Thom Yorke : Suspiria (Music For The Luca Guadagnino Film)

Dario Argento’s legendary supernatural masterpiece Suspiria was not only a stunning slice of atmospheric horror, it also boasted one of the great scores of 20th century cinema by Italian band Goblin (or the “Goblins” as they were credited on the film).

Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria remake starring Dakota Johnson and Tilda Swinton is about to hit British cinemas next month, having recently premiered here at the BFI London Film Festival to reviews that generally agree the new film fails to match the breathtaking brilliance of its original.

Composed by Thom Yorke, the accompanying soundtrack – his debut feature length score – comes out today on XL. According to the singer, the music this time round takes its main influence not from Goblin’s disturbing but dazzling OST but from Vangelis’ work on Blade Runner. This is maybe most evident in the cold synth riff that opens Volk, and micro-short tracks like A Soft Hand Across Your Face, Synthesizer Speaks, The Universe is Indifferent and Suspirium Finale pt 2.

This, though, is a diverse listen. One minute you might think of a György Ligeti choir; the next some musique concrète experiment. The Balance of Things possesses a distinct eastern feel while Klemperer Walks momentarily made me think of the Wendy Carlos.

More often, a number of the tracks bring to mind kosmiche acts from the mid 1970s. The original movie was released in 1977 and this new ‘cover version’ as Swinton refers to it as, is set in that same year, a time when German electronic act Tangerine Dream scored William Friedkin’s Sorcerer, Klaus Schulze provided the music for Lasse Braun’s Body Talk and Popol Vuh released their ninth album, the OST for Werner Herzog’s Heart of Glass. It’s easy to imagine Yorke listening to albums like these as he commenced work on this project.

Suspirium itself, the first taster from the album, is one of the highlights here. A sparse song with elegiac piano melody, pastoral flute and the most plaintive vocals you’ll hear in 2018, this is vintage Yorke. Has Ended features a crisp drum tattoo (played by Yorke’s son Noah) and dreamy psychedelic drones; A Choir of One has a sinister feel, the prelude, I would guess, to some nerve shredding action. The piano on Unmade wouldn’t sound out of place on some middle of the road track and gives listeners some light relief during what is a sometimes unsettling listen.

Notably Yorke’s bandmate companion Jonny Greenwood has received much acclaim for his own contributions to the art of scoring in recent years although the Academy have so far failed to award him an Oscar. I haven’t yet seen the new Suspiria, so it’s impossible for me to say how effective this music will work in tangent with the visual flair of Guadagnino but I would guess Yorke’s work here would have to be seriously considered – along with Greenwood’s fine job on Lynne Ramsay’s You Were Never Really Here.

I can judge this, though, as a standalone (double) album. There are many fascinating instrumental fragments that might be described as incidental music rather than as fully fledged songs. Not that this means I don’t admire them hugely anyway.

Best of all are the tracks where Yorke supplies that famous fragile falsetto of his on such as Has Ended and Open Again. Suspirium Finale is a take on Suspirium with strings supplied by The London Contemporary Orchestra, who also contributed to Radiohead’s A Moon Shaped Pool. It’s as good as anything on that 2016 album.

Other pieces such as Sabbath Incantation obviously have a definite purpose in accompanying some specific narrative event on-screen, and these prove less successful as music you’ll want to listen to on any kind of regular basis. For the sake of album cohesiveness, Yorke might have been wise to drop some of these moments. Most fans will likely want to programme their own version.

Uneven but mostly engrossing.

8/10

To stream or buy the album click here.

Enter the Fat Dragon & The Incredible Kung Fu Master (A Sammo Hung Double Bill)

Enter the Fat Dragon (1978): Directed by Sammo Hung
The Incredible Kung Fu Master (1979): Directed by Joe Cheung

An absolute icon of Hong Kong cinema, Sammo Hung has acted with Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Donnie Yen and many other martial arts superstars as well as directing, producing and working as a fight choreographer.

Here he stars as Ah Lung, a young pig farmer who, on the order of his father, is told to move to Hong Kong to help his uncle run his food stall.

Lung is a Bruce Lee fanatic and strives to copy the great man in as many ways as possible. As you can imagine from the title, though, while Lee was a sinewy powerhouse of a man, Lung has the look of someone whose nearest encounter with sport is maybe chucking a few darts down his local. He gets called variations of Fatty by just about everyone he comes across.

He’s also clumsy, headstrong, naive and has a truly terrible bowl haircut but looks can be deceiving. Lung is surprisingly supple, he can kick beyond his height and he packs the kind of mightily hard punch that can send an opponent across a room.

