After a two year delay, I was finally able to go to the British Film Institute Archive Open Day on Sunday. It was fun and eye opening. Essentially it’s a facility that comprises some offices, some ‘labs’ where film is worked on and preserved and some vaults or archives that house millions of metres of film, old and new. Now I make it sound quite simple and / or dry, but I’m not going to be able to capture the magic of the place in words. Because it looks like any other archive that I’ve been to and I’ve actually been to a couple before, but there’s the magic of film there. Walking into one of the vaults and for me, a fairly low key fan of film, tv and cinema, there’s magic in the air. On these thousands of reels sit culturally significant British output.
My lovely friend Jo works at the BFI archive. Jo has written for the blog before and now writes her own blog on film. It’s a great read, really in-depth film reviews and she loves Nicholas Cage. There’s a link to her blog below, please do check it out. When I was in the vault, I was listening to the talk given by the very knowledgeable employees of the archive, but my eyes kept darting back and forth between the reels of film. Could I spot something interesting? The copies that were in this particular vault were films that would be sent out to cinemas to watch. The facility is in Berkhamsted and considering Berko is really just a posh little commuter town for London, it’s a cool place. The Rex Cinema is awesome. There’s a bar inside the cinema and you can sit at small round tables like civilised people and watch a film. And the owner normally comes out to introduce the film and lets you know what’s coming up soon. And it has a great Italian restaurant called Zaza. I love Italian cuisine and it’s some of the best I’ve tasted in England.
And so a quick film review from me. I went to see The Critic this week starring Sir Ian McKellen, Gemma Arterton and Mark Strong. A very British film set in 1930s London. Our grumpy leading man, Jimmy Erskine (SIM) is the theatre critic for a big newspaper. Our wilting diva, Nina Land (GA) is a troubled actor trying to get decent reviews. Erskine entwines Land in a devious plot to get his job back after being fired by Viscount David Brooke (MS). It’s meant to be a period thriller. The story binds itself to the 1930s through politics, but more through sexual politics. There’s not enough mystery for me and therefore not enough of a thrill. It’s a half decent tail which is acted extremely well. All of the cast were more than enough for the source material, but the film itself lets down the performances. It’s alright like.
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