Lorenz Meran is a successful middle-aged gay writer who is struggling with writer’s block when he gets called back home after his elderly mother has a stroke.
Rosie is a feisty old bird and unlike Lorenz and his perpetually unhappy sibling Sophie, she seems to be the one member of this family who likes to have some fun. A little too much now given the fragile state of her health but whatever happens, she is determined not to give up chain smoking or even admit to the fact that she is an alcoholic.
The parental home is a small town in eastern Switzerland, a far cry from Lorenz’s hedonistic life in Berlin of one-night stands that he chronicles in his novels, but as his mother’s health declines he very reluctantly finds himself back in the house he never thought he would ever have to live in again. He does, however, have a diversion one night when he has an ‘encounter’ with Mario a grandson of his mother’s friend, but as he dresses and prepares to leave the next morning he discovers that the boy had actually been a big fan of his work for some time. So without discussing it at all, Lorenz panics and hastily dashes off telling a startled Mario that he would never have had sex with him if he had known he was just a groupie.
The plot unravels slowly as the family are hesitantly drawn together by their mother’s decline, and Sophie has to finally deal with her own failing marriage, and both siblings make the startling discovery that it wasn’t in fact their mother who had been having ‘affairs’ when they were young as they had always suspected, but it had been their overbearing and distant father, now long dead. And all his lovers were in fact men.
Jaded Lorenz’s humor never seems to lighten as he tries to deal with his impatient Literary Agent from afar, and with sullen Chantal a young neighbor of his mother’s who he suspects is supplying Rosie with alcohol. If that is not enough, at his mother’s insistence, Mario turns up to help doing oddjobs about the house.
And then just when you are about to despair about this family, Rosie reluctantly but with her usual style, decides to make a go of living in the Seniors home that they forced her into, Sophie gets back with her estranged husband for another reconciliation, and Lorenz stops being angry and suspicious of the world just in time to realise that the long term love of his life that he has always wanted is actually there on his doorstep in the shape of Mario. And to top it all, his writer’s block disappears as he sets about writing his latest novel based on Rosie, and the ‘triangle’ he discovered when he explored his father’s past.
The movie is the latest work of Swiss gay filmmaker Marcel Gisler (who like Lorenz was born in Altstätten and works in Berlin, however I could not establish if this is an autobiographical piece). Gisler’s movie output is infrequent at best… the last one was 14 years ago… his usual fare are more explicitly gay and complicated, and this one is definitely his most refined and subtlest. Lorenz’s long struggle for happiness is finally determined by resolving the questions that arise from the troubling nightmares he still has about his father, and from being able to accept and enjoy the love of his family simply for what it is.
It all works… albeit a little drawn out… not just because of the script with its scattered passages of dark humour, but also because of the two excellent central performances. The veteran Swiss Actress Sibylle Brunner, in her first ever leading role, is rightly picking up awards for her devastatingly wonderful turn as Rosie, and Swiss actor Fabian Krüger is pitch perfect as the dour faced Lorenz who waits until the last reel to smile.
This movie is being hailed in some quarters as New Swiss Cinema and worthy of a world audience. I’m not sure if I really knew much about ‘Old Swiss Cinema ‘to make any comment, other than to say it definitely is well-worth seeing.
A Man, His Lover And His Mother is Available to buy on DVD from Amazon
Khalid Shawwa loves Captain Jean-Luc Picard aka Patrick Stewart almost as much as he loves his boyfriend Brett Lotriet. So when Brett decided he wanted to ask Kahlid to marry him he thought about asking the fearless Star Trek Captain for his help. When they didn’t pan out he did the next best thing by asking Patrick Stewart’s best friend, Sir Ian McKellen to help out instead, and he agreed. So here in one the cutest marriage proposals ever is Sir Ian McKellan pitching in and encouraging Kahlid to accept.
When the movie opens Earlene is sitting on a wall in Venice Beach swigging from a bottle secreted in a brown paper bag and she very dramatically utters to a total stranger, ‘Experience is the name we give our mistakes. Which one are you?’ and I cannot help but cringe.