He’ll need these skills as he’s about to come across two different sets of thugs, one lot who refuse to pay for their meals at the food stall; another with connections to a highly eccentric (and pervy) antique dealer Professor Pak, a man with a hairstyle that makes Lung’s look like a high fashion cut.

Although the title riffs on Lee’s biggest success – and Sammo was the first opponent of Bruce Leed in that film – the plot here is as close to Way of the Dragon and Game of Death as it is to Enter the Dragon. The climax, for instance, is surely a nod to Game of Death, with Sammo taking on three opponents possessing distinctive fight skills one after the other.

The film parodies Lee movies while also paying homage to him – and Hung was a friend of Lee. It also parodies the Brucesploitation trend that I mentioned in my previous post and, through a family friend, Lung is invited to take part as an extra in one of these movies which is called Death Appointment. Critical of the arrogant star and his lack of Lee-style skills, he ends up going head to head with him on the movie set and shows him how to should fight like the great man.

Lung is hugely likeable throughout and the fight sequences often dazzle. My personal highlight being Lung seeing off some troublemakers at a fancy do while blootered – a nod to Drunken Master I would guess.

The humour throughout does regularly veer towards the ‘so bad it’s good’ variety and there’s even a pratfall involving a banana skin. It’s also spectacularly un-PC. Pak has three personal bodyguards, each one as I pointed out earlier, having mastered a different fight style. There’s a local who specialises in kung fu, a Westerner who is expert at boxing and kickboxing, and then there’s an American who is a karate seventh dan, clearly based on Jim Kelly, the blaxploitation star who appeared in Enter the Dragon. He’s played by Lee Hoi Suk.

If this kind of thing offends you, go elsewhere. It’s not the only incident that would be unlikely to make its way into any modern-day movie.

At it’s best, though, Enter the Fat Dragon is highly amusing with some of the best fight choreography of any kung fu comedy. This is up there with Hung’s best work such as Winners & Sinners and My Lucky Stars.

The Incredible Kung Fu Master, which stars Stephen Tung Wei, Philip Ko and Hoi Sang Lee alongside Hung isn’t as good. The first half drags and the funniest thing about it is the comedy dubbing that accompanies it, most of the characters sounding like they were auditioning for some third rate English drawing room drama from the 1940s which they had no chance of ever securing a role in.

The pace does pick up when Sammo as Fei Chai, a martial arts master who also runs a little wine shop in the countryside, takes on Sei Leng Chai aka Kung Fu Ching as his pupil. Played by Stephen Tung Wei – who also appeared briefly in Enter the Dragon as Bruce Lee’s young student – he is put under enormous pressure by a hard taskmaster.

Watching the gruelling training scenes is great fun, especially if you’re relaxing with a coffee and slice of cake – I guess my calorie intake is much nearer Hung’s than the average martial arts maestro.

The climax features a battle between Ching and a troupe of acrobatic Manchurians while Fei Chai takes on former town bully Yeung Wai (Lee Hoi Sang) with Ching joining in halfway through the fight.

Fantastic stuff that just about makes up for the lacklustre first forty-five minutes or so.

* Another martial arts movie titled Enter the Fat Dragon will be released soon. I’ve read that it is remake of the 1978 film, although lead actor Donnie Yen has stated that it is not ‘necessarily’ a remake, while co-director and producer Wong Jing explained that ‘The title doesnt really matter. Many film titles could be recycled for new projects.’

Drunken Master & Police Story (A Jackie Chan Double Bill)

Drunken Master (1978): Directed by Yuen Woo-ping
Police Story (1985): Directed by Jackie Chan

People have asked me if I consider watching Jackie Chan movies as a guilty pleasure. Answer: Certainly not the Hong Kong made movies that he made his reputation with. And these are two of the very best films belonging in that category.

Like many films in a similar vein, Drunken Master focuses on the relationship between an apprentice and master albeit with a twist, the master here being a straw haired and red nosed senior citizen who is far too fond of Chinese wine.

The apprentice Wong Fei-hong, aka Naughty Panther, is played by Jackie Chan. He’s a talented fighter though one who requires far stricter self discipline if he is ever to achieve his potential. A prankster who drifts through life never far from mischief, Wong is highly likeable, and has a good heart. For example, when he discovers that a local man has been ripped off by an arrogant businessman, he promptly beats up the swindler, whose father then complains to Wong’s own father, Wong Kei-ying.

