Rocking the VG purple and orange (is he wearing nail polish?)
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Happy Birthday to Todd Haynes!
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Insightful review of Todd's films
including this perfectly apt take on Velvet Goldmine, by Dennis Lim:
"The common knock on Haynes — that he's overly cerebral — came up most often with "Velvet Goldmine," which remains his most underrated film. Some found its layered, referential game-playing antithetical to the Dionysian spirit of rock and roll, but in Haynes' best work — and in some of the most inspired glam rock (Roxy Music, for instance) — intellect and emotion go hand in hand.
...
Although Haynes is obviously steeped in glam lore, the film's parallel-universe mythology, with its mix of quoted and imagined histories, original and counterfeit songs, annoyed some purists. Since its release, though, as numerous fan sites suggest, it has found an obsessive following among younger audiences. And no wonder — in its delirious jumble of fact, extrapolation and wish fulfillment, "Velvet Goldmine" acknowledges and demonstrates the transformative promise of pop music. More than a mash note from a fan, it's a film that powerfully conveys the sensual and imaginative experience of fandom."
Read it all here at the L.A. Times.
*Bolded text is our doing.
"The common knock on Haynes — that he's overly cerebral — came up most often with "Velvet Goldmine," which remains his most underrated film. Some found its layered, referential game-playing antithetical to the Dionysian spirit of rock and roll, but in Haynes' best work — and in some of the most inspired glam rock (Roxy Music, for instance) — intellect and emotion go hand in hand.
...
Although Haynes is obviously steeped in glam lore, the film's parallel-universe mythology, with its mix of quoted and imagined histories, original and counterfeit songs, annoyed some purists. Since its release, though, as numerous fan sites suggest, it has found an obsessive following among younger audiences. And no wonder — in its delirious jumble of fact, extrapolation and wish fulfillment, "Velvet Goldmine" acknowledges and demonstrates the transformative promise of pop music. More than a mash note from a fan, it's a film that powerfully conveys the sensual and imaginative experience of fandom."
Read it all here at the L.A. Times.
*Bolded text is our doing.
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Damn you Atlantic Ocean
Dear Sweet Darlings,
So many of our obsessions are represented at museums this year. The academics have analyzed Glam Rock and now the curators have at it. There's a Bowie retrospective at the Victoria & Albert Museum. Glam! The Performance of Style is now at the Tate Liverpool. Stateside we've got Punk: Chaos to Couture at The Metropolitan Museum this summer.
There's a thrill to hear this and then almost immediately a critique of what they will get right and get wrong. Of course this is a highly opinionated and totally subjective topic. The V&A show seems to anticipate that with the title "David Bowie is". As he once said, "I guess I am what the greatest number of people think I am. I have no control over that at all." As the owner of a $500 book about Ziggy Stardust who has never seen Labyrinth, I understand that Bowie fans share a quirky demographic. No matter what the exhibition is about, it's damn thrilling to have the new album.
Glam! The Performance of Style seems like it's throwing a very wide net to be able to make it about ART rather than NME. The curator, Darren Pih, certainly has read "Please Kill Me," and includes the Max's Kansas City/ Warhol scene as the beginning part of the story. And while several films are included in the show, as well as screenings of others, there's apparently not a mention of Velvet Goldmine, which certainly was a landmark in the reassessment and appreciation of the Glam era, in particular noting the origins of glam in the drag, underground and art school scenes. We can't imagine the curator hasn't seen it.
vardathemessage started on the fifth anniversary of the VHS release of Velvet Goldmine*. At that time it was difficult to find links to illustrate and illuminate the entries - Wikipedia was just emerging, Tumblr was lightyears away in internet time - and you can see that it still has some not so fab images, sorry. Now that VG love is all over the internet, let's not forget that in many ways Todd Haynes rediscovered the era and put it back on the cultural map as something more than a punchline. Glam was out of fashion in 1998 - this was the year Madonna was wearing cowboy boots afterall, and even Bowie was chuckling as David Letterman mocked a photo of Ziggy Stardust. Now that TRAFOZSATSFM is 40, Bowie has a new album and a retrospective at the V&A, it's hard to believe that for a very long time Bowie was considered a weirdo rather than a pioneering artist. And even then, when he was at the height of his fame during the 80s, many considered Ziggy just a slightly embarrassing best ignored experiment of his early career.
Being on the wrong side of the pond, I won't be able to see the V&A and Tate shows, so those of you who have seen them, please free free to give us your take. And certainly correct me if I'm wrong about the Glam! exhibition having no mention of Velvet Goldmine.
*To give you an idea of how ancient history that is, the VHS was available for $125.00! This is because the first buyers of the VHS were the rental shops who were expected to recoup the cost in rentals. So the next best thing was later that summer when the used copies of VG were put on sale for something like $14.99.
So many of our obsessions are represented at museums this year. The academics have analyzed Glam Rock and now the curators have at it. There's a Bowie retrospective at the Victoria & Albert Museum. Glam! The Performance of Style is now at the Tate Liverpool. Stateside we've got Punk: Chaos to Couture at The Metropolitan Museum this summer.
There's a thrill to hear this and then almost immediately a critique of what they will get right and get wrong. Of course this is a highly opinionated and totally subjective topic. The V&A show seems to anticipate that with the title "David Bowie is". As he once said, "I guess I am what the greatest number of people think I am. I have no control over that at all." As the owner of a $500 book about Ziggy Stardust who has never seen Labyrinth, I understand that Bowie fans share a quirky demographic. No matter what the exhibition is about, it's damn thrilling to have the new album.
Glam! The Performance of Style seems like it's throwing a very wide net to be able to make it about ART rather than NME. The curator, Darren Pih, certainly has read "Please Kill Me," and includes the Max's Kansas City/ Warhol scene as the beginning part of the story. And while several films are included in the show, as well as screenings of others, there's apparently not a mention of Velvet Goldmine, which certainly was a landmark in the reassessment and appreciation of the Glam era, in particular noting the origins of glam in the drag, underground and art school scenes. We can't imagine the curator hasn't seen it.
vardathemessage started on the fifth anniversary of the VHS release of Velvet Goldmine*. At that time it was difficult to find links to illustrate and illuminate the entries - Wikipedia was just emerging, Tumblr was lightyears away in internet time - and you can see that it still has some not so fab images, sorry. Now that VG love is all over the internet, let's not forget that in many ways Todd Haynes rediscovered the era and put it back on the cultural map as something more than a punchline. Glam was out of fashion in 1998 - this was the year Madonna was wearing cowboy boots afterall, and even Bowie was chuckling as David Letterman mocked a photo of Ziggy Stardust. Now that TRAFOZSATSFM is 40, Bowie has a new album and a retrospective at the V&A, it's hard to believe that for a very long time Bowie was considered a weirdo rather than a pioneering artist. And even then, when he was at the height of his fame during the 80s, many considered Ziggy just a slightly embarrassing best ignored experiment of his early career.
Being on the wrong side of the pond, I won't be able to see the V&A and Tate shows, so those of you who have seen them, please free free to give us your take. And certainly correct me if I'm wrong about the Glam! exhibition having no mention of Velvet Goldmine.
*To give you an idea of how ancient history that is, the VHS was available for $125.00! This is because the first buyers of the VHS were the rental shops who were expected to recoup the cost in rentals. So the next best thing was later that summer when the used copies of VG were put on sale for something like $14.99.
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Those who know should make the cognoscenti think
One night, eons ago when I was waitressing at an art bar in Tribeca, these two angelic faced young men, tourists from Germany, had finished their meal and were paying their tab when they asked with complete sincerity, in beautiful, slightly accented English, Where is this Wild Side? At first I thought they meant the West Side but they clarified that they were interested in that famous place, The Wild Side. As I enthusiastically explained about the Warhol crowd and the characters in the song their faces dropped. They had come all the way to New York City to take a walk there.
How does one's initiation to the 'underground' of pop culture happen? Seeing a photograph or reading an interview or hearing a song can spark a sudden feeling that you don't know where it's at along with a immediate need to rectify that situation. At one time these were things that you couldn't ask your elders about, because there was literally a generation gap. While today parents and children may not listen to the same music, there are bands or landmark albums that are seen by both as essential. Yesterday's scandalous underground film is now a 'must-see classic'. We're used to seeing infants advertising their approval of cunnilingus as well as the (not so) 'hip' factor of their parents by wearing a Rolling Stones Lapping Tongue onesie. Just today I saw a toddler sporting a white on black skull print scarf & mitten combo because, certainly, four is about the age one needs a reminder that death comes to us all.
But the latest questionable meeting of innocent youth and suggestive pop culture is the downloadable Teacher's Guide to the Tate Liverpool's exhibit Glam! The Performance of Style. Advertised as "suitable for all ages" with its harmless suggestions like Invent a glam rock star! and Write a glam poem! it also offers cheery enthusiasm for stuff like transsexuality and the 'trashy decadence' of the Warhol scene. Peter Hujar's photograph Candy Darling on her Deathbed is the cover for the program, a rather ominous start to the proceedings.
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The next image, as well as the main poster image, is Kenny putting on make-up, Boston 1973 by American photographer Nan Goldin, kind of weird since Glam is quintessentially British.
![]()
Another portrait of John Rothermel of San Franscico's legendary drag troupe The Cockettes by Peter Hujar, completes the 3 photos in the guide. Kenny, Rothermel and Hujar all died of AIDS, kind of indicating that Glam is nothing but a sad, sorry scene. In the actual non-curated version of pop history, can you think of any healthier specimens of human endurance and overcoming drug addiction than Iggy Pop, Lou Reed and David Bowie?
![]()
And no matter what the much discussed sexual preferences of these gender bending pioneers once were, all three are married to women now. Oh Glam Rock, you are a paradox! But a happy, delightful paradox, not this grim checklist that seems to be equating Glam with only drag and death.
Up next in the guide, fabric designer Celia Birtwell and clothing designer Ossie Clark are reduced to mere characters in a David Hockney painting.
![]()
The school trippers learn that he's bisexual and unfaithful, but nothing about the clothes he designed. Instead we are to analyze it for symbolism like Jan van Eyck's Arnolfini Wedding Portrait.
![]()
In actuality Ossie Clark's designs were a hallmark of London's Swinging 60s era rather than Glam Rock's early 70's. But since the Tate owns this painting it's taken center stage.
While the only photos in the Teachers Pack are of gay men in drag, there is the obligatory nod to token feminism in the pathetic "discuss the representation of women in the exhibition" sidebar, mentioning Richard Hamilton, Allen Jones and Cindy Sherman and the truly obscure art school band Moodie and the Menstruators. This exhibit could simply be all about Carol Mcnicoll's brilliant stage costumes for Brian Eno and her cover of Here Come the Warm Jets and it would tell you all you need to know about Glam.
![]()
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And dammit, what about LaBelle?
![]()
I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!! (I can't let Moodie and the Menstruators, off the hook for that horrid name. It just proves that fine art majors and rock & roll don't go together. It's not kick-ass or witty, but then you really can't top Chrissie Hynde's band Mike Hunt's Honorable Discharge.)
Much of the art in the exhibit is 60s Pop Art which was, of course, influential in connections like the fact that Bryan Ferry studied art under Richard Hamilton. But Allen Jones' voluptuous sex furniture in an exhibit about androgyny?
![]()
Gee kids what do you think of this? There'll be a quiz tomorrow.
Cindy Sherman? she was still in school when Glam was happening, and while her work explores identity and performance, it's not very glam. The most glaring misunderstanding of glam in the exhibit however, is that Pink Flamingos is being screened - there is nothing Glam about Pink Flamingos! Glam is about Sex and as John Waters admits in his book Crackpot when he was providing screenings of his films for prisoners, an inmate told him, "Every week, John, I hope there will be an image in the films that I can masturbate to later, but I never seem to find one."
As far as I can tell, the original dandy to which the idea of artist as a self-reinvention is credited, Oscar Wilde, is nowhere to be seen in the show.
As Todd Haynes says in the commentary on the Velvet Goldmine Blu-ray, "Pop culture is full of the most delightful corruption." It's just more fun and more appropriate to get corrupted by a pop star at the record shop with your pals, rather than by your teacher at a museum.
I leave you with more LaBelle
![]()
How does one's initiation to the 'underground' of pop culture happen? Seeing a photograph or reading an interview or hearing a song can spark a sudden feeling that you don't know where it's at along with a immediate need to rectify that situation. At one time these were things that you couldn't ask your elders about, because there was literally a generation gap. While today parents and children may not listen to the same music, there are bands or landmark albums that are seen by both as essential. Yesterday's scandalous underground film is now a 'must-see classic'. We're used to seeing infants advertising their approval of cunnilingus as well as the (not so) 'hip' factor of their parents by wearing a Rolling Stones Lapping Tongue onesie. Just today I saw a toddler sporting a white on black skull print scarf & mitten combo because, certainly, four is about the age one needs a reminder that death comes to us all.
