In celebration of two recent first love themed releases, GOODBYE FIRST LOVE and CAFE DE FLORE, I’ve compiled a list for Grolsch Film Works of my top five painful first love films, which includes minor rants about my fetish for John Keats, and some casual Baz Luhrmann-bashing. And then I made a moodboard.
The last image is a photo of billboard art by Robert Montgomery.
Posted in Art, Fashion, Film, Inspiration
Grolsch Film Works website has just launched and I’ve written a piece on cinema’s top five sad grads. Read here and you should have a good old browse of the website too! For inspirational joy, and proving that quarter-life crises can also be pretty (crap), I include a couple of my fave pics below.
Posted in Fashion, Film, Inspiration, Uncategorized
My interview with Jesus Lopez on his debut prize-winning film ‘Ephemeral Nature’, for Wonderland magazine, is here.
Drive (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2011) must be the filmic equivalent of a cigarette and small talk with a Dalston hipster. Everything looks bloody great, don’t get me wrong, until you start talking, and quickly begin to realise that this is going to be about as deep as a puddle. Based on a novel by James Sallis, Drive tells the story of an unnamed mechanic and stunt driver for films (Ryan Gosling), who becomes embroiled in the seedy LA underworld of speed racing and gangster crime, while also falling for his married neighbour, a young single mother whose husband’s in prison (Carey Mulligan).
For all the soaring LA skylines and Friday night sex music, the film remains an attractive disappointment. What would make a cracking music video, just doesn’t have the depth of human interest or emotion to be sustained over two hours.
Ryan Gosling has all the charisma of a bowl of porridge, and his dialogue’s about as lumpy. Irene (Carey Mulligan) is utterly cute and charming, but entirely miscast as a lonely single mother. For a start, her creamy, dimpled, Hollywood complexion and calm exterior belie apparent years of single mothering in a rough part of LA. Her chemistry with Gosling is zilch, though at least this is more than what fizzles between her and her gangster husband (which can only be succinctly graded as double zilch). Apparently, Driver and Irene’s relationship is platonic and romantic, and this is the point. I’m sceptical. At the very least, I can believe why she would fall for Gosling, and the gentle way he looks after her child; you can practically hear her ovaries pinging away as she watches Gosling and son together in front of the TV, though if you listen more carefully, they’re probably those of the audience behind you. Am I being unkind? Probably.
Drive, like many mainstream ‘alternative’ or ‘artsy’ films at the moment, is just too aware of itself to provide anything other than feather light escapism. I know this is why most people, myself included, go to the cinema, but sometimes escapism can be so light as to poof away into nothingness. I was so looking forward to the film, after rave reviews from good friends and film critics, but Drive left me bone cold and bored. It also reminded me of (500) Days of Summer (Marc Webb, 2009), although it’s not that bad, little is. In a similar way, (500) Days used trendy actors, obviously targetable indie music, artsy angles and “Super 8” style shots that are to independent film-making what the Hipstomatic app is to photography. Combine all this with lazy dialogue and little to no character development, often dropped altogether in favour of a flavour-of-the-month indie track, and you have yourselves an artsy box office hit, my friends.
With its visually stunning LA pulp noir backdrop and incredible soundtrack, Drive is much better, though, in my mind, no more genuine, than 500 Days. At least it shows off its influences more subtly (though just how subtly it does this is debatable). Man-of-the-moment Ryan Gosling cruising around LA in his white scorpion bomber jacket is reminiscent of Nicolas Cage in David Lynch’s Wild At Heart, and the trashy landscapes could be straight out of a Tarantino, or True Romance, all minus the black humour and surrealism. This hark back to ‘80s trashy chic, exemplified by the slashed pink typeface in the film, and Gosling and Hendricks’ costumes, is so culturally trendy it seems like its lost its edge. With Carey Mulligan and Christina Hendricks, Refn has also scored a tick on the artsy Hollywood checklist, although Hendrick’s ten minute cameo is so minor as to be practically meaningless (what’s that, Peter Bradshaw, she steals the show? She’s barely in it – all simpering chavvy sex appeal until she gets walloped over the head by allegedly tender Gosling before having her brains blown off by a loaded gun). And don’t even start me on Drive’s lazy chauvinism.