This influences Wong Senior’s decision to send his son off to study with Beggar So (Yuen Siu-tien) a man renowned equally for the extremity of his training techniques and his love of liquor.

Little old wine drinking So is a difficult taskmaster and several times a desperately unhappy Wong attempts to escape from his clutches. Eventually succeeding, the outside world unfortunately proves far crueller and the young man suffers humiliation when pitted in a fight against a killer for hire known as Thunderleg (Hwang Jang Lee).

‘You could study all your life and still never beat me,’ Thunderleg taunts him after displaying his superior skills, before making him crawl through his legs. ‘Killing a nobody like you would only sully my reputation.’

This acts as a catalyst for Wong to fully devote himself to perfecting his kung fu prowess with the help of Beggar So – which is fortunate as Thunderleg will soon be hired to kill Wong’s father.

Luckily it’s not long before Beggar So teaches the younger man the secrets of the Eight Drunken Gods, a martial arts technique that involves some degree of intoxication. To fight in this way requires equal parts boozed up stagger and martial arts swagger and makes it almost impossible for an opponent to anticipate what is coming next – and usually involves imbibing some bevvy during the course of the rumble.

Yes the plot is predictable and about as substantial as a prawn cracker and the humour is broad (trouser splitting and very bad comedy teeth for starters) but the choreography is spectacular and all achieved without the aid of wires or CGI.

While watching Chan, you might one minute think of Buster Keaton, the next of ballet or Golden Age of Hollywood musicals – only with kung fu clashes rather than elaborate song and dance routines.

It may not be the greatest martial arts film ever made but it is very possibly the most enjoyable.

In the wake of Bruce Lee’s early death in 1973, Hong Kong studios had tried their hardest to find a successor, or at least maybe con the public into thinking their movie had some connection to the dead star. A Bruce Le appeared and a Bruce Li, Bruce Lea and Bruce Lai, while film titles followed the cash-in trend. There was Enter Another Dragon, Enter Three Dragons and The New Game Of Death. And that’s just for starters.

Some producers attempted to push Jackie Chan as the man to take on Lee’s mantle but as Chan has explained, he never wanted to be the next Bruce Lee, only the first Jackie Chan.

Watching Police Story, you’ll see why I earlier mentioned him resembling Buster Keaton as much as Bruce Lee .

One of the most enjoyable 1980s action films from anywhere on the planet, the plot of Police Story, it would have to be admitted, is really just an excuse for breathtaking sequences with some of the best choreographed stunts you’re ever likely to see.

Chan Ka-Kui (Jackie Chan) is assigned to protect state’s witness Selina Fong (Bridgett Lin), who risks being murdered if she’s located before the trial begins of crime lord Chu Tao (Chor Yuen).

Chan kickstarts his film brilliantly with a shootout between cops and Chu’s gang that builds towards a car chase that obliterates a mountainside shanty town. This sensational sequence is directed with a high-octane pizzazz, and ends with Ka-Kui’s attempts to arrest Chu and his henchmen on a hijacked double-decker bus, an umbrella coming in very handy as he does so. But I should say no more.

Throughout the film, viewers may wonder how Chan could top the opening. He does during a climactic confrontation between Ka-Kui and the same men inside a shopping mall, that by the end of proceedings, is almost reduced to rubble. Amazing stuff and local glaziers must have been kept busy for weeks afterwards. Like Nick Lowe, Jackie Chan obviously loves the sound of breaking glass.

I won’t be the first reviewer to note that the middle of the film does sag at times. As in Drunken Master, the comedy elements are almost as childish as the set-piece stunts are ingenious. There are pies in the face, fart jokes and Jackie standing on dung and accidentally breaking into a little moonwalk while he attempts to wipe it from his shoes.

During the action, though, you have to be glad that Chan never went down the Bruce Lee clone road.

Police Story became a massive success, especially in East Asia and, according to Chan’s autobiography, it’s his favourite of the films he’s made although Drunken Master edges it for me.

Here’s the trailer for Police Story 1 & 2 from Eureka:

The above is a mash-up of a couple of reviews originally written for Louder Than War.

For more on Drunken Master click here, and here for more on Police Story.

Smithereens (1982)

Here’s something from the vaults. From the third issue of 2012 e-fanzine I edited that was titled Positive Noises.

Smithereens has recently been reissued as a director-approved special edition by Criterion in a 2K digital restoration. Extras include an audio commentary from Susan Seidelman, interviews and a couple of early shorts by Seidelman, with new introductions by the director.

