British Films

Even though professional, cinema-quality digital cameras are now commonplace, they're generally not small or compact. (Take a look at Arri's current lineup, for example, with its Mini LF, used to capture Deadpool & Wolverine.) However, Danny Boyle’s forthcoming zombie flick, 28 Years Later, was shot over the summer with a bunch of adapted iPhone 15s, WIRED has learned, making the Hollywood thriller, with its budget of $75 million, the biggest movie to date filmed with smartphones.

Starring Killing Eve's Jodie Comer, next James Bond favorite Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and Ralph Fiennes, 28 Years Later, due for release in June 2025, is the long-awaited follow-up to 28 Days Later—the 2002 genre-defining movie that was the first to portray zombies as scary fast rather than lumbering—and 2007's 28 Weeks Later. Boyle is joined by cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle; they won Oscars together in 2009 for their hit Slumdog Millionaire. Mantle was also cinematographer on the original 28 Days Later, as well as Boyle’s films Trance (2013), T2 Trainspotting (2017), and 127 Hours (2010).

There’s a tech story arc to Boyle and Mantle choosing Apple’s log-profile powerhouse for 28 Years Later: The pair’s 2002 kick-off movie, 28 Days Later, was filmed with an innovative-for-the-time digital camera—one of the first Hollywood feature films shot with a Canon XL-1. The lust-worthy $4,000 prosumer camcorder had interchangeable lenses and wrote data to MiniDV (digital video) tapes.

...

The use of Apple smartphones as the principal camera system on 28 Years Later was subsequently confirmed to WIRED by several people connected with the movie, detailing that the particular model used to shoot was the iPhone 15 Pro Max. (Evidently, filming took place too early for Boyle and Mantle to get their hands on the new iPhone 16 series.)

...

Several arthouse films have been shot with iPhones, including Sean Baker’s Tangerine (2015) and the Steven Soderbergh drama Unsane (2018), but these movies were limited-release, low-budget offerings compared to 28 Years Later.

The independent UK film sector is at “crisis” point according to research from the British Screen Forum that examines trends in film finance over a 10-year period, with investment in local film production falling miserably behind local high-end TV (HETV).

The ‘Show me the money’ report was conducted by analyst Ben Keen for the decade ending 2023, and prior to the UK government announcing the UK Independent Film Tax Credit (IFTC) in March 2024. It draws on analysis of BFI certification data for tax break claims and consultation with the industry.

The report suggests five key interventions to help revive the sector. They are: the development of ‘media management’ skills; fostering corporate partnerships for diversification; increased private equity investment; and enhancing the quality of and access to film finance data.

...

Total spending across film and high-end TV rose to an all-time peak of £9.7bn in 2022. However, this fell to £5.8bn in the Hollywood strike-impacted year of 2023, a drop of 40%.

“This decline was even more extreme than the 23% recorded in 2020, when Covid hit hardest, and effectively wiped out the post-pandemic recovery that the industry has enjoyed in 2021 and 2022,” said the report.

For the UK’s local film production specifically, investment fell to its lowest ever level in 2023 of £160m. Meanwhile, local HETV production attracted five times more investment (£812m). The peak year for domestic film investment was 2016 when £405.5m was spent – only 10% less than the total invested in HETV that year.

...

The annual number of UK-qualifying productions financed by legacy US-based studios peaked at 30 in 2017. Since then, the studios’ production activity has fallen and appears to have levelled out at less than half the peak annual output recorded in 2017.

Despite this, 2023 was the first time in which the total volume of films made with inward investment, combined with those made under official co-production agreements, exceeded local-only production. Historically, the volume of locally funded films produced in the UK has always exceeded the number financed from outside the UK, albeit at far lower average budgets. The average budget for a film financed through inward investment in 2021-23 was £26.4m – 18 times higher than the average of £1.5m from the UK alone.

...

Over the four years to 2022, Netflix, was involved in the financing of more UK films than Warner Bros, Disney and Universal combined, while Netflix, Amazon and Apple were involved in the financing of more productions over those four years than the six legacy Hollywood groups (Disney, Warner Bros, Universal, Sony Pictures, Paramount and MGM) combined.

...

The demise of Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEISS) following the introduction of more restrictive rules in 2018, to include a ‘risk to capital’ funding test, has cut off further routes to film investment. The schemes no longer allow investment in individual films; however, investments in company shares are deemed to meet the ‘risk to capital’ test.

