Week 4 - You had a Droch Latha?

I am loathe to admit that I have nothing more positive to relate, to follow the perhaps rather negative impression created by my comments last week, with respect to this Monday’s Sound class. Perhaps the only memorable product of that afternoon was the first few lines of a song for Simon, composed by Gavin and myself, which I will refrain from including here so as to maintain a shred of professional loyalty. After all, Simon has a lot to offer and I understand that there is little point in moving on until everyone in the class is comfortable with the basics and therefore at the same level.

Screenwriting was uncharacteristically tame this week. We heard all the new three-minute premises and then decided on two for the whole class to choose and write a script from. Whilst we were beginning this process – finding external character goals and internal character needs – Richard gave saw us individually to provide feedback on our previous three-minute screenplays; which I have been longing for ever since we handed them in. So it proved to be rather an anti-climax. It turned out that my analysis of my own work was in one accord with Richard’s criticisms and neither of us was entirely certain whether it was worth developing further and yet neither did we want to give it up entirely…. In other words; nothing new. Still, I can have another shot with this new premise and see what happens. I think my goal should be to make writing a discipline. If I expect the quality of my writing to improve then I must schedule in the time to practise, whether we have a script for Richard or not. Surely if I was constantly and militantly writing I would have to eventually produce something which was not just okay, but good; or even great.

Wednesday began a bit earlier for me than usual with an MER Meeting which went fine, even with the absence of Adam. This was followed by an extremely brief Programme Meeting with poor Andy holding the fort as the only tutor in the building! Then we were in class considering whether Television is the new cinema. I’ve thought for a while that cinema has lost a lot of creativity and originality. Hollywood seems only to churn out remakes, sequels, films based on books, films based on comics, films based on TV series… stories that have been tried and they assume will already have an audience but nothing new; nothing daring, nothing brave. Cinema will always be a unique, social experience so in that sense I don’t think TV can ever replace it but in terms of ingenuity and pioneering it seems like there may be more interesting things to see from the sitting room couch than at the pictures.

The third instalment of The History of Cinema was delivered half by Andy, with insight into the emergence of the role of Director, and half by Martin Scorsese in an interesting documentary called The Director as Illusionist. This was really quite interesting and some of the films he talked about were quite new to me so I learned a lot from it. Also, I think because it was a personal journey from a great director’s point of view it added another dimension to it which made it more captivating. Andy finished off with a brief foretaste of German Expressionism Cinema, to whet our appetite for what is to come next year, and posed the question: “Was sound necessary for cinema to develop, or has it ruined the art form?” I’m assuming that ‘sound’ means, more specifically, dialogue and I’m pretty sure I know where I stand in response to this. However, we’ll be discussing it next week so I’ll wait until then to solidify my opinion.

Sunrise was a pleasant surprise. It looked like it was going to be the standard ‘cheating-husband’ story but in fact took an unexpected turn and became one of the most charming romances I’ve ever seen. It is strange that a film, which was so clearly a love story, would be constantly showing off with innovative special effects and also a unique structure whereby everything is sorted by half-way through the film. In fact the entire middle section was a glorious revel in the reawakened passion between two lovers where nothing is forcing them apart and the protagonist meets no obstacles. It was beautiful, it was a masterpiece, it was refreshing, and it was silent! Not a word spoken and yet far from failing to engage it produced, with the skilful marriage of images and music, what can only be described as magic.

I missed a Sound class on Friday afternoon so that I could travel up to Inverness for the Awards Ceremony of MG Alba’s FilmG competition, where my short film Droch Latha? (watch here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2x22J1Sw74) was shortlisted for Best Performance. Unfortunately I didn’t win anything but it was an enjoyable event, a worthwhile experience and most of all a kick up the butt of my complacency to rekindle the passion and get me eager to make more (better!) films.