Monthly culture: September 2017
Friday, October 13th, 2017 06:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tamaranth02SEP17: The Limehouse Golem, Greenwich Picturehouse
I read, long ago, the Peter Ackroyd novel on which this is based: I had forgotten nearly everything about it, and was entirely swept away by the narrative. It's a murder mystery set in Limehouse in the 1880s: Inspector Kildare (whose career has been blighted by rumours that he's not the marrying kind) is assigned to the investigation of a series of gruesome murders. The four main suspects are Karl Marx, George Gissing, Dan Leno and playwright John Cree -- whose wife, music-hall performer Lizzie, is subsequently accused of poisoning her husband. The killer has left a series of confessional writings in the margins of Thomas de Quincy's book about the Ratcliffe Highway murders: Kildare is convinced that he can unravel the clues therein, save innocent Lizzie from the rope and reveal the killer. Like all the men in this film (though less so than some), he sees himself as a white knight, and expects admiration for his selfless acts. None of the women in the film are kind, compassionate or sisterly -- beginning with Lizzie's mother -- and Lizzie may well need rescuing.
Fabulous performances from Bill Nighy as Kildare, Olivia Cook as Lizzie, Douglas Booth as Dan Leno (truly awesome): a gloomy, threatening, monochrome London, contrasted with the bright artifice of the music hall and the red splash of blood as Kildare reviews each murder: some very interesting takes on gender, with both Lizzie and Dan cross-dressing on stage. One of the best films I've seen this year.
14SEP17: Outlaws to In-Laws, King's Head Theatre
Seven short plays, the first set in 1953 (the Coronation) and the last in 2017 (a gay wedding), each by a different author, each illustrating how the lievs of gay men have changed decade by decade. Blackmail in the Sixties, a National Front skinhead and a black student in the Seventies (the latter reading The Left Hand of Darkness: kemmer as a chat-up line!), the AIDS crisis and Clause 28 in the Eighties, a Princess Di impersonator in 1997, online cruising in the early 2000s ... Twenty roles, six actors, some excellent acting: some of the playlets are really too short for their subjects, and some are more successful than others. But the final line -- 'there's a future to be getting on with', and Robin's sheer satisfaction at getting to a point where homosexuality is 'boring', do reinforce the theme that things are, slowly, getting better.
20SEP17: Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Wimbledon Odeon
Hadn't seen the first one, but still enjoyed this as lightweight entertainment. Excellent performance from Elton John. Second film of the summer to have '(Take Me Home) Country Roads' as a plot point. Credible female villain. Fun.
21SEP17: Giselle, English National Ballet at Sadler's Wells
Akram Khan choreography, music adapted (very loosely) from the original score, setting updated to a science-fictional world of refugees and almost-alien aristocrats: not the Giselle I was expecting. Gorgeous, unsettling, physically compelling -- but I still feel I don't have the grammar, or something, to 'get' dance, modern or traditional.
30SEP17: The Tempest, Greenwich Theatre
Another non-traditional production of a classic: this is Bilimankhwe International Theatre's post-colonial Tempest, bringing out the tension between incomer Prospero and the islanders he enslaves. Most of the actors (including both Ariels -- a doubled spirit) were black, and some of the dialogue was spoken in Chichewa, a Malawian language, with surtitles. A play full of motion, with a great deal of dance and live music supplied by an on-stage band.
My companion wasn't familiar with the play, and had assumed that Prospero was the villain: and yes, he does, canonically, behave in ways we now read as villainous: oppressing and bespelling his daughter, enslaving Ariel, abusing Caliban, asserting his right over the island even though Sycorax arrived in almost exactly the same way (exiled, cast adrift, accompanied by a child). A compelling, thought-provoking production.
I read, long ago, the Peter Ackroyd novel on which this is based: I had forgotten nearly everything about it, and was entirely swept away by the narrative. It's a murder mystery set in Limehouse in the 1880s: Inspector Kildare (whose career has been blighted by rumours that he's not the marrying kind) is assigned to the investigation of a series of gruesome murders. The four main suspects are Karl Marx, George Gissing, Dan Leno and playwright John Cree -- whose wife, music-hall performer Lizzie, is subsequently accused of poisoning her husband. The killer has left a series of confessional writings in the margins of Thomas de Quincy's book about the Ratcliffe Highway murders: Kildare is convinced that he can unravel the clues therein, save innocent Lizzie from the rope and reveal the killer. Like all the men in this film (though less so than some), he sees himself as a white knight, and expects admiration for his selfless acts. None of the women in the film are kind, compassionate or sisterly -- beginning with Lizzie's mother -- and Lizzie may well need rescuing.
Fabulous performances from Bill Nighy as Kildare, Olivia Cook as Lizzie, Douglas Booth as Dan Leno (truly awesome): a gloomy, threatening, monochrome London, contrasted with the bright artifice of the music hall and the red splash of blood as Kildare reviews each murder: some very interesting takes on gender, with both Lizzie and Dan cross-dressing on stage. One of the best films I've seen this year.
14SEP17: Outlaws to In-Laws, King's Head Theatre
Seven short plays, the first set in 1953 (the Coronation) and the last in 2017 (a gay wedding), each by a different author, each illustrating how the lievs of gay men have changed decade by decade. Blackmail in the Sixties, a National Front skinhead and a black student in the Seventies (the latter reading The Left Hand of Darkness: kemmer as a chat-up line!), the AIDS crisis and Clause 28 in the Eighties, a Princess Di impersonator in 1997, online cruising in the early 2000s ... Twenty roles, six actors, some excellent acting: some of the playlets are really too short for their subjects, and some are more successful than others. But the final line -- 'there's a future to be getting on with', and Robin's sheer satisfaction at getting to a point where homosexuality is 'boring', do reinforce the theme that things are, slowly, getting better.
20SEP17: Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Wimbledon Odeon
Hadn't seen the first one, but still enjoyed this as lightweight entertainment. Excellent performance from Elton John. Second film of the summer to have '(Take Me Home) Country Roads' as a plot point. Credible female villain. Fun.
21SEP17: Giselle, English National Ballet at Sadler's Wells
Akram Khan choreography, music adapted (very loosely) from the original score, setting updated to a science-fictional world of refugees and almost-alien aristocrats: not the Giselle I was expecting. Gorgeous, unsettling, physically compelling -- but I still feel I don't have the grammar, or something, to 'get' dance, modern or traditional.
30SEP17: The Tempest, Greenwich Theatre
Another non-traditional production of a classic: this is Bilimankhwe International Theatre's post-colonial Tempest, bringing out the tension between incomer Prospero and the islanders he enslaves. Most of the actors (including both Ariels -- a doubled spirit) were black, and some of the dialogue was spoken in Chichewa, a Malawian language, with surtitles. A play full of motion, with a great deal of dance and live music supplied by an on-stage band.
My companion wasn't familiar with the play, and had assumed that Prospero was the villain: and yes, he does, canonically, behave in ways we now read as villainous: oppressing and bespelling his daughter, enslaving Ariel, abusing Caliban, asserting his right over the island even though Sycorax arrived in almost exactly the same way (exiled, cast adrift, accompanied by a child). A compelling, thought-provoking production.
