ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE (1969, Douglas Hickox, UK, 94 min, A+)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YLNr2-dsyk

What I think is interesting in ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE includes:

1.All the main characters are "unlikeable". It is not easy for an ordinary viewer to identify himself/herself with any of the four characters. I identify myself a little bit with Ed (Harry Andrews), because this character is a lusty middle-aged gay, though I can't identify myself totally with this character, because this character is much richer than me.

Normally I identify myself with a lonely middle-aged female character, especially with the heroines of the films MOURIR D'AIMER (2009, Josée Dayan), SHIRLEY VALENTINE (1989, Lewis Gilbert), SWANN (1996, Anna Benson Gyles), THE LOVE LETTER (1999, Peter Chan), and AN AUTUMN TALE (1998, Eric Rohmer), but I can't identify myself with Kath (Beryl Reid) in ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE, though I would do the same thing that she does in the opening scene--inviting a handsome stranger to stay at her house. I think the main reason why I can't identify myself with this character is because the film doesn't look at this character with "sympathetic eyes", but look at this character in a little bit sarcastic or contemptuous eyes.

I like it very much that Kath, the heroine of this film, is a fat, middle-aged woman, but the heroine of this film is closer to the monstrous Diane Ladd in WILD AT HEART (1990, David Lynch) than to the heroine of MOURIR D'AIMER, whose yearning for a younger lover can easily break my heart. I mean ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE seems to make the viewers "fear" the sexual advance of Kath, instead of "cheering for" Kath.

I can't identify myself with the hero (Peter McEnery) of this film at all. The hero, or anti-hero, of this film reminds me a little bit of Joe Orton (Gary Oldman) in PRICK UP YOUR EARS (1987, Stephen Frears) and Stuart Jones (Aidan Gillen) in QUEER AS FOLK (1999-2000). These characters are confident, sexy guys who like to manipulate other people. ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE is based on a play written by Joe Orton, and I think Orton might have transferred some of his own characteristics to Mr. Sloane.

2.The film is loveless. There is lust in this film, but there seems to be no real love. Thus, the film is even bleaker than the films of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, who also dealt with the gay relationship and the relationship between an old woman and a young man in his films. I guess Fassbinder didn't believe too much in the power of love, but some of his characters might believe in it. On the contrary, the characters in ENTERTAINING MR. SLOANE give me the feelings that they are unable to love.

3.The black comedic tone of this film reminds me of the wonderful black comedies of Danny DeVito, especially DUPLEX (2003) and THROW MOMMA FROM THE TRAIN (1987), but ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE goes farther than DeVito's films because there's no character whom you can identify with or root for in ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE, while you can a little bit cheer for Billy Crystal in THROW MOMMA FROM THE TRAIN or Ben Stiller in DUPLEX.

4.The ending of ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE surprises me a little bit.

5.Its story reminds me of two groups of films that I like very much:

5.1 Films about a handsome stranger who seduces members of a family

5.1.1 TEOREMA (1968, Pier Paolo Pasolini), but I prefer TEOREMA to ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE, because I like the supernatural part of TEOREMA very much.

5.1.2 DRY CLEANING (1997, Anne Fontaine)

5.1.3 BROKEN DOWN FAMILY (2010, Claude d'Anna, A+/A). This film is like a PG version of other films in the same group. This film deals with a middle-class family who lets a male friend who is an ex-prisoner stays at their house. The ex-prisoner attracts the wife, the daughter, and a friend of the daughter, but not the husband, unfortunately.

5.2 Films about a woman who picks up a young guy from the street and invites him to stay at her house

5.2.1 MON HOMME (Bertrand Blier)

5.2.2 THE NOISE IN MY HEAD (2008, Vincent Pluss)

5.2.3 CAN'T SAY NO (2009, Iliana Lolitch)

5.2.4 JOY HOUSE (1964, René Clément)

I still haven't seen THAT COLD DAY IN THE PARK (1969, Robert Altman), which I think belongs to this group, too.

