There is still chance to catch a glimpse into Manchester Art Gallery’s impressive collection of over 90 Goya prints. The Fantasies, Follies and Disasters exhibition has been running since August, with a new display of 30 prints on show from early this year. Displayed in Gallery 11, which usually hosts the small and changing exhibitions, the collection pays homage to Goya’s controversial yet widely-acclaimed three series of copper plate etchings: Los Caprichos (The Fantasies), Los Desastres della Guerra (The Disasters of War) and Los Disparates (The Follies) all produced between 1797 and 1824.

Francisco Goya (1746-1828) enjoyed a successful art career in his native Spain as the chief painter to Charles IV, and at one point as Director of Painting at the Spanish Royal Academy. Known as a prolific portraitist he painted many establishment figures of the age including the Duke of Wellington. Yet Manchester’s display observes how a more disaffected and political side of Goya emerged, and was celebrated, most notably after his death. A culmination of events including an illness, which left him significantly deaf in 1792, and mass disillusionment at the bloodshed following the Napoleonic invasion of Spain in 1808, led him to develop this fascinating artistic style. The intense scorn and political contempt Goya’s works show meant that following his death in 1828 they were judged too controversial to be published until finally in 1863-4.

The exhibit, while only small, is uniquely powerful because of the parallels it draws between the 19th and 21st centuries. The chief of these parallels is of course war, but other concurrent themes, which define both Goya’s work and our own modern cynicism, are those of cruelty, hypocrisy, corruption, deceit and satire.

On entering the exhibition you are first confronted with a wall of artwork inspired by Fantasies, Follies and Disasters, and created by 15-18 year olds from across Manchester. This introduction establishes a very innocent mindset from which to view Goya’s prints. Inside the main room the 30 prints line the four walls while in the very centre is a contemporary piece by Jake and Dinos Chapman in tribute to Goya’s etchings.

Known for their controversial modern art, ‘Disasters of War’ (1993) by the Chapman brothers is no exception. Inspired by the Goya collection a glass case features individual sculpted scenes replicated from Goya’s prints. It recalls a horrific battlefield of mutilations, hangings, famine and death. Like Goya’s work it reflects and makes visible the most barbaric and ridiculously inconceivable actions inflicted on and by civilisation. The smallness of each model is instantly captivating – as though observing a collection of toy soldier figurines – yet the intricacy and depth imbues the models with a more realistic intensity, bringing the horrors of the battlefield home and away, past and ongoing, to the relative safety of the art gallery.

Goya’s Los Caprichos (The Fantasies, 1797-9) satirises the hypocrisy and corruption of the social and political elite. The nobility, religious orders and establishment figures most commonly bear the brunt, yet Goya occasionally turns on the public for their gullibility, and to question aspects of humanity. In ‘Que Pico de Oro!’ (What a Golden Beak!) the public are mocked as they crowd round a parrot speaking from the lectern. The prints are deeply dark and graphic as the sinister and the ridiculous come together to create a sense of unease and unfamiliarity, which reflect the distortions of human civilisation. The caricatures are hideous and gnarled, often haggard and androgynous, while Goya also intersperses these with fantastical animals or humans bearing the faces of beasts. The surreal undercurrents surface through themes of witchcraft, fable and allegory, and are often based on Goya’s experiences. ‘Muchohay Quehupar’ (There is Plenty to Suck) was conceived after reading about two women who sacrificed their children to the devil. A gang of witches gather round a basket of mutilated babies at the forefront of the image, while bats cluster overhead.

Goya’s Los Desastres della Guerra (the Disasters) makes a significant leap to the surreal, where establishment figures are ridiculed under the guise of animals and beasts. Yet the Disasters series ends on a question of hope. The two etchings ‘Murio la Verdad’ (Truth Has Died) and ‘Si Resucitara?’ (Will She Rise Again?) show the virginal white of the female embodiment of Truth against a background of heavy grey etching. In the former Truth is being buried by monks and priests, with Justice mourning to the right, and a crucifix at the top centre of the print fading under the darkness of the scene. In the latter the whiteness of Truth shines forth from the foreground in possible resurrection, startling the gathering clerics, beasts and monsters. However, that the plate’s inscription is posed as a question illustrates Goya’s deeply ambiguous view of the future.

