Welcome to WeeklyWilson.com, where author/film critic Connie (Corcoran) Wilson avoids totally losing her marbles in semi-retirement by writing about film (see the Chicago Film Festival reviews and SXSW), politics and books----her own books and those of other people. You'll also find her diverging frequently to share humorous (or not-so-humorous) anecdotes and concerns. Try it! You'll like it!
“Their pooled emotions wouldn’t fill a teaspoon.” (quoted in Not Much Fun: The Lost Poems of Dorothy Parker)
For being asked for writing advice:
“If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second-greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first-greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they’re happy.” (originally published in a review in Esquire, 1959)
For riding the subway in New York City:
“Not just plain terrible. This was fancy terrible; this was terrible with raisins in it.” (quoted in Chimes of Change and Hours by Audrey Borenstein)
For turning down a proposal:
“By the time you swear you’re his, Shivering and sighing. And he vows his passion is, Infinite, undying. Lady make note of this— One of you is lying.” (her poem “Unfortunate Coincidence”)
For when you hate a book everyone else loves, and you know you’re right:
“But on second thinking, I dare to differ more specifically from the booksie-wooksies. . . . For years, you see, I have been crouching in corners hissing small and ladylike anathema of [author’s name here—in this case, it’s Theodore Dreiser]. I dared not yip it out loud, much less offer it up in print. But now, what with a series of events that have made me callous to anything that may later occur, I have become locally known as the What-the-Hell Girl of 1931.” (from a review of Theodore Dreiser’s Dawn in The New Yorker)
For Monday mornings:
“To my own admittedly slanted vision, industry ranks with such sour and spinster virtues as thrift, punctuality, level-headedness, and caution.” (from a review of Sinclair Lewis’s Dodsworth in The New Yorker)
“It has lately been drawn to your correspondent’s attention that, at social gatherings, she is not the human magnet she would be. Indeed, it turns out that as a source of entertainment, conviviality, and good fun, she ranks somewhere between a sprig of parsley and a single ice-skate.” (from a review of Favorite Jokes of Famous People in The New Yorker)
For every single day, reading the news:
“Civilization is coming to an end, you understand.” (The Paris Review)
“What fresh hell can this be?” (everyone’s favorite Dorothy Parker quote, though often misquoted, here reported in You Might as Well Live: the Life and Times of Dorothy Parker, by John Keats)
This quote from “Last Night in Soho” director Edgar Wright is a good jumping-off point, for talking about his newest film, “Last Night in Soho,” which opened October 29th after premiering in Toronto. Said Wright, “I’ve always been fascinated by horror films and genre films. Horror films harbored a fascination for me and always have been something I’ve wanted to watch and wanted to make.”
That said, “Last Night in Soho” (an area of London known for its sex trade) is not strictly a horror movie. Until the final 30 minutes of the 1 hour and 57 minute movie, I had no idea where we were being taken by Edgar Wright, director of such films as “Baby Driver,” “Sean of the Dead” and “Hot Fuzz.”
Initially, it didn’t seem as though it was going to be a horror movie at all. The set-up of “Last Night in Soho” seemed to be exploring the family dynamic of a young girl from the countryside (Cornwall) who is an aspiring fashion designer haunted by the suicide of her mother when she was just 7 years old.
We see Eloise “Ellie” Turner (Thomasin McKenzie) in rural Cornwall, where she lives with her Grandmother Peggy (Rita Tushingham), who is a seamstress; her mother also went to London to become a fashion designer.
“Last Night in Soho“
Peggy is played by Rita Tushingham, a nice homage to the ingenue from 1961’s “A Taste of Honey” who was a vanguard of the Kitchen Sink school of British cinema. Not only do we see Tushingham, but Diana Rigg (the Bond girl in “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” in 1969), in her final film role; Rigg is a major character and pivotal to the plot. Teence Stamp (absolutely beautiful in 1962’s “Billy Budd”) also has a recurring role.
For me, this film was a stroll down memory lane. I was an exchange student in England in 1967 and made a special trip to Carnaby Street back in the days of mini-skirts and 60s fashion, including “the tent dress,” as worn by the second star of the film, Anya Taylor-Joy (“The Queen’s Gambit”).
Although I found the multiple tent dresses in Ellie’s fashion show to be pushing the entire idea of the “tent” dress of the sixties, I remember them well. One of the worst moments of my 7th grade school year was when Jimmy Cowell loudly proclaimed that I was wearing “a maternity dress,” when it was,in reality, that season’s new look, the tent dress. (When you’re 12 it doesn’t take much to embarrass you).
That did it.
I was impressed with costume designer Odile Dick-Mireaux’s work, and the 60s music, selected by music supervisor Kristen Lane is to-die-for. The cinematography is great and the special visual effects, which primarily depict the young Ellie communing in dreams (and, sometimes, in reality, it seems) with a girl named Sandy who once lived in the apartment she rents, are terrific. The multiple images of predatory men with faces blurred are original and appropriately frightening.
At first, the film, which builds slowly, seemed as though it were going to be about the country mouse coming to the big city (London) and dealing with all that entails. It seems as though Ellie’s struggle to become a fashion designer at the London College of Fashion and her ESP super-sensitivity, especially because of the loss of her mother, are going to be the primary focus of the film. Her bitchy roommate Jocasta (SynoveKarlsen) says, “I’d lay bets on her slashing her wrists before Christmas.” And perhaps Ellie would have, had she had to endure rooming with the likes of Jocasta for more than one night.
Ellie quickly decides to rent a room of her own, which is advertised by a kindly landlady, played by Diana Rigg in her final film role. (Rigg’s presence in the cast is also a nice salute to the 60s).
It seems odd to me now that Ellie never learns the landlady’ name until their final scenes together. Wouldn’t Grandma Peggy want to know the name of the woman who is now Ellie’s landlady? It wasn’t until the final scenes of the film that her name surfaced, however.
Anya Taylor-Joy as Sandi (with Jack) in “Last Night in Soho.”
I also wondered, “How did Ellie get her money back for the dorm room she would have had to pay for in advance?” These are practical things that bothered me, which have little to do with the plot. My own daughter spent a semester in Brooklyn and we had to pay for her lodging in advance. The fact that Ellie spent only one night in the dormitory and then moved out struck me as odd. Her Grandmother did not seem independently wealthy and yet Ellie acted as though money were not an object throughout most of the film.