But the latest questionable meeting of innocent youth and suggestive pop culture is the downloadable Teacher's Guide to the Tate Liverpool's exhibit Glam! The Performance of Style. Advertised as "suitable for all ages" with its harmless suggestions like Invent a glam rock star! and Write a glam poem! it also offers cheery enthusiasm for stuff like transsexuality and the 'trashy decadence' of the Warhol scene. Peter Hujar's photograph Candy Darling on her Deathbed is the cover for the program, a rather ominous start to the proceedings.
The next image, as well as the main poster image, is Kenny putting on make-up, Boston 1973 by American photographer Nan Goldin, kind of weird since Glam is quintessentially British.
Another portrait of John Rothermel of San Franscico's legendary drag troupe The Cockettes by Peter Hujar, completes the 3 photos in the guide. Kenny, Rothermel and Hujar all died of AIDS, kind of indicating that Glam is nothing but a sad, sorry scene. In the actual non-curated version of pop history, can you think of any healthier specimens of human endurance and overcoming drug addiction than Iggy Pop, Lou Reed and David Bowie?
And no matter what the much discussed sexual preferences of these gender bending pioneers once were, all three are married to women now. Oh Glam Rock, you are a paradox! But a happy, delightful paradox, not this grim checklist that seems to be equating Glam with only drag and death.
Up next in the guide, fabric designer Celia Birtwell and clothing designer Ossie Clark are reduced to mere characters in a David Hockney painting.
The school trippers learn that he's bisexual and unfaithful, but nothing about the clothes he designed. Instead we are to analyze it for symbolism like Jan van Eyck's Arnolfini Wedding Portrait.
In actuality Ossie Clark's designs were a hallmark of London's Swinging 60s era rather than Glam Rock's early 70's. But since the Tate owns this painting it's taken center stage.
While the only photos in the Teachers Pack are of gay men in drag, there is the obligatory nod to token feminism in the pathetic "discuss the representation of women in the exhibition" sidebar, mentioning Richard Hamilton, Allen Jones and Cindy Sherman and the truly obscure art school band Moodie and the Menstruators. This exhibit could simply be all about Carol Mcnicoll's brilliant stage costumes for Brian Eno and her cover of Here Come the Warm Jets and it would tell you all you need to know about Glam.
And dammit, what about LaBelle?
I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!! (I can't let Moodie and the Menstruators, off the hook for that horrid name. It just proves that fine art majors and rock & roll don't go together. It's not kick-ass or witty, but then you really can't top Chrissie Hynde's band Mike Hunt's Honorable Discharge.)
Much of the art in the exhibit is 60s Pop Art which was, of course, influential in connections like the fact that Bryan Ferry studied art under Richard Hamilton. But Allen Jones' voluptuous sex furniture in an exhibit about androgyny?
Gee kids what do you think of this? There'll be a quiz tomorrow.
Cindy Sherman? she was still in school when Glam was happening, and while her work explores identity and performance, it's not very glam. The most glaring misunderstanding of glam in the exhibit however, is that Pink Flamingos is being screened - there is nothing Glam about Pink Flamingos! Glam is about Sex and as John Waters admits in his book Crackpot when he was providing screenings of his films for prisoners, an inmate told him, "Every week, John, I hope there will be an image in the films that I can masturbate to later, but I never seem to find one."
As far as I can tell, the original dandy to which the idea of artist as a self-reinvention is credited, Oscar Wilde, is nowhere to be seen in the show.
As Todd Haynes says in the commentary on the Velvet Goldmine Blu-ray, "Pop culture is full of the most delightful corruption." It's just more fun and more appropriate to get corrupted by a pop star at the record shop with your pals, rather than by your teacher at a museum.
I leave you with more LaBelle
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Who Breaks a Butterfly on A Wheel
There is something petty about an academic using a fangirl's tumblr as a straw man in his critique of a film.
I was looking forward to reading Rob White's new book on filmmaker Todd Haynes and was delighted that I received it as a birthday gift. It is an excellent overview of his work with insightful analysis and extensive film references written by someone with considerable knowledge of cinema. The best part for me was the in-depth interview with Haynes.
However when I saw Varda the Message mentioned on the first page of the part on Velvet Goldmine I was dumbfounded and then really pissed off. Mr White, for all his erudition and research skills, apparently does not have much facility with google. Nor does he know the difference between blogging platforms like LJ and Tumblr.
I started vardathemessage.livejournal.com in May 2004, on the 5 year anniversary of the release of Velvet Goldmine on VHS. It analyzes the film's references in over 365 entries, mostly focusing on music, literary and real life connections. Todd Haynes explicitly thanks vardathemessage in the Blu-ray commentary and cites it several times while describing the film.
It's the first result when you google vardathemessage or even varda the message. It is also linked under the quote by Haynes on the first page of my tumblr.
My vardathemessage.tumblr.com, on the other hand, is a gallery created with both original content and by reblogging images which embodies the Tumblr style. There weren't a lot of images available when I created the LJ in 2004, (there was hardly a Wikipedia) so I started a Tumblr to enjoy the rich trove of available visuals as well as the increasing popularity of the film and glam rock. The fact Mr White cites the Tumblr as the sum of my efforts to analyze the film is selecting a straw man (or Aunt Sally if you prefer) to knock down. He mentions vardathemessage four times in his book only to use it as a 'here's where they got it wrong' example. Is there any other single source that he felt the need to deride four times? A tumblr for fuck's sake?
At first I thought I'd write a respectful email to Mr White correcting him but then I thought he had no qualms about mocking me in print, so here goes, from page 57:
![VardaMention1]( "VardaMention1")
"An image only need be theatrical, debonair, haughty, or luxurious to be recruited," said as if that's a bad thing! But since, to paraphrase Bowie, Glam descends from the tradition of the British music hall, the Oscar Wilde dandy, and the futurism of A Clockwork Orange, influenced by, among other things, Japanese Kabuki, Burroughs, Brecht, Baudelaire, Dada, Dietrich, Warhol and Wittgenstein, (Bowie in the intro to Blood and Glitter"I could list ad nauseam, and have been known to do so, as the ingredients for high-glam were dizzyingly disparate.") And it's had 40 years since its inception to influence pop culture, there are 2 British museum shows about it running right now, so it does throw a pretty wide net for visual images to reference.
As a direct reference to the film I framed an entire set of images with these words from the screenplay itself:
"Following the title card “Meaning is not in things but in between them” …
This is cut from the completed film but in the screenplay: The chorus (of Hot One) continues over a final, rapid-fire montage of images depicting the ancestry of camp, fag-pop and glitter rock: Oscar Wilde, Noel Coward, Liberace, Little Richard, Valentino, Dietrich, Ray Davies, Mick Jagger, Syd Barrett, Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, Alice Cooper, Marc Bolan, David Bowie, Bryan Ferry, Eno and Roxy, Suzi Quatro, Alice Cooper, New York Dolls, Brian Slade as Maxwell Demon, Curt Wild, Jack Fairy, Polly Small, The Flaming Creatures, (a mesh of fact and fiction). Here follows (in order depending on the direction you are reading from) some images to illustrate that - with a reoccurring theme of tuxedos and cigarettes.
More:
![Ludwig1]( "Ludwig1")
![Ludwig2]( "Ludwig2")
>The post on Ludwig is clearly tongue in cheek, and I state, "This may be serendipity, in his many interviews, Todd Haynes doesn’t mention that he was influenced by Visconti’s Ludwig." The reason I created and posted that set was when googling for images of Helmut Berger's wonderful posters of Dorian Gray, I came across the shot of the embrace in the snow, in the woods, at night, that look very much like the Ladytron scene in Velvet Goldmine.
![Ludwig Snow]( "Ludwig Snow")
![VG snow]( "VG snow")
There really isn't another shot like that in any other film I have seen. Then I noticed the similar circus images and hats on Brian and Romy. Mr. White insists that I'm wrong to make this mere cheeky reference to Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know cinematic bisexuals from 1972 but he then takes my post as an invitation to ramble on about Ludwig and Death in Venice which really have very little to do with Brian Slade or any character in Velvet Goldmine, page 59:
![Ludwig boring parts]( "Ludwig boring parts")
![Ludwig boring 2]( "Ludwig boring 2")
Grottos? Grottos? I think not, Mrs Gesteten.
More on page 58:
![Bale Gifs analysed]( "Bale Gifs analysed")
This post of Christian Bale is not mine, it's from baledaily, the 'source' clearly listed on the post. I was one of 218 people who reblogged it. BTW, Mr. White, writer for Film Quarterly and BFI, the word for those "mini clips ... just a few frames each, playing back on a loop" is .gif
In my opinion the sequence of Arthur masturbating is not frenetic, the music only makes it seem so. Arthur seems to take a while to get into it actually. It gets reblogged a lot because yes, it's erotic, but mainly because we love Christian Bale's acting here, his Arthur is so vulnerable and endearing. We don't have to be reminded that while he's alone in his room jerking off, other, more glamorous people are having actual sex at an orgy, WE KNOW THAT.
As for Varda only meaning look, the full expression is Varda the Message, what Brian Slade says at the press conference when asked if he was a blinking fruit. It means "get the picture?""well what does it look like?""if it walks like a duck...""capisce?"Perfect and poisonous is right there in the opening scenes, we get it, Velvet Goldmine has some very sad and even tragic aspects, but they do not negate the beauty and imagination of the film. They don't negate the idea of allowing yourself the freedom to be yourself. If Mr White took a look at my LJ it would be apparent that the film in all its paradoxes are explored. Ultimately, however, Mr. White sees the work of Todd Haynes mainly about pathos since its full title is The Misery the World Is Made Of: The Cinema of Todd Haynes. That brilliant line from Poison makes sense in the context of that film (and I quoted it the first entry for my fuckyeahtoddhaynes.tumblr.com) but it only tells part of the story. What Mr White doesn't mention in his book is the film that started it all for Todd Haynes, the Rosebud you might say, Mary Poppins. Haynes has said 'Mary Poppins' maybe the singular text that defines me -- and why not?"Why not indeed, the proof's here.
Of course I can toss this all off with one of the nearly three dozen Oscar Wilde quotes I know from VG, most apt being "Praise makes me humble. But when I'm abused I know I have touched the stars." However the quote I think of now in reference to Rob White is the definition of Puritanism from H.L. Menckin, as The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
P.S. Bowie didn't write Make Me Smile, Steve Harley did.
I leave you with bitchplease Iggy:
![iggy bitch please]( "iggy bitch please")
I was looking forward to reading Rob White's new book on filmmaker Todd Haynes and was delighted that I received it as a birthday gift. It is an excellent overview of his work with insightful analysis and extensive film references written by someone with considerable knowledge of cinema. The best part for me was the in-depth interview with Haynes.
However when I saw Varda the Message mentioned on the first page of the part on Velvet Goldmine I was dumbfounded and then really pissed off. Mr White, for all his erudition and research skills, apparently does not have much facility with google. Nor does he know the difference between blogging platforms like LJ and Tumblr.
I started vardathemessage.livejournal.com in May 2004, on the 5 year anniversary of the release of Velvet Goldmine on VHS. It analyzes the film's references in over 365 entries, mostly focusing on music, literary and real life connections. Todd Haynes explicitly thanks vardathemessage in the Blu-ray commentary and cites it several times while describing the film.
It's the first result when you google vardathemessage or even varda the message. It is also linked under the quote by Haynes on the first page of my tumblr.
My vardathemessage.tumblr.com, on the other hand, is a gallery created with both original content and by reblogging images which embodies the Tumblr style. There weren't a lot of images available when I created the LJ in 2004, (there was hardly a Wikipedia) so I started a Tumblr to enjoy the rich trove of available visuals as well as the increasing popularity of the film and glam rock. The fact Mr White cites the Tumblr as the sum of my efforts to analyze the film is selecting a straw man (or Aunt Sally if you prefer) to knock down. He mentions vardathemessage four times in his book only to use it as a 'here's where they got it wrong' example. Is there any other single source that he felt the need to deride four times? A tumblr for fuck's sake?
At first I thought I'd write a respectful email to Mr White correcting him but then I thought he had no qualms about mocking me in print, so here goes, from page 57:
"An image only need be theatrical, debonair, haughty, or luxurious to be recruited," said as if that's a bad thing! But since, to paraphrase Bowie, Glam descends from the tradition of the British music hall, the Oscar Wilde dandy, and the futurism of A Clockwork Orange, influenced by, among other things, Japanese Kabuki, Burroughs, Brecht, Baudelaire, Dada, Dietrich, Warhol and Wittgenstein, (Bowie in the intro to Blood and Glitter"I could list ad nauseam, and have been known to do so, as the ingredients for high-glam were dizzyingly disparate.") And it's had 40 years since its inception to influence pop culture, there are 2 British museum shows about it running right now, so it does throw a pretty wide net for visual images to reference.
