Even Dwarfs Started Small

Werner Herzog, 1970

One director whose vast spectrum of work has been criminally overlooked by a mainstream audience, but whose reputation as an outlandish filmmaker and wide output of feature-lengths has gained him a devoted cult audience is German director Werner Herzog. With notorious tales of his unconventional methods in filmmaking often matching the actual features themselves, from the famously chaotic production of Fitzcarraldo, to his legendary tumultuous working relationship with actor Klaus Kinski, these stories act almost as counterparts to the features. Following his debut film Signs of Life in 1968 and encompassed in commercial and critical acclaim, Herzog's next feature was released in 1970 to a largely disfavorable audience, branding him a 'fascist' due to themes within his film. Even Dwarfs Started Small follows a group of dwarfs, isolated in a desolate institution, as they rebel against their enforcers and cause considerable mayhem and violence.

Whilst some may choose to view the use of an all-dwarf cast as somewhat of a novelty, Herzog himself claims that the use of little-people in the film is a satire on society, using the dwarfs to illustrate the overshadowing of people by the worlds of commerce and consumer goods, with the dwarfs riotous behavior against their confinement reflecting Herzog's views on the German student movement of 1968. Something that has become noticeably frequent within the films of Werner Herzog, is his use of animals, often acting as a metaphor, such as the famous image of a dancing chicken in Stroszek, to Nicholas Cage's hallucinatory visions of iguanas in Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call - New Orleans. Although Herzog has expressed his love of nature, often choosing to document it on numerous occasions, in films such as Grizzly Man or Encounters at the End of the World, in Even Dwarfs his self-proclaimed fondness for animals becomes somewhat altered, with Herzog choosing to contrast various images of animals in and around the institution, with themes of death or execution throughout the movie, creating an almost haunting quality, most notable of which are scenes in which piglets suckle the teats of their dead mother, a long uninterrupted shot in which a crippled dromedary camel tries to stand, and a strangely surreal sequence, in which a live monkey is crucified and paraded around the courtyard. 

With Herzog's famous claims about his inability to dream, Even Dwarfs acts almost as a substitute for this, creating an ulterior reality, strewn with illogical patterns and surreal and often nightmarish imagery that is somewhat reminiscent of Tod Browning's Freaks, a movie Herzog considers to be one of the greatest films ever made, though what is similar in aesthetic, is entirely different in theme, whilst Freaks portrays the 'monsters' with real delicacy, the complete polar is depicted in the characters of Even Dwarfs. Whether the film was intended to be viewed in a dream-like fashion or as a satirical commentary on 1960's politics is open to interpretation by the audience, but as it remains, Even Dwarfs Started Small is an unregarded classic, and a notable second feature for one of the most important and original filmmakers working today.
words by danny walker.

Performance

Donald Cammell and Nicholas Roeg, 1970

The casting of musicians in acting roles has been a varied affair, often capitalizing on the success of the artist, and exploiting the target audience; fans of the musician's work. For the artist the transition from sound to vision could be a method of reinvention (Bjork in Dancer in the Dark) or a platform by which the performer can promote their music (Eminem in 8 Mile). With Performance, the alteration of Mick Jagger's career from lead singer of The Rolling Stones, to his first serious acting role, after appearing in Jean-Luc Godard's documentary Sympathy for the Devil, seems to be a genuine attempt at change, funneling Jagger's on-stage persona and renouncing that image throughout the course of the movie. 

Originally completed in 1968, but released two years later after controversies surrounding the film's content (one executive's wife infamously vomited during a test screening), Performance takes place on the back-end of the 60's, following Chas (James Fox) a 'Performer': a violent member of an East-London gang. After finding himself overpowered and tortured in his own flat by order of his boss, Chas is forced to abandon his life of crime, and go on-the-run, finding refuge in a house owned by Turner (Mick Jagger), a reclusive hermit and former rock star. Although the pair clearly come from polar worlds, Chas deriving from a male-run heterosexual background, and Turner's indulgences into a hidden world of sex, in the form of a bi-sexual ménage à trois, and recreational drug use, their influence upon each other culminates towards the end of the film, with each character gaining qualities of the other, Turner abandoning his feminine appearance during a David Lynch-style dream sequence, in which he becomes the boss of Chas' gang, and performs an impromptu version of Memo from Turner, and Chas' transformation from virility to androgyny after consuming hallucinogenic substances.

