So finally after about 2 weeks it started raining, much needed water. We also had some nice effects in the air as thunder storms accompanied the precipitation.
I filmed this for about 10 minutes before getting enough glimpses. The quality is okay on this little video, eventually I'll upload the high quality version. However the WMV file is here.
Enjoy!
We wind up our unofficial podcasts with some actual discussion of some films we've seen. After a weekend of debauchery, and getting covered in excrement, the chat is somewhat bizarre - probably best if you don't listen to this one...
Download it directly from here, or on ITunes.
Recharging back at nofear HQ we rush through descriptions of 5 or 6 films that we've seen, before racing off into the centre of Cambridge to catch some more erotic cinema. Hamgray wibbles about the word 'comedy' being used in any sort of film description regardless of the actual content of the film. Doug rants about Pixar's subversive message to young children, in their latest film 'Cars', glorifying automobiles, but the poet disagrees with him!
Download it directly from here, or (as usual) on ITunes.
It was with great sadness that I discovered the news about Syd (Roger) Barrett's untimely death. I read with less sadness the criticism that we at nofear receive having posted, many months ago, a clearly fictitious photo purporting to be Mr Barrett.
Those who are puzzled by our actions may wish to reflect on the fact that, when we discovered how many people were still understandably intrigued by Syd's recent life, we thought it might be a good idea to throw people from the scent. Syd had removed himself from stardom many years ago, and whilst polite interest in his former career was acceptable it was amazing to see how many people still believed it was fair-play to continue to attempt to track him down.
Farewell Syd!
Finally removed from the cinema venue we climbed onto the roof for today's podcast, where Doug and Hamgray discuss why it is people should walk out of films such as Erotic: Totally Uncensored and H6: Diary of a Serial Killer. Hamgray complains about the use of mobile phones in cinemas even when switched to 'silent'.
Download it directly from here, or play "find the monkey" on ITunes...
This time we've had to record our podcast in the kitchen next to the bar at the Arts Picturehouse. As well as mentioning 'Happy As One' we also discuss the annoying phenomenon of "the sycophant club", the popularity of the bar and it's proliferation of laptop users, and the effect of Nazi control on German film export success.
Download it directly from here, or look us up on ITunes!
Another 20 minute wibble about a couple of films that we've seen, plus Hamgray rants about the increasing number of wannabe filmmakers at the festival who use the Q&A sessions with famous people as a poor attempt to jump on the movie-making bandwagon.
Direct download from here.
Apparently you can also get hold of us on ITunes as well.
I'd also point out that our podcasts are a lot shorter than the official ones and have less advertising information!
Continuing our semi-regular and un official podcasts about this year's film festival...
Now we've seen a couple of films hamgray and 'the poet' describe their thoughts on 'Pirates of the Caribbean' and the first of the short film collection. Hamgray also explains why people who work at the Picturehouse cinema in Cambridge are all known as the "clumpies".
You can download it here, look us up on iTunes, or use the feed link from the 1st podcast posting.
This was the first of the short film collections of this festival sadly we could only vote for one film as our favourite and of the 12 we were shown it was almost impossible to choose between them:
Burning Love: This was a quirky, dialog-less, but slightly slow moving short about a young lady (who apparently could not afford trousers, and was played by one of the clumpettes) who upsets one of her domestic appliances.
Living Room: A dark and harrowing tale of domestic abuse by Alan Seiglow. Difficult to watch, and sadly, despite being initially intriguing, lacking any cinematic inventiveness. The short did pack a lot of emotion into a short time.
Socially Denying Helen: A one-trick film, where the trick essentially involves a trumpeter blasting out tunes on the London Underground. This film wins due to its sheer novelty, simplicity, and the added value of seeing normally frosty Londoners reacting well to this intrusion.
JA05TBO: An experimental short starring the famous Joosy Pidgeon. Filmed in Super-8 and using a clever technique it is a surprisingly enjoyable film of this type.
Interchange: Unlike the above, this film was not intriguing, the exploration of train travel and memory seemed to wipe my mind of any recollection about it. I seem to remember that it was shot in black and white.
Silvertown: An interesting insight into junkyard and dredger life in London, unfortunately marred by corrupt projection.
Apathy or Activism?: This was the film I voted for, it was an understated yet thought provoking voyage into the general public’s input into political process.
