Good God........

In anticipation of the impending release of Richard Donner's director's cut of Superman II - an event us Superman fans have been awaiting for decades - and my viewing of aforementioned long lost gem......please show your support for everyone's favourite dictator.

Robert Altman (1925-2006)

Colour me depressed......

David Cronenberg in less than a 100 words

"I had a disturbing dream last night. In the dream I found myself making love to a strange man, only I'm having trouble because he's old and dying and smells bad and I find him repulsive. But then he tells me that even old flesh is erotic, that disease is the love of two creatures for one another, that even dying is an act of eroticism, that everything is sexual and that even to exist is sexual. And I believe him and we make love beautifully. "

-Nurse Forsythe (Lynn Lowry) in Shivers (1975; Cronenberg)

The Departed

Amateur or not, admitting to the inadequacy of one’s words is probably not a good way to begin a review. Despite this, I shall start by saying that words are not enough to describe the toe-curling delight flowing through me during every single minute of this sublimely crafted piece of entertainment. I admired Scorsese’s ambitious (though flawed) Gangs of New York and I genuinely liked The Aviator and found it to be a truly amazing feat of direction but The Departed returns little Marty to the sort of movies that he used to make, the ones that turned me into a gibbering fanboy. With every crunch of fist against cheekbone and every thunk of plumbing against skull, every keening Mick Jagger vocal and every perfectly nuanced delivery of the word ‘fuck’ you know you are back in the capable hands of the man that has made the best and most perfect gangster movies since the mid 70s. I have not been this completely blown away at the movies since my back to back viewings of The Proposition and A History of Violence (many comments about emerging patterns with regards to my preferred content in films have been made before so prospective snarky types need not apply).

There are not very many movies where everyone involved brings their A game and it all comes together perfectly but this is one of those times. I had grave doubts about anyone remaking Infernal Affairs, a film I’ve enjoyed several times over and consider to be one of the best of the Hong Kong crime thriller lot. Somehow, though, Scorsese takes the essential story (really quite unchanged in its mechanics) of undercover cops and gangsters and transposes it into the Irish working class culture of Boston and in doing so, makes a whole new movie that stands apart entirely on its own merits. It is a supremely accomplished riff on Irish machismo (a perfect complement to Scorsese’s existing theses on Italian machismo) with the ‘Irishness’ of Boston’s working class culture forming pretty much as integral an element of the movie as the characters themselves. The Departed does not pretend to be any kind of high faluting treatise on the role of immigrants or the hardships of the working stiff, however. Sure, there are tips of the hat to both subjects and a palpable undercurrent of topical commentary running throughout the film (“Patriot Act, Patriot Act, I love the Patriot Act!”). But everyone involved knows that they are making the ultimate B movie, a piece of pure blood-soaked pulp fiction. Tongues are pressed firmly in cheek, nearly every line of dialogue is delivered as a punch line and every laugh – and they are numerous – is interspersed with a moment of heart-stopping suspense.

This does not mean it is not a good movie. It does not mean it’s not a brilliant movie. I belong to the school of movie-watching that says that a pulpy genre flick can be every bit as worthy of all accolade as a big old event film or an offbeat indie and this is an example of pulp elevated to the highest level of artistic achievement. Somehow it seems to take a few decades of kicking around for a movie like this to be considered in conjunction with the Citizen Kanes of the world (the old Hitchcock fans are still going ‘I told you so’ at the even older academics that dismissed that particular genius while he was working) though, admittedly, things have changed a bit since the Year of Pulp Fiction. Still, The Departed does feel a little bit like a big old ‘fuck you’ to the Academy and I’m right behind little Marty, cheering him on as he moons those clueless defenders of all things middlebrow. This is pretty close to a perfect piece of genre cinema but is so cheerfully and snarkily over the top about it that you can just feel the Academy voters retreating to find something that doesn’t contain spraying brain matter, dildos, fly-eating gangsters or Marky Mark bringing the house down. Also, Scorsese’s movies have often been funny (“Funny how? Funny like a clown? Do I fuckin’ amuse you?”) but none of them have been quite as hysterical as The Departed. This is down not only to the cast’s flawlessly timed delivery of the numerous zingers but also William Monahan’s great script. This too is a minus point Oscar-wise since the Academy does not exactly have a history of rewarding filmmakers for inducing laughter. They might still give him a directing Oscar for this movie just to shut up the people giggling/screaming about the fact that Paul Haggis has more Oscars than Martin Scorsese but you just know they really don’t want to! Should’ve given it to him for The Aviator when you had the chance, you silly buggers.

