american hardcore Tagged Articles at Cinematical

I know I sound like my dad, but when I was a kid, music and buzz about music couldn't move at the speed of light, via music blogs, MP3s and filesharing; it moved from town to town in photocopied 'zines, 45's, and gear-crammed Ford Econoline vans that smelled like dude. American Hardcore, adocumentary by Paul Rachman based on the book by Steven Blush, revisits that time, and celebrates it through a rag-tag mix of old, blurry footage, new, slightly blurry interviews and loud, fast music. Specifically, American Hardcore is subtitled "The History of American Punk Rock 1980-1986," and offers an interesting counter-timeline for the early '80s. History, they say, is written by the winners; American Hardcore offers a few chapters from people who were, in fact, proud to be 'losers,' then and now, if that was defined by being set against the mainstream of consumerism and conformity.

American Hardcore isn't the most polished documentary you've ever seen -- there are plenty of interviews where the microphone cord sticks out on the subject's shirts like an undone zipper, or a spoken phrase is mixed with the huff and bluster of the wind. But then again, punk rock was never about sonic perfection: It was (and is) about emotional intensity, and American Hardcore has that in van loads, and delivers with onetwothreefour! power. All the usual suspects are interviewed here -- Henry Rollins of Black Flag, Ian MacKaye of Minor Threat, Greg Hetson of The Circle Jerks -- but there are also interviews with more marginal figures (or, more precisely, figures on the margins of the margins) like Vic Bondi of Articles of Faith, who sums up Hardcore's response to the Reagan era: "Everyone was saying it was 'Morning in America'; someone had to say 'It's fucking midnight!" In fact, the interviews are strong enough that Rachman wisely forgoes a narrator (And who would you get to narrate this film, anyhow? It's not really a gig for Morgan Freeman) and relies instead on the people who were there, the old VHS tapes plundered from some closet and a few wisely-chosen video graphics.

Ah, punk rock. Director Paul Rachman and screenwriter Steven Blush explore the history of punk rock from 1980-1986 in their documentary American Hardcore, which features interviews with a veritabe who's who of the hardcore scene. Cinematical's James Rocchi sat down with Rachman and Blush at the Toronto International Film Festival to talk about their film. You can download the full video here (76.6MB, 12 minutes) or watch it over on Netscape, where there's an interesting discussion of the film and punk rock going on. Dive on in, hardcore fans.

I've been in Park City now for about 26 hours, and all I can think about is sex, love, punk rock and insomnia. A quick glance at the catalog would suggest that I am in the right place. Read on for the details...

• American Hardcore– "Hardcore was more than music," reads a statement on the website for this documentary, based on the Feral House book by Stephen Blush. "It was a social movement created by Reagan-era misfit kids."  The movement as such was dead before Reagan left office, but with Nirvana and Green Day going on to sell tens of millions of records in 1994 alone, the musical aesthetic was soon reborn – sans social critique, the political urgency of the DIYers worn inside-out as personal fashion. Born too late to live it the first time around, at some point in the late 90s I became your annoying friend prone to dropping Minor Threat lyrics into casual conversation. The petulant middle-class teenager inside me can't wait to see it.
• Destricted – An omnibus comprised of semi-shorts by Sam Taylor-Wood, Gaspar "So twisted Harmony Korine idolizes me" Noe, Marina Abramovic, Marco Brambilla, Larry "so twisted I invented Harmony Korine" Clark and Matthew Barney (that's Mr. Bjork to you), Destricted's mission is to liberate "erotic film" from the constraints of the mainstream and the stigma of porn. Segments feature a range of love objects from babysitters to monster trucks; as Clark's contribution (a seeming take-off on the mid-90s Calvin Klein ads his early photography inspired) seems like the most tame, this seems like a must-see for afficianados of cerebral smut.
• Flannel Pajamas – I'm a sucker for any film that takes love seriously enough to approach it with a measure of realism – and apparently, I'm not the only one, if Brokeback Mania is any indication. Directed by Jeff Lipsky (founder of Lot 47 and October Films, he also distributed John Cassavetes' A Woman Under the Influence), Pajamas tracks an intense love affair between two New Yorkers, played by Justin Kirk and Julianne Nicholson. All other things being equal, a recent indieWIRE interview with the director totally won me over. First, he namechecked Cassavetes, Bergman, Woody Allen, and Mike Leigh as his biggest influences; then, he said that his partial goals in making the film were to "meet a wonderful woman who lives in New York" and to have the "opportunity to direct an episode of The Gilmore Girls, the best written (and acted) show on TV." Cassavetes AND Rory and Lorelai? He's got me.