Notes from the dark - Paul Markey's year at the movies

Any trip to the cinema these days is a joy, by sheer definition - they're still standing! We’re still standing. Despite working in one as a projectionist, I still make the time to attend as a movie-goer. Because even with a privileged view from the booth, nothing beats sitting in the dark, preferably with an audience. Nothing. Have I seen even ten new for-the-ages movies this year? Probably not. Though time will tell, as with all great art, there is a fermentation process. But 'greatness’ didn’t stop me from having some wonderful times at the pictures in 2022, often alone, but sometimes with people I love.

As gangster-in-chief Vladamir Putin did what he had always been threatening to do, I still found myself like many, utterly aghast when he actually did it. At almost exactly the same time, I sat under a dark cloud in one of the IFI’s screens to test-run a restored copy of Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator. It was my first time experiencing Chaplin’s last real masterpiece, and if there ever was a movie for the moment it was this. Laughing at facism is as important as stomping on it. I left that screening with a new commitment: I’m gonna laugh at the TV every time I see Putin. Laugh. In. His. Face. Ha! There goes the putz who despite reassuring us he found his thrill on Blueberry Hill still invaded Ukraine!

Like many during the pandemic my attention span differed considerably. I likely ended up watching far more short-form film docs and essays on YouTube than actual films or television. Despite having Disney+, one of the casualties of this was Peter Jackson’s The Beatles: Get Back - something I had been anticipating for years. The upside of my neglect came when the rooftop portion was released to cinemas as a concert movie early in the year. I must’ve watched it half a dozen times with audiences in its week-long run. Often staring at a different part of the 4K frame to take in faces of a new set of onlookers and listeners. The split screen tension of the gradually approaching bobbies, as passers-by looked skyward to songs they’d never heard before…for the eyes and ears, this was pure cinema.

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Even several months into 2022, the pandemic lingered prominently in my mind. Still, I never imagined I’d find myself pinning again for isolation. The Velvet Queen managed to do that. Filmed in Eastern Tibet, the French documentary follows photographer Vincent Munier and writer Sylvian Tesson, as they search for the elusive snow leopard across plateaus as high as 15,000 feet. Nick Cave and Warren Ellis's music along with narrator Tesson’s gallic tones bring a beauty and depth to their wanderings and saint-like patience. Suitably affected, I hunted down a book by Sylvian Tesson about the time he spent six months living alone in a cabin in Siberia. Even there, ostensibly the middle of nowhere, his biggest problem wasn’t wandering bears, but avoiding randomers.

Since when did Igmar Bergman become comfort food? It happened one Sunday during my lunch break. By all definitions I shouldn't have found the fiftieth anniversary release of Bergman's Cries and Whispers the balm that it was. But yeah, this story of a visit by two sisters to their dying sibling made me feel… better. I can’t tell you why. Other than it being magnificent in its simplicity. It was nominated for five Oscars, winning for its cinematography despite being essentially just shot in someone’s period gaff. I think I’ll still be wondering about this on my own deathbed.

My dad was the one to take me to the pictures when I was a kid. So I return the favour whenever something potentially to his liking pops up. Being a retired firefighter, Notre Dame On Fire, had himself written all over it. Jean-Jacques 'Quest For Fire’ Annaud’s mega docudrama made up of re-enactments and a collection of footage captured by the public on the day makes for enthralling viewing. Shot in IMAX but released over here in plain olde 4K Cinemascope, Arnaud's storytelling skills enthral, despite of course us knowing how it all panned out. My dad would sometimes lean in to whisper, "Japers, we didn’t have equipment for THAT move. Had to do it all with a crowbar." Fair dues, dad. Fair dues.

I figure my favourite actual film of the year is a two-horse race. The movies could not be more different. The first closed after a week; the second (as of writing) has yet to open. What they do have in common are seriously divisive reviews. Being first generation children of Dublin comic shops, my dear friend Derek and I knew where Funny Pages was coming from. Or so we thought. What we weren’t expecting was the explicit honesty of a closely-observed slice of a specific but familiar world. Not of superheroes or cos-players, but aspirers; struggling and aggrieved artists; disgruntled shop managers and increasingly grotesque customers. A film jammed with irredeemable characters, many brimming over with resentment, nastiness and even violence. The result? The most human and downright funniest ninety minutes of my cinema-going year.

What could possibly challenge that? How about three hours and ten minutes of madness and joy, every iota, every bead of sweat (and other bodily fluids) splattered onto a canvas to express one feeling: love. Our love of cinema; their love of cinema; the characters, the actors, the film makers, the audience, the lot.

The movie is Babylon, and it's one of the first major releases of 2023.

We’ve seen movies delve into the world of silent cinema before, Bogdanovich's Nickelodeon and more recently, The Artist spring to mind. But, oh lord, to mangle Al Jolson, you ain't seen nothing yet. Damien Chazelle writes and directs us into a world of drama, comedy, action, drugs, sex, horror, more drugs, Flea from Red Hot Chilli Peppers, and an elephant - all in the first twenty minutes. With his previous movie, La La Land, you may have floated and danced out into the lobby as the credits rolled. Here you will exit, head in hand, with a joyful if exhausted melancholy, "Wow…cinema."

I had stumbled out of "Babylon" into the lobby of Dublin’s Savoy Cinema, a place I’d known since childhood. I hadn’t been back since they chopped it up several years ago. Like myself, now middle-aged, she was almost unrecognisable yet familiar to the memory. The last word of my movie year goes to my partner, Fiona. Sitting in La Filmotheque in Paris’ Latin Quarter, I looked around at the youthful audience nudging her as it sank in: "I’m the only one here who could have seen Blue Velvet when it first came out. Sweetheart…am I old?!" She put a hand on my shoulder and said, "Do like Dennis. Suck it up." The lights went down, the curtains opened, and I breathed it all in.

Because there’s no place I’d rather be.

Notes from the dark - Paul Markey's year at the movies

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