One line from the film is, “There’s just something about the sixties that speaks to me.” It is uttered by Ellie, but it could have been me. I arrived in the United Kingdom in 1967 for my home stays in three communities: Chislehurst, Weston-Super-Mare, and Birmingham. Chislehurst was in Kent, just a short train ride to London, and I visited many clubs like those depicted (a Wright trademark) in the film and remember the “swinging sixties.” (My favorite was “The Three Witches” in Stratford-on-Avon).
It struck me as interesting how faithfully someone born in 1974 (i.e., Edgar Wright) has managed to recreate that era, but Quentin Tarantino (one of Wright’s close friends) did so in “Once Upon A Time in Hollywood.” Both are spot on. I say this as an expert who lived the sixties as a youth aged 15 to 25. It was definitely THE best decade to be young in this or any country, (although my mother, who was that same age during the Roaring Twenties, might have disagreed.)
At night, in her newly-rented flat that is quintessential 60s, Ellie dreams of a young girl named Sandy, who came to London to be a singer. The young singer is played by Anya Taylor-Joy, who is brimming with the self-confidence that Ellie lacks. The cinematic choices and visuals that cinematographr Chung-hoon Chung selects are stunning. The film is truly worth seeing for the music, fashion and cinematography alone. But we have the added bonus of a film that morphs from being (apparently) about a young girl trying to forge a career in the big city and dealing with the loss of her mother to suicide at the age of 7 into something completely different.
POTENTIAL SPOILER ALERT
In some ways, this film reminded me the most, thematically, of the Emerald Fennell Best Picture nominee of last year, “A Promising Young Woman” with Carrie Mulligan. In that film, Carrie seeks revenge on the predatory males who drove her best friend, a rape victim, to suicide.
Although Ellie’s Grandmother warns her about being careful in the Big City, the minute Ellie hits the city and gets a cab, the cab driver (Colin Mace) turns out to be a dirty old man. All of this preying upon beautiful young women of the sixties is absolutely Gospel, but only now, in the wake of Harvey Weinstein and Donald J. Trump are there films about women speaking out and demanding some form of justice, or taking revenge, vigilante-style. I can remember being “hit on” by dirty old men and horny young men and, yes, it was always quite a daunting task to keep one’s self safe from predators.
It doesn’t stop there.
In her nightly clairvoyant visits to the time that Sandi was trying to make it as a singer in Swinging Sixties London, we see Sandi (whose real name is Alexandra) being victimized by a “manager” named Jack (Matt Smith), who is a bigger predator than the skeevy cab-driver and wants to “turn her out” as a prostitute.
Just as I enjoyed “Antlers,” the horror movie showing across the hall from “Last Night in Soho,” I enjoyed this movie and found it to have the clearest claim to Best Costume Design for a film made this year since the Disney epic, “101 Dalmatians.”
The film cost $43 million to make. With its homage to 60s stars and fashions, it was a real kick for me. I’m old enough to remember all of the things being presented to today’s audiences as ancient history; I am glad I lived through it as a young person.
The music, cinematography, acting, writing (co-writer is “1917’s” co-writer, Krysty Wilson-Cairns) are all Top Notch, and I thoroughly enjoyed the movie from start to finish. If you are young, you’ll get a chance to experience the sixties. If you’re a child of the sixties, it will be like leafing through your old scrapbooks.
“The Last Horns of Africa” is a film by director/cinematographer Garth de Bruno Austin that chronicles the endangered rhinoceros of South Africa. The film is shot in Kruger National Park, a 2-million acre park the size of Israel or Wales.
Regional Ranger Don English, whose father was a ranger in the park from 1963 on, has worked the area since 1985. Over the years, Don’s job has changed from conservation to guerilla warfare against rhinoceros poachers, who will stop at nothing to kill the rhinos in the park in order to remove their horns and sell them on the black market.
The Chinese belief in the medicinal properties of rhino horn powder, as well as the prestige of having a dagger with a rhino handle has made life difficult for the 450 ranger who try to patrol the large park. The job is virtually impossible since the ratio is one ranger for every 3,000 acres.
Also prominent in the telling of the story is the woman running the Care for Wild Rhinos Sanctuary, a rhino orphanage, Petronel Nieuwoudt. Petronel is plunged into deep grief over the death of Thor, a rescued baby rhino. Thor does not die at the hands of poachers, however, but as the result of frolicking with a herd of white rhinos, who somehow harm his spine.
There are only a few thousand rhinoceros left in Africa and something like 300 to 400 in Kroger Park. The pay-out of up to $8,600 for a rhino horn is irresistible to small teams of natives who have even resorted to murder of breeders, making it necessary to hire security and to keep the exact location of the rhino orphanage within the park a secret.
One breeder, John Hume, of Swaziland wants the government to legalize the trade of rhino horns, the money going towards the car and upkeep of rhinoceros to replenish the herd. His reasoning seems to make sense, as he is trying to save the lives of the animals and the horns, removed humanely, would not be sold on the black market but would allow the community to financially support the animals. And, as he pointed out, it might drive the high price of the rhino horn down if it were legalized. A vote is taken and fails, with only 26 yes votes, 17 abstentions, and 100 voting no.
One interesting analysis of the inability of the principals to agree reminded a lot of the current dilemmas in Congress between the GOP and the Democrats. As the narrator suggests, “They’re reluctant to sit down around the table and find a solution that works for everybody.”
The cinematography of the veldt, with a variety of wild animals pictured in their natural habitat, is visually stunning. Gorgeous landscapes abound. At one point, we see a rhinoceros come down to drink at the river, something Don England said he had never seen in his 44 years in the park.
Rhino numbers have decreased dramatically in Kruger National Park. According to recent rhino statistics, the rhino population in Kruger National Park has decreased by 60% since 2013. There are only 3,529 white rhinos and 268 black rhinos left in Kruger National Park. Rangers have recently voiced their frustration to the media about the courts taking too long to prosecute alleged rhino poachers who have been arrested. Many go free on bail only to commit more acts of rhino poaching.