It’s not that he doesn’t deserve one for this film. This is tremendous moviemaking, reminiscent of the Goodfellas days with the mobile camera injecting much kineticism into the proceedings and the gritty genre aesthetic nailed down to the last drop of blood. Scorsese loves his genre movies and it’s all in here – superbly staged action sequences, slatherings of grand guignol baroqueness, touches of sleaze and even a Takeshi Miike film playing in a character’s bedroom!! The whole affair could have become self indulgent and overlong but with Scorsese’s knack for pacing and longtime collaborator Thelma Schoonmaker’s expert editing, you walk out of the theatre having no real sense of the fact that you just watched a 152 minute movie. Also deserving of mention is the music. This is no surprise – Scorsese’s record collection is legendary and he generally scores his films with all his (entirely appropriate) pop favourites. The film opens with Gimme Shelter and does not let up with the auditory goodness for the rest of the equal parts punk, bagpipes and classic rock soundtrack.

It’s not just Marty that’s back to his old tricks either. We have a whole host of actors returning to the things they do best, the personas that they are beloved for. I adored Jack Nicholson’s recent attempts at beating type, as in About Schmidt or The Pledge, but I have to say - I had a massive grin plastered across my face during every scene he was chewing. The smile, the one-liners, the chauvinism, the swaggering Randle Patrick/Colonel Jessup/Daryl Van Horne badassery and everything else that one loves (or hates if they have no soul) about the old Jack. It’s all there, only amped up to hyperbolic levels of insanity and sadism. I’m sure a few people will complain how he’s just doing the same old character he’s always done or that he’s hamming it up but those people are missing the point of a film like this. I’m perfectly certain that everyone involved is aware of the fact that he’s sending up his own storied and infamous career of highly memorable roles and that this was precisely why DiCaprio and Scorsese sat Nicholson down and convinced him to take this role.

Similarly, DiCaprio returns to the role of anguish-filled man-child with electrifying results. He’s brilliant in roles like this, as demonstrated by films like Gangs of New York and The Aviator – men with simmering anger/frustrations seething inside them with more than a palpable shade of the boys they used to be and, in some ways, still are. He spends the entire film trying to reconcile various ideas of who he is – Southie hard man or “lace curtain motherfucker” North Boston pushover, son of a man of integrity or a man who amounted to nothing, cop or criminal – and his struggle for identity is wonderfully portrayed in DiCaprio’s twitchy performance. Film critic MaryAnn Johanson got it right when she said that DiCaprio has become Scorsese’s new De Niro – a “muse/alter ego” whose talents he mines to the maximum. Almost as good is Matt Damon in his return to slimeball Mr Ripley mode as the villain whom the audience is just all too happy to hate (as opposed to the often inexplicably likeable Nicholson character). He is delightfully evil throughout. We also see the endlessly amusing return of Alec Baldwin to his hyperactive Glengarry Glen Ross boss mode and of Mark Wahlberg to his always reliable portrayal of a working class bad boy. Both bring new interpretations to those old characters and are on the money throughout. Wahlberg has never been better (don’t laugh, he actually is quite a decent actor) and his creatively profane exchanges with Baldwin and DiCaprio have to be seen to be believed. Ray Winstone plays Ray Winstone, Martin Sheen is a wise old father figure and these are always good things that let you know all is right with the world. The rest of the supporting players are equally good. This is a cast that really took their ensembling seriously.

For the purpose of seeming objective while writing about a Scorsese film, I suppose I should complain about something. If there’s anything to really complain about, it’s the film’s love interest subplot, involving the police psychiatrist (Vera Farmiga), that feels a little tacked on. This is not owing to any deficiency in Farmiga’s acting or her interactions with DiCaprio or Damon’s characters (both of whom she is smitten with at some level) but simply because there is so much else going on in the film that the thematic contributions of this aspect feel a little perfunctory. The scenes between Farmiga and the two undercovers are well written and do add to the film’s emotional resonance but the romance factor seems a little unnecessary.

