Posts by philipmatthews
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Where's all the bloody poetry 'en?
-
-
and flying the flag for Public Address – David Haywood is featured in a panel on Saturday the 11th called Pressed into Service chaired by no lesser personage than Philip Matthews (who is also one of the festival Trustees)
It's really just an excuse to get David Haywood to read one of his Alan Bollard stories before a (hopefully shocked) writers festival audience -- especially as the actual Bollard will be around that weekend, launching his own book ...
-
Speaking of poetry, an updated Howl at McSweeney's:
TWEET.
BY OYL MILLER
- - - -I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by brevity, over-connectedness, emotionally starving for attention, dragging themselves through virtual communities at 3 am ...
And so on. Link here.
Coincidentally, the guy who inspired the line "who jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge this actually happened and walked away unknown and forgotten into the ghostly daze of Chinatown soup alleyways & firetrucks, not even one free beer" died this week.
-
What Auckland would need is a wide street lined with munter-friendly pubs that can be closed to traffic for a few nights, with space for screens, crowds and a few marquees. Courtenay Place plays that role in Wellington, and when combined with some waterfront areas and every other bar adding its own little marquee, should just about do it.
How many bars are there on Ponsonby Rd? Close it to traffic from Crummer Rd to Three Lamps, put up screens in Western Park. Kinda like the Hero Parade -- only for rugby.
-
Unless it's either based on a classic local novel or about Maori, it's pretty much not going to happen.
Sione's Wedding, The World's Fastest Indian, Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls, Second-Hand Wedding, Home By Christmas, Scarfies, Out of the Blue, Footrot Flats, Heavenly Creatures and Goodbye Pork Pie excepted, of course. (All grossed more than $1 million at NZ box office).
-
Actually, the Sir PJ report generally proposes a less commercial model than the present one, eg:
We recommend that the NZFC relax its commercial imperative in the development process, especially for first features. While this may go against the grain, we feel that the increasing pressure on projects to be ‘commercial’ has been counter-productive. It’s an approach that can lead to mundane, forgettable, boring movies – unfunny comedies, undramatic drama and material better suited to television than international cinema. Some critics would say that comes close to describing the country’s movie output during the past few years.
Quotes like the above, and the lack of any costings (as Gordon pointed out), make me suspect the report is something of a pipe dream. In the current environment, will a funding organisation like the NZFC really be able to get away with taking more risks and being less commercial?
There are some good ideas in it: empowering the writers and disempowering the producers. Making sure short films are limited to test runs for features (why I am thinking of Neill Blomkamp?). Easing the rule on having a NZ distributor signed up -- there's a boldly uncommercial move. Much of what they say about the Escalator "bootcamp" scheme seems reasonable.
But it's a pity that the report depends so heavily on the complaints of anonymous sources. Much of the press coverage since has been the recycling of those quotes -- the more critical, the better. As we know at PAS, every funding bureaucracy is an easy target.
And as much as I admire Ant Timpson, I'm not sure that 48 Hours can be a very reliable guide to future feature talent. Surely there's a vast gulf between short sketches that send up established genres and creating original, 90-minute stories. In its eight years, has 48 Hours produced a new generation desperate to write and shoot their own features? Ant said this on http://gordoncampbell.scoop.co.nz/2010/02/26/gordon-campbell-on-the-phil-heatley-saga/ a little while back:
I do acknowledge that my dreams of an explosion of low fi feature gems being produced post V48 hasn’t really eventuated. Maybe there’s not enough anger out there at the moment. Maybe the drip-fed nature of development here has conditioned a nation that wait to suckle the nipple. Or maybe someone right now is creating the new BAD TASTE/ SMALL TIME /POP SKULL /CLERKS /SHES GOTTA HAVE IT / THE HORSEMAN/ PARANORMAL ACTIVITY as we speak.
-
Anyway, I'm calling it the 'Hand of Sod'.
Son of Hand of God?
-
The goal scoring machines vs the world's wildest cheerleader.
Roddy Doyle agrees with you:
By the time I got to the bookies, a five-minute walk, I’d changed my mind and I put my euros on Argentina. It was a wise, mercenary decision, I thought. The odds, 9 to 1, were daft. Argentina were being written off because their coach is probably mad. But look at all the other coaches, look at the world’s leaders, look at the world’s greatest authors—they’re all mad. Maradona just accepts his insanity; he loves it. He hugs his players; he loves them. And they love him. Some of them are brilliant, and one of them, Lionel Messi, is an even better footballer than Maradona was.
So, my money’s on Argentina.
-
Without wishing to upset any Italians, I'd like to post the following, pinched from writer Pip Adam's twitter account:
The Italian team visit Cape Town orphanage. "It's heartbreaking to see their sad little faces with no hope" said Jamal, age 6