6.My most favorite scene is the one in which Mr. Sloane is lying half-naked in bed, talking about sports, and trying to seduces Ed by touching himself. You can watch this scene here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72dIjbxNbHU&feature=related

7.The use of beautiful songs to summarize the story. This kind of technique reminds me of the film THEY ALL LIE (2009, Matías Piñeiro, Argentina). The use of beautiful songs in a black-comedic context also reminds me of the songs of the band THE BEAUTIFUL SOUTH. You can listen to the song at minute 4:30 in this clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcJ05HReUio&feature=related

In conclusion, ENTERTAINING MR SLOANE is a really entertaining black comedy. I like the presentation of sexuality in this film very much. Somehow I think of this film as a "distant" cousin of Fassbinder's films, though it lacks Fassbinder's sharp observation on society.

TIPPING THE VELVET (2002, Geoffrey Sax, British miniseries, 177 min, A+++++)

What I like very much in this lesbian miniseries include:

1.The scene in which Nan Astley (Rachael Stirling) dares to confront her master (Anna Chancellor) and her rich friends in a lustful party to protect Zena Blake (Sally Hawkins) from humiliation. I think Nan is very brave and very inspiring in that scene. The scene is very powerful. It is always inspiring to see a character who says something or does something which seems to announce, "Enough is enough. I will not be your slave any more. I will not bow down to you any more. You are rich, but I am a human being like you. Your richness cannot suppress us any more. Your power cannot make us shut our mouths any more." Nan doesn't say the previous sentence, but what she says and does in that scene gives the feeling like that.

You can watch this scene here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugD7UzMrP0Q

The power of "rising up" in that scene reminds me of one of my most favorite music videos of all time: DÉSENCHANTÉE -- Mylène Farmer (1991, Laurent Boutonnat)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XazOkXRTyR4&feature=related


2.The presentation of lesbian sex and dildo, which is much more explicit than what I had imagined. I didn't know that British television can be as explicit about sex as this, so it is a surprise for me when I see a dildo in this miniseries. I rarely see a dildo even in films, which theoretically should be more explicit than TV programs. The impressive presentation of dildo in TIPPING THE VELVET reminds me of the one in TWO DRIFTERS (2005, João Pedro Rodrigues).

I'm very glad that TV programs are now very much more explicit than the time when I was a kid in 1970's and 1980's. I just discovered a Thai gay cable TV series called LOVE AUDITION, which is a little bit more explicit than I thought.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwEuXMY0RQM

Having said that, I want to add that Thai mainstream TV is much more censored than before. When I was a kid, characters smoking a cigarette or having alcoholic drinks were not censored in Thai TV, but they have been censored during the past 10 years or so. While the rest of the world has been progressing, Thailand has been going downhill into the medieval era.

3.The beautiful melodies of the songs in this miniseries.

4. The world of lesbians one hundred years ago. I think I had never seen a period lesbian film before TIPPING THE VELVET. I think its story occurs nearly the same time as the homosexual stories in WILDE (1997, Brian Gilbert) and MAURICE (1987, James Ivory).

I hope in the future there will be some Thai period gay and lesbian films like TIPPING THE VELVET and MAURICE. There seems to be many interesting real Thai gay and lesbian stories worthy to be adapted into films, such as the lesbian story of Princess Yuangkaew Siroros or the gay story of Prince Kraisorn (1771-1848)
http://www.oknation.net/blog/print.php?id=482112
http://www.matichon.co.th/news_detail.php?newsid=1267432127&grpid=&catid=02

5. Some parts of the story in TIPPING THE VELVET reminds me of my life. The first part of the film deals with "innocent love". The second part deals with "lust". The third part deals with "settling down". The first and second parts of the miniseries remind me of my life. The first part of the film reminds me of the time when I was under 25. It is the time when I still had romantic dreams, or dreams that one day a man would sweep me off my feet. The second part reminds me of the exciting, lustful world of a gay discotheque which I used to frequent in the late 1990's. However, the third part of the miniseries doesn't remind me of my life, because my life is far from settling down yet. I don't have a house, a husband, or a really successful career. The happy ending of this miniseries is still beyond my reach.