The number of UK film productions with money from specialist investment companies peaked in 2017 and fell by 60% the following year after the EIS changes came in. Specialist film financiers still active in the market, such as Head Gear Films and Ingenious Media, mostly now offer forms of loan finance rather than the equity investments that UK film producers are calling for, with financiers asking for bigger percentages in return for their investment.

SHOCKER: Napoleon: The Director's Cut is good! It may be longer, but it improves upon the theatrical version with better pacing, restoring scenes and moments that explain the historical and political reasons for the characters' actions and is also a more complete story that makes director Ridley Scott's true intentions, which is to make an anti-Great Man story as an utterly irreverent comedy. The main character is not a Great Man but a miserable jerk, and the message of the film seems to be "Don't trust the myth of any Great Men." This makes it the most subversive historical blockbuster epic of the 21st Century. If you watch it knowing this, it is actually very funny, even if some of that laughter turns bitter.

Ridley Scott seems to have a very strong point of view here, which is in opposition to the "Great Man of History narrative." It feels like he deliberately had Joaquin Phoenix play Napoleon Bonaparte as the most unlikable, uncharismatic, insecure, incel dweeb imaginable. He's petulant and uncouth, makes weird noises with his mouth to get attention, and is prone to tantrums. He's the epitome of every unhappy twelve-year-old boy you've ever had the misfortune to babysit, made even worse that he's a horny grown man, and even sex and love don't make him happy. It's hard for me not to laugh at every scene in which Phoenix does something, either physical or verbal, that just makes this guy utterly appalling and hilariously unappealing. Phoenix plays Bonaparte as if he didn't want to be here, and Paul Schrader's complaint about his lack of charisma might be the whole point. Bonaparte's military prowess or skill does not make him charismatic or glamorous here; he doesn't even take any joy from winning. Some viewers might have found the subversion of "The Great Man" story confusing since we've all been conditioned to treat historical biopics as respectful, but this movie is very funny. The casting of many British comedy actors who are normally familiar to British TV audiences seems to be a clue to Scott's intentions here.

...

The French still have a sentimental and romantic view of Napoleon and even his romance with Josephine, and Scott seemed to make it so toxic and horrible as if he really wanted to piss them off. The whole movie gets funnier when you start to think Scott spent over $100 million to piss off the French, which any Englishmen would love to do if given half a chance.

On Sunday, the Toronto film festival will hand out its prizes and roll up its red carpet, a week after the Venice film festival did the same. This means only one thing: the start of Oscar season.

And, as the dust settles on these prestige launchpads, pundits have started to notice that there’s something remarkably similar about three of the key best actor contenders. They’re British. They’re former pin-ups now hovering around 60. And they’re all awards bridesmaids, so far unfeted by Oscar and long overdue for podium toasting.

Of the three, Ralph Fiennes looks the strongest bet. Now 61, Fiennes has won rave reviews for his performance as a troubled cardinal in classy pulp thriller Conclave, adapted from the Robert Harris bestseller and directed by Edward Berger, whose All Quiet on the Western Front won four Oscars from nine nominations two years ago (and swept the board at the Baftas).

Despite his status as one of the most acclaimed actors of the age, Fiennes hasn’t been on an Oscar shortlist for almost three decades. His nomination in breakout film Schindler’s List was unsuccessful, in part because of his youth, in part because the Academy is squeamish about appearing to actively celebrate Nazis. Then, in 1997, he lost out on the lead actor gong to Shine’s Geoffrey Rush (though The English Patient, in which Fiennes starred, did bag nine other Oscars).

“Fiennes has the perception of being overdue,” says Jenelle Riley, deputy awards and features editor at Variety. She believes he was particularly egregiously ignored for his mad chef turn in 2022’s The Menu; similar outrage met snubs for roles in The End of the Affair, The Constant Gardener, Coriolanus, A Bigger Splash and, especially, The Grand Budapest Hotel.

Awards expert Guy Lodge agrees. “Fiennes has the kind of IOU from the Academy that often translates into an overdue Oscar when the right vehicle comes along,” he says, “and the chewy, accessible dramatics of Conclave fit the bill.”

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/17353054

The live intro and live Q&A are only at the Leicester Square Odeon.