As a direct reference to the film I framed an entire set of images with these words from the screenplay itself:
"Following the title card “Meaning is not in things but in between them” …
This is cut from the completed film but in the screenplay: The chorus (of Hot One) continues over a final, rapid-fire montage of images depicting the ancestry of camp, fag-pop and glitter rock: Oscar Wilde, Noel Coward, Liberace, Little Richard, Valentino, Dietrich, Ray Davies, Mick Jagger, Syd Barrett, Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, Alice Cooper, Marc Bolan, David Bowie, Bryan Ferry, Eno and Roxy, Suzi Quatro, Alice Cooper, New York Dolls, Brian Slade as Maxwell Demon, Curt Wild, Jack Fairy, Polly Small, The Flaming Creatures, (a mesh of fact and fiction). Here follows (in order depending on the direction you are reading from) some images to illustrate that - with a reoccurring theme of tuxedos and cigarettes.
More:
>The post on Ludwig is clearly tongue in cheek, and I state, "This may be serendipity, in his many interviews, Todd Haynes doesn’t mention that he was influenced by Visconti’s Ludwig." The reason I created and posted that set was when googling for images of Helmut Berger's wonderful posters of Dorian Gray, I came across the shot of the embrace in the snow, in the woods, at night, that look very much like the Ladytron scene in Velvet Goldmine.
There really isn't another shot like that in any other film I have seen. Then I noticed the similar circus images and hats on Brian and Romy. Mr. White insists that I'm wrong to make this mere cheeky reference to Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know cinematic bisexuals from 1972 but he then takes my post as an invitation to ramble on about Ludwig and Death in Venice which really have very little to do with Brian Slade or any character in Velvet Goldmine, page 59:
Grottos? Grottos? I think not, Mrs Gesteten.
More on page 58:
This post of Christian Bale is not mine, it's from baledaily, the 'source' clearly listed on the post. I was one of 218 people who reblogged it. BTW, Mr. White, writer for Film Quarterly and BFI, the word for those "mini clips ... just a few frames each, playing back on a loop" is .gif
In my opinion the sequence of Arthur masturbating is not frenetic, the music only makes it seem so. Arthur seems to take a while to get into it actually. It gets reblogged a lot because yes, it's erotic, but mainly because we love Christian Bale's acting here, his Arthur is so vulnerable and endearing. We don't have to be reminded that while he's alone in his room jerking off, other, more glamorous people are having actual sex at an orgy, WE KNOW THAT.
As for Varda only meaning look, the full expression is Varda the Message, what Brian Slade says at the press conference when asked if he was a blinking fruit. It means "get the picture?""well what does it look like?""if it walks like a duck...""capisce?"Perfect and poisonous is right there in the opening scenes, we get it, Velvet Goldmine has some very sad and even tragic aspects, but they do not negate the beauty and imagination of the film. They don't negate the idea of allowing yourself the freedom to be yourself. If Mr White took a look at my LJ it would be apparent that the film in all its paradoxes are explored. Ultimately, however, Mr. White sees the work of Todd Haynes mainly about pathos since its full title is The Misery the World Is Made Of: The Cinema of Todd Haynes. That brilliant line from Poison makes sense in the context of that film (and I quoted it the first entry for my fuckyeahtoddhaynes.tumblr.com) but it only tells part of the story. What Mr White doesn't mention in his book is the film that started it all for Todd Haynes, the Rosebud you might say, Mary Poppins. Haynes has said 'Mary Poppins' maybe the singular text that defines me -- and why not?"Why not indeed, the proof's here.
Of course I can toss this all off with one of the nearly three dozen Oscar Wilde quotes I know from VG, most apt being "Praise makes me humble. But when I'm abused I know I have touched the stars." However the quote I think of now in reference to Rob White is the definition of Puritanism from H.L. Menckin, as The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
P.S. Bowie didn't write Make Me Smile, Steve Harley did.
I leave you with bitchplease Iggy:
↧
↧
DB and VG Q&A at the MCA with Todd and Sandy!
Dear Sweet Darlings,
We are less than a week away from the event of the century: Todd Haynes and Sandy Powell are doing a Q&A after a screening of Velvet Goldmine as part of the David Bowie Is exhibition in Chicago. This brilliant show from the Victoria and Albert Museum is touring the world and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago is the only U.S. stop.
The date is this Sunday October 5. Screening of VG at 1, Q&A at 3:15-5. It is not sold out as of this moment. It would be fab to see some of you there!
http://www2.mcachicago.org/event/mca-talk-todd-haynes-and-sandy-powell/
David Bowie Is, now through Jan 4:
http://www2.mcachicago.org/exhibition/david-bowie-is/
We are less than a week away from the event of the century: Todd Haynes and Sandy Powell are doing a Q&A after a screening of Velvet Goldmine as part of the David Bowie Is exhibition in Chicago. This brilliant show from the Victoria and Albert Museum is touring the world and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago is the only U.S. stop.
The date is this Sunday October 5. Screening of VG at 1, Q&A at 3:15-5. It is not sold out as of this moment. It would be fab to see some of you there!
http://www2.mcachicago.org/event/mca-talk-todd-haynes-and-sandy-powell/
David Bowie Is, now through Jan 4:
http://www2.mcachicago.org/exhibition/david-bowie-is/
↧
Q&A Audio with Todd Haynes and Sandy Powell at the MCA
So a few Sundays ago I shook out my Marc Bolan style corkscrew curls, put on some glitter eyeshadow, my Bowie/Tilda leggings, a silver jacket, my Lindsay Kemp designed Swatch watch and took a 6:45 am flight to Chicago to see the David Bowie Is exhibit at the MCA. Also on the schedule for the day was a screening of Velvet Goldmine followed by a Q&A with Todd Haynes and Sandy Powell. It was like ComicCon/Christmas morning for Glam Rock aficionados.
David Bowie Is is a gorgeous exploration of DB from his earliest days to now. The V&A developed the show with permission to access Bowie's own archive. He's saved, repurchased or been gifted items in the show including costumes, artwork, hand written lyrics, etc. As you enter you are given a headset that narrates the exhibit. Its on a GPS system so the matching audio syncs as you walk through the areas. You can linger or skip what interests you. Oddly you don't communicate much with others which makes it a bit of an isolated experience. The exhibit has been touring the world and Chicago is the only stop in the U.S., although it will go on to Paris, Melbourne Australia, and Groningen the Netherlands.
If you can't get to Chicago, or the above cities, I highly recommend you consult this website and see if the documentary on the exhibit is playing near you. It's a one-night-only screening in mid-November and very much worth the effort to get there. It was filmed on the closing night of the V&A exhibit and presented by their curators and includes guests like Kansai Yamamoto and Jarvis Cocker. Watch the trailer here.
So on to the Todd and Sandy Q&A. It was moderated by film professor Bruce Jenkins, who started with some informative overviews of Todd Haynes' and Sandy Powell's work. He quickly turned it over to the audience that, to a person, lavished praise on both Todd and Sandy before asking intelligent questions. Their enthusiasm in discussing their collaborations matched the audience's interest. It was a very indulgent hour & a half to explore their work. "Less a Q&A and more a love fest," declared Professor Jenkins in his closing remarks.
I had about 4 hours of sleep and had just absorbed 60 years of David Bowie in 3 hours so I was nervous when Professor Jenkins pointed to me and I was handed a microphone. But I introduced myself as the person behind vardathemessage and Todd was so gracious on complementing the site. He had tried to contact me in 2012 for help in preparing for the Blu-Ray commentary track (dream job!) but it was a silly email mix up that prevented that (much weeping). But since it lead to him also praising vardathemassage on the commentary track itself, it all worked out. I realize that you don't hear me thank Todd on the audio but it was because my eyes were tearing up and I wouldn't have been able to speak. I did mime my heart fluttering to him, so he understood what his words meant to me. I fangirled him, he fanboyed me, it was a dream come true.
Here's the transcript of the Q&A. For those of you interested, I'm at about 1:16:45.
David Bowie Is is a gorgeous exploration of DB from his earliest days to now. The V&A developed the show with permission to access Bowie's own archive. He's saved, repurchased or been gifted items in the show including costumes, artwork, hand written lyrics, etc. As you enter you are given a headset that narrates the exhibit. Its on a GPS system so the matching audio syncs as you walk through the areas. You can linger or skip what interests you. Oddly you don't communicate much with others which makes it a bit of an isolated experience. The exhibit has been touring the world and Chicago is the only stop in the U.S., although it will go on to Paris, Melbourne Australia, and Groningen the Netherlands.
If you can't get to Chicago, or the above cities, I highly recommend you consult this website and see if the documentary on the exhibit is playing near you. It's a one-night-only screening in mid-November and very much worth the effort to get there. It was filmed on the closing night of the V&A exhibit and presented by their curators and includes guests like Kansai Yamamoto and Jarvis Cocker. Watch the trailer here.
So on to the Todd and Sandy Q&A. It was moderated by film professor Bruce Jenkins, who started with some informative overviews of Todd Haynes' and Sandy Powell's work. He quickly turned it over to the audience that, to a person, lavished praise on both Todd and Sandy before asking intelligent questions. Their enthusiasm in discussing their collaborations matched the audience's interest. It was a very indulgent hour & a half to explore their work. "Less a Q&A and more a love fest," declared Professor Jenkins in his closing remarks.
I had about 4 hours of sleep and had just absorbed 60 years of David Bowie in 3 hours so I was nervous when Professor Jenkins pointed to me and I was handed a microphone. But I introduced myself as the person behind vardathemessage and Todd was so gracious on complementing the site. He had tried to contact me in 2012 for help in preparing for the Blu-Ray commentary track (dream job!) but it was a silly email mix up that prevented that (much weeping). But since it lead to him also praising vardathemassage on the commentary track itself, it all worked out. I realize that you don't hear me thank Todd on the audio but it was because my eyes were tearing up and I wouldn't have been able to speak. I did mime my heart fluttering to him, so he understood what his words meant to me. I fangirled him, he fanboyed me, it was a dream come true.
Here's the transcript of the Q&A. For those of you interested, I'm at about 1:16:45.
↧
Fade Away Never
↧
Crazy but well informed
So I was reading an excellent interview with Todd Haynes about his new glorious film, Carol. The article had an overview of Todd's work, so he was asked about his earliest influences, which of course includes Mary Poppins. Those who know have been aware of the MP/VG links via the now decade old Mary Poppins/Velvet Goldmine Gallery.
From the article:
Can he remember the first film he saw? He makes a noise that’s close to a squeal. “Yes, I can, and it was Mary Poppins, and it conducted an intense power over me. Oh, my God. Something about it conspired to make it an indelible piece of… psychic formative work for me. It produced obsession, utter obsession. I was only three, and this was a time [before video] when you saw a film only once. I would spend days drawing pictures of it, and acting it out, and dressing up, making everyone into Mary Poppins: ‘Mom, put this hat on and then I’m going to put flowers on it!’ It was a way of life.”
To a greater or lesser degree, all his films can be traced back to Mary Poppins. “After I did Velvet Goldmine, which is also set in London and a fantasy, a crazy but well informed fan made me a T-shirt that had Jane and Michael Banks [the children in Mary Poppins] looking up at the star next to a picture of Ewan McGregor and Christian Bale [who appear in Velvet Goldmine] looking up at the spaceship. They all have the exact same expression, the same lighting… Yes, I see the continuum.”
Crazy but well informed. That's me that!
And, yes, I gave that T shirt to Todd when he was in my neighborhood shooting Mildred Pierce.
From the article:
Can he remember the first film he saw? He makes a noise that’s close to a squeal. “Yes, I can, and it was Mary Poppins, and it conducted an intense power over me. Oh, my God. Something about it conspired to make it an indelible piece of… psychic formative work for me. It produced obsession, utter obsession. I was only three, and this was a time [before video] when you saw a film only once. I would spend days drawing pictures of it, and acting it out, and dressing up, making everyone into Mary Poppins: ‘Mom, put this hat on and then I’m going to put flowers on it!’ It was a way of life.”
To a greater or lesser degree, all his films can be traced back to Mary Poppins. “After I did Velvet Goldmine, which is also set in London and a fantasy, a crazy but well informed fan made me a T-shirt that had Jane and Michael Banks [the children in Mary Poppins] looking up at the star next to a picture of Ewan McGregor and Christian Bale [who appear in Velvet Goldmine] looking up at the spaceship. They all have the exact same expression, the same lighting… Yes, I see the continuum.”
