One Plus One Equals Three

Nature Found Them Guilty: 'Long Weekend'

Another in our remembrances of Australia's cinematic past. A forgotten gem of the Australian film industry of the 1970s is Colin Eggleston's 'Long Weekend' from 1978. A young couple go bush in an effort to rekindle the flames of their romance, but nature (even their pet Jack Russell) has other ideas – and goes on the attack. You may be familiar with a film by Alfred Hitchcock that explored a similar idea in far bleaker fashion, but 'Long Weekend' holds up quite well 30 years on.

The plot keywords at IMDB humorously capture the essence of the film too: "Female Nudity, Camping, Nature Run Amok, Nature Takes Revenge, Spear Gun". Highly recommended.

Also - 'Long Weekend' wasn't shot in Tasmania, yet there's a Tasmanian Devil that makes a guest appearance. (Well, they are pretty scary, even out of their home state), and note the electronic bird sound effects –€“ they're just like those in that other more prominent 'nature runs amok in Bodega Bay' film mentioned above.

Related (vaguely): artist Martin Hendriks removes the birds from 'The Birds'.

'The Man from Hong Kong': An Ozploitation Classic

It's always entertaining to see a film (trailer above) that features George Lazenby, Valiant Chargers, a hang-gliding kung-fu cop and Frank Thring! 1975's 'The Man From Hong Kong' is Australia's first kung-fu action movie, directed by Brian Trenchard-Smith. (Of whom, Quentin Tarantino is a fan).

More on this Ozploitation classic at Australian Screen, and more on Ozploitation at The Duece (aka The Grindhouse Database).

The Girl, The Boy, The School and The Rock

Here's the strangely long and rather awkward trailer to Peter Weir's 1975 film 'Picnic at Hanging Rock'. Weir's film is based upon Joan Lindsay's novel set in 1900 where a group of schoolgirls mysteriously disappear whilst visiting Victoria's Hanging Rock. This evocative and nicely enigmatic film is a bit like watching a live-action Streeton or Condor painting – with some quiet sexuality thrown in for good measure. The trailer's voice-over is by (recently retired 'shock-jock') John Laws and it (the trailer) features some rather oddball writing. 'Picnic' was shot at Hanging Rock and in South Australia.

Weir's previous film discussed on this blog here. More at Australian Screen too.

Remember: if it's warm, it's best to remove your gloves after you pass through Woodend.

Del Toro on Hitchcock (Very Briefly)

"David Cronenberg was a major influence. He is a nihilist and I am a romantic. I admire Terry Gilliam; we have the same sense of fantasy. Reality and fantasy have equal weighting. Also Luis Bunuel. Alfred Hitchcock because he was fat, Catholic and repressed; he had mysterious fantasies."

Guillermo del Toro, director of the very wonderful and visually stunning Pan's Labyrinth. I missed this when it first came out and saw it recently – it's a remarkable cinematic treat.

Excerpts from del Toro's sketchbooks (above) at The Guardian.

Paris (Australia). Eaten. By Cars.

"No one leaves Paris. No one."

A wonderful, yet quite schlocky horror film directed by the now acclaimed Peter Weir in 1974 'freaked the hell' out of me as a callow youth. The Cars That Ate Paris played with both the stereotype of the friendly, neighbourly country or outback town and its opposite – a terrifying backwater of uncivilised barbarity (with those barbarians often of the inbred variety). This was the era of John Boorman's Deliverance after all. Violently crashing cars, mangled bodies and freakish car creations seriously etched themselves onto an impressionable young teenager's mind (mine) back in the 70s.

The outback town of Paris derives its income from car accidents – or rather, car accidents that are deliberately caused. Valuables and parts of the cars are then sold off in between devising the next car accident and the next. Quite a Ballardian tale and one that features some great (well, interesting) car design and modifications. You could also say that it's a precursor to the Mad Max series and the very sinister and creepy Wolf Creek. Read on to see a 'video salute' to this quirky Australian cinematic treasure (of sorts) from the 1970s.