It sadly will not be the last time I feel like that, whilst watching this well-meaning micro-budget indie movie, that is all heart but ends up being an undisciplined convoluted mishmash of a film.
Earlene like every other character in this story has her ‘issues’ although in her case the reason for her mood swings is not clear until near the end. Her new androgynous Australian friend Bruno, that she immediately latches on to at their first encounter is sexually confused, and so she adopts his well-being and happiness as her own crusade. Bruno has a dream of visiting Paris to see the Eiffel Tower, which is obviously out of the question as neither of them have any money, so his new friend Earlene promises to take him on a road trip to see the next best thing i.e. a full-size replica in Las Vegas.
En route and a chance meeting with Billy, a good-looking cocky gay drifter takes them off course and they stumble upon a very small forgotten town in the middle of the Nevada desert. It’s inhabited by an odd bunch of misfits straight out of Central Casting that includes a Cher look-alike Sheriff, a tap-dancing drag queen, and a couple of Scottish male strippers. They are all kindred spirits who have found this remote bolt-hole where they can escape the outside world that none of them remotely fit in.
This debut feature from British writer/director/producer Simon Savory bravely tackles issues of gender and sexual identity and friendship, and at times is close to succeeding. It’s valiant effort, however, is hampered by a heavy-handed script with a smattering of pompous sounding epithets which made the dialogue somewhat stilted. Ashleigh Simpson the lead actress could have taken her performance down a notch or too as she overplayed the part of Earlene to the point of being annoying.
On the other hand, Savory’s choice to shoot this British production on location was very wise and really paid off with some excellent cinematography of the beautiful desert setting.
P.S. It’s tough being a filmmaker with such a minute budget and the biggest disadvantage of assuming all the major functions yourself, as in this case is that you lack the benefit of another independent set of ears and eyes which may have spotted some of the issues, which stopped it being the movie it was obviously meant to be.
Over the course of his long and distinguished career Robin Williams won four Golden Globes, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, two Emmys, and an Oscar. And although he started off his career as a stand-up comedian who became a household name as the star of TV’s Mork and Mindy, a silly show about Aliens, some of the finest work he went on to create were in some superb highly dramatic movies.
Every summer for the past 15 years THEGAYUK’s British/American movie critic Roger Walker-Dack has hot tailed it to spend his entire summer in Provincetown on the tip of Cape Cod.
A lot has changed since the first Brits landed there when the Mayflower docked in 1602. They only stayed five weeks then before sailing on to their final destination at Plymouth Rock, and they really don’t know what they missed. This captivating beautiful small seaside town has been an artist’s colony, a Portuguese haven, and now it is an enchanting gay mecca that each summer sees the all-year round population of less than 3000 swell to over 60000 people.
In a series we are calling POSTCARDS FROM P.TOWN, Roger Walker-Dack will introduce some of the people and things that create the magic that make this such a ‘must see’ destination for gay people from all over the world.
Kate Clinton describes herself as a faith-based, tax-paying, America-loving political humorist and family entertainer. She is also one of the funniest and quick-witted lesbian comics with her no-holds barred, often-controversial take, on all the hot button topics of the day. Now in her third decade of performing, the woman is seemingly unstoppable with TV appearances ranging from ‘The Rachel Maddow Show’ to ‘The L Word’, several off-Broadway shows, countless sold-out nationwide tours, movies, radio, MC‘ing events and even doing a turn at The Gay Games in Chicago one year. She has worked with some of the greatest performers of her time from Lily Tomlin to Oprah Winfrey. Her summer show is one of the first dates I put in my diary when I arrive here in P.Town. I’ve sat in her audience at least once a year for the past 15 years, and have also exchanged the odd quip or two as we passed each other at Joe’s Coffee Shop, but now she is taking time out of her busy schedule to give her first ever UK magazine interview to The Gay UK:
RWD: You shocked me one year by revealing in your show that you were once a schoolteacher.
