A Day in London Part 2 - Fallen Angels at the Menier Chocolate Factory

 

The combination of a Noel Coward play, Fallen Angels, a visit to a theatre I had never seen before (yes, it is called The Menier Chocolate Factory) and starring Janie Dee, one of my favourite actresses, persuaded me this was something not to miss. The theatre first. The seating was in an L shape, six rows with extremely tight bench seating, so quite cosy. The good thing is that the seating is very steep, so my view in the back row was fantastic. However, the legroom is close to nonexistent, which is OK for comfort because of the steepness but very difficult to get past anybody. One hundred and eighty seats, all with perfect views. 

The stage is fine for this one-set comedy, and below are the stars of the show. On the right is Janie Dee (some posts on this blog), and on the left is Alexandra Gilbreath, whom I should have recognised from lots on TV. They have most of the play to themselves, especially an evening when this meal is bolstered by drink. They are a riot. The dialogue is so fast and furious; it's wonderful. In the middle of the picture is Jane (or Saunders), the maid played by Sarah Twomey. She is absolutely brilliant, although she does have some good lines, and director Christopher Lunscombe pulls out all the stops. 

The three male members of the cast are less visible and all pretty dull. With a running time of over two hours, it was over in a flash. The journey home was fine, leaving the theatre at 5.15pm, and the train was waiting at Euston. I found a seat before it was standing room only, and I was home before 7pm. What a great day.

A Day in London Part 1 - Wes Anderson: The Archives at the Design Museum, London

 

Not the best time of year for a day in London, especially when it's cloudy and a cold 5°C. But the play I wanted to see had only one date left for a matinee. And an exhibition for one of my favourite movie directors was too good to miss. The Wes Anderson Archives are superb. The images below are a mixture of my photos and stock images. Somehow my camera settings went off the grid in my walk around the first part of the exhibition.

The displays are in the order of his films, starting with Rushmore. I should say that the first things we did see were from his first short film, Bottle Rocket. 

Rushmore (1998)

The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)

 

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004)

The Darjeeling Limited (2007) 

The Fantastic Mr Fox (2009)

Moonrise Kingdom (2012)

The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)

The Isle of Dogs (2018)

The French Dispatch (2021) 

Asteroid City (2023)

The Phoenician Scheme (2025)

I have to say that the presentation of costumes and so many other objects was exceptional. Those above are just a representation of what is on display.

As for the journey, the train was quite busy, as it was half term. I had to catch the train from Tring, as the Chiltern Line had a bus replacement for part of the route. (Thanks to Alison for the lift, which was fortuitous as the car park was full). The Underground was fine to Holland Park station, so a walk across the park to the Design Museum. I found a seat in the cafe for a nice early lunch. Then a walk back across the park after taking this photo on Kensington High Street of what was the huge Odeon Kensington and is now fancy apartments.

Quillbot for my Blog

 

Ever since Google withdrew the spellchecker for my blog, there must be so many posts that have spelling and grammatical mistakes. (I only used one 'm' in 'grammatical'). I have now found a great spellchecker called QuillBot that also corrects grammar. For example, those words in brackets now have quotation marks around them. It can also add a word if it thinks it needs it.

There is also a way of not just changing individual mistakes, but you can let QuillBot change them all with one click. I wish I had found it sooner.

H is for Hawk, No Other Choice and Send Help

 

The goshawk was the star of H is for Hawk. What an amazing creature it is. Claire Foy plays Helen, a fellow at Jesus College, Cambridge, where she teaches history and other stuff. But it's when her beloved father, played by Brendon Gleeson, dies that she struggles to cope. So enter Mabel, the goshawk who fills Helen's life to the detriment of her work. Emma Donoghue has adapted the famous book by Helen McDonald and Phillipa Lowthorpe directs with sensitivity. This is a rather sombre story; we feel Helen's struggles with grief and squalor despite the loving attention of her mother, played with absolute brilliance by Lindsay Duncan. 

Also on hand to help is Helen's best friend, played by Denise Gough with a strange antipodean accent. But it's Claire Foy who is so good. I have seen four of the films which have Oscar nominations for actress in a leading role, and none of them, in my opinion, are anything like as good as Foy. But this is a small film; it was only on at Hemel Hempstead for a week. There are no nominations for awards, not even at the Golden Globes. It is a slightly depressing film, so maybe that is why. But I loved the scenes in Cambridge and the music of the early twenty-first century and Helen's penchant for even earlier records. Apache by The Shadows is one of my all-time favourites. 

