Author: Claude

Reel 44: When Musicians Direct

No, you’re not missing an episode…we are.

I (Claude) have no idea how it happened but our recording for Episode 43 has simply vanished. Having said that, however, Sean and I have committed to re-recording the show and you’ll get it in your feed, just out of order.

In the meantime, here’s Episode 44, which focuses on films that are directed not so much by film directors, but by people who are more conventionally known for their musical careers.

In Part One we have True Stories, from 1986 and directed by David Byrne, who you probably know is the founder of the band Talking Heads. As loose and unformatted as this film appears to be, there was in fact a script. And while many of the characters may seem to be a little weird to the casual observer, it’s their brand of weird and they wouldn’t have it any other way. It’s a touching tribute to small-town America. (Trust me, I lived in a Virgil, Texas for five years, only it was in New Jersey.)

From there we move on to Part Two, and a film from 2014 called God Help the Girl, written and directed by Stuart Murdoch. Murdoch is one of the founders of the band Belle and Sebastian, and it’s no small coincidence that “God Help the Girl” was also the name of a 2009 music project that he worked on, where female vocalists sang songs about girls and women. One of the standout voices on that album was Catherine Ireton, who appears on about two-thirds of the tracks in one form or another. At any rate, God Help the Girl (the film) is about a trio of young adults who help each other find direction through their music.

Both of these films use the music to help us get into the singer’s head, but they deviate from “traditional” musicals in that the action doesn’t stop completely while the character is singing. In True Stories the singing is more like dialogue. In fact, in a couple of cases dialogue segues into singing and then back again. In God Help the Girl the characters sometimes may occasionally sing to nobody in particular. But then again it’s part of the action and doesn’t prevent the story from moving forward.

COMING ATTRACTIONS:

Episode 43 is next. Pay attention.

Reel 42: Off-Beat Musical Biopics

Biographical films are always tricky to navigate, largely because they need to choose a point of view to work from. For instance, when talking with other people about the recent biopic Elvis, some viewers were disappointed that we didn’t get to see Elvis Presley eating one of his weird sandwiches, or that we didn’t get the encounter with President Nixon. But the focus of that film was Elvis’ relationship with his manager, Tom Parker.

So we have to imagine that it’s going to become even more complicated when the film’s subject is still alive, as we delve into this episode’s films. First up is 2007’s I’m Not There. The life of Bob Dylan is examined through the viewpoints of five different fictional characters. Each character represents a specific phase of Dylan’s life.

In Part 2 we concentrate on 2014’s Love and Mercy, which centers on two specific eras of Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson. First we have his mid-60s period, which outlines the growing pains that the band went through, and then we jump to the 1980s, where he’s basically a broken man under the thumb of his therapist. We don’t get the whole story of how he got out from under there, but again it’s part of the film’s viewpoint that there are events in the story that we don’t get to see.

COMING ATTRACTIONS: 

In our next episode we spend some time in Dublin, with a pair of films that have many points in common, including one that’s led to an interesting theory tying them together. First up is The Commitments, Alan Parker’s 1991 film about a band’s rise and fall. From there we jump to 2007 to talk about a truly delightful film called Once, written and directed by John Carney, about a week in the life of a pair of struggling musicians, and the songs that underline their relationship. 

Reel 9: SorkinFest Part IV–The Credited Rewrites

We’re closing in on the end of SorkinFest as we get to Part 4 of our five-part series looking at the work of Aaron Sorkin. And this time around we’re looking at a couple of films that Sorkin had a public hand in writing–or, more accurately, re-writing: 1993’s Malice, starring Nicole Kidman and Alec Baldwin, and Moneyball, the 2011 film starring Brad Pitt and Philip Seymour Hoffman. 

These two films couldn’t be more different in their subject matter or their approach to storytelling, but Aaron Sorkin has a few tricks up his sleeve that have you realizing that, even when he isn’t the primary writer, he’s going to manage to put his stamp on the film anyway. 

NOTE: I (Claude) accidentally put in the code for an older episode in the space below. My apologies if you were confused.

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Reel 7: Sorkinfest, Part 2

Aaaand, we’re finally back, thank goodness.

SorkinFest continues with the two films that Aaron Sorkin wrote after his series Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip was cancelled after only one season. (Interestingly, the same people who seemed kind of disappointed in Studio 60 as it aired are viewing it a little more generously in retrospect.)

First we take a look at 2007’s Charlie Wilson’s War, the more-or-less true story of Congressman Charlie Wilson of Texas, who manages to almost single-handedly drum up political and financial support for the Afghan people in their battle against the Soviet Union in the 1980s. This was Mike Nichols’ last theatrical film, and it was a great film to go out on.

We then move on to 2010’s The Social Network, directed by David Fincher. This film doesn’t hew quite as closely to the way it all went down in real life, but you do get the broader outlines of the story without casting a specific good guy or bad guy, and in that respect it’s a strong movie that’s easy to follow despite its non-linear structure.

Coming Attractions: Reel 8 will feature a pair of biographical films Sorkin worked on: Steve Jobs (2015) and Sorkin’s directorial debut, Molly’s Game (2017). Both films are available for streaming on Netflix, and can be rented or purchased through the usual outlets.

Reel 2: Malcolm X, Selma

In today’s episode, Sean and Claude take a look at two films about civil rights leaders of the 1960s: Malcolm X (1992), directed by Spike Lee, and Selma (2014), directed by Ava DuVernay.

In general, people have very different images of these two icons in their heads: Martin Luther King as the nonviolent, peaceful “passive resistance” guy and Malcolm X as a radical out to get what he wants “By Any Means Necessary”. And for many, that painted him as a violent person.

But Malcolm X’s tactics were steeped in defense, not offense. And unfortunately his break from the Nation of Islam crowd came just a little too late. However, in reviewing these films we discover that there were many more things these men had in common than not.

Your podcatcher may or may not have this show available (the show as a whole is still worming its way into directories), but you can always download or listen to it here:

Reel 1: 1968 Science Fiction

That this didn’t appear sooner is totally on me (Claude). I promise, the workflow on this show is improving.

For our first show, we have to go back to the start, of course. Specifically, Sean’s start. We go back to the year of his birth and check out a couple of science fiction movies that were both released in 1968, but which have very different outlooks on what the future is going to be like. Sit back and enjoy as we discuss Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey and the original Planet of the Apes, directed by Franklin Schaffner.

This being our first “real” episode, we do hope you’ll forgive a couple of weird technical glitches that we’ve been working on, and focus instead on the great conversation we had. 

Reel 1 Preview

In our honest-to-goodness first episode, Sean and Claude take a look at two science fiction films which were both released in 1968, but which couldn’t have more different views with regard to how things turn out in the future.

Tune in on August 24th when we look at 2001: A Space Odyssey and the original Planet of the Apes.

Viewing options for these films (via JustWatch.com):