Aren't You Happy? Screening at Edinburgh International Film Festival

Writer-director Susanne Heinrich’s first feature length film is a cinematically interesting exploration of life, love and gender relations for today's young woman. 

A nameless and melancholy young woman (Marie Rathscheck) is a writer with writing issues (she's got no further than the first line of the second chapter of her novel). She searches for meaning to life and a bed for the night while waiting for the end of capitalism. She meets various men, none of whom she allows to mean anything to her. She visits art galleries and philosophises about beauty, feminism and consumerism.

The film is very stylised (reminding in this particular though not in others of Fassbinder's Fear Eats the Soul) and almost static, broken down into self consciously announced episodes. Everything takes place in a very distinctive colour palette dominated by pink and blue. 

Then suddenly in the middle there's a wonderful animated music video then we're back to the same clever and contrived format as before.  

There are moments of humour here and some ideas worth thinking about but mostly it's melancholy and feels as though it should be more entertaining than it is.

Aren't You Happy? is nominated for the 2019 Award for Best International Feature Film.

Aren't You Happy screens at the Edinburgh International Film Festival at 2020 Monday 24 June and 2040 Wednesday 26 June both at Vue Omni Centre. You can book tickets here.

You can read my earlier reviews from Edinburgh International Film Festival 2019, by following the links below:

Boyz in the Wood a group of teenage boys get lost in the Scottish Highlands.

2040 - can technology offer solutions to our current climate and ecological crises?

 Bait - Cornish fishermen try to adapt to a changing world

How to Fake  a War what happens when a rock star decides to meddle in international affairs?

Farm Animals on Film - featuring The Biggest Little Farm - an inspiring story of the creation of a sustainable biodiverse farm in California, plus Vulture, an experimental film about farm animals.

Virgin and Extra: Land of the Olive Oil.


Chef Diaries: Scotland - Spanish chefs the Roca brothers take the viewer on a culinary road trip round Scotland.

Up the Mountain - a year in an artists' studio in the Chinese mountains.

The Amber Light - a cinematic ode to Scotland's national drink

Disclaimer: I have a press pass for the film festival and attended a free press screening of these films.

How to Fake a War - film review

This is how World War Three starts, an explosive mix of fame obsessed celebrities, fake news, international meddling in a sovereign state's affairs, naivety and misadventure.

Hip-hop star Harry Hope (Jay Pharoah) claims to have won every music and acting award going and now has its sights set on the Nobel Peace Prize. So when he hears about war breaking out on the border of Georgia and a neighbouring republic that no-one has ever heard of, he sees this as his chance and announces a major Concert for Peace. But almost immediately a ceasefire is brokered and Harry is annoyed that his opportunity for greater fame has been undermined. So he tasks his PR consultant, Kate (Katherine Parkinson), and her sister and intern, Peggy (Lily Newmark),with manufacturing a fake conflict for long enough for Harry's concert to be seen as the catalyst for peace. 

This is as dubious a proposition as it sounds and leads to mayhem, violence and the build up to potentially serious international conflict. 

Despite being billed as a comedy, this is more often very uncomfortable viewing. You may laugh at this seemingly ridiculous story, but underneath, in this world of fake news and celebrity obsession, you sort of wouldn't be too surprised to find out it's true.

How to Fake a War is screening as part of the Edinburgh International Film Festival 2019 at 1755, Saturday 22 June and at 1515, Sunday 23 June, both at Odeon, Lothian Road. You can buy tickets here.


You can read my earlier reviews from Edinburgh International Film Festival 2019 (posted on my Crafty Green Poet blog) by following the links below:

Boyz in the Wood a group of teenage boys get lost in the Scottish Highlands.

2040 - can technology offer solutions to our current climate and ecological crises?

Bait - Cornish fishermen try to adapt to a changing world. 

Disclaimer: I have a press pass for the film festival and attended a free press screening of these films.

Russian Doll by Lucy Lloyd

Set in the near future and originally published as Shotlandiya on Kindle this is an intriguing novel about a Russian take over of a newly independent Scotland, starting with their annexing the island of Rockall.

Anna works for the newly independent Scottish Broadcasting Corporation producing radio programmes, and struggles to remain true to herself as Russian managers and staff start taking over the studios.

She finds herself becoming closer to Grigory, a Russian diplomat who is overseeing Scottish-Russian media relations and struggles against their growing mutual attraction. 

This is an excellent novel, the characters are believable and complex and the narrative moves along well with escalating tension and intrigue. I was very impressed by the way that the censorship and control by the Russians was depicted, starting as something quite subtle and increasing slowly until they were controlling basically all the station's output. It's moving and amusing as well as thought provoking. 

Russian Doll by Lucy Lloyd, published (2018) by Comely Bank Publishing.

Finding the Right Words

Gumusservi

on the beach
I watch moonlight
liquid silver
on the waves

Altjiranga mitjina

the eternal ocean of dreams

Razblyuto

sea breezes carry away
the last pain of
an impossible love

Ichigo-ichie

I will treasure this moment
perfect it in my memory.



