London Alt Gigs and Cult Cinema

Named after a Suicide song, Fast Money Music look like one of those moody, suave 90's guitar bands that used to sing about bad romance and existential sorrow. And guess what, that's kind of what they sound like too - though they also have a lot more zip (and a bit less depth) than the likes of Afghan Whigs or Tindersticks. Here are some song samples:

Parker Posey has mostly been known for livening up a range of movies in supporting roles, but Party Girl is the rare example of her being given the lead - and running with it. This is basically a fun, colourful mid-90s romcom with an outrageous fashion sense and a cult following. How many movies are there about librarians, after all?

Posey plays Mary, a New York socialite who spends all her time partying until she gets arrested for putting on an illegal rave. The punishment turns out to be community service as a library clerk, which helps her learn a bit more about responsibility and the wider world as she begins a relationship with a Lebanese food vendor.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9y-TvmzQ8qA

This is showing at New Cross Learning Centre, which pretty much is a library, as part of the New Cross and Deptford Free Film Festival*. That means you don't have to book a ticket, but you do have to arrive early because these can be hard to get into. Doors open at 6.30pm so let's get there just before that. We can grab a pint around the corner afterwards.

The structure of Timecode is what makes it famous but even without that, it's an absorbing film about a group of people in and around the movie business in Hollywood. Mike Figgis (Leaving Las Vegas) directs an ensemble cast that includes but is not limited to Salma Hayek, Stellan Skarsgård, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Kyle MacLachlan, Saffron Burrows, Holly Hunter, Julian Sands and Leslie Mann.

So, what about that structure? It's a one-shot, heavily improvised ensemble piece filmed with up to four handheld cameras, each eventually taking up a quarter of the screen as its characters interact with each other in real time. Each camera follows a character or characters, and you can track the events of the film on any of the split screens, but it doesn't become overwhelming because only one has sound at any one time. Trust me, it works!

It's also a film that really benefits from the big screen, since you have plenty of space to see everything at once. This is going to (probably) be a one-off screening where Figgis mixes the cameras/sound live, which I take to mean we might see a completely unique version?

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icUyG8ZdX04

Jake Scully is an actor in a slump. He can't get or keep a job, his girlfriend has been cheating on him and to cap it all off, he suffers from crippling claustrophobia. Things seem to be looking up when a friend from his acting class offers him a cushy housesitting gig, where he finds himself besotted by a beautiful neighbour. After seeing her being abused, he tries to intervene, only to get drawn into a mysterious and violent world where the rules seem to be constantly in motion.

This may not quite be the biggest Hitchcock ripoff Brian de Palma's ever made*, but Body Double is probably the most de Palma movie he ever made, an erotic film noir that asks the audience to examine their own voyeuristic tendencies as they judge Scully for his. The movie itself is often ludicrous but never less than watchable, and it has at least two absolute crackerjack scenes.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_B6KEJD605M