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armageddon-generation · 3 years

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Articulating Why His Dark Materials is Badly Written

A long essay-thing with lots of specific examples and explanations of why I feel this way. Hopefully I’ve kept fanboy bitching to a minimum.

This isn’t an attack on fans of the show, nor a personal attack on Jack Thorne. I’m not looking to ruin anyone’s enjoyment of the show, I just needed to properly articulate, with examples, why I struggle with it. I read and love the books and that colours my view, but I believe that HDM isn’t just a clumsy, at-best-functional, sometimes incompetent adaptation, it’s a bad TV show separate from its source material. The show is the blandest, least interesting and least engaging version of itself it could be.

His Dark Materials has gorgeous production design and phenomenal visual effects. It's well-acted. The score is great. But my god is it badly written. Jack Thorne writing the entire first season damned the show. There was no-one to balance out his flaws and biases. Thorne is checking off a list of plot-points, so concerned with manoeuvring the audience through the story he forgets to invest us in it. The scripts are mechanical, empty, flat.

Watching HDM feels like an impassioned fan earnestly lecturing you on why the books are so good- (Look! It's got other worlds and religious allegory and this character Lyra is really, really important I swear. Isn't Mrs Coulter crazy? The Gyptians are my favourites.) rather than someone telling the story naturally.

My problems fall into 5 main categories:

Exposition- An unwillingness to meaningfully expand the source material for a visual medium means Thorne tells and doesn't show crucial plot-points. He then repeats the same thing multiple times because he doesn't trust his audience

Pacing- By stretching out the books and not trusting his audience Thorne dedicates entire scenes to one piece of information and repeats himself constantly (see: the Witches' repetition of the prophecy in S2).

Narrative priorities- Thorne prioritises human drama over fantasy. This makes sense budgetarily, but leads to barely-present Daemons, the Gyptians taking up too much screentime, rushed/badly written Witches (superpowers, exposition) and Bears (armourless bear fight), and a Lyra more focused on familial angst than the joy of discovery

Tension and Mystery- because HDM is in such a hurry to set up its endgame it gives you the answers to S1's biggest mysteries immediately- other worlds, Lyra's parents, what happens to the kids etc. This makes the show less engaging and feel like it's playing catch-up to the audience, not the other way around.

Tonal Inconsistency- HDM tries to be a slow-paced, grounded, adult drama, but its blunt, simplistic dialogue and storytelling methods treat the audience like children that need to be lectured.

MYSTERY, SUSPENSE AND INTRIGUE

The show undercuts all the books’ biggest mysteries. Mrs Coulter is set up as a villain before we meet her, other worlds are revealed in 1x2, Lyra's parents by 1x3, what the Magesterium do to kids is spelled out long before Lyra finds Billy (1x2). I understand not wanting to lose new viewers, but neutering every mystery kills momentum and makes the show much less engaging.

This extends to worldbuilding. The text before 1x1 explains both Daemons and Lyra's destiny before we meet her. Instead of encouraging us to engage with the world and ask questions, we're given all the answers up front and told to sit back and let ourselves be spoon-fed. The viewer is never an active participant, never encouraged to theorise or wonder

Intrigue motivated you to engage with Pullman's philosophical themes and concepts. Without it, HDM feels like a lecture, a theme park ride and not a journey.

The only one of S1's mysteries left undiminished is 'what is Dust?', which won't be properly answered until S3, and that answer is super conceptual and therefore hard to make dramatically satisfying

TONAL INCONSISTENCY

HDM billed itself as a HBO-level drama, and was advertised as a GoT inheritor. It takes itself very seriously- the few attempts at humour are stilted and out of place

The production design is deliberately subdued, most notably choosing a mid-twentieth century aesthetic for Lyra’s world over the late-Victorian of the books or steampunk of the movie. The colour grading would be appropriate for a serious adult drama.

Reviewers have said this stops the show feeling as fantastical as it should. It also makes Lyra’s world less distinct from our own.

Most importantly, minimising the wondrous fantasy of S1 neuters its contrast with the escalating thematic darkness of the finale (from 1x5 onwards), and the impact of Roger’s death. Pullman's books are an adult story told through the eyes of a child. Lyra’s innocence and naivety in the first book is the most important journey of the trilogy. Instead, the show starts serious and thematically heavy (we’re told Lyra has world-saving importance before we even meet her) and stays that way.