Whilst Performance may run parallels to certain other British crime movies of the day, such as Get Carter or Brighton Rock in terms of theme, what places the film miles apart from it's gangster movie counterparts, aside from it's study of gender identity, is Donald Cammell and Nicholas Roeg's prominent directorial work, which blends various different styles and techniques together, from jump cuts to crash zooms, often with the camera focusing on inanimate objects and rapidly panning out to reveal the subject. Most notable of all, is Performance's use of the cut-up technique, a style often used in literature, most famously by William S. Burroughs, in which text is literally cut up and rearranged to create an altogether new text. This style works in the films favor, giving the impression that the character of Chas may be losing his mind, or perhaps exposing the audience to his and Turner's perspectives with the character's consumption of mind-altering drugs. 

Whilst Mick Jagger's acting career has been somewhat diverse, appearing in Tony Richardson's poorly received Ned Kelly as the title character, and even being briefly cast alongside Jason Robards in an early production of Werner Herzog's Fitzcarraldo before the film was entirely re-shot (footage of which can be found in either Herzog's own documentary My Best Fiend, or in the Fitzcarraldo documentary Burden Of Dreams) Performance remains as Jagger's greatest feat in the world of acting. Whilst the demographic for Performance is arguably fans of The Rolling Stones (the poster for the movie boasts 'Mick Jagger and Mick Jagger') and released under a year after the huge success of Let It Bleed, the film is far more than a method of reinvention or a promotional platform for Jagger, it remains nonpareil, perfectly capturing the essence of the 'swinging sixties' along with the seedy underbelly of London, whilst the execution of the film is as experimental as the period it captures.
words by danny walker.

F for Fake

Orson Welles, 1973

As Welles himself points out during the course of the film, his career began with a fake. This would be when he launched his infamous radio version of War of the Worlds, broadcasting it as though it were a genuine news report of Martians invading Earth, allegedly sending panic across America as people believed what they heard to be real (although whether this hysteria is true or simply a construction to give Welles and his show publicity remains unknown). It therefore seems fitting that his final feature would bring things full circle, with a documentary on the nature of forgery- F for Fake.

 ‘Ladies and gentleman, by way of introduction, this is a film about trickery, fraud, about lies’ this is Welles introduction to a film that blurs the boundaries between what is truth and what is not at every possible opportunity. All documentary is a construction of the author, twisting the facts to put across their own particular viewpoint, rarely however does the filmmaker make the confession themselves that they are not being entirely truthful. Welles makes a promise during his introduction to tell the truth for the next hour, anyone paying the mildest of attention will notice the film overruns this initial hour and in turn progressively descends into fabrications, with Welles himself stating that throughout certain sections they were simply ‘lying their heads off’.

 

In a similar manner to a more recent film like Grizzly Man, large portions of the film were from a stock documentary that Welles discovered before reediting it with his own additional material. The initial focus of this documentary regards an art forger residing in Ibiza by the name of Elmeer de Hory, his villa here is paid for by an anonymous art dealer who he supplies with fakes to be sold on as the real thing, with many facts about himself, along with anecdotes about the sale of his work, supplied by his biographer Clifford Irving. Where Welles steps in and things become interesting, is that Irving himself was later jailed following the discovery that an official biography he had written on reclusive billionaire Howard Hughes was totally fraudulent (Irving himself claimed that he believed he really was working with Hughes on a biography, and that an impostor had in turn tricked him). This is the real focus of the film, if experts such as Irving and the art dealers who sell Elmeer’s work aren’t to be trusted as authorities, then who is?