Goya exercises this imaginative leap more fully in Los Disparates (the Follies, 1815-1824). The final images on display are elevated from the bloodshed and agony of the former pictures and clearly question the absurdity of war and politics. There is a sense of the carnivalesque running throughout the images on display, but most notably in Los Disparates. ‘Los Eisacades’ (The Men in Sacks) shows a group of men bound in sacks and alludes to the pretence of madness at carnival time; in this way Goya hints at how the traditional carnival was at once a release and also a pressure-cooker of social ills. In ‘Dis Puntual’ (Sure Folly) a woman on horse back performs an acrobatic trick, yet the tightrope her horse walks across is flat on the floor, while the circus audience have their eyes closed to the truth. Goya moves on from the visceral reality of war to the ideas behind it: ideas about corruption, deception, infantile politics and repression that we are so familiar with in our modern day experiences of warfare and politics.

Being only small, the display is almost a snapshot of an exhibition, but it does its job in provoking thought and debate that is as relevant today as it was in the 19th century. Although there are some informative panels that accompany the prints, the images are open to interpretation simply because of their surreal and fantastical nature. It is this attitude of showing and not telling that the display does so well, and using just 30 prints makes it accessible and manageable. Moreover, the exhibition features an array of art by young people and an area where visitors can play with paper, pens and stampers to encourage the next generation of Bankys. The ability to interact with young people on these political and controversial issues demonstrates how, unlike Goya’s repressive society, the 21st century is a time when all voices should be heard. For me, the exhibition goes some way to answering Goya’s question: will Truth rise again?

Fantasies, Follies and Disasters: The Prints of Francisco de Goya

Manchester Art Gallery, Mosley Street, Manchester, M2 3JL

15 August 2009 – 25 July 2010

FREE

Open Tuesday – Sunday 10am – 5pm

Closed Mondays except Bank Holidays

See website for more information.

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State of Play: 1984, Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, 24 Feb – 27 March

George Orwell’s 1984 is showing at the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester until 27 March. The play never strays too far from the original text and is adapted from the novel by playwright, director and actor Matthew Dunster, who also directed the Exchange’s sinister production of Macbeth last year.

Overall it is an action-packed, darkly comic and sexually charged production, with relatively minimal props. Jonathan McGuinness’s Winston is convincing and impassioned, yet occasionally a little naïve. Likewise Caroline Bartleet is a confident Julia, but her at times strained performance betray her recent graduation from acting school. The cast are multi-talented and the acting is well choreographed. The play begins and ends with the ministry workers saluting and singing ‘Oceania I love you’ (which I unfortunately can’t get out of my head) to the faceless authority of the telescreens. About five of these transparent, lit-up frames are suspended from the ceiling in various positions and lowered throughout the performance when needed.

In spite of this minimalism, the Royal Exchange’s use of props are effective and more often than not their interpretations have been some of the most innovative I have seen in contemporary theatre. A battered bed, grubby sink, desk and telescreen are all that comprise Winston’s flat. When he is asked by his neighbour to have a look at her sink McGuinness instinctively whirls his own around to a new position at the other end of the stage and cranes his head underneath, to symbolise a scene shift; spinning it back to its original position when he has finished. The actors are prepared to enact the scene changes as part of their role, and that is the great thing about the Exchange. The first time this happens you notice it, but afterwards you begin to view the performance as more fluid and sequential than that of a fixed stage play with clearly defined acts.

Yet despite a sparseness of scenery and set, there is an impressive surprise awaiting the second half. The raised platform, which denotes the stage, is lifted to reveal a shallow, white-tiled rectangle, resembling the bottom of a swimming pool. This is all that is needed to signify the stark horror of the cell and Room 101, where Winston is later physically and mentally tortured and has his face strapped to a tube containing several very hungry rats – his most unimaginable fear. But the preparation for a stage effect like this comes at a cost. Earlier in the play, when Winston and Julia are arrested in the bedroom above the curiosity shop, two black-clad party policemen abseil down from the upper rafters of the theatre. As they hook up their cables to the platform to secure it for lifting, this unfortunately distracts temporarily from the main action.