Crazy but well informed. That's me that!
And, yes, I gave that T shirt to Todd when he was in my neighborhood shooting Mildred Pierce.
↧
↧
The Whole Shebang
Dear Sweet Darlings,
Long time since we've been together!
I thought I should let you know about a brilliant podcast - The Whole Shebang is discussing Velvet Goldmine minute by minute, each weekday. A glittery way to start the day! The erudite hosts, Jenny and Mike, are fascinating and funny as they treat us to their take on the details in and behind our favorite film. Find them here, with links to other platforms. (Remember when platforms referred to shoes!?)
One ingenious piece of the VG puzzle was explained by Mike who identified the mysterious voice that starts the film as Amelia Earhart from a 1935 radio broadcast, "A Woman's Place in Science". Hence, the film begins and ends with radio!
Long time since we've been together!
I thought I should let you know about a brilliant podcast - The Whole Shebang is discussing Velvet Goldmine minute by minute, each weekday. A glittery way to start the day! The erudite hosts, Jenny and Mike, are fascinating and funny as they treat us to their take on the details in and behind our favorite film. Find them here, with links to other platforms. (Remember when platforms referred to shoes!?)
One ingenious piece of the VG puzzle was explained by Mike who identified the mysterious voice that starts the film as Amelia Earhart from a 1935 radio broadcast, "A Woman's Place in Science". Hence, the film begins and ends with radio!
↧
Please Stand By
livejournal did some kind of maintenance the other day and all my images have disappeared. please be patient while I figure out how to put them back. Mercury's in Retrograde, ain't it a bitch? Let's get stinko!
↧
Cinematic Details
After thirty years one year of being immersed in trivia about Velvet Goldmine we've probably covered most aspects of the film but heaven knows that Todd's multilayered, well-read mind has included some reference or quote that has slipped by us. We'll continue to update any earth shattering discoveries. We'll also be working on corrections and hope to create some kind of index, so stay friended.
Additionally, after a year of being immersed in trivia about Velvet Goldmine, we're experiencing a bit of a withdrawal – perhaps you minskys are too. Here's a little 'methadone' in the form of more films to explore. During the course of the year we've mentioned many films that have left their mark on Velvet Goldmine or influenced Todd Haynes. In his own words, Todd explains some of his Early Cinematic Influences(from Cinema Papers, December 1998). This fascinating article provides some inspiration when we're thinking what to rent or add to our Netflix list.
American independent filmmaker Todd Haynes, the man responsible for Poison (1991), Safe (1995) and, most recently, Velvet Goldmine, talks about early cinematic experiences and influences on his own work:
The films that influenced me as a kid were films that kids are taken to see when they're my age. The first one was Mary Poppins [Robert Stevenson, 1964], my very first movie when I was three, and I almost had a psychotic obsession for Mary Poppins. There's probably a lot about that film, and a lot about film in general, that really deeply affected me, and made me respond by wanting to create things in response to it. I would draw pictures and play or perform the songs; relive the experience in all these different ways. It definitely inspired me creatively, and I guess that's my point; something about seeing films at that age got my motor running. And that would continue; there'd be certain films that would just really penetrate me.
It's funny, a lot of them were English in theme. The next one was Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli's film [1968]. I went through a massively romantic period; I was a little Shakespeare freak as a kid. I was probably so insufferable to be around, so pretentious.
Later, films that definitely hooked me were films that probably came out of the 1960s drug culture, experience movies like Performance [Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg, 1970], Women in Love [Ken Russell, 1969], A Clockwork Orange [Stanley Kubrick, 1971], and 2001: A Space Odyssey [Stanley Kubrick, 1968].
They were films that I thought a lot about in making Velvet Goldmine, because they invited you to go somewhere you'd never seen before. I think that was responding to a youth culture that wanted that and created that experience. They really wanted to be surprised and challenged, and, unfortunately, I don't feel like those kinds of films are made so much today. I was hoping that Velvet Goldmine might rekindle some of those feelings of mystery, and excite the imaginations of young people that see it.
I loved Hollywood films like Citizen Kane [Orson Welles, 1941] and Fritz Lang, but, moving into college, I would discover Fassbinder's work, who remains my most favourite filmmaker. His Angst essen Seeie auf [Fear Eats the Soul, 1973] is my favourite of his films.
There are so many, and they're so different and varied, and the whole body of work is so astounding. But I was still very much into Hitchcock and Douglas Sirk. I also saw Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles [Chantal Akerman, 1975] in college; that remains a real pivotal film for me, as well. I love Nashville [Robert Altman, 1975], Lola Montés [Max Ophüls, 1955] and also a lesser known film by Max Ophüls, The Reckless Moment [1949], with John Bennett and James Mason, an amazing internal melodrama that I particularly adore.
I have unintellectual passion for a film like Picnic [Joshua Logan, 1955], which has a profound effect on me; I start sobbing from the opening credits through to the end. It definitely touches me in some bizarre way. I also love certain experimental films like Blow Job by Andy Warhol [1963] and Un Chant d'Amour [A Song of Love, 1950] by Jean Genet.
~
The following article from the Brown [University] Daily Herald of Monday, April 14, 2003, gives us a little more insight to Todd Haynes:
Director Todd Haynes, [class of] '85, talks on his upbringing and artistic influences during Q&A session Friday
By Dan Poulson and Adam Hundt
A strong interest in feminism and melodrama contributed to the creation of his film "Far from Heaven," director Todd Haynes '85 explained in a question and answer session held Friday in Upper Salomon.
Moderated by Department of Modern Culture and Media Chair Michael Silverman, the discussion covered Haynes' first filmmaking experiences and the career path he took after graduating from Brown, which eventually led to a Best Screenplay Oscar nod for "Far from Heaven." The discussion was one of several weekend-long events sponsored by the MCM Department that dealt with Haynes and his work.
The Q&A opened with a screening of Haynes' 1993 short film "Dottie Gets Spanked," the story of a young boy and his obsession with a sitcom actress. As the director later explained, some of the personal touches in that film came directly from Haynes' own experiences while growing up.
"The first movie I ever saw was ‘Mary Poppins,'" he said. "And I became absolutely obsessed with it. I felt a very strong need to respond to it, in some way creatively. Many of the children's drawings you see in ‘Dottie Gets Spanked' are my own from that time." He added that the use of color in that film in part influenced the color schemes in "Far from Heaven."
Haynes also talked about his upbringing in Sherman Oaks, Calif., and his introduction to filmmaking at the progressive Oakwood School. It was there he became friends with the actresses Elizabeth McGovern ("Ordinary People") and Jennifer Jason Leigh ("Fast Times at Ridgemont High") and appeared in student plays with both of them. "I played the Romeo to her Juliet, the Death to her Everyman," Haynes said of Leigh.
While at Oakwood, Haynes also turned one of his creative writing assignments into an experimental super-8 short film, "The Suicide." With help from "some friends of friends," Haynes and a companion were able to get a chance to edit the film in a professional editing studio, he said.
But despite Haynes' childhood proximity to Hollywood, he said he never felt the need to pursue a filmmaking career there. "I didn't really appreciate the Hollywood studio hierarchy. I was really turned off by the idea of climbing the studio ladder," he said. His fascination with New York during his childhood visits there convinced Haynes to go to college on the East Coast, and eventually to Brown, because he found the open curriculum attractive.
It was as an undergraduate in MCM that Haynes was exposed to filmmakers he would find deeply influential. In particular, Haynes singled out the movies of Douglas Sirk, Nicholas Roeg and the German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Like Haynes'"Far from Heaven," Fassbinder's 1974 film "Fear Eats the Soul" was directly inspired by Sirk's melodramatic tearjerker "All that Heaven Allows," which used gender roles and the domestic environment to critique suburban contentment.
Haynes acknowledged that, while "Far from Heaven" is most overt in its references to Douglas Sirk, he agreed with Silverman's comment that many of his own films have had a strong melodramatic edge.
One of Haynes' first student productions was "Assassins: A Film Concerning Rimbaud," which explored the life of the French poet Arthur Rimbaud. Set during Rimbaud's lifetime, Haynes remarked that "it was really fun to make Providence look like 1870s Paris." Following his graduation from Brown, Haynes filmed "Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story," a movie that depicted, with Barbie dolls as actors, the singer Karen Carpenter's struggle with anorexia. "‘Superstar' got a lot of attention in the media and was being written about a lot," Haynes said, which helped it to get distribution in theaters. After the controversy and success of that film, Haynes formed Apparatus Films, a production company that included fellow Brown graduate Christine Vachon '83.
Created during the beginnings of the independent film movement, Apparatus financed a number of films, including Haynes' own "Poison," a movie based on the writings of Jean Genet that dealt explicitly with the AIDS epidemic. That film also reflected Haynes' involvement in the AIDS awareness organization ACT UP.
"I can remember being in New York and seeing the "Silence = Death" posters everywhere, and that really piqued my interest. I saw something in the discourse about AIDS that really needed to be interrupted. I felt there had to be some sort of conduit for that intervention, and at that time it was Jean Genet," he said.
"Poison" was a landmark in the New Queer Cinema of the 1980s and 1990s, creating controversy because it received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, but was released with an NC-17 rating.
Haynes also discussed his 1998 film "Velvet Goldmine," a dark portrayal of the glam-rock era in London. When asked whether he talked with any glam-rock musicians about the film, Haynes recalled a phone conversation he had with punk rocker Iggy Pop. In Haynes' film Ewan McGregor played a character loosely based on him. "Iggy was like, ‘Yeah, I saw your film ‘Safe' the other night, man. It was a packed house, and you could have heard a pin drop,'" Haynes said. "Coming from Iggy Pop, that was a great compliment."
Additionally, after a year of being immersed in trivia about Velvet Goldmine, we're experiencing a bit of a withdrawal – perhaps you minskys are too. Here's a little 'methadone' in the form of more films to explore. During the course of the year we've mentioned many films that have left their mark on Velvet Goldmine or influenced Todd Haynes. In his own words, Todd explains some of his Early Cinematic Influences(from Cinema Papers, December 1998). This fascinating article provides some inspiration when we're thinking what to rent or add to our Netflix list.
American independent filmmaker Todd Haynes, the man responsible for Poison (1991), Safe (1995) and, most recently, Velvet Goldmine, talks about early cinematic experiences and influences on his own work:
The films that influenced me as a kid were films that kids are taken to see when they're my age. The first one was Mary Poppins [Robert Stevenson, 1964], my very first movie when I was three, and I almost had a psychotic obsession for Mary Poppins. There's probably a lot about that film, and a lot about film in general, that really deeply affected me, and made me respond by wanting to create things in response to it. I would draw pictures and play or perform the songs; relive the experience in all these different ways. It definitely inspired me creatively, and I guess that's my point; something about seeing films at that age got my motor running. And that would continue; there'd be certain films that would just really penetrate me.
It's funny, a lot of them were English in theme. The next one was Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli's film [1968]. I went through a massively romantic period; I was a little Shakespeare freak as a kid. I was probably so insufferable to be around, so pretentious.
Later, films that definitely hooked me were films that probably came out of the 1960s drug culture, experience movies like Performance [Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg, 1970], Women in Love [Ken Russell, 1969], A Clockwork Orange [Stanley Kubrick, 1971], and 2001: A Space Odyssey [Stanley Kubrick, 1968].
They were films that I thought a lot about in making Velvet Goldmine, because they invited you to go somewhere you'd never seen before. I think that was responding to a youth culture that wanted that and created that experience. They really wanted to be surprised and challenged, and, unfortunately, I don't feel like those kinds of films are made so much today. I was hoping that Velvet Goldmine might rekindle some of those feelings of mystery, and excite the imaginations of young people that see it.
I loved Hollywood films like Citizen Kane [Orson Welles, 1941] and Fritz Lang, but, moving into college, I would discover Fassbinder's work, who remains my most favourite filmmaker. His Angst essen Seeie auf [Fear Eats the Soul, 1973] is my favourite of his films.
There are so many, and they're so different and varied, and the whole body of work is so astounding. But I was still very much into Hitchcock and Douglas Sirk. I also saw Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles [Chantal Akerman, 1975] in college; that remains a real pivotal film for me, as well. I love Nashville [Robert Altman, 1975], Lola Montés [Max Ophüls, 1955] and also a lesser known film by Max Ophüls, The Reckless Moment [1949], with John Bennett and James Mason, an amazing internal melodrama that I particularly adore.
