the ben wheatley/amy jump thread

baloo baloo
baloo baloo
baloo baloo lu lee lee lu
the field in england sdtk is seriously in my head
who is jim williams? has he done other stuff? he is not easy to google imo.

Sightseers was p good, not quite as absorbing as Field or Kill List.

I loved Sightseers!
I can't wait to see whatever's next even though each time the more recognizable famous ppl there are, the less likely i am to truly enjoy it.

well I don't recognize any of these people so no problem for me! Sightseers was fine, it just wasn't as striking to me as the other two

felt like a smaller-stakes film is all, the conventions it was playing with were less resonant for me

Sightseers is great! Down Terrace is his first film and was made with quite a small budget, and that deals with a murderous bunch of Brighton gangsters, but there's also this sussex folk song element woven into it - feels like all his films tap into this same subcurrent of atavistic violence in some way.

Down Terrace is a real street here btw, made it into the local paper here only the other day in fact:
http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/11352302.Man_jailed_after_violent_attack_on__obnoxious__unwanted_guest/

i haven't seen kill list yet
so i have at least that to look forward to
sussex folk song element woven into it - feels like all his films tap into this same subcurrent of atavistic violence in some way.
yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees

but srsly will SOMEONE tell me about jim williams?
listen to this!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XW39fmmQEmc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6gaBc-O_4A

who is he
where did he come from
what does he do all day
what else has he done
these are merely some of the questions i have for jim williams

ok i watched 1 min of that and didn't want to spoil any more of the movie -- looks great!

for me it's kill list>down terrace>sightseers but please keep in mind those are minor tiny greater than signs, i think all of them are great to really great honestly. gotta get myself in the right awake mindframe for field in england before i watch it

the youtube for the complete soundtrack only has 262 views
and it's like
SO GOOD
i don't know how to describe it -- it's like evocative dark atmospheric synth sounds with more organic sounds too, baloo my boy (2x), other parts are heavy, super slow, a few melodies, i dunno
i posted it in the popol vuh thread because i think it would appeal to vuh fans but not because it sounds esp like pv

who is jim williams?!

oh! and there is one comment on youtube from "steven smith" (steven r smith?) that reads "yes"

i have a lot of questions

http://www.afieldinengland.com/masterclass/people/james-williams/

http://www.15questions.net/interview/fifteen-questions-interview-jim-williams/page-1/

you guys are mean

weird that first link doesnt work but its totally legit wtf

let me try here

success! click that link for info

haha sorry, I don't know why that link doesn't work!

hey i can be a drip sometimes, nbd
and thx for some answers

i wonder if there is a collected works of james jim williams

love this part

Ben Wheatley: We try and imagine that the film is split into two halves and the first half is period instruments that the characters might be able to play or that their friends might own.

Jim Williams: What Ben suggested was could we have one small thing as if they could play the instruments themselves so that there be a small band of simple instruments and then to expand it into more of a psychedelic electronic thing.

Ben Wheatley: Once they cross over the mushroom circle, everything will be much bigger and synth-ier and kind of more electronic and booming and more like the sound of inside your body rather than a kind of diluted musical score.

watched a field in england last night. I loved sightseers and liked kill list a lot but this was on another level. Immediately upon finishing I went back and watched the first 25 minutes again while annoying La Lechera with messages about the movie. So much to chew on and like.

I felt pretty convinced this is supposed to be like ye olde english Mystery Play where the characters are not people at all but virtues, jostling about in the self. But in the cold light of saturday maybe I'm wrong. It gave me that feeling v strongly though. Accentuated by the greenawayish hyper-formalized moments where they would be in tableaux vivants and the way new sections would be kind of signaled by sudden gong or bell sounds like in a monastery ringing the different phases of the day (starting with the shell giving the scholar tinnitus).

IDK I never felt that these were characters with lives before and after the story, they seem like allegorical items to me (this is not meant at all to be pejorative btw).

I want to know more about Amy Jump. She has no interviews online that I can find. I will probably watch some of the copious process videos they released about the movie today. Wheatley says he wrote the movie a bunch of times over years and gave up and she took it and totally rewrote it based on her own ideas and research.

I have some eMusic credits left; the OST will be mine today.