Contrasting the serious tone, grounded design and poe-faced characters, the dialogue is written to cater to children. It’s horrendously blunt and pulls you out of scenes. Subtext is obliterated at every opportunity. Even in the most recent episode, 2x7, Pan asks Lyra ‘do you think you’re changing because of Will?’

I cannot understate how on the nose this line is, and how much it undercuts the themes of the final book. Instead of even a meaningful shot of Lyra looking at Will, the show treats the audience like complete idiots.

So, HDM looks and advertises itself like an adult drama and is desperate to be taken seriously by wearing its big themes on its sleeve from the start instead of letting them evolve naturally out of subtext like the books, and dedicating lots of scenes to Mrs Coulter's self-abuse

At the same time its dialogue and character writing is comparable to the Star Wars prequels, more childish than media aimed at a similar audience - Harry Potter, Doctor Who, Avatar the Last Airbender etc

DAEMONS

The show gives itself a safety net by explaining Daemons in an opening text-crawl, and so spends less time showing the mechanics of the Daemon-human bond. On the HDM subreddit, I’ve seen multiple people get to 1x5 or 6, and then come to reddit asking basic questions like ‘why do only some people have Daemons?’ or ‘Why are Daemons so important?’.

It’s not that the show didn’t answer these questions; it was in the opening text-crawl. It’s just the show thinks telling you is enough and never shows evidence to back that up. Watching a TV show you remember what you’re shown much easier than what you’re told

The emotional core of Northern Lights is the relationship between Lyra and Pan. The emotional core of HDM S1 is the relationship between Lyra and Mrs Coulter. This wouldn't be bad- it's a fascinating dynamic Ruth plays wonderfully- if it didn't override the Daemons

Daemons are only onscreen when they serve a narrative purpose. Thorne justifies this because the books only describe Daemons when they tell us about their human. On the page your brain fills the Daemons in. This doesn't work on-screen; you cannot suspend your disbelief when their absence is staring you in the face

Thorne clarified the number of Daemons as not just budgetary, but a conscious creative choice to avoid onscreen clutter. This improved in S2 after vocal criticism.

Mrs Coulter/the Golden Monkey and Lee/Hester have well-drawn relationships in S1, but Pan and Lyra hug more in the 2-hour Golden Compass movie than they do in the 8-hour S1 of HDM. There's barely any physical contact with Daemons at all.

They even cut Pan and Lyra's hug after escaping the Cut in Bolvangar. In the book they can't let go of each other. The show skips it completely because Thorne wants to focus on Mrs Coulter and Lyra.

They cut Pan and Lyra testing how far apart they can be. They cut Lyra freeing the Cut Daemons in Bolvangar with the help of Kaisa. We spent extra time with both Roger and Billy Costa, but didn't develop their bonds with their Daemons- the perfect way to make the Cut more impactful

I don't need every single book scene in the show, but notice that all these cut scenes reinforced how important Daemons are. For how plodding the show is. you'd think they could spare time for these moments instead of inventing new conversations that tell us the information they show

Daemons are treated as separate beings and thus come across more like talking pets than part of a character

The show sets the rules of Daemons up poorly. In 1x2, Lyra is terrified by the Monkey being so far from Coulter, but the viewer has nothing to compare it to. We’re retroactively told in that this is unnatural when the show has yet to establish what ‘natural’ is.

The guillotine blueprint in 1x2 (‘Is that a human and his Daemon, Pan? It looks like it.’ / ‘A blade. To cut what?’) is idiotic. It deflates S1’s main mystery and makes the characters look stupid for not figuring out what they aren’t allowed to until they did in the source material, it also interferes with how the audience sees Daemons. In the book, Cutting isn’t revealed until two-thirds of the way in (1x5). By then we’ve spent a lot of time with Daemons, they’ve become a background part of the world, their ‘rules’ have been established, and we’re endeared to them.

By showing the Guillotine and putting Daemons under threat in the second episode, the show never lets us grow attached. This, combined with their selective presence in scenes, draws attention to Daemons as a plot gimmick and not a natural extension of characters. Like Lyra, the show tells us why Daemons are important before we understand them.

