Do You See

The Sound Barrier Podcast: 6: Der Müde Tod & The Seventh Seal

Ah Death. May your cold embrace be delayed, but when you grasp me at least do it with the humility and grace you do in this week’s Sound Barrier podcast. For this week Peter Baran and Pamela Hutchinson discuss the recently re-released Der Müde Tod and The Seventh Seal both of whom feature Death as a lead character. How do these personifications stack up, how do Fritz Lang and Ingmar Bergman deal with this heavy material and which one is a comic masterpiece (Bill And Ted’s Bogus Journey obviously). Recorded in a makeshift studio, but with all the non-makeshift opinions you expect we pit these two movies together, and the conclusion may surprise you. Listen to it over on Silent London here.

The Silent London Podcast is also available on iTunes and Stitcher. If you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave a rating or review too. The podcast is presented in association with SOAS radio by Peter Baran and Pamela Hutchinson.

The Sound Barrier Podcast: 5: Wall-E / The Red Turtle

On the fifth Sound Barrier we have no guests, but an extremely animated discussion about – oh, did you see what I did there. We are comparing a Pixar classic with a brand new, but dialogue free, movie. So the dialogue free movie The Red Turtle is our “silent movie”, while Wall-E, which has largish silent section, is our sound film for comparison. Beautiful hand drawn Studio Ghibli animation vs incredibly detailed computer generated work. We delve into the animation, but we also spend a fair bit of time of the thematic similarities between the two, loneliness, love, loss and of course skittering critter sidekicks. So build a raft, or hold on to a passing rocket and listen as we break the Sound Barrier again.

You can listen over on Silent London here or on iTunes and Stitcher. If you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave a rating or review too. The podcast is presented in association with SOAS Radio by Peter Baran and Pamela Hutchinson.

The Sound Barrier Podcast: 4: Mindhorn / The Mystery Of The Leaping Fish

This fortnights Sound Barrier podcast tackles comedy for the first time. And in particular the comedic potential of detectives and drugs. On the modern corner with have British meta farce Mindhorn, where Julian Barrett plays Richard Thorncroft who played Isle Of Man bionic detective Mindhorn. He is drawn back to the Isle Of Man to help with a case, or to try and regain some fame, and also take some drugs. Which made us think of our favourite drugged up detective, Coke Ennyday, played by Douglas Fairbanks Snr in The Mystery Of The Leaping Fish. Coke is a Sherlock Holmes pastiche who really doubles down on one particular aspect of Holmes’s method…

So join myself, Pamela Hutchinson and special guest Julian Coleman (you can follow him on Twitter here). Listen over on Silent London here or on iTunes and Stitcher. If you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave a rating or review too. The podcast is presented in association with SOAS Radio by Peter Baran and Pamela Hutchinson.

The Sound Barrier Podcast: 3: The Wind / Lady Macbeth

The Sound Barrier podcast is back with an episode about women up against the patriarchy, the odds and some mighty gusting wind. And we look at two actresses, one at the height of her powers and popularity, in Lillian Gish, and one virtual unknown who both captivate their audience. So stern looks, staring through the screen, death and sex all feature highly in this episode. Joining Pamela Hutchinson and Pete Baran in the studio special guest (and occasional FT contributor) Ewan Munro. Which is better, a Virginian flower trapped in the desert or a Northern lass, traded for a bit of worthless land who starts to rebel (answer – they are both really good).

Thanks as ever to SOAS Radio, you can listen to the podcast here on Silent London
Or on iTunes here.

The Sound Barrier Podcast: 2: The Beloved Rogue / Neruda

The second episode of our fortnightly silent sound film comparison podcast. This week our topic is political poets, or poets who have been exiled for their politics (though in one case possibly for his terrible poetry too). Our poets are Pablo Naruda, subject of Pablo Larrain’s recent Naruda, and Francois Villon, portrayed by John Barrymore in 1927’s The Beloved Rogue. Our modern film is playfully metatextual about its subject and delivery, but that isn’t to say that silent film is a simple as the romantic swashbuckler suggested on poster.

Myself and Pamela Hutchinson talk politics, poetry, lens flare, crabby acting, snow and inevitably facial hair as we play our cinematic game of top trumps to determine which movie is the best. And your FreakyTrigger correspondant might say the word “interesting” a few too many times. Subscribe on iTunes here:
https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/silent-london-podcast/id518437841

Or listen on Silent London here: https://silentlondon.co.uk/2017/04/16/sound-barrier-neruda-the-beloved-rogue-1927/

Presented in association with SOAS Radio.