I have unintellectual passion for a film like Picnic [Joshua Logan, 1955], which has a profound effect on me; I start sobbing from the opening credits through to the end. It definitely touches me in some bizarre way. I also love certain experimental films like Blow Job by Andy Warhol [1963] and Un Chant d'Amour [A Song of Love, 1950] by Jean Genet.
~
The following article from the Brown [University] Daily Herald of Monday, April 14, 2003, gives us a little more insight to Todd Haynes:
Director Todd Haynes, [class of] '85, talks on his upbringing and artistic influences during Q&A session Friday
By Dan Poulson and Adam Hundt
A strong interest in feminism and melodrama contributed to the creation of his film "Far from Heaven," director Todd Haynes '85 explained in a question and answer session held Friday in Upper Salomon.
Moderated by Department of Modern Culture and Media Chair Michael Silverman, the discussion covered Haynes' first filmmaking experiences and the career path he took after graduating from Brown, which eventually led to a Best Screenplay Oscar nod for "Far from Heaven." The discussion was one of several weekend-long events sponsored by the MCM Department that dealt with Haynes and his work.
The Q&A opened with a screening of Haynes' 1993 short film "Dottie Gets Spanked," the story of a young boy and his obsession with a sitcom actress. As the director later explained, some of the personal touches in that film came directly from Haynes' own experiences while growing up.
"The first movie I ever saw was ‘Mary Poppins,'" he said. "And I became absolutely obsessed with it. I felt a very strong need to respond to it, in some way creatively. Many of the children's drawings you see in ‘Dottie Gets Spanked' are my own from that time." He added that the use of color in that film in part influenced the color schemes in "Far from Heaven."
Haynes also talked about his upbringing in Sherman Oaks, Calif., and his introduction to filmmaking at the progressive Oakwood School. It was there he became friends with the actresses Elizabeth McGovern ("Ordinary People") and Jennifer Jason Leigh ("Fast Times at Ridgemont High") and appeared in student plays with both of them. "I played the Romeo to her Juliet, the Death to her Everyman," Haynes said of Leigh.
While at Oakwood, Haynes also turned one of his creative writing assignments into an experimental super-8 short film, "The Suicide." With help from "some friends of friends," Haynes and a companion were able to get a chance to edit the film in a professional editing studio, he said.
But despite Haynes' childhood proximity to Hollywood, he said he never felt the need to pursue a filmmaking career there. "I didn't really appreciate the Hollywood studio hierarchy. I was really turned off by the idea of climbing the studio ladder," he said. His fascination with New York during his childhood visits there convinced Haynes to go to college on the East Coast, and eventually to Brown, because he found the open curriculum attractive.
It was as an undergraduate in MCM that Haynes was exposed to filmmakers he would find deeply influential. In particular, Haynes singled out the movies of Douglas Sirk, Nicholas Roeg and the German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Like Haynes'"Far from Heaven," Fassbinder's 1974 film "Fear Eats the Soul" was directly inspired by Sirk's melodramatic tearjerker "All that Heaven Allows," which used gender roles and the domestic environment to critique suburban contentment.
Haynes acknowledged that, while "Far from Heaven" is most overt in its references to Douglas Sirk, he agreed with Silverman's comment that many of his own films have had a strong melodramatic edge.
One of Haynes' first student productions was "Assassins: A Film Concerning Rimbaud," which explored the life of the French poet Arthur Rimbaud. Set during Rimbaud's lifetime, Haynes remarked that "it was really fun to make Providence look like 1870s Paris." Following his graduation from Brown, Haynes filmed "Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story," a movie that depicted, with Barbie dolls as actors, the singer Karen Carpenter's struggle with anorexia. "‘Superstar' got a lot of attention in the media and was being written about a lot," Haynes said, which helped it to get distribution in theaters. After the controversy and success of that film, Haynes formed Apparatus Films, a production company that included fellow Brown graduate Christine Vachon '83.
Created during the beginnings of the independent film movement, Apparatus financed a number of films, including Haynes' own "Poison," a movie based on the writings of Jean Genet that dealt explicitly with the AIDS epidemic. That film also reflected Haynes' involvement in the AIDS awareness organization ACT UP.
"I can remember being in New York and seeing the "Silence = Death" posters everywhere, and that really piqued my interest. I saw something in the discourse about AIDS that really needed to be interrupted. I felt there had to be some sort of conduit for that intervention, and at that time it was Jean Genet," he said.
"Poison" was a landmark in the New Queer Cinema of the 1980s and 1990s, creating controversy because it received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, but was released with an NC-17 rating.
Haynes also discussed his 1998 film "Velvet Goldmine," a dark portrayal of the glam-rock era in London. When asked whether he talked with any glam-rock musicians about the film, Haynes recalled a phone conversation he had with punk rocker Iggy Pop. In Haynes' film Ewan McGregor played a character loosely based on him. "Iggy was like, ‘Yeah, I saw your film ‘Safe' the other night, man. It was a packed house, and you could have heard a pin drop,'" Haynes said. "Coming from Iggy Pop, that was a great compliment."
↧
Cinematic Details
After thirty years one year of being immersed in trivia about Velvet Goldmine we've probably covered most aspects of the film but heaven knows that Todd's multilayered, well-read mind has included some reference or quote that has slipped by us. We'll continue to update any earth shattering discoveries. We'll also be working on corrections and hope to create some kind of index, so stay friended.
Additionally, after a year of being immersed in trivia about Velvet Goldmine, we're experiencing a bit of a withdrawal – perhaps you minskys are too. Here's a little 'methadone' in the form of more films to explore. During the course of the year we've mentioned many films that have left their mark on Velvet Goldmine or influenced Todd Haynes. In his own words, Todd explains some of his Early Cinematic Influences(from Cinema Papers, December 1998). This fascinating article provides some inspiration when we're thinking what to rent or add to our Netflix list.
American independent filmmaker Todd Haynes, the man responsible for Poison (1991), Safe (1995) and, most recently, Velvet Goldmine, talks about early cinematic experiences and influences on his own work:
The films that influenced me as a kid were films that kids are taken to see when they're my age. The first one was Mary Poppins [Robert Stevenson, 1964], my very first movie when I was three, and I almost had a psychotic obsession for Mary Poppins. There's probably a lot about that film, and a lot about film in general, that really deeply affected me, and made me respond by wanting to create things in response to it. I would draw pictures and play or perform the songs; relive the experience in all these different ways. It definitely inspired me creatively, and I guess that's my point; something about seeing films at that age got my motor running. And that would continue; there'd be certain films that would just really penetrate me.
It's funny, a lot of them were English in theme. The next one was Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli's film [1968]. I went through a massively romantic period; I was a little Shakespeare freak as a kid. I was probably so insufferable to be around, so pretentious.
Later, films that definitely hooked me were films that probably came out of the 1960s drug culture, experience movies like Performance [Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg, 1970], Women in Love [Ken Russell, 1969], A Clockwork Orange [Stanley Kubrick, 1971], and 2001: A Space Odyssey [Stanley Kubrick, 1968].
They were films that I thought a lot about in making Velvet Goldmine, because they invited you to go somewhere you'd never seen before. I think that was responding to a youth culture that wanted that and created that experience. They really wanted to be surprised and challenged, and, unfortunately, I don't feel like those kinds of films are made so much today. I was hoping that Velvet Goldmine might rekindle some of those feelings of mystery, and excite the imaginations of young people that see it.
I loved Hollywood films like Citizen Kane [Orson Welles, 1941] and Fritz Lang, but, moving into college, I would discover Fassbinder's work, who remains my most favourite filmmaker. His Angst essen Seeie auf [Fear Eats the Soul, 1973] is my favourite of his films.
There are so many, and they're so different and varied, and the whole body of work is so astounding. But I was still very much into Hitchcock and Douglas Sirk. I also saw Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles [Chantal Akerman, 1975] in college; that remains a real pivotal film for me, as well. I love Nashville [Robert Altman, 1975], Lola Montés [Max Ophüls, 1955] and also a lesser known film by Max Ophüls, The Reckless Moment [1949], with John Bennett and James Mason, an amazing internal melodrama that I particularly adore.
I have unintellectual passion for a film like Picnic [Joshua Logan, 1955], which has a profound effect on me; I start sobbing from the opening credits through to the end. It definitely touches me in some bizarre way. I also love certain experimental films like Blow Job by Andy Warhol [1963] and Un Chant d'Amour [A Song of Love, 1950] by Jean Genet.
~
The following article from the Brown [University] Daily Herald of Monday, April 14, 2003, gives us a little more insight to Todd Haynes:
Director Todd Haynes, [class of] '85, talks on his upbringing and artistic influences during Q&A session Friday
By Dan Poulson and Adam Hundt
A strong interest in feminism and melodrama contributed to the creation of his film "Far from Heaven," director Todd Haynes '85 explained in a question and answer session held Friday in Upper Salomon.
Moderated by Department of Modern Culture and Media Chair Michael Silverman, the discussion covered Haynes' first filmmaking experiences and the career path he took after graduating from Brown, which eventually led to a Best Screenplay Oscar nod for "Far from Heaven." The discussion was one of several weekend-long events sponsored by the MCM Department that dealt with Haynes and his work.
The Q&A opened with a screening of Haynes' 1993 short film "Dottie Gets Spanked," the story of a young boy and his obsession with a sitcom actress. As the director later explained, some of the personal touches in that film came directly from Haynes' own experiences while growing up.
"The first movie I ever saw was ‘Mary Poppins,'" he said. "And I became absolutely obsessed with it. I felt a very strong need to respond to it, in some way creatively. Many of the children's drawings you see in ‘Dottie Gets Spanked' are my own from that time." He added that the use of color in that film in part influenced the color schemes in "Far from Heaven."
Haynes also talked about his upbringing in Sherman Oaks, Calif., and his introduction to filmmaking at the progressive Oakwood School. It was there he became friends with the actresses Elizabeth McGovern ("Ordinary People") and Jennifer Jason Leigh ("Fast Times at Ridgemont High") and appeared in student plays with both of them. "I played the Romeo to her Juliet, the Death to her Everyman," Haynes said of Leigh.
While at Oakwood, Haynes also turned one of his creative writing assignments into an experimental super-8 short film, "The Suicide." With help from "some friends of friends," Haynes and a companion were able to get a chance to edit the film in a professional editing studio, he said.
But despite Haynes' childhood proximity to Hollywood, he said he never felt the need to pursue a filmmaking career there. "I didn't really appreciate the Hollywood studio hierarchy. I was really turned off by the idea of climbing the studio ladder," he said. His fascination with New York during his childhood visits there convinced Haynes to go to college on the East Coast, and eventually to Brown, because he found the open curriculum attractive.
It was as an undergraduate in MCM that Haynes was exposed to filmmakers he would find deeply influential. In particular, Haynes singled out the movies of Douglas Sirk, Nicholas Roeg and the German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Like Haynes'"Far from Heaven," Fassbinder's 1974 film "Fear Eats the Soul" was directly inspired by Sirk's melodramatic tearjerker "All that Heaven Allows," which used gender roles and the domestic environment to critique suburban contentment.
Haynes acknowledged that, while "Far from Heaven" is most overt in its references to Douglas Sirk, he agreed with Silverman's comment that many of his own films have had a strong melodramatic edge.
One of Haynes' first student productions was "Assassins: A Film Concerning Rimbaud," which explored the life of the French poet Arthur Rimbaud. Set during Rimbaud's lifetime, Haynes remarked that "it was really fun to make Providence look like 1870s Paris." Following his graduation from Brown, Haynes filmed "Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story," a movie that depicted, with Barbie dolls as actors, the singer Karen Carpenter's struggle with anorexia. "‘Superstar' got a lot of attention in the media and was being written about a lot," Haynes said, which helped it to get distribution in theaters. After the controversy and success of that film, Haynes formed Apparatus Films, a production company that included fellow Brown graduate Christine Vachon '83.
Created during the beginnings of the independent film movement, Apparatus financed a number of films, including Haynes' own "Poison," a movie based on the writings of Jean Genet that dealt explicitly with the AIDS epidemic. That film also reflected Haynes' involvement in the AIDS awareness organization ACT UP.
"I can remember being in New York and seeing the "Silence = Death" posters everywhere, and that really piqued my interest. I saw something in the discourse about AIDS that really needed to be interrupted. I felt there had to be some sort of conduit for that intervention, and at that time it was Jean Genet," he said.
"Poison" was a landmark in the New Queer Cinema of the 1980s and 1990s, creating controversy because it received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, but was released with an NC-17 rating.
Haynes also discussed his 1998 film "Velvet Goldmine," a dark portrayal of the glam-rock era in London. When asked whether he talked with any glam-rock musicians about the film, Haynes recalled a phone conversation he had with punk rocker Iggy Pop. In Haynes' film Ewan McGregor played a character loosely based on him. "Iggy was like, ‘Yeah, I saw your film ‘Safe' the other night, man. It was a packed house, and you could have heard a pin drop,'" Haynes said. "Coming from Iggy Pop, that was a great compliment."