KC: Yes, I taught English in High School for years but I always wanted to try my hand at Stand Up Comedy. In March 1981, after I only had just ‘come out’, a friend booked me into a local gay club in Syracuse New York. To my great relief it was a huge success, although it did help that all my friends had turned up to support me. However two weeks later I did the same show at a Women’s Club in Boston where they had no idea of who I was. And the same lines that had slayed them before, now just died an instant death, and from the back of the room a voice shouted out in a broad South End accent ‘you’re on your own now dahling!’ And I was.
RWD: Did that floor you?
KC: (laugh) No. I knew from Teaching just to go on regardless. So I did, and got through it.
RWD: How long did you juggle both careers?
KC: Actually I didn’t. My partner at the time said after my first show ‘I don’t know how to tell you this, but you have to do it again.’ So I immediately gave up teaching and went into performing fulltime and she became my manager. Then another good friend who used to perform in a band booked me for a first summer season touring the North West in a red camper van called Ruby, playing one nighters in an a varied assortment of small and… how can I put it politely… ‘interesting venues’.
RWD. Wow! The touring part doesn’t amaze me but the camper van part is too hard to swallow. You are without doubt THE most elegantly-dressed woman in P Town and even when you whizz past on your bike here you look like you are suitably attired to have tea with The Queen…or a queen at least.
KC: (laughing very loud) I only had a few outfits in those days. But in 1985 I started travelling more and Eastern Airlines had this amazing deal where you could fly to 21 cities for a pittance. The only catch was that you always had to fly through Atlanta, so if you wanted to go from Portland Oregon to Seattle it added 5000 miles to a 173-mile journey.
1985 was also a turning point for me as the AIDS crisis started to hit hard and I played less lesbian only audiences and began playing more gay audiences along with fund raisers and benefits as well. And then I also went on to do memorials and services for friends that were lost.
RWD: A very tough time…
KC: Yes, but I also saw it as a great coming together of our community too, as a way of healing.
RWD: Have you always been so very political?
KC: Coming out as a lesbian in those days was in itself considered a political act. After all, some women can’t say the word lesbian… even when their mouth is full of one.
But on a professional level I feel that we have to deal with a barrage of news and information on a daily basis and I think it is the job of the comic to filter and give it the benefit of a thought that people generally don’t tend to do. I like to contextualize it and to put it in historical context.
RWD: I find what you do is to articulate something that concerns us all and put a funny spin on it, even topics that are considered very serious. You are unashamedly a fervent and passionate Democrat and so I love the stand you take on every issue as I feel completely in tune with your political beliefs, however I am wondering how they go down with an audience that is a tad more conservative?
KC: Maybe it’s the teacher in me, but I think it’s all-educational still, and anyway I just presume that we are all in it together.
RWD: Even though a third of gay people voted for George Bush. Twice?
KC: That’s still hard to believe, but people do come up to me afterwards and say I’m a Republican BUT I loved your show.
RWD: And those that don’t?
KC: When they find it too tough to take, like when I was including pieces on the Iraq war, I simply pretended that all the people who walked out during my performance had just gone to the bathroom and so I carried on. And anyway, I’m a moderate lesbian, I only hold grudges for six generations.
RWD: (laugh) But do you ever censor yourself thinking you may be going too far?
KC: I don’t deliberately set out to provoke outrage. If I am confident in any piece and feel good about it, then I will do it.
RWD: P Town is not just the place you perform. It is also very much home for you and your partner.
KC: I came here first in 1984 and performed for a week. The next year I did two and so on, and I very quickly fell in love with the place. I started to think why am I going back to Upstate NY when this is the place to be all summer. I love all the natural beauty of the town, and the way that people still come here for both that, and also the wonderful sense of community we have here.
RWD: The thing most baffling about you is why have you never ever performed in the UK? Many of your books and CDs are available on Amazon there and sell very well so I know you have a big British fan base.
KC: I’ve got very close to it twice but on each occasion I had family emergencies and had to cancel. BUT I am really hoping it‘s going to be 3rd time luck. I do get a lot of Facebook mail from the UK from people who seem to like that my take on the US is quite raw.
