Darklight / Considine again / Movie waffle
// July 3rd, 2008 // 5 Comments » // films
At the risk of going on about Meadows and Considine a bit too much… (See my Considine, This is England, and Once Upon a Time in the Midlands posts)… here’s one more!
I went to the darklight screening of Dead Man’s Shoes last weekend. Their was an exciting buzz in the air at the IFI. I don’t go to half as much stuff like this as I’d like to. I really enjoy festivals of any kind – yet I think this is the only festival-like event I’ve managed to get to this year, pathetic. I’ve seen Dead Man’s Shoes a couple of times before but it was great to see it in the IFI with an appreciative audience. There wasn’t a single rustle of sweet packets nor any sounds from mobile phones. Paddy Considine was supposed to introduce the film but instead it was announced that he’d do a Q&A afterwards, which was a bit dissapointing as I just knew there’d be wanky drawma students asking wanky drawma questions.
Shane Meadows is a brilliant director and Considine is a brilliant actor. They wrote Dead Man’s Shoes together. So naturally its a brilliant movie. Its really funny in places and downright evil in others. Toby Kebbell is also brilliant as Considine’s ’spastic brother’. He played Rob Gretton in Control, the same character who Considine played in 24 Hour Party People. There’s a bit of trivia for you that’s not even on IMDB yet. You read it here first. Breaking news.
I always feel a lot more connected to movies that are a bit closer to home. Grounded in a world that remotely resembles my own. I can’t really connect with lots of the American films that people go on about. On a random brain scan, the first two to pop into my head that I saw recently are Blood Diamond and The assasination of Jesse James. Both highly recommended by lots of people but I thought Blood Diamond was Hollywood by numbers. And The Assassination of Jesse James was well boring and about two hours too long. Most of it was filler considering all that happened is in the title. And its tone and pace seemed to aspire to the far superior Unforgiven – but lacking in good content. Actually they’re both bad examples to illustrate my point as they wouldn’t be relevant to anyone’s life really. But the point is that good UK movies set in modern times really strike a chord with me, whereas those set in a world I’ve no relation to at all, which is nearly every movie in this Must see movies of 2008 list, are usually gone from my memory as soon as the credits roll.
So back to the darklight. I’m not usually much of a fanboy but it was cool seeing Considine in person. Good idea getting him over. There’s something very likeable and down to earth about him – and that comes across in most of his films. Even if he was answering wanky questions. Actually, the questions weren’t so bad it’s just the type of people here who ask questions at something like that. They seem to love the sound of their own voice or something.