General screenings Friday 27th - Sunday 29th September, with an iSense one on Wednesday 2nd October (the one I'm going to).

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/17323607

A new documentary on the history of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum is set to premiere at the BFI IMAX, in London, next month on Thursday, October 3rd, 2024

The Rubber Keyed Wonder - Story of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum is a new documentary from the directors of Bedrooms To Billions, Anthony & Nicola Caulfield. It aims to chart the history of the iconic British microcomputer, looking at how it originally came to be and how it opened the doors for a generation of game developers.

The documentary will feature new interviews with Sir Clive Sinclair’s family (such as his son Crispin Sinclair and nephew Grant Sinclair), various media personalities, former members of Sinclair Research, and the developers of several legendary ZX Spectrum games. It will also feature some rare archive footage, which will further help tell the story of the iconic machine.

Trailer

The Thursday Murder Club is one of our most-anticipated upcoming movies, and Richard Osman has shared an exciting update for the Netflix adaptation.

Talking on The Chris Moyles Show on Radio X, Osman revealed that today (September 11) marks the final day of filming on the movie, which has been in production since late June in the UK.

...

We still don't have a confirmed release date for The Thursday Murder Club movie, but Osman added that it "should be out next year" albeit with the caveat that "who knows with films".

The nominative deterministic owners of Hammer Films, the classic British horror movie studio and library, John Gore Media Limited, have announced the acquisition of Silver Salt Restoration, a British film restoration studio, as part of what they call "our ongoing commitment to preserving cinematic history." Silver Salt, which has a long history of working with the likes of Arrow, StudioCanal and the BFI, will now take on some of the more memorable films within the Hammer Films portfolio for restoration.

And right now Silver Salt is working on the remastering of a number of rare Hammer Films cult classics, many of which have been out of circulation for years. These films will undergo 4K restoration and preservation, for new and old audiences.

This comes as Hammer Films celebrates its 90th anniversary in November, with a special documentary, Hammer: Heroes, Legends and Monsters on Sky TV, exploring the legacy of Hammer Films, its many productions, and its impact on British cinema.

When you think of British sci-fi movies, what comes to mind? For many, it will be directors like Ridley Scott and Alex Garland being exemplary of UK filmmakers who have put a stamp on the genre with films like Alien and Ex Machina. However, outside the heavy hitters and big titles, British sci-fi movies largely go underappreciated; relegated to cult status, or completely ignored in America.

These 10 movies don't get nearly enough attention for their approach to sci-fi, whether it be innovative techniques, a clever approach to the genre, or being so over-the-top they had problems finding an audience. To celebrate the stand-out sci-fi movies, we will blast off and jump between these gems that present some of the best British sci-fi seldom seen but loved by a core audience.

1. Triangle (2009)
2. The Boys from Brazil (1978)
3. Sunshine (2007)
4. Journey to the Other Side of the Sun (1969)
5. Morons From Outer Space (1985)
6. Frequencies (2013)
7. Phase IV (1974)
8. Unearthly Stranger (1963)
9. Under the Skin (2014)
10. Xtro (1982)

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16891767

Gwledd/The Feast (2021) got the number one slot in the best folk horror movies of the 2020s listicle but there isn't a post on it, so here is one from 2022.

Where did the inspiration for this project come from?

I’ve worked with screenwriter Roger Williams quite a bit on a number of television projects, and we’re both passionate about horror. We were also passionate about creating a piece of horror cinema in the Welsh language, with the ambition of having it travel the world. We decided to delve into the long history of Welsh literature, which is inherently horrific in many ways, and use that as a springboard to tell a story about contemporary Wales, weaving in the global theme of climate crisis.

...

Now that the film is about to be unleashed on the world, what are your hopes for it and the Welsh industry at large?

I have big hopes for our little film. I would love it if it were to kickstart some kind of industry in the Welsh language. There’s absolutely no reason why we shouldn’t have a thriving film industry. But it seems to me that we need to be pragmatic in establishing the kind of brand that we sell to the world, and it’s about identifying what we do really well. Our culture, our literary heritage is full of these brilliant, fantastical stories. I think that’s a really good base for us to start from. There is no reason why Wales can’t be as renowned for horror as somewhere like South Korea.

