And woke up in the rain
And everyone turned over
Troubled in their dreams again
-The Cure
Well, here we are again and as usual, it's been far too long since my last entry. Things have been busy aboard HMS Beck, the crew working on reduced rations and only a few hours of sleep, but we've a strong wind in our sails and spirits are high.
My latest exploits within the field of film making have been enlightening, the central focus of which have been culture. Early in the week, I began work on a project with my friend and sometime colleague The Kingpin, the theme being to examine the cultural differences between Sweden and well, everybody else. We started our day with a prodigious breakfast of fried eggs, bacon and potatoes, washed down with a nice, strong cup of tea. Once fortified with this honking great mountain of food, we were ready for anything. We then took our rented production car, a Citroen C3, and whizzed away to our first location of the day, the home of an Egyptian gentleman who we will call Bakari, who has been living in Sweden with his wife and child for some time, and who had plenty to say about Swedes as a people. It was interesting to hear his observations, which largely referred to the fact that Swedes are a lot less extroverted than your average European. I can't say I entirely agree, having always found them to be very open, and easy to make contact with. The other people that we interviewed throughout the following two days, who hail from countries such as Canada, Iran, and Japan held very much the same view, and although I can see what they are driving at, I don't think they quite hit the nail on the head. The thing with Swedes isn't that they are introverted, but rather, as a Swedish language student we interviewed put it, very lagom. Lagom is a word that the English language has no equivalent for, and means, translating as closely as is possible, just right. That is to say that Swedes like to keep a slightly lower profile than most, not wanting to stick out too much, or blow their own trumpet, as it were. Swedes themselves hold the general opinion that they are a shy race, and less outgoing than us loudmouthed Johnnies from across the water. On the whole, I find them pleasant company, good listeners, and satisfyingly enlightened. All in all it was a fun project to work on, although there is still quite a lot of material left to edit.
That, however, will have to wait, because this weekend finds us up in Värmland, a few hour's drive North of Gothenburg, where we are visiting relatives. Leia's grandparents, to be precise. Värmland is a beautiful place at any time of the year, positively bursting with birch and pine forests, and still, misty lakes that, as lakes have a habit of doing, seem to suck the sounds out of the air and produce a silence like that of an empty church, seeming almost unreal for an outdoor location. They are magic places, lakes, and when standing by them on these hushed, chilly days, I'm almost tempted to switch off my telephone for fear of breaking that perfect quiet.
Winter is almost upon us, and it's once again time to fit the snow tyres onto the car, a job that my father-in-law can do in a tenth of the time that it takes me to do it. He is a man who has, and I quote, 'petrol in his blood', and what he doesn't know about cars isn't worth knowing. My daughter is fascinated by him, always breaking into a huge smile whenever she sees him, which in turn makes him visibly swell with pride, and go gooey in that special way that only grown men can. My own father is affected by her in the same way, and seeing how he is around her sends me rushing back to some of my earliest childhood memories, to a time when our home was a happy one, when Christmas was an enchanted time, and summers lasted forever. Those images have never entirely faded from my mind, but since Leia's arrival, something has stirred within me, bringing them back with far greater clarity, and along with them a strange kind of yearning sensation, as if some part of me longs to relive those days of simple, worry-free existence, when the world was further away from us. Today, everything seems inescapably close, and getting away from it requires real effort.
Ah well; there's always the lakes.
I always round off my blog entries with a small film critique, and this time won't be any exception. I'm not, however going to be as positive as I usually am. Three years ago, I watched a film about vampires. It was set in an Alaskan town called Barrow, and was different from other vampire films, being more (and I use this word with reservation) realistic than the usual yarns spun surrounding these eternally popular creatures. It was called 30 Days Of Night, and starred Josh Harnett, Melissa George, and Danny Huston. Directed by Hard Candy helmer David Slade, it was brutally simple, and filmed in a way that didn't employ the usual Hollywood film methods of making everyone look like they've stepped out of the make-up trailer before every scene is shot, and where the vampires are all eloquent goth-new romantics who are dreadfully bored with everything, except their wardrobe. I liked it. Along with the brilliant Swedish production Let The Right One In, and Tony Scott's The Hunger, from 1983, it's to my mind one of the only few vampire films worth watching. So, when I found out about the sequel, entitled 30 Days Of Night: Dark Days, I was naturally excited and perched myself in my seat, popcorn in hand, ready for more of the same. What I didn't consider however, was the fact that sequels to decent films are almost always terrible by comparison, created to turn a success into a franchise. Dark Days started out with a glimpse of the events in Barrow, and my hopes were high. What followed was, simply put, rubbish. The story quickly turned into a tenuous Let's-Form-A-Team-Of-Vampire-Hunters spiel, which was about as convincing as an episode of Dukes Of Hazzard. Why film makers insist on making their vampires act like brainless reptiles whose entire communicative ambit consists of baring their fangs at the moonlight, (or just the ceiling), hissing and screeching, is anybody's guess. Not even the DoP Eric Maddison's capable camera work could save the day. Painfully predictable and embarrassingly weak, this awful farce goes from bad to nonsensical. Relative newcomer Ben Ketai directed this film, and one can only hope he pulls his socks up in the future, because films like this are all too commonplace in today's cinema, and annoyingly, usually make enough money to keep the cash cow fed and milked. Or bled, as the case may be.
Quentin Beck,
November 7th 2010
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