Sight&Sound - 05.2020

May 2020 | Sight&Sound | 95

Letters are welcome, and should be

addressed to the Editor at Sight & Sound,

BFI, 21 Stephen Street, London W 1 T 1 LN

Email: [email protected]

THE BEACHCOMBER

I was fortunate enough to visit Prospect Cottage

to interview Derek Jarman for a radio series

many years ago (‘A room with a view’, Rushes,

S&S, April). Apart from eulogising Michael

Powell and Emeric Pressburger, explaining his

Black Paintings and venting his anxiety about

being “irrevocably lumped, maddeningly, with

Peter Greenaway”, he showed me the joys of the

shore near his home. Much of the material in his

garden – driftwood, jewellery, bottles – washed

up from the sea, of course. Just as we came into

contact with the waves, a box of oranges flipped

up and rolled out across the sunlit sands... “Nature

always does it better than artists,” he said.

Professor Paul Wells By email

KALER ID

Reading Kim Newman’s tribute to the trash

auteur Andy Milligan (‘Milligan ways to die’,

Wide Angle, S&S, April), I noticed that the

poster for Nightbirds (1970) included the name

Berwick Kaler among the cast. Readers may be

interested to know that in addition to appearing

in a number of other Milligan films – The Body

Beneath and Bloodthirsty Butchers in 1970; The Rats

Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here! and The Man

with Two Heads in 1972 – he went on to achieve

fame as the resident dame in York Theatre Royal’s

Christmas pantomimes. Kaler also wrote the

scripts and stood down only last year, after some

40 years of treading the boards. The ‘glitterball’

costume he wore in his final appearance is

now on display at the city’s Castle Museum.

Terry Hanstock By email

STOCK CORRECTION

Having just watched Todd Haynes’s Dark Waters,

I read with great interest Kieron Corless’s

interview with the director (‘Toxic avenger’,

Rushes, S&S, April). Corless writes: “A plea

for help from a farmer, Wilbur Tennant, who

lives close to Bilott’s grandmother and whose

sheep have been dying by the dozens...” It is

Tennant’s cows that have been dying, though.

Frank Tucciarone Sarasota, Florida

HAPPY TOGETHER

Sitting at home during this almost global lockdown,

I found myself unexpectedly moved by Marjane

Satrapi’s account of her film-watching experiences

(Dream Palaces, Rushes, S&S, April). The list of

films she remembers from her cinema-going days

in Paris in the 1990s (Visconti, Pasolini), and before

that on VHS in Iran in the 1970s (King Kong, The

Towering Inferno), is a reminder of the ways that

movies, without losing their special national

characteristics, can cross cultural boundaries and

be part of a shared global culture. In general, the

Dream Palaces column reminds us that film has

been until recently a communal experience,

something we can all enjoy as part of a crowd.

The Covid-19 pandemic, which pushes us

as nations and as individuals towards ever

greater isolation, towards building ever higher

walls, is a threat to cinema as we have known

it. I hope that when the crisis is over we won’t

carry on sitting at home streaming films, but

will remember how important it is to get out

and sit in cinemas, together in the dark.

Georgina Robinson By email

WESTERN REPROACHES

Writing about the Blake Edwards TV detective

series Peter Gunn (Archive Television, S&S,

April), Robert Hanks says that Craig Stevens,

who plays Gunn, had been second-billed in

Buchanan Rides Alone (1958), “the last of the

Randolph Scott-Budd Boetticher westerns”.

It’s perfectly true that Stevens was in that film,

playing a hired gun who turns out to be quite a

decent chap after all and, at the end, is entrusted by

Buchanan (Scott) with restoring law and order to

the town of Agry. However, this was not even close

to being the last of the Scott-Boetticher westerns:

Ride Lonesome (1959) and Comanche Station (1960)

were still to come, not to mention the somewhat

inferior Westbound (1959) – a contractual obligation

film which Scott owed Warners rather than part

of their independently produced Ranown cycle.

Matthew Peel Newcastle upon Tyne

PROPHET OF DOOM

I’m writing to point out that Roger Luckhurst’s

consideration of H.P. Lovecraft’s place in cinema

(‘Lovecraft waits dreaming’, S&S, April) was

not remotely well-timed or prophetic, and

that Lovecraft’s overriding vision of a world

poised to plunge into chaos and darkness has

no relevance whatsoever to any current events.

Just in case anybody got the wrong idea.

Peter Smith By email

Additions and corrections

April p.61 Fire Will Come: Certificate 12A, 85m 32s; p.67 Cunningham:

Aspect ratio: [1.85:1], In Colour and Black & White; p.69 Downhill:

Aspect ratio: [2.35:1]; p.70 The Great Buster: A Celebration: Certificate PG,

100m 56s, Distributor is Blue Dolphin Films; p.71 Koko-di Koko-da:

Aspect ratio: [1.85:1]; p.72 Military Wives: Aspect ratio: [2.35:1]; p.73 The

Perfect Candidate: Certificate PG, 104m 22s; p.75 Run: Certificate 15, 76m

43s; p.78 Vivarium: Aspect ratio: [2.35:1]; p.80 When Lambs Become Lions:

Not submitted for theatrical classification, VoD certificate: 12, Running

time: 75m 52s

READERS’ LETTERS

FEEDBACK

I feel I may well be placed in a lonely

category of one with my thoughts about the

quadruple Oscar-winning Parasite (above;

S&S, March, passim). However, I shall risk

poking my head above the parapet.

The fact the title is singular, not plural,

kept rolling in my mind after watching the

picture. Could it be that the parasite the

title refers to is the viewer, mercilessly

feasting on the jet-black humour, indulging

in the surprise shifts of tone and perhaps,

like me, only aware of the playfulness of

Boon Joon Ho’s title after the credits have

rolled? Whether or not this was intended,

it was a pleasure to watch the movie and

untangle a possible layer of meaning.

For the record, it took me till the next

day to work out this potential hidden joke,

which actually was in plain sight all along.

Richard Sherwood-Farnfield Maidstone

LETTER OF THE MONTH

IT COULD BE YOU