For it's reception see:

• Gwledd (The Feast) on track to become most successful Welsh language film of all time
• The Feast’ review: A keen-edged, slow-burn Welsh-language horror that takes no prisoners
• The Feast is a chilling Welsh-language eco-horror
• The Feast—folklore meets gore in this environmental horror film

Trailer

IMDb

The BBC has unveiled a first look at the upcoming Wallace and Gromit adventure that will air on the BBC in 2024.

In Vengeance Most Fowl, Gromit worries that Wallace has become unduly reliant on his creations, and his worries are validated when Wallace creates a "smart gnome" that appears to have an independent mind.

The League of Gentlemen and Inside No. 9's Reece Shearsmith is the voice for Norbot, who can be heard in the new teaser.

In terms of other cast members, Ben Whitehead stars as Wallace, who previously worked alongside the late Peter Sallis (the original voice of Wallace) on other Wallace and Gromit brand projects.

The cast also includes Peter Kay, Lauren Patel, Diane Morgan, Adjoa Andoh, Lenny Henry, and Buzz Khan.

The BBC confirmed earlier this year that the renowned supervillain Feathers McGraw will make a comeback in the new 79-minute film.

Directed by Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, the film will make its UK premiere on BBC iPlayer and BBC One this Christmas. Later in the winter, it will be accessible on Netflix worldwide.

A silent Sherlock Holmes film starring Arthur Conan Doyle’s favourite impersonator of the famous sleuth, Eille Norwood, is to be screened for the first time since its release in 1922, following its extensive restoration by the BFI national archive.

Titled The Golden Pince-Nez, it is a classic case of Holmes detection, based on a Conan Doyle short story that was first published in the Strand magazine in 1904.

It was among many screen adaptations in which Norwood portrayed the master detective who deduces the truth from the slightest of clues.

Conan Doyle said of him: “His wonderful impersonation of Holmes has amazed me. Norwood had that rare quality which can only be described as glamour, which compels you to watch an actor eagerly even when he is doing nothing. He has a quite unrivalled power of disguise.”

The restoration world premiere will be held on 16 October as part of the BFI London film festival.

...

The Golden Pince-Nez was among 45 episodes – each lasting up to 30 minutes – that Norwood made between 1921 and 1923, as well as two features.

Its premiere will be screened with two other restored episodes – A Scandal in Bohemia, in which Holmes uncharacteristically falls for a woman, and The Final Problem, in which Holmes meets his arch-enemy, Moriarty.

These are the first titles in the BFI’s “mammoth multi-year restoration project”, Dixon said, noting that Norwood’s films were well-received in their day by audiences who flocked to the cinema back then in their millions. “This was culturally more like us watching TV,” she said.

The BFI national archive boasts the world’s largest film and television holdings. It acquired the original negatives for the Holmes series in 1938, and in the early 1950s it duplicated the two-reel camera negative of The Golden Pince-Nez on to safety stock before the original decomposed.

“The quality is pretty much as good as it gets,” Dixon said of the restoration, adding that it was close to the way the original audiences saw it.

Despite the relative obscurity of its source material, the Rogue Trooper voice cast boasts an impressive ensemble of A-list talent. Take a look at the actors lending their voices to the out-of-this-world adventure, all of whom have currently undisclosed roles except for the one portraying the title hero.

Duncan Jones’ Rogue Trooper is being voiced by Aneurin Barnard, who has previously faced combat as a member of Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk cast in 2017, as well as otherworldly phenomena as part of Netflix’s 1899 cast and in a couple of episodes of Doctor Who.

...

Also lending her voice to the Rogue Trooper voice cast is Hayley Atwell, who is no stranger to dealing with otherworldly phenomena, having played Peggy Carter in the Marvel movies, starred in AMC’s remake of the classic sci-fi TV series, The Prisoner, and led one of the best Black Mirror episodes, “Be Right Back.” The English actor also, more recently, joined the Mission: Impossible movies as Grace in Dead Reckoning.

Barnard’s Dunkirk and War & Peace co-star Jack Lowden can also say he has starred opposite Tom Hardy in a crime biopic, namely Capone, and an adaptation of David Copperfield for Audible. The Scottish actor has also played a spy in the Apple TV+ original TV show, Slow Horses, for which he received a nomination at the 76th Emmys.

