Joanna Hogg, painterly, modernist Brit filmmaker utilizing static frames, uneasy vibes

^^^^^^^^

yes, i'd like to swing by there on a visit

That house gave great stair!

has anyone feigned illness at dinner parties after seeing this?

The snot/snob sister in Archipelago is my favorite recently viewed movie villain.

yes, i'd like to swing by there on a visit

unfortunately, it's now a sainsbury's local

lol

sequel imo

fuck me, archipelago might be even better

There are lots of things in Hogg's style that connect her to earlier British avant-garde filmmakers like Laura Mulvey and Sally Potter, without even addressing the distinctly British concerns - class, social hierarchy - that are embedded in the films themselves.

― sʌxihɔːl (Ward Fowler), Tuesday, 17 February 2015 09:49 (3 weeks ago)

have you seen 'riddles of the sphinx'

fuck me, archipelago might be even better

― vacuum head tree disease (imago)

thx for the dn

have you seen 'riddles of the sphinx'

Yeah, I've got the BFI blu - thought the 'performance' sequence in Exhibition was especially similar to the acrobatic sequence in Sphinx, and that both films used a long take aesthetic to explore gendered domestic spaces

no, Archipelago is not better

https://whatson.bfi.org.uk/Online/default.asp?BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::permalink=cinemabornagain

Laura Mulvey talk on the 21st April. Seen her speak in discussions before, she is awesome.

Have now seen Museum Hours - it's astonishing and the two protagonists are superb characters (also, the visiting lecturer bit is great) - could listen to Johann opine on art and its spectators for hours

a beautiful well-composed conjecture on art, survival and the search for context with one of the lightest dramatic touches I've seen - it felt accidental at times, as if a documentary, even though it was clearly complex and thought-out

makes me want to spend more time in art galleries, which will have pleased the person I watched it with

excellent!

yeah ty! even more amazing is that it was a debut feature film (i think) by an admittedly seasoned documentarian & music video maker

it felt accidental at times

^ lovely

I'm really glad you watched Museum Hours. It's a small project of mine to get people to watch it -very pleased! When MMO'H sings alone in her room "there is a crying in my heart..." - tears every time.

I've watched the whole thing 4 times I think.

it felt accidental at times

I think this is key, really. The whole thing is about how accidental, or incidental, things shape our lives. Chance encounters lead to deep experiences etc. so beautiful. Deft.

loved archipelago, thought exhibition was far more predictable, less interesting, and more prone to art house cliche, and also just had far less sympathetic characters. but her films are more notable for the milieu they feature and how she brings european arthouse style/formalism to middle class britishness than for anything all that stylistically novel. though i do love her.

http://www.whitechapelgallery.org/learn/jem-cohen-compass-magnet/

^screening on Thursday with director.

Come back from Museum Hours. Really set up a unique tension between a documentary and this quietly powerful encounter between two people - a spinning plates trick and Cohen pulled it off as both elements were really satisfying while being almost their own separate thing. Like how Cohen took a risk by switching off the developing relationship between the Johann and Anne to then wander off to the city, around the museum and a few monologues, before then returning to that relationship -- just when you thought he wouldn't. The delay kept me on edge.

A couple of things rang false: surely the guard would've known about the punk kid's arguments against art and museums? After all, he witnesses the gallery guide's (in his favourite Bruegel room) Berger-esque Q&A with the tourists. Plus he surely would've witnessed enough dumb remarks like this in his time touring with rock bands? Additionally, there is something unsatisfying about the family member in a coma as a device for Anne to come and then stay in Vienna for as long as she has. I know you needed something to light a match, some spark so that the act of kindness could be bought out into the open -- and while this was as powerful a moment there could've been another way? Also the nudity was unnecessary, empty surrealism.