In sum, if you like going to the movies to be entertained but prefer a side of depth with your brutal violence and dick jokes, this is the film for you. It is the work of one of the greatest living film directors at the absolute top of his game and its success proves that you can make a good movie and turn a profit at the same time. Brett Ratners of the world take note. It’s one of those films that almost everyone seems to like, regardless of whether they’re Scorsese junkies like I am. Even the Academy is going to be obliged to give the film an award or two. And, well, if they don’t, it was Harvey Keitel that said of Oscar’s constant snubbing of Scorsese that it was what “he deserved – an exclusion from mediocrity”. I think we can be pretty sure that movies like Taxi Driver, Goodfellas and The Departed will be remembered long after Crash is notable for being nothing more than the film that made everyone accidentally watch David Cronenberg’s classic little nasty about car crash fetishists. There’s nothing like Elias Koteas beating off to car accidents for making Paul Haggis fans run away.

"How could they cut the power, man?! They're animals!!!"

For those of us that are hopelessly addicted to watching movies, there are certain situations and scenes that kick off an instant sense of déjà vu when we come across them. Hell, never mind just us addicts, it applies to even the average filmgoer. Everyone’s rolled their eyes at the scene in the action flick where the rule-breaking loner cop gets his ass chewed out by his irate, antacid-popping superior. “You’re a good cop but that was ten cars and a fish you blew up yesterday and the mayor called the commissioner and the commissioner called me and now my ass is grass. Next time, it’s your badge”. There are tons of prefab screenwriting situations like this one and many of them can get annoying to watch time after time. However, there is one such situation that I will never tire of (re)watching, thanks to the pioneering efforts of Messrs Ridley Scott and James Cameron. The "clueless ,overconfident humans explore unknown area only to discover they are not the biggest badasses on the block" sequence. You know what I’m talking about. If you don’t, go rent Aliens right now.

This sequence can frequently be found in science fiction/horror film hybrids. There are just a few factors that ensure the success of such a sequence:

1) The inclusion of a sufficiently interesting group of cannon/claw/fang/tentacle fodder.
This should be comprised of two kinds of people. One category is of people who have some idea of what might go wrong. This serves to create appropriate pre-carnage ominousness and, later, sheer ‘should’ve listened to Ripley’s briefing instead of cracking jokes, you moron’ indignation as they inevitably take control of the situation. Second category contains the kind of characters that describe themselves as being “state of the badass-art”. They provide necessary pre-evisceration sense of false security and, later, appropriately entertaining descent into hysteria (“Game over, man, game over!”). Also, we have to care whether these people live or die or your prefab situation will become like the explore-the-haunted-house bits out of Scooby Doo where we are always hoping the monster will disembowel Shaggy.

2) Your ‘unknown area’ must be suitably interesting. Suggestions of satanic/supernatural presence always help. The weird skin growing on the deck of the titular Event Horizon and the flashes of barbed wire/mutilation/pig Latin on its monitors did much to help counter the awfulness of Sam Neill in said film. Isolation is essential. In space, no one can hear you scream….and so on. Do not use generic science labs unless you are certain of your ability to make them interesting (consult James Cameron for further lessons). These sequences do not have to take place underwater or in space (see Predator).

3) Perhaps the most important – a worthy adversary. Your hapless humans must be stalked and brutalized by a beastie that scares, creeps out or – at the very least – amuses the audience. First step to those desired results would be creature design. In these days of audiences accustomed to the creations of Stan Winston or WETA, it is no longer enough to use animals, whether or not they are in large numbers, oversized or super-intelligent. The more creatively designed your killing machine (whether supernatural or extraterrestrial), the more successful your prefab sequence. Once an adequately grisly creature has been dreamed up, it is best to resist the temptation to show it off too much. As established by the Alien template, these sequences work best when you cannot quite see the monster in question up until the big close-up, blood-spattered money shot. The excessive use of CGI is also a deal-breaker. This might change someday (or perhaps with the advent of Gollum-level technical expertise, already has) but until then a good dose of prosthetics, old-school FX and red syrup is required. Those that disagree, ask yourself which stalk/hunt sequence was scarier – the one in Aliens or the one in Alien: Resurrection? CGI is great to a certain extent but it should not be the primary technique used for the creation of your sequence’s beastlet.

Once these three factors have been included, you have yourself a movie I would probably watch at least twice. Please include the separation of at least one limb from a body or the gutting of at least one torso. The studio bean-counters that thought up the current trend of PG-13 horror films would, in an ideal world, be placed on a deserted planetoid and nuked from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure. Those of my brethren who are sick of the PG-13 plague should start experimenting with films from other countries. The British have put out some excellent examples of the prefab sequence (occasionally slightly modified) in discussion in delightful, R-rated genre gems like The Descent, Severance and Dog Soldiers.

