK/CINESKINNY TUESDAY 19 FEBRUARY THE CINESKINNY 1

FREE TUESDAY 19TH FEBRUARY THE OFFICAL GFF DAILY GUIDE WWW.THESKINNY.CO.UK/CINESKINNY

WHAT’S INSIDE?

GFF BOX OFFICEOrder tickets from the box office atwww.glasgowfilm.org/festival

or call0141 332 6535or visitGlasgow Film Theatre12 Rose Street, Glasgow, G3 6RB

[email protected]

2 — TODAY’S PICKS There’s a Marvel Marathon

on, if you’re into spandex

2 — FEATURE Interview with Village at the End of the World director Sarah Gavron

3 — REVIEWSTower Good Vibrations Village at the End of the World

4 — WHAT’S NEW ONLINE Links to people who write more better than CineSkinny

4 — MUCH ADO ABOUT WHEDON We profile the beloved screenwriter of Alien: Resurrection

4 — PIC OF THE DAY The Daleks took a super injunction out against our first choice of photo

4 — WHAT DO YOU THINK? Just be grateful that we let you even have your own thoughts

THE OZON LAIRWe anticipate good things from FRANÇOIS OZON’s latest confectionWORDS: HELEN WRIGHT

THE TITLE of François Ozon’s In the House is likely to tantalise those familiar with the man’s back catalogue. From his first feature, 1998’s Sitcom, in which a suburban household is terrorised by a pet rat, to his 2010 effort Potiche, a satirical Catherine Deneuve vehicle about a housewife freed from maternal obligation, the French director consistently insinuates how menacing and threatening a domicile can be.

Various influences are chan-neled through the filmmaker’s obsession with familial spaces. Sitcom is indebted to Pasolini’s Teorema, a classic account of bourgeois values breaking down as a lusty stranger sleeps with the occupants of a single Italian home. By replacing the stranger with a rodent, the effect Ozon creates is more magical realist and tongue-in-cheek than his source material, but his commen-tary on middle class hypocrisy is unmistakable. The auteur also

notably adapted the socialist critique of R.W. Fassbinder’s play Water Drops on Burning Rocks, about a businessman’s inexplica-ble domination of all who enter his apartment.

While a student at Paris’ prestigious La Fémis film school, Ozon was looked down upon for watching Hollywood mov-ies alongside more respectful Euro-arthouse fare. Exposure to divergent styles goes some way to explaining the eclectic nature of his output. The type of creepy house found in horror staples such as Psycho, The Haunt-ing, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was surely on the director’s mind when making his Criminal Lovers, in which an ogre locks a young couple up in his basement, and Swimming Pool, a meta-murder mystery featuring Charlotte Rampling as an author intoxicated by the eeriness of a French villa.

Perhaps because of his close acquaintance with American

pulp, Ozon’s fixation with familial life is finally identifiable as a study of sexism, the sort con-centrated in mainstream cinema. ‘Women’s director’ Douglas Sirk is another major reference point. Musical 8 Femmes, which first made Ozon famous outside France, and Potiche, are steeped in Sirkian melodramatic irony. Set in the 50s and 70s respectively, they are bold in both colour and their appraisal of patriarchy.

With its salutatory heading, In the House is bound not to disap-point in terms of seedy sexuality, Hollywood-esque pastiche, and social exposition, all of which will presumably be focused on an outwardly civilised but deeply disturbed human home.

20 FEB – GFT 1 @ 18.10

21 FEB – GFT 1 @ 16.00

GLASGOWFILM.ORG/FESTIVAL/WHATS_ON/4761_IN_THE_HOUSE

Produced by The Skinny magazine in association with the Glasgow Film Festival

Editors Lewis Porteous Jamie DunnDesigner Marianne Wilson Digital Nathanael SmithDeputy Editor Josh Slater-Williams

IN THE HOUSE

2 THE CINESKINNY TUESDAY 19 FEBRUARY WWW.THESKINNY.CO.UK/CINESKINNY

TODAY’S PICKSNEVADA: LAU 19.30 @ ST ANDREWS SQUAREFolk trio Lau provide live accompaniment to this psychological relationship drama before sticking around for a mini concert. There’s a pun to be made here, but the editors wouldn’t alLau it.

