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Nightcrawler essentially looks at the darker side of desire, the shadows of the personal pyramid and what twisted conclusions models of management can bring. To be clear, I see no difference between Nightcrawler and Wolf of Wall Street. The difference between Scorsese and Dan Gilroy is the choice of metaphor and depth. One uses the conventions of the mobster film to portray the criminality present in the financial system, while the other sinks deeper into the damaged psyche of profit-making. With his repetition of TedX mantras of leadership, Louis Bloom often feels like the personification of an internal memo from JP Morgan. The lengths of his rhetoric and the way he cannot abandon this language highlight his traits as a psychopath and are the only genuinely creepy things he does(bar killing people that is). Furthermore, the choice of hair do, words, cars create a distance between him and the emotionally invested world around him. The only clue the movie gives about this is his desire to create a working business from his camerawork.

photo cbsnews1.com

Moving through the narrative, the way Nightcrawler conjures all social relationships is perfectly transparent towards models of economic domination. The business partnership, here shown as the attempted fraternity between two fellow night cameramen, ends in a classic tale of sabotage. The zero sum game has only one winner, and Gylenhaal’s eerily calm character understands this better than Bill Paxton’s character, Joe Loder. His only employee, Ricky, works as a clear reference to the exploitation of young workers for internships in what are ‘career altering’ perspectives, and ‘unique opportunities towards self-advancement’. He will meet his end on tape, recorded by his self-affirmed benevolent employer. Finally, Bloom’s relationship with his boss, the morning news program director is a variation of metaphors on power, from money, to sex, and finally violence.

photo cinemagia.ro

Jake Gylenhaal’s character merely wants to make more money, and he applies himself in a persuasive way towards this goal. This hollowness of spirit, with the human only in charge of his margin projection, is the founding element of his criminality and lack of empathy. His business model never includes sentimentality and is what makes him a killer. This cinematic monster is unique due to this capitalist inclination and might very well spark a new genre of economic thrillers. Given Nightcrawler’s fairly good run at the box office, I see no reason why it shouldn’t.

by Paul Dunca

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post Bored at Movies: Nighcrawler, or how Corporate America Is Out to Get You appeared first on INHALE MAG.

The latest Clint Eastwood has already garnered, only a few weeks into its release, more passionate commentary than all other major Oscar releases put together. Perhaps it is because this year’s ceremony will not feature any women or race milestone, or perhaps movies about quirky hotels or psychotic Hollywood stars turned stage actors are simply not controversial enough to stoke that sort of debate. The other argument is that it is because ‘American Sniper’ is simply too in your face Republican for the internet mainstream to accept. Watch the trailer and see for yourself.

Let’s take a step back and look at the men behind the film, both the creator and the subject. Clint Eastwood was last featured heavily in the media as he appeared at the Republican National Convention, speaking to an empty chair personifying Obama, or Bush, or the war in Afghanistan. No one really knows, but the fact that the old time Hollywood legend chose to lend his image not to the changing forces of the Obama campaign, but rather to the comically evil charade of the Republicans Party made it newsworthy enough to circle the web. Many jokes were made and questions of old age and mental fragility were asked. His next film was the perfect follow up: a biopic about the most prolific sniper in US military history, who served in the Iraq war. Chris Kyle wrote a book about himself, with facts which many have contested and won damages in court against. This is the basis for the movie.

photo cnn.com

American Sniper unashamedly presents the story of the ultimate patriot. The last scene of the film, real footage of Americans across the land waving flags as their hero was buried after being killed by a disturbed fellow veteran, is merely a prologue twisted to the will of the director. The film is essentially built around those images, proving something Grand Torino and Iwo Jima merely strived for: American patriotism, that form of exceptionalism now commonly referred to as ’Murica’ across the globe is real – People who join a war because the ‘terrorist want to steal our freedom’ exist, in overwhelming numbers actually. Marines truly believe they are saving the world from evil and weak-links live just enough to see their freedoms taken away from them. There is nothing profound in this, just the will of a superpower being imposed upon a world. The morality of the decision made by the leaders of the country are not judged at the ultra-local level, where normal citizens of the United States can only react defensively towards any outside threat. This is the space where Chris Kyle and American Sniper reside.

