LFF

A quickie on the LFF. The launch was last week and after a few days of digesting the programme, here are a few of the things I'm looking forward to (and not).

As per usual the galas are nice for star-spotting (though you'll be spending most of your time at the Vue West End, while the Odeon is redeveloped to include a hotel, flats, restaurants and, sadly, smaller screens) But in reality, wouldn't you rather see the very beautiful restoration of Asquith's Underground, with live music from Neil Brand and ensemble? - actually, in a welcome reappraisal of the archive strand it is a gala! Or how about Hollis Frampton's epic seven-film sequence Hapax Legomena?

As to the East European stuff, for the minute I'll limit myself to brief details:

Tales from the Golden Age (Amintiri din epoca de aur). A Romanian-French black comedy set under Ceaucescu, that's been picked up by Trinity Films. More info here.

Help Gone Mad (Сумасшедшая помощь, Sumasshedshaya pomoshch'). A Beckettian-Kaurismakian 'bleak and lugubrious comedy' from Boris Khlebnikov.

Morphia (Морфий). Balabanov's latest, scripted by the late Sergei Bodrov Junior and based on Bulgakov. Must be a candidate for proper distribution but, as yet, hasn't been picked up.

Osadné. A documentary about the titular Slovakian village and its relationship to the rest of Europe.

Protektor. A Czech drama about a journalist and an actress who gradually realise the implications of the Nazi occupation of Bohemia and Moravia.

A Room and a Half (Полторы комнаты или сентиментальное путешествие на Родину, Poltory komnaty ili sentimental'noe puteshestvie na Rodinu). A fantasy that realises exiled poet Joseph Brodsky's imaginary incognito trip back to Russia. Director Khrzhanovsky is best-known for his animation (The Glass Harmonica is a classic) and this live-action film interpolates animated sequences.

St George Shoots the Dragon (Sveti Georgije ubiva azdahu). A WW1 Balkan epic from Srdjan Dragojevic (director of Pretty Flame, Pretty Village). It's allegedly the most expensive Serbian film ever, though if East European cinema teaches us anything, it's that there's no necessary connection between budget and quality.

Sweet Rush (Tatarak). Just as Britain belatedly gets to see Wajda's Katyn, the LFF launches his new one. Counterpointing the fictional story are Krystyna Janda's meditations on the death of her husband, cinematographer Edward Kłosiński, As yet, nobody's picked up up, but hopefully we won't have to wait too long for a proper release.

Who's Afraid of the Wolf? (Kdopak by se vlka bál?) A Czech family drama that merges into a fairy-tale world, and specifically Little Red Riding Hood. Sounds intriguing, and the LFF listing specifically mentions the score by Jan P Muchow.

Meanwhile, there's the Russian Wolfy (Волчок, Volchok). Another redemptive, fantasy-tinged childhood story, this time loosely based on the dysfunctional family of lead actress Yana Troyanova.

The Ferrari Dino Girl (Holka Ferrari Dino) is a welcome return for Jan Nemec. An autobiographical look at the footage he shot of the 1968 Soviet invasion, how he smuggled it out of the country and its fate thereafter.

Victor Alampiev's enigmatic avant-garde 8-minute My Absolution will be shown on a loop in the studio on 25 October for anyone to drop in for free.

As for shorts, there are three Polish and two Latvians. I wish they'd put them on as supports to appropriate features (like the LFF used to many years ago - even if they were often unannounced so you might end up seeing the same thing three times). But unless there's been a change of heart, here are links to the programmes in which they appear. From Poland: Chick, Don't Look Back (Nie Patrz Wstecz) and A Story of a Missing Car (Historia a Braku Samochodu). The Latvian pair, both children's films (When Apples Roll (Kad Aboli Ripo) and Magic Water (Dzivais Udens) are at least gathered in the same strand. Also, Romka-97 is a Finnish film set in St Petersburg.

In the British film Perestroika, Sarah Turner re-enacts her Trans-Siberian rail trip from twenty years ago, and readdresses the footage that she shot at the time.

Elsewhere, Trimpin: the Sound of Invention, a doc about the sonic experimenter looks worthwhile. Again, no distributor but it's showing at the ICA who, if they have any money, might be tempted to give it a week or so.

Double Take, a Hitchcock mockumentary-found-footage-CGI-mash-up looked hilarious in the LFF trailer.

Another mash-up - this time about love and creation, destruction and death - comes from Gustave Deutsch with FILM IST: a girl & a gun.

I'm hoping no-one holds me to the rash predictions I made about the 'inevitable' inclusion of Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus, but there's always the possibility that it's the surprise film.

Another change is that there'll be a proper awards night (again, back to the future). Fest director Sandra Hebron said "The idea is very much to raise the festival both in terms of its public address but also in terms of its relationship with the industry. A lot of the things we’re doing are about trying to bring the festival up to a level of parity with festivals internationally that operate on a similar scale." But at the same time:"We are not an A-grade competitive festival and at the moment we are not aspiring to be one" and that she would personally resist copying the likes of Cannes by having a high-profile competition strand because it would not be true to London's aim to be a festival for audiences. So, is this the start of a (slow) march towards making the LFF more Cannes-ish, Venetian or Berlinian? We shall see.

Finally, I would say that Nowhere Boy, Sam Taylor-Wood's John Lennon biopic (though the LFF brochure denies it that description) has divided the people that I've talked to. Except I can't. Perhaps it's just who I knock around with, but everyone is shuddering with horror at the prospect. Certainly the trailer makes it look like a standard biopic, with no evidence of the 'authorial signature' that the programme cites. But who knows...

