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-first- article written for Crossing Europe website's "CrossBlog", Thu 26 Apr :
THREE OF THE BEST
Day three of my third visit to Crossing Europe, and a triple dedication: this entry is in memoriam Jean-Pierre Cassel, Boris Yeltsin and Alan Ball, who have all passed away over the last week or so.
Of the trio, Cassel has the most direct connection to cinema. From the great French actor's long filmography, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie stands out as a topical recommendation: topical, because another masterpiece by the same director, Belle de jour, is showing here in Linz later in the week (as a "double belle" with its belated sequel, Manoel de Oliveira's Belle toujours). It's being screened on Friday and Saturday afternoon - and you could do much worse than attending both screenings.
As for Yeltsin - or rather Jelzin, as his name is transliterated in Germanophone nations - he did actually appear as himself in Michael Caton-Jones's The Jackal (1997), a fact strangely omitted from the otherwise-exhaustive obits which have appeared since his sad passing.
Alan Ball, however, seems to have eluded the cinematographers' gaze altogether - the 1966 World Cup winning footballer (not to be confused with his Oscar-winning namesake, scribe of American Beauty) even managing to avoid being roped into John Huston`s 1979 wartime soccer misfire Escape To Victory. Luminaries such as Pele, Ardiles and 1966's victorious captain Bobby Moore weren't quite so lucky...
I'm pleased to report that the standard among competition films (I've seen nine of the 12 so far) here at Crossing Europe is Champions' League material compared with the low-level fare provided by Huston's turkey. But as I'm serving on the jury - awarding a prize of no less than 10,000 euros ("tax free, old boy, tax free!") - I can't be more specific.
The five of us are observing a professional omerta until the winner is announced on Saturday evening - though anyone who's kind enough to supply me with a bottle or two of the discreetly charming Krušovice beer at the OK Mediendeck party after midnight may find that glasnost isn't entirely a thing of the past...
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-second- article written for Crossing Europe website's "CrossBlog", Sat 28 Apr :
WISE AFTER THE EVENT
It's 10.33pm, Saturday night, and I'm using the computer on the ground floor of Linz's OK Centrum. About an hour ago I was on stage upstairs, announcing - on behalf of my fellow jurors and myself - that the winning film this year is Die Unerzogenen (The Unpolished), the fine debut by Pia Marais. The post-ceremony party is well underway, but I am being the dutiful "blogger" and recording my innermost thoughts, fears, desires, and so on.
Oh, and in the spirit of my earlier entry, I should mention that this entry is dedicated to the memory of Mstislav Rostropovich, who passed away earlier in the week (a pal of Yeltsin, apparently : fans of The Parallax View may draw their own conclusions...) Back to business: I can state on record that, out of all the festivals where I've done jury service (including Rotterdam last year), Crossing Europe 2007's was the most competitive and of the highest overall standard.
Unprecedentedly for me, there were as many as five movies which I would have been happy to see winning our prize, Pia Marais`s film very much among 'em. I won`t say any more about our deliberations, except that they were enjoyable, funny, not too protracted, and toasted by a glass or two of Bulgarian liquour, as supplied by our Thracian member Mira Staleva.
It did turn out to be a very late night, indeed I managed to see the sun rise over the Donau as I sipped a final Krusovece outside the riverside Stadtwerkstatt bar, debating key cultural issues of the day with some youthful Linzers. I even managed to persuade them to come and see some movies at the festival. Juror, publicist, blogger, spokesperson... Surely I'll be invited back for Linz 2008??!!
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-third- article written for Crossing Europe website's "CrossBlog", Sun 29 Apr:
Grüß Kot!
A warm Sunday afternoon in Linz, and with an hour between screenings I wandered around some quiet streets not far from City-Kino. Near a petrol station I spotted graffiti art on a wall, signed - sorry, tagged - by someone calling themselves KOT. I've seen several examples of his/her daubings around the city, and he/she is clearly the bearer of considerable talent. A quick search on Google ("LINZ GRAFFITI KOT") yielded the following example:
http://flickr.com/photos/sooperkuh/358241808/
which isn't one of his/her best (KOT might even be the name of a collective, come to think of it), but gives a general impression of what he/she/they/it is/are up to. Sorry, too many slashes in that sentence.
Anyway, what I am wondering is to what part this KOT is going to play in the whole '2009 Capital of Culture' thingy which is inescapable in Linz at the moment. Perhaps the organisers are going to focus on "high" culture - classical music, ballet, opera, well-made plays, literature, cinema, etc - and overlook or somehow marginalise what we might call "street" culture.
I hope this isn't the case: though to most British people Austria has something of a stuffy image, on my four visits to the country (thrice to Linz, once to Vienna), what I've been impressed by is the energy, creativity and "attitude" of its young people. There's a lot going on in Linz in terms of what some might call "alternative" culture: punk, hardcore, radical, cutting-edge, label it what you will. And I really hope that the Capital of Culture organisers will try to put as much of that as possible at the heart of their project: many small grants to many small groups, rather than huge wodges of cash devoted to "grands projets".
And for anyone dubious that KOT isn't worthy of acclaim and attention might like to know that in my home country of Britain the artist who's attracting the most serious interest at the moment isn't Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst or Howard Hodgkin, but a man/woman/collective who tags his graffiti with the legend BANKSY.
And as this year's Crossing Europe has so triumphantly demonstrated, the most interesting culture, the most interesting and important art, is so very often that which is the most unbridled, unconfined, unrestrained, unpolite, unpretty... In a word: UNERZOGENEN!!!!!
neil_young - 29. Apr, 17:19
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more on Crossing Europe 2007...
... roundup article for Tribune magazine
... film-by-film reviews
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