We could have done with some story about what happens after the film suddenly finishes. Guy Lodge in Sight and Sound Magazine calls it a "handsome, stout-hearted film" and pays tribute to Foy's "fine performance". Peter Bradshaw in his Guardian review was equally positive. 

One review of No Other Choice recommended that we watch it on the biggest screen possible. So when Cineworld at Hemel Hempstead showed it in their IMAX theatre, I paid the extra. I was very surprised that a South Korean subtitled film made its way to this huge auditorium, where I was one of only three in attendance. It was not even shown at the Odeon. Of course this is a Park Chan-wook film, of which I have seen five, including the English-language movie Stoker. There are particular scenes where the big screen comes into its own, especially the distant shots of the exteriors of the house and garden where much of the action takes place. And at the end, in an ultra-hi-tech factory.

But this is a strange story based on the book The Ax by Donald Westlake. Man-su, played by Lee Byung-hun, is made redundant from his many years at a paper factory. All he knows about is paper. He lives with his wife and two children in this lovely isolated house he shares with his wife (I thought Son-ye Jin was by far the best thing about the film – strong, supportive, hard-working and attractive). But Man-su has other ideas when he fails to secure alternative employment. Much of the story involves just the family. That was OK, but the scenes of Man-su trying to eliminate the competition for a new job descend into farce and chaos. Yes, they were cleverly filmed, and it's meant to be a satire, but their clash with family life seemed strained. I'm not sure whether a Western movie would tolerate what was going on and getting away with it. A black comedy, yes, but so uneven. Maybe I went in with my hopes too high.

There is one American song on the soundtrack: Sam and Dave's Hold On, I'm Comin' from 1966. Pumped out from the big IMAX speakers, this was something else. Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian gave the film four stars, which is just about right. Nicolas Rapolo in a long review in Sight & Sound magazine, calls it "comic yet grisly". He compares this film with the director's Decision to Leave, which I felt was far superior. I can now read the four-page spread by Arjun Sajip in the magazine.

Does this look like that mousy yet invaluable member of staff from Strategy and Planning? Rachel McAdams is almost unrecognisable as dowdy Linda Liddle, only on the plane to a conference as she knows more than anyone. When the plane goes down, who is the only other survivor but the new CEO Bradley Preston, played with unstoppable awfulness by Dylan O'Brien? You would think that Linda saving him from a certain death on the beach, tending to his injuries, and sheltering and feeding him would make him so thankful. But no. Even through the many times she helps him, he always reverts to type. Which is not very nice.

So basically a two-hander about surviving on a deserted island. Linda was a huge fan of the TV show Survivor, and her skills here are amazing. The sets are very clever, a jungle type of island where the many palm trees are a source of everything you might need. Including the spear Linda uses to make dinner. She doesn't want to be rescued, as moaning Bradley cannot think of anything else. Rachel McAdams holds the whole movie together. She had supporting roles in so many films I have seen to other starring performances such as Red Eye (2005), Spotlight (2015) and Game Night (2018).

It's just over halfway when things turn ugly. Linda might not be that friend you would always pray for in such circumstances. And Bradley has that permanent menace and entitlement that clashes with Linda's sense of fun. Until. Strangely enough, there are quite a few laughs along the way. Director Sam Raimi (amongst his many mainstream films is another comedy horror, Drag Me to Hell, that is also very clever) has made a very entertaining movie. There are reports of horror, but these are basically human clashes. Except maybe for the beast. But it's mainly an exciting romp. Mark Kermode thought it "just had the right degree of nasty and surprise" and that he had "an absolute ball". Me too. Obviously Sight and Sound magazine thought it too popular to include any mention. 

Movies at Home: The Deadly Affair, Open Fire and Arabesque

 

The Deadly Affair is an adaptation of John Le Carre's first book Call for the Dead. Here George Smiley is called Charles Dodds as Paramount had gained copyright for Smiley's name when they released The Spy who came in from the cold. Dodds is played by James Mason, I thought an odd choice, especially as Alec Guines wonderfully restrained in Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy. Mason shouts far too much, especially when he talks to his wife Ann (her name the same as the book) played by Harriet Anderson. I felt there was far too much about their relationship and not enough about the story.

Dodds talks to Samuel, a member of his organisation, in a park, almost an interrogation. But later Samuel is found dead.  When Dodds visits the bereaved wife (Simone Signoret) he becomes suspicious. And so the plot thickens. I liked the London scenes of 1967, it looks pretty grimy down The Embankment and Battersea Power Station. I thought that Harry Andrews was best thing about the film as an MI5 operative called Mendel.