Billy Costa's fate falls flat. It's missing the dried fish/ fake Daemon Tony Markos clings to in the book. Thorne said this 'didn't work' on the day, but it worked in the film. Everyone yelling about Billy not having a Daemon is laughable when most of the background extras in the same scene don't have Daemons themselves

WITCHES

The Witches are the most common complaint about the show. Thorne changed Serafina Pekkala in clever, logical ways (her short hair, wrist-knives and cloud pine in the skin)

The problem is how Serafina is written. The Witches are purely exposition machines. We get no impression of their culture, their deep connection to nature, their understanding of the world. We are told it. It is never shown, never incorporated into the dramatic action of the show.

Thorne emphasises Serafina's warrior side, most obviously changing Kaisa from a goose into a gyrfalcon (apparently a goose didn't work on-screen)

Serafina single-handedly slaughtering the Tartars is bad in a few ways. It paints her as bloodthirsty and ruthless. Overpowering the Witches weakens the logic of the world (If they can do that, why do they let the Magesterium bomb them unchallenged in 2x2?). It strips the Witches of their subtlety and ambiguity for the sake of cinematic action.

A side-effect of Serafina not being with her clan at Bolvangar is limiting our exposure to the Witches. Serafina is the only one invested in the main plot, we only hear about them from what she tells us. This poor set-up weakens the Witch subplot in S2

Lyra doesn’t speak to Serafina until 2x6. She laid eyes on her once in S1.

The dialogue in the S2’s Witch subplot is comparable to the Courasant section of The Phantom Menace.

Two named characters, neither with any depth (Serafina and Coram's dead son developed him far more than her). The costumes look ostentatious and hokey- the opposite of what the Witches should be. They do nothing but repeat the same exposition at each other, even in 2x7.

We feel nothing when the Witches are bombed because the show never invests us in what is being destroyed- with the amount of time wasted on long establishing shots, there’s not one when Lee Scoresby is talking to the Council.

BEARS

Like the Witches; Thorne misunderstands and rushes the fantasy elements of the story. The 2007 movie executed both Iofur's character and the Bear Fight much better than the show- bloodless jaw-swipe and all

Iofur's court was not the parody of human court in the books. He didn't have his fake-Daemon (hi, Billy)

An armourless bear fight is like not including Pan in the cutting scene. After equating Iorek's armour to a Daemon (Lee does this- we don’t even learn how important it is from Iorek himself, and the comparison meant less because of how badly the show set up Daemons) the show then cuts the plotpoint that makes the armour plot-relevant. This diminishes all of Bear society. Like Daemons, we're told Iorek's armour is important but it's never shown to be more than a cool accessory

GYPTIANS

Gyptians suffer from Hermoine syndrome. Harry Potter screenwriter Steve Kloves' favourite character was Hermione, and so Film!Hermoine lost most of Book!Hermoine's flaws and gained several of Book!Ron's best moments. The Gyptians are Jack Thorne's favourite group in HDM and so they got the extra screentime and development that the more complicated groups/concepts like Witches, Bears, and Daemons (which, unlike the Gyptians, carry over to other seasons amd are more important to the overall story) needed

At the same time, he changes them from a private people into an Isle of Misfit Toys. TV!Ma Costa promises they'll ‘make a Gyptian woman out of Lyra yet’, but in the book Ma specifically calls Lyra out for pretending to be Gyptian, and reminds her she never can be.

This small moment indicates how, while trying to make the show more grounded and 'adult', Thorne simultaneously made it more saccharine and sentimental. He neuters the tragedy of the Cut kids when Ma Costa says they’ll become Gyptians. Pullman's books feel like an adult story told through the eyes of a child. The TV show feels like a child's story masquerading as a serious drama.

LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA

Let me preface this by saying I genuinely really enjoy the performances in the show. It was shot in the foot by The Golden Compass' perfect casting.