However, the Royal Exchange will always remain a first-class venue to watch a performance, particularly if you’re looking for a fresh approach on an old text. At the centre of a grand and ornate high-domed building in the middle of Manchester city centre, complete with gilt and marble columns, you stumble across a relic of the 20^th century. The theatre is a circular scaffold with glass sides and primary-coloured staircases, with the stage at the very centre of the theatre space and seating completely surrounding it. The very best part in visiting this theatre is walking around the outside – usually served as café space – and seeing all the props and dressing rooms ready to be wheeled onto the stage via one of the side entrances.

The seats at the very top are some of the best, in my opinion, because not only can you observe the stage works if you choose, but you also get a completely different perspective on the play. You can still see everything that happens, and occasionally you see more. In this production, when Winston and the other workers collect their meals from the canteen you can see they are actually eating; when Julia brings a supply of forbidden foods to the bedroom she actually brews the coffee and Winston actually pierces the tin of milk, as they share a freshly baked loaf of bread. There may be an absence of set design and props but that is the very nature of this kind of theatre space. It eradicates the stage director’s volition to adorn the stage (and so distract the audience) with functionless props. Instead the production team make it their business to focus on realism and detail, such as when O’Brien plucks a tooth from Winston’s mouth and drops it to the floor.

It might be easy to say that this performance is needed now more than ever, at a time when the choice for ID cards has been made for us and we are subject to the scrutiny of a CCTV civilisation. But the interesting thing I realised when watching this performance is that 1984 is not just a warning against a totalitarian state, it is a warning against humanity, and even more it is a warning against how well we know ourselves. It is possible to become so disillusioned with law and society that we can, like Winston, begin to show a fervour that mimics the behaviour of those we rebel against. When Winston goes to visit O’Brien in the hopes of joining an underground revolution, he unreservedly agrees to carry out some appalling acts to achieve the party’s aims (such as “throw sulphuric acid in a child’s face”). Even the one act he steps down from, sacrificing Julia, (the one redeeming feature of mankind, the play pretends, is love) he eventually submits to by betraying her. And she him. The most ironic aspect is that Winston is only made aware of his own baseness by the same man who duped him into joining an underground revolution: O’Brien, who turns out to be his interrogator.

We generally consider ourselves to be a liberal society, erring to the left rather than the right. But as we know, and as 1984 tries to assert, “the object of power is power” (O’Brien), and no matter how far apart two political parties are, they inevitably meet. The furore over Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time last year can be seen in the same light (at this point I would like to stress that I am not expressing any political opinions here). The way he was hounded by our so-called liberal politicians and commentators recalled the same vitriolic repression enforced in Orwell’s dystopia. To suggest Griffin should not have appeared on the panel, and so deny that alternative insurgences exist in the UK, is no different to Winston Smith erasing the inconvenient history of Oceania in his job at the records office. In this way the performance simultaneously asks us to question the society we live in alongside the horror played out before us, yet also whether an alternative is viable, and at what cost. The moral barometer is so unbalanced that we are left wondering who represents whom, and which side of the fence would we end up on if it came down to it.

I would definitely recommend 1984 to anyone who enjoyed the book, is interested in the psychology of politics and society, and has the mental capacity to explore such scary realms of human behaviour. Equally I’d recommend it if you’ve never been to the Royal Exchange as their performances are always inspiring. As far as theatre prices go it’s middle of the road, but there are a number of concessions available and the cheap seats at the top are a winner. It might be almost three hours long but with the drama, suspense and dark humour it doesn’t feel like it.

1984 @ The Royal Exchange Theatre, St Ann’s Square, Manchester
24 February – 27 March 2010
Tickets £8.50 – £29.50
Variety of concessions available including government free theatre tickets for under 26s.
See website for more ticket details and performance times and to view a trailer for the show.