RWD: You would have a great deal of fun giving us your very incisive take on British politics too. I think if you had been born there you would have become one of our great stately Institutions, the sort of person the Queen would have made a Dame.
KC: Thank you.
RWD: Here in Provincetown despite all the many changing fads and trends that have occurred over the years you are still here, and obviously having a great deal of fun, and in fact this season you are the ONLY lesbian comic performing. Whilst all the other acts are ‘barking’ on the street trying to entice people in to see the shows, you don’t and yet you play to packed houses every night.
KC: I think sometimes they come simply because I don’t plaster the beaches with flyers when everyone is simply trying to catch some rays! (laugh) But it’s also a longevity thing, as after all these years I have become part of people’s regular schedule. In the winter I travel a lot around the country: I do workshops, conferences, host award dinners etc. and so many of the people I meet there come to see me when they are on vacation here.
RWD: Over all these years that you have been performing you have won countless Awards, been lauded with praise from the likes of writer TONY KUSHNER (Angels In America) who called you a ‘political visionary’ and ‘incredibly funny’, and rave reviews from the media such as the NY TIMES whose critic said he was in tears from laughing so much, but I am wondering what your favourite compliment is that you have ever received after a show.
KC: After a show in Lexington, Kentucky, I was having dinner with the producers and a young woman came up to me and clapped me a good one on the back, and exclaimed, “Kate Clinton! You made me want to f**k again!”
Junn is a rather disgruntled 60-something year old Chinese woman who has been co-coerced against her will into moving into a care facility for Seniors by Kai her son. The opening scenes of this wee British drama see the unhappy mother berating her only child for her present predicament, which is, exasperated by the fact that although she has lived in London for decades she has never learned to speak English. ★ ★
It is soon revealed that Kai had recently died under mysterious circumstances and what we are watching now are in fact her memories. Richard who was Kai’s boyfriend for the past few years feels it’s his duty to take over from his late lover and starts to regularly visit Junn in his place. The trouble is Junn never knew her son was gay (or refused to admit it anyway) and really loathes Richard who she felt usurped her place in Kai’s life. And to make matters worse as Richard cannot speak Mandarin, the two of them have no way to communicate.
When Junn gets hit on by the home’s resident lothario, Richard seeing a glimmer of hope of some happiness for the perpetually melancholic Junn, hires a translator to help the lovebird’s potential courtship. It also serves as a means for him to start a dialogue with the old woman too, which is no easy task, as she seemingly has no concept of the fact that Richard is grieving for his loss too.
It’s a very slight story and as it is essentially about these strained relationships between different cultures and generations, a lot of the emotions literally get lost in the translating. Richard seems to spend much of his time in tears whilst on the other hand Junn just sits and stares with he big wide eyes.
This debut movie from filmmaker Hong Khaou reeks of good intentions but never really takes off. He had the good fortune to cast veteran Chinese acting legend Pei Pei Cheng as Junn, and had managed to snare Ben Whishaw to play Richard. Most indie films would kill to get stars like this, but in this case, Whishaw’s uneven performance seemed to unsettle the balance between him and the other actors, particularly Andrew Leung, who played his on screen boyfriend Kai.
This engrossing story of Mason Jnr. growing up from a kid to a young man starts when he is just 6 years old.
He lives with his older sister Samantha and their mother Olivia in an ordinary suburban home that they simply cannot afford. His rather immature father Mason Snr. who acts like a big kid himself at times, roars into his life occasionally and apart from trying to play the role of Dad for a whole 12 hours at a time, contributes little else to help the family survive. So Olivia decides it’s time to make what will turn out to be the first of many moves as she continually struggles with both paying bills and leaving the drunks that she, unfortunately, marries along the way.
This initial move is to Houston to be near the children’s Grandmother and to enable Olivia to study for the first of the degrees she will earn, and also juggle holding down a full-time job. Along the way, she marries her professor who has a son Mason’s age and a daughter too, and for a few years, they all get to play happy families. When the Professor’s alcoholism manifests into bullying Mason and the other children and physically abusing Olivia, she walks out of the house taking Mason and Samantha with literally only the clothes on their backs.