We cannot help but feel that Sean Bean’s Rogue Trooper character might be doomed to suffer a bitter fate, given how many of his most famous roles — such as Boromir in the Lord of the Rings movies and Ned Stark from the Game of Thrones cast — do not survive for very long. Then again, he lived through his last few space movies, Jupiter Ascending and The Martian, and he also made it to the Possessor ending, despite being the main assassin’s target in Brandon Cronenberg’s 2020 thriller.

Irish actor Daryl McCormack is yet another cast member who has a credit in common with Barnard, namely Netflix’s Peaky Blinders, on which he recurred as Isaiah Jesus. He is better known for playing the title role of one of the best movies on Hulu, Good Luck to You, Leo Grande, and more recently appeared in Twisters (which experienced a real tornado on set) in a brief, but memorable part.

Two-time BAFTA winner Reece Shearsmith has also been on Doctor Who, but has encountered extra-terrestrials on many other occasions — such as on Apple TV+’s Foundation, on Netflix’s 3 Body Problem, and in 2005’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy alongside his fellow members of surreal British comedy troupe, The League of Gentlemen. Some audiences may also recognize him for his brief appearance in horror comedy classic Shaun of the Dead and as Professor Ware in Saltburn.

Best known as one-half of New Zealand-based folk parody duo, Flight of the Conchords, Jemaine Clement has shared the screen with aliens (in Avatar: The Way of Water) and also played one of the Men in Black movies’ scariest aliens, Boris the Animal. He is also known for his many collaborations with Taika Waititi, such as the hilarious, mockumentary-style vampire movie, What We Do in the Shadows.

Speaking of What We Do in the Shadows, one of the stars of FX’s hilarious spin-off (and one of the best horror TV shows on Hulu), Matt Berry, is also part of the Rogue Trooper cast. The IT Crowd actor has previously lent his instantly recognizable voice to sci-fi titles like Disney+’s Star Wars Universe TV show The Book of Boba Fett and Amazon Prime’s Fallout, and also has a role in The Wild Robot — an animated sci-fi film coming out in September 2024.

British comedian Diane Morgan is probably best known as Philomena Cunk — a TV reporter she has played in various titles, such as Netflix’s Cunk on Earth. She also voiced Gryphon in Netflix’s The Sandman cast and plays another British TV character named Mandy on her self-titled sitcom.

One of Alice’s Lowe’s earliest acting gigs was alongside Matt Berry on the sci-fi horror parody, Garth Merenghi’s Darkplace, before she went on to work with the likes of Edgar Wright on Hot Fuzz and The World’s End, and Ben Wheatley on films like Sightseers and Kill List, to name a few. She was also in Netflix’s interactive movie, Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, and the platform’s short-lived sci-fi TV show, Lockwood & Co.

One of Asa Butterfield’s earliest leading roles (following 2008’s The Boy in the Striped Pajamas and 2011’s Hugo), saw him go to space in the titular role of 2013’s Ender’s Game and later saw him visit Earth for the first time in 2016’s The Space Between Us. The English actor has also starred in many recent horror titles, like Netflix’s Choose or Die, but one of his most popular gigs with the platform is leading the Sex Education cast as Otis.

...

Duncan Jones is serving as both the writer and director of Rogue Trooper. The son of late rock star David Bowie made his feature film debut with the aforementioned Moon (one of the best movies of the 2000s), which he followed with Source Code, Warcraft, and a Netflix movie called Mute from 2018.

Jones is also producing the film alongside Stuart Fenegan and Jason and Chris Kingsley. This will actually mark the second attempt at making Rogue Trooper, following when, according to Daily Record, acclaimed comic book writer Grant Morrison was set to pen the adaptation that never came to fruition after the disappointing box office returns of what is now considered one of the best non-Marvel or DC comic book movies, Dredd.

While a live-action Rogue Trooper movie sounds like a pretty remarkable idea, as we established at the top, this feature will be animated. The film is being developed with the use of the Unreal 5 Engine, which is a virtual reality tool that is used by many game developers and animators to create realistic 3D simulations. So, that being said, anyone disappointed that they won’t be seeing a live-action adaptation might be thinking twice when the film comes out.

National Cinema Day is returning for its third year next weekend with £4 cinema tickets across the UK.

Developed by Cinema First, with the support of the Film Distributors' Association and the UK Cinema Association, National Cinema Day will take place on Saturday, August 31 at more than 630 venues across the UK.

Tickets will be available from only £4 on all formats – including 3D, IMAX and 4DX – at all of the major UK cinema chains and a wide range of smaller cinema operators and venues.