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The large swath of criticism for the film comes from folks adamant that the film is bending the truth; that it’s using a cheap form of propaganda not seen since the Nazi regime.

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More-so, the inaccuracies conjure a version of the facts more closely aligned with the paranoid militarist version of Fox News rather than anything veritable. However this morally grounded criticism of the film, so deeply hinged on the viewers’ distaste of the Iraq War misses both the logic of fiction, as well as the reality of the character being portrayed.

However far-fetched it may seem, ‘The Legend’, here portrayed by a fairly impressive Bradley Cooper, is not manufactured propaganda character but a real person. The fact that the real Chris Kyle lied about how much he hated terrorist and how many outlandish things he did to protect America merely prove the film’s point. Undegraded by post-modernism, early twentieth century love of country exists well and true in Texas. Not just that, but every time an enemy comes along, be it a fictionalized child-drilling Islamist radical or not, he will rise to the occasion and prove a model for Hells Angels columns of cycles to form in his memory. That is the American Sniper, and the way Clint Eastwood captures it is brilliant in its awfully specific and manipulative way. Deal with it.

photo imgur.com

by Paul Dunca

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post Bored at Movies: American Sniper and the legitimacy of patriotism appeared first on INHALE MAG.

Daniel Clowes has seen his work adapted without permission
photo comicsalliance.com

Some might argue against this association with his low brow commercial career past, the point being that he is rejecting his celebrity persona. However, my main point is that he fits perfectly into the narrative of child-star–turned-rebel. While working with Lars von Trier is a notoriously transformative process, I doubt that it was the Danish director’s aura alone that explains LaBeouf’s behavior.

I had noticed The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman after a Hannibal series tour de force, and a more than delightful viewing of The Hunt, after which I was convinced that Mads Mikkelsen is incapable of being anything other than an amazing actor in any of his roles; a Norwegian Daniel Day Lewis if you will. With the conjunction of LaBeouf’s slightly baffling coverage, I decided to watch the film and perhaps notice the root of his anxiety and troubles in an indie production, where he, as an artist, could theoretically express himself more freely as a lead actor in a character driven movie.

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Given his recent performance piece in LA, called #iamsorry, where a crowd of mainly TMZ drawn fans lined up to sit in front of him for a few minutes as he supposedly apologized, I think I might extend the barrier of his work from the physical to the virtual, and propose a few things Shia Labeouf should be sorry about after watching the film.
1. He should be sorry for his acting inconsistency. While Charlie Countryman switches from grieving son to enamoured puppy to noir detective, the audience registers exactly zero changes in his character, and that is perhaps the most frustrating aspect about the film.
2. He should be sorry for rehashing all rom-com clichés that died once Jude Apatow got a bit serious about writing. From tired speeches about love, to single guitar cord soundtrack, the film excels at offering no original line of dialogue or film-making.
3. Shia should say sorry that he made a big deal about taking acid before filming a scene where Charlie Countryman is on LSD, only for the audience to see a minute’s worth of unconvincing moaning. Watch Enter the Void and take some acting lessons; perhaps then you can start comparing yourself to Sean Penn.
4. He should apologize for missing the opportunity to portray a vibrant Eastern European capital with anything other than soviet police state/interwar nostalgia stereotypes, and Eurotrip references.
5. As a personal note, I’d personally want LaBeouf to apologize for the worst English speaker trying to say something in Romanian scene that, as a Romanian abroad, I have ever seen.
I’d give an actual review of the film, but I see no use in pointing out flaws in paragraph form. Even Mikkelsen disappoints, and he’s the best thing to come out of the whole movie.