Although probably best known for directing Desperately Seeking Susan, this is Susan Seidelman’s best film, her character driven debut set in a gritty New York in the early 1980s. She made it on a budget of only $80,000; the cast and crew consisting mainly of NYU Film School friends prepared to work for deferred salaries.

The film is French Nouvelle Vague meets New York New Wave and was notably the first truly independent American film to compete at Cannes. Smithereens is the story of Wren, played by Susan Berman, a brash wannabe Jersey gurl, whose life appears to revolve around plastering photocopies of her face around Manhattan’s Lower East Side and attempting to ingratiate herself with local bands in an attempt to manage them. She also claims to be thinking of getting a band together herself – and you get the impression that Wren is a talent free zone, unless you count alienating everyone you come into contact with as a talent.

Yes, Wren from the opening scene, where she steals a pair of sunglasses from a girl on the subway, isn’t destined to be one of the more likeable characters you will ever see onscreen. A user and a loser, she invents ludicrous stories that are never going to be believed. She dodges paying rent, is almost constantly on the cadge for money and/or accommodation, and treats friends and family with contempt.

Even potential good things in her life are just added to her list of potential situations to take advantage of. Paul (Brad Rinn), a naive native of Montana, who’s just arrived in the Big Apple, and lives in a psychedelic painted van in a deserted parking lot under the old West Side Highway populated mainly by prostitutes, is somehow smitten by Wren.

He takes her for a night out – paying of course – but he’s ditched the moment she meets up with Eric (Richard Hell), a punkish musician who has released an album called Smithereens that probably bombed but who dangles the possibility to Wren of moving with him to LA, where he claims he’s going to cut another album. ‘I got something really good going with some people there.’

Interestingly, Eric is as manipulative and amoral as Wren and their ‘relationship’ mirrors that of Wren and Paul, Eric only continuing it when he judges Wren might be able to help him, clearly he has no real interest in her; once Wren has ditched Paul, they head back to the flat where Eric stays with a sleazy mook called Billy and a mysterious blonde. Eric and Wren jump into bed together but Wren leaves him to brush her teeth (borrowing Billy’s toothbrush, yuk!). By the time she’s finished and rejoined Eric, he’s already conked out.

Hell certainly put in an assured performance – which might just have encouraged Seidelman to use another singer, Madonna, in her next film (Hell also played a small role as her dead boyfriend in that one). In his autobiography, I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp, he named Smithereens as the by far the best film he’s been a part of. ‘It was a kind of liberal Hollywood mixture of sympathy and cynicism in its conception of the New York quasipunk club scene of the time.’

I think I maybe know what he means.

The script doesn’t always really push the film forward, and script gurus like Robert McKee would doubtless disapprove. In one scene a drugged-up hooker asks Paul if she can sit in his van for a few minutes to get out of the cold. She unsuccessfully attempts to coax money out of him then begins gabbering on about how she sculpted clay turtles in her art classes at school. Finally, she tries one more time to get him to part with some cash. ‘I gotta scar,’ she informs him proudly. ‘I’ll show it to you for five dollars. It’s in a real interesting place.’

And that’s that. No more drugged-up hooker.

Again, a script guru would insist that a main character must grow in some way throughout the film, so will Wren turn her life around and choose the good guy or the exploitative chancer? Should we even give a damn?

One of the good things about the film is you can never be 100% sure of Wren’s next move. And yeah, for all her faults and selfish antics such as her helter-skelter shifting of allegiances between Paul and Eric whenever it suits her, Wren does exert a strange fascination: she’s sexy, she’s a survivor and she’s just about feisty enough to care about.

Smithereens is by no means a classic, but it is a film that has become unfairly neglected over the years and worth seeking out, particularly if you’re a punk/new wave fan or interested in seeing a side of New York that’s usually ignored in cinema.

Susan Seidelman began shooting in the first half of 1979 and continued on an on-off manner for eighteen months; she filmed almost exclusively in the down at heel, bohemian East Village just before that area’s yuppie gentrification of the 1980s had begun and Smithereens utilizes some great scuzzy locations.

According to the director the look of the film was also influenced by street fashion, such as what people wore to CBGBs and the Mudd Club, and also street art.

Not surprisingly there’s also a top notch soundtrack that includes The Kid with the Replaceable Head by Hell and his Voidoids and ESG’s Moody.

An arthouse hit, Smithereens prompted a pair of producers Midge Sanford and Sarah Pillsbury to send Susan a copy of a script they had recently optioned named Desperately Seeking Susan. Naturally, she liked the name. She loved the script. And this movie, made on a $5 million budget, gave her another hit, this time a mainstream one.