The documentary could have played like a “Dateline” thriller, as the law, working undercover, attempts to shut down the two biggest illegal dealers, “Big Joe” Nyalunga and Mshengu (Petros Meduza). Finally, we see the raid on the property of Big Joe, as he and his colleague are taken down, as the result of an undercover officer, Lt. Colonel LeRoy Bruwer, who, along with the others, is successful in arresting the duo in September of 2018. Although the prosecution argues against bail for the defendants, they are released anyway. March 17 of 2020 the lead investigator is assassinated while on his way to work in Mbombela in Mpumalonga Province. He was 49 years old.
The film is long, but beautifully photographed and helped draw attention to a very real problem. According to the latest statistics, the problem is becoming somewhat better, no doubt because of efforts like those detailed in the documentary.
French/American female director Niav Conty made a short film called “Joy Ride” that won her the Best Director award at the Reno Tahoe Film Festival in 2017. The film featured “Small Time” star Audrey Grace Marshall riding on the back of Rick’s (Holter Graham’s) motorcycle. These characters soon expanded into the full-length second feature film “Small Time”from Conty, who wrote, directed, shot and edited this indie film set in Pennsylvania.
The film is worth seeing for the performance of young Audrey Grace Marshall, (“The Flight Attendant”) who was 7 when filming began. Over the 3 years the film took to make, Audrey grows into a beautiful, blonde 10-year-old. She is the second child actor whose debut performance I recently saw that gave the audience a polished-but-natural impressive onscreen performance. (The first was the 9-year-old star of “Belfast,” Jude Hill.)
The plot follows Emma (Audrey Grace Marshall) as she is more-or-less left to raise herself in rural Pennsylvania. Her mother, Jessie, (Jessie-Dominique Johnson), is a drug addict. Jessie overdoses and ends up comatose in the local hospital. There is a period of plot time when the audience is left wondering, “What has happened to the child’s mother?”
It’s not quite clear, at first, either, who her biological father is. In time, we find out that it is Lonnie (Kevin Loreque) a veteran with severe PTSD.
Lonnie also has a Jesus-freak mother, Emma’s grandmother, Sadie, well-played by Maria Hasen in what appears to be her first role.
The film almost becomes a “What Not To Do In Raising A Child” manual:
Do not entrust a small, innocent child to a mother who regularly and routinely does drugs.
Do not let a friend of the mother have the very young child help her “cook” drugs.
Do not shuttle the child around to the point that we (the audience) are confused as to how she ended up in the living room of the Jesus freak Sadie, her son Lonnie, and Lonnie’s ne’er-do-well friends. (The fact that Lonnie was Emma’s father was unclear for quite a while.)
Do not take the child for a walk balanced on your shoulders while she is holding a gun that is sometimes pointed at your head.
Do not allow the child to fire the pistol at a bottle many yards away.
Do not expect the child to apologize for bopping a bully in the nose at school, when the other girl calls her mother “retarded” and her father “crazy.”
Do not have the minor child do drug exchanges in a local restaurant with a skeevy man, while said child is heavily made up.
Do not put the blonde child in excessive make-up not unlike that seen in children’s beauty pageants.
Do not offer a child under the age of 10 a beer.
Do not let the child tie up her best friend outside and leave him there for hours.
Do not let the child point a gun at her best friend’s head while he is tied up. For that matter, do not leave a gun under one of the pillows on the child’s bed nightly.
Do not let the child go on numerous drug deliveries with a drug dealer.
Do not let the child ride on the back of the drug dealer’s motorcycle.
It was at that last point that I said, “Watch. I’ll bet she isn’t wearing a helmet.”
Audrey Grace Marshall in “Small Time.”
Wonder of wonders! Emma WAS wearing a helmet! Hip hip hooray! She still doesn’t have a stable guardian situation, since the film opens with her Grandfather’s death. Apparently Gramps had inherited the task of being the responsible adult in her life.
After the funeral of her grandfather, Emma sits down next to a woman we don’t know and says, “Why are you here?”
The stranger says, “Well, he was my father.”
Now we are puzzled about what the relationship is between the strange woman at the funeral and Emma. Is this Emma’s biological mother? Did Grandpa have an older child and then father this much younger child? These are plot mysteries that we ultimately do figure out, but there had to be a better way to clue the audience in on plot points like, “Who is this woman at the funeral?” “What has happened to Jessie in the hospital? She is gone a long time from the plot and nobody seems to know or care.” “Why is there no agency responsible for checking in on poor Emma?”
The film makes good use of Camp Ballibay in Pennsylvania, producer John Jannone’s childhood home and of Towonda High School. Jannone is an important part of this film, producing, given a credit for the music; he even made it onto the list of caterers. Oren Moverman, who wrote “The Messenger” is also a producer for the film. The entire project reminded me a bit of “Shooting Heroin,” also filmed in Pennsylvania, with all of the director’s family hostessing the cast. (That was also a film about the opioid epidemic.)
This film is much more about a little girl named Emma who still loves life and believes in the Tooth Fairy, despite a series of extremely negative early childhood challenges to her normal development. She is a young actress that we may well see a lot of in the future.
“Small Time” is a noble effort and the performances are better than fine. My complaints are: (a) it’s too long at 1 hour and 44 minutes and (b) some of the plot points are difficult to figure out for extended periods.
For a first (or second?) feature film, however—an outgrowth of “Joy Ride”—it’s a noble effort by these two Brooklyn College instructors (Niav Conty and John J.A. Jannone).
It’s streaming now on virtual cinema and digital platforms.
Sir Kenneth Branagh came to Chicago for the Chicago International Film Festival and screened his semi-autobiographical film, “Belfast,” at the 92-year-old Music Box Theater on Thursday, October 21, 2021. He received a Lifetime Achievemet Award. The screening was preceded by the organist serenading the assembled audience with oldies like “You Ought to Be in Pictures” and “What Is This Thing Called Love?” The film to follow would be touched by a similar sheen of sentimentality and shots of the fictional Branagh family at the movies felt quite sympatico with this opening. This one is going to be a big one at Oscar-time.
Following the showing of the film, Branagh thanked the organist for such a grand introduction. He praised Chicago for its “creativity, vitality and generosity,” and also thanked the audience, which had just viewed a highlights reel of Branagh’s many other films, movies which have yielded 5 Oscar nominations in a variety of categories. Said Branagh, “Thank you for watching that reel entitled ‘the history of my waistband.’”
Kenneth Branagh on October 21, 2021, with his Lifetime Achievement Award fro the Chicago International Film Festival.