In the end, we might end up posing some serious questions about what celebrity culture does to the young stars that spend most of their childhood in the rainbow coloured spotlight of the Disney channel. When Selena Gomez stars in the most MTV-generation damning movie of all, directed by the all time American myth-destroyer Harmony Korine, and Miley Cyrus keeps wiping her make-up from all the tongue showing and pretend fornication acts, Shia LaBeouf actions seem more-so part of a trend, rather than a personal meltdown.

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This is defined by a game of opposites that all these stars play, based on the idea that there can be no linearity between two stages in a career, no slow incursion into quality film-making or serious song-writing. Perhaps when you have so many Twitter followers telling you that you are perfect just the way you are, moving from one to another might gain tragic proportions in your mind. Maybe they were never supposed to be lauded as much to begin with, or maybe they just aren’t cut for real work. Whether we really want to or not, we will be watching closely.

by Paul Dunca

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post BORED AT MOVIES: WHY SHIA LaBEOUF #shoudbesorry appeared first on INHALE MAG.

photo standbyformindcontrol.com

It would be hard to add anything new on the topic of Blanchett’s Oscar-deserving portrayal of an Upper East Side socialite turned manic depressive who moves to her sister’s house in San Francisco after her husband commits suicide while imprisoned for running a Ponzi scheme. There are few performances where you can distinctly feel an actor’s choice in developing a character. Faced with a role that is defined by a lack of sensibility, a constant denial of her actual situation, Blanchett chooses to repeat each mistaken premise that Jasmine embodies to the point of desperation. And that is what depression feels like in Blue Jasmine. A frustrating lack of perspective that creates a vicious cycle of impotence that drives one crazy. What would normally be a classic neurotic charming dialogue between Allen-esque New York hypochondriacs, in Blue Jasmine, turns into infuriating ramblings of an ungrateful sister.

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Her pill and empty mantra addiction are always self-serving and only deepen Jasmine’s manic state. As the title character’s guilt is slowly revealed, there is no empathy that the audience can project for her, only a sense of embarrassment. While there are elements of chance (a staple of Allen’s oeuvre) that alter Jasmine’s life course, they end up serving the same linear narrative. A chance encounter on the street or a lucky break in the dating game doesn’t lift Jasmine from her state of depression, and only highlights her practical inability to get past her tormented past, despite her repetition of the opposite.

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I’d ideally give a special mention to each small character, as Allen managed to get the best out of his entire cast, but one that truly deserves a special mention is Louis CK. As the 21st century’s comedian of the everyday, his cameo as a character embodying lack of sophistication is a nice touch to the story. Although presented as a gentleman towards Jasmine’s sister Ginger, he is a cynical cheater whose defining characteristic is his unmistakable blandness. He is opposed by Alec Baldwin’s now typecast character: the New York investment shark; an easy fit for Baldwin, especially as his character is released of all pretences of sentimentality. His final confession of being in love with an 18-year old French au-pair seems more like a crisis point from a man on the brick of disaster rather than a genuine confession. Ultimately though, they both buy their love and cheat on their lovers, so the difference lies more in Ginger’s ability to admit that her ‘settling for less’ is in fact a path to happiness.

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A mere 4 years ago, in Whatever Works, Woody Allen’s most stereotypical and self-congratulatory feature, Larry David’s character glances into the camera and joyfully serves the film with a tragi-comical ending that references the title. This gives the audience the impression that it is precisely because of our self-awareness, that we can enjoy the ever-deflating lifejackets that destiny throws in our troubled waters. In Blue Jasmine, there is no mention of this, and the only scenes of joy that we can see are Ginger’s cliché New York sightseeing tours, and her re-engagement to a man she so easily discarded once a gentleman courted her. Her story ends the same as the 2004 film, only now the audience is no longer smiling, as Chilli is objectively presented as a weaker choice. From this point of view, while the film definitely provides depth in terms of character complexity and stylistic details, its over-arching message about human happiness is that ‘ignorance is bliss’ and that we should all stop trying. It is somewhat ironic that this comes at a late point in Allen’s career, when he most certainly seems to be doing this.

