Blogs
This is where you will find short blogs on my favourite themes, or even some random thoughts that pop into my head. Might get political here too!
Designed to complement my Next Stage Instagram account
A trilogy of music films
To complement my live concert adventures, I have just completed a trilogy of music related films in February!
“Maria”, with Angelina Jolie was as sad and tragic as one might expect. Not only that but I was the only one in the local cinema who turned up, which made it even more poignant! If you remember, O mio babbino caro was my first Desert Island disc and podcast from 2012. Angelina Jolie did a great job portraying Maria Callas in her last years in Paris, a broken woman by that time with an addiction to anti-depressant drugs. As I was on my own in there, it somehow added to the theme of loneliness - no one could see me cry 😭
Next up was “A Complete Unknown”, the film about Bob Dylan’s early years, from arriving in New York in 1961, to going electric and causing uproar at the Newport Folk festival in 1965. Also brilliantly portrayed by Timothée Chalamet. He did well to convey the mystery of the man and how Dylan wasn’t about folk or protest but about songwriting. I thought Edward Norton also did a great job of playing Pete Seeger and it was nice to see other musical characters of the era in the film such as Woody Guthrie and Joan Baez of course but also Johnny Cash, Mike Bloomfield and Al Cooper. A must see for Dylan fans
Two days later, I took the train into Paris to one of the giant Pathé IMAX cinemas to see “Becoming Led Zeppelin”. I thought it deserved the trek and would give me another chance to get the Tandoori Bagel at le Pick Clops bar, that I had missed the previous week after the Thee Sacred Souls gig!
The IMAX screen was massive, the seats super comfortable and the sound just amazing and very loud – fitting for a Led Zeppelin performance. The documentary format covered their early years and formation up until Led Zeppelin II. They were very young when fame came to them. Most of the video footage I had seen but there were some good insights in the interviews with the band members and even the voice of John Bonham. Interestingly, the interviews were all recorded separately rather than together and we all know Robert Plant is dead against reforming the band. For him it is just too far away in the past, when they were just 20yr old kids and he has moved on. He looks back at the experience fondly but not to be relived.
I saw Led Zeppelin only once, at Knebworth in 1979. John Bonham died on the following European tour in 1980 and that was it, so I count myself lucky to have seen them at all.
BTW: the Tandoori Bagel was good 😊
Dinard British & Irish Film Festival 2024
We have been going to the film festival in Dinard for nearly 10 years and this was another fantastic edition, with some thought provoking and brilliant films. Also the first time it became the “British & Irish” film festival, although we have seen many great Irish films here in the past, like Calvary, one of our favourites, and a must see!
Below are the films we went to see (8 shorts and 7 full features)
Shé (Snake) by Renee Zhan
Synopsis: Eight shorts that offer a space for new talent and voices to share stories and push narratives that challenge and entertain. They give a snapshot of the future of filmmaking through powerful drama, hybrid documentary and ground-breaking animation.
My Thoughts: “Shortcuts” is a regular feature at the festival that I like to start, or end, the festival with. 8 films that will grab your attention and spark your interest. Usually quirky, edgy and sometimes disturbing! They are put to the public vote and this year I voted for Shé (Snake), a kind of horror drama with a message about the inner demons that challenge your creative self. It’s also about being true to your native culture. You can watch it in full on BBC iPlayer here.
Unicorns by Sally El Hosaini, James Krishna Floyd
Synopsis: When Luke stumbles across an underground nightclub he meets Aysha, a beautiful, seductive woman. Their first kiss yields fireworks — which are immediately followed by Luke’s sobering realisation that Aysha is not the woman he thought her to be, but a remarkably femme drag queen. Spending more time together and navigating the challenges of their respective domestic lives, they face the question of whether or not there is a love that can exist beyond traditional labels.
My Thoughts: Not just a unlikely love story between a drag queen and a mechanic but an insight into the somewhat hidden “gay-asian” world in the UK. Very well acted by the principle characters, I happened to bump into Jason Patel (the drag queen character Aysha) on a seafront walk in Dinard! We had a good chat and I wished him luck in winning something at the festival. Low and behold the film won both the public vote and the special “Barriere prize” from the Jury
The Convert by Shane Danielsen, Lee Tamahori
Synopsis: 1830’s New Zealand, a Māori world, dominated by tribal wars. Seeking redemption from a dark past, lay preacher Thomas Munro boards a trading vessel heading to the newly established British settlement in that far corner of the world. He soon finds himself caught up in a battle between Māori tribes and to experience the white townsfolk’s entrenched racism and paranoia towards the Māori. He is increasingly ostracised within the community he is meant to serve and realises he has been brought to this isolated British outpost merely to add the veneer of civilisation.
