I was so busy organising a teen film festival last week that I completely forgot to mention what a bonkers clocks week it was for new teen movies. Young Adult, Martha Marcy May Marlene and Chronicle all more or less fit the profile, and two of them already feature in my Best Movies of 2012 list. Cinemas showing all three are few and far between, but if you happen to live near the West India Quay Cineworld then there’s a hell of a triple bill waiting for you one night this week.
Consumer Advice: Contains strong language and violence
According to the extended classification information, the aforementioned language is ‘often used in tense war zone scenarios by exasperated or angry soldiers’, but not both, presumably. Most of the film is ‘shot with a hand-held camera’ (big surprise there then) and there is also ‘somemild and moderate languagesuch as ‘dick’, ‘shit’ and ‘Goddamn” if ‘fuck’ isn’t your cup of tea.
Consumer Advice: Contains strong language, once very strong, and strong bloody violence
The most fascinating BBFC guidelines are always the ones that use the word ‘once’. It has the immediate effect of forcing everyone in the cinema (or maybe it’s just me) to sit and wait for the word ‘cunt’. You know it’s only going to happen once. And you don’t want to miss it.
Consumer Advice: Contains strong language and bloody violence
There are ‘around 30 uses of strong language’ in Egde of Darkness and the violence is described extensively by the BBFC, using phrases such as ‘blood sprays’, ‘bloody gore’, ‘huge splashes of blood’ and ‘brief blood spurts’.
But what I’m really excited to see are the ‘mild sex references (for example ‘you wanted to have sex with her’)’ and the ‘mildly upsetting scenes of people vomiting’. Hardcore.
Consumer Advice: Contains one mouthed use of very strong language
If ever you needed an example of the absurdity of the ratings system, here it is. Here is a description of the scene mentioned in the above guideline:
‘Eliza has caused a traffic jam and is facing a barrage of abuse by the frustrated drivers behind her. One such driver shouts: ‘We can’t move, you cunt!’. The very strong language is actually inaudible as it is obscured by the coincidental blaring of a car horn but it is clearly identifiable from the character’s lip movements. Its presence is further confirmed when Eliza upbraids the man for using ‘the c-word in front of a child’.’
So not only is there no actual use of the word ‘cunt’ but its use is also presented in an entirely negative light and explicitly criticised by the lead character. And yet the scene is deemed to be inappropriate for every 14-year-old in the country. For once, the MPAA were actually the voice of reason here, passing it with a sensible PG-13 rating in the States. Whereas the BBFC seem more concerned with explaining why it didn’t quite make it into the 18-category.
Chances are you’re already very familiar with Precious, this year’s little-indie-that-could which has spent most of the last month sweeping through award ceremonies, leaving scores of disgruntled Anna Kendricks in its path. This week it FINALLY makes it to UK cinemas, although you might need a bit of help identifying it on the marquee…
Originally, the movie was called Push, the same title as the novel it was based on. This is a perfectly good title. Unfortunately, that shit Dakota Fanning movie was swanning around at about the same time, so they decided to change it. This is where the madness began. They chose the unnecessarily long title Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire. To make matters worse, they’ve decided to have everything misspelled in the film’s title sequence, with the correct spellings in brackets (to reflect the lead character’s illiteracy). And because the BBFC use the on-screen title to determine the name of a movie, the technical UK title of this film is:
PRECIOUS (BASE ON NOL BY SAF) (BASED ON THE NOVEL ‘PUSH’ BY SAPPHIRE)
Not sure they’ll be using that at your local Odeon though.
20 word review
An incredibly powerful film whose two central performances more than make up for director Lee Daniel’s relentlessly gimmicky visual approach.
10 word review
Looks like a mid-nineties 2Pac video, but with better acting.
We’re trying not to write too much Sundance stuff, because it tends to descend into pointless jealous whinging, but one movie that we’re particularly interested in is Cyrus, the mainstream-crossover-attempt from Mumblecore grandaddies the Duplass Brothers.
[If you don't know about Mumblecore, go home now.]
It premiered at Sundance last night and there’s also a new trailer online:
The exciting thing about Cyrus is that, like Greenberg (a.k.a. Mumblecore Crossover No. 2), it looks as if the Brothers Duplass have just made a Mumblecore movie like any other, except this one has famous people in it.
All those wobbly camera moves and rambly conversations are making me want to catch the next flight to Utah.
Or just wait a couple of months and then pop down the I.C.A.
I know this should technically be in the trailers section but here’s the promo for that new Spike Jonze short you’ve read so much about on ‘the blogosphere’. Looks pretty good, doesn’t it? Even if the Absolut sponsorship gets a bit over-wa-helming.
And that kid from Boy A is definitely the next big thing.