'Eastern Promises' Gets Under Your Skin

Much has been deservedly praised and written about the Coen Brothers' recent film 'No Country For Old Men'. It's quite brilliant* and is undoubtedly one of the great films of last year. Another great and significant film of last year (for me) is David Cronenberg's haunting (and I mean haunting) 'Eastern Promises'. The film, which features tattoos of the vory v zakone (that's the Russian 'mafia' to you), creepily gets under your skin – pardon the pun. I saw it again a few days ago and cannot get the vivid images from it – courtesy of cinematographer Peter Suschitzky – out of my head. Powerful and arresting stuff indeed.

Here's the film's simple, yet chilling end title sequence by Toronto's Cuppa Coffee Studios. The end titles have even more impact in the context of the film. Some of the criminal tattoos in the titles may have been sourced from here too – that cat in a hat does look familiar.

"David Cronenberg is the most provocative, original, and consistently excellent North American director of his generation."

You bet.
........................................

*Two aspects ever-so-slightly mar the excellent 'No Country' for me (no film is perfect): the typeface Trajan used yet again for the very brief main titles (I'm being a bit fussy here). And perhaps I shouldn't have seen the wonderful 'The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada' recently too. In that film Tommy Lee Jones plays a grizzled, wizened Texas cowboy hunting a criminal. In 'No Country' Jones plays a grizzled, wizened Texas cop hunting a criminal. He's terrific (in both films), but his 'rural Texan grizzledness/wizenedness' is getting a little tiresome perhaps. Or is that just me?

Ruddmao

See "young Ruddling". Learn of the Principle of Similar Difference. Hilarious and brilliantly executed (except perhaps for the main type banner above – but small point). Clever stuff.

Echoes in the Dust

"Dust Echoes is one way that we are bringing everyone back to the same campfire - black and white. We are telling our stories to you in a way you can understand, to help you see, hear and know. And we are telling these stories to ourselves, so that we will always remember, with pride, who we are."

From Central Arnhem Land in Australia's Northen Territory comes Dust Echoes, a series of twelve animated dreamtime stories of "love, loyalty, duty to country and aboriginal custom and law". The stories, collected from the Wugularr (Beswick) Community, were "recorded as audio and then interpreted as short animated movies by some of Australia's most talented emerging animators". Some great stories and beautiful, evocative animation work to be seen here. Richly educational too – with study guides to download as well. Well done Aunty (again). You're light years ahead of commercial media.

Fifteen Minutes on Six Feet Under: TV Titles Bliss

The titles for Six Feet Under are considered by many to be the apogee of TV titles design. They certainly "raised the bar for television everywhere". Beautiful, haunting and elegant (words not often associated with the TV medium) and matched by a brilliant programme.

Here's a 15 minute 'behind the scenes' video on the creation of these great titles. Contains the background to those opening chords, a description of how to find a 'solo tree' in Seattle and how to film a crow in the US – which is actually illegal(?). A must see (even if this is quite a big download). Enjoy. I've watched this three times already...

Also, another example of fine TV show titling by Digital Kitchen: The Company (a mini-series about the CIA). Superb stuff.

Helvetica: A Predominant Character

Review
Character 4: 26 Letters a Second
Helvetica, 2007
ACMI July 22

It's winter in Melbourne, and you know a Character event is just around the corner. Character has been a series of yearly design and typography-based events and forums devised by Stephen Banham in conjunction with RMIT's Communication Design program. This year, graphic design and its relationship with cinema/the moving image was to be explored. Gary Hustwit's new documentary film Helvetica was to be the focus of this always well-attended event.

Staged at an ACMI cinema, which I think Banham jokingly referred to as 'Pat Benatar Theatre' (!), a few cinematic shorts were screened:

Toast by France's Bagard, Dufoure and Harang was a suitable (if effect-driven) opening sequence.

Float by Stephen Watkins, saw typography liberate itself from city signage and hover and glide over Melbourne (shades of Hitchcock's The Birds, but with type).

Kapitaal by Holland's Studio Smack is quite a well-known piece exploring the typography found in advertising throughout a modern cityscape – and was great to see on the big screen.

But the main attraction was the eagerly awaited Helvetica. When I first heard that someone was making a film about Helvetica, I must admit I envisaged something about as dry as eating Salada biscuits in the desert. Thankfully, Gary Hustwit's film is very juicy indeed.