PETER DARELL: SCOTLAND’S DANCE PIONEER14.30 @ GFT 2This documentary about the Scottish Ballet founder is brimming with presentations of his finest work and, as such, is a must see for all serious dance fans. Come wearing a tutu for added enjoyment.

GEEK NIGHT WITH ALEX SALMOND18.15 @ GFT 1The First Minister and renowned Star Trek fan reveals his favourite ‘geek film’ and discusses it with Mark Millar after its screening. Surely Braveheart would be too conservative a choice?

STEVE NILES20.30 @ CCA THEATREA screening of 30 Days of Night will follow a conversation with this comic book doyen. It’s alleged that a Saturday night out on Sauchiehall Street inspired the film’s grim, bloody horror.

BROKEN 20.45 @ GFT 1GFF loves an impressive debut feature and this BIFA-winning coming-of-age drama doesn’t disappoint. Actor Robert Emms will be in attendance, hopefully with news of the sequel, Fixed.

OUT IN THE COLDSARAH GAVRON and cinematographer David Katznelson take their camera to a dying community on the icy fringes of the arctic circle for this extraordinary doc. INTERVIEW: CHRIS BUCKLE

BEST KNOWN for her works of fic-tion – from BAFTA-winning TV drama This Little Life to 2007’s Brick Lane – Village at the End of the World sees director Sarah Gavron take on the role of documentarian, filming the inhabitants of a tiny Inuit community in northern Greenland as they try to restore their economic fortunes and halt the outflux of villagers seeking work elsewhere. We spoke to Gav-ron about the project’s origins, and the complexities involved in bringing the community’s story to screen.

Where did the initial idea to film in remote Greenland come from?

Well, my husband [cinematogra-pher David Katznelson] is Danish, and he’d been to Greenland and made a documentary there some years ago [Arctic Crime and Punish-ment (2002)]. He was really keen for me to go there with him, so we went there on an adventure with half an eye on making a film together. We ended up visiting a few tiny hamlets, and I was immediately drawn to them – it was just a world apart from anything I’d ever encountered before. When we went to Niaqornat, which is the village that we focus on, we were greeted by Illannguaq [the sewage collector in the film] who was the only one who spoke English. He was really our way in – he explained the whole mechanics of the village, and we spent time there and were made welcome. So after that first trip we thought ‘perhaps there is a story here – one that tells of a traditional way of life fighting for survival, which will connect, perhaps, with a global narrative of small com-munities all over the world fighting for their existence’.

What was the shoot like? Well, it was all about going back

and forth and spending quite a lot of time there. It was a very tiny crew – there was me doing sound and directing, and David looking through the camera. Sometimes I had to stand back and it was just him with the camera and mic, alone – it sort of depended on the situation. So it was a very reduced crew, and quite difficult circumstances – you know,

filming in the dark because they have perpetual darkness in winter, filming in very freezing conditions…

How long did the editing take?It took an enormous amount of

time. Something that I hadn’t really anticipated is that if you film in a foreign language, which I’d never done, then you’ve got the added job of translating – and [it’s] a language that no one in England speaks, so it wasn’t like we could find a translator here! There were people in Copenhagen who came across and sat in the edit suite and went through [the footage with us], and that was enormously time-consuming, finding the little nuggets within the interviews.

Do you think that your work as a fiction filmmaker has influenced the documentary’s style?

I think as a fiction director I find it very important to constantly observe the real world and life around you,

because in a way you’re trying to create truth – you know, what would someone do if they’re told that piece of news, how will they respond, will they cry, will they laugh. So I’m really obsessed with observing how people respond to things… And I suppose in documentaries you’ve got the truth laid before you, so you’re just capturing what’s there. In documentaries, if someone shows emotion, you obviously believe them, [whereas] in fiction you have to work hard to create those moments. So it’s kind of a different muscle in lots of ways, but obviously one does feed into the other.

