The Notorious Bettie Page (2005, Mary Harron)

The Notorious Bettie Page is a smart, funny and engaging look at the life of one of the first pin-up sensations, the titular Ms Page.  Well acted and flawlessly directed (Harron creates a perfect 50’s ‘woman’s film’ feel and mixes black and white and colour without drawing attention to it), the film tells it’s story in a matter of fact way that mirrors Page’s own outlook and delivers an interesting study of a society on the brink of change.

Although revolutionary in her own way (more by personality than design) the Page presented here is a woman interestingly out of time – she is more homely and naive than those that condemn her work and breaks barriers without a sense of surging onwards, in fact one could go so far as to argue that her opponents hatred of sex (and her sexuality) is the curse of the future (hello Republican far-right, happy clappers, fundamentalists and The Daily Mail) after all, as she herself states, ‘Adam and Eve didn’t put on clothes till they sinned’…

…talking of which The Notorious Bettie Page has a British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) rating of ‘18′.  Considering that the 1950’s pin ups (and the various ‘health’ magazines that they appeared in) do not even come close to the contents of the tamest ‘lads mag’ or even the average music video.  The use of  ‘notorious’ in the title is somewhat ironic as it is a label that is projected onto Page rather than a comment on who she is and, accordingly, the film is rather tame when it comes to sex.  Yes, there is nudity but Harron manages to normalise it by giving Betty control and keeping everything in context – this is the polar opposite of the way Megan Fox is filmed/leered at in Michael Bay’s ‘12A’ rated Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009).

So what’s the deal?  Looking across the sea at the Irish Film Classification Office (IFCO) (the owners of the blue, usually higher, certificate printed on some of your DVDs), we see that the film has a ‘15′ rating (‘15A’ in cinemas) due to ‘moderate’ violence, sex/nudity and language and the further information on their website notes just ‘one expletive’.  It should also be noted that the guidelines for the ‘15A’ rating state that “mild/moderate sexual activity/nudity is acceptable, particularly when portrayed positively”.  So what is it that has the BBFC’s knickers in a twist?  The answer can be found on the website: ‘Contains sexual fetish theme‘.

That is it.

‘Contains sexual fetish theme‘

Not ‘graphic depictions’, not even the dreaded ‘imitable techniques’ but a ‘theme‘.

…it is,  of course, true.  The Notorious Bettie Page does contain a ’sexual fetish theme’, dealing as it does with the career of Bettie Page but this is not an explicit or exploitative film – it is as if the BBFC have decided that the very notion of ‘fetish’ will corrupt the nation’s teenagers.  But then we shouldn’t really be surprised by this as, despite a general relaxing of the rules, Britain still has one of the most severe film classification bodies in the democratic world and, let us not forget, the Orwellian ‘Dangerous Pictures Act’ under which you could even be prosecuted for having some stills from this on your computer.

All film is of it’s time.  The Notorious Betty Page is based in the 1950’s but tells us plenty about our own time and, bless ‘em, the BBFC are once again on hand to remind us that fifty years later not much has changed when it comes to our fear of the bedroom.  Jason Bourne, James Bond and Batman can beat the living shit out of people in front of children under 12 but the fabulous Bettie Page strapping on a pair of high heels and pretending to spank another woman is clearly such a danger to society that they dare not allow you to see it until you are two years past the age of consent.

The Notorious Bettie Page is available on DVD.

CinemaScream Live – how about it?

Okay so it’s time to stop talking the talk and start walking the walk… well ‘walking the walk’ would actually be making films so I suppose I mean ‘talking the talk’ infront of an audience but I would be stood up so technically I will be ‘walking the talk’… never mind, the point is that I want to start a film club here in Hampshire with some decent extras (that was a play on DVD extras not ‘happy finish’ extras).

Anyway, I’m looking for anyone who wants to join in, writers, performers, musicians etc, beginners who want to hone their craft… oh look here is a poster – please email me if you are interested or forward it  / retweet etc to anyone else that you think might be…

W. (Oliver Stone, 2008)

What will history make of George W. Bush?  Warmonger?  True beliver?  Visionary?  Frat boy?  Puppet? Leader? I’m guessing that, despite the overwhelming public opinion and ‘mis-under-estimations’, it is going to be few years until we fully get the measure of the man.  Of course the same cannot be said for his team who, with the exception of Colin Powell who managed to exit with a tiny shred of dignity, are just gangsters…

…the problem is that Oliver Stone’s film doesn’t seem to offer anything more.  Aside from a very clear ‘rulers of the world’ type speech from Cheney there is no great political statement being made and there is certainly nothing new being said about ‘Dubya’ himself… at least when John Sayles wrestled the subject via a fictional stand-in in Silver City (2004) he had a point to get across.