Look. Films don’t have to be realistic, they don’t have to have dialogue, they can even just look good. But for me to buy into their world, I have to care, and for me to care, I have to believe that there is something genuine about it. And the problem with ‘hipster cinema’, for want of a better label for these types of films, is that it is so stylistically aware and postmodern that it ends up coming across as fake, shallow and void of human interest. I define ‘hipster cinema’ as cinema that isn’t genuine; cinema that’s cool for the sake of it, knowingly cult, and utterly aware of itself.
Ryan Gosling’s scorpion bomber jacket seems to exemplify this style of hipster cinema: it is the cult symbolic object that is also immediately purchaseable and attainable. It both harks back to past cultural references and ’80s cultural retromania, but also looks towards the future as a trendy fetishisable commodity. Rumours that the scorpion bomber jacket is soon to be released in Urban Outfitters are proliferating the blogosphere, and a quick look through American Apparel confirms that this 80s trash trend is very much in vogue. “Since Drive hit the cinemas, Gosling’s James Dean-inspired look is noticeably influencing shoppers,” says Lee Douros, menswear buying manager for my-wardrobe.com. “We have seen a rise in the sales of Levi’s black 501 jeans and leather bombers from the likes of Acne, D&G and Swedish brand Jofama.” I mean even the launch party for Drive was sponsored by Doc Martens, with a pre-party music video starring Agnes Dean in Docs – that has to be the ultimate symbol of hipster cinema if nothing else is!
Drive is one of the latest in a long line of stylistically aware ‘cult’ films, from the trendy Gallic combination of Marxist philosophy and 60s colour blocking in the Nouvelle Vague, to Jim Jarmusch’s rock ‘n’ roll styled rockabilly films. But what sets these films apart from Drive and 500 Days, is that I don’t feel like I’m being conned into buying the latest pair of Doc Marten Chelsea boots, or a trip-hop soundtrack. Those films may be stylish, but they have substance. Drive does not. It’s lush American escapism with a moody existentialist babe in the driving seat, and we’re the ones being taken for a ride. Cynical, moi?
I wrote an article on 50s film “The Best of Everything”, Don Draper’s bookshelves and the “Mad Men Effect” in publishing for The Spectator arts blog. Czech it!
Posted in Comedy, Fashion, Film, Photography
Some photos wot I took. Some of these are over at Dissocia Zine, along with plenty of other people’s articles, poems, photos and illustrations. We’re looking to expand so send us an email if you want your work to feature here. Happy summer!
Posted in Art, Fashion, Photography
Pattie Boyd is far and away one of rock ‘n’ roll’s greatest muses. The wife of both George Harrison and Eric Clapton, Pattie was also a succesful model, one of the key faces of the Swinging Sixties and immortalised in the (now impossibly rare) photography book of 60′s female icons Birds of Britain. She was the inspiration behind some of the greatest songs of all time, like Harrison’s “Something”, “I Need You”, “For You Blue” and “Isn’t It a Pity”, and Clapton’s “Layla”, “Wonderful Tonight” and “Bell Bottom Blues”. She is also a photographer, and recently had an exhibition in SF called Through The Eyes of A Muse. Her autobiography Wonderful Today is well worth reading, though in my opinion not a patch on other female memoirs of the period – such as Marianne Faithfull’s unrivalled and achingly beautiful Memories, Dreams and Reflections. Wonderful Today is a harrowing read, and unlike Faithfull’s autobiography, it lacks the lyrical beauty and pathos that makes her story so readable. It’s stark, and at times desperate, and tells of her problems with alcohol addiction and anorexia, and the difficulties of living in the limelight as model and muse to two of rock’s greatest stars. I speed-read it in a day and absolutely loved it. It was only really much later that I felt its emotional effect, and now, I find myself looking at those fabulous 60′s shots with a different eye. Well worth the read.
Posted in Fashion, Photography, the 60's, vintage ads
Hated by the British establishment, and one half of one of the most scandalous love affairs of the 20th century, Wallis Simpson was, and still remains, a divisive character in British royal history, and Tom Hooper’s new film “The King’s Speech” throws some light on their royally outrageous relationship.
“I’ve found that if you bring up King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson at a dinner party or a social gathering, it’s like throwing a Molotov cocktail into the room”, says Madonna, who’s directing a film exclusively about the relationship, to be called “W. E”. Wallis was the American socialite who stole the heart of King Edward VIII, and whose relationship with the king forced him to abdicate the throne just 325 days into his reign, to be replaced by his younger brother Albert.