Branagh shared that he had been thinking about making this particular film for half a century. “It’s about something which happened to me when I was 9 years old.” Branagh revisited “the Troubles,” when Protestants and Catholics blew each other up over Catholic Ireland’s desire to leave the United Kingdom.
After a wide-screen aerial view of Belfast, shot by long-time cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos (“Thor”) in living color, the film reverts to black-and-white and the specific starting date flashes on the screen: August 15, 1969. Men had walked on the moon on July 20,1969, roughly a month earlier.
Change and uncertainty were in the air and, for Branagh’s family, they would soon make the difficult decision to leave their family and friends behind and move to England. (One wag remarked that it was this move to England that allowed Branagh to lose the thick Northern Ireland accent. which American audiences will have trouble understanding. Some have said the film needs sub-titles, much to the amusement of the Irish.)
This was the day that violence came to Branagh’s Belfast neighborhood in Tiger’s Bay, County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It changed the trajectory of young Kenneth/Buddy’s life forever. Since it is Branagh’s own childhood memories we are seeing, it is appropriate that the film is shot from the point-of-view of young Buddy (the stand-in for Branagh), well-played by new-comer Jude Hill.
Branagh recalled, onstage, during the Q&A, how the onset of the pandemic, which also brought fear, chaos and uncertainty, seemed some sort of signal that it was time to make this film. Because the pandemic was raging worldwide, extensive time, effort and money was devoted to keeping the crew safe from the dreaded disease. The cast operated more-or-less in a bubble, by staying in the same hotel, which led to comraderie. He commented, also, on the building of sets based on Branagh’s remembrances of his childhood home, complete with barging into similar homes whose owners had volunteered to let the production crew measure each room so that it could be reproduced. (Branagh’s childhood street of row homes is gone.) As he said on Thursday, October 21st, at the 57th Chicago International Film Festival showing, “It was going to be too problematic in the time of Covid to shoot in the real world.”
The director also shared, “I could never have made this while my folks were alive.” He showed it first to his brother and sister (in real life,Branagh is one of three children), who approved. Memories of having to sign in and out of their row home in Tiger’s Bay and the way the street’s cobblestones had been ripped up to make into a barricade while he was having tea, leaving only sand in the previously paved street, added to the audience’s knowledge. (“I went in for tea, and when I came out, the street was just sand.”)
Some have complained that the couple portraying Branagh’s parents, Jamie Dornan (“Fifty Shades of Grey”) and Caitriona Balfe (“Outlander”), were too good-looking to be “real” parents, but, again, Branagh shared that, in the eyes of a nine-year-old boy, his parents were almost godlike figures. (The Denver International Film Festival is hosting star Jamie Dornan.)
Certainly the two stars have great onscreen chemistry and are extremely easy on the eyes. In one scene, Jamie Dornan sings—again. He’s been singing—and singing well—in other films of late, and, as he sings “Open Up Your Eyes” with flair, enjoy it.
The costume/make-up people, while working with the handsome actor and the beautiful leading lady, took them aside and showed them still shots of 60s “the look” envisioned for the duo. There were many shots of a tousled-looking Brigitte Bardot and a young Marlon Brando. Again, the explanation from the director is that, in a child’s eyes, loving parents are quite handsome and larger-than-life.
ACTING:
(L to R) Caitriona Balfe as “Ma”, Jamie Dornan as “Pa”, Judi Dench as “Granny”, Jude Hill as “Buddy”, and Lewis McAskie as “Will” in director Kenneth Branagh’s BELFAST, a Focus Features release. Credit : Rob Youngson / Focus Features
The acting awards for this one will be rolling in for Dame Judi Dench, who has collaborated with Branagh over six times. She plays young Kenneth/Buddy’s Granny and her husband of half a century is portrayed by Cilian Hinds, who is equally good. The pair are definitely in line for nominations, and newcomer Jude Hill as the nine-year-old protagonist, carries the film on his slim shoulders quite effectively. He’s off to a great start.
There’s really not a false player in the entire cast. The charming blonde girl, Catherine, whom Buddy has a crush on is played well by Olive Tennant in a small part.
WRITING:
Branagh both wrote and directed this semi-autobiographical tale. If you can decipher the thick Irish accents, the screenplay contains both pathos and humor. The film won the Audience Award at the Toronto International Film Festival and the trailer highlights the young boy’s fear that, if he is forced to relocate, nobody will be able to understand him. As one line has it, “The Irish were born for leaving. Otherwise, the rest of the world would have no cops.” Among things mentioned specifically that an Irishman needs to be happy: “Guinness and sheet music for ‘Oh, Danny Boy.’”
There’s even a joke worked into the script (although a really old one), and the gentle back-and-forth ribbing of Cilian Hinds and Judi Dench is both touching and funny, portraying the elderly grandparents.
MUSIC:
(L to R) Mimi Plauche, Sir Kenneth Branaugh and Vivian Teng outside the Music Box Theater in Chicago at the 57th Chicago International Film Festival.
Van Morrison did the music: 8 old songs and 1 new one. Morrison grew up in Belfast. The 76-year-old musician is known for blending all styles of music. Among his compositions are the song “Gloria” (written when still a member of the group “Them”) and “Brown-Eyed Girl.” Some of the songs that Morrison selected for the film worked in the spot where they were inserted. Some did not. “My momma told me there’d be days like this,” coming on the heels of a tense discussion between the parents about whether or not to move away from Belfast seemed incongruous. Likewise, when his father is leaving on a bus (to go back to England for work), a jazzy tune plays. There is a frisking in the street and an up-beat song is playing in the background. One critic complained about the use of Dimitri Tiomkins’ theme from “High Noon” as shown on the television set, calling it “incessant.” On the other hand, using “Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darling” made a certain amount of sense in the context of the film’s friction between the parents over whether or not to move away from Belfast.
The use of western influences was mentioned by Branagh as both an homage to the cinema and as providing a moral framework for the young boy. As he explained, “Cinema was a place of escape for me. It was a ritualistic experience.” Branagh mentioned other specific films he had thought of having the family attend together, beyond the actual use of “One Million B.C.” with Raquel Welch and “Chitty, Chitty, Bang Bang” (which causes Dame Judith to mutter upon hearing the name, ‘Oh, God! Now I’ve heard it all.’).
