Fiddler on the Roof - Sunrise Sunset

Just finished watching Fiddler on the Roof.  Wonderful storytelling.  Felt the need to share the film's centrepiece song Sunrise Sunset.  Sung during the wedding of Tzeitel and Motel, the sung is sweet, moving and beautifully performed here with an Oscar-winning arrangement.  Tear-jerking for all the right reasons.

The Favourite - not quite my favourite

Earlier this year Olivia Coleman won an Oscar for her performance as Queen Anne in The Favourite.  She has been a stalwart of British TV and transatlantic film for years, and rightfully was honoured for the work she has been involved in.  It feels like there is a limit number of female actors who are allowed to be big stars as they age, Coleman is only 45, but the industry appears to be grooming her as the next Judi Dench.  Why else would she be cast as two versions of the British monarch in two years (she has since been cast as our very own Liz in the 4th series of The Crown)?  Watching The Favourite reveals why she was the Academy's choice this year, her character swings from the regal to the mad, from isolation to outrageous expressiveness, and crucially goes through a decent into weakness and madness that bares her inner self.  It's a classic Oscar-bait role.

The Favourite puts a 17th century spin on both the class and gender differences that lie at the heart of Western society.  Starring alongside Coleman is an actress who matches her step for step - Rachel Weisz is outstanding as Anne's confidant, secret lover and #1 adviser Sarah Churchill.  It's a story about how throughout history there have been women as powerful, driven and Machiavellian as any men in the modern era, and men as vain and love-stricken as any doting 1950s wife was expected to be.  The plot focuses on intrigue at court as Queen Anne's health fails and war in France comes to its final stages.  Churchill attempts to run the country and military over the lesser-qualified heads of the simpering men of parliament.  Into this lands Churchill's cousin Abigail Marsham (Emma Stone) - vying to regain influence in the only way a woman in the 17th century could rely, through the favour of a man (or perhaps woman) of power and wealth.

Filmed on site at Hatfield house in Hertfordshire, the production team have gone to extraordinary lengths to capture the location on screen.  The cinematography makes liberal use of a fish eye lens, often sitting in one locations and pivoting around to follow movement - bringing to the attention of the viewer the fact this is very much not a set.  Extensive use of candle light necessitates expert lighting to keep everything as dark as possible while picking out facial detail - perfectly executed here.  The film rightly won Oscars for both production design and costume.  Black and white costumes feature strongly amongst its female protagonists, emphasising their role as central power-brokers as opposed to simpering extras.

All this praise, and yet The Favourite didn't completely grip me.  Perhaps it was the niggling feeling that the use of the fish eye lens was mostly to show off Hatfield House rather than an artistic decision?  Perhaps 'intrigue at court' plot lines featuring British monarchs have become so commonplace that they bore me?  Perhaps there's a subconscious part of my brain getting discombobulated by the lack of patriarchy (all those simpering make-up-wearing idiots chasing adoringly after partially-interested women - is this what it is like to watch most films as a woman?).  Whatever it is, I'm sure it will recede upon a second viewing - there are simply too many good things to say about this film.  The Favourite is obviously a film I will recommend.

BlacKkKlansman - Spike Lee isn't it

Spike Lee has spent a career making the films America needed to see.  I have sometimes wondered if Lee's films would be as well-regarded if there was more black directors telling these stories.  His films are sometimes too shmaltzy and play to a contemporary audience at the expense of longevity (Do the Right Thing is extraordinarily dated in its style, 25th Hour is laden with visual cues that were powerful in the aftermath of 9/11 - less so as time goes on) - but he is always telling the story that America needs to hear.  His films are striking and carry weight to a contemporary audience.  All films are political - Lee's always more overtly than others.  Sometimes though, overt is good.  Overt is powerful.  Overt makes you think.

BlacKkKlansman was made in 2017 in the aftermath of the ascension of Donald Trump to the US presidency, and the ushering in of an era of regressive racial politics, reversal of social gains and unleashing of a new wave of racism on to American streets.  It seemed as if years of liberal social progress was being wiped out in a moment, with an increase in police murders of young black men and fascists emboldened on America's streets aping the president's codified racism.  It is against this background that Lee stepped up to make BlacKkKlansman - adapted from a true story of a black policeman who infiltrated a local KKK group in small town Colorado.  John David Washington is Ron Stallworth - Colorado Springs' first ever black policeman.  His first job is to spy on a civil rights rally, but soon stumbles across the local KKK cell - calling them to make contact and before long being invited along to meetings.  Adam Driver plays Stallworth's partner Flip Zimmerman, himself Jewish and as much an outsider to the KKK as Ron himself.  However Zimmerman is white, and so is able to infiltrate the KKK meetings in person, pretending to be Stallworth.

The film makes two crucial points.  One is that laughing at racists is good.  Two is that the racists of the 1970s never went away - they've just been waiting for their time to rise again.  The script borrows heavily from what any contemporary audience will recognise as Trumpian language, drawing parallels between the leader of the KKK and Trump.  The men and one woman of the KKK that we see are laughably idiotic in their views and behaviours, but never are they anything less than dangerous.  As it was in the 1970s so it is now, the danger posed by hatred on our streets is frightening and real, and should be countered wherever it is found.

I was initially disappointed that Stallworth's character wasn't more rounded.  He appears at the start of the film almost as a Deus ex Machina ready to kick KKK ass on the white bred streets of Colorado.  Who is he?  Why is he here?  My girlfriend pointed out that this is actually a strength in the film.  Stallworth could be anyone.  It doesn't matter who he is or how he got here, he's an average American Joe who wants to be a cop, meet a nice girl and build a future.  He could be any one of us.  He shouldn't have to justify his existence or feel a gripping fear when getting searched by the police just because of the colour of his skin.  The fact he does have to think and feel that way is what is wrong with America.  It has been wrong for a very long time, and a divisive president in the white house isn't going to heal those wounds any time soon.  The best artists like Lee can do is show a mirror to the US and get everyone to ask themselves if this is a society they want to live in.  Lee's final montage of real life events is powerful (to a contemporary audience - see above comments though) and underscores that this is story American needs to see.  We in the UK would do well to remind ourselves that democracy and freedom isn't something we should take granted.  Who knows if we will get our very own Trump one day.  And who knows what will become of this nation.