The most contentious/'miscast' actor among readers is LMM. Thorne ditched the books' wise Texan for a budget Han Solo. LMM isn't a great dramatic actor (even in Hamilton he was the weak link performance-wise) but he makes up for it in marketability- lots of people tried the show because of him

Readers dislike that LMM's Lee is a thief and a scoundrel, when book-Lee is so moral he and Hester argue about stealing. Personally, I like the change in concept. Book!Lee's parental love for Lyra just appears. It's sweet, but not tied to a character arc. Done right, Lyra out-hustling Lee at his own game and giving him a noble cause to fight for (thus inspiring the moral compass of the books) is a more compelling arc.

DAFNE KEENE AND LYRA

I thought Dafne would be perfect casting. Her feral energy in Logan seemed a match made in heaven. Then Jack Thorne gave her little to do with it.

Compare how The Golden Compass introduced Lyra, playing Kids and Gobblers with a group of Gyptian kids, including Billy Costa. Lyra and Roger are chased to Jordan by the Gyptians and she makes up a lie about a curse to scare the Gyptians away.

In one scene the movie set up: 1) the Gobblers (the first we hear of them in the show is in retrospect, Roger worrying AFTER Billy is taken) 2) Lyra’s pre-existing relationship with the Gyptians (not in the show), 3) Friendship with Billy Costa (not in the book or show) 4) Lyra’s ability to befriend and lead groups of people, especially kids, and 5) Lyra’s ability to lie impressively

By comparison, it takes until midway through 1x2 for TV!Lyra to tell her first lie, and even then it’s a paper-thin attempt.

The show made Roger Lyra’s only friend. This artificially heightens the impact of Roger's death, but strips Lyra of her leadership qualities and ability to befriend anyone.

Harry Potter fans talk about how Book!Harry is funnier and smarter than Film!Harry. They cut his best lines ('There's no need to call me sir, Professor') and made him blander and more passive. The same happened to Lyra.

Most importantly, Lyra is not allowed to lie for fun. She can't do anything 'naughty' without being scolded. This colours the few times Lyra does lie (e.g. to Mrs Coulter in 1x2) negatively and thus makes Lyra out to be more of a brat than a hero.

This is a problem with telling Northern Lights from an outside, 'adult' perspective- to most adults Lyra is a brat. Because we’re introduced to her from inside her head, we think she's great. It's only when we meet her through Will's eyes in The Subtle Knife and she's filthy, rude and half-starved that we realise Lyra bluffs her way through life and is actually pretty non-functional

Thorne prioritises grounded human drama over fantasy, and so his Lyra has her love of bears and witches swapped for familial angst. (and, in S2. angst over Roger). By exposing Mrs Coulter as her mother early, Thorne distracts TV!Lyra from Book!Lyra’s love of the North. The contrast between wonder and reality made NL's ending a definitive threshold between innocence and knowledge. Thorne showed his hand too early.

Similarly, TV!Lyra doesn’t have anywhere near as strong an admiration for Lord Asriel. She calls him out in 1x8 (‘call yourself a Father’), which Book!Lyra never would because she’s proud to be his child. From her perspective, at this point Asriel is the good parent.

TV!Lyra’s critique of Asriel feels like Thorne using her as a mouthpiece to voice his own, adult perspective on the situation. Because Lyra is already disappointed in Asriel, his betrayal in the finale isn’t as effective. Pullman saves the ‘you’re a terrible Father’ call-out for the 3rd book for a reason; Lyra’s naive hero-worship of Asriel in Northern Lights makes the fall from Innocence into Knowledge that Roger’s death represents more effective.

So, on TV Lyra is tamer, angstier, more introverted, less intelligent, less fun and more serious. We're just constantly told she's important, even before we meet her.

MRS COULTER (AND LORD ASRIEL)

Mrs Coulter is the main character of the show. Not Lyra. Mrs Coulter was cast first, and Lyra was cast based on a chemistry test with Ruth Wilson. Coulter’s character is given lots of extra development, where the show actively strips Lyra of her layers.

To be clear, I have no problem with developing Mrs Coulter. She is a great character Ruth Wilson plays phenomenally. I do have a problem with the show fixating on her at the expense of other characters.

Lyra's feral-ness is given to her parents. Wilson and McAvoy are more passionate than in the books. This is fun to watch, but strips them of subtlety- you never get Book!Coulter's hypnotic allure from Wilson, she's openly nasty, even to random strangers (in 2x3 her dismissal of the woman at the hotel desk felt like a Disney villain).