I liked the monologues a lot though -- in complete contrast to Old Masters where the guard doesn't have an independent voice. And I loved his voice, the script and delivery were near perfect (although I would've liked the last monologue to have been spoken in German as well.) In my wanders in museums I often wander what the guard thinks of what's going on, what this might be for. Haven't we all? And even if you didn't then surely museum trips won't quite be the same..also liked the conflict with tech. Cohen doesn't put too heavy a judgement either way on earphone commentary, or does he? He sure locks in to the man pulling the mobile phone out during the tour guide's talk.

that's a very good review

did jemmy lad say anything revealing afterwards

Cohen just gave an intro.

johann's voice was probably my favourite thing about the film tbh

Mary Margaret O'Hara was singing a bit though. Still got it.

Hey, I didn't realise that Hogg was joining Laura Mulvey at the BFI 'visual pleasure' panel

Only about 5 seats left!

Just watched Archipelago. I would love to see her movies on a big screen. Her composition is fantastic, but the quiet tones she likes get dulled out on a small screen. Even so, a gorgeous movie. Something I didn't realize to the end was the way the camera moved in closer to the characters over the course of the movie. At the beginning it's all medium to long shots, and body parts but no faces. So that by the time you can really see them close up, you already know them.

http://www.mml.cam.ac.uk/news/filmmaker-residence-joanna-hogg

cantabs ppl get to 'go the whole hogg' :)

Yeah I couldn't make the majority of the screenings as I'm just too swamped atm but I'm gonna try to get to Exhibition (+Q&A) tonight and maybe the early shorts if I get enough work done/think I can stay awake

Think I would've preferred her version of High Rise

had no idea abt her film w tilda.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/0/souvenir-review-arch-dramatist-joanna-hogg-returns-home-personal/

getting a ton of raves/coverage before its US opening next week, Honor Swinton Byrne 's performance in particular

https://www.filmcomment.com/article/i-know-where-im-going/

WTF, not opening in the UK until August??

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/may/15/the-souvenir-joanna-hogg-humanises-middle-class-problems?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook&fbclid=IwAR2IfaRsDcxO_9u7u4DZJwzIBE0XHHSYglx-jSIQtGaS6_RfqNEF0TssfMA

Yeah!

Hogg has written that one of her inspirations is Roberto Rossellini’s Journey to Italy, saying, “I strive to create this degree of aliveness. I need to see this film often to understand what it is I am trying to do.” Most of our time in life is not spent in dramatic standoffs and cathartic breakdowns. Most of the time we are cooking and eating, taking walks, making phone calls, having deep conversations (or shallow), having sex, having arguments. Hogg clearly has a plan and knows what she wants to create, but within that plan she allows for extraordinary freedom. Perhaps the limits she imposes, by proceeding in chronological order, by keeping the camera in doorways or on the far side of a room, encourages the exhilarating sense of “aliveness” felt in Unrelated, Archipelago, Exhibition, and The Souvenir. Helle le Fevre has edited all of Hogg’s features, and her contribution is essential.

Superb Rebecca Mead feature.

No idea she directed the second (and bigger) of the videos for Johnny Hates Jazz's "Shattered Dreams."

👍

might go see this today, did we like it?

did like her previous stuff, mostly & found the background/build up articles intriguing but i could not get into this idk i felt like its a level of self-involvement too far & that somehow feels magnified by it being undramatic, etc

No idea she directed the second (and bigger) of the videos for Johnny Hates Jazz's "Shattered Dreams."

― recriminations from the nitpicking woke (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, May 19, 2019 12:59 PM (two weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

WHATTTT

yep

There's just something about the fact that the mother is played by Tilda Swinton and the daughter is played by Tilda Swinton's daughter that gets my back up. I know we are so used to this horrendous nepotism in the UK, maybe elsewhere, that we become inured to it and I also know that there exist think-pieces about how it's all perfectly normal and makes sense within the world she's portraying etc. but that makes it worse. She's a decent filmmaker with a singular vision who's made one good film so far (Archipelago) and she's being given huge leeway because she is fucking posh!

exhibition was pretty good too

we need some kind of venn diagram that connects xyzzz and ward's politics to this sort of aristo masturbation fantasy.

I've not seen it. Also, I've just drunk a bottle of wine.

xp it's interesting and boring. I dunno if it's good. It's unique though.