photo aceshowbiz.com

The post BLUE JASMINE: EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT DEPRESSION BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK appeared first on INHALE MAG.

photo news.rapgenius.com

Let’s start by looking at the horrible habitat Earth has become in Elysium. The year is 2154 and humans are split in a two tier class system between citizens,with access to the lush tropical-resort-like Elysium station outside Earth’s atmosphere, and the rest. The first shot of the rotating Elyseum made me think of the opening scene in 2001: Space Odyssey, but it turns out that even 150 years into the future(fictional or otherwise) humanity has only managed to advance A.I.as far as recognizing irony and being more muscular. It’s been obvious for a while that future worlds will no longer be portrayed in a positive manner, but given that the film’s technical crew was mostly drawn from District 9, the fact that we’ve gone from ‘this is how a South African alien ghetto looks like’, to ‘this is how Earth looks like’ seemes a bit dramatic. The landscape is filled with Mad Max imagery, geek-communities living in underground shelters, neons flicking all around, planning the next horribly flawed attack on the establishment. The ‘opposition’s’ main goal is to smuggle people onto the Elysium station, where state of the art facilities can cure any disease, and they do this in the least strategic way possible(until Damon shows up). Also, the choice of music does not appear to have evolved past dubstep. This is truly sad.

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What this sets up is an allegorical space for a conversation on equity and politics that is reinforced by every character in the film, especially Matt Damon’s Max De La Costa. Firstly, he is Mexican. It is never explained or worked on, but we just know that he is, the film arbitrarily identifying the main character with the biggest immigrant population in current day America. As a person, Max is a cog in the system, trying to sort his life out after various stints in prison. He is thus part of the working class, assembling the robots that make up the police force that harasses him every day and break his arm on his way to work. On top of the fact that it’s a very bad metaphor, it also assumes that although there is highly superior technology, full automation is not something that has been introduced in the manufacturing process. The system thus operates on the logic of 19^th century capitalism, with ruthless businessmen apparently thinking that a worker’s life is less important than the assembly line being stopped for 5 seconds. This particular incident leads to Damon’s character being irradiated and triggering Max the hero character.

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Fortunately for the likely bored audience, Max the hero is somewhat unique in his drive for most of the movie. I would identify him with middle class America if anything. Namely, he finds himself in the situation that he needs to cure himself, and the only way to do that is to bring the entire system down. Although he ends up bringing along a sick child of a former lover with him, he obsessively repeats that he is doing all of it to stay alive, the perfect self-involved 21^st century man. But as those exact words are heard over and over again and mixed with images of suffering populations, the audience is supposed to realize that his striving for life is the call of all humanity that is stuck on Earth to be granted the right to live. This is why he sacrifices himself at the end and appears to forget everything his character said up to that point in the movie. Indeed, the middle-class American, underneath his ego-driven persona, is in fact a humanitarian that is willing to trade his precious life for the good of others. How noble.

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In terms of negative characters, there is Jodie Foster as the commander in chief of Elysium’s defenses. Given her rhetoric and militarism that stands in contrast to the supposed ‘enlightened’ leaders of Elysium, she is either a critique on the Republican party’s war-mongering crowd of neocons, or a slight wink at Israel. It doesn’t stop here though, as this system is attacked right before Max’s crew get a chance to, by the rogue assassin Jodie Foster’s character employed on Earth, Kruger. He sports a ridiculous South-African accent and is likely to make even the most unassuming viewer think of apartheid. As cartoonish right-wing characters parade at the helm of Elysium, exposing structural flaws that could be spotted by an 8-year old, our heroes finally achieve victory and save the day. The hackers finally over-ride the Elysium system, the child is saved and drones are heading to Earth to provide assistance to the newly registered citizens. This finally wraps up what can be best seen as a 2 hour long advertisement for the Obamacare program, ardently supported by Hollywood figures, Matt Damon included.