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In pursuit of some culture comforts to push aside the dreariness of the weather and unemployment, I ventured to my neighbouring Preston to catch the ‘At The Edge: British Art 1950 – 2000’ exhibition. Currently on show at the Harris Museum and Art Gallery, ‘At The Edge’ illustrates how four northwest galleries took innovative steps in cultivating the modern art we know today. Taking controversial measures to gain more choice over the items in their collection, and to challenge the conservative opinions of art, galleries in Bolton, Oldham, Rochdale and Preston were at the forefront of bringing modern art to the mass. ‘At The Edge’ aspires to teach us a lot more than we think we know about the art being produced in the cultural age closest to us, the last half of the 20^th century.

I found the exhibition insightful and though relatively small at just three rooms, it is overall a good, brief introduction to the disparate themes of the age. Despite its size the exhibition boasts paintings, ceramics, sculptures, photography and print works from many notable names including Terry Frost, Lucian Freud, Howard Hodgkin, Helen Chadwick and Cornelia Parker. The layout is structurally coherent and the panels read with clarity, providing snippets of a changing political, economic, social and cultural scene. However, one of my main problems when trying to get to grips with the exhibition was my all too-modern perspective. The exhibition recalls how the respective gallery curators were at times taking controversial steps in collecting this art, yet for the average viewer it can be difficult to see how these artistic devices were radical. Although the panels contain the right amount of information for the size of the exhibition, they are often found wanting when explaining the shock-factor of some pieces. The first painting on display is John Bratby’s ‘The Bicycle Interior’ (1958). The painting was aptly chosen to demonstrate the increasing fascination with the banality and debris of everyday life. In fact the panel explains how it was one of Bratby’s paintings that inspired the critic David Sylvester to coin the phrase ‘kitchen sink realism’, which became a key cultural movement in the 1950s. However, a composition of pushchair, newspapers and bicycles doesn’t quite have the same impact with an audience for whom the term ‘modern art’ is synonymous with a man’s head sculpted from human blood.

The exhibition’s look at the 1960s steers far from the mass appeal of Pop Art, instead towards Op Art. There is an increasing focus on the reinvention of technique and a shift towards geometric patterns and optical illusion in the work of artists such as Peter Sedgely, ‘Phase 2’ (1965) and Jeffrey Steele, ‘Scala’ (1965). In a rebellion against expressionism the energy of these pieces is exercised through the pushing of mathematical principles into the realm of art. It rather aptly sums up certain opinions I have about the imaginative radius of the 1960s, most of which are borne out in its stolid, geometrically precise architecture. However, the collection also demonstrates more expressionistic styles of painting, with the likes of Lucian Freud’s ‘Woman’s Head With Yellow Background’ (1963), which brings more of an emotional gravitas to figure painting. Frank Auerbach’s, ‘E.O.W On Her Blue Eiderdown’ (1963) also experiments with layering and moulding oil on canvas to create a physical presence that protrudes from the wall. Yet it was William Roberts’ ‘The Common Market’ (1963), which brought the two diametrically opposed styles together in a modern metaphor for the debate over EU membership. The painting fuses the expressive use of colour and vibrancy of multi-cultural London, with a controlled use of form to accentuate a community living and working together.

The way art was thought about during these five decades also changed, becoming increasingly subjective from the 1970s. Displaying some works from the rise in British figurative painting, also known as ‘The London School’ of art, the pieces on display demonstrate an increased experimentation with perspective. None more so than John Wonnacott’s ‘Crescent Road II’ (1963-76) where a seemingly normal suburban street is seen through a wide-angled view. The distorted foreground creates a real sense of everyday unease, which would become more prevalent in art of the later decades. In a similar exploration of perspective, Adrian Berg (whose painting ‘Gloucester Gate, Regents Park: Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring’ (1977-79) hangs adjacent to Wonnacott’s) flexes his artistic dominance by painting the entire stretch of his perspective: ‘Naturally I can see an arc of 180 degrees […] I have joined up what I see on the extreme left to what I see on the extreme right’. Although ostensibly more of a figurative experimentation than Wonnacott’s literal one, there is the idea of the artist being able to subtly distort our perceptions of the truth. Ironically, most of these paintings depicting London life belonged to the Touchstones Rochdale gallery. It is surprising to see how these relatively unknown northern galleries were at the forefront of a shifting artistic landscape.