...

For the full list of participating UK cinemas in this year's National Cinema Day, check out the official website.

National Cinema Day was launched in 2022 and saw 1.46 million admissions in one day, which climbed to 1.56 million admissions in 2023. This year has seen new brands join the initiative, including Coca-Cola and Millie's Cookies.

"National Cinema Day is fast becoming a Great British cultural event, sharing the joy and sociability of cinema across the nation," said Iain Jacob, Chair of Cinema First.

Glasgow Cathedral is being used as the latest backdrop for Guillermo Del Toro's adaptation of Frankenstein.

We reported earlier this week that the 12th-century structure was closed for filming, and on Saturday, our photographer Gordon Terris captured more of the action.

Actors were seen dressed in Victorian garments and the famous director was pictured on the set.

Star Wars actor Oscar Isaac will play the doctor, while Euphoria and Saltburn star Jacob Elordi is set to star as 'the Monster'.

Also joining the cast are Mia Goth, David Bradley, Christoph Waltz and Charles Dance.

Kneecap is so confident and single-minded in its telling of the semi-fictionalised origins of its titular west Belfast hip-hop trio, that it may make anyone who’s never heard of them feel like a bit of a loser. It’s a film that not only signals a major musical arrival, but ends up feeling a lot bigger than the conventional (and often confining) boundaries of the “music biopic”. Kneecap is the story of Belfast and of the “ceasefire generation” – the ones who were told that all is well, that they live in “the moment after the moment”, even when their nation’s traumas are still writ into their bones. It’s a story, too, crucially, about language deployed as an act of liberation and defiance.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16425987

28 Years Later and its planned sequels get a surprising update from producer Andrew Macdonald. Released in 2002, Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later follows Cillian Murphy's Jim as he attempts to survive after the "Rage Virus" turns British citizens into zombie-like monsters. After a mixed-reviewed sequel from director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo in 2007, Boyle is set to re-team with Murphy and original movie writer Alex Garland for the upcoming 28 Years Later, which is intended to serve as the first installment in a new trilogy.

Now, Macdonald reveals to THR that 28 Years Later has just wrapped filming. According to the producer, work on 28 Years Later Part II is also set to get underway imminently. The planned fifth film in the franchise, however, seems less concrete at this stage, though Macdonald seems hopeful. Check out his comment below:

“We’re making, hopefully, three more 28 films with the first one called 28 Years Later that Alex has written, and Danny has directed, and has finished shooting. Then we’re just about to start, tomorrow morning, actually, part two. And then we hope there’s gonna be a third part and it’s a trilogy.”

Seven years ago, Alice Lowe released her debut movie Prevenge, which she filmed while pregnant. It followed a pregnant widow who was convinced her unborn child was compelling her to go on a killing spree.

It was every bit as brilliant as that unique concept promised (it's available to watch on Prime Video if you haven't seen it), leaving us desperate to see what Lowe would do next. We've had to wait a while, but fortunately, Timestalker has been worth it.

The historical sci-fi rom-com – which held its UK premiere at the Edinburgh International Film Festival – is another inventive and unique offering from Lowe, confirming her as one of the UK's most exciting filmmakers.

...

If you're familiar with Lowe's previous written work, Timestalker's dark vein of humour won't surprise you, but otherwise, be prepared. It might be romantic and also a comedy, but a fluffy rom-com it isn't. There's a winning blend of deadpan humour, very silly (and very British) gags and pitch-black, gory laughs.

...

Timestalker is the most unique British movie of the year, and it's also among the best British movies of 2024 to date. Let's hope Alice Lowe doesn't leave us waiting seven years again for her next movie.

As you can tell, Scorsese is a tremendous fan of the Stones, using their songs at any chance he can get. Naturally, then, he has watched Nicolas Roeg and Donald Cammell’s 1970 film Performance, which starred Mick Jagger. The movie is one of many British films that Scorsese loves, although he once claimed that he “never quite understood it”.

Performance follows James Fox’s Chas, a gangster who, in a rage, shoots an old friend and subsequently flees the scene. Looking for somewhere to stay, he pretends to be a performer and manages to blag his way into an apartment where Jagger’s rock star character, Turner, is living with two women, including Anita Pallenberg’s Pherber.