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I could of course not look at it like that, but then the film fails on every account of cinematic experience, mainly because it lazily drifts into familiar patterns of action movies that have long lost their appeal. Now, Elysium will always be:

‘Hey, remember when Matt Damon did that advertising campaign for Obama’s re-election?’

’Ow yeah, didn’t it come out like, a year too late though?’

‘Yeah, that was funny’.

photo hollywoodreporter.com

Next up, how Tom Cruise went from scientology nutter to Tea Party hero.

by Paul Dunca

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post BORED AT MOVIES – ELYSIUM AND POLITICS appeared first on INHALE MAG.

photo cinemasalem.com

The story follows a family of drug smugglers that own a boxing arena searching for the killer of one of their brothers. All the ingredients are present for the film to be viewed as a neo-noir representation of the Bangkok crime scene and the classic cinematic artifices are all employed in this sense. Firstly, the black and white colour scheme is replaced by variations on red and blue which dominate the screen throughout the movie. The city is mired in darkness and narrow streets that form a maze for the characters, with the diegetic sound mainly used for punctuated footsteps, creating a sense of expectancy and heightened tension.

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Also formally within the noir genre is the femme fatale character Crystal, the evil blonde mother that seeks to push Julian (Ryan Gossling) into murdering his brother’s killer. She is opposed by the classic ‘good girl’ Mai, who tries to reduce and replace the influence of the mother. The moral ambivalence of the characters is often emphasized with the use of shadows, with both Julian and Chang moving in and out of dark spaces.  These two stand in opposition, emanating energy on the screen with full body shots that are linked to crescendos in the soundtrack. Julian’s role as a leader in his family group is matched by Chang (The Angel of vengeance), who is a spiritual leader of the police department, with a god-like persona that is adored by his colleagues. In classic noir tradition, the film ultimately looks at the main character’s struggle to reconcile good and bad and achieve spiritual unity.

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Given that this is a movie that breaks the East-West divide, it is also interesting to look at the way the differences between characters follow those lines. In this respect, a clash between kitsch and cliché is neatly presented in Only God Forgives and the play between appearance and essence is important in reading this aspect. While Bangkok is filled with Chinese lanterns and cheap colourful spaces, all Thai characters present a strong sense of morality and family values. From the prostitute’s father who kills his daughter’s assassin, to the hit-man whose only concern is his son’s well-being, a sense of right and wrong permeates.  Outside of whorehouses with art-deco interiors and Greek sculptures, there appears to be a singular understanding of ethics that is enforced by Chang.

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On the other hand, Julian’s family is characteristic of a dysfunctional modern ‘unit’. With a dead father, a child abusing brother and a manipulative, perhaps incestual mother, their moral bankruptcy is evident in the mother’s dialogue, which jumps between vulgar and neurotic. These themes are all portrayed in very straightforward psychoanalytical narrative sequences that reek of ‘white’ insecurity and oppose the clean aesthetics of the mother’s hotel room. This clash between cultures offers Julian a space to go through a transformative journey that ends with his purification.

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The last point and the unifying theory for the unfolding of the film appear with the dedication of the film to Alexander Jodorovsky. Firstly, we can look into the ways Refn borrows from the Chilean’s director supra-realist style to explain much of the performance of the characters. We also see the use of sound as a primary source of cinematic experience (tip!:close your eyes when Chang asks the girls to do so and see the results). More importantly however is Jodorovsky’s writing and experience as a tarot reader and his method of psychomagic. The technique relies on the psycho-genealogy (psychoanalysis that takes the family tree as the key aspect of therapy) of the subject that is targeted and then healed, based on the patient’s subjective superstitious beliefs. Under this lens, violence is the purifying agent, and Chang is the healer. Gossling’s character acknowledges Chang’s morality and pardons his brother’s killer after hearing what the Angel of Vengeance made him do. This sets up a spiritual link between the two main characters from the beginning, and Chang goes on to gradually kill all the negative elements in Julian’s life. Furthermore, Julian’s willingness to fight is in fact his preferred choice of superstition(that of archetypal male behaviour), his only means of communication, and the scene is followed by his salvation, as he stops his mother’s assassin from killing Chang’s daughter.