He said that “The Sound of Music,” “The Great Escape,” and “Yellow Submarine” were all in the running at one point, explaining that he wanted one of the sixties movies that had a big-screen Cinemascope feel. The family viewing the Dick Van Dyke classic about the flying car together and then leaning in as though they were really in a flying car was a bit hokey, but appealing in a saccharine fashion and a salute to late sixties state-of-the-art cinematic special effects. (Since Branagh had previously mentioned that each primary actor had contributed at least one extemporaneous line, I wondered if Dame Judith’s remark about “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” was her contribution.)
CINEMATOGRAPHY:
Kenneth Branaugh on the Red Carpet at the Music Box Theater on Thursday, October 21, 2021, at the 57th Chicago International Film Festival.
The film uses bursts of color interspersed within the largely black-and-white film. The opening aerial shots are gorgeous and the color is meant to shock. As Branagh explained it, the color is evocative of creativity.
He said, “It represents the energy to dream. If you could dream, maybe you could dream yourself out of this nightmare.”
The film opens in theaters on November 12, 2021, and is bound to appear on many “Best of the Year” awards lists. Initially, it can only be seen in theaters.
Rebecca Hall screened her directorial debut, “Passing,” on October 20, 2021, in Chicago and was presented with an Artistic Achievement Award by the Chicago International Film Festival. It was the second award she has received in Chicago—the first being a Silver Hugo for her lead in the biographical picture “Christine” in 2016.
“Passing” stars Ruth Negga (“Loving”) as Clare and Tessa Thompson (“Creed”) as Irene, with a small role for Alexander Skarsgaard (“Big Little Lies) as Clare’s white racist husband. Andre Holland plays Brian, Irene’s husband, and Bill Camp has a supporting role as Hugh Wentworth, a successful white novelist. The film is an adaptation of Nella Larson’s 1929 novella about a Black woman passing for white.
Rebecca, who is now 39, had been thinking about adapting “Passing” for the screen since she was 25. She has a personal reason for feeling connected to the theme, with a mother who is part African American and was born in Detroit. Maria Ewing, Rebecca’s mom, a Metropolitan opera star, had a Dutch mother and a father, Norman Ewing, who was American Indian, Scottish and African American.
There have been other films about passing for white. “Pinky” earned Jeanne Crain an Oscar nomination in 1949 and “Imitation of Life” in 1959 also dealt with the theme. The stars seemed to have aligned in 2021 for a timely film on the topic, and Rebecca was the perfect choice to direct it.
As Rebecca said, “I spent 13 years being in awe of that book. I’m still in awe of that book.” She described it as “a tiny book that holds worlds.” She told “Deadline” magazine in 2018, “I came across the novel at a time when I was trying to reckon creatively with some of my personal family history, and the mystery surrounding my bi-racial grandfather on my American mother’s side. In part, making this film is an exploration of that history, to which I’ve never really had access.”
During the Q&A that followed the screening of the film, Rebecca shared that the script “sat in a drawer for 6 years” while others told her, “You’ll never get this made, and if you do, it won’t be commercial.” The 98-minute film is set to stream on Netflix on November 10th.
It is definitely a thinking man’s (or woman’s) film. As the director described the themes that the book contains, it is about: 1) The many ways we protect lies. (2) Categorization, especially in regards to racism (3) Repressed homosexuality (4) Adultery (5) Marital discord. I read the book, which is a slim novella, and found the ending ambiguous. The ending of the movie is similarly ambiguous and the adaptation is very faithful to the original source material.
Rebecca Hall, interviewed by Reggie Ponder, on the Red Carpet at the AMC Theater in Chicago on October 20, 2021 at the 57th Chicago International Film Festival.
I was impressed with the way that Rebecca managed to re-create 1920s New York City fairly inexpensively. As the film opens, we see only the feet of the characters walking on the city streets and the occasional period car passing. Rather than having to re-create 1920 New York City on a larger, more expensive scale, she had the women whose shoes and feet we are following enter a store. The set costs then decline appreciably. Rebecca shared with the audience that the Drayton Hotel of the film was really a tribute to Chicago’s Drake Hotel.
Hall uses some potent symbolism in her film. You will notice various characters, including Irene’s husband, Brian (Andre Holland), staring at a crack in the ceiling. They often are lying on the bed looking up at the crack that represents the fissures in the foundation of Irene’s life that Clare has introduced. Of Irene, who has the more traditional marriage to an African American doctor and has two sons, Rebecca said, “She’s barely holding it together, and her life is a prison.”
Clare is the catalyst for everything that happens in the film. When Irene and Clare meet by accident in the heat of summer, Clare shares with Irene that “I’m not like you one bit. I’d do anything. Hurt anybody. Throw anything away. Anything. I’m not safe.”
As Irene ponders this truth about Clare’s personality, the script—which is very faithful to the book—says, “I’m beginning to think that no one is ever completely happy, free or safe.” The screenplay adds, “We’re all of us passing for something.”
After accidentally breaking an heirloom teapot, Irene also muses that “I only had to break it, and I was free of it forever.” This may help explain the denouement. Or not, because the book and the movie are equally ambiguous when the final credits roll.
Weather is used in a Shakespearian fashion throughout the novella and the film. It is beastly hot when the film commences, but snow is on the ground at the film’s climax with some interesting aerial shots from Cinematographer Eduard Grau.
(L to R) MimiPlauche, Rebecca Hall, and Vivian Teng with Rebecca’s Artistic Achievement Award on October 20, 2021.
Rebecca uses black-and-white to tell this story and the 4/3 ratio that, she says, is better for faces in close-up. She shared that her cast was pre-determined and that the only auditions that were held were for the housekeeper, Zulena (Ashley Ware Jenkins), and for the parts of Irene’s sons ( Ethan Barrett as Junior and Justin Davis Graham as Ted).
The music throughout is by Devonte Hynes, who has 16 composing credits, including “In Treatment.” The light, tripping musical score also features Ethiopian pianist nun Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou.
More than one person has commented on the casting of Ruth Negga as the light-skinned Clare, saying she is not as likely to fit this profile. She is “passing,” after all, and the comments were along the lines of, “This looks good, but weren’t Rashida Jones/Meghan Markle (etc.) available?”
For me, you just have to believe that there is no one who could play the part of Clare any better than the Ethiopian-born Ruth Negga of “Loving.” Hall shared that Ruth was originally being considered for the role of Irene, but that the Academy Award-nominated actress felt that she totally understood Clare’s motives; she was intent on playing that part.