I need to go rewatch this movie. I found it quite frustrating at the time.

Like peoples reactions to it like Jon's above are intriguing. I certainly wasn't ready for that type of movie on the back of the other Wheatley movie I've seen (although there are parallels in terms of folklore and so on just a complete 180 in terms of style I thought)

I want to know more about Amy Jump. She has no interviews online that I can find.

She's Wheatley's partner, and they do a joint commentary track on the Kill List DVD

I just happened to see this again last night. One of my favourite films of the last few years. Certainly one of the most beautiful films of recent times.

Did anyone get the very limited vinyl-only release of the sightseers OST? I am very grumpy that I can't buy it as a download like the Field album.

I really like everything he's done. Very excited about High Rise.

I mean the four films. Never seen any of his TV work for hire so can't comment on that.

Watched Kill List tonight because of this thread. Liked it. The whole movie to me seems to be about violence and the ways we process it and categorize it. (A lot like The End of Violence.) It's not any accident that the three institutions represented -- church/scholars/politics -- are the three that provide the needed blessing/justification/legal cover for institutional violence in warfare. And the ending (SPOILER) is just a re-enactment of Abraham and Isaac, without the last-minute reprieve. It's not even as bad as the Bible, because he doesn't know he's killing his own child. It's a parable of sacred violence.

Want to see more of his/their stuff.

And the particular intensity of the violence against the librarian was interesting -- the idea that documenting and archiving was somehow the worst offense. In this case it was for pleasure, but I think the snuff-film thing was a bit of a red herring. It was more that someone had seen him and written him down -- as if there's something inherently sadistic in the knowledge.

re-watched A Field in England the other night, so great. The faerie circle/magical curse angle makes more and more sense (esp since I endeavored to pay closer attention to some of the dialogue this time around). It seems clear that Whitehead essentially swaps places with/becomes O'Neill - Cutler, as O'Neill's "familiar" (more or less) is released/freed when O'Neill kills him (O'Neill makes a crack at one point that the only way out for Cutler will be death), and is replaced by Jacob, who assumes his role in the end.

In one of the banner deals to go down at the 2015 Berlin Fest, Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions (SPWA) has acquired a clutch of territories including Australia/New Zealand, Latin America, Scandinavia, Spain, Eastern Europe and select other markets on Ben Wheatley’s upcoming action thriller “Free Fire.”

Executive produced by Martin Scorsese, the latest from one of the most-talked up of young British talents features a cast led by Luke Evans, Armie Hammer, Cillian Murphy and Olivia Wilde.

“Free Fire” tells the story of the aftermath of a gun deal gone horribly wrong.

Studiocanal has U.K. rights to the film, Protagonist Pictures is selling international and WME Global is handling its U.S. domestic sale.

The first film from Wheatley to be set in the U.S., “Free Fire” is scheduled for a spring start.

http://www.criterion.com/explore/234-ben-wheatley-s-top-10

I've seen The Ascent in a really bad copy - even so it was a powerful experience.

http://variety.com/2015/film/news/toronto-film-festival-platform-lineup-1201569157/

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-toronto-high-rise-20150912-story.html

the reviews aren't great

still, Portishead doing ABBA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRBeZGYisLg&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYmY2tBYins

Don't know what to make of Love On a Real Train usage.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CbU9sFuWwAAwwIj.jpg

Aw man (squints at credits) they didn't use their usual composer, they have Clint mansell on this. That's disappointing.

Bummer

I saw Ben the other day going into a comic store in Brighton, wanted to say hi but nerd-mobbing film guys that's not me

Liked this, especially the scenes that faded into each other.

this was kind of extremely tedious tbh

film fan mate of mine said it was 'fucking awful'

smdh

all of you go and join xyawnzzzz in the pure cinema corner

Watched A Field in England not long ago. My wife fell asleep at some point and woke up maybe 25 minutes later and after trying to follow it said, "I'll have to watch this again, I have no idea what's going on." I assured her that staying awake would make no difference. We both enjoyed the film, but it was one of the most disorienting movies I've ever seen. Every time I thought I had a handle on it, it slipped away.

same. liked the overall vibe and look, and the film as a whole has stuck with me, but I spent most of it totally perplexed as to what was supposed to be happening. In retrospect, I suppose it achieves the 'dream logic' thing really well, as that's exactly how I feel about it - like a dream I had a few nights ago about which I only remember a few things.