Interesting modifications of the template – for example, the alien turning out to be benign – are welcome as long as you scare us for at least a part of the movie. Keep in mind that the inclusion of successful prefab sequences on above lines will not ensure that your film is good. Event Horizon was a waste of great potential. Sphere was no classic. Ghost Ship was crappy. They were, however, a whole lot of fun.

Finally, even if you are too inept to pull off those three requirements successfully, you can try to save your movie by casting ‘prefab characters’ (article for another day) like James Woods, Peter Weller (Leviathan had a rubbery monster, boring victims and generic lab but it still entertained), funny foreign guy (whether or not he is Sean Pertwee), Gabriel Byrne (have him knock back a drink or two) or the godlike Lance Henriksen (“Last week he had this guy in here who burned his Afgan, he screwed it first and then he set it on...). These actors could probably make a Uwe Boll movie tolerable. All bets are off if you’re making Aliens vs Predator. Nothing will save you then.

But all right, if you cast Ron Perlman, you get a free pass however bad your film is.

Lucky Number Slevin

What people sometimes forget when going into a film with a certain pedigree is the fact that not all movies can - or need to - blow you away with the “I just saw something that will change cinema” sort of reaction. No, sometimes, you will get a movie where the filmmakers watched the same groundbreaking film(s) you had that reaction to and decided to add their own coda to it – to make what is not exactly an equal but certainly a worthy addition to the genre. Lucky Number Slevin is such a film. You take in the cast list and you see names like Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman and Ben Kingsley. You hear from the marketing campaign that it’s a gangster film about an everyman getting caught between two rival New York gangs and a mysterious hitman. You watch the trailer and witty dialogue is being thrown at you by tough looking guys in suits. Automatically, you go in half-expecting the next Pulp Fiction. And inevitably, you are disappointed, as the lukewarm reception to Lucky Number Slevin indicates. Complaints abound that the movie does nothing new with the Tarantino template, that is derivative and so on, but sometimes people need to forget about looking for innovation and just enjoy an exceedingly well put together motion picture. One that – true enough – does nothing new but performs the old routine well enough and with sufficient style as to be worth the two hours of your life.

I will say, however, that Lucky Number Slevin is not a cheap imitation. Even the word ‘derivative’ with its negative connotations may be too harsh. Or if it is derivative, it is on the lines of how Reservoir Dogs is derivative of Ringo Lam’s City on Fire. The former does enough with the latter’s source material to really deserve some forgiveness in the matter. Director Paul McGuigan (maker of the unfairly overlooked Brit mod crime thriller Gangster No. 1 from which some intriguing set design elements remain) has certainly taken inspiration from Tarantino movies (not to mention The Usual Suspects and its ilk) but he is not following slavishly in their footsteps. There are plenty of knowing winks, tributes, tips of the hat (I refuse to say homaaaage), cleverly appropriated concepts and techniques. There is a discussion between two characters about Bond movies that is undoubtedly Tarantino-esque but then again a similar discussion popped up in Trainspotting and no one complained! What matters is that it is done in an entertaining, efficient and pleasantly charming fashion. If that isn’t enough, there are some genuinely wonderful performances by Willis, Freeman and Kingsley. Willis has come a long way since his (albeit equally rewarding) Die Hard days and is consistently putting in restrained, interesting performances where he plays his age. As for Freeman and Kingsley, there is a scene between them that alone makes the film worth watching. It’s not quite De Niro and Pacino in Heat but it’ll certainly do. Josh Hartnett is also surprisingly good and Lucy Liu’s turn is her only work to date during the viewing of which I did not feel like taping up her mouth and burning her agent alive.

