Tag: Film analysis
Maya Deren And The Scores Of Teiji Ito (Meshes Of The Afternoon + Others)
Time past and time future, What might have been and what has been, Point to one end, which is always present. – T.S Eliot (Four Quartets) There’s a clash often present in the films of Maya Deren but especially in the ones that incorporate music into their styling. From her most famous short Meshes Of The Afternoon (1943 or 1952 with music) to other titles such as … Continue reading Maya Deren And The Scores Of Teiji Ito (Meshes Of The Afternoon + Others)
The Horror Score Rebellion – Part 3 (Rosemary’s Baby And Popular Music In Horror)
Though 1968 may best be remembered for Romero’s zombies, another film released that same year had a similar impact to the way horror films in the subsequent decade were scored. Rosemary’s Baby, directed by Polish émigré Roman Polanski, has a legacy of imitators that developed from its scoring techniques. Polanski’s tale of the occult in a Manhattan apartment block primarily employs a classical score but large … Continue reading The Horror Score Rebellion – Part 3 (Rosemary’s Baby And Popular Music In Horror)
Interview with Ben Rivers
Originally published in ACE Magazine. Ben Rivers is one of Britain’s leading experimental filmmakers, broaching the ground between narrative and documentary film. He has been making short films since 2003 but has recently risen in popularity due to the release of his first feature length film Two Years At Sea in 2011. Rivers is famed not just for creating haunting visuals but also for using … Continue reading Interview with Ben Rivers
Avant Godard! Musical Subversion In The Films Of Jean-Luc Godard. (Part 1)
Avant Godard! Musical Subversion And Fictional Interaction With Non-Diegetic Music In The Films Of Jean-Luc Godard. Introduction – French New Wave As Avant Garde. When discussing Avant Garde cinema, the most obvious choices of cinematic subject would no doubt be linked to the likes of Dali, Buñuel and Cocteau. However, the gradual movement from Avant Garde to Art House cinema presents a more interesting case for Avant Garde … Continue reading Avant Godard! Musical Subversion In The Films Of Jean-Luc Godard. (Part 1)
Night Of The Eagle – Sidney Hayers (1962)
If Alfred Hitchcock were to have made an occult horror film, it’s not beyond the realms of fantasy to believe that it would look something like Sidney Hayers’ 1962 film Night of the Eagle. Mixing up all sorts of clean cut imagery and marvellously juicy language, the film is one of the more Freudian in the horror canon and a far more subtle affair than … Continue reading Night Of The Eagle – Sidney Hayers (1962)
X The Unknown – Leslie Norman (1956)
Following on from Hammer’s The Quatermass Xperiment, the company continued their desire for rating incorporated titles with 1956’s X The Unknown. It may perhaps hold the most unimaginative of Hammer’s titles but the film itself has some surprisingly good moments. The story follows an extremely similar route to its predecessor but certain tweaks allow more paranoia to build specifically around the radiation that clearly obsessed … Continue reading X The Unknown – Leslie Norman (1956)
BBC Ghost Stories – The Stalls of Barchester/A Warning To The Curious (1971/1972)
This review contains spoilers. The second release of the BBC Christmas ghost stories finds the real birth of it as a staple of the wintery Christmas nights of the 1970s and showcases the first two of five serials by Lawrence Gordon Clark. Though both of the stories are again M.R James adaptations the connecting factor here, apart from being chronologically accurate, is the inclusion in … Continue reading BBC Ghost Stories – The Stalls of Barchester/A Warning To The Curious (1971/1972)
The Reptile – John Gilling (1966)
This article contains spoilers. As a companion piece to John Gilling’s other big Hammer success The Plague of Zombies, 1966’s other Cornish based horror is an entirely different film even though shot relatively back to back. The Reptile focuses far more on the individual effects of a creature on the loose rather than a general view on the chaos, though obviously the villages where both … Continue reading The Reptile – John Gilling (1966)
BBC Ghost Stories – Whistle And I’ll Come To You (1968 & 2010).
The first of the two BFI releases due out on the 20th of August, this double bill of the classic BBC ghost story adaptations sets the tone for the future releases while also justifying the detail and time put into them. This release contains both adaptations of perhaps M.R. James’ most famous short tale and the release plays wonderfully on the natural juxtaposition of the two … Continue reading BBC Ghost Stories – Whistle And I’ll Come To You (1968 & 2010).
Celluloid Wicker Man 