Funny how an idea for a low-budget guerrilla film in the style of Man Bites Dog got turned into the bloated technicolor opus - complete with moralistiFunny how an idea for a low-budget guerrilla film in the style of Man Bites Dog got turned into the bloated technicolor opus - complete with moralistic anti-media sub- (or should that be sur-?) text - we know and (in my case) revile. Oliver Stone's justification? 'Quentin, you make movies; I make films.' Read the screenplay and imagine what might have been if it hadn't fallen into the hands of the most pretentious, vainglorious director of his generation....more
You ask me, Blasted is a masterpiece and Sarah Kane was the modern day Georg Buchner. I picked this up again last night to take a quick look at the stYou ask me, Blasted is a masterpiece and Sarah Kane was the modern day Georg Buchner. I picked this up again last night to take a quick look at the style and couldn't put it down till I'd finished. The language is sparse, intense, brutal, as blasted as the city of Leeds in the play's post-apocalyptic latter half. Yes, the shift from England-as-we-know-it to England-at-war could have been smoother (it would only have needed a line or two early on to suggest the possibility of invasion), but thematically the connections are clear. Rape during wartime or rape in suburbia, Kane's grasp of sexual politics and insensitivity is acute. Here's Ian, middle-class middle-aged journalist/rapist with a smoker's cough from hell, phoning in a story from his posh hotel room while his young would-be lover looks on:
A serial killer slaughtered British tourist Samantha Scrace in a sick murder ritual comma, police revealed yesterday point new par. The bubbly nineteen-year-old from Leeds was among seven victims found buried in identical triangular tombs in an isolated New Zealand forest point new par. Each had been stabbed more than twenty times and placed face down comma, hands bound behind their backs point new par. Caps up, ashes at the site showed the maniac had stayed to cook a meal, caps down point new par. Samantha comma, a beautiful redhead with dreams of becoming a model comma, was on the trip of a lifetime after finishing her A levels last year point. Samantha's heartbroken mum said yesterday colon quoting, we pray the police will come up with something dash, anything comma, soon point still quoting. The sooner this lunatic is brought to justice the better point end quote new par. The Foreign Office warned tourists down under to take extra care point. A spokesman said colon quoting, common sense is the best rule point end quote, copy ends.
That Ian ends this phone call with a laugh and a reference to a 'scouse tart' is in character, and when later he tells a soldier he can't write about his experience because it's not 'a story anyone wants to hear', quoting from a newspaper about a 'kinky car dealer' who kidnapped a 13 year old prostitute and whipped and raped her to illustrate his point, his cynicism is shocking and exquisite, yet not at all exaggerated.
Sarah Kane was young when she wrote this - early twenties - and her text is sometimes too forceful or unsubtle as the work of the young can be. It's like punk rock, or post-punk, all spiky and angular, but with a hyper-concision that could only have come from serious heartfelt dedication. From the moment these characters walk on stage we know them, and can only watch fascinated as they unravel.
Phaedra's Love (her 'comedy') is excellent too, though I'm not game to reread it just now, so soon after Blasted.
Sarah Kane died at age 27 by her own hand. ...more
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