Eduard Grau (“The Gift,” “The Way Back”) handles the cinematography with assurance. The film was a solid accomplishment from a first-time director. Hall has been acting since 1992. With her family background, including a father who founded the Royal Shakespeare Company and 5 half-siblings, all of whom are involved in the arts—often as directors—this is a logical next step for her. It is an impressive debut film.
The illustrated cat book “The Christmas Cats in Silly Hats.”
I have a series called “The Christmas Cats in Silly Hats” (www.TheXmasCats.com), ;which I began writing for my granddaughters when they were three years old. The books are “throw-back” books to what I learned in elementary schools of the fifties when early readers featured Dick and Jane and the policeman on the beat was always your friend. The books resemble Dr. Seuss books in that they rhyme and the cats of the title are a troupe of hardy do-gooders who go about helping other animals in distress.
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The first book ‘s illustrations were drawn by Andy Weinert of East Moline (IL), a friend of my daughter’s, when I had two cats that were constantly fighting. I learned that Andy’s mother was Rita Mankowski, one of the smartest 7th graders I ever had in nearly 20 years of teaching 7th and 8th grade Language Arts at Silvis Junior High, and that sealed the deal. Andy was then a high school student who showed much artistic promise. (He has gone on to earn a Master’s in graphic design). When I asked him to draw a series of cats wearing “silly hats” he did a wonderful Grandma Moses-style treatment and the rhyming text shows the cats learning to get along with others, rather than constantly fighting with them (Lesson #1). However, AuthorHouse lost one-half of Andy’s original drawings (a bad lesson learned about dealing with AuthorHouse) and, when it came time to try to make the book just from the scans in my computer, years had passed and I drafted the girls’ Venezuelan nanny, Emily Marquez Vlcek to help finish the message and do some additional drawings linking the story to the season.
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The second book, “The Christmas Cats Chase Christmas Rats”, featured the intrepid cats checking in on lab rats at Green Laboratories, to make sure they were being treated well. The message was “Do not judge others without knowing, or prejudice you will be showing” So, DON’T BE PREJUDICED. A good lesson for all time, but especially for these times.
Book #3, “The Christmas Cats Encounter Bats” featured bats wreaking havoc at South Park Mall (there is one in Moline, IL, as well as in the Dallas/Fort Worth area) and the cats teach the lesson that all life has value and every creature has a place in theUniverse. Hallmark artist Gary McCluskey can also take credit for creating the first upside-down Christmas tree, far ahead of this year’s fad. (Bats hang their Christmas trees upside-down, you know.) Austin people, you’ll love this one!
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Book #4, “The Christmas Cats Fear for the Deer“, featured beautifully drawn deer in Scott County Park (Davenport, IA), who, although well within the city limits, were in danger from hunters allowed to “thin the herd.” The Cats came to the rescue, spiriting them from the park by means of the CatCopter and ferrying them to the North Pole, where they were fitted with prosthetic antlers and fly with Santa. This book exists in hard cover format as well (although only available by contacting me, only in limited quantities, and costing $25 plus $3 postage). The color copies were run by ColorWise Press of Indiana and are gorgeous. The back of the book contains interactive activities for children, including puzzles and coloring book pages and we encouraged children to send them to the series dedicated website, www.TheXmasCats.com. Because only limited copies were run, the books were among the most beautiful in terms of color and quality, but paying $19 a book (the publisher’s price) means that one of these books in hard cover, plus postage, is going to set readers back $28, so it remains something that is only able to be purchased by contacting me via ConnieCWilson.com or WeeklyWilson.com or on LinkedIn. It is available through Amazon in paperback and e-book.
Click to buy on Amazon.
The fifth book in the series is “The Christmas Cats Care for the Bear” and it has an anti-bullying message, as the cats spring into action to help a little bear who is being bullied by others because he is pudgy and has funny hair. It is a book made for today’s youth and the interactive pages at the back of the book were increased, while the cost of running the book dropped dramatically as we transferred the book’s publication to Ingram Spark. The hard cover book is in the $12.95 range, from Amazon, while, paperbacks and e-books are also available.
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I always said I would write the books until the girls turned 10 which has passed so the sixth and FINAL book is “The Christmas Cats Flee from the Bee.” Gary McCluskey was still available to lend his fantastic illustrations to another story with a message. This story is about a golden-haired bee that hates the Queen Bee and does everything he can to destroy her, but soon faces his own come-uppance when the rest of the hive unites to drive him from their colony.
I hope you enjoy ALL of the existing books, which will be going on various discounts throughout the months of November and December. If you want to know WHEN those FREEBIES and DISCOUNT days are, then you should subscribe to my newsletter or you may miss out! HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
The biggest lesson from “The Conductor,” now screening at the Denver International Film Festival, (but also a selection at the AustinDocumentary Film Festival), is “Don’t tell me I can’t do something.” The individual being told she can’t be a conductor, because she’s female, was Marin Alsop, now conductor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Sao Paulo Symphony Orchestra, and a trailblazer for other female directors.
Director Bernadette Wegenstein quotes Alsop, the first woman to become the conductor of a major American city’s orchestra, as co-parent with spouse Kristen Jurkscheit of their child, “I want my son to be his own person.” She related years of being told no, including showing a copy of a March 27, 1980 rejection letter from Julliard signed by registrar Mary H. Smith. Indeed, at one point, Alsop said she had to either quit Julliard or quit music.
The child of two musicians who grew up in a two-bedroom apartment at Broadway and West 107th Street in New York City, says that she “had to be an adult from the age of three.” Her parents had to travel frequently for their musical gigs and she was an only child.
Marin’s attendance at a Leonard Bernstein Youth Concert when she was nine years old set her off on a quest. “I want to be that. I want to be a conductor,” said Marin after the concert. Her Julliard violin instructor, however, said, “Girls can’t do that.”
Marin described her father as being visibly upset when Marin’s teacher made that remark. He went out and bought her multiple batons and presented them to her in an ornamental box. Leonard Bernstein also came around, as time went by, and became one of her biggest supporters. Another big supporter was Tomio Taki, a Japanese businessman who helped her to form the Concordia Orchestra with $5,000 donations from 10 of his wealthy friends and who remains supportive.
Marin says that, to her, “can’t is “the worst 4-letter word ever invented.”
