Amy Miniter
celluloid relapse: eyebrows and unlikely heroines in gone with the wind (1939)
Ours is a strange world indeed when Shane Warne, Taylor Momsen and Robert Falcon Scott can all have something in common. All are, in one way or another, role models. These figures are however nothing more than a degustation menu of expected inspiring figures. Selected from just three zones of achievement valuable to society – [...]
celluloid relapse: cautionary tales for the 21st century human in alien (1979)
Humanity as a collective has lauded a whole range of inventions throughout its existence, some for no reason at all. The wheel admittedly has proved itself to be utterly indispensible, as has modern medicine, cutlery and welding. The other side of the figurative coin, represented by such blatant banalities as apple corers, sock puppets and [...]
celluloid relapse: strictly ballroom, wither australian cinema?
Imagine, just for a moment, that you are no longer you. You are an alien dumped unceremoniously upon this earth for no apparent reason. Unsurprisingly you feel quite alone, disoriented and encumbered by your flotilla of antennae. From here, how would you proceed? If you were in any way rational, it is likely that you [...]
celluloid relapse: aesthetics rears its ugly head in beauty and the beast
We, the living, are warned incessantly of the trappings of aesthetics. Hounded from infancy by parents, folklore, teachers and anything vaguely resembling authority, our spawn soon learn to forsake a glamorous exterior in search of an elusive inner core. These warnings whilst omnipresent are neither threat nor intimidation. Found somewhere in the lower end of [...]
celluloid relapse: cries and whispers (wailing reaches a new peak)
Harking from the dark ages where Abba and Ingrid Bergman roamed free, Anglophone culture has cultivated a healthy obsession for Swedes. To be clear, these Swedes are not the underwhelming root vegetable popular with octogenarians the world over, but the people of the small, cold and sparsely populated nation sitting atop Western Europe. Our world [...]
ideological technicalities: ‘the big four’ vs. the artist
One may accuse the noughties of many things, or perhaps of nothing at all. Being still too similar to the current decade, a lack of distance renders our target as highly ambiguous. Despite this, there are particular omnipotent forces whose influence was just so great that we are able, at this juncture, to comment upon [...]
celluloid relapse: the bitter tears of petra von kant
John Waters, spokesman-in-chief for housewives, suburban boredom and Baltimore itself, is well known to us all as the cultural monarch of the weird and perfectly wonderful. Infinitely notorious, a large portion of his oeuvre remains inaccessible to our more ‘conscientious’ citizens but for those among us who apparently remain wanting as far as a conscience [...]
celluloid relapse: all about my mother
Despite any protest asserting the contrary, human beings are remarkably similar. Culture, appearance and whatnot may be paraded around as a supreme marker of difference, but the volume at which we object seems due to a very odd misunderstanding. Primary school tried to tell us we were all different, but fundamentally we were and are [...]
celluloid relapse: breaking the waves
In this new column, ‘Celluloid Relapse’, Amy Miniter will be revisiting the earlier creations of established directors. ____ Lars von Trier, it seems, was born to push boundaries. An interesting character even from his earlier days, he has of late solidified his reputation as one of cinema’s veritable enfants terribles. Well known for his bouts [...]
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