Additionally, after a year of being immersed in trivia about Velvet Goldmine, we're experiencing a bit of a withdrawal – perhaps you minskys are too. Here's a little 'methadone' in the form of more films to explore. During the course of the year we've mentioned many films that have left their mark on Velvet Goldmine or influenced Todd Haynes. In his own words, Todd explains some of his Early Cinematic Influences(from Cinema Papers, December 1998). This fascinating article provides some inspiration when we're thinking what to rent or add to our Netflix list.
American independent filmmaker Todd Haynes, the man responsible for Poison (1991), Safe (1995) and, most recently, Velvet Goldmine, talks about early cinematic experiences and influences on his own work:
The films that influenced me as a kid were films that kids are taken to see when they're my age. The first one was Mary Poppins [Robert Stevenson, 1964], my very first movie when I was three, and I almost had a psychotic obsession for Mary Poppins. There's probably a lot about that film, and a lot about film in general, that really deeply affected me, and made me respond by wanting to create things in response to it. I would draw pictures and play or perform the songs; relive the experience in all these different ways. It definitely inspired me creatively, and I guess that's my point; something about seeing films at that age got my motor running. And that would continue; there'd be certain films that would just really penetrate me.
It's funny, a lot of them were English in theme. The next one was Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli's film [1968]. I went through a massively romantic period; I was a little Shakespeare freak as a kid. I was probably so insufferable to be around, so pretentious.
Later, films that definitely hooked me were films that probably came out of the 1960s drug culture, experience movies like Performance [Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg, 1970], Women in Love [Ken Russell, 1969], A Clockwork Orange [Stanley Kubrick, 1971], and 2001: A Space Odyssey [Stanley Kubrick, 1968].
They were films that I thought a lot about in making Velvet Goldmine, because they invited you to go somewhere you'd never seen before. I think that was responding to a youth culture that wanted that and created that experience. They really wanted to be surprised and challenged, and, unfortunately, I don't feel like those kinds of films are made so much today. I was hoping that Velvet Goldmine might rekindle some of those feelings of mystery, and excite the imaginations of young people that see it.
I loved Hollywood films like Citizen Kane [Orson Welles, 1941] and Fritz Lang, but, moving into college, I would discover Fassbinder's work, who remains my most favourite filmmaker. His Angst essen Seeie auf [Fear Eats the Soul, 1973] is my favourite of his films.
There are so many, and they're so different and varied, and the whole body of work is so astounding. But I was still very much into Hitchcock and Douglas Sirk. I also saw Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles [Chantal Akerman, 1975] in college; that remains a real pivotal film for me, as well. I love Nashville [Robert Altman, 1975], Lola Montés [Max Ophüls, 1955] and also a lesser known film by Max Ophüls, The Reckless Moment [1949], with John Bennett and James Mason, an amazing internal melodrama that I particularly adore.
I have unintellectual passion for a film like Picnic [Joshua Logan, 1955], which has a profound effect on me; I start sobbing from the opening credits through to the end. It definitely touches me in some bizarre way. I also love certain experimental films like Blow Job by Andy Warhol [1963] and Un Chant d'Amour [A Song of Love, 1950] by Jean Genet.
~
The following article from the Brown [University] Daily Herald of Monday, April 14, 2003, gives us a little more insight to Todd Haynes:
Director Todd Haynes, [class of] '85, talks on his upbringing and artistic influences during Q&A session Friday
By Dan Poulson and Adam Hundt
A strong interest in feminism and melodrama contributed to the creation of his film "Far from Heaven," director Todd Haynes '85 explained in a question and answer session held Friday in Upper Salomon.
Moderated by Department of Modern Culture and Media Chair Michael Silverman, the discussion covered Haynes' first filmmaking experiences and the career path he took after graduating from Brown, which eventually led to a Best Screenplay Oscar nod for "Far from Heaven." The discussion was one of several weekend-long events sponsored by the MCM Department that dealt with Haynes and his work.
The Q&A opened with a screening of Haynes' 1993 short film "Dottie Gets Spanked," the story of a young boy and his obsession with a sitcom actress. As the director later explained, some of the personal touches in that film came directly from Haynes' own experiences while growing up.
"The first movie I ever saw was ‘Mary Poppins,'" he said. "And I became absolutely obsessed with it. I felt a very strong need to respond to it, in some way creatively. Many of the children's drawings you see in ‘Dottie Gets Spanked' are my own from that time." He added that the use of color in that film in part influenced the color schemes in "Far from Heaven."
Haynes also talked about his upbringing in Sherman Oaks, Calif., and his introduction to filmmaking at the progressive Oakwood School. It was there he became friends with the actresses Elizabeth McGovern ("Ordinary People") and Jennifer Jason Leigh ("Fast Times at Ridgemont High") and appeared in student plays with both of them. "I played the Romeo to her Juliet, the Death to her Everyman," Haynes said of Leigh.
While at Oakwood, Haynes also turned one of his creative writing assignments into an experimental super-8 short film, "The Suicide." With help from "some friends of friends," Haynes and a companion were able to get a chance to edit the film in a professional editing studio, he said.
But despite Haynes' childhood proximity to Hollywood, he said he never felt the need to pursue a filmmaking career there. "I didn't really appreciate the Hollywood studio hierarchy. I was really turned off by the idea of climbing the studio ladder," he said. His fascination with New York during his childhood visits there convinced Haynes to go to college on the East Coast, and eventually to Brown, because he found the open curriculum attractive.
It was as an undergraduate in MCM that Haynes was exposed to filmmakers he would find deeply influential. In particular, Haynes singled out the movies of Douglas Sirk, Nicholas Roeg and the German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Like Haynes'"Far from Heaven," Fassbinder's 1974 film "Fear Eats the Soul" was directly inspired by Sirk's melodramatic tearjerker "All that Heaven Allows," which used gender roles and the domestic environment to critique suburban contentment.
Haynes acknowledged that, while "Far from Heaven" is most overt in its references to Douglas Sirk, he agreed with Silverman's comment that many of his own films have had a strong melodramatic edge.
One of Haynes' first student productions was "Assassins: A Film Concerning Rimbaud," which explored the life of the French poet Arthur Rimbaud. Set during Rimbaud's lifetime, Haynes remarked that "it was really fun to make Providence look like 1870s Paris." Following his graduation from Brown, Haynes filmed "Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story," a movie that depicted, with Barbie dolls as actors, the singer Karen Carpenter's struggle with anorexia. "‘Superstar' got a lot of attention in the media and was being written about a lot," Haynes said, which helped it to get distribution in theaters. After the controversy and success of that film, Haynes formed Apparatus Films, a production company that included fellow Brown graduate Christine Vachon '83.
Created during the beginnings of the independent film movement, Apparatus financed a number of films, including Haynes' own "Poison," a movie based on the writings of Jean Genet that dealt explicitly with the AIDS epidemic. That film also reflected Haynes' involvement in the AIDS awareness organization ACT UP.
"I can remember being in New York and seeing the "Silence = Death" posters everywhere, and that really piqued my interest. I saw something in the discourse about AIDS that really needed to be interrupted. I felt there had to be some sort of conduit for that intervention, and at that time it was Jean Genet," he said.
"Poison" was a landmark in the New Queer Cinema of the 1980s and 1990s, creating controversy because it received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, but was released with an NC-17 rating.
Haynes also discussed his 1998 film "Velvet Goldmine," a dark portrayal of the glam-rock era in London. When asked whether he talked with any glam-rock musicians about the film, Haynes recalled a phone conversation he had with punk rocker Iggy Pop. In Haynes' film Ewan McGregor played a character loosely based on him. "Iggy was like, ‘Yeah, I saw your film ‘Safe' the other night, man. It was a packed house, and you could have heard a pin drop,'" Haynes said. "Coming from Iggy Pop, that was a great compliment."
↧
↧
Cinematic Details
Fittingly, we end with what Todd has been doing since he made Velvet Goldmine. Happily, he had a critical success with Far From Heaven. This February 2003 article from The Independent at the release of Far From Heaven explains what we have to look forward to:
At the start of 2000, he drove to Portland, Oregon, and wrote Far From Heaven in 10 days in a friend's house. "I started to meet all these awesome people there – musicians, painters, weirdos, just these great minds. So I stayed. Sometimes I've thrown parties for 300 people, half of whom I don't even know." He chuckles at the naughtiness of it.
On that drive to Portland, Haynes played Bob Dylan tapes for the first time since college. Now he's preparing to make him the subject of his next picture. There are two kinds of Todd Haynes film. The female ones – Superstar, Safe, Far From Heaven – have rigidly controlled, almost fetishistic visual surfaces, and heroines with harshly chiming names. These alternate with wild, flamboyant, male-oriented works: Poison draws from three contrasting genres, while the various tones and textures of Velvet Goldmine could not be counted on all your fingers and toes. Haynes tries to offer an explanation for this pattern of neat film/messy film – "In those that deal with women, the references are more singular than multiple ... the male films have more erotic pleasure I think"– but it doesn't get us terribly far.
Still, the cycle continues. The Dylan film will be sprawling and multi-layered. "Seven characters will share the film, and they'll represent aspects of Dylan during different periods. But they'll look nothing like him. One will be an 11-year-old black kid. The one who most resembles Dylan will be a woman. It's going to be a multiple refracted biopic." Far out. The amazing thing is that, unlike David Bowie, who threw a hissy fit when Haynes asked to use his songs in Velvet Goldmine, Dylan himself has given the project his blessing – and, more importantly, his music. "I can use whatever I like," beams Haynes, returning to fan mode. "It's in ink!"
At the start of 2000, he drove to Portland, Oregon, and wrote Far From Heaven in 10 days in a friend's house. "I started to meet all these awesome people there – musicians, painters, weirdos, just these great minds. So I stayed. Sometimes I've thrown parties for 300 people, half of whom I don't even know." He chuckles at the naughtiness of it.
On that drive to Portland, Haynes played Bob Dylan tapes for the first time since college. Now he's preparing to make him the subject of his next picture. There are two kinds of Todd Haynes film. The female ones – Superstar, Safe, Far From Heaven – have rigidly controlled, almost fetishistic visual surfaces, and heroines with harshly chiming names. These alternate with wild, flamboyant, male-oriented works: Poison draws from three contrasting genres, while the various tones and textures of Velvet Goldmine could not be counted on all your fingers and toes. Haynes tries to offer an explanation for this pattern of neat film/messy film – "In those that deal with women, the references are more singular than multiple ... the male films have more erotic pleasure I think"– but it doesn't get us terribly far.
Still, the cycle continues. The Dylan film will be sprawling and multi-layered. "Seven characters will share the film, and they'll represent aspects of Dylan during different periods. But they'll look nothing like him. One will be an 11-year-old black kid. The one who most resembles Dylan will be a woman. It's going to be a multiple refracted biopic." Far out. The amazing thing is that, unlike David Bowie, who threw a hissy fit when Haynes asked to use his songs in Velvet Goldmine, Dylan himself has given the project his blessing – and, more importantly, his music. "I can use whatever I like," beams Haynes, returning to fan mode. "It's in ink!"
↧
Behind the Scenes Bonus
A delightful darling just gifted me with a copy of the VG issue of American Cinematographer magazine! The fascinating, if a bit technical, article about the choices made by DP Maryse Alberti and Todd Haynes is available on-line and I have quoted it extensively. However, there are a few wonderful photos in the issue. There are some stills (all by Peter Mountain) that look just like film clips but this picture of Todd and Maryse on set is new to me:
The caption: "Hmm, who played lead guitar on Ziggy Stardust?" In the midst of the shoot, Haynes ponders pop history while Alberti does a credible impression of Velvet Underground drummer Mo Tucker. Says Haynes, "I like Maryse's style as a person, so our working relationship has a great deal to do with the fact that we communicate very well."
And I love this one of Johnny taking a break from the platform shoes and getting into hightops. no, it's not drunk scanning, they look like they are going downhill but the photo is printed that way.
Another pertinent bonus in the issue: behind the scenes on Performance.
The caption: "Hmm, who played lead guitar on Ziggy Stardust?" In the midst of the shoot, Haynes ponders pop history while Alberti does a credible impression of Velvet Underground drummer Mo Tucker. Says Haynes, "I like Maryse's style as a person, so our working relationship has a great deal to do with the fact that we communicate very well."
And I love this one of Johnny taking a break from the platform shoes and getting into hightops. no, it's not drunk scanning, they look like they are going downhill but the photo is printed that way.
Another pertinent bonus in the issue: behind the scenes on Performance.