Invisible: A well produced short about a subject that we hear too much about in Cambridge, homelessness.
Stuffed: A joyful and entertaining piece about getting “it” out of your system.
Myth 821 How Man Got Fire: Adam Proctors work nearly got my vote, sorry Adam! It was a lo-fi animated short and an amusing visual fabrication, but then it could be true!
De Sul: A higher budget short and a slow moving insight into why the language of the Cornish folk is dying out.
Perfect Day: A very high budget (when compared to the shoestrings that the other films were probably made with) and overly emotional piece about a single father sharing a day with his daughter. Good acting.
This was the first official screening of the 2006 Cambridge Film Festival, and a good choice for getting a sell-out performance, so what was the film like?
Disney studios hoist the spinnaker once more for Captain Jack Sparrow’s second adventure. Has it really been three years since the first one? Fans of the first film will not be disappointed and there is no requirement to have seen the first instalment beforehand as the few ‘in-jokes’ are quite easy to spot and the continuation of the plot is easy to pick up.
Once again Johnny Depp swaggers onto his newly acquired pirate ship and sounding more like a shipwrecked Withnail than ever before. This time the main problem that Sparrow has is that he discovers that he owes a debt to the fearsome Davy Jones, played in this case by the excellent Bill Nighy – who is initially difficult to spot since he has an octopus for a face!
In the meantime the clean-cut Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) is also searching for Sparrow, Turner is beholden to the evil Cutler Beckett (of the East India Company) as he has managed to prevent Turner from marrying Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley) and has her incarcerated his dungeons.
When you consider the various other sub plots, cameo characters, and side-gimmicks, you have a film that is comparable to an instalment of Lord of the Rings. In fact “Pirates 2” does seem to borrow some of the essence of the film version of the Tolkien story, there are many more dark scenes and there is much more in the way of a gothic influence about the whole setting. Of course the film is also hilarious, there are many goofs and gags, the “Sparrow kebab” (I won’t spoil it) being one my particular favourites.
Is it really a suitable family film? This is one of the main questions in my mind. There is a large amount of horror for a 12A and there were certainly some much younger children in the audience (accompanied by adults). Should an 8-year-old really see an eye being pecked out by a crow? Even if the clever editing takes away most of the graphic realisation of the action? Fortunately these are questions that need only be answered by society and the film censors board, certainly the film pushes the bounds of a family film to the limit.
We were privileged at the Picturehouse to witness this film being projected on the flashy 2K projector, having read up a little about this it appears that this is a Christie 2K projector, which uses 3 DMD chips (digital micro-mirror device), one chip for each of the primary colours. Certainly from the back of the theatre I could not see any pixels and the clarity of the picture was amazing.
All credit to Gore Verbinski, director of this soon-to-be trilogy that combines an amazing cast and crew with incredible CGI effects and some really inventive sequences. I was pleased to discover that Verbinski was the creator of the ‘Budweiser Frog’ commercials, mighty oaks from acorns once again…
***** (out of 5)
Here's our first un official podcast about this year's Cambridge Film Festival. Recorded in the disabled toilet of the main venue for the event, and introduced by Orson Welles. Hamgray and Doug discuss the previous years that we have attended, and reflect on how life and film has changed in the last three years!
You can listen to it here, and it should be available as a proper podcast via ITunes very soon after this post goes up.
Updated 23:40 by 'Ed' - Podcast feed is available here:
Nofear.org's Unofficial Cambridge Film Festival podcast Feed
It's July! Our fans will no doubt be aware that this means it is time to embrace the event known as "The Cambridge Film Festival". After a break of a year, this time in 2006 your nofear authors will be taking the week off again to see as many of the weird and wonderful films as possible.
This year we are dabbling with podcasts and we'll be doing 5 un official podcasts from the film festival bar. We'll be talking about which famous people and which films we have seen, and also talking about ourselves mainly. So tune in, if for no other reason than just to see if we actually manage to generate anything.
Referring to my post about 'enduring love on a class 150' I alluded to it being 38 miles from Cambridge to Bury St Edmunds by bicycle. It would appear it is only 34 miles, as I hadn't taken into account the extra dithering around I did last time. My aim is to try to do this both ways once a week, but I imagine by the time I can persuade my body to do that, the nights will be drawing in, it'll be cold and I won't want to cycle further than the railway station.
