Tom Ford, Colin Firth and Jason Solomons at Bafta

Tom Ford, Colin Firth and Jason Solomons at Bafta
Originally uploaded by Catfunt

Saw Tom Ford's quite amazing debut feature A Single Man at Bafta last night. It's based on a Christopher Isherwood story following a single day in the life of a lietrature literature professor at a Los Angeles university. The film's magical and most reminded me of Steve McQueen's Hunger and Julian Schnabel's Diving Bell and the Butterfly in that all three were made by non-directors who're hugely successful in their own fields. There are moments of real freshness of vision that it's hard to imagine them coming from a battle-hardened Hollywood director.

There was a Q&A with Colin Firth who plays the university professor and the director Tom Ford. Sadly it centred too much on the fact that it's Ford's first feature and the problems that might have created. When a film's this good you know it's no fluke and the result of a real determination and vision.

The other slightly irritating thing was the near constant returning to the idea of it being a gay story rather than one of loss, loneliness and how we might find redemption which far overshadows the sexuality of the cast. Similarly, there were several questions to Firth about a straight man playing a gay character and how that works. Er, he's an actor for fuck's sake - they pretend, it's what they do!

There was an interesting moment when in describing the fact that Nicholas Hoult's mohair jumper need Tom Ford's constant attention with hairspray to stop it fluffing up (fashion tip!) Colin Firth said something like "You can see from that Nicholas is very secure in his masculinity." What caught my attention is that he said "masculinity" when I think he perhaps meant "sexuality". So not "heterosexuality" versus "homosexuality", which is the usual binary opposition that is made, but one of "homosexuality" versus "masculinity". Does this mean that male homosexuals can't be masculine?

Finally the beautiful John Lautner house (more pics) that was used in the film is for sale.

Things I like today...

The Wrestler: Mickey Rourke has the hair to end all hair (think David van Day meets Nicola big-tits-whatever-her-name-is) and is stunning as an aging wrestler in this new wave-ish Darren Aronofsky film.
Places to eat: Tre Viet near me and Soho Japan (for the lunch specials) in town.
Netherland by Joseph O'Neill: mostly for the cricket and Trinidad in New York.

Some films: I'm not there, 3:10 to Yuma, Brick Lane

I've been kinda busy so here's a brief rundown on what I've seen and what I made of them. It's mostly for my benefit as my memory, long and short-term, is shot to hell. The pic is from Todd Haynes' I'm not there, his Bob Dylan bio-pic (sort of). So in what way isn't it a bio-pic? Well, the Dylan character is never named as being Dylan and is played by a bunch of different actors including Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale and Marcus Carl Franklin. The whole thing is fairly entertaining with some great high-points but does go on a bit. My favourite bit is Cate Blanchett's stoned Dylan and Allen Ginsberg heckling a life-size statue of Christ on a cross and she chucks out the fantastic Dylan-esque line: "Play one of the early ones!".

3:10 to Yuma proves that Russell Crowe is in much better films than his somewhat limited acting range deserves but in his defense it must be said that they're never less than entertaining. Christian Bale is the stand-out presence here in this hugely entertaining Western.

The Kite Runner, based on Khaled Hosseini's novel (which I haven't read) is probably my least favourite film here. I found the film overly manipulative and nasty (which isn't something I would normally hold against a film). Great performance by Homayon Ershadi as the father of the feckless Amir which is probably worth the price of admission on its own.

There are lots of great things about Brick Lane, not least that fact that I found it way more engaging than the book and visually it does some interesting things, especially in the way the almost exclusively non-white cast are shot in a sympathetic way that emphasises their ethnicity that places them at the centre of the film. Having said that the film is almost too gentle and doesn't fire up the passions. Again I think the best piece is the portrayal of the father, Chanu, by the legendary Satish Kaushik.

The barbershop from Eastern Promises

The barbershop from Eastern Promises
Originally uploaded by Catfunt

Regular readers will know that David Cronenberg's new film Eastern Promises is currently my film of the year despite Julian Schnabel's The Diving Bell and the Butterfly's best efforts to dislodge it. I was probably swayed by the fact that Cronenberg came across very well in the Radio 4 interview with Mark Lawson (no longer available on listen again) and Schnabel didn't when I saw him Q&Aed at Bafta. I found his name-dropping irritating but only because of his failure having mentioned Marty (Scorsese) or Harvey (Keitel) or David (Bowie) to delivery an interesting anecdote about them. Schnabel's a name-dropping celebrity cock-tease.

