Photos: Classiq Journal
“Create films that help children feel glad that they’ve been born.”
Hayao Miyazaki
The Boy and the Heron, 2023
Hayao Miyazaki
“I believe that children’s souls are the inheritors of historical memory from previous generations,” Hayao Miyazaki said in an interview in 2005. “It’s just that as they grow older and experience the everyday world that memory sinks lower and lower. I feel I need to make a film that reaches down to that level. If I could do that, I would die happy.” In The Boy and the Heron, Mahito, a 12-year-old boy, is trying to settle into a new town and home after his mother’s death. But when he meets a talking heron, it will open a new world to him shared by both the living and the dead. The film is filled with such richness and complexity that can reach everyone from children to adults in the seemingly most simple way or in the deepest form of reflection. I couldn’t help feeling that the film can easily be perceived as a full-circle moment for the director, with so many of his films flashing through my eyes during the closing credits, but it’s Miyazaki’s wonderful sense of fantasy, always anew, always inviting us in, always opening our eyes in a myriad of ways, that will forever single out his films. And for children, his films should be the gate towards the world of cinema, and in part, maybe even into life. “As a child… I was trying to follow my parents’ will without any self-reflection. I wasn’t conscious of this, which is scary in itself. As I developed into a youth and young adult, I came to realise that I shouldn’t be just a good kid, that I should look at things with my own eyes and have independent ideas.” – From the book Hayao Miyazaki, by Jessica Niebel, Pete Doctor and Daniel Kothenschulte
Cerrar los ojos (Close Your Eyes), 2023
Victor Erice
A Spanish actor, Julio Arenas (José Coronado), disappears during the filming of a movie. After twenty years, a tv show brings new light into his disappearance and an investigation by the director of the film, Miguel Garay (Manolo Solo), Julio’s friend, brings us to the present day, to an adrift life, un uncertain future and the frailty of our memory. What also unfolds is a tribute to the magic of film. It speaks of something irreplaceable that is missing in the digital age, a more tactile film and movie-going experience, but also about how certain images can take permanent residence inside us even if life, loss, memory or old age is dragging away. Victor Erice’s film patiently, almost silently, informs about the profound power of movies. You almost miss it if you don’t pay attention. Maybe a movie can not bring out a miracle (a remark made by Miguel’s editor friend), maybe the future of cinema is dimmer than ever before, but we can sure still appreciate and revel in the irresistible beauty and power of movies whenever a film like Cerrar los ojos comes along. The camera should be used as if it were a curious child. Maybe our mind is like a curious child, too. When we stop using it as such, it may be lost forever.
Anatomy of a Fall, 2023
Justine Triet
A fearlessness performance from Sandra Hüller, who plays a writer who is a suspect in the death of her husband and an excellent, skillfully built courtroom drama, with a key scene coming (the only visual scene between Sandra and her husband) when you least expect it, a full blown clash when every possible issue between a wife and a husband, between a mother and a father, between a successful writer and a struggling writer, resurfaces.
Wonka (2023)
Paul King
I am always reticent to prequels, sequels, readaptations of stories that have been repeatedly told, and, quite frankly, to musicals, too. But watching Wonka with my son over the holidays was a feast. It’s spectacular, imaginative, immersive and truly wonderful. I love that we are introduced to a different character, a young, charming, kind Willy Wonka. As much as I love the worlds of Roald Dahl, which can so vividly and fully capture children’s attention and imagination, without ever restraining from frightening them, I loved this newly invented Willy Wonka impersonated by Timothée Chalamet.
Une vie de chat (A Cat in Paris), 2010
Jean-Loup Felicioli, Alain Gagnol
When everything seems to go in the same direction, and I am especially referring to Disney animated films, when you watch a film like Une vie de chat, you realise how much we have lost, creatively, emotionally, and our need to return to “more sensitive, more humane things”, as directors Alain Gagnol and Jean-Loup Felicioli remarked after their film’s release. With drawings made by hand, on paper, the old way (then scanned and transferred to computer for the finishing touches), the film is not only a celebration of traditional craftsmanship, but a good story about a cat that lives a double life, a pet for little Zoé by day and partner in crime for a burglar who uses the rooftops of Paris as escape routes by night, with a nice thrill of gangster films thrown in the mix.
Reading
“… I have heard, Mr Holmes, that you can see deeply into the manifold wickedness of the human heart…” The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is, some say, the best collection of Arthur Conan Doyle’s short stories. I hadn’t read his stories since I was a child (captivated by everything Agatha Christie and everything classic crime novel), but I do agree that these are 12 wonderful short stories that have proven to be the best reading for the bright and crisp winter mornings between the years. The only thing missing was “the snow of the day before” to “still lay deep upon the ground” (The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet).
“They always fill me with a certain horror. It is my belief, Watson, founded upon my experience, that the lowest and vilest alleys in London do not present a more dreadful record of sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside.”
“You horrify me!” (The Adventure of the Copper Beeches)
Listening
The soundtrack: Wonka , with music by Joby Talbot and Neil Hannon
The album: Going Back Home, Wilko Johnson and Roger Daltrey
Making
Sézane x Pangea, a beautiful collaboration and my favourite after Sézane’s capsule collection with another French favourite, G. Kero. Sézane is so good to add “a twist to a classical and timeless outfit, with a nice detail, a special material”, as its founder Morgane Sézalory told me some years ago, when Sézane was just starting out. What’s more important, their clothes simply look great on.
Exploring
Douglas Kirkland: A Life in Pictures photography exhibition at the Fahey Klein Gallery. The street colour photography (the feel, the freedom, the classic Americana – my favourite must be the one with Sigourney Weaver), those special black and white shots of Marilyn, the fabulous photos of Brigitte Bardot, which seem to allow us into the world of a star being born, and the most beautiful photograph of Meryl Street and Robert Redford on the set of Out of Africa. Douglas Kirkland captured so well the times, the glamour, the individuality of everyone he photographed.
The regulars: The interviews, newsletters and podcasts I turn to every week and/or every month because they are that good. Craig Mod’s newsletters: Roden and Ridgeline. Soundtracking, with Edith Bowman. The MUBI Podcast. Alicia Kennedy’s newsletter. Gone to Timbuktu, Sophy Robert’s podcast on the art of travel. Wachstumsversuche, with Sarah Schill. Sirene, Racquet, and Yolo Journal, all in print.
Akiko Stehrenberger’s brilliant poster for “Anatomy of a Fall” (look closer for details)