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As Julian slowly moves closer to the Angel of Vengeance, he finds himself searching for the purification that his brand of justice offers, and finally accepts his punishment. While the Ryan Gosling school of deadpan acting might see a fall in applicants, Only God Forgives cannot be judged singularly on those standards (on which it mainly fails). Meant to be released soon after Valhalla Rising, it follows Refn’s thread of non-social violence explored through characters placed outside classic understandings of morality and offers a distinct tale of man’s resolution with his violent self.

by Paul Dunca

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post ONLY GOD FORGIVES – BEYOND NEO-NOIR appeared first on INHALE MAG.

Discussing such a truly engrossing and complex film like Ben Wheatley’s 17^th century English Civil War supernatural drama, A field in England, is a difficult task. That statement alone only offers slight indications of the cinematic feast that the British director prepared with his latest instalment. With layers of symbolism and powerful aesthetics wrapped around a story dealing with the occult and the mystical, the movie captivates through its resilience to conventional interpretations of cinema.Torn by conflict, the space inhabited by the characters is restricted to war and religion.This makes any reading of the film rely on power relations and allegory.

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The plot follows four deserters who meet on the battlefield and decide to leave together in order to escape capture. Whitehead is a noble’s servant in search of a former disciple of his master that stole alchemy books, later shown as O’Neil. He is the main character of the story, and the plot mainly revolves around his development. A pious man with fear of God, he transforms by acquiring self-consciousness, as he abandons the rigours of his teachings to battle O’Neil’s evil ways. Complementing him is Trower, a thief whose rotten character extends to his physical health(‘Am I turning into a frog?’’Tis the one complaint you do not suffer from.’).

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Trower drinks and swears and formally repeats that he is his own man, setting up the main theme of Whitehead’s development but also ironically pointing to his capture by O’Neil and his servant. Another supporting role is Friend (Trower ‘names’ him as such), a cheerful Essex peasant who sees life as an obstacle course between divine punishments. Hejokes, smiles and is fascinated with hands and handcrafted tools, pointing to a purity of the simple man that takes life as it is. He is also the only one to break the violence-religion barrier, with a song that correlates both to Trower’s salvation and to Whitehead’s awakening. Lastly there isO’Neill, who is revealed to be Cutler’s master and the reason the latter suggested to the other three to go towards the alehouse, who is an alchemist seeking treasures to pay off debts. He wishes to use Whitehead’s conjuration powers to find these and is aware of the main character’s real strength.

photo theskinny.co.uk

The four men initially head towards an alehouse as a marching band without a leader. Their first collective action is pulling a rope that leads them to O’Neil, when their purpose is revealed(the henchman, the treasure-seeker and the two workers). At this point, Whitehead is only a coward, unaware of the world or his self, as O’Neil points out. He enslaves Whitehead and forces him to look for a treasure site, also making him break his fast and drink wine.

photo bbci.co.uk

As Neil’s plan progresses and Trower and Friend dig deeper for the treasure, Whitehead becomes more inward looking. His vision of a foreign planet crushing the earth bears a resemblance to an iris, the world looking into the character. This, along with the runes with unknown writings that he coughs out, isone of the visual metaphors that point to Whitehead’s inability to know himself and his true power. Finally, Friend’s song triggers his catharsis, as he embraces the evil that O’Neil represents in order to foil his plan. Blindly ingesting mushrooms as he is chased around the field, a visual play on identity between the two opposing characters occurs. Finally, the revelation of the digging spot as a burial ground that holds mystical powers confirms Whitehead’s transformation and true form, of a charlatan and a killer with great power.

