Radio On
A few weeks ago, I was finally able to see the film Radio On, directed by Chris Petit. I would now like to make a blog entry referring to it using my notes of the time. I present:
Memorable scenes from Radio On by Chris Petit
1. A very slow pan around a flat in Bristol, enlivened by the use of David Bowie singing Heroes, in German. This ends up showing the dead brother who is the focus of what plot there is.
2. A strange sequence apparently showing our protagonist DJing in a factory. (We have also been shown his empty London flat, which for some reason, has multiple TVs in it, as well as a moody woman watching them.)
3. Quite a lot of driving about, with a Kraftwerk tape on.
4. An encounter with a frightening squaddie who has been caught up in the Troubles of Northern Ireland, who luckily gets left by the side of the road before he can cause any more grief.
5. A visit to a petrol station, at the back of which the attendant incessantly plays an Eddie Cochrane song. (The attendant being the young Gordon Sumner.)
6. A wander round the flat in Bristol, a visit to a burger van, a meeting with two Germans, who are staying in a hotel.
7. An excellent part: the Germans are looking out of the hotel window, when the camera suddenly zooms past them from the outside, along the weird overpass road that the protagonist's car went along earlier. This is a genuine coup on the part of the film-maker and the most memorable and odd moment.
8. A scene at a pier; a scene in a pub, getting knocked off a bar stool by a horrible woman; a drunken scene in a car, at a quarry, in despair; attempted suicide.
These scenes are not really dramatised. Our interest is generally only held by the soundtrack; and the camerawork; and the roadside scenes, landscapes, buildings, and interiors which are constantly in front of the camera.
My conclusion
Surely this film evokes its period (Britain at the end of the 70s) like no other.
The soundtrack is perfect (it reawoke my interest in the music of the time).
The film evokes its period in a slightly bad way. It is rather broodingly, pointlessly existentialist. Being made by a former leading film critic of Time Out, it could even be seen as predictable social criticism of the early part of Thatcher's Britain, from the viewpoint of some sort of trendy London set.
Yet: the positive side of Chris Petit's very painstaking alienation and passivity is that there is such a strong sense of his being removed from everything happening in the film, that it becomes almost a documentary rather than a work of fiction. He notices so much of the way everything looked at that point in time, that this film is surely a classic despite its faults.
Memorable scenes from Radio On by Chris Petit
1. A very slow pan around a flat in Bristol, enlivened by the use of David Bowie singing Heroes, in German. This ends up showing the dead brother who is the focus of what plot there is.
2. A strange sequence apparently showing our protagonist DJing in a factory. (We have also been shown his empty London flat, which for some reason, has multiple TVs in it, as well as a moody woman watching them.)
3. Quite a lot of driving about, with a Kraftwerk tape on.
4. An encounter with a frightening squaddie who has been caught up in the Troubles of Northern Ireland, who luckily gets left by the side of the road before he can cause any more grief.
5. A visit to a petrol station, at the back of which the attendant incessantly plays an Eddie Cochrane song. (The attendant being the young Gordon Sumner.)
6. A wander round the flat in Bristol, a visit to a burger van, a meeting with two Germans, who are staying in a hotel.
7. An excellent part: the Germans are looking out of the hotel window, when the camera suddenly zooms past them from the outside, along the weird overpass road that the protagonist's car went along earlier. This is a genuine coup on the part of the film-maker and the most memorable and odd moment.
8. A scene at a pier; a scene in a pub, getting knocked off a bar stool by a horrible woman; a drunken scene in a car, at a quarry, in despair; attempted suicide.
These scenes are not really dramatised. Our interest is generally only held by the soundtrack; and the camerawork; and the roadside scenes, landscapes, buildings, and interiors which are constantly in front of the camera.
My conclusion
Surely this film evokes its period (Britain at the end of the 70s) like no other.
The soundtrack is perfect (it reawoke my interest in the music of the time).
The film evokes its period in a slightly bad way. It is rather broodingly, pointlessly existentialist. Being made by a former leading film critic of Time Out, it could even be seen as predictable social criticism of the early part of Thatcher's Britain, from the viewpoint of some sort of trendy London set.
Yet: the positive side of Chris Petit's very painstaking alienation and passivity is that there is such a strong sense of his being removed from everything happening in the film, that it becomes almost a documentary rather than a work of fiction. He notices so much of the way everything looked at that point in time, that this film is surely a classic despite its faults.
posted by Peter at 21:01
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