Kłosiński

Over the next few weeks I'll be back in the blogging saddle and will be leavening the new stuff with a dig into the archives.

With that in mind, here's a belated obit of the Polish cinematographer, Edward Kłosiński, who died in January 2008.



Cinematographer Edward Kłosiński worked with some of the greatest Polish directors on the most important films of the ‘cinema of moral concern’.

After art school, Kłosiński studied cinematography in Łodz, graduating in 1967 and entering the industry when the so-called Polish School, having rejected Socialist Realism, had brought greater creative freedom and an international profile to Polish cinema. Starting as a stills photographer he graduated to filming shorts and educational films.














His break came when he replaced cinematographer Zygmunt Samosiuk on Andrzej Wajda’s The Birchwood (Brzezina, 1970), whose palette echoes the deathly hues of Jacek Malczewski’s Thanatos paintings, one of which hangs in the protagonist’s house.

Kłosiński's first solo feature was Janusz Zaorski’s early comedy Run Away Nearly (Uciec jak najbliżej, 1972). Its delicately erotic scenes (and some less gentle ones) are shot in a quiet reportage style while the broader comedy is underlined by more obvious cinematography.



The following year’s Illumination (Illumiunacja), Krzysztof Zanussi’s, bildungsroman film about a young physics student’s moral crisis, has a similar near-documentary style.

In the mid 1970s unrest was rising in Poland was the ‘cinema of moral concern’ responded by attacking bureaucracy and careerism. Kłosiński was at the centre of the movement but several of his films hit problems. Speaking of that period he said:

'I like that cinema, I know it was needed and important, but in terms of form it is hard to view it as rich. It probably had to be that way. If the formal aspects had been more spectacular, they would have falsified the content which was the most important thing.'

In fact, Kłosiński's documentary approach intensified the effect, bringing home the reality of the situation.

The Story of a Love (Historia pewnej miłości, 1974), documentarist Wojciech Wiszniewski’s only drama, was banned for almost ten years, but things came to a head with Zanussi’s Camouflage (Barwy ochronne, 1976). When a mediocre student paper is rewarded above a better, though unconventional one, the point is hard to miss. In early 1977 the authorities turned on the industry, replacing administrators, and canceling and banning films. Camouflage was a lightning rod for disapproval and positive reviews were spiked. But this only increased interest so, ironically the authorities camouflaged their intentions by awarding it a prize, which Zanussi refused.

Zanussi's contemporary story was complemented by Wajda's Man of Marble (Człowiek z marmuru, 1977) on the previously near-untouchable subject of Poland’s Stalinist past.
A film student’s project about a 1950s Stakhanovite bricklayer questions national myths and, when her tutor blocks the work, Wajda examines how Poland was dealing with its past. The virtuoso Kłosiński shot not only Wajda’s film but also the ‘found footage’ that comprises the student’s documentary. In 1981 he married the film’s star Krystyna Janda and went on to photograph her directorial debut The Pip (Pestka, 1996).

When Wajda’s career was blocked he made Rough Treatment (Bez znieczulina, 1978) about a comparably shunned journalist. Kłosiński made it look “like a reporter’s work … restless, careless.” Yet their next collaboration was the lyrical Maids of Wilko (Panien z Wilka, 1979).

In Feliks Falk’s bitter Top Dog (Wodzirej, 1977), Kłosiński counterpoints the darkly comedic moments with documentary-like inserts to comment of the hyperactive Master of Ceremonies who feels he has to betray a friend to secure a prestigious booking. It was banned for two years.



As the political situation darkened, Kłosiński shot Zaorski’s Child’s Play (Dziecinen pytinia 1981) about a student arrested for asking awkward questions. Two years later Mother of Kings (Matka Królów), about a man arrested as a collaborator and the effect on his family, was banned until 1987.

In 1981 Wajda rushed to beat a possible ban on Man of Iron (Człowieka z żelaza), about a dissolute journalist’s attempt to disrupt Solidarity. Culture Minister Józef Tejchma, sacked for approving Man of Marble, had returned to his post and, after approving Man of Iron was again dismissed. A few months later, martial law was declared and both films were withdrawn.

This was the most important phase of Kłosiński's career, and though he continued to make many films in Poland he also worked overseas. Kieślowski cast his crews as carefully as his actors and chose Kłosiński for the second episode of Dekalog (1989), which desperately balances one life against another. The mostly naturalistic photography serves to highlight intense moments such as the very slight slow-motion of a coffee cup being deliberately dropped.

Kłosiński's work was usually naturalistic (‘Cinematography cannot be a “wall” separating the film from the viewer’) but Lars von Trier’s Europa (1991) is a barrage of artificiality with its mixture of colour and black-and-white (sometimes in the same frame) and back-projected dreams on a post-War nightmare trans-European train journey.



In 1994 Kłosiński shot Kieślowski’s White, the middle panel of his Three Colours trilogy, perhaps the hardest assignment as the director felt that 'White is not a colour – it is an absence of colour.' Possibly the understated power of Kłosiński's self-effacing style was the attractant.

On his sixty-fifth birthday, three days before he died, Kłosiński was made an Officer of the Order of the Restoration of Poland (Orderu Odrodzenia Polski), one of the country's highest civil distinctions.

Edward Stefan Kłosiński. Born Warsaw 2 January 1943. Died 5 January 2008, Milanówek, near Warsaw. Wife Krystyna Janda. Two sons (Adam and Andrzej), plus a daughter, Magdalena from a previous marriage.