Compare how The Golden Compass (2007) introduced Mrs Coulter through Lyra’s eyes, with light, twinkling music and a sparkling dress. By contrast, before the show introduces Coulter it tells us she’s associated with the evil Magisterium plotting Asriel’s death- “Not a word to any of our mutual friends. Including her.” Then she’s introduced striding down a corridor to imposing ‘Bad Guy’ strings.

Making Mrs Coulter’s villainy so obvious so early makes Lyra look dumber for falling for it. It also wastes an interesting phase of her character arc. Coulter is rushed into being a ’conflicted evil mother’ in 2 episodes, and stays in that phase for the rest of the show so far. Character progression is minimised because she circles the same place.

It makes her one-note. It's a good note (so much of the positive online chatter is saphiccs worshiping Ruth Wilson) but the show also worships her to the point of hindrance- e.g. take a shot every time Coulter walks slow-motion down a corridor in 2x2

The problem isn’t the performances, but how prematurely they give the game away. Just like the mysteries around Bolvangar and Lyra’s parentage. Neither Coulter or Asriel have much chance to use their 'public' faces.

This is part of a bigger pacing problem- instead of rolling plot points out gradually, Thorne will stick the solution in front of you early and then stall for time until it becomes relevant. Instead of building tension this builds frustration and makes the show feel like it's catching up to the audience. This also makes the characters less engaging. You've already shown Mrs Coulter is evil/Boreal is in our world/Asriel wants Roger. Why are you taking so long getting to the point?

PACING AND EDITING

This show takes forever to make its point badly.

Scenes in HDM tend to operate on one level- either 'Character Building,' 'Exposition,' or 'Plot Progression'.

E.g. Mary's introduction in 2x2. Book!Mary only listens to Lyra because she’s sleep and caffeine-deprived and desperate because her funding is being cut. But the show stripped that subtext out and created an extra scene of a colleague talking to Mary about funding. They removed emotional subtext to focus on exposition, and so the scene felt empty and flat.

In later episodes characters Mary’s sister and colleagues do treat her like a sleep-deprived wreck. But, just like Lyra’s lying, the show doesn’t establish these characteristics in her debut episode. It waits until later to retroactively tell us they were there. Mary’s colleague saying ‘What we’re dealing with here is the fact that you haven’t slept in weeks’ is as flimsy as Pan joking not lying to Mary will be hard for Lyra.

Rarely does a scene work on multiple levels, and if it does it's clunky- see the exposition dump about Daemon Separation in the middle of 2x2's Witch Trial.

He also splits plot progression into tiny doses, which destroys pacing. It's more satisfying to focus on one subplot advancing multiple stages than all of them shuffling forward half a step each episode.

Subplots would be more effective if all the scenes played in sequence. As it is, plotlines can’t build momentum and literal minutes are wasted using the same establishing shots every time we switch location.

The best-structured episodes of S1 are 1x4, 1x6, and 1x8. This is because they have the fewest subplots (incidentally these episodes have least Boreal in them) and so the main plot isn’t diluted by constantly cutting away to Mrs Coulter sniffing Lyra’s coat or Will watching a man in a car through his window, before cutting back again.

The best-written episode so far is 2x5. The Scholar. Tellingly, it’s the only episode Thorne doesn’t have even a co-writing credit on. 2x5 is well-paced, its dialogue is more naturalistic, it’s more focused, it even has time for moments of whimsy (Monkey with a seatbelt, Mrs Coulter with jeans, Lyra and Will whispering) that don’t detract from the story.

Structurally, 2x5 works because A) it benches Lee’s plotline. B) The Witches and Magisterium are relegated to a scene each. And C) the Coulter/Boreal and Lyra/Will subplots move towards the same goal. Not only that, but when we check in on Mary’s subplot it’s through Mrs Coulter’s eyes and directly dovetails into the main action of the episode.

2x5 has a lovely sense of narrative cohesion because it has the confidence to sit with one set of characters for longer than two scenes at a time.

