THE WARRIORS - What a great movie. Been ages since I last saw it, but it hasn't lost any of its appeal. Set in the neon wilderness of 70s NYC, a place which you imagine felt perpetually on the brink of some kind of apocalypse. The look, feel and sound of the film sum up that era so well, at least in my head. Takes us through endless grey subways and litter strewn alleyways where the gangs thrash it out to a Suicide-esque / Carpenter style soundtrack. The closing scenes in Coney Island seem weirdly biblical, particularly the ones on the beach. Excellent.
THE DAY - I really liked this, despite its mixed reviews. It's a survivalist horror set in a landscape populated by roving cannibal gangs in pursuit of the few remaining norms. A bunch of cannibal resisters hole up in an abandoned house and end up in a seige. Yeah, not very original, but it's very good. It's really downbeat and grim, about as uplifting as a 'Kids of Degrassi Street' box set. That's what makes it great. I felt really emotional watching it today, and although that happened to me recently when I saw 'The Brood', normally I'm pretty detached from flicks like this. Dig a world filled with brutality, pain and the comfort of a swift death? Recommended to all nihilists.
BERBERIAN SOUND STUDIO - A film about men trying to make women scream. They don't really succeed. OK, it's about more than that. This is really excellent. It's such an odd film, an adventure in sound before anything else, but also a witty genre deconstruction, a homage to the slippery world of movie making and then again something really abstract. I could sum up the plot, but that's not really what the film's about, or at least not what makes it special. A gauche wallflower arrives in Italy from blighty and subsequently loses himself in a Kafkaesque maze of prima donnas and corporate paranoia. Then again, I could say "Sound is the real Supernatural" and not make it any clearer than that. This film takes us into the mystery that lies behind a sound recorder's knobs and dials. I'll never look at my 4-track in quite the same way ever again. Anyway, 'Berberian Sound Studio' is really, really good and I recommend it unreservedly.
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