For shy and somewhat introverted Mason this needs to start all over again in a strange school without any friends is tough. Samantha is more outspoken and angry with her mother about it, but she at least has the outgoing personality to adapt more easily to their new environment.
Complete with her Degree and now studying for her Masters, Olivia has moved the family again so that she can start teaching in a small town outside of Austin. One of her mature students becomes both her next husband and the next alcoholic who tries to manipulate her and the children. Mason by now is a troubled teenager struggling with his adolescence and about to graduate high school. His father has remarried and with a new baby in tow and has become the respectable adult that Olivia had wanted him to be 16 years ago, so he can at least help his confused son move forward to deal with whatever new challenges college life will have in store for him.
This remarkable film made over 12 consecutive years sees this tender and profound story unfold in real time as we witness this cast of actors playing the family grow up and grow old in front of our very eyes.
There is such a fluidity to the whole piece that it’s hard to even consider the notion that when the Richard Linklater the director/writer started this project in the summer of 2002 that he knew exactly how this extraordinary movie of his would pan out. To see a family mature together and somehow pull through a whole series of near-catastrophic scenarios like this and come out stronger and intact at the end is nothing less than astonishing. At the end when Olivia is single again and just about to watch Mason finally leave her to go to college she has a small meltdown as she looks back at the past 18 years and cries out ‘I just wish it could have been better.’ But even she could not deny that what she had enabled them all to achieve was incredible.
In this epic masterpiece of a flawless movie, Linklater’s attention to every single detail paid off so handsomely. Starting with the cast of Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke as Olivia and Mason Snr but more especially the unknown young Ellar Coltrane with a superb breakthrough performance as Mason Jnr that was totally pitch perfect and wonderfully fresh as too was Linklater’s own daughter Lorelei who played Samantha. He needed actors of this calibre for as the years rolled on, each of the characters developed in a much deeper and profound way than one would have initially have imagined, especially Mason Snr. who we were ready to write off as lightweight in the beginning.
Linklater’s attention to every aspect got personal too as he owns the GTO that Mason Snr. drove as his pride and joy as it somehow made him feel like the rock star he never was.
This audacious experiment that has resulted with such a brilliant and compelling cinematic treat will undoubtedly end up on many ‘best movie lists of 2014’, including mine.
P.S. This concept of making a movie in real time seems so brilliant now that it’s a surprise that more filmmakers haven’t tried it before. Acclaimed Brit. director Michael Winterbottom’s ‘Everyday’ released in 2012 was filmed over 5 years but with a very little plot this very tedious drama turned out to be his worst movie to date. The nearest equivalent is Micheal Apted’s award-winning documentary TV series ‘7 Up’ that has revisited a group of ‘children’ every 7 years for 5 decades now.
Every summer for the past 15 years I’ve hot tailed it to spend my entire summer in Provincetown on the tip of Cape Cod. A lot has changed since the first Brits landed there when the Mayflower docked in 1602. They only stayed five weeks before sailing on to their final destination at Plymouth Rock, and they really don’t know what they missed. This captivating beautiful small seaside town has been an artists colony, a Portuguese haven, and now it is an enchanting gay mecca that each summer sees the all-year round population of less than 3000 swell to over 60000 people.
In a series we are calling POSTCARDS FROM P.TOWN, I will introduce you to some of the people and things that create the magic that make this such a ‘must see’ destination for gay people from all over the world.
For the past 3 years when you bike down Commercial Street (the main drag of P Town) at dusk, it’s hard not to notice the dulcet tones coming from a String Quartet playing on the sidewalk outside The Art House to advertise their Show. These are the boys who comprise WELL STRUNG: they are four classically trained musicians who put their own spin on a repetoire of pop and classical music: and they sing too. They also are without doubt the best looking guys on the block, which is more than an added bonus. They have very quickly become a big hit with audiences and when they are not performing in P.Town they are on the road touring, and last year they actually made their London Debut at the Leicester Square Theater.