The Sound Barrier Podcast: 1: The Lost World / The Lost City Of Z

So for a while myself and Pamela Hutchinson, of Silent London fame have been talking about doing a more regular podcast. And while we love talking about silent films, we also like new films too. And so The Sound Barrier was born over a Campari Spritz or four, we take a new release and we contrast it with a silent antecedent. And we were extremely lucky with the release dates as just released was The Lost City Of Z, about Major Percy Fawcett’s hunt for a lost civilization in the Amazon. And this seemed to compare perfectly with The Lost World, based on Arthur Conan Doyle’s pulp, in which Professor Challenger (based partially on Percy Fawcett) searches for a lost plateau of ancient creatures. . We talk exploration, beards, special effects, not so special acting and we may even, for a bonus mention The Smurfs: The Lost Village.

You can listen to it here on Silent London:
https://silentlondon.co.uk/2017/04/02/sound-barrier-the-lost-city-of-z-the-lost-world/
Here on iTunes (usual give us a review plea to bump us up search function)

And any suggestions for future pairings let us know, or just come back in a fortnight for the next one. Enjoy.

The FT Top 41 Films 2016 – #10 – #1

“Hi I’m The Brave Little Toaster, star of the 1986 film The Brave Little Toaster and its direct to video sequels The Brave Little Toaster To The Rescue, and The Brave Little Toaster Goes To Mars. You know, the late 80’s was a brilliant time to be a Toaster, we were flying all over the place on screensavers, being fancipantsed up by Duralit, and then there was me, an honest to god appliance hero for a consumer age. These days though, you’re all in tha cloud, and there is no room for toast in the cloud, so I have been told. So I sit with my friends, Lampy, Air Conditioner and Two Faced Sewing Machine and watch Entertainment Centre and all the great films that came out last year like these ones. I mean, I assume I got back from Mars, I have to admit I didn’t watch it, it seemed far fetched. ”

Cheers Toasty, and you should just be proud that as a Toaster you got your own film franchise. The mind boggles. Anyway here is the top ten:

The FT Top 41 Films 2016 – #20 – #11

“Hi I am Elliot from Pete’s Dragon. I suppose you could call me Pete’s Dragon, except Pete clearly doesn’t own me, we are just buddies who hang in the woods. And yes, I am the proper Pete’s Dragon, not that godawful 2D drawn travesty from the 70’s. I’m the Pete’s Dragon from the much better 2016 film Pete’s Dragon, which I expect will pop up on this list of best films of 2016.

Oh, just looked below. Must be in the top ten. Well these are all pretty good too I guess. Not elegiac and majestic like some sort of kids film made by Malick in the 1970’s, not good like Pete’s Dragon, but good. ”

Thanks Elliot, but I have some bad news for you. Pete’s Dragon just missed our list at number 42. I know, it was a travesty. Don’t blow fire on me. I’d have voted you higher, except you weren’t as good as Mustang. Which is…

The FT Top 41 Films 2016 – #30 – #21

“Hi I’m Godzilla. No honestly I am. I know what you’re thinking, that doesn’t look like Godzilla, he stands up on his hind-legs and stomps Tokyo. Well firstly who are you calling a “he”. Godzilla, ie me, is a lady. And secondly, that Godzilla is stupid – I’m the kind of more realistic Godzilla that people were crying out to see in the 90’s.”

“What’s that?”

“They didn’t? What even with Matthew Broderick? Jean Reno? What about the twist of my babies? Jamiroquai? His song is the best bit? Well that just makes me angry, makes me want to destroy Manhattan with my atomic breath.”

“I don’t? Well nuts to that.”

“Sorry about that, it turns out that I’m not the crowd pleasing monster I thought I was, instead I am a punchline to a number of jokes and I have been assigned to one of the great flops of history. Well just as well I spent last year watching the ten films which appear to come in between #30 and #21 in the FT film poll.”

Thanks rubbish 90’s Godzilla and that is a remarkable coincidence isn’t it. Well here’s what I thought of this run of movies.

The FT Top 41 Films 2016 – #40 – #31

Hi, I’m Dr Zaius smoking a cigarette from The Planet Of The Apes. You know the proper Planet Of The Apes from the sixties where people acted as apes, rather than Andy Serkis wearing ping pong balls and making a fool of himself. OK it meant that Charlton Heston got a bit too personal about our personal hygiene but the allegory more or less worked. I also turned up in Beneath The Planet Of The Apes, which was surprisingly good despite Chuck ducking out and an even heavier handed Nuclear War Allegory. Since then I’ve been pretty quiet here in the potentially nuclear destroyed future, I didn’t travel in time to Escape From… and they didn’t get me back for the Tim Burton travesty and I think it is a bit early in the new cycle of Apes films for a doddery old Doctor type to turn up (though I must go see my agent just in case). Nevertheless all of this spare time has allowed me to look at the best films released in the UK in 2016, and help curate the Freaky Trigger Top 41 (because there are two number 40’s).