I was not sure why we see rehearsals for Macbeth, except that there was an early role for Lynne Redgrave as teenage dogsbody Virgin Bumpus. She was brilliant. Of course it's Dodds whose plan at the end comes to fruition and the spies are dealt with. This was not a great movie, but intereting all the same.

Open Fire is actually a 1994 made for TV film. I have included it here as it was one of the first directed by Paul Greengrass. Based on the true story about gay criminal and nasty transvestite David Martin played by Rupert Graves. We are the 1970's, it's seedy and violent and so are the police. We follow Martin and his robbery'sincluding where he is discovered and shoots a member of the constabulary. The film explores his sexuality and his relationship with Sue Stephens played by Kate Hardie.

I liked how Martin's escape from custody was so well filmed, and the subsequent police search and a chase on foot through Hampstead Underground Station. Leading the police was Jim Carter (from Downton Abbey) as Detective Chief Superintendant Young. He makes the arrest. This was after one of them shot Stephen Waldorf by mistake. The film looked as dirty as it's subject matter.

I may not have seen Arabesque since I saw it in the cinema in 1966. Based on the 19061 novel The Cipher, it stars Gregory Peck and Sophia Loren in a Stanley Donen movie. Typical of it's time (unfortunately) it did win a BAFTA for best cinematography. But the whole thing looked like a Bond rip off and other scenes straight from North by Northwest. We are never quite sure whose side anyone is on as poor hapless Peck struggles through, chasing a scrap of paper with some hyroglyphics. 

This was a follow up for director Stanley Donen following his far more successful Charade. (See my review 19th April 2020). However there is one interesting scene of a building site where the builder was Cubitts. A wonderful firm back then called Holland, Hannen and Cubitts. Taken over by Tarmac who went bust in 1976.

Mark Kermode's Surround Sound - Part 2

 

Chapter 3  The Director's Vision

Mark starts this long chapter with Jordan Peele's creepy debut film Get Out where composer Michael Abels also scored his first film. We hear lots about the relationship between the director and composer. As an example Mark talks about the composer Anne Dudley working with director Paul Verhoeven. Anne talks to Mark about how a director might have trouble with a piece of orchestration, whether too fast, not fast enough, too loud or too soft, or even the wrong instrument. 

Mark mentions one theme from Manchester by the Sea. Director Kenneth Lonergan won the Oscar for best original screenplay, but according to Mark, let everyone down by ignoring Lesley Barber's score for the movie's most dramatic sequence and instead the oh so familiar Albinoni's Adagio in G Minor. Mark says "the result is disastrous". (Yes it's familiar but not worth the criticism.)

There is a lot about a technique some directors use called "temp tracks". They lay down some pre-existing music over a rough cut of the movie to get the composer started. Some of them hate this. We hear some examples. Then with big studio films, the composer might not just be inconverstion with the director, but also the producers, music supervisors and the editor without even the director being there. (These people tell the director separately what they think of the music).

More interestingly, we hear about partnerships between director and composer such as Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone (A Fistfull of Dollars etc), and Christopher Nolan and Hans Zimmer (Interstellar etc) Paul Thomas Anderson and Johnny Greenwood (There will be Blood etc), David Cronenberg and Howard Shore (Cosmopolis etc) and Yorgos Lanthimos and Jerskin Fendrix (Poor Things).  I'm surprised I have seen all these. Mark says about the last of these "the most adventurously inventive scotre of 2023", and that the director had asked for ther score before the film was even shot and (miraculously, 95% ended up in the film. Mark ends this chapter with a favourite film of his called Out of Blue. (No, this is one film I have not seen, nor has hardly anyone else). Loosely based on the Martin Amis 1997 novel Night Train. Mark loves the score and the film that did rather badly at the box office.

Soundtrack Selection -  Under the Skin (2013)

Maybe I'm one of the few people who went to see this film. Scarlett Johanson is an alien finding her way on Earth. Mark loves the soundtrack by British composer Mica Levi. You can hardly call it music, more just sounds. Not easy l;istening to it on it's own, but somehow matches the movie for it's strangeness. Mark thinks it "lends cohesion to a film that occasionally threatens to fall apart". I can agree with that. We hear about Levi's  other scores for films like Zone of Interest. 

Chapter 4   How did we get here?

Part 2 - From Goldsmith to Gudnadottir

Despite Mark's accolades for composer John Williams, he tells us he just prefers the music of Jerry Goldsmith. We hear a lot about his soundtracks. As we do for his "challenging" music. Next comes a part about composer Anne Dudley. (See my posts of 22nd April 2022 where there is a huge amount about her scores for so many films. And then on 24th June 2022 about her work with ABC, next on 15th August 2018 and January 2019 about the souindtrack for Mama Mia and 6th May 2022 for her work on Benedetta). Mark reminds us that Anne actually won an Oscar for scoring The Full Monty and only the second woman to do so. I did not know that. We hear about her career with the Art of Noise and working with many icons in the pop music industry. She scored so many films of which I was not aware. 