There’s plenty of crime, a topic often explored by Scorsese, although Performance is also defined by its sex and drugs, making it a quintessential British ‘sex, drugs and rock and roll’ era movie. For Scorsese, he “didn’t understand any of the drug culture at that time.”

Still, he “liked the picture,” and found inspiration in one of the songs used in the film. The same version of ‘Memo From Turner’, a Stones song that Jagger re-recorded for Performance, is used by Scorsese in Goodfellas. Scorsese explained: “I love the music and I love Jagger in it and James Fox — terrific. That’s one of the reasons I used the Ry Cooder [song] ‘Memo to Turner’.

This, though, is a very British journey into the macabre. The original title was “Tea Time of the Dead” (a spin on Romero’s Night of the Living Dead, Dawn, and Day of the Dead). It was easy to understand the wariness among industry observers in April 2003 when they heard that the project was finally going into production. The director had sold his film to nonplussed trade journalists as “a naturalistic comedy about the zombified existence of late twentysomethings, crossbred with a full-scale zombie invasion”.

That was a lot to devour. The director later elaborated on the Reel Feedback podcast that Shaun had been conceived in the manner of Mike Leigh’s Life is Sweet (1990). Its heroes Shaun and Ed (Nick Frost) aren’t trying to save the world. They’re ordinary Londoners who, when clear and present danger looms, immediately look for refuge in their favourite pub, the Winchester, where they can have a “nice cold pint and wait for all this to blow over”.

“Mostly in the American films, and even in 28 Days Later, it revolves around the military, or scientists, or people who can do something,” the director said. “What if it’s the least important people? What if it is two guys on the couch who are hungover and missed the news?”

Wright’s admirers were ready to cut him some slack. He already had a fervent following in the UK thanks to cult TV sitcom Spaced, which also starred Pegg alongside Jessica Hynes. Nonetheless, that was no guarantee that he could make a successful movie. His debut feature A Fistful of Fingers (1995), a spoof western made in Somerset when he was barely 20, had received one or two encouraging reviews without making any impact at all at the box office. One critic summed up its ingredients as being “budget £10,000, cardboard horses and a handful of sixth-formers”.

To certain foreign distributors, Shaun of the Dead didn’t seem a commercial proposition at all. It was far too quirky and sardonic. Senior managers at UIP, the company handling its international rollout, refused even to release it in some territories.

...

A few weeks later, though, FilmFour went bust, and the funding for Shaun promptly vanished. There were many reasons why other industry executives were initially reluctant to bite on Shaun of the Dead. As Wright himself acknowledged in You’ve Got Red on You (2021), Clark Collis’s exhaustively researched book about the making of the film, British horror movies “died out” in the 1990s. The glory years of Hammer were a long way in the past.

There had never really been a tradition of British zombie films anyway – and Wright himself was doubtful that the market was big enough for two of them at once. When he and Pegg were working on the first draft of the Shaun of the Dead screenplay, they were utterly dismayed to discover that Trainspotting director Danny Boyle and author Alex Garland were already hard at work on their own London-set story about the undead, 28 Days Later. “I was like, “Argh, no! Oh, we’re f***ed!” Wright admitted to Collis.

Omens on the comedy front weren’t any brighter. In February 2004, only two months before Shaun of the Dead was due to hit cinemas, The Sex Lives of the Potato Men, about the amorous misadventures of a group of vegetable delivery guys, had been fried to a crisp by indignant critics. “Nauseous”, “inept”, “smut for morons”, “witless and repulsive”, “useless”, and “one of the worst films of all time” were some of the nicer remarks reviewers made about the ill-fated film, which, like Shaun, starred several popular TV comedians.

Archive

There used to be something almost apologetic or at least self-deprecating about British road movies, as if the makers were well aware how poky and circumscribed they risked looking compared with the thousand-mile journeys essayed in American films. But in this new British road movie, a tale of two troubled teenage boys driving from London to Scotland over a couple of days, it’s as if the film thinks its every cliche is as newly minted and revelatory as the latest dashboard software update. There’s a singing-in-the-car moment of bonding, an accidental discovery of a beautiful seaside landscape, and even that old chestnut, a backstory reveal involving the ashes of a dead loved one. The only thing missing is a high-speed escape from a traffic cop, but maybe the ubiquity of speed cameras on British roads means that doesn’t happen much any more.