The half-concealed symbolism that pervades Wonnacott’s painting seems to point to the 1980s, which in part became a playground for the senses and the imagination. This is at least the case with artists like Maggi Hambling whose painting, ‘Sunrise, Orwell Estuary No.2’ (1985) looks supernatural. The great globe of red, yellow and orange light twists and rises from the dark blue and black of the sea beneath, like the conjuring up of some great power. In reality it is one woman’s expression of awe as dawn breaks across the Suffolk coast. Other artists, however, were battling themes as diverse as capitalism, race, women’s rights and alienated youth. John Keane’s ‘Controlling Interest’ (1987) is the collage that most struck a cord with me, as it shows the villain we have all become so accustomed to ridiculing in the last few years: through the melee of brush strokes, newspaper clippings and glossy magazine images, the archetypal successful businessman of the 80s reclines in his chair. Subtitled, ‘A latter day baron enjoys the freedom of the press’, we see how there was a new hierarchy for art to challenge and detest.

Whereas art between the 1950s and the 1980s is seen to introduce new methods of painting and new subject matter, the art of the 1990s becomes more interactive with the viewer. Painting is almost completely overridden by the use of mixed media in a bid for hyper-realism, and the strongest of these artworks prey on the fear and fascination of the unknown. If the art of the 70s saw a shift towards the autonomy of interpretation, the 90s seeks to confront those interpretations. So many of the artworks in the final room of the exhibition cause us to experience feelings of familiarity alongside discomfort that we are expected to do something with them. We ask ourselves why we are so repulsed yet in awe of a long plait of golden hair braided with a pig’s intestine (Helen Chadwick, ‘Loop My Loop’, 1991). Similarly, with Laura Ford’s ‘Elephant Boy’ (1998) we are introduced to a vulnerable child-like figure, clothed head to toe in a grey knitted schoolboy uniform. His hands in his pocket seem at once innocent and frightened, yet also confrontational. That the boy’s head is masked behind an elephant shaped hood, instinctively makes us question what is beneath. Art has entered a psychological realm, where our imagination becomes our own enemy. It is a striking piece to end the exhibition on; you leave feeling unsure about what is to come next, and if anything this is the principal point of the exhibition.

In questioning what the future of art will be like, ‘At The Edge’ also ponders the future of galleries. A glance at the accompanying leaflet, branded with a plethora of corporate logos, highlights to what extent regional galleries have become reliant on centralised funding bodies and local authorities in recent years. This exhibition runs for a year, visiting each of the galleries integral to the collections on display: Touchstones Rochdale, Gallery Oldham, Bolton Museum as well as the Harris. While this exhibition is unique in that the respective gallery curators have collaborated to build on their own collections, there are more and more exhibitions touring from national museums and assembled by outside bodies. Although they increase the profile and the accessibility of the touring exhibition, it does raise the question whether local galleries and their curators in particular are losing some of the autonomy they worked so hard to gain.

Overall, the real charm of  ‘At The Edge’ is viewing these works in their regional homes. We are far too familiar with seeing modern art paraded on the London scene that it is refreshing to see their northern origins. Unfortunately, perhaps because of its size, ‘At The Edge’ occasionally feels a bit too ambitious; I found it difficult to get a real sense of any prominent themes or movements in the art of this tumultuous period. Moreover, with the focal point of the exhibition being a northwest perspective, it is a little lacking in explaining how the collections in these galleries compared to those nationwide. Nevertheless, the exhibition is innovative in the way it approaches this era of art and it certainly made me think differently about the northwest’s cultural heritage. Moreover, it fills in a few gaps while bringing the viewer up to date with the modern art we know today.