In their first ever-exclusive UK magazine interview these four disarmingly charming men who the New York Daily News said were ‘the hottest thing with a bow since Jennifer Lawrence in The Hunger Games’ sat down with TheGayUK to talk about making music, meeting men and lots more.
First things first guys. How did Well Strung start?
In the summer of 2010 Chris (Christopher Marchant) was here in P.Town appearing in ‘Naked Boys Singing’ and in between shows he was busking shirtless in the streets and playing his violin and attracting quite a large crowd.
Yes, I remember him very well.
And one person who heard him was Mark Cortale, the Artistic Director of The Art House who immediately offered him a Show at the Theater. That initial idea soon went from being a Solo Performance to maybe forming a String Quartet.
And how did the four of you come together?
Daniel Shevlin: (Cello) Chris called me and I was in Denver finishing a National Tour of ‘Rent’ and was wanting to move, so I jumped at the chance.
Edmund Bagnell: (1st Violin) I was based in NY doing mainly musical theater playing Tobias in the first national tour of Sweeney Todd directed by John Doyle, and I wanted a change.
Trevor Wadleigh: (violist) My career had taken a totally different path and at the time I was actually working in Financial Services, so I was very happy indeed to get back to performing again.
We had out first ‘staged reading’ within a few months and then later in May 2012 we made our official debut at Joe’s Pub in N Y, and then we were ready to hit the streets of P Town with our first ever summer season.
How conscious are you of the fact that you all look as hot as hell?
WS: Well as artists you are always concerned with your appearance as well as your performance but we think we have evolved more since then, so now it’s much less about how we look and much more about how we sound.
But your name alone is intentionally provocative!
Well, our instruments are very well tuned. (laugh)
And you were all shirtless in your first poster.
Well, sex sells (but we don’t sell sex) and we will admit it did help us get our first few audiences in before we could depend on ‘word of mouth’.
I remember sitting in the audience that first year and hearing people somewhat in disbelief saying ‘Wow, these boys can really play, and play well.’ But what they related to as well was how you all shared stories of your life in between your playing which really bonded you with this P-Town crowd.
I think we also opened up the whole potential of listening to classical music to a brand new audience too, which we are so thrilled to continue to do.
Who decides the balance of pop vs. classics in your show, and is the choice of the program a collective decision?
We have a whole team that includes Donna Drake our Director, and David Lavinson our arranger, asides from Mark Cortale our Manager, but essentially we all get a say in what we want to play as we think it an important part of us performing is that we too enjoy all the music.
What immediately strikes me talking to you all is that you are very close to each other. Has that closeness ever led to anything romantic between any of you?
NO! (laughing)
And are you all currently single or?
Two of us are single, one is involved in a relationship and one is in the ‘its complicated ‘ stage.
Which is which?
That would be telling. We’ll let you try and work that out for yourself. (laugh)
What’s your favourite thing about being Well Strung?
Being able to combine all the things we love: namely playing our instruments, singing and getting to be actors too. We love the fact that we are a very unique group, in fact so different from the norm, that it’s tough describing it adequately to people meeting us for the first time. And most importantly we have a great deal of fun just being together and performing especially with a new audience and winning over new ‘converts’.
And now in your third Season here in P-Town and putting the ‘sold out‘ signs up nearly every night you perform, it’s clear that visitors and locals alike love you. What do you think about the magic of this very special place that we get to call home each summer?
It’s the Never Never Land for gay men (and women).
(laughing) Beautifully put. What happens next for Well-Strung after the summer ends?
We have a very extensive nationwide tour with our brand new show POPSSICAL which features the music of Beethoven, Ravel, Madonna, U2 and Miley Cyrus that is going to keep us very very busy. (dates & venues on the website) What we love about our work is that we keep discovering new audiences everywhere: young and old, gay and straight. This year we played to kids at Schools and we also performed at the International Mr Leather (IML) Convention in Chicago.
When you say ‘perform’ at that raunchy venue you mean…?
(laughing) Just on our instruments. But they were such a lovely crowd, and we had a blast and learned a lot too (ahem).
And do you ever think about a life after Well Strung?
