romance
You may be wondering why you are reading a review for a film initially slated for release in 2014, after its première at the Los Angeles film festival, in the here and now of 2016. It tells us a lot about contemporary cinema and the struggle independent films face in finding distribution that this well-made film has waited two years for a wider release when there have been countless lesser films clogging our screens in the intervening time. It has been with the recent support of Ava DuVernay’s company ARRAY that Echo Park has found a cinematic release in LA and New York as well as an international release through Netflix and, if you are looking for something different to the sometimes saccharine cuteness of US indie romances, I would encourage you to seek this film out.
Despite The Falling Snow is a film by novelist and filmmaker Shamim Sharif. The film is based on her book of the same name and plays out over two time periods. In 1950’s Moscow Katya is a spy for the Americans and is encouraged to marry and steal secrets from the young politician Alex.
To talk about this film, you must talk about the rise and acceptance of post-modernist cinema with mainstream audiences and how this has changed the way modern genre films are tackled. To break it down, post-modernist cinema essentially is cinema that tackles ‘modern’ or traditional cinema. Post-modern cinema wants to actively point out the different film elements that make traditional cinema work, show them to you and deconstruct these cinematic codes in order to stand apart and comment on its established genre/story-telling methods that its currently indulging in.
In classical art forms each specific field has one or two areas that have a more prestigious status. In dance it is ballet, and in the orchestra it is the violin. These two have a reputation of being highly difficult to master, being rigid in both technique and discipline.
Like all social groups, people with disability have been portrayed in diverse ways in Hollywood, from stereotypical representations in horror to genuine inspirations in melodramas. Disability is represented as a metaphor through imagery or characters’ features, or as a direct subject within the narrative. The entire concept of genre is recycled from elements within society, and the relevant features of each specifically labels the disabled into a certain character type.
For a horror sub-genre that is frequently criticised for misogynist overtones, it is surprising how many gothic filmmakers haven’t combined the LGBT themes inherent in horror with the rampant violence of slasher film more frequently before. You’re Killing Me is a horror-comedy that puts the emphasis on the comedic elements, its many detours into slasher film never feeling either shocking or as amusing as the film around them. But it is unique for a film in this sub-genre to remove any subtext about societal fears among gay people in contemporary society and just make a straightforward horror-comedy with no deeper thematic resonance.
There has been a historical frequency in film for older men to be depicted in romantic relationships with younger, sometimes much younger, women. This article seeks to examine whether this propensity for older men to be paired with younger women on-screen can reveal something of mainstream cinema’s and, by extension, western culture’s attitudes towards older women, sex and romance. Might more contemporary examples featuring fresh approaches to the age gap be leading us down a new path, featuring a wider range of romantic perspectives?
Screwball comedy is a predominantly American film genre popularised during the Great Depression. The golden era of screwball comedy was the 1930s and early 1940s, with hundreds of films being produced and the genre fast becoming one of Hollywood’s most popular. However, from the mid 1940s, evolving circumstances saw it becoming increasingly obsolete, with true screwball comedies beyond the 1960s being few and far between.
I love Pride & Prejudice and I will never tire of its adaptations and interpretations. I also really like zombie films. I am Pride & Prejudice & Zombies’ demographic.
There is a moment about halfway through Brooklyn when Saoirse Ronan’s character is shown as a distant speck in a giant field of green grass, as if lost amongst the lush vegetation. The moment comes soon after she has decided to go visit her mother in Ireland after a loss in the family; though not immediately apparent, it foreshadows her soon-to-come inner conflict, which will make her question where she truly belongs. Such a gorgeous and symbolic shot is representative of much of Brooklyn, which is far deeper than its relatively straightforward subject matter would imply.
People like to tout the virtues of ‘unique’ and ‘misunderstood’ independent cinema, but sometimes a film is independent simply because it wasn’t good enough to obtain funding. The problem then is that curious people like me are unwittingly drawn to pretty bad, unknown, independently made films. Well, I’m delighted to say that while Portrait Of A Serial Monogamist is not going to rock your world, it’s better and I would say surprisingly sweeter than the average unknown indie.
No movie gives an aura of eighties nostalgia better than St.Elmo’s Fire. The Joel Schumacher directed film is somewhat of an underappreciated ‘masterpiece’.
Most directors have a recognisable style that characterises their movies, giving them a distinctive visual stamp that claims it as wholly theirs. Todd Haynes is an unusual director in that his style differs from movie to movie, fully committing to replicating different genres and bygone fashions to the extent that he has no distinctive visual style that claims any movie as distinctively his. With Carol, he has made a period drama not entirely dissimilar from his early film, 2002’s Far From Heaven.
Knight of Cups is the first film I’ve ever seen where over a third of the audience left the theatre during the film. Without any context, I understand why this film would drive people to leave the movie. The film is an artistic montage, never stopping to deliver any linear narrative or dialogue scenes, continuing its visual poetry.
I can’t think of any other couple that exemplified the pure nature of an old Hollywood romance other than Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. If you take a quick glimpse at their history together, the love they shared was palpable. Bacall was only nineteen when they met (twenty when they married), and Bogart was old enough to be her father.