photo eastendfilmfestival.com

The visual style stands out through the choice of black and white instead of colour. The bleakness of the imagine favours a strong use of sound in telling the story, with hard-hitting, psychedelic drums and repetitive guitar samples(think Wender’sKings of the Road or Refn’sValhalla Rising) that punctuate and enforce the narrative. Walking through plains and meadows, the audience never sees any structure or sign of civilization, creating a sense that the characters journey through a stateless land. The role of mise-en-scene is further enhanced by tableaux that the characters create at the beginning of each ‘chapter’ through stand-still poses.

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As the story reaches its climax, with the 10 minute hallucination scene that the main character experiences, the sense of paranoia and loss of control is enforced by stroboscopic sequences, kaleidoscope effects and higher frame rate. These film-making elements are normative rather descriptive, as the experience of the characters trickles into the visual style of the film.

Ben Whitley covers the film with numerous artifices that capture the attention of the audience, creating a unique sensory experience outside of classic formulas and worthy of the alchemy theme of the film. In the end, A field in England is a single-standing tale of emancipation and unleashing of human potential, as the protagonist takes on the role of the coward, the faithful, the slave and finally the master. ‘I shall pray for more legs and hands to better appreciate the wonders that play out beneath us.’ Whitehead’s ultimate desire to know and feel more reveals a very humane message in A field in England, perhaps fitting for an English Civil War film.

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post MUSHROOMS AND ALCHEMISTS ON A FIELD IN ENGLAND appeared first on INHALE MAG.

Is Tropical
photo Paul Dunca

Perhaps it’s more fitting to first describe how the band presents itself. Signed with Kitsune (Yelle, Pheonix, Klaxons), there is an obvious blurring between the music and the image that is implicit with Is Tropical and is in line with the French label’s business model. With scarves and fake bears over their faces, un-google-able signs on their website and very bold music videos, they’ve managed to create an aura of mystery around them that has worked so well for other bands in attracting the gem-seeking carnivores of the blogosphere. Wikipedia tells us they have ten million hits on Chinese YouTube, which is what perhaps inspired them to be ‘the first western band to tour Mongolia’. A less than impressive feat, but it goes along with the type of non-linear path to fame they are trying (so hard) to take.

photo kitsune.fr

As such, the London trio has been riding the synth gravy train since 2011, with two albums and a lot of good PR behind them. I think I started listening to them during the summer and believed it was circumstantial that I ended up liking them. If you hear a song enough times, you’ll find something you like about it(the basic premise of pop music producers I guess). Tracks like Greeks or Seasick Mutiny were catchy on Native To, their first album, and had enough guitar riffs through their songs for me not to dismiss them wholly. Their new album sounds like the band is moving towards a classic instrumental sound, with more work being put on a heavy bass line and indie guitar that references Joy Division rather than New Order. Coupled with clear attempts to create genuine crowd pleasers, I’m Leaving was a welcomed return and got me in the mood to see them live.

photo runderground.ru

The venue was a gallery somewhere around Hoxton. It stood out as the event of the evening, with a huge density of accessories per square foot, but it was nothing too glamorous (in the industrial sense of the word) and was packed and dark enough to get lost in the crowd. After getting a free Jager shot from the Rastafarian bartender for pointing out the fact that they did indeed have the beverage, I felt the night was going well and was getting anxious about seeing the band. Soon enough, they entered the stage unceremoniously, leather jackets and long sleazy hair abound and opened with Lover’s Cave. This first song on the album sets the tone well, with an inviting chorus, drowned by jumpy synth and high-pitch guitar. The pace was great and the drums were resonating throughout the crowd and already, three minutes in, you could tell they’ve moved their focus from the dance floor to the concert halls.The key moment was the onstage appearance of the female voice from their new single, Dancing Anymore, arguably their best song yet.