19 FEB - CINEWORLD 17 @ 18.45


GLASGOWFILM.ORG/FESTIVAL/WHATS_ON/4718_VILLAGE_AT_THE_END_OF_THE_WORLD

Be the star in your own movie

Let Stow College play a supporting role T: 0844 249 8585

WWW.STOW.AC.UK

CREATIVE INDUSTRIESSCIENCE, HEALTH & CAREENGINEERING & TECHNOLOGYBUSINESS & CONTINUING EDUCATION

VILLAGE AT THE END OF THE WORLD

LAU

30 DAYS OF NIGHT

WWW.THESKINNY.CO.UK/CINESKINNY TUESDAY 19 FEBRUARY THE CINESKINNY 3

REVIEWSTOWERDIRECTOR: KAZIK RADWANSKISTARRING: DEREK BOGART, NICOLE FAIRBAIRN, DEBORAH SAWYER

VILLAGE AT THE END OF THE WORLDDIRECTOR: SARAH GAVRON

GOOD VIBRATIONSDIRECTORS: LISA BARROS D’SA, GLENN LEYBURNSTARRING: RICHARD DORMER, JODIE WHITTAKER, DYLAN MORAN

Derek is an outsider. Not the mysterious gunslinger type who rolls into town, but a strange oddball full of ticks and frowns. Sitting somewhere between Travis Bickle and Napoleon Dynamite, he spends his days in the basement of his family home, funnelling weird fantasies into substandard animation projects. It’s possible that his well meaning parents are the root cause of his strange behaviour, pampering, condescending and ultimately infantilis-ing their son. Tower plays in this way as an anaemic take on the We Need to Talk About Kevin nature/nurture debate.

Throughout the film, handheld cameras float excruciatingly close to the minutiae of Derek’s life. The problem with Kazik Radwanski’s feature debut

is that it piles too much focus on its subject while offering the audience little respite. Indeed, the movie’s feature length presumes more legs than this character study owns and we see little in the way of progress or hope. So, while approaching interesting themes, this remains a snapshot rather than a journey, a sketch of an odd piece unable to fit into the puzzle of modern life. By the end, we are happy to reject Derek as he remains coldly impenetrable. [Alan Bett]



GLASGOWFILM.ORG/FESTIVAL/WHATS_ON/4725_TOWER

Directors Lisa Barros D’Sa and Glenn Leyburn explore the life of Belfast record shop owner Terri Hooley (Dormer), whose career was inextricably linked to the explosion of punk and set in parallel to the Troubles. Hooley’s greatest achieve-ment in terms of music lore was stumbling upon a young band from Londonderry and recording their first single, Teenage Kicks.

What makes The Undertones so

fascinating is how far removed their innocence and lighthearted subject matter was from outside perception of life in Derry’s Bogside. Good Vibrations attempts to emulate this effect, focusing on Terri’s love of music amidst surrounding violence.

The issue with Good Vibrations is that its directors constantly fore-ground the atmosphere surround-ing the shop on Great Victoria Street with archive images of balaclavas,

machine guns and British Army soldiers, drawing attention to its conceit. As a result of this heavy-handedness, the characters remain distant and fail to secure any real empathy from the viewer. [David McGinty]



GLASGOWFILM.ORG/FESTIVAL/WHATS_ON/4815_GOOD_VIBRATIONS

Many small-town teens dream of moving to the big city, but few experience as profound an isolation as sixteen-year-old Lars. Living in the remote Inuit settlement of Niaqornat in northern Greenland, peers are few and options limited. “We don’t have internet cafes, hotels or restaurants,” he explains. “We only have the shop” – a small convenience store serving the settlement’s 59 residents, and one of the few employers left in a village facing an uncertain future due to its ever-dwindling population.

Filming over an 18-month period, director Sarah Gavron focuses in on a handful of those that remain, piecing together an absorbing documentary portrait of everyday life in an extreme environment. The community’s attempts to kick-start their prospects by purchasing an abandoned fish factory provide a kind of overarching narrative, but it’s the vignettes proffered along the way – from whale butchery to springtime celebrations – that make Gavron’s film so fascinating. Beauti-fully shot and purposely unsenti-mental, Village… is an insightful study of lives in transition. [Chris Buckle]



GLASGOWFILM.ORG/FESTIVAL/WHATS_ON/4718_VILLAGE_AT_THE_END_OF_THE_WORLD

TOWER

GOOD VIBRATIONS

4 THE CINESKINNY TUESDAY 19 FEBRUARY WWW.THESKINNY.CO.UK/CINESKINNY

WE ARE NORTHERN LIGHTSOne of the 121 directors involved in the Scottish documentary speaks in response to We Are Northern Lights’ première. A lovely insight from someone who was part of the project.

tinyurl.com/NLightsVlog

PARK CHAN-WOOKThe director of Stoker talks to The List about his divisive film and sheds some light on the piano scene. “It’s a metaphor...”

tinyurl.com/ParkChanWook

EYE FOR FILMA round up of GFF’s first few days from Eye for Film, who seem to have had a busy time taking in James Cosmo, Northern Lights and Electric Boogaloo.

tinyurl.com/EyeForFilmGFF

GOOD VIBRATIONSEmpire describe this Belfast biopic as “a very buoyant and really quite infectious film about the power of hope as a force for change.”

tinyurl.com/GoodVibrationsGFF

WHAT’S NEW ONLINE?

