| | | Jeff Parker: Forfolks review – a meditative gem | | by Kitty Empire Dec 12, 2021 | | (International Anthem)
The style-surfing guitarist deploys self-quoting loops and minimal solo work to beguiling effect Best known as the jazz-facing guitarist in the influential Chicago post-rock outfit Tortoise, Parker, now based in LA, wears many berets: band leader, film composer, unstarry collaborator. Parker’s third solo album for the International Anthem label is a meditative gem that breaks with the more fully fleshed out style of his two previous outings. The New Breed (2016) memorialised Parker’s late father; last year’s Suite for Max Brown was dedicated to his mother, Maxine. This year’s Forfolks does away with collaborators in favour of self-quoting loops and minimal solo guitar – impressionistic daubings of notes playing out in the space between jazz, ambient and the daily practice of quietly sketching out a tune for oneself. Continue reading... | | | | | West Side Story review – Spielberg's remake takes off when it dances to its own tune | | by Mark Kermode, Observer film critic Dec 12, 2021 | | Rachel Zegler’s Maria alone justifies this handsome update of the classic Broadway musical hits – though not everyone is a perfect fit Do we really need a remake of West Side Story? Having won 10 Oscars (a record for a musical), including best picture, Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins’s 1961 screen incarnation of the 1957 Broadway musical hit remains a much-loved and much-watched “classic”; a self-consciously streetwise affair with weapons-grade earworm tunes and choreography that kids would try to mimic in school playgrounds for decades. Yet even the most ardent fan of the original would have to admit that time has not been kind to the sight of Natalie Wood playing a Latina. Hooray, then, for screen newcomer Rachel Zegler, who landed the lead role of Maria from an open casting call, and whose vibrantly natural performance almost singlehandedly justifies this “reimagining” from director Steven Spielberg. The story, which transposes the star-crossed lovers of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet from Renaissance-era Verona to postwar New York, hardly needs rehearsing. Suffice to say that Spielberg’s version opens with what could be an outtake from the later stages of Saving Private Ryan – an aerial view of what looks like a bomb site, over which a wrecking ball ominously hangs. This is the stamping ground of the Jets, the white gang fighting a turf war with their sworn Puerto Rican enemies, the Sharks. Continue reading... | | | | | 'You've got to try and worry about something bigger than yourself': Riz Ahmed on rap, racism and standing up to Hollywood | | by Tim Lewis Dec 12, 2021 | | Riz Ahmed has never been afraid of a challenge – he famously learned drumming and sign language for his role in Sound of Metal. But his most fearless performance? Taking on Hollywood… This summer, Riz Ahmed took aim at Hollywood and the wider film industry. In a speech that was somehow both measured and searingly furious, the British actor called out the “toxic portrayals” of Muslim characters in TV and movies. Using research that he was directly involved in commissioning, Ahmed showed how Muslims, who make up almost a quarter of the world’s population, are either “invisible or villains” in our screen entertainment. He said that this omission resulted not just in “lost audiences” but “lost lives” because of the “dehumanising and demonising” ways that Muslims were often depicted. In fact, Ahmed noted, some of the most prestigious and awards-laden releases of recent years were “frankly racist”: specifically The Hurt Locker and Argo, both of which won best picture at the Oscars, and Marvel’s Black Panther, which earned more than $1bn at the box office. The speech in June, which launched an initiative called the Blueprint for Muslim Inclusion, was many things: timely, vital and, for some, eye-opening. But mainly, on Ahmed’s part, it felt brave, even risky. Actors typically don’t take potshots at their paymasters, the studios. They almost never single out specific, very successful films for criticism. Continue reading... | | | | | The big picture: a brilliant spark amid the darkness | | by Tim Adams Dec 12, 2021 | | Rinko Kawauchi captures the hypnotic magic of fireworks and how a single point of collective wonder can unite us Rinko Kawauchi began taking pictures of fireworks when she was living alone in Tokyo in 1997. At the time, she was spending her days working out what kind of photographer she wanted to be, a process she recalls as “agonising trial and repetition”. Often in the evenings she would find firework displays, which, she says, provided her “with a sort of healing… Alongside people of all ages, I would look up at the sky and marvel at the beautiful sparks. In an instant they would vanish – and so would we return to our own daily lives. In a chaotic world, such moments felt like salvation: an affirmation of being alive.” Her images from that time are included in a group exhibition devoted to the broad theme of fire, involving finalists for this year’s Prix Pictet at the V&A. Many of the pictures in the show focus on awful incendiary power: the inferno and aftermath of forest fires that are an ever more common feature of the warming planet and the charred devastation that fire can bring to environments and to communities. Kawauchi’s photographs provide little epiphanies of human joy in that context. Continue reading... | | | | | March of the Trump memoirs: Mark Meadows and other Republican reads | | by Lloyd Green Dec 12, 2021 | | The former chief of staff has written the most consequential Trump book – if not, thanks to the revelation of the great Covid cover-up, in quite the way he planned. In contrast, McEnany, Navarro and Atlas just play fast and loose with the truth The Chief’s Chief is the most consequential book on the Trump presidency. In his memoir, Mark Meadows confesses to possibly putting Joe Biden’s life in jeopardy and then covering it up – all in easily digested prose and an unadorned voice. If nothing else, the book has provided plenty of ammunition for Donald Trump to have concluded that Meadows “betrayed” him. Trump has trashed The Chief’s Chief as “fake news”, derided Meadows as “fucking stupid”, and falsely claimed that the book “confirmed” that he “did not have Covid before or during the debate”. Continue reading... | | | | | 'They were a bit abrasive': how kids' TV Clangers secretly swore | | by Vanessa Thorpe Dec 12, 2021 | | The son of Oliver Postgate, creator of the 1970s show, reveals what was in the scripts for the delightful and puzzling swannee-whistle creatures When Oliver Postgate, the late maestro of children’s television programmes, first invited young viewers to travel with him “in our imaginations across the vast starry stretches of outer space”, he was introducing many of them to a lifeform they would never forget: the Clanger. These little pink, knitted, nozzle-nosed aliens, Postgate suggested, were really rather like us, living out their lives on the “small planet wrapped in clouds” they called home. Now it has emerged they were much more like us than we thought. Continue reading... | | | | | Those we lost in 2021: Helen McCrory remembered by Cillian Murphy | | by Guardian Staff Dec 12, 2021 | | 17 August 1968 - 16 April 2021
The actor on his Peaky Blinders co-star, a supremely talented and compassionate performer whose grace and dignity never deserted her I first met Helen in the late 90s, when I attended an audition for a play at the Donmar Warehouse in London – I think Colin Farrell got the role. For some reason, she was there. I was just starting out, really nervous, and I think she picked up on that. We went outside at one point to smoke a rollie and she was really kind and supportive. I mentioned it to her when we started doing Peaky Blinders and she actually remembered it. Helen had this genuine compassion. It was part of her DNA. She wasn’t an actor who turned up, did the gig and went home. All the way through Peaky Blinders, she would chat to members of the crew as well as the actors. She knew everyone’s name. It’s a huge collaboration making a series like that and it’s easy to think it’s only about the actors, but she was always very aware of the collective aspect of what we do. At the wrap for series two, she actually got up and performed a poem to us all. It was about how special the show was and how great the crew were. It was humorous, but really considerate. She had obviously put a lot of thought into it. It was pure Helen. Continue reading... | | | | | |
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