6.The first part of the miniseries reminds me of the films WHEN NIGHT IS FALLING (1995, Patricia Rozema), in which a conservative woman falls in love with a carnival woman who comes to town, and DRY CLEANING (1997, Anne Fontaine), in which a heterosexual couple become attracted to a man performing in a drag club.

Fortunately, TIPPING THE VELVET doesn't stop at the lesbian love story between the small-town woman and a travelling woman. The miniseries goes on to explore other things in part 2 and 3.

7.I like the world of theatre one hundred years ago. In this miniseries, the heroine is dressed as a man and sings some beautiful songs onstage. It reminds me of some films about the theatre world in the past, such as

7.1 BEING JULIA (2004, István Szabó)

7.2 ESTHER KAHN (2000, Arnaud Desplechin)

7.3 FRENCH CANCAN (1955, Jean Renoir)

7.4 QUEENIE (1987, Larry Pearce, 2367 min), in which the heroine becomes famous after performing an exotic dance in a club.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093808/


8.The drag performance of the heroine reminds me of Marlene Dietrich in trousers and Annie Lennox in the music video LEGEND IN MY LIVING ROOM.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gd8QNraWB0

9.The performance of Anna Chancellor

Other interesting things:

--It is funny to think that Geoffrey Sax directed both TIPPING THE VELVET and the horror film WHITE NOISE (2005), because these two works seem to have nothing in common.

--The beach scenes in TIPPING THE VELVET reminds me of the music video FOREVER BLUE (1989) -- Swing Out Sister
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35S2Ox0SbCg

--Like many good miniseries/TV series, the strength of TIPPING THE VELVET comes from "a good story being told efficiently", not the breakthrough of forms or styles as found in great films. However, I don't mean to say that TIPPING THE VELVET is not great because it is not experimental or avant-garde. I just want to observe that this seems to be one of the main differences between these two media, because many miniseries/made-for-TV films that I like also have this quality--conventional storytelling of great stories, while many films that I like are the ones that "don't want to tell stories." I also want to note that "to tell a good story efficiently" is not an easy thing, and there are many films nowadays which cannot even "tell a good story efficiently".

Period miniseries/made-for TV films that I like very much include:

1.CAT'S PAW HOUSE (2009, Jean-Daniel Verhaeghe), based on the short story of Honoré de Balzac
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Maison_du_chat-qui-pelote

2.CLAUDE GUEUX (2009, Olivier Schatzky), based on the novel of Victor Hugo. It deals with social injustice very powerfully.

3.COURRIÈRES 1906, THE CHILD OF DARKNESS (2007, Thierry Binisti). This film is based on a true story about the tragic fates of mining workers.

4.CRAINQUEBILLE (2009, Philippe Monnier), based on the short story of Anatole France. It deals with social injustice very powerfully.

5.DOMBAIS ET FILS (2007, Laurent Jaoui, 180 min), based on the novel of Charles Dickens. It deals with a tyrannical man whose wife and daughter rebel against him.

6.FRIEND JOSEPH (2008, Gérard Jourd'hui), based on the short story of Guy de Maupassant. It deals with the conflicts between the Monarchists and the Republican.

7.HAPPINESS DWELLS IN CRIME (2009, Denis Malleval), based on the novel of Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly. It deals with the downfall of the aristocracy.

8.THE HAUNTED SEAT (2009, Claude Chabrol), based on the story of Gaston Leroux

9.PRIDE AND PREJUDICE (1995, Simon Langton, 300 min), based on the novel of Jane Austen

10. THREE MURMURED MASSES (2009, Jacques Santamaria), based on the story of Alphonse Daudet (1840-1897). It presents a sarcastic view on the religion establishment.

11.TIPPING THE VELVET, based on the novel of Sarah Waters

30 DAY CINEPHILE CHALLENGE -- DAY 19

Day 19: Your favorite British filmmaker – It's hard for me to choose between Derek Jarman, Ken Loach, and John Smith, but I think I choose Derek Jarman, because THE GARDEN (1990) is one of the first arthouse films I saw in my life. Before I watched it in early 1995, most of the films I had seen are Hollywood mainstream films, so THE GARDEN made me realize that there are many interesting films to explore apart from narrative films.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/30-Day-Cinephile-Challenge/184987868220596