NO! (Very empathically). We all feel that there is so much more for us to do and achieve professionally together, and as long as we and our audiences are happy, we will keep developing and creating and playing our hearts out.
At TheGayUK the first story we ran on P-Town this summer was entitled ‘Everything Old is New Again’ which was about the remarkable fact that there are a whole plethora of both veteran and ancient stars performing here even though some are in their 80’s and beyond. Can you see yourself being in that group in the far distant future?
(laugh) Only if you promise to hang on to review us then!
Touché! So what did you think of London when you played there for a week at the Leicester Theatre in the Fall?
It was our first time and we LOVED everything about the City. Everybody was so welcoming and friendly, and in fact, we had our first ever groupies there, which made us for once actually feel like rock stars! (laugh) The Brits were very generous and even though we were newcomers, by the end of our run we had ‘sold out’ which was very exciting
And what did you think of British men?
For some reason, we had this concept of them all being the big rugged types like the Host on TV’s ‘Restaurant Impossible’ and more than a little bit different than the average American gay man.
I think you mean Robert Irvine who is different, and STRAIGHT!
(laugh). Well, the Brits we met turned out to be completely different than that, and a very welcome change. Charming, good looking and very fit but not gym-body obsessed like the men in NY, and very hot indeed!
So you like British men?
(laugh) What’s not to like?
And more than ‘like’ even?
That would be telling, but let’s just say that we are putting a great deal of pressure on our Manager to close the deal that will take us back to London very soon. And not just so that we can perform on the stage!!
Watch this space for the exclusive news when the next Well Strung London dates are announced. Meanwhile get an another taster of the Boys with their latest video Mozart meets Kelly Clarkson.
Mexican filmmaker Julián Hernández’s latest cinematic treat is essentially a film within a film.
Its protagonist Emiliano is an openly gay director whose current movie that we see in progress on screen involves filming real-life dancer Gloria Conterras and some of her students. It soon becomes apparent that Emiliano’s interests in the dancers go way beyond this project as he lusts after all the cute male ones, and soon becomes the lover of one of their number.
For the seemingly emotionless Emiliano having a handsome lover like Octavio is simply not enough to satisfy him even though it is obvious that the young dancer is hopelessly in love with him. Monogamy equals monotony in the director’s eyes, but even with a succession of hot rent boys who are willing to satisfy his every desire, Emiliano is never happy. But then again it’s hard to know what will. He is very handsome, has a successful career that has given him both fame and fortune and seeks solace in some casual drug and alcohol but still feels completely empty.
The movie with its sparse dialogue and its emphasis on aesthetics of these handsome Latino men and little attempt to include a conventional plot, makes this a typical Hernández movie. And one that is possibly better than A Thousand Peace Clouds Encircle the Sky andRaging Sun, Raging Sky that won him his two prestigious Teddy Awards from the Berlinale. He has this remarkable ability to photograph his men in the most seductive and sublime manner that when naked they seem so erotic and sensual that make the scenes of intimacy seem so natural and totally beautiful without ever appearing to be remotely just basically explicit or crude in any.
There are, as always, more than a few questions when certain (of the few) strands of the story seemed to go off-kilter… such as the abandoned Octavio seeking comfort with making out with two girls as if he had now suddenly embraced bisexuality. But then again Hernández never even attempts to make our jobs easy with his lyrical style of filmmaking that focuses more on a vision that encourages us to stretch our imagination a tad more than usual.
He is helped to this end with a heart-beating cast led by the stunning Hugo Catalán who made such an impact in ‘Clandestinos’ a few years ago, and newbie actor Alan Ramirez as the beautiful dancer Octavio.
If you like a conventional start, middle and end to your movies, then this is certainly not one for you. However, if you are up for a very intricate piece that is shot almost like a ballet with its seemingly choreographed moves and against an exhilarating soundtrack (composed by Arturo Villela) that is steeped in both passion and pain (with sex too), then you will revel in this extraordinary new movie.
When Emiliano says ‘I love you’ (as he often did), he means it for that moment. The trouble is that it is followed by a lot more moments. It’s doubtful if he ever will truly find happiness on earth.