HDM also does this thing where it will have a scene with plot A where characters do or talk about something, cut away to plot B for a scene, then cut back to plot A where the characters talk about what happened in their last scene and painstakingly explain how they feel about it and why

Example: Pan talking to Will in 2x7 while Lyra pretends to be asleep. This scene is from the 3rd book, and is left to breathe for many chapters before Lyra brings it up. In the show after the Will/Pan scene they cut away to another scene, then cut back and Lyra instantly talks about it.

There’s the same problem in 2x5: After escaping Mrs Coulter, Lyra spells out how she feels about acting like her

The show never leaves room for implication, never lets us draw our own conclusions before explaining what it meant and how the characters feel about it immediately afterwards. The audience are made passive in their engagement with the characters as well as the world

LORD BOREAL, JOHN PARRY AND DIMINISHING RETURNS

At first, Boreal’s subplot in S1 felt bold and inspired. The twist of his identity in The Subtle Knife would've been hard to pull off onscreen anyway. As a kid I struggled to get past Will's opening chapter of TSK and I have friends who were the same. Introducing Will in S1 and developing him alongside Lyra was a great idea.

I loved developing Elaine Parry and Boreal into present, active characters. But the subplot was introduced too early and moved too slowly, bogging down the season.

In 1x2 Boreal crosses. In 1x3 we learn who he's looking for. In 1x5 we meet Will. In 1x7 the burglary. 1 episode worth of plot is chopped up and fed to us piecemeal across many. Boreal literally stalls for two episodes before the burglary- there are random 30 second shots of him sitting in a car watching John Parry on YouTube (videos we’d already seen) completely isolated from any other scenes in the episode

By the time we get to S2 we've had 2 seasons of extended material building up Boreal, so when he just dies like in the books it's anticlimactic. The show frontloads his subplot with meaning without expanding on its payoff, so the whole thing fizzles out.

Giving Boreal, the secondary villain in literally every episode, the same death as a background character in about 5 scenes in the novels feels cheap. It doesn’t help that, after 2x5 built the tension between Coulter and Boreal so well, as soon as Thorne is passed the baton in 2x6 he does little to maintain that momentum. Again, because the subplot is crosscut with everything else the characters hang in limbo until Coulter decides to kill him.

I’ve been watching non-book readers react to the show, and several were underwhelmed by Boreal’s quick, unceremonious end.

Similarly, the show builds up John Parry from 1x3 instead of just the second book. Book!John’s death is an anticlimax but feels narratively justified. In the show, we’ve spent so much extra time talking about him and then being with him (without developing his character beyond what’s in the novels- Pullman even outlined John’s backstory in The Subtle Knife’s appendix. How hard would it be to add a flashback or two?) that when John does nothing in the show and then dies (he doesn’t even heal Will’s fingers like in the book- only tell him to find Asriel, which the angels Baruch and Balthamos do anyway) it doesn’t feel like a clever, tragic subversion of our expectations, it feels like a waste that actively cheapens the audience’s investment.

TL;DR giving supporting characters way more screentime than they need only, to give their deaths the same weight the books did after far less build up makes huge chunks of the show feel less important than they were presented to be.

FRUSTRATINGLY LIMITED EXPANSION AND NOVELLISTIC STORYTELLING

Thorne is unwilling to meaningfully develop or expand characters and subplots to fit a visual medium. He introduces a plot-point, invents unnecessary padding around it, circles it for an hour, then moves on.

Pullman’s books are driven by internal monologue and big, complex theological concepts like Daemons and Dust. Instead of finding engaging, dynamic ways to dramatise these concepts through the actions of characters or additions to the plot, Thorne turns Pullman’s internal monologue into dialogue and has the characters explain them to the audience

The novels’ perspective on its characters is narrow, first because Northern Lights is told only from Lyra’s POV, and second because Pullman’s writing is plot-driven, not character-driven. Characters are vessels for the plot and themes he wants to explore.

This is a fine way of writing novels. When adapting the books into a longform drama, Thorne decentralised Lyra’s perspective from the start, and HDM S1 uses the same multi-perspective structure that The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass do, following not only Lyra but the Gyptians, Mrs Coulter, Boreal, Will and Elaine etc

However, these other perspectives are limited. We never get any impression of backstory or motivation beyond the present moment. Many times I’ve seen non-book readers confused or frustrated by vague or non-existent character motivations.