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Barely distinguishable from the lads, she gave the act the sort of warm vocals and raw appeal that made me realize, all of a sudden, that I was in fact at a rock’n’roll concert. Drunk and rarely hitting their cues, the band proceeded to stumble through much of their new songs, as well as some older classics like Greeks or Lies. What made the concert great however was not the music per se, but the type of band and brand of music they were personifying. As they insistently and unimaginatively repeated that everyone needs to get fucked up, you slowly startedto believe them. And perhaps that’s the point that I was missing for such a long time.

The Greek clip:

‘I don’t wanna leave the party, oh nooo’, went one of Is Tropical’s last songs.  Although I will always prefer a British stadium to a scruffy post-industrial gallery space, I’m more and more disappointed with the bands I ceremoniously follow. As for the new ones, I hate Jake Bugg and don’t really get the hype. Perhaps it’s in this niche where artists that can still capture my imagination reside, or maybe I was fooled by some gimmick thought of by a French producer.

In any case, I was dancing all night.

photo theupcoming.co.uk

By Paul Dunca

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post IS TROPICAL – OR HOW I STOPPED WORRYING AND LOVE SYNTH appeared first on INHALE MAG.

photo papermag.com

First time director Adam Leone drew inspiration from genre classics, like Larry Clark’s Kids (1995)  or Little Fugitive (1953). Firstly, the visual style of portraying the metropolis as an indifferent mass of bodies where daring youths appear to dominate the city, is clearly reminiscent of Kids. While Harmony Korine’s scriptwriting debut is code for uncompromising visuals and narrative violence, it is from Little Fugitive that Gimme the Loot takes its tone. Yes, the parents are missing, and the two main characters are robbed(twice!), walk around bare-foot and are double-crossed every step of the way, but they are still kids. They are still defined by that sort of unadulterated, free-willing pursuit of happiness that allows them to shrug off any hardship. And while many things go wrong as they trail the city looking for graffiti stardom, in the end it seems like just an ordinary 24 hours. All that remains is the playground attraction between Sofia and Malcolm that make them such a good on-screen pair.

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There are a lot of other things that work well for Gimme the Loot. As any good New York movie, it has impressive and original great location shooting that embeds the audience in the urban environment and feels real. However, unlike a Spike Lee or Woody Allen feature, Leone does not seek to define the city within a narrow narrative viewpoint, but rather reveal it in its totality. Moving from Upper East Side condos to Queens rooftops and Bronx projects, while flowing through parks and busy streets, it fills the screen with an authentic New York aesthetic without politicizing the image.

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This uninhibited, no-label type of directing further applies to the story. Much like The Little Fugitive, the movie does not have a contrived sense of right or wrong that ends the story, no moralistic view that it forces upon its audience. Every character seems like a natural element of the city, from the arrogant, educated Ginnie, a charming hipster seemingly cut from a Vampire Weekend album cover, to the couple’s partner in crime Rico, who obsessively repeats that he does everything to feed his family or Lenny, the dealer boss with a Cornell degree and a passion for golf. All of them in the end reveal themselves as endearing characters. They carry the essence of individualism/ exceptionalism that is so prevalent in the film and make Gimme the Loot such a feel-good flick. All this points to the film being a slice of life in the big city for 24 hours, filmed from an impartial vantage point.

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The central metaphor of conquering ‘the big apple’ is obvious and applies throughout the movie. Malcolm and Sofia are two parts of the same self-sufficient unit(it should be noted that there are no tweets, Iphones or vlogs involved). Alone, New York will crush them, but together, their energy can overcome any hardship.

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Here is the trailer:

By Paul Dunca

Paul Dunca is a freelance saboteur looking for a change of pace. He writes reviews and opinion pieces to keep appearances and can be reached at various wishing wells around London.

The post LET’S BOMB THE BIG APPLE! – WARMTH AND MISCHIEF IN GIMME THE LOOT appeared first on INHALE MAG.