Let’s start at the bottom. I revisited Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker for the first time since a single viewing during its theatrical run. This in itself is of note, and says more about my relationship with the film than any amount of words could do.
Growing up I was a major Star Wars fan. A fanatic even. I grew up on the original films, came of age at the time of the release of the prequels and greeted the news of the Disney buyout with nothing but optimism. I really enjoyed J.J. Abrams’ The Force Awakens, which even placed quite highly in my year end list for 2015. I liked Rian Johnson’s follow-up, The Last Jedi even more, with the bold and unorthodox direction taken by the Brick director the perfect counterpoint to Abrams’ more nostalgic effort. I was excited to see how the series would be wound up, but was left feeling angry and disappointed. It’s a film of backpedaling and bowing, and not worth wasting any more time on.
On a more positive note, I took in a refresher of Brian De Palma’s Scarface remake on Saturday night. It’s one of the great American epics concerned with the immigrant, and Giorgio Moroder’s score is still bounding around my head. Having revisited Mathieu Kassovitz’ La Haine just last week the remnants of that film’s remix-like treatment of the De Palma movies central themes were also in mind too.
I’ve begun revisiting the films of Wes Anderson this week. This was initially in anticipation of The French Dispatch, which was due this Spring but has been delayed to later in the year due to the ongoing situation. Wes Anderson is my favourite contemporary American filmmaker, and I have spent more time with his work than I can actually recall. I wore out VHS copies of his two earliest films, Bottle Rocket and Rushmore when I was really coming into my own as a cinephile, and feel a strange sort of kinship to the trajectory upon which the filmmaker’s career has taken. Going back to these films over the past few days has felt like catching up with a pair of old friends.
The other film I watched this weekend was John Ford’s The Last Hurrah, which was the final disc from the recent Indicator Series box-set collecting a number of the director’s movies produced for Columbia Pictures. The Last Hurrah, which stars Spencer Tracy stands as a superior political picture of the era in which it was produced (1958), and effectively carries the unique sense of dread that accompanies an election result that hasn’t gone to plan.
The Glass Family 