 Before Elmeer’s paintings are validated by an expert they are worthless, however once they receive their seal of approval they instantly become worth thousands. Similarly Irving was convicted on the grounds that a handwriting expert judged correspondence he had received from Hughes as being forged. If the experts can be mistaken in judging Elmeer’s fake’s as genuine, couldn’t they just as easily be wrong when they declare something genuine to be a fake?

Welles films is full of these sort of questions, and he cuts back and forward between them all at a frenetic pace helping to the create the confusion that is so clearly his goal. Stylistically it is in the editing that the film is at its most influential, with its fast pace created via frequent cuts and a very short length of shot. Self conscious as ever of what he is doing, the editing itself becomes one of the focuses of the film, often cutting back to Welles sat in an editing suite overseeing the footage and manipulating it to put across his point. As Godard once famously stated ‘every edit is a lie’, Welles knows this and ensures that it is every bit a feature of his film.

 In Elmeer, Welles has a kindred spirit. He only began with forgery as means to fund his own paintings which he could not sell, similarly Welles would find himself resorting to starring in any film that came his was in a bid to fund projects such as F for Fake that no studio ever would. After this films completion, Elmeer would commit suicide following the decision by Spanish authorities to extradite him to France for prosecution. Despite his best efforts, and despite earning the AFI lifetime achievement award in 1975, Welles would not complete another film in the decade leading to his death. As he declares within the film he ‘started at the top and has been working his way down ever since’, however far he felt he may have fallen, the quality of his films never did, with F for Fake showing the great director was at his best right until the end, continuing to break new ground and forever experimenting with film form.
words by pete bond.

Mystery Train

Jim Jarmusch, 1989

The recurring theme of estrangement, predominately from a character's native land, is considered a  hallmark in the films of Jim Jarmusch, with the audience often viewing the director's America through foreign eyes, with films such as Down by Law, and Night on Earth using an alienated protagonist to give an outsider's perspective towards events. Between the successes of the aforementioned features, Jarmusch directed Mystery Train, an anthology film set in Memphis, Tennessee, that follows three separate story lines, involving characters foreign to America, that are linked by a run-down hotel they each spend the night in, various locations throughout the city, several loose character links and most notably, Elvis Presley. Unlike other anthology films, such as New York Stories or Paris je t'aime, Mystery Train's triptych stories do all follow a consistent storyline, but are told parallel to one another, showing each characters experiences in, and perspectives of, Memphis, all amounting to the same eventual climax.

Far From Yokohama, the first story in the anthology, follows a young Japanese couple, Jun and Mitsuko, on an excursion to Memphis, with the prospect of visiting Graceland during their trip across America. For the feature segment, Far From Yokohama is an inviting story, acting as an almost precursor to Sophia Coppola's Lost in Translation, a film with similar themes of alienation, loneliness, boredom and culture shock, that also follows an out-of-place couple who find mutuality also in a hotel, and perfectly blends deadpan humor with elements of drama. The second story of the movie, A Ghost follows Italian widow Luisa, astray in Memphis after experiencing trouble escorting her husband's coffin home, after becoming conned out of money on two occasions, and being confronted by two men outside a diner, she finds solace in the Arcade Hotel. Whilst falling asleep, Luisa is visited by the ghost of Elvis Presley.

The third and final feature Lost in Space follows recently single, and unemployed Englishman 'Elvis' (Joe Strummer) as he drunkenly flaunts a gun at a bar, before leaving with his ex-girlfriend's brother Charlie (Steve Buscemi) and his friend (Rick Aviles) and commiting a robbery and possible murder at a local liquor store. In an attempt to hide out and lay-low, they too retire to the Arcade Hotel. This segment could been seen as polar to the themes of the previous two features, displacing the reoccurring ambient theme of isolation, with a fast-paced use of crime and violence, most notably towards the climax of the story. Mystery Train has been influential on many other filmmakers, most notably the work of Quentin Tarantino with the three-tiered, interwoven storylines and the Lost in Space segment being more than an obvious inspiration for Pulp Fiction, using the same culmination of intense, humorous and wild events as Jarmusch's film, that is far too often associated as being an original characteristic of Tarantino's work. 