For example, S1 spends a lot of time focused on Ma Costa’s grief over Billy’s disappearance, but we never see why she’s sad, because we never saw her interact with Billy.

Compare this to another show about a frantic mother and older brother looking for a missing boy. Stranger Things uses only two flashbacks to show us Will Byers’ relationships with his family: 1) When Joyce Byers looks in his Fort she remembers visiting Will there. 2) The Clash playing on the radio reminds Jonathan Byers of introducing Will to the song.

In His Dark Materials we never see the Costas as a happy family- 1x1’s Gyptian ceremony focuses on Tony and Daemon-exposition. Billy never speaks to his mum or brother in the show

Instead we have Ma Costa’s empty grief. The audience has to do the work (the bad kind) imagining what she’s lost. Instead of seeing Billy, it’s just repeated again and again that they will get the children back.

If we’re being derivative, HDM had the chance to segway into a Billy flashback when John Faa brings one of his belongings back from a Gobbler safehouse in 1x2. This is a perfect The Clash/Fort Byers-type trigger. It doesn’t have to be long- the Clash flashback lasted 1:27, the Fort Byers one 55 seconds. Just do something.

1x3 beats into us that Mrs Coulter is nuts without explaining why. Lots of build-up for a single plot-point. Then we're told Mrs Coulter's origin, not shown. This is a TV show. Swap Boreal's scenes for flashbacks of Coulter and Asriel's affair. Then, when Ma Costa tells Lyra the truth, show the fight between Edward Coulter and Asriel.

To be clear, Thorne's additions aren’t fundamentally bad. For example, Will boxing sets up his struggle with violence. But it's wasted. The burglary/murder in 1x7 fell flat because of bad editing, but the show never uses its visual medium to show Will's 'violent side'- no change in camera angle, focus, or sound design, nothing. It’s just a thing that’s there, unsupported by the visual language of the show

The Magisterium scenes in 2x2 were interesting. We just didn't need 5 of them; their point could be made far more succinctly.

In 2x6 there is a minute-long scene of Mary reading the I Ching. Later, there is another scene of Angelica watching Mary sitting somewhere different, doing the SAME THING, and she sees an Angel. Why split these up? It’s not like either the I Ching or the Angels are being introduced here. Give the scene multiple layers.

Thorne either takes good character moments from the books (Lyra/Will in 2x1) or uses heavy-handed exposition that reiterates the same point multiple times. This hobbles the Witches (their dialogue in 2x1, 2 and 3 literally rephrases the same sentiment about protecting Lyra without doing anything). Even character development- see Lee monologuing his and Mrs Coulter's childhood trauma in specific detail in 2x3

This is another example of Thorne adding something, but instead of integrating it into the dramatic action and showing us, it’s just talked about. What’s the point of adding big plot points if you don’t dramatise them in your dramatic, visual medium? In 2x8, Lee offhandedly mentions playing Alamo Gulch as a kid.

I’m literally screaming, Jack, why the flying fuck wasn’t there a flashback of young Lee and Hester playing Alamo Gulch and being stopped by his abusive dad? It’s not like you care about pacing with the amount of dead air in these episodes, even when S2’s run 10 minutes shorter than S1’s. Lee was even asleep at the beginning of 2x3, Jack! He could’ve woken from a nightmare about his childhood! It’s a little lazy, but better than nothing.

There’s a similar missed opportunity making Dr Lanselius a Witchling. If this idea had been introduced with the character in 1x4, it would’ve opened up so many storytelling possibilities. Linking to Fader Coram’s own dead witchling son. It could’ve given us that much-needed perspective on Witch culture. Imagine Lanselius’ bittersweet meeting with his ageless mother, who gave him up when he reached manhood. Then, when the Magisterium bombs the Witches in 2x2, Lanselius’ mother dies so it means something.

Instead it’s only used to facilitate an awkward exposition dump in the middle of a trial.

The point of this fanfic-y ramble is to illustrate my frustration with the additions; If Thorne had committed and meaningfully expanded and interwoven them with the source material, they could’ve strengthened its weakest aspect (the characters). But instead he stays committed to novelistic storytelling techniques of monologue and two people standing in a room talking at each other

(Seriously, count the number of scenes that are just two people standing in a room or corridor talking to each other. No interesting staging, the characters