‘At The Edge’ is definitely worth a visit, if you fancy a break from the shops, or if you just want an excuse to do something different. It is compact with minimal reading and the best part is that admission is free (thank god for local authority funding)! There is still time to catch the exhibition at the Harris, which is on until 13 March, but it will also be travelling to Gallery Oldham in mid April, and Bolton Museum at the end of July. So, if you fancy brushing up on your modern art history this is a good place to start.

At The Edge: British Art 1950 – 2000
Harris Museum & Art Gallery, Market Square, Preston PR1 2PP
16 January – 13 March 2010
Admission FREE

Check the website for more information on opening times

The exhibition can also be seen at:

Gallery Oldham
17 April – 17 July 2010
Bolton Museum, Aquarium & Archive
31 July – 30 October 2010

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The 20^th century literary critic Shklovsky considered the purpose of all art to be that of rendering things unfamiliar, strange and distant. Brecht thought this is necessary in theatre in order to make the audience critically aware of what is happening on stage. Unlike the dynamics of conventional entertainment – where individuals are encouraged to identify with the characters and the story – experiencing the unfamiliar and the “strange” through art prolongs the processes of perception, suspends judgement, and transforms individuals.

In this light, Japan’s ancient art of noh is a peculiar occasion of estrangement for Westerners ready to submit to its slow-paced movements, symbolical gestures and prescribed rhythms.

Oshima Noh Theatre of Hiroshima Prefecture and Theatre Nohgaku, based in Tokyo and New York, are currently collaborating on a tour visiting four European cities, offering a rare chance to experience this fascinating, rich and mysterious art form which includes poetry, music and dance.

The show visited Queen Elizabeth’s Purcell Room in London on the 2^nd and 3^rd December before moving on to Dublin, Oxford and Paris. The performance features the central scenes of classical warrior play Kiyotsune written by noh author Zeami in the 14^th Century, as well as the world premiere of Pagoda, a contemporary noh piece written by Chinese playwright Jannette Cheong. The first is the story of general Kiyotsune who took his own life by jumping into the sea to avoid giving himself into the hands of the enemy. The show stages the encounter and dialogue between the ghost of Kiyotsune and his wife. Pagoda is an English language noh work focusing on themes of migration and mourning. As Theatre Nohgaku artistic director and Pagoda’s music composer Richard Emmert puts it, “it is a step in making noh an accessible art form for the English-speaking world”.

Traditional noh chant and dance developed from the Japanese language. Several attempts were made in the 20^th century to create an English noh play. Pagoda has an English text and original noh style music, both written following strict noh rules. In the noh world every scenic element is protagonist: nothing is left to chance. Characters gracefully inhabit the minimalism of the setting, the stage creates a space of intimacy and the spectator sits still as if witnessing a very special and highly aesthetic ritual. The beauty of the costumes worn by the actors combines with the delicacy of the noh masks, the elegance of the gestures and the precision of the music. Characters come in and out of stage in silence: we follow their movements – incredulous – to the centre of the stage where their masks or their mask-like faces stare at a void above and beyond the audience. The latter watches them looking out at sea, counting boats, recollecting broken destinies. We travel through space and time together with these unearthly figures whose feet slide slowly onto the floor, whose arms seem immobile until we see them bursting out in a fast but composed final dance. Here speed seems suggested, rather than exposed, through sudden yet soft moves within the restricted space of the noh stage.

A sense of tranquillity is constantly evoked by the ever present pine tree image painted on the back wall: a symbol of longevity, virtue and steadfastness in Japanese culture.

Websites for both companies can be found at:
http://www.noh-oshima.com/noh-oshima-index.html
http://www.theatrenohgaku.org

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2012 and the Onslaught of the Hollywood Blockbuster

2012 is an epic production and a culmination of all of its director’s prior concerns. One could go far as to state that it is perhaps the film Roland Emmerich was destined to make. It is also a huge headache which you will probably forget in a couple of hours, if you’re lucky.