Glossary:
Gumusservi (Turkish) moonlight shining on water

Altjiranga mitjina (Aranda, Australia) the timeless dimensions of dreams

Razblyuto (Russian) The feeling for someone once but no longer loved

Ichigo-ichie (Japanese) the practice of treasuring each moment and trying to make it perfect.


Originally posted in October 2006 for Poetry Thursday - theme - Be Inspired by newspapers.

I wrote this poem in response to the article: Lost in Translation G2, Guardian, 9 October 2006. The words from other languages and their definititions are taken from the article.

An earlier poem on this blog was also written in response to a newspaper article - Tarragona Widow. 

And over on Crafty Green Poe4t, I've reposted another old poem, you can read it here. 

Some photos of Haddington, East Lothian

Haddington is a lovely town just outside Edinburgh. We visited there yesterday with my Dad who was visiting us for the weekend.

We had lovely weather and here are some photos of the town, photos of the park and river will be on my Crafty Green Poet blog tomorrow

Art House

Visionary works edged in a haze
I can all too readily relate to.

I think of the near collisions
of your life with mine

the labyrinthine possibilities
never explored, the fact that

put us in any two squares of a chessboard
and we would recognise each other

instantly.

But the world outside is so big and bad
it is selfish to obsess on the very small

so let the Technicolor wide-screen of dreams
collapse in on itself to a mobile phone

that one day I can carelessly lose.


previously published in Iota and inspired by a cinema advert for mobile phones. 

First posted on this blog in June 2007

International Women's Day - Girl, Lady, Woman

Happy International Women's Day! To mark the occasion I'm reposting my thoughts (again) about the use of the words girl and woman from a year or so back.

***

I'm a woman and resent being referred to as a girl.

In my mind a girl is a female under 16, a young girl is a girl under 12 and a little girl is a girl under 5 or a girl under 12 of particularly small stature.

Some people say calling adult women girls doesn't matter, but think about it, would you call a male work colleague a boy? If you would then maybe it's fair enough to call your female work colleagues girls, but I'm guessing that most people refer to their male work colleagues as men (or possibly guys) and so should refer to their female work colleagues as women. I've only ever met one man who has ever referred to his male colleages as boys.

There's a time and a place of course to use the word girls - 'Girl's night out' for example, but in that case it's a choice made by a group of women to refer to themselves as girls and is directly equivalent to the use of 'Boy's Night Out'.

Using the word girl to refer to adult women is just another symptom of the increasing sexism of today's society and it tends to infantalise women. The word 'Girlpower' is an attempt to reclaim the word girl from it's infantalising useage.

Sometimes I think focussing on the use of words can detract from the issues. For example news articles sometimes obsessively analyse a politician's use of one word or phrase on one occasion while the issue behind the words isn't touched. However, the use of 'girls' to refer to women is still so persistant I feel it undermines a lot of the work done by feminism to move towards the equality of women and men.

**

You may also be interested in my blogpost about women's health 'Our Ovaries Ourselves'. 

**

It's great to see Poetry24 devoting the whole day to poetry for International Women's Day!

Return

You travelled alone
posting pieces of time
in sea-views and lines -
rewording your life.

My only map
a patchwork of postcards
with scribbled notes.

Home.

Salt on my tongue,
I taste the tidemark
of your travels,
explore you back from absence.

Abandon distance. 


Originally published in Envoi magazine and first posted on this blog in 2007. 

My poem Home Town is now up on the Crafty Green Poet blog, you can read it here.

Tarragona Widow

Sixty years inseparable love, I knew you perfectly,
read the maps of your mind and body unerringly,
rejoiced in your company.

Our love was strong and sure, multi-layered, a symphony
with melodies and harmonies in balance, perfection.
Passion entwined our bodies in dance,
hearts beating in time, part of each other.

Sixty years inseparable love, childless and contented,
ended.
Your long lean body cold to touch,
your laughing eyes dead and glassy now,
your loving lips pale, still and grey,
your passion, your humour and vitality
all have drained away.

This empty husk is you,
is all that’s left of you,
is all I have of you.

They can’t take you away from me,
I will hide you away from them,
I’ll keep you safe in a secret place,
you’re mine for eternity.

I don’t want to lose you.

The pungent, rich sweetness of you,
like incense, hangs in the air,
rises with your soul like a prayer,
fills the room with heady aroma.

I breathe you in.
You are part of me once more. 

*** 

This poem is based on a true story. 
 

(Previously published in Quantum Leap poetry magazine and first posted on this blog in 2006) 

I also reposted an old poem on Crafty Green Poet today, you can read it here.

Bouquet

She gave me cheap carnations,
petals falling too soon
in the cold room.

I said flowers weren’t the point.

She brought more anyway,
their pale presence
filling the silence.

It was easier than talking.




Originally posted on this blog in 2008 for Totally Optional Prompts

First published in Raindog

I've also reposted an old poem over on Crafty Green Poet, you can read it here.