With Mystery Train being Jarmusch's first venture into colour film making, briefly abandoning his signature black-and-white bergman-esque cinematography, which he would most notably revisit in Dead Man and Coffee & Cigarettes, his employment of European-film legend Robby Müller is greatly received, with Müller capturing the beauty of everything from a cityscape, to an empty run-down hotel room. What remains, is one of Jarmusch's finest and most original works. Whilst today he is considered one of the greatest independent, cult directors in the world, staying true to his art without compromise, Mystery Train is the film that brought him out of the art house, and in front of an audience.

words by danny walker.

Une Femme est une Femme

Jean-Luc Godard, 1961

How good a Godard film is tends to be inverse to how seriously it takes itself. During his initial years as a filmmaker Godard was at his most playful, approaching moviemaking in a care free manner that led to him being, almost by accident, responsible for countless stylistic innovations (most notably his use of jump cuts) that would influence generations of filmmakers to follow. What stands as one of Godard’s best works, is also one of his earliest, and most light hearted films Une Femme est une Femme.
 
Une Femme est une Femme follows Angela (played by Godard’s then wife Anna Karina) as she attempts to persuade her boyfriend Émile (Jean-Claude Brialy) to have a child with her. When he refuses she begins to flirt with the idea of having a baby with Émile’s best friend Alfred (Jean-Paul Belmondo). As always with Godard, the plot is secondary with Godard using it merely as a framework throughout which he can shoehorn in various nonsensical conversations and playful camerawork.

Whereas his previous feature À Bout de Souffle can be seen as Godard’s own take on the crime films of directors he admired such as Howard Hawks, Une Femme est une Femme is his take on the Hollywood musical (further imitating Hawks by choosing to make genre pictures) and also his earliest foray into colour filmmaking. Godard’s regular cinematographer Raoul Coutard doesn’t squander this opportunity putting the use of colour at the forefront, ensuring that the film is illuminated by lighting of bright blue and red, particularly during the scenes in which Angela sings at the club. This use of red and blue is extended to both the set design and to the costumes of the characters, meaning that despite the realist elements associated with the Nouvelle Vague such as location shooting the film still possesses the fantastical appearance of a 1930’s musical.

 Whenever Godard casts a male lead other than Belmondo in these earlier pictures you can’t help being disappointed that he isn’t there, always feeling as though his replacement is simply acting as his stand in, this is also true of any female lead being considered over Karina. As he manages to cast both in this film (a feat he would only manage on only one more occasion four years later with Pierrot le Fou) the performances are some of the best seen in Godard’s oeuvre with Belmondo displaying the effortless cool that would typify all of his future roles. Karina is at her best too, not lip synching but singing the musical numbers herself and giving a great comic performance as the fickle Angela. Having married shortly before the films production, Godard appears to be setting out to make Une Femme est une Femme a tribute to his new wife and her beauty affording her numerous close ups and direct-to-camera dialogue.

After 1967 Godard’s films would begin to change for the worst, his marriage to Karina would end and his films would begin to take an ever more serious approach to their subject matter. He would focus less on technical and stylistic innovation in favour of experimenting in ways such as rejecting the narrative form of cinema, regarding it as capitalist construction, and with his most recent film Socialism even refusing to grant it English subtitles at Cannes regarding it as the language of western imperialism. With this his influence has wavered, the New Hollywood directors of the 1970’s took inspiration in countless ways from his earlier films and in turn have replaced him as the directors who the current wave of independent filmmakers look to emulate. When you think how Godard has sidelined himself it seems a shame, films such as Une Femme est une Femme, À Bout de Souffle, Alphaville and Vivre sa Vie are all still here though are all, and standing the test of time as some of the most enjoyable art house films to ever be contributed to cinema.

words by pete bond.