As I mentioned the film contains many of the trademark conventions of Emmerich’s prior productions. Foremost is an ensemble cast all playing their part to avert or escape danger, previously witnessed in Independence Day. Secondly there is the frankly awful b-movie dialogue, evidenced in The Day After Tomorrow. Finally there is the central theme of a broken family which overcomes disaster and ultimately returns to its conventional nuclear state, also present in Independence Day.

In one particular scene John Cusack’s character states ‘We’re going to need a bigger plane’. He is making a light-hearted reference to his family’s doomed situation as they try to escape the apocalypse. The filmmakers, however, are knowingly referencing the mother of all blockbusters, Jaws, and the now infamous line uttered by Roy Scheider’s character ‘You’re going to need a bigger boat’.

The Hollywood blockbuster has come a long way since the release of Jaws in 1975. It was in the seventies that the Hollywood movie brats were honoured as the saviours of the film industry. The films of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg continued to prosper precisely because they focused on marketing and targeted a broad audience. Together they invented the summer blockbuster and the franchise and the rest is all history.

Hollywood is still following the same principle, albeit on a larger scale with more risk involved. As Henry K. Miller has noted in his review of 2012, published in this month’s edition of Sight and Sound magazine, blockbusters can be viewed as Hollywood’s reaction to the threat of home and portable entertainment and its continued proliferation. The point being that these high-budget spectacles are unsuitable for laptops or phones and can only be viewed on the big screen. The scenario was the same in the fifties when Hollywood tried to combat the threat of television by inventing a number of gimmicks such as 3D, which has recently been revived, and several widescreen formats. The latter were created to further enhance the spectacle of the A-list productions that the studios were focusing on. Successful films of the era included the biblical epics The Ten Commandments and Ben Hur. Output continued to decrease but budgets grew alarmingly creating a recipe for disaster. The failures were as epic as the productions themselves. Cleopatra released in 1963 followed the same conventions as the blockbusters of the previous decade. With its inflated budget, overlong running time and delayed release date it did not repeat their success. The same occurred in the seventies when Michael Cimino, riding high on the success of The Deer Hunter, was given carte blanche on his next film. The production of his following feature, Heaven’s Gate, was notoriously elaborate and ultimately catastrophic. The film was released over schedule and its budget had rapidly increased. Unlike Apocalypse Now, Coppola’s huge commercial failure, it didn’t even receive good reviews. It also resulted in United Artists, the studio that had backed it, almost filing for bankruptcy and eventually being sold off to MGM.

Today’s industry ethic revolves around the continual promotion of a handful of spectacular event movies seen as the backbone of the industry. These include comic book adaptations such as Iron Man, franchises such as Harry Potter and general high budget eye-candy such as Transformers. Unlike the blockbusters of previous decades the subject matter has lost every ounce of intelligence and originality in favour of spectacle.

One major change which has recently appeared is the alteration of the A-list calendar. Whereas before these movies were relegated to the summer period they are now being released late in to the year. Two such examples are 2012 and Avatar and to a lesser extent the second part of the Twilight saga, New Moon. What is also notable is how Hollywood has managed to cater for different forms of its fractured audience yet continually chooses to ignore certain demographics altogether. Whereas the comic book adaptations are catered toward the young male crowd the most popular franchises of recent years also attract young female viewers, examples include the Harry Potter series and the Twilight Saga. It is the older adult demographic which continues to be ignored and most likely continues to ignore the cinema.

The A-list films are marketed through the use of multi-media platforms which include toys, books, games, accessories and pop soundtracks. These films are touted as the saviours of Hollywood and much like the apocalyptic spectacle of 2012 there is no escaping them.

