Sunday, October 25, 2009
TIME WAS
Today's film was Terence Davies'
This ode to Liverpool, Davies' home town, and the revelations of his life there, combined with archival and current photos and films, make up a stirring documentary of, well, time and a city.
I think that Davies is reaching for the feel in every city of decay and its inevitability. He begins, obviously, with a reading of Shelley's Ozymandias which is not hitting us over the head to hard with his intention.
But there is something subtler here. It is that realization in youth that what we see is not permanent. Hidden away in the back streets are the foundations of yesterday. The decaying buildings. The old people. When we look on these in our youth we are brought up short to realize the inevitability of time and our own mortality. Live in the moment or die before you die.
Terence Davies is queer so he has some things to say about wasted life trying the old (church) ways and he is curmudgeonly antagonistic toward royalty and all the establishment crap that so dominates British society. Or has in the past.
I think that the right word for this is "impressionistic" but there are some good solid bits to bite on and laugh or feel sad and nostalgic whether your past is buried in Liverpool or wherever you have lived before.
I liked it a lot and might even be willing to see it again some time. It takes a while to "get it" and some of the footage is riveting.
That would make it a 4 out of Netflix5.
Davies is new to me. I think that I will try some of his other films. There aren't many. He has been anti-establishment from the start and he will not compromise in his work. It slows him down. So be it.
Labels: film, films, gay history, gay life