Much has been made of the film’s supposedly confusing, dishonest narrative. Personally, I found it quite easy to follow as long as I paid attention and the twists in the end were – I thought – sufficiently telegraphed and worked into the film as to seem well earned and not like a top of the hour con job. It’s like a Hitchcock movie – you will surely find the whole thing quite preposterous when you think about it over your après-theatre pie and coffee (in keeping with the Tarantino theme) but while you’re watching it, everything feels as kosher as Ben Kingsley’s ‘The Rabbi’ (terrible, I know). It really should not matter that it all falls apart on close questioning. What is important is that during the running time, it is put together with enough skill to keep you entertained and in the moment. The Hitchcock influence does not end there – the central character Slevin is cast in the classic Hitchcockian mold of ‘the innocent man in the wrong place at the wrong time’. In fact, North by Northwest is explicitly referenced in the dialogue. McGuigan has learnt well from his predecessors and adds enough little spins of his own to the genre as to keep you guessing. For example, the too-good-to-be-true female characters in these films are more often than not treacherous. So is Lucy Liu’s friendly (too friendly?) neighbor character going to follow this tradition? Or perhaps, McGuigan’s approach to this particular genre trope will be to make Liu’s character exactly who she appears to be? You never know and that’s the point. Anyone who has watched a movie or two should go into this one knowing that they will have their head messed with a little bit. It’s not the next Pulp Fiction but if we went into every movie expecting to listen to Christopher Walken discuss watch-concealment technique, we'd never have any fun, would we?

Miami Vice

It’s difficult to go into a Michael Mann film without high expectations. Director of Heat - one of my favourite crime drama/thrillers – and the unhealthily entertaining, superbly efficient Collateral, he’s been knocking them out of the park throughout his career. Given all this baggage, Miami Vice is a disappointment. Style without a corresponding amount of substance, it is still watchable and even sporadically exhilarating. However, the humanism that Mann customarily injects into his wonderfully testosterone charged stories of men that take pride in the execution of their tasks (on either side of the law) is notably missing. Gone are the well written interactions between the fleshed out characters that one takes for granted in Heat and Collateral, replaced here by the terse mumblings exchanged by the ciphers played by Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx. Missing in (excitingly bloody) action are the imperfect but sympathetic protagonists we get behind in Manhunter or The Insider. AWOL is the emotional heart that beats at the centre of every Mann film to date, replaced by the cold void within which nearly every character in Miami Vice operates. You get the point.

The performances mostly range from adequate to bad, another deviation from the usual Mann template. Jamie Foxx and Colin Farrell are not terrible in their roles per se but there is so little to their characters beyond the ruthless professionalism that there is little they can do with their portrayals. They function like automatons, advancing relentlessly through the film like Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Terminator (as opposed to say Michael Biehn in the same). The few occasions on which they do get to reveal a glimpse of humanity are welcome but, in the case of Farrell, even these are not well constructed. Foxx’s interaction with Naomie Harris feels natural for the most part, especially in the early playful scenes at their apartment but most of Farrell’s relationship with the femme fatale played by Gong Li feels forced. This is mostly down to bad writing and to execrable line delivery by Li. She is an accomplished actress (as evident in her work with Wong Kar Wai) but her English is one dialogue coaching session away from ‘pidgin’. There are a host of other talented women that could have conveyed a sense of the exotic while delivering their dialogue convincingly and coherently so the casting choice is inexplicable. Some of the more wordless scenes between Farrell and Li do work a little better but this does not serve to advance the cause that much.

Also resulting from this lack of dimension to the characters is the absence of any chemistry between the two leads. At no point does one feel that Crockett could trust Tubbs with his life (or vice versa). They hardly exchange a word that is not mumbled police jargon* and it is difficult to feel any sense of friendship between them. This detracts from enjoyment of the film to the point that I was almost wishing someone would say “I’m too old for this shit”. The villains do a good job of being villainous (especially John Ortiz as the slimy Jose Yero) but, again, their characters are not very well defined beyond their…well…villainy.

This is not to say that there is nothing of value in this film. This is still a work by one of the most talented directors working in America today. His usual humanity might be missing but the technique and style is trademark Mann. The cinematography is gorgeous, taking the audience from breathtaking ocean vistas to rundown Latin American ghettos with equal amounts of artistry. The visuals are given the sort of immediacy and neo-noir grittiness that audiences were introduced to in Collateral, as Mann uses some of the same methods of digital photography that he experimented with in that film. He also uses the same camera – the Viper Filmstream, known for its ability to shoot in extremely low light levels, leading to the inclusion of some of the most gorgeous HD night photography ever seen by this writer.

