More time for cinema.

Since leaving employment at my local independent art-deco establishment and finding myself having to pay to watch films, I have returned to my discerning ways. My usual utter disappointment in films that are not only overexposed and overrated by film magazines and critics but were shoved down my throat through ticket sales and daily performances has finally abated.

I saw a couple of films at the BFI London Film Festival. The first was Bernadette: Notes on a Political Journey, the subject matter of which is of such interest to me that it was never going to disappoint. In fact it far exceeded my expectations. An important moment for me was when Bernadette Devlin McAliskey (leader of the National Anti H-Block/Armagh Campaign) described the hunger strike as a cycle of death and grieving. This links in with Allen Feldman's description of the hunger strike as a production line of corpses, a conveyor belt, which I touched on in my dissertation.

The second film was part of the Gay & Lesbian film festival. I had meant to see a different film but got the wrong day. I was miserably hungover. We got to the BFI with about 10 minutes to spare and then found out the film was showing at Vue, Leicester Square. So hungover and having slept in contact lenses I then had to dash over Hungerford Bridge (following the massively tall JW whose pace is about 2.5x mine). I was ready to give up and go home but I persevered. The film was a South African film called Skoonheid, or Beauty in English, and it was incredible. One of the best films I've seen for a long long time. I really hope it widens its audience from the gay & lesbian market which it was obviously promoted to at the BFI LFF, because it should have a much broader appeal.
Here is the trailer:




I also saw Tyrannosaur which was brilliantly acted, scripted, directed. It was horrific, peculiarly British, raw and moving. It felt real.

Last week I went to see Throwing Muses in a rare London appearance. I have a few TM albums but do not know their entire back catalogue. The set was diverse (although thin on Real Ramona stuff) and seemed to miss out the Tanya Donnelly songs which was a shame as 'Not Too Soon' is probably the perfect pop song. A few other hits were missed out (Counting Backwards, Snakeface) but it didn't even matter, because Kristin Hersh's voice is just incredible.