“The King’s Speech” instead focused on Albert (played exceptionally well by Colin Firth) and his stutter, a problem which has affected him from the age of five, and threatens to get in the way of his ability to take on the new role of king. We explore in the film a different relationship, the budding friendship between him and his speech therapist Lionel (Geoffrey Rush), as they try to cure his emotionally debilitating stammer. The film is a gentle, beautiful and charmingly British piece of cinema – I must admit, I’m quite surprised by the incredible box office success it’s had in Britain – but clearly audiences are hankering for some old-fashioned British nostalgia and that is exactly what “The King’s Speech” delivers, with its clipped radio accents, conservative sense of humour, and gorgeous shots of grey London landscapes, and warm, patterned ‘30’s furnishings.
Even the oncoming threat of Hitler and World War II is rather bizarrely pushed aside, as the film ends with the threat of war being overshadowed by Albert’s succesfuly pronunciation of his speech. I don’t think this matters; the film seems to focus on the bonds of friendship between two very different men, and the need to find one’s voice within your chosen or allotted role, than it is really about the political climate of the time.
Nonetheless, while watching the film, I became intrigued by the character of Wallis Simpson, and her relationship with Edward. What could that possibly have meant for the Royals at the time? The English throne being usurped by an American harlot with a fondness for men, parties and expensive jewellery? A bit of research brought out some interesting facts and photos. Having made the ultimate sacrifice for their love, the couple spent the rest of their lives in exile, mainly in France. Wallis was an extremely glamorous woman, as these photos show.
Romantic love story, or outrageous royal scandal? Methinks both. Whatever it is, its a helluva lot more interesting than the next royal engagement…
With their slicked-back quiffs and tailored jackets, John Lennon’s teddy girlfriends in Sam Taylor-Wood’s biopic Nowhere Boy (2009) are the rebellious antidote to the boys’ mouthy machismo. Teddy girls were the first British female youth group, and their rebellion has until recently gone quite undocumented. But with Nowhere Boy and an exhibition in 2006 called “The Bombsite Boudiccas”, which featured pictures Ken Russell took of London Teddy Girls in 1955 (photos above), film and photographing is shining a light on this bangin’ girl tribe.
The Teddy girls’ rebellion was generally crime-free, and purely an aesthetic one, something Rose Shine points in an interview the Times ran with old Teddy girls in 2006:
“We weren’t bad girls,” says Rose Shine, then Rose Hendon, who was 15 when she posed for Russell. “We were all right. We got slung out of the picture house for jiving up the aisles once, but we never broke the law. We weren’t drinkers. We’d go to milk bars, have a peach melba and nod to the music, but you weren’t allowed to dance. It was just showing off: ‘Look at us!’ We called the police ‘the bluebottles’ – you’d see them come round in a Black Maria to catch people playing dice on the corner. But we’d just sit on each other’s doorsteps and play music.”
Instead of getting pissed and causing trouble, teddy girls caused a sensation with what they wore, which was a fastidious combination of 50’s rockabilly and haute couture, resembling Edwardian era fashions. Girls combined pencil skirts and rolled-up jeans with tailored jackets, often adorned with velvet collars or cuffs, flat shoes, clutch bags, doo-rags and elaborate quiffs. Smoking, riding bikes, and kissing boys was the extent of the rebellion, but they sure looked good doing it.
On a slightly different note, check out my new Teddy girl-inspired Brothel Creepers from Underground. Beautiful but scarily disgusting all at one. By the by,
debates still run about the origin of the name ‘Brothel Creeper’. I seem to think its because of a popular Teddy boys song was The Creep by Ken Mackintosh – a slow shuffle of a dance that led to them being nicknamed “creepers”. If anyone knows if this is right or not, drop me a message on here, thanks! The creepers were also known as beetle crushers or crepe boppers, largely because of the thick crepe rubber soles, and the ease with which one could bounce around in them.
<
Creeper photos by Hapsical
Here are some photos, old and new, of textile designer Zandra Rhodes’s various houses. Zandra Rhodes is one of my all-time fashion heroes. I love Rhodes for her glamorous take on maximalism, her punk-psychedelic aesthetic, and her love of bright colours and crazy patterns. During the punk era, Rhodes involved exposed seams and jewelled safety pins into her designs, yet maintained her 60’s inspired psychedelic designs. Rhodes is the embodiment of her work – her house, like her person, is every inch a reflection of her textiles and designs. I love her for her bright pink hair (which has also been bright green and red in the past), her theatrical make-up, costume jewellery and long flowing bright gowns. Rhodes is one of a line of true British female eccentrics, with the likes of Vita Sackville-West or Vivienne Westwood.