W. is available on DVD

Jennifer’s Body (Karyn Kusama, 2009)

Okay, so whilst this film is interesting it isn’t actually much good.  Neither funny nor scary enough, Diablo Cody’s second script is something of a disappointment.

Hmm.  Bottom line is that I’ve seen Heathers (1988) and I’ve seen Ginger Snaps (2000) and no amount of self-concious dialogue is going to convince me that I hadn’t already seen this one better, faster, stronger and before… but at least it’s not as utterly soulless as the latest round of Platinum Dunes photocopies.

Jennifer’s Body is in cinemas now.

 

Coraline (Henry Selick, 2009)

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – children should be scared on a regular basis.  They should be weirded out and made to check under the bed.  Their imaginations should be vivid enough to scare them… enter Coraline.

Based on a book by Neil Gaiman and brought to life by Henry Selick, this is the story of a young girl called Coraline Jones who escapes the humdrum real world, populated with uninterested parents, odd ball neighbours and boredom, and enters a dream world where her ‘other’ mother and father are full of fun and the people next door are magical entertainers.  Of course everyone has buttons for eyes but there can’t possibly be anything wrong with that can there?

Skipping between the real world and the uncanny ‘other’, Coraline is an absolute delight of a film that, unlike Pixar’s output, remains engaging throughout.  The design and stop-motion animation are simply superb and the voice cast, including Dakota Fanning, Teri Hatcher, Ian McShane, comedy duo French and Saunders and the velvet tones of Keith David, are faultless… to be honest I can’t find anything wrong with this film.

…oh and (here he goes again) whilst I can say that I feel that I missed out by not seeing this on the big screen I cannot really see how 3D would have improved on such goodies.

Coraline is available on DVD.

RIP Filmstar Magazine

In August I got all excited by the Hotdog flavoured Filmstar Magazine.  It was stuffed with very good writting and a nice mixture of humour and seriousness but, above all, it was a very decent and extremely interesting read.  A couple of days ago it occurred to me that I hadn’t seen issue six yet went searching for it… no luck at WHSmith, no new issue date online.

I google.  Wikipedia?  I click the link, scroll down the page…

Oh.

In October 2009, it was announced that Blackfish Publishing had split from Rebellion and that both Death Ray and Filmstar would cease production. Matt Bielby was quoted as saying

“I’ve got some sad news, I’m afraid. Blackfish Publishing is currently in the process of splitting from its parent company, the video game developer and publisher Rebellion, which means that the current issues of Filmstar and Death Ray magazines will, at the very least, be the last for some time.”

Shame that.

Oh well – good luck to all concerned and I look forward to reading their words elsewhere in the future.

Live! (Bill Guttentag, 2007)

“…imagine the numbers we would get if people tuned in actually knowing someone would die on air.“

Six members of the public play Russian Roulette live on TV and the filmmakers wag their fingers at us and so in true Hollywood fashion we have a whole load of scenes in which people have SERIOUS TALKS about the ISSUES (of course, the voice of decency is embodied by the documentary maker) and, for me, these are exactly the scenes you don’t need if a film is to work.  SERIOUS TALKS take the place of real engagement and allow the audience to sit there whilst morals comfortably wash over them thus taking away any real slap in the face… supposedly though they want us to watch it, hence the film is not advertised as media satire but a film about a Russian Roulette gameshow.  Which, I suppose, is the point (we are hungry for blood and must be chastised) but Haneke-lite doesn’t really work and leaves us no closer to a great moral revelation about violent entertainment than Death Race (2008) or The Running Man (1988), films that, despite all their faults, knew exactly what they were and didn’t pretend otherwise.

Maybe if the film had followed the contestants, contrasting the real people with the constructed biographies.  Maybe if it actually made us care about the contestants some emotion/tension may have been injected into the ‘game’ itself and forced a response to the expliotation etc etc.  Maybe then we would have something worthwhile… you know, at least if it was as downright reprehensible and two-faced as The Condemned (2007) it would be more interesting.

Live! is available on DVD.