The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) has issued a statement after lowering the age rating of horror classic A Nightmare on Elm Street.

The organisation, which handles the censorship and classification of films released in the UK, had previously given the 1984 movie an “18” rating, forbidding anyone under the age of 18 from seeing it in cinemas or purchasing it on DVD.

However, on 1 August, the film was reclassified with the more lenient age rating of “15”, ahead of a re-issue of the film this September.

Speaking to The Guardian, a BBFC spokesperson said that there was “strong support” among audiences for older films to be re-classified to better reflect modern sensibilities.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/15945465

A Scottish horror film has finally been released - 17 years after filming first got under way.

The Bench is a grisly slasher where a group of friends take a trip to a remote cabin in Renfrewshire, only to disappear one by one.

However, the production was struck by a host of difficulties, from badly misjudging the Scottish weather's suitability for filming to money running out half way through.

Writer and director Sean Wilkie told BBC Scotland News that he was a mixture of being "pleased, nervous and relieved" now that The Bench can be seen by the public.

...

Filming began in Lochwinnoch in 2007, using a cabin owned by friends of the film's director of photography.

For indoor filming, the Caves venue in Edinburgh was used, with Drumpellier Country Park used for occasional outdoor shots.

The film has a cast that includes Two Doors Down star Joy McAvoy and Matt McClure from American horror show Penny Dreadful.

"The first two weeks on location were fine but we couldn’t keep that up," reflects Sean.

"I wish we’d have someone following us all the way though, as it would have made some documentary. Due to the weather and other things we couldn’t finish filming as planned, so we were coming back on odd weekends here and there to complete it."

That was only the start of the film's issues. Initial financing had fallen through at an early stage, but Sean decided to "charge ahead" anyway, something he admits now was "probably a mistake."

The film's original editor departed, so Sean took on that role as well, and by the time reshoots were needed many of the cast and crew were working on other projects.

Kenneth Branagh’s The Last Disturbance Of Madeline Hynde starring Jodie Comer has begun filming in the UK.

Branagh has written the screenplay for the film, which is described by the production as a “contemporary psychological thriller” with the plot still under wraps.

The film is independently financed and produced by Branagh who reunites with Belfast producers Tamar Thomas, Laura Berwick and Becca Kovacik. Other producers include Matthew Jenkins, who produced Branagh’s Death On The Nile and Murder On The Orient Express, and Maximum Effort’s Ashley Fox and Johnny Pariseau.

Fond amusement is mostly the point (I think) of this clear-eyed look at a short-lived British phenomenon. Sexploitation films emerged from the burgeoning sexual revolution of the 1960s. Depending on who you ask, this revolution came about as a result of sex between men being decriminalised, or the liberating arrival of the pill for women. All the subsequent shagging coincided with a dip in British-made films, owing to the explosion in popularity of television, which provided audiences with entertainment they could watch in their own homes. But what they couldn’t watch at home – not easily anyway – was pornography, which was still illegal.

A handful of canny film-makers sensed something in the air, combined a furtive nude short-film industry with slapstick comedy, and invented a new and wildly popular genre.

...

The documentary is as gregarious and cheeky as the subject matter demands, but it takes a sensitive, contemporary view on it, too, and allows the people involved to explore every side of the story. Among the big questions addressed is whether the female actors were exploited. Some of them say they went willingly and happily; others say there weren’t many other parts for women. Some paint a grimly familiar picture of casting couches and jobs for “favours”, in a heavily male-dominated business. In a fascinating segment, we learn about the one woman who held a position of real power: Hazel Adair, writer of Virgin Witch, Sex Clinic and Keep It Up Downstairs. She also co-created Crossroads.

Its other main query is why the British seem compelled to mix their sex with comedy. In Europe, sex films were sensual, soft-focus and at least aimed to be classy. In Britain, it was ooh-er-missus innuendo, door-to-door salesmen being ravished by housewives and female characters called Busty. There are various theories put forward as to why, from traditional seaside-postcard humour to the stiff upper lip to the fact that “nobody took their clothes off in those days”. I like the producer who blames it on the inherent conservatism of the nation and the old aristocracy. But it never quite settles on a convincing answer. Nevertheless, this is highly entertaining, eye-opening stuff, and it’s only the first part of two. Next week: Joan Collins and The Stud. If those five words don’t reel you in, this probably isn’t for you.