It seems that Hollywood is headed down the same path to failure. For every film touted as the saviour of the industry there are numerous failures. This year for example The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and GI Joe: Rise of the Cobra underperformed at the box office. Hollywood continues to mine other avenues in order to prolong its unoriginal output. The comic book writer Alan Moore who has severed any ties he had with Hollywood as it continues to butcher his work stated that the more money you throw at a project, no matter its field, the less risk and imagination is involved. Therefore Hollywood should stray from its conventional attitude of bigger is better and in the process perhaps cultivate original ideas. Asian cinema has proven that it can be done. It needs to readdress the older audience it has ignored for the past decade and respect its younger viewers by intelligently interacting with them through the medium of film. Otherwise the naysayers will continue to rightly proclaim, as in 2012, that the end is nigh.

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The following article is a review of Ramchand Pakistani, a film that was broadcast on Channel 4 in October as part of their Cinema Pakistan season. Whilst writing this article I became sidetracked with my opinions on the Pakistan film industry and the significance of a film such as Ramchand Pakistani emerging from this capricious environment.

Believe it or not Pakistan once had a movie industry. Located in Lahore, the cultural capital of the country, it was referred to as Lollywood and churned out amateur genre pictures on low budgets catered for male audiences. A steady output of films was released throughout the eighties and nineties and many cinemas gave the films precedence over foreign productions. A ban on Bollywood films also meant that the industry generated enough revenue to keep up momentum. Its status as an industry, however, has remained problematic for a number of reasons. Foreign competition and the thriving dvd piracy market in the country are its major obstacles. A person can walk into a legitimate shop in the capital Islamabad and buy box sets of their favourite shows or films for a small price. For the working class citizens of Pakistan cinema going is still a cheap form of entertainment. After all Bollywood is a contemporary multimedia giant because of the working class citizens that pay to view its unique brand of glossy escapism. Therefore it is a shame that Lollywood could never match its competitor. Lollywood’s output of generic productions aimed at working class males was regarded as proof of the immoral nature of the film industry by the nation’s conservative society. As a result a cinema full of young working class men was deemed an unsuitable environment for women and families. Therefore it was Lollywood’s refusal to address a wider audience that ultimately sealed its fate.

Ramchand Pakistani, Mehreen Jabbar’s debut feature is significant for a number of reasons. It is among a handful of films that are currently being produced through collaborative efforts between Pakistan, India and the West. The fact that it is directed by a woman and contains a female protagonist reflects the progressive stance the film has. It deals sympathetically with its subject matter and characters showing a mature sense of restraint in relation to the heavy political issues it tackles. Adapted from actual events the narrative concerns a family that belong to the Hindu Dalit caste, discriminatorily referred to as “untouchables”. This particular family of husband, wife and child live near the border with India. The child, Ramchand, and his father accidentally cross the meagre borderline and are captured by Indian forces and thrown in jail. The film then focuses on two parallel storylines concerning the torment of the father and child trapped in an overcrowded jail and the grief of the mother.

Identity is a major theme in the film. The script provides a series of interesting comments on the issues of nationalism and injustice. In the prison there are ‘no castes’ says an Indian officer and the multicultural inmates echo this statement. Yet there are signs of progress in the plot which the filmmakers want us to believe are achievable. Most notably in Ramchand’s relationship with a female police officer who initially won’t even touch him due to his background. Their friendship and the camaraderie of the inmates is part of the progressive stance the film takes.

Mehreen Jabbar must be commended for her debut feature film. She has announced herself as a distinct voice in an arena which required the presence of a female visionary. She manages to extract strong performances from her cast, which is mostly made up of Pakistani actors. Nandita Das, one of the few Indians in the film and perhaps the most well known actor, is good as the mother but Rashad Farooqi, the father, and Navaid Jabbar as the older version of Ramchand are arguably better. Furthermore the cinematography also shows moments of intense beauty in its depiction of the barren landscapes of the Sindh region and the gloriously colourful costumes and bazaars.

Although the film is a collaborative effort between India and Pakistan it does not resemble a Bollywood masala feature. In fact it mirrors the Parallel Cinema, also known as the Indian new wave, associated with the films of Satyajit Ray. One can only hope that this is the beginning of a Pakistani new-wave and I can’t think of a more capable director to be leading the cinematic revolution than Mehreen Jabbar.

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