Tyneside Cinema Faces a New Competitor
Everyman Cinemas is set to open a new arthouse cinema on Grey Street to rival Tyneside Cinema. But with declining interest in specialised films is this decision viable?
Tag: cinema
Images of the Old Odeon Interior
The demolition of the Old Odeon will begin in November 2016. Here are a few images of the original interior.
British Cinema’s North-South Divide: In Conversation with Tom Jackson
Northern Realism versus ‘Southern Splendour’ – two common ways of imagining the geography and the stories of the United Kingdom.
Summer Film Viewing
Followers of this site will already know of my love for Jafar Panahi and the Iranian cinema in general, so it is fairly straightforward that I would find Closed Curtain (Panahi, 2013) appealing in all of its postmodern, metatextual exuberance. It is a film which may seem unintelligible to audiences unaware of the director’s plight… Continue reading Summer Film Viewing
The Tribe (Miroslav Slaboshpitsky, 2015)
It could be said that like the elongated motorway sequence in Solaris (1972), supposedly included to alienate audiences unworthy of an Andrei Tarkovsky film, Miroslav Slaboshpitsky offers a similar manoeuvre by warning us both in the trailer and at the film’s inception that The Tribe will include no subtitles, voice-over or any other explanation of… Continue reading The Tribe (Miroslav Slaboshpitsky, 2015)
Whiplash, Jazz and Creativity
It could be said that the history of jazz has followed the same course as the history of the American cinema. Born around the same time in the late 19th century – one in the Deep South, the other in France – and progressing to become the popular American art forms of choice in the… Continue reading Whiplash, Jazz and Creativity
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (Alejandro González Iñárritu, 2015)
In the first years of the 21st century, Hollywood discovered a thirst for male and female characters with superhuman powers. These extraordinary individuals were able to confront the type of modern crime that has progressively rendered the classical systems of state power – the police and governmental intelligence services – helpless. Exploiting the widespread paranoia… Continue reading Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (Alejandro González Iñárritu, 2015)
2014: The Year’s Best Films
Here’s my list of the ten best films of the year: Leviathan (Andrey Zvyagintsev) Two Days, One Night (Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne)* Boyhood (Richard Linklater) Mr. Turner (Mike Leigh) The Wind Rises (Hayao Miyazaki) Under the Skin (Jonathan Glazer) The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson) Starred Up (David Mackenzie) Winter Sleep (Nuri Bilge Ceylan) Her… Continue reading 2014: The Year’s Best Films
Only Lovers Left Alive: Jim Jarmusch and the Vampire Genre
Although the vampire genre has always proved popular within both cinema and literature, the 21st century has witnessed a staggering rise in the amount of films centred on vampires. From the profoundly beloved Twilight Saga (2008-2012) to the obscure Thirst (Park Chan-wook, 2009) and the upcoming Dracula Untold (Gary Shore, 2014), it would be difficult… Continue reading Only Lovers Left Alive: Jim Jarmusch and the Vampire Genre
Slow Cinema and Norte, the End of History
To most audiences, to describe a film as ‘slow’ is to give it a negative value judgement. In answer to the question ‘why didn’t you like the film?’ one often hears the response ‘oh because it was so slow’, especially in relation to non-mainstream and art cinema. The word ‘slow’ regularly works as a… Continue reading Slow Cinema and Norte, the End of History