MUSIC
One of the best things about the documentary, beyond wonderful cinematography by Shana Hagan of a variety of cities, including the Lucerne Music Festival, are the symphonies providing the soundtrack. Supervising sound recordist is Dwayne Dell (with a lot of assistance). Mahler. Shostakovich’s Symphony #5. Aron Copland’s Symphony #3. Bernstein directing. Marin’s “String Fever” group, profiled by Allison Fields of News 4 in New York City. The music is as breathtaking as the cinematography, and both are wonderful.
THEMES
Obviously, the big theme is to never take “no” for an answer. Marin never did. As she said, “I’d like to turn every struggle into an opportunity.” She always felt that “Conducting is the only thing in life I want to do.” She rails against the institutions that, she said, have this philosophy: “There’s something about breaking a young person’s spirit and building them back in the image they have for you.” Not for Marin, whose success has led to other female conductors at other major orchestras. She says: “I needed individuality.” She repeats that, “You never want to tell them they can’t do something, especially someone who clearly has a passion for it.” Even the New York Philharmonic had to rewrite some of its “rules” about conductor hires and we meet Sylvia Cadaff, who worked as Leonard Bernstein’s secretary for years.
Marin suggests that, “The Old Boys’ network has been there for centuries. We need to form the Old Girls’ network and be there for one another.” While I nodded my head in agreement with this thought, and am happy to report that Marin Alsop has actually taken constructive steps toward this goal, founding a scholarship for female conductors, I wondered what Hillary Clinton and/or Vice President Kamala Harris might say about female support for them in their posts.
When I saw that Kartemquin films was involved in the Van Jones documentary “The First Step,” now showing at the Denver Film Festival (and 23 other festivals), I was optimistic. It’s a 90-minute film directed by Brandon Kramer, with cinematography by Emily Topper and music by Joshua Abrams. If it’s backed by Kartemquin, it’s usually good. The topic of “The First Step:” prison reform.
Here’s what the “New York Times” said about Kartemquin: “There are few film production companies in the United States as admirable as Kartemquin Films, the nonprofit documentary house founded in Chicago in 1966 that was subsequently responsible for such outstanding, illuminating works as “Hoop Dreams” (1994) and “Abacus: Small Enough to Jail” (2016).
“All the Queen’s Horses” (2017) about Rita Crundwell’s embezzlement of $53 million in Dixon, Illinois–the largest case of municipal fraud in U.S. history—was another outstanding Kartemquin documentary.
As a Chicago-based journalist, aware that Chicago-based Kartemquin’s films have received 4 Academy Award nominations, won 6 Emmys, and collected three Peabody Awards, I was enthusiastic about this story of Van Jones’ attempts to help successfully shepherd a bill for criminal justice/prison reform through Congress.
There are some exchanges between subjects in the documentary that stay with you, as when Jones’ assistant, Louis Reed, who spent 14 years in prison, is dismissed rather abruptly by a former prosecutor (clip above). We hear a different ex-convict, addressing post-prison life and jobs, say, “Nobody don’t see past McDonald’s for us.”
The original prison reform bill was weak. As initially proposed, the bill had only three proposals. Two of them were so seemingly non-controversial that it’s difficult to believe a crusade was necessary to secure them.
One change proposed that prisoners should be housed in facilities within 500 miles of their hometowns. The other change would ban femaleprisoners from being shackled while giving birth. These don’t seem like very controversial proposals. but both former Attorney General Jeff Sessions and junior Republican Senator from Arkansas Tom Cotton actively opposed the bill with vigor. Kim Kardashian gets screentime advocating for the bill, so there’s that.
Van Jones’ tactic is to begin a campaign to forge an alliance with Jared Kushner to gain passage for the prison reform bill.
Van Jones and Louis Reed in “The First Step” documentary.
Others on the Jones team have misgivings about trying to work with Donald J. Trump during his time as president through Kushner or anyone else (one member of Jones’ team flat-out refuses to go to the White House for a meeting).
To some, meeting Trump on his home turf is a dangerous and poorly thought-out tactic, since the opposition can frame the meeting any way they want. Van’s meeting with Jared Kushner was a bit like 88-year-old Senator Chuck Grassley (R, IA) appearing onstage recently with Donald Trump and gleefully accepting Trump’s endorsement. These actions legitimize Trump, perhaps the least progressive president in American history.
I heard Van Jones speak in Austin in 2017. “Just do something,” he said. He also said, “Own your need for acknowledgment and maintain visibility,” adding “I was never afraid to be in front of a camera or speak into a microphone – I’ve got something to say.”
This is true. Jones has had something to say for a long time—things with which I generally agree. However, barely mentioning the nay-sayers who brought Jones down (chief among them, Glen Beck) in the documentary seems like a major omission.
Van Jones’ affiliation with a 1990s anti-war group called Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement exposed him to accusations that he associated with Communists. When he is shown arriving at CPAC, one of the audience members shouts out, asking him if he is “still a Communist.” Jones’ hasty departure from office during the Obama administration, where he was a special advisor to Obama on green energy, is totally ignored.
Former Democratic National Committee Chairman and presidential candidate Howard Dean on “Fox News Sunday” called Van Jones’ abrupt resignation from his post in the Obama administration a “loss for the country.” “This guy is a Yale-educated lawyer, he is a best-selling authority about his specialty. I think he was brought down. It is too bad. Washington is a tough place that way,” said Dean.
Jones, for his part, said he never believed in the so-called “Truther” movement, issued an apology for his past remarks, and said, in a statement, that his involvement with 9/11 conspiracy theories “does not reflect my views now or ever.”
I believe those Van Jones sentiments. But, just as the wisdom of some of Van Jones’ past statements or affiliations are questioned, when the documentary covers his big bright idea of lobbying the White House by befriending Jared Kushner, you have to ask, “Is that really a good idea?” A line that resonated was: “What does it mean when the President of the United States is divisive?” (A national topic that we’ve been wrestling with through two impeachments and a failed coup d’etat.)
Apparently I was not alone in my lack of enthusiasm for Jared Kushner as a conduit to convincing then-President Trump to support a bill on prison reform. Kushner’s father spent time in prison so maybe he’ll be an enlightened proponent for prison reform, went the thinking. (Of course, Kushner still has Saudi, Arabia’s MSB on speed dial; MSB sanctioned killing and cutting up a Washington Post reporter, Jamal Khashoggi).
