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Originally Posted by MellySingsDoom
Definitely some interesting thoughts there - to be honest, I haven't seen that much Brit cinema of this period, so I should check out some more to see where you're coming from on this. Agreed that the acting ain't exactly A1 level stuff, but it didn't come across as that particularly awful to me. As for the politics - well, I did have a good laugh when one of the characters turned out to be an SWP member (they get everywhere, don't they?), and will concede that the "NF News" bit was a tad shoehorned in, though I still think the gay stuff was overall sensible and even-handed. I'm trying to think of other films that had the "worthy" thing going on which I've seen, and nothing's coming up so far - it'll probably come to me once I wake up in a few hours time (wait a sec - would Godard's "La Chinoise" count as "worthy", or is that a different beast altogether?).
Anyway, ta muchly for your take on it - always appreciate your views on film business and stuff.
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The difference with Godard is that you don't have to share his politics to enjoy or at least appreciate his films - although it obviously helps and I do think his films declined the more explicitly political they became. There are obviously great political filmmakers though (Eisenstein? Pasolini? Bunuel? Loach? Fassbinder?) but above all else they were great filmmakers full stop. I like some of Isaac Julien's short independent stuff but when it comes to features I just don't think he has a clue. It's telling that after YSR he went straight back to the independent/gallery scene and hasn't tried to make a feature film since. Thank fuck.
Some better politically oriented Brit stuff from that period would be (for me anyway) something like Letter to Brezhnev but the best stuff seemed to be more TV based: Edge of Darkness, Our Friends in the North, A Very British Coup, Boys From the Black Stuff, Made in Britain, etc.