↧
Glad I caught you on my view screen, sailor
[originally posted July 26, 2006]
School's out for summer, as Alice Cooper's musical manifesto defiantly declared. However, my dear minskys, I have been doing the most enjoyable homework as of late. The marvel of democracy that is YouTube.com has enabled me to illustrate some of the major Real Life Parallels and Rock & Roll History mentioned in this compendium of trivia.
As with all matters of taste, some of these may not be to your liking, and some of you may be on dial up, so I've marked the essential ones as they pertain to Velvet Goldmine with ****, the mere greats with ***, those of interest to the enthusiast with **, and suggest the completists enjoy the more esoteric ones marked with *. Length is noted like this (00:00) allowing you to decide your level of commitment before clicking the link since they load right away. Read the entry link first if you want background on the clip or just go straight to the visuals.
Because I have no idea how long these links will be available, I'm not adding them to each entry. However, I'll add a link to the left side of the main page, next to the Indexes, so you can access them there.
UPDATE: I know you are often getting a statement that clips have been removed for violations of terms of service. Some escape the ban and others get taken down right away - so there are still lots of goodies here - just a boring trial and error, sorry. Since people will attempt to re-post the clips, you can do a search and still find them (or a close match).
The links follow the chronological order of the film:
Read the entry about the quintessential glam rock album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Bowie always offered a bit of theater with the music. Here is a ** delightful snippet of Ziggy doing mime during Width of a Circle. (1:07)
Read the entry about photographer Mick Rock and then see him at the *** opening of his gallery show in Berlin in April of this year. (2:57) The montage of iconic images will remind you of how essential his presence was in documenting Glam Rock.
Read the entry on Venus in Furs and then see ** Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable perform it. (3:26) The beautiful Gerard Malanga is in there doing the whip dance.
Then watch the **** performance of Marianne Faithful, high as a kite, dressed like a nun, duet with Bowie on I Got You Babe (3:31) from The 1980 Floor Show that's discussed in the comments.
Read the entry about costume designer Sandy Powell and then see how the kids on the street in this *** performance of All the Young Dudes by Mott the Hoople resemble Sandy Powell's costumed extras.
Here you can read about the promo film on Brian Slade that starts with the Perfect and Poisonous quote. To see a major influence on Todd, please put up with the poor quality [content ****/quality*] to watch a bit of the BBC doc Nationwide. (6:17) The narrator is positively livid that Bowie is pulling the birds with his act. Then see ** Bowie singing Time in a similar off the shoulder jumpsuit to Brian on The 1980 Floor Show (5:07), (and dig those far out dancers). Then take a look at **** Mick Rock's film of Jean Genie featuring Cyrinda Foxe. (4:06)
Queer Studies and Cinema majors can read about the iconography of the sailor and then they, and those of us who truly appreciate seeing two hot men kissing, can see a *** clip of Fassbinder's hypnotic take on Genet's Querelle. (3:27) [btw, the artificial voiceover is intentioned by Fassbinder - the film is originally in English - it's only part of the charm of this Douglas Sirk meets Tom of Finland weirdness.]
Read about Slade's "Cuz I love You" and then watch *** them sing it on Top of the Pops (3:10) giving you an idea of their audience pleasing enthusiasm despite their 'blokes in mascara' image.
Read about Elton John before he made his Goodbye Yellow Brick Road album and watch him *** play piano for T Rex on Bang a Gong. (4:08)
Read the entry about young Tommy singing Tutti Frutti in the style of Little Richard. There is a ** performance of Little Richard singing Tutti Frutti (2:12) on YouTube but it is mostly static shots from a poor quality black & white print of 1956's Don't Knock the Rock. However, this *** (2:54) 1969 live performance of The Georgia Peach singing Lucille shows his more fabulous side. His ensemble wouldn't be out of place at the 1970 New Years party where Mandy and Brian meet. His tunic and necklaces are très Jack Fairy.
Here's the entry on Gary Glitter. Watch him perform *** ‘Do You Want To Touch Me (Oh Yeah)’ (3:15) and see how he can rock with the best of them despite looking like Benny Hill in a mullet wig.
The entry on the history of the Mod and Rockers is here. Watch a ** British newsreel clip about it and view the ** Quadrophenia trailer. (1:36)
You've seen Ewan do Iggy and you can read the many reactions to seeing Iggy on stage then see Iggy and the Stooges perform **** TV Eye (5:04) at the infamous Cincinnati Pop Festival that is mentioned in the comments.
Read about how Jimi Hendrix set his guitar on fire at the 1967 Monterey Pop festival and then **** watch him turn the Trogg's classic Wild Thing into a virtuoso career defining performance in which he segues into Strangers in the Night, playing it with one hand, turns a somersault while playing, plays it behind his back, humps it, kisses it goodbye and finally lets it burn, baby, burn. (9:14)
Todd bristles when people call The Ballad of Maxwell Demon a 'music video'. Those who know realize that these short films have a different cinematic sensibility than 80s rock videos. Read this entry on The Ballad of Maxwell Demon and then watch this * long clip (9:38) of Lindsay Kemp in Pierrot in Turquoise, pt. 1, with Bowie as 'Cloud'. There is a certain resemblance to The Ballad of Maxwell Demon here. You have to put up with the poor quality but longtime Bowie fans will will know this film as one of the earliest experimental theater pieces Bowie performed in and might find this a little goldmine.
When Brian makes his splash on Top of the Pops, Todd is referencing Bowie's star making turn on TOTP from 1972 when he and the Spiders from Mars sang Starman. Read the entry and the watch the **** performance. (3:32) Hard core fans can compare that confident "I'm already a star" attitude of Ziggy with ** Bowie's first television appearance, performing and accepting an award for Space Oddity. (4:20)
At this entry when Cecil laments, The next day every schoolgirl in London was wearing glitter eye make-up and I was out of a bleeding job, he's talking about the reaction to the first man to wear glitter on the telly, Marc Bolan. In this documentary segment there is a *** clip at about 2:00 in of Marc making Glam history singing Hot Love. (6:32) The piece also has more about early Bolan and Bowie with interviews from Tony Visconti and Mick Rock.
Listen to Mick Rock's delightfully sonorous voice say "If David Bowie was the Jesus Christ of glam, then Marc Bolan was John the Baptist," and watch a **** bit of a documentary about Glam with an interview with Lindsay Kemp. (9:47)
A brief description of The Mighty Hannibal can be followed up with a DJ giving more biography on James T Shaw. (4:31) A * minimal visual here, just a studio and turntable, it's all in the narration.
Read the entry on Ladytron and then watch the incomparable **** Roxy Music perform it on The Old Grey Whistle Test. (4:44)
Read about that marvel of lyrical virtuosity Virginia Plain and then see **** performance by Roxy Music. (3:10)
The script mentions what we can infer as two references to the Rolling Stones via Dancing in the Street. Watch *** David Bowie and Mick Jagger camp it up to their version done for Live Aid (2:52) Devotees can watch *** Martha and the Vandellas sing the original (drat, the better version of them in super cool mod gear is gone). (1:51) Listen to the very beginning of the song and try to hear the fuzzy riff that Keith was obsessed/inspired by and then watch *** the Stones in action (4:33) and see if you can hear the influence on Satisfaction.
Read the entry about Jean Harlow and then see the *** scene from Dinner at Eight (1:32) with that endearing glamourpuss, sensational in white satin.
Read the entry on the New York Dolls and Personality Crisis then see them in all their **** trashy glory here. (3:36) Mere serendipity or an influence on the Max's scene - notice the Marilyn illustration of the back of David Jo's leather jacket.
See Suzi Quatro lead her all man band, in matching black racer back vests ** here. (3:29)
Read the entry with the reference to the Monkees and then watch the ** Richard Lester influenced opening to their show. (:49) If you're smitten, there are lots of Monkees clips at YouTube, including ones with Tim Buckley, Johnny Cash and Frank Zappa.
Read the entry on Satellite of Love. As close as we can get to the original is U2 and Lou Reed via satellite performing Satellite of Love on the Zoo TV tour. (4:48) The * poor quality here diminishes the inspired pairing but may be of interest to U2 and Lou fans.
Read the entry on Todd's homage to his own Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story and then watch this infamously banned indy here. (43:44) **** for content and * for quality but all copies of this are bootlegs so it's actually not that bad because the sound is ok. See Todd himself as the cool disc-jockey Todd Donovan! Todd's style is recognizble and there are a lot of similarities to visuals in VG.
Here's the entry on Mick Rock's infamous shot catching Bowie and Ronno in the act. There doesn't seem to be an actual guitar fellatio on YouTube but here's ** David teasing Ronno with a hand job. (00:24)
Hardcore Iggy fans can read![]()
spacequeen and I obsess about seeing Bowie and Iggy on Dinah Shore's afternoon chat show in comments. There is a link to a snippet of an interview there (of excellent quality) and some stills but now you can see Iggy perform **** Funtime (3:42) and **** Sister Midnight. (3:44) Bowie quietly plays keyboards as a shirtless Iggy throws himself all over the tasteful set like a possessed dervish.
Read who's really behind that behind that Brian is snorting coke off of here. Then see *** David with Ava Cherry as his backup singer from The 1980 floor show (5:00) But oh gosh, my geesh, darlings, I think Angie's assessment of her lack of singing talent is spot on.
Read how Berlin figures in the mix and then why Bowie needed a change in this film clip of Bowie singing Be My Wife. (3:12) It seems the director is going for the minimal magic that worked for Life on Mars (4:10) but Bowie simply looks like a corpse with make up here.
Iggy fares better in this era, here he is singing The Passenger (7:31) (wearing his lovely horse's tail.)
Read the entry about 20th Century Boy and then watch *** Marc Bolan's original version. (1:50)
Regarding this entry, witness the * blandness that is Pat Boone. (1:19) I dare you to call it rock & roll.
Read this entry on the use of masks in VG and by Bowie. Then watch this clip of the documentary on Bowie, ** Cracked Actor, (4:39) showing the creation of a plaster mask of Bowie's face that was used to make his stage prop.
Read the entry about Jack Fairy's Death of Glitter performance and then see the inspiration for his fabulous feather collar as worn by Brian Eno as he plays synthesizer (to the left of the screen) for Roxy Music's **** Do the Strand (3:51), one of the best examples of their witty wordplay.
Read the entry on the song over the credits, Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me), and then watch **** Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel perform it on Top of the Pops from 1975. (3:36)
Just for fun, hear *** Christian Bale talk about his method of becoming skinny enough to play Arthur. (0:39)
School's out for summer, as Alice Cooper's musical manifesto defiantly declared. However, my dear minskys, I have been doing the most enjoyable homework as of late. The marvel of democracy that is YouTube.com has enabled me to illustrate some of the major Real Life Parallels and Rock & Roll History mentioned in this compendium of trivia.
As with all matters of taste, some of these may not be to your liking, and some of you may be on dial up, so I've marked the essential ones as they pertain to Velvet Goldmine with ****, the mere greats with ***, those of interest to the enthusiast with **, and suggest the completists enjoy the more esoteric ones marked with *. Length is noted like this (00:00) allowing you to decide your level of commitment before clicking the link since they load right away. Read the entry link first if you want background on the clip or just go straight to the visuals.
Because I have no idea how long these links will be available, I'm not adding them to each entry. However, I'll add a link to the left side of the main page, next to the Indexes, so you can access them there.
UPDATE: I know you are often getting a statement that clips have been removed for violations of terms of service. Some escape the ban and others get taken down right away - so there are still lots of goodies here - just a boring trial and error, sorry. Since people will attempt to re-post the clips, you can do a search and still find them (or a close match).
The links follow the chronological order of the film:
Read the entry about the quintessential glam rock album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Bowie always offered a bit of theater with the music. Here is a ** delightful snippet of Ziggy doing mime during Width of a Circle. (1:07)
Read the entry about photographer Mick Rock and then see him at the *** opening of his gallery show in Berlin in April of this year. (2:57) The montage of iconic images will remind you of how essential his presence was in documenting Glam Rock.
Read the entry on Venus in Furs and then see ** Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable perform it. (3:26) The beautiful Gerard Malanga is in there doing the whip dance.
Then watch the **** performance of Marianne Faithful, high as a kite, dressed like a nun, duet with Bowie on I Got You Babe (3:31) from The 1980 Floor Show that's discussed in the comments.
Read the entry about costume designer Sandy Powell and then see how the kids on the street in this *** performance of All the Young Dudes by Mott the Hoople resemble Sandy Powell's costumed extras.