When I sat watching writer/director John Carney’s latest movie that was hoping to follow on with the surprise success of his last hit…
Instead of being enthralled by the warbling tones of singer/songwriter Gretta on screen, I just couldn’t get a certain Sondheim lyric out of my head. ‘Once, yes, once for a lark, Twice, though, loses the spark’ which so summed up my feelings about the sickly sweet story unravelling in front of me.
Like his first movie ‘Once’ (which spawned the Tony Award winning Musical of the same name) this is the tale of a troubadour. In this instance Gretta who had accompanied Dave her budding rock star boyfriend to New York where he was being treated like royalty as he recorded his first album. Up to this point they had written songs together but the record company just wanted his music and they gave him anything and everything he wanted to ensure he produced a hit. It included a pretty assistant who stepped into his bed when Dave went off to LA without Gretta.
When she discovers this she storms off in a huff and lands on the doorstep of Steve a fellow Brit and ex-college mate from Bristol, whilst she plans to fly back home to the UK. He’s also a musician, a pretty bad one though, and he persuades her to accompany him to an open mic night at a small local bar. He forces her to perform and her wispy willowy lament goes down like a lead balloon except in the ears and eyes of Dan a drunk recently-fired record company executive who thinks she is a star in the making.
However no-one else does and as he cannot get her signed up with a record label, Dan sets out to make an album with her to prove that they are all wrong. As he is penniless and cannot shell out for a studio he hits on the idea of recording it all live on different locations on the streets of the city with the help of a few other hippie musicians willing to work for free. It makes for a pretty travelogue for the some of the scenic and hip places of New York that actually end up with a starring role in the movie.
As this unlikely pair of singer and manager/producer make music Gretta has to deal with the fact that Dave is getting famous but wants her back, whilst Dan is trying to re-connect to both his teenage daughter and his ex-wife whom he is estranged from. Hence the title of the movie, although only one of the two chooses to go it alone whilst the other decides to begin again by re-visiting their past.
The essential ingredients of making a movie about a singer/songwriter are that you need someone with a good voice and give them some good material to sing. This sadly has neither. The irritating and somewhat awkward Gretta as played by the oh-so-British Keira Knightly can limp through her songs but they sadly lack the energy and lasting power of the ones in ‘Once’. Mark Ruffalo energetically throws himself into the role of music genius Dan but there is the uncomfortable frisson between him and his protege who are never sure if they should have a romantic connection as well. I’m glad they don’t as they are so worlds apart that it would almost seem creepy.
Kudos though to young Hailee Steinfeld who was perfect as Dan’s daughter Violet, and also to handsome Adam Levine (ex Lead Singer of Maroon 5) making his acting debut as Dave for at least giving some real musicality to the piece.
I’m sure that despite all that it lacks it will still find an audience especially amongst aficionados of all those TV talent shows. I however can simply summarise it up with the same word that I counted Gretta used at least four time in the movie: it’s just cheesy.
Everything may still be coming up roses after all for Barbra Streisand as after years ‘in development’ which is Hollywood politesse for ‘sitting on the shelf in some studio head’s office gathering dust’, she may get to film her version of the famous musical Gypsy after all.
Downton Abbey’s creator Julian Fellows was commissioned to write a script for Barbra back in 2012 but then that was put on hold after the death of Arthur Laurents the co-creator of the original show/movie. Now Stephen Sondheim who composed the songs for the musical has sole approval of the director and star of any re-make and evidently he has approved Babs who wants to do both.
Now Universal Studios have hired Richard LaGravenese to write a new script and as he had penned ‘The Mirror has Two Faces’ for La Streisand he obviously knows how to keep the Diva happy. (Incidentally he also wrote HBO’s award-winning Liberace biopic ‘Behind the Candelabra).
One tiny (?) possible drawback is the fact that it has been 31 years since Babs last directed and starred in a musical namely YENTL, and now she’s reached the grand old age of 72 years, so they may need to think about changing her character from Mama Rose to Grandma Rose.