In addition, anyone who has ever seen a Mann movie knows that no one stages action sequences or shootouts better than he does. The bank robbery shootout in Heat and the nightclub sequence in Collateral will entertain punters and enthrall film students for decades to come and their counterparts in Miami Vice are no less exciting. It must be mentioned, though, that this is not really an action film per se. There is at least an hour-long section in the middle where there is no action whatsoever. However, Mann manages to inject a sense of constant kineticism and tension into the proceedings, making the prospect of sudden and brutal violence possible at every turn. This serves to keep the audience on edge until such time as the ultra-violence does break out, making the adrenaline payoff that much more potent. Never having been involved in any shootouts, my word cannot be taken for gospel but I do imagine that the final shootout of this film is about as close as anyone can come to simulating the experience of being in an actual gun battle. This results as much from the sublime sound design as from the action choreography and cinematography.

There are aspects beyond the technical that would interest the thinking audience, primary amongst these being the shift in tone and philosophy from the original TV series (which was also produced by Mann). The contrasts between the show and the film are extreme to the point that aside from the location and the names, jobs and predilection for fast vehicles of the leads, there is nothing linking the two. The pastel colours, South Florida aesthetic, materialism and banter of the show have been replaced by a washed out neo-noir Miami of a sort that has never been seen before and a nihilism that borders on the inhuman. There is much food for thought in these evolving worldviews. Mann has always been interested in the implications of consummate professionalism on the lives of his characters, whether at a personal level or a more philosophical (if the two are, in fact, separate). We find that the efficiency of his characters in the realm of their jobs leads to emotional disconnect, sometimes bordering on nihilism, in the personal realm. In Heat, the philosophy of the thief Neil McCauley is “don't let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner”. Yet it is in only in an act of vengeance – and by implication, emotional attachment – that his character finds closure. Similarly, Jamie Foxx’s taxi driver in Collateral finds comfort only in the routine of his job and it is this routine that prevents him from realizing his dreams of starting his own business. Ironically it is by embracing the “improvise, adapt to the environment, Darwin, shit happens” philosophy of the jazz-loving hitman in his backseat that he makes his own breakthrough. The disconnect in these prior films, then, is within the characters. Once they adapt and evolve and make the connection within what is inside and what lies without (often this is where the women in Mann’s films come in) they grow as people.

However, in Miami Vice, there seems to be a shift in this paradigm. The world without is as bleak and nihilistic as the internal rhythms of the characters themselves. Here, love becomes an unattainable ideal, dreams become empty illusions that shatter in the face of a cruel, unfeeling world. Everyone in Miami Vice is simply going through the motions. They are good at their jobs because it is all they have in the face of both literal and metaphorical opposition. Even the greatest victories in Miami Vice are ultimately irrelevant in the bigger picture of worldwide drug trafficking. For every Jose Yero the police bring down, ten more spring up. Miami Vice is, for better or worse, a hyper-real product of the terrorism-fighting, existentialist 21st century. Bright shirts have become flak vests, the toys have become passé (you can always find a bigger gun) and the men and women no longer find any lasting comfort in each other. There is nothing left to connect with. So all that remains is the job and the vicious cycle of wars that cannot be won, whether it is against terrorists, drug dealers or mortgage payments. So why keep going in this bleak universe envisioned by Mann? Evidently, the answer can be found in the words of Tom Sizemore’s character in Heat – “the action…for me, the action is the juice”.

* Not that there's anything wrong with a certain amount of police jargon. I admit to curling my toes with amusement whenever someone said 'double tap to the sternum, one to the head' in previous Mann films. But it's not that great when nearly the entire script consists of said jargon.

In the beginning

I decided to start a blog exclusively for my film reviews/scribblings/essays. There are a few reasons for this. Ever since I finished college, the frequency with which I write about movies has dropped off sharply and I'm hoping having a blog will prod me into writing more. One or two other people reading what you write is generally a more desirable option than writing something and putting it away. Secondly, those interested in just my film-related writing will no longer have to wade through blog entries about the dream i had the other night where i thought i was four little fishes and a Borghal Rantipole. You shall find all my filmic writings here and not on the other one. Thirdly, it is something interesting to do and I shall do it until I don't feel like it anymore. Mainly, it is just a sounding board for me. I have no illusions about Sight & Sound editors coming across this blog and mulling over giving me a job. Seriously.

Comments and suggestions always welcome. Rude people will find their IP addresses/email IDs posted in the dark little corners of the web where those deposed Nigerian princes look for people to help them with the 47 million US dollars that they need to get out of their bank accounts.