Here you can read about the promo film on Brian Slade that starts with the Perfect and Poisonous quote. To see a major influence on Todd, please put up with the poor quality [content ****/quality*] to watch a bit of the BBC doc Nationwide. (6:17) The narrator is positively livid that Bowie is pulling the birds with his act. Then see ** Bowie singing Time in a similar off the shoulder jumpsuit to Brian on The 1980 Floor Show (5:07), (and dig those far out dancers). Then take a look at **** Mick Rock's film of Jean Genie featuring Cyrinda Foxe. (4:06)
Queer Studies and Cinema majors can read about the iconography of the sailor and then they, and those of us who truly appreciate seeing two hot men kissing, can see a *** clip of Fassbinder's hypnotic take on Genet's Querelle. (3:27) [btw, the artificial voiceover is intentioned by Fassbinder - the film is originally in English - it's only part of the charm of this Douglas Sirk meets Tom of Finland weirdness.]
Read about Slade's "Cuz I love You" and then watch *** them sing it on Top of the Pops (3:10) giving you an idea of their audience pleasing enthusiasm despite their 'blokes in mascara' image.
Read about Elton John before he made his Goodbye Yellow Brick Road album and watch him *** play piano for T Rex on Bang a Gong. (4:08)
Read the entry about young Tommy singing Tutti Frutti in the style of Little Richard. There is a ** performance of Little Richard singing Tutti Frutti (2:12) on YouTube but it is mostly static shots from a poor quality black & white print of 1956's Don't Knock the Rock. However, this *** (2:54) 1969 live performance of The Georgia Peach singing Lucille shows his more fabulous side. His ensemble wouldn't be out of place at the 1970 New Years party where Mandy and Brian meet. His tunic and necklaces are très Jack Fairy.
Here's the entry on Gary Glitter. Watch him perform *** ‘Do You Want To Touch Me (Oh Yeah)’ (3:15) and see how he can rock with the best of them despite looking like Benny Hill in a mullet wig.
The entry on the history of the Mod and Rockers is here. Watch a ** British newsreel clip about it and view the ** Quadrophenia trailer. (1:36)
You've seen Ewan do Iggy and you can read the many reactions to seeing Iggy on stage then see Iggy and the Stooges perform **** TV Eye (5:04) at the infamous Cincinnati Pop Festival that is mentioned in the comments.
Read about how Jimi Hendrix set his guitar on fire at the 1967 Monterey Pop festival and then **** watch him turn the Trogg's classic Wild Thing into a virtuoso career defining performance in which he segues into Strangers in the Night, playing it with one hand, turns a somersault while playing, plays it behind his back, humps it, kisses it goodbye and finally lets it burn, baby, burn. (9:14)
Todd bristles when people call The Ballad of Maxwell Demon a 'music video'. Those who know realize that these short films have a different cinematic sensibility than 80s rock videos. Read this entry on The Ballad of Maxwell Demon and then watch this * long clip (9:38) of Lindsay Kemp in Pierrot in Turquoise, pt. 1, with Bowie as 'Cloud'. There is a certain resemblance to The Ballad of Maxwell Demon here. You have to put up with the poor quality but longtime Bowie fans will will know this film as one of the earliest experimental theater pieces Bowie performed in and might find this a little goldmine.
When Brian makes his splash on Top of the Pops, Todd is referencing Bowie's star making turn on TOTP from 1972 when he and the Spiders from Mars sang Starman. Read the entry and the watch the **** performance. (3:32) Hard core fans can compare that confident "I'm already a star" attitude of Ziggy with ** Bowie's first television appearance, performing and accepting an award for Space Oddity. (4:20)
At this entry when Cecil laments, The next day every schoolgirl in London was wearing glitter eye make-up and I was out of a bleeding job, he's talking about the reaction to the first man to wear glitter on the telly, Marc Bolan. In this documentary segment there is a *** clip at about 2:00 in of Marc making Glam history singing Hot Love. (6:32) The piece also has more about early Bolan and Bowie with interviews from Tony Visconti and Mick Rock.
Listen to Mick Rock's delightfully sonorous voice say "If David Bowie was the Jesus Christ of glam, then Marc Bolan was John the Baptist," and watch a **** bit of a documentary about Glam with an interview with Lindsay Kemp. (9:47)
A brief description of The Mighty Hannibal can be followed up with a DJ giving more biography on James T Shaw. (4:31) A * minimal visual here, just a studio and turntable, it's all in the narration.
Read the entry on Ladytron and then watch the incomparable **** Roxy Music perform it on The Old Grey Whistle Test. (4:44)
Read about that marvel of lyrical virtuosity Virginia Plain and then see **** performance by Roxy Music. (3:10)
The script mentions what we can infer as two references to the Rolling Stones via Dancing in the Street. Watch *** David Bowie and Mick Jagger camp it up to their version done for Live Aid (2:52) Devotees can watch *** Martha and the Vandellas sing the original (drat, the better version of them in super cool mod gear is gone). (1:51) Listen to the very beginning of the song and try to hear the fuzzy riff that Keith was obsessed/inspired by and then watch *** the Stones in action (4:33) and see if you can hear the influence on Satisfaction.
Read the entry about Jean Harlow and then see the *** scene from Dinner at Eight (1:32) with that endearing glamourpuss, sensational in white satin.
Read the entry on the New York Dolls and Personality Crisis then see them in all their **** trashy glory here. (3:36) Mere serendipity or an influence on the Max's scene - notice the Marilyn illustration of the back of David Jo's leather jacket.
See Suzi Quatro lead her all man band, in matching black racer back vests ** here. (3:29)
Read the entry with the reference to the Monkees and then watch the ** Richard Lester influenced opening to their show. (:49) If you're smitten, there are lots of Monkees clips at YouTube, including ones with Tim Buckley, Johnny Cash and Frank Zappa.
Read the entry on Satellite of Love. As close as we can get to the original is U2 and Lou Reed via satellite performing Satellite of Love on the Zoo TV tour. (4:48) The * poor quality here diminishes the inspired pairing but may be of interest to U2 and Lou fans.
Read the entry on Todd's homage to his own Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story and then watch this infamously banned indy here. (43:44) **** for content and * for quality but all copies of this are bootlegs so it's actually not that bad because the sound is ok. See Todd himself as the cool disc-jockey Todd Donovan! Todd's style is recognizble and there are a lot of similarities to visuals in VG.
Here's the entry on Mick Rock's infamous shot catching Bowie and Ronno in the act. There doesn't seem to be an actual guitar fellatio on YouTube but here's ** David teasing Ronno with a hand job. (00:24)
Hardcore Iggy fans can read
spacequeen and I obsess about seeing Bowie and Iggy on Dinah Shore's afternoon chat show in comments. There is a link to a snippet of an interview there (of excellent quality) and some stills but now you can see Iggy perform **** Funtime (3:42) and **** Sister Midnight. (3:44) Bowie quietly plays keyboards as a shirtless Iggy throws himself all over the tasteful set like a possessed dervish. Read who's really behind that behind that Brian is snorting coke off of here. Then see *** David with Ava Cherry as his backup singer from The 1980 floor show (5:00) But oh gosh, my geesh, darlings, I think Angie's assessment of her lack of singing talent is spot on.
Read how Berlin figures in the mix and then why Bowie needed a change in this film clip of Bowie singing Be My Wife. (3:12) It seems the director is going for the minimal magic that worked for Life on Mars (4:10) but Bowie simply looks like a corpse with make up here.
Iggy fares better in this era, here he is singing The Passenger (7:31) (wearing his lovely horse's tail.)
Read the entry about 20th Century Boy and then watch *** Marc Bolan's original version. (1:50)
Regarding this entry, witness the * blandness that is Pat Boone. (1:19) I dare you to call it rock & roll.
Read this entry on the use of masks in VG and by Bowie. Then watch this clip of the documentary on Bowie, ** Cracked Actor, (4:39) showing the creation of a plaster mask of Bowie's face that was used to make his stage prop.
Read the entry about Jack Fairy's Death of Glitter performance and then see the inspiration for his fabulous feather collar as worn by Brian Eno as he plays synthesizer (to the left of the screen) for Roxy Music's **** Do the Strand (3:51), one of the best examples of their witty wordplay.
Read the entry on the song over the credits, Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me), and then watch **** Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel perform it on Top of the Pops from 1975. (3:36)
Just for fun, hear *** Christian Bale talk about his method of becoming skinny enough to play Arthur. (0:39)
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Some People with Whom We are on a First Name Basis
Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde spaketh thus:
As one becomes famous, one sheds some of them, just as a
balloonist, when rising higher, sheds unnecessary ballast.
All but two have already been thrown overboard. Soon I
shall discard another and be known simply as
"The Wilde" or "The Oscar."
So here we are on a first name basis with both Oscar and Todd, not out of disrespect, but because we feel in some mysterious way their lives have been our own.
balloonist, when rising higher, sheds unnecessary ballast.
All but two have already been thrown overboard. Soon I
shall discard another and be known simply as
"The Wilde" or "The Oscar."
So here we are on a first name basis with both Oscar and Todd, not out of disrespect, but because we feel in some mysterious way their lives have been our own.
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Todd and Cate win at Venice!
originally posted September 8, 2007
I'm Not There has won the Special Jury prize at the Venice Film Festival! Cate Blanchett is Best Actress!
Our Main Man accepting his award:
![Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket]()
(There were two winners of the Special Jury prize, Franco-Tunisian director Abdellatif Kechiche also won for 'La Graine et Le Mulet'.)
Cate Blanchett was awarded the Best Actress prize, the Coppa Vopli, for her performance in "I'm Not There." She was not present to accept the best actress award.
"I'm sorry I can't stand here throwing my arms around Todd, weeping just like a woman," she said in a statement read out at the ceremony by a deliberately anti-glam Heath Ledger (socks by Where's Waldo Couture).
![Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket]()
The film goes on to the Toronto and New York Festivals.
Darlings, it's getting exciting! Come up and see me at![]()
im_not_there.
I'm Not There has won the Special Jury prize at the Venice Film Festival! Cate Blanchett is Best Actress!
Our Main Man accepting his award:
(There were two winners of the Special Jury prize, Franco-Tunisian director Abdellatif Kechiche also won for 'La Graine et Le Mulet'.)
Cate Blanchett was awarded the Best Actress prize, the Coppa Vopli, for her performance in "I'm Not There." She was not present to accept the best actress award.
"I'm sorry I can't stand here throwing my arms around Todd, weeping just like a woman," she said in a statement read out at the ceremony by a deliberately anti-glam Heath Ledger (socks by Where's Waldo Couture).
The film goes on to the Toronto and New York Festivals.
Darlings, it's getting exciting! Come up and see me at
im_not_there.
↧
Vogue us up, Ducky
originally posted September 15, 2007
Here's a fabulous clip of Christine Vachon and Todd Haynes interviewed by indieWIRE.com outside the Toronto Film Festival before the September 12th premiere of I'm Not There. They talk about how the idea of identity is central to Todd's films, (mentioning Velvet Goldmine) and about the challenges they faced in the making of I'm Not There.
The subject line, in case you are rusty on your polari, is Give us a cigarette, luv. It's adorable how Todd lights up and Christine steals a drag while they practically finish each other's sentences.
Darlings, don't join the party too late, come up and see me over at![]()
im_not_there
Here's a fabulous clip of Christine Vachon and Todd Haynes interviewed by indieWIRE.com outside the Toronto Film Festival before the September 12th premiere of I'm Not There. They talk about how the idea of identity is central to Todd's films, (mentioning Velvet Goldmine) and about the challenges they faced in the making of I'm Not There.
The subject line, in case you are rusty on your polari, is Give us a cigarette, luv. It's adorable how Todd lights up and Christine steals a drag while they practically finish each other's sentences.
Darlings, don't join the party too late, come up and see me over at
im_not_there
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That’s me, that! That is me!
There is a wonderful interview with Todd Haynes over at The Onion AV Club about I’m Not There. He was asked about the reception his films have received.
I think all my films can be enjoyed. In fact, they've often surprised me with how they're received. A film that had the hardest time, at least initially, was Velvet Goldmine, and it's the film that seems to mean the most to a lot of teenagers and young people, who are just obsessed with that movie. They're exactly who I was thinking about when I made Velvet Goldmine, but it just didn't get to them the first time around. Now we have all these different ways for movies to get to people. People can live with them over time and pass them around like special secrets. The movies all live their own weird lives, which is so cool.
I think all my films can be enjoyed. In fact, they've often surprised me with how they're received. A film that had the hardest time, at least initially, was Velvet Goldmine, and it's the film that seems to mean the most to a lot of teenagers and young people, who are just obsessed with that movie. They're exactly who I was thinking about when I made Velvet Goldmine, but it just didn't get to them the first time around. Now we have all these different ways for movies to get to people. People can live with them over time and pass them around like special secrets. The movies all live their own weird lives, which is so cool.
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