The Van Jones friendship with Kushner did not fly with everyone on the Van Jones team.
“The First Step:” West Virginia meets Los Angeles.
The most impressive part of the documentary depicts a program that Jones originated to bring South Los Angeles residents together with West Virginia natives, including the Sheriff of Welch, West Virginia, a community of 50,000 that shrank to 18,000. Welch ranked first or second in deaths from opioids nationwide.
Each group tours the other’s hometown area, including Skid Row in L.A. There is a feeling that growing mutual awareness could change attitudes. The supportive community approach of West Virginia towards addiction is praised. A member of the Los Angeles group is heard saying, “How do we replicate this in L.A.?”
As for me, I began to wonder what Van Jones’ main causes are. He has three best-selling books on Amazon. I’m having trouble pinning down his primary concerns. Green energy and prison reform seem to be just a small slice of Jones’ town. In this respect, he reminded me of the Reverend Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson, who always seem to show up at any Black/white imbroglio.
While there are some good nuggets of information about Van Jones, the man, I would have liked more personal information about the ex-wife who shows up briefly onscreen and/or the small children that appear to be his. I enjoyed the shot of Van Jones in dreadlocks while in college at Yale. The trip home to visit his twin sister is great. The failure to give us more information on Van Jones, pre-2021, made the random shouted remark about “still being a Communist” without enough context to decode it unless you are a news junkie, as I am.
The shift from green jobs to prison reform: when and why did that become the new Van Jones frontier? What is next on the Van Jones “to do” list? Is it “any old cause in a storm?” Why not just run for office, if he is devoted to societal change?
There’s much to admire in the documentary. The cinematography and music are good. Van Jones is an attractive and charismatic subject, but he is only peripheral to the theme of trying to help pass a bill advocating prison reform, when I, for one, wanted to know much more about the idealistic emissary at the heart of the campaign. The documentary was 90 minutes long and, like many documentaries, seemed to drag at key points, but there’s certainly something for everyone in that 90 minutes.
I’ll be waiting for the one that focuses on Van Jones, the candidate.
Harry Shum, Jr. who appeared in “Crazy Rich Asians” and “Glee,” appears as James in the 57th Chicago International Film Festival offering “Broadcast Signal Intrusion.” Billed as a blend of “Blow-Up” and 70s paranoid cinema, the film is directed by Jacob Gentry and the cinematography is expertly handled by Scott Thiele. The film premiered at SXSW 2021 and was released October 22nd.
In this film noir offering, James (Harry Shum, Jr.) is a video archivist. He is also a grieving husband whose wife was either murdered or simply disappeared. James investigates the intrusion into broadcasts in Chicago that occurred, first, on November 22, 1987, with two later episodes where a broadcast to the general public was interrupted by a strange masked figure who appears to be roaring. The appearances of the masked figure are creepy, throwing this mystery into the horror category.
James, who works as a video archivist with analog films and cameras in a one-man shop, becomes obsessed with the episodes of video piracy. His relationship with his employer is strange. They never see each other face-to-face, but notes are left for James, the employee, concerning his duties. He is eventually fired by memo. Or, as he mutters upon reading the message, “Fired by a fucking haiku.”
James’ wife disappeared or died (not sure which). The date of her demise is tattooed on James’ wrist. For reasons that escape me, James comes to the conclusion that the various dates of the broadcast signal intrusions are related to the disappearance/death of his wife, and he sets out to see if his theory is correct. For roughly half the length of the one hour and forty-four minute film, James is assisted by Kelly Mack, who shows up in a bar and offers her assistance, but only after insisting that James down numerous drinks in exchange for information that she can provide relevant to his search.
The screenplay was written by Phil Drinkwater and Tim Goodall, but it’s not really the sketchy plot that deserves praise; it’s the moody setting of the entire film and the way the actors, including Shum, Mack, Michael B. Woods and Anthony E. Cabral pull off this Illinois project.
Using Chicago’s skyline and alleyways and moody, gloomy lighting, our inscrutable hero’s investigation takes him to a storage unit in Peoria, to the Tower Inn and Suites, to LaGrange, with shots of the city skyline and trains and references to a post office box in Joliet. This is definitely a slice of Chicago, Illinois movie.
The set decorating and noirish mood are Top-Notch. The sound is also good, including “Make the world go away” in one scene, and the cinematography and lighting are stellar. But the plot, when it finally resolves in its entirety, is not up to the standard of all the excellent acting, moody vibe, and great cinematography that has gone before.
When the film finally reveals its denouement, as the script put it, “Some threads aren’t worth picking at.”
While James is investigating whatever connection there may have been between the 3 instances of broadcast signal intrusion and the disappearance of his wife, he is warned, “Never attribute conspiracy to what is more appropriately termed coincidence.” I’d add, never accept great moody lighting and sound and excellent acting as a satisfactory substitute for a coherent plot that hangs together when revealed.
Branagh recalled, onstage, during the Q&A, how the onset of the pandemic, which also brought fear, chaos and uncertainty, seemed some sort of signal that it was time to make this film. Because the pandemic was raging worldwide, extensive time, effort and money was devoted to keeping the crew safe from the dreaded disease. The cast operated more-or-less in a bubble, by staying in the same hotel, which led to comraderie. He commented, also, on the building of sets based on Branagh’s remembrances of his childhood home, complete with barging into similar homes whose owners had volunteered to let the production crew measure each room so that it could be reproduced. (Branagh’s childhood street of row homes is gone.) As he said on Thursday, October 21st, at the 57th Chicago International Film Festival showing, “It was going to be too problematic in the time of Covid to shoot in the real world.”
Rebecca, who is now 39, had been thinking about adapting “Passing” for the screen since she was 25. She has a personal reason for feeling connected to the theme, with a mother who is part African American and was born in Detroit. Maria Ewing, Rebecca’s mom, a Metropolitan opera star, had a Dutch mother and a father, Norman Ewing, who was American Indian, Scottish and African American.
The biggest lesson from “The Conductor,” now screening at the Denver International Film Festival, (but also a selection at the Austin Documentary Film Festival), is “Don’t tell me I can’t do something.” The individual being told she can’t be a conductor, because she’s female, was Marin Alsop, now conductor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Sao Paulo Symphony Orchestra, and a trailblazer for other female directors.