FESTIVAL CLUB

Join us at our new Festival Club! Open every day,

12noon till late. Come along for free talks & live DJ acts.

SARAMAGO TERRACE BAR, CCA, 350 SAUCHIEHALL STREET

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features!

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• Real-time guidebook• Location based searching• What’s On listings• Shopping, dining out & special offers

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THE FESTIVAL’S MVP, JAMES COSMO

@SOMEONEONTWITTERI thought this film was quite good. I’ve seen worse, but also seen better too as well! #GFF #CINESKINNY


@SOMEONEONTWITTERI thought this film was quite good. I’ve seen worse, but also seen bet-ter too as well! #GFF #CINESKINNY










@DEBORAHMURRAY Brilliant evening looking at #TheCity with @auricleensemble at #gff13 Superb Copland soundtracks and Sprawl, a great new piece by Steve Forman.#GFF #CINESKINNY

@GLASGOW FILM FEST So far all the twitter guesses on what the Surprise Film will be are wrong! #onlyiknow-andimnottelling #GFF #CINESKINNY

@MCGOFFIC The Paperboy - gloriously ridiculous. It’s so unruly but hilariously so. I was creasing through-out. #GFF13#GFF #CINESKINNY

@FATTOUSHSo far, three films seen at GFF: Caesar Must Die, After May and The Gatekeepers. All excellent and well worth seeing. #GFF #CINESKINNY

@SAMBROOKESecret Subway-ers come out to play! Cult classic The Warriors screened to bold (but cold) cine-adventurers#GFF #CINESKINNY

@ADEY70Calamity Jane at the Grand Ole Opry. Screening / singalong terrific. Now for the barndance... #Whip-CrackAway #GFF #CINESKINNY

WHAT DID YOU THINK? THE BEST TWEETS

MULTI-TALENTED JOSS Whedon (screenwriter, director, producer, actor, comic-book author and composer) can do no wrong these days. He’s enjoyed cult status – and a doggedly dedicated fan following – since Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the mid-90s, but last year Avengers Assemble, now the third highest-grossing film of all time, pushed him into the movie-strato-sphere. So what does Whedon decide to do next? A low-budget, black and white Shakespearean adaptation, of course.

Fans of his TV shows and movies aren’t the only Whedon-nuts. His cast and crew also provide unwavering admiration. Regular collaborator Nathan Fillion (star of Firefly and Se-renity) reported that he answers phone calls from Whedon by saying “I’m in,” so irrelevant is the actual offer.

Much Ado About Nothing, a modern day version of the Bard’s romantic comedy, came about after years of gathering friends to his LA home for Shakespearean readings. This is not the first time such gatherings have resulted in a creative endeavor: Once More with Feeling, a musical episode of Buffy, came about after an alcohol-fuelled sing-along session around the piano at Whedon’s pad.

Whedon’s films and television shows have become known for the writer’s distinctive style: his quick wit, pop culture references, and nerdy in-jokes have cemented his status as a geek icon. He is also a feminist favourite, having created Buffy because he believed the helpless blonde in horror movies needed a better image. His preference for ensemble casts proved he was the perfect choice for Aveng-ers Assemble, where he put his talents to good use and, among other things, created the first truly successful onscreen appearance of the Hulk. His next (known) project is Marvel-based, with Avengers 2 due in 2015. Could it knock Avatar off top spot as most suc-cessful film ever? With Joss Whedon, anything’s possible.

24 FEB – GFT 1 @ 20.15

24 FEB – CINEWORLD 18 @ 20.45

MUCH ADO ABOUT WHEDONWORDS:BECKY BARTLETT

JOSS WHEDON

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CineSkinny – 19 Feb 2013