Mark describes Hans Zimmer as "the current blockbuster composer of the day" with over 200 films in over 40m years and two Oscars. He also presents live shows. We hear all about all the big movies that he scored and his work with Christopher Nolan. The stories about Hannibal and Dune are amazing. I had not heard of the next composer Shirley Walker or why she "held the record for composing more original scores for major studio features than any other woman". She scored many super hero movies and three Final Destination films. Next is Rachel Portman whose score for Emma (1997) won the Oscar. Her work includes radio and TV s well as films like The Cider House Rules and Chocolat which was also Oscar nominated. 

Mark says that Enrico Morricone being prolific is not the word with over 500 film and TV scores. I'm just not sure Mark's listin of so many does the book any favours. I wanted more about the person or some anecdotes. Like the fact that he didn't win an Oscar until 2016 for Taratino's The Hateful Eight. Lists again for A R Rahman, his Oscar and nominations. Icelamdic composer Johann Johansson gets a mention for Arrival and Hildur Guonadottir for Joker.

Soundtrack Selection - Drive My Car (2021)

Drive My Car is a wonderful film, and saved on my TV recordings. Ryusuke Hamaguchi's film was the first Japanese film to be nominated for a best picture Oscar. (Should have won). It did win best International Feature and nominations for best doirector and best adapted screenplay. Mark tells us this was his favourite score for that year composed by Eiko Ishibashi and is now a favourite album. But he calls it a strange film (I don't know why, its perfect). Mark describes the instruments the composer used that "feels like scenery" just as the director wanted. (Eiko's favourite film composer is John Barry, as he is mine. So why is he hardly mentioned in the book!) Where is his score for Out of Africa not mentioned. Just because it is too popular does not mean it's great and so much better than lots of movies that are mentioned. And Mark, it won the Oscar! Anyway, Mark completes this part with "it defies clinical assessment" and "the music is the movie". How can he be so wrong.

Chapter 5   The Long and Winding Road

From Compostion to Orchestration (and occasionally rejection)

This section starts with Elmer Bernstien who scored more than 150 films. Why must Mark just list so many. Better is stuff about composers and their own techniques for the process, Some might go into the studio with just the story, others with the full screenplay. All sorts of differnet ways. Isabel Waller-Bridge wants to see the picture with all it's visuals. Michel Jarr researched everything about Laurence of Arabia before starting on his score. We hear lost od anecdotes about ridiculous deadlines for the music. And even a composer's score being ditched completely for someone new. There are instances when a film and it's score have been fully completed, only for the studio to cancel it's distribution. 

There is a great part about Abbey Road Studios. Who and what was recorded there. John Barrett, the studio engineer there, tells us about everything that goes into a recording session. From the musicians to instruments, orchestrators music editors and lots more. In the booth there might be producers and others connected to the film, all wanting their say. There is a huge amount here about the ways the soundtrack ncan be recorded, lots of anecdotes and technical stuff. Really amazing what goes on. All very interesting. Mark end this part with "watching an orchestra play note perfect a piece they are rfeading for the very first time always seems like an extraordinary magic trick". But that's what they do. 

Soundtrack Selection - Brazil (1985)

Is "Terry Gilliam's dystopian masterpiece" going toom far? Mark goes to the "devasating ending" which includes  Michael Kamen's Bachianos Brazil Samba. The composer remembers one time when he thought he was being ditched for another composer. But Gilliam stuck by him. The whole soundtrack is worked around that piece. Recorded at Abbey Road Studios, this was the first their after it's major upgrade. For Mark, we have to "abandon reality and let our musical thoughts take flight". Well, I have not seen this film for a long time so I cannot comment. Maybe do some research.

Kingfisher at the Canal

I had just started on my way back home, walking down the Wendover Arm of the Grand Union Canal, when I saw a flash of blue in the trees. I only had my phone with me that has a very poor camera. But both these photos do have a speck of blue if you look hard enough. A beautiful kingfisher.

As I walked down the canal path, the bird flew from tree to tree just ahead. And I followed just behind. I stopped when the kingfisher stopped. Once near the end of this section of the canal path, a lady coming towards me from the opposite direction also stopped when I pointed out the bird, for which she was delighted. I just wish I had my camera.