Rebecca seems to have been universally panned as a waste of time so this kinda makes sense.

Statham panned The Meg 1 as a waste of time tbh

directors gotta make a living

could be he is a hack

(nb: Statham said the script and original cut of The Meg was an entertaining violent dumb horror action film, but the released PG-13 cut was pointless)

this looks like the sort of thing Wheatley would sign onto and be happy to get paid off and fired from two years before production starts, or be happy to be paid more and get a chance to make a big-budget movie with no expectations if he stays attached

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/all-the-wrong-reasons-to-remake-rebecca?

More interested in this than Rebecca... Ben Wheatley's directed the new Sleaford Mods video.

https://youtu.be/iKcbSOjIzjQ

Everybody’s gotta eat but still...never expected him to turn into Neil Marshall.

I think that's probably going to happen to lots of directors who were previously able to do their own thing at a decent budget. And maybe Neil Marshall didn't expect to turn into Neil Marshall, no offense meant to him because that has probably always been the lot of most directors.

I was hoping that he'd get a chance to direct more episodes of Strange Angel (and that there would be a third season)

I read somewhere Down Terrace is supposed to be a dark comedy? It's horrifying

it reminded me of the Australian film Animal Kingdom from a year later. I thought that film was more interesting

Down Terrace was pretty good though

snuck this one out

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Lqkfo7IymU

Where do you watch this one? I couldn't find it on netflix or prime

It says "in theatres 4.23" right there in the trailer. The distributor's website has it still running in independent cinemas in Texas, Colorado, southern California and a few other cities (or a $7 digital rental) - multiplectra here didn't get it. Major cinemas in the UK appear to be reopening next week, so maybe check the programming at your local/s?

Ben Wheatley’s ‘In The Earth’ will be released in UK cinemas on 18 June 2021

Thanks

Thanks, sic.

Saw this last night, and really enjoyed it.

a companion but not a sequel to AFIE, some overt and some implied links between the two.

Like AFIE the visual effects and sound design deserve to be seen on a big screen, at least for the first watch.

Kermode has a good review that hits most of the points I would make.

Cant tell if the pandemic premise will date it, but it added an extra charge to the narrative that might be lost in a few years.

Fun, but inferior to AFIE in virtually every regard. Still, nice to be back in a cinema!

Watched In the Earth over the weekend, and was pretty disappointed... kind of a mess, with too much explaining. Cool idea but a ham-fisted execution.

As per the Meg thread, the trailer is now out for the Ben Wheatley directed sequel, Meg 2: The Trench.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG91B3hHyY4

Just watched High-Rise and really enjoyed it. Need to watch some more, I guess.

finally someone else thinks it's good lol

i'm v glad that after tomb raider got canned, wheatley is still operating in the daft lower-budget action field now

ok maybe not that lower-budget

Lol what an odd career trajectory.

Pro tip= work back from High Rise not forwards

Heh, was thinking of going straight to Kill List.

Do people actively dislike High-Rise or just think it’s worse than what preceded it?

High Rise is unfilmable but Wheatley had a good shot at it is how I see it.

Wheatley was right to cast Hiddleston but even his blank charmlessness couldn't quite match what Ballard was reaching for.

Years ago, I remember seeing a mock poster for Concrete Island with Christian Bale, but I don't think they even began filming

Pretty sure Concrete Island is similarly unfilmable. If it wasn't for Cronenberg's *Crash* I'd say all of Ballard is unfilmable. *Empire of the Sun* kind of doesn't count.

There is even an ebook of High-Rise with Hiddelston as reader, to close the circle.

Hiddleston

this from 2011... I remember looking forward to it

https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-M3Vllqvqw8c/TpeH0zoEXyI/AAAAAAAAABc/oN4iR1XbreY/s1600/Concrete+Island+Teaser+Poster.jpg

if you found the right location you could shoot Concrete Island for cheap!

yeah.. i'm not sure it's 'unfilmable', but it would be like a play with a lot of traffic noise

agreed