The hardcore story of a grieving surgeon who embarks on an odyssey of forbidden pleasures is intriguing but hard to watch
This movie from Finnish director J-p Valkeapää brought back to me the title of Jenny Diski’s Bdsm novel from the 80s: Nothing Natural – which is taken from lines by Brecht: “Let nothing be called natural in an age of bloody confusion, ordered disorder, planned caprice, and dehumanised humanity, lest all things be held unalterable!”
Respected surgeon Juha (Pekka Strang) is numb with grief after the death of his wife by drowning. When his teenage daughter chivvies him into taking her to a tattoo parlour so she can get a tongue-piercing, prim Juha does not care to witness the grisly procedure and so tactfully wanders away elsewhere on the premises and happens across the dungeon of dominatrix Mona (Krista Kosonen). He is enthralled and emotionally freed by the forbidden ritual,...
This movie from Finnish director J-p Valkeapää brought back to me the title of Jenny Diski’s Bdsm novel from the 80s: Nothing Natural – which is taken from lines by Brecht: “Let nothing be called natural in an age of bloody confusion, ordered disorder, planned caprice, and dehumanised humanity, lest all things be held unalterable!”
Respected surgeon Juha (Pekka Strang) is numb with grief after the death of his wife by drowning. When his teenage daughter chivvies him into taking her to a tattoo parlour so she can get a tongue-piercing, prim Juha does not care to witness the grisly procedure and so tactfully wanders away elsewhere on the premises and happens across the dungeon of dominatrix Mona (Krista Kosonen). He is enthralled and emotionally freed by the forbidden ritual,...
- 3/19/2020
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
In today's roundup, we track the fates of the blogs leaving the Indiewire network. Plus: The late Jenny Diski on Frank Capra, Adrian Martin on Margot Nash, Olaf Möller on Lav Diaz's A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery, Michael Koresky on Christian Petzold's Phoenix, Thom Powers on documentaries by Robert Drew, Richard Leacock, D.A. Pennebaker and Albert Maysles, Richard Brody on Christian Braad Thomsen's Fassbinder: To Love Without Demands and Ada Ushpiz's Vita Activa: The Spirit of Hannah Arendt, Jonathan Rosenbaum on Otto Preminger, plus news from Cannes and Venice—and more. » - David Hudson...
- 4/30/2016
- Keyframe
In today's roundup, we track the fates of the blogs leaving the Indiewire network. Plus: The late Jenny Diski on Frank Capra, Adrian Martin on Margot Nash, Olaf Möller on Lav Diaz's A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery, Michael Koresky on Christian Petzold's Phoenix, Thom Powers on documentaries by Robert Drew, Richard Leacock, D.A. Pennebaker and Albert Maysles, Richard Brody on Christian Braad Thomsen's Fassbinder: To Love Without Demands and Ada Ushpiz's Vita Activa: The Spirit of Hannah Arendt, Jonathan Rosenbaum on Otto Preminger, plus news from Cannes and Venice—and more. » - David Hudson...
- 4/30/2016
- Fandor: Keyframe
Social realism meets Ai No Corrida in Kieran Evans's provocative and well-shot drama
There's something very unsentimental and provocative being served up along with the romance in this love story from writer-director Kieran Evans. Social realism meets Ai No Corrida – or almost. Antonia Campbell-Hughes plays Kelly and Julian Morris is Victor. They are both trying to get away from something in their chaotic and scary lives, and find their escape in extreme and transgressive sex, which frightens and excites Victor, and then awakens in him a passion which he guilelessly associates with his love of nature. (I was reminded of the lines from Brecht from which Jenny Diski took the title of her novel Nothing Natural: "Let nothing be called natural/ In an age of bloody confusion.) The couple are inspired by visits to Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery, and canvasses such as Giovanni Segantini's mysterious painting The Punishment of Lust.
There's something very unsentimental and provocative being served up along with the romance in this love story from writer-director Kieran Evans. Social realism meets Ai No Corrida – or almost. Antonia Campbell-Hughes plays Kelly and Julian Morris is Victor. They are both trying to get away from something in their chaotic and scary lives, and find their escape in extreme and transgressive sex, which frightens and excites Victor, and then awakens in him a passion which he guilelessly associates with his love of nature. (I was reminded of the lines from Brecht from which Jenny Diski took the title of her novel Nothing Natural: "Let nothing be called natural/ In an age of bloody confusion.) The couple are inspired by visits to Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery, and canvasses such as Giovanni Segantini's mysterious painting The Punishment of Lust.
- 9/19/2013
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Sam Frears has a rare condition and wasn't expected to live beyond five. Now 40, he's an actor, an avid rock climber and an inspiration to his family and friends. By Simon Hattenstone
Mary-Kay Wilmers is determined to plug the book she has written about her family of Russian baddies; notably Leonid Eitingon, who hired Trotsky's assassin. Sod Sam, and his illness, and all this mother-son relationship yuck, she says, can't we get something worthwhile out of this?
"People always talk about Sam," she complains. Earlier this year My Friend Sam, a Storyville documentary about her son, was shown on BBC Four. Now an ebook has been written about him. Perhaps it was inevitable. After all, Mary-Kay runs the prestigious London Review of Books, while his father, Stephen Frears, is a leading film director whose work includes The Queen, The Grifters, Dangerous Liaisons and My Beautiful Laundrette.
Sam was born 40 years ago,...
Mary-Kay Wilmers is determined to plug the book she has written about her family of Russian baddies; notably Leonid Eitingon, who hired Trotsky's assassin. Sod Sam, and his illness, and all this mother-son relationship yuck, she says, can't we get something worthwhile out of this?
"People always talk about Sam," she complains. Earlier this year My Friend Sam, a Storyville documentary about her son, was shown on BBC Four. Now an ebook has been written about him. Perhaps it was inevitable. After all, Mary-Kay runs the prestigious London Review of Books, while his father, Stephen Frears, is a leading film director whose work includes The Queen, The Grifters, Dangerous Liaisons and My Beautiful Laundrette.
Sam was born 40 years ago,...
- 7/6/2012
- by Simon Hattenstone
- The Guardian - Film News
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