The worst bits of Eastern Promises are pure B movie (which isn't such a bad thing to be in my book) but the good bits are jaw-droppingly good. Both movies are flawed: the resolution in Promises isn't all it could be and the last third of Diving Bell drags a bit but both are definite ones to see.

Anyway, the point of this post was that the barbershop in the opening scene of Eastern Promises is the barbershop on Broadway market where I get my hair cut (£8.50). When I went in yesterday the nice barber pointed out some of the things they'd done to his shop for the filming including painting the sign you can see here which he's left on the window. And at the time I just thought he'd redecorated.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Le Scaphandre et le papillon): Hot ladies and the rest

Went to a screening of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Julian Schnabel's adaptation of the autobiographical book of the same title by Jean-Dominique Bauby which recounts his life after suffering a stroke that left him almost totally paralysed. "The guy who dictated his book by blinking his eyelid" is how everyone refers to him and while that in itself is a remarkable achievement, what's best in the film is the simple but visually stunning way that Bauby's experience of locked-in syndrome is recounted. By all accounts the book is quite something (I haven't read it) and gives fuller rein to Bauby's attempts to deal with his state through humour (according to my wife). The film is definitely worth seeing and the opening 15 minutes or so are pure cinema, the story seen quite literally from Bauby's point of view as he first comes round out of his coma post-stroke. (All the effects were done in camera, often using a movable back on the camera resulting in the blurring of the action). There are some nice quirks to the film that made me smile not least the fact that this being a French movie all the women in it from the girl-friend and mistress to the speech therapist are all really hot (and not just Emmanuelle Seigner).

There are a couple clips on YouTube of Schnabel talking about the film:
Reasons to make the film (including fact that Johnny depp was in line for part of Bauby originally)
Biographical aspects of the film

Schnabel did a Q&A after the Bafta screening where he gave TimeOut magazine's film editor Dave Calhoun the runaround and generally came across as a bit of a prick. I like to think that the YouTube clips above are more indicative of what he's like in real life (but he's still an inveterate name-dropper).

Eastern Promises: My new film of the year

So Control only got to be my film of the year for a few weeks (like buses, there's dross for months and then two great films come along in a matter of weeks) to be replaced by David Cronenberg's new thriller, Eastern Promises, which is set amongst the Russian gangster class of contemporary London. Excitingly (for me at least) a lot of the exteriors were shot round Hackney with the opening shot featuring the Joy Tandoori, our local curry house, on fashionable Broadway market. By way of a warning to the squimish it does feature several scenes of extreme visceral violence (which are quite amazing) but if you liked A History of Violence then you're in for a real treat and yet again Viggo Mortensen is outstanding.

Another Control entry

One of the comments for this YouTube Joy Division video - about John Cooper Clarke ("Who the fuck is the prick talking about 'bloody queues' at the beginning?") - reminded me about something that happened at the screening we went to the other night. Yol pops out of the cinema just before the film starts and the 20-something barmaid asks her what's on. Yol says 'Control'. The woman looks blank. 'A film about Joy Division,' says Yol. 'Ian Curtis?' The woman shakes her head more blankly, the words passing over her head meaninglessly. Young people, eh? They know nothing, happy to wallow in their ignorance.

The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw agrees with me: Control is the film of the year

Not so much about Control not being The Commitments part 2 (that was all my work), but about being the best film so far. I also noticed that sneaky Peter Bradshaw (one of the best film writers around) has upgraded his star rating for Control (Four stars at Cannes in May, five out of five for the UK release).

Control: it's not 'The Commitments II"

It's probably the best film I've seen so far this year with excellent performances by Sam Riley, Sam Morton and pretty much all the cast. I wasn't expecting a huge amount from the film as I'm always suspicious about most films made of true stories, particularly music biopics, but this was the honourable exception and succeeds in making the telling of Ian Curtis's short life hugely resonant and deeply touching. Yol said she found the look of the film too dour and oppressive. I pointed out that she'd spent the years in question in London and that Birmingham at least pretty much looked and felt like that. Other good things include the cinemascope, the understated camerawork (it would have been easy to mimic director Anton Cobijn's photographic style that was such a defining part of the look of the early 'eighties NME), the quality of the music (the original plan had been for the band to mime but they actually play while Riley sings and it's wholly convincing), John Cooper Clarke now playing himself 28 years ago, and my favourite bit - Joy Division's manager Rob Gretton (Toby Kebell) offering Crispy Ambulance's singer twenty quid to go on stage to sing vocals to a hostile crowd after a depressed Curtis has been unable to go on.