Electroma

Thomas Bangalter & Guy-Manuel De Homem-Christo, 2007

Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel De Homem-Christo, the duo more popularly known as Daft Punk, have always had a long standing affair with film. Their first album Homework spawned numerous innovative music videos such as those for Around the World and Da Funk, giving visionary directors such as Michel Gondry and Spike Jonze some of their earliest exposure. With their follow on album Discovery they would collaborate with renowned manga creator Leiji Matsumoto on Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem a feature length animation set to the album, with the film divided up into it’s separate songs for release as music videos.

It is this point in their chronology that Electroma comes along, originally intended to simply be a music video for the title track off of their third recording Human After All, the concept soon snowballed into a feature length production with Daft Punk choosing to co-direct. Shot over the course of 11 days in the desert of Barstow, Electroma follows the robotic alter egos of Daft Punk as they pass through a world populated by robots, as they attempt to be transformed back into humans (people familiar with Daft Punk‘s mythology will be aware they were born human and only became robots when infected with the 909 virus). When this fails they head out into the desert, walking aimlessly to their certain death.
 

The film is sparse in every way, most notably in that their isn’t a single line of dialogue spoken throughout. Regardless of this the motives of the robots and their emotions are always clear, their disappointment at their failure to make the transition and their despair as they flee into the desert. The cinematography consists of extended tracking shots (with steadicam operated by none other than Chris Cunningham) with harshly lit white corridors reminiscent of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Whilst it’s minimal and steady approach may leave some viewers cold, it is fans of meditative science fiction such as 2001: A Space Odyssey and Silent Running that will understand and appreciate it’s approach.
 
Perhaps the most unusual stylistic choice made by a duo primarily known as musicians is the restricted use of music. A mere nine songs feature on the soundtrack, none of which are performed by Daft Punk themselves instead choosing to use tracks by the likes of Brian Eno and Curtis Mayfield instead, it’s a curious choice given that the film was envisaged specifically to accompany the song Human After All. This would seem to be to avoid Electroma being viewed as Daft Punk repeating themselves, having already made one film scored by their previous album their was no need in repeating the task.

Although no further plans to continue their directorial career have been discussed, the duo have continued a close relationship with film. They provided both a cameo and the score for Tron: Legacy (the films only saving grace) and Bangalter continued his collaboration with Gaspar Noe providing the opening theme for Enter the Void, having previously contributed the score to his 2002 film Irreversible. Making electronic music, sampling the work of other people is a large part of what Daft Punk do. With Electroma they appear to have applied the same approach to filmmaking, drawing on their influences to combine the visuals of Kubrick with a story reminiscent of Gus Van Sant’s Gerry with their own personal touch, making a film that stands alongside the likes of Duncan Jones’ Moon as one of the more mature and interesting science fiction works of the decade.
words by pete bond.

Twenty Four Seven

Shane Meadows, 1997

With the decision late last year towards the abolishment of the UK Film Council,  a non-departmental body, that's purpose was to directly fund the production and development of British-based films, and to sustain an active and successful film industry and culture, the future of the UK's output has been brought into question. One director who's work has greatly benefited from funding by the UKFC is Shane Meadows, who's films Somers Town and This Is England have broken the Independent market, and into the mainstream, with the latter even enjoying a spin-off television series last year. Arguably the highest point of Meadow's career so far is the vastly overlooked 1997 drama Twenty Four Seven.

The film, set in a Thatcheresque, working-class town, follows Alan Darcy (Bob Hoskins) as he recruits the local youths into his boxing club, in an attempt to steer them away from criminal behavior, and engage them in something they can be passionate about. This in turn merges the rival gangs together, injecting self-respect into their empty lives, but as the day of the tournament quickly approaches, the stress of home-life, drug abuse and other such realities, come to an almighty climax. Twenty Four Seven seemingly lends alot to Tony Richardson's 1962 British classic The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, not only in it's subject matter which merges a grim view of working-class England, and it's class consciousness, with youth rebellion and escapism, but in it's bold black and white imagery, that became popular in the late 50's/early 60's during the British New Wave trend.


Twenty Four Seven is often paralleled to Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull, with it's similar black and white aesthetic, and dramatic content, but whereas Scorsese's picture deals more with the contrast of life in and out of the ring, Twenty Four Seven's use of boxing as a driving force behind the plot is more expendable, choosing to focus upon character development and interaction, more so than any scenes of fighting. A scene in particular, in which Hoskins Waltz's with his aunt to The Blue Danube in a social club is easily comparable to a Raging Bull fight sequence, with it's use of classical music, and razor-sharp editing.

As most director's careers develop, the output of their films tend to lose the originality of their first several features, whether that be due to studio interference or any other means, Shane Meadows is one director who's releases have  retained a unique style and voice throughout his career, and whilst the allure of Hollywood and a mainstream audience may not appeal to him unlike some British directors (Micheal Winterbottom, Danny Boyle, Guy Ritchie to name a few) Meadows joins the ranks of Mike Leigh, Andrea Arnold and Ken Loach, as one of the most exciting and original UK directors working today.
words by danny walker.

Italianamerican

Martin Scorsese, 1974

Scorsese is renowned for his two long term actor/director relationships, firstly with Robert De Niro and more recently with Leonardo DiCaprio stepping up to fill his place. One returning performer who has received considerably less attention for their work with the great director is his own mother, Catherine Scorsese. Often playing a character not far removed from her real life persona, Catherine has starred in no fewer than eight of his films (an equal number to De Niro) with speaking roles in everything from Goodfellas and The King of Comedy, to Casino. The roles she has fulfilled often centre around her cooking- whether it be in the back room of the convenience store in Casino or when she cooks a late night meal for Tommy, Henry and Jimmy in Goodfellas. In Italianamerican Catherine and her cooking get to take the starring role as Scorsese documents her cooking them dinner whilst along with Scorsese’s father Charles they tell anecdotes about themselves and their lives, growing up as second generation immigrants in New York’s Little Italy.

 
All of Scorsese’s trademarks here- the Italian family, Catholicism, New York city. Watching Charles and Catherine’s light hearted bickering you can see where the inspiration for the relationships and mannerisms of the couples in his films emerge from. Whereas Scorsese has tended to focus his narrative films on the darker corners of Italian American life with his mafia pictures and films such as Raging Bull, Italianamerican is a much more romanticized and sentimental view as his parents recount tales about their own parents romances, their journeys through Italy and spiritual visions they have witnessed, any hardships an immigrant family would have faced at the turn of the 20^th century are all but it ignored. Where the documentary truly achieves its strength is from these stories, and Charles and Catherine’s ability to express them so well to the camera. Watching them talk and imagining Scorsese growing up in their home it is easy to see where he will have obtained his talents as a storyteller. 

One of the greatest additions in this vérité style documentary comes in the extremely limited closing credits, where after the brief list of names involved with the project comes Catherine’s own recipe for the tomato sauce and meatballs she cooks in the film, it’s a quaint touch on such a nostalgic film (Catherine would even go on to publish her own recipe book, titled The Scorsese Family Cookbook).

So far the only release Italianamerican has seen was on a laserdisc titled Three by Scorsese featuring alongside the best of his short films The Big Shave and his influential documentary American Boy: A Profile of Steven Prince (a review of which will one day follow) making it a hard film to obtain. It is a however a must for any Scorsese enthusiast, one of his easiest and most entertaining films to watch and quite possibly his best foray into documentary filmmaking yet.

words by pete bond.