My Thoughts: A good period drama set in New Zealand at the time of early colonization and inevitable confrontation between British settlers and the native Māori people. Bloody, violent and troubling. Pity the hero is a white man: ex soldier, turned minister, who converts to the Māori cause and becomes their lead spokesperson/negotiator with the British. Having said that Guy Pearce does an excellent job in the role.
Kneecap by Rich Peppiatt
Synopsis: This is the
extraordinary story of how an anarchic Belfast trio became the unlikely figureheads of a civil rights movement to save their mother tongue. Creating mayhem along the way. There are 80,000 native Irish speakers in Ireland. 6,000 live in the North of Ireland. Three of them became a rap group called Kneecap. The rest is rapidly becoming history...
My Thoughts: A riotous romp of a movie, reminiscent of Trainspotting. Sex, drugs (lots of them) and rock and roll. A “Mostly True” story of how the band started out in Northern Ireland rapping in Irish/Gaelic tongue and offending everyone on both sides of the community. Also a big injection of republican history and the troubles. Might need to check out the band one day! They did play Glastonbury earlier this year
Baltimore by Christine Molloy, Joe Lawlor
Synopsis: Based on actual events that took place on the 26 April 1974 when Oxford educated Rose Dugdale, debutante and English heiress and three comrades carried out an armed raid on Russborough House, Wicklow, in which 19 masterpieces were stolen in an effort to support the IRA’s armed struggle. The film plays out over the course of the days following the raid, when Rose is in hiding in a remote cottage in Baltimore, county Cork.
My Thoughts: Another film with an Irish republican theme. And another “mostly true” story. This time of how a woman, Rose Dugdale, from a well-to-do family from Devon becomes radicalized at Oxford University and joins the IRA armed struggle. I found it a bit hard to understand how an individual can transition to commit and justify such extreme violence, however worthwhile the cause. Pistol whipping old people (difficult to watch), bombing and kidnapping etc. She remained a committed Marxist and was unrepentant to the end (died March this year in Ireland). You have to have an inner anger and hatred in you to go that far, especially when you have not personally suffered the injustices that the Irish and other oppressed people have endured (the Palestinians come to mind).
Bird by Andrea Arnold
Synopsis: At the age of 12, Bailey lives with her brother Hunter and her father Bug, who is raising them alone in a squat in North Kent. Bug doesn't have much time for them and Bailey, who is approaching puberty, is looking for attention and adventure elsewhere.
My Thoughts: On watching this “coming of age” film, set in northern Kent (Gravesend area), I was reminded and struck by the pockets of poverty and deprivation we still have in this country. It’s really shocking to see it depicted on film. I remember another film at the Dinard film festival some years back, set somewhere in a remote part of East Anglia, that was equally horrific. The living conditions, drug use, violence in these isolated communities is terrifying.
But you have to love the fantastical character Bird, who saves the day, even if that is “mostly not true” !
Poison by Désirée Nosbusch
Synopsis: Poison is a love story about a couple reunited years after tragedy drove them apart. Their brief but intense meeting will bring simmering pain and resentments to the surface but will be a reminder too of cherished intimacies and the love they once shared.
My Thoughts: The most “serious” film we watched. The script, dialogue and acting by Tim Roth and Trine Dyrhol was amazing. Life is a series of losses they say but the loss of a child is hopefully a loss that none of us will ever have to experience. One could feel the pain, bitterness and destruction this brought upon their relationship. It was raw man, very raw.
High & Low - John Galliano by Kevin Macdonald
Synopsis: From the mid 1980’s until 2011 John Galliano, the flamboyant, iconoclastic head designer at Dior, was considered one of the most important fashion designers in history. But in February 2011 a video emerged of Galliano spewing anti-Semitic slurs in a Parisian bar. He was fired by Dior, berated by the Jewish community and ostracised from the fashion world. He lost everything. And then he tried to make amends.
My Thoughts: The last film we saw was a biography of the hedonistic and creative genius that John Galliano was. Focusing on his spectacular rise and fall (and recent recovery) it was entertaining, provocative and political. The Scottish Director Kevin Macdonald (Last King of Scotland) originally set out to do a sort of “cancel culture” movie but left it more open. The question remains, was John Galliano a very bad drunk with a foul mouth and a propensity to say hateful things? or justifiably prosecuted for antisemitic and racist remarks when pissed? I think the public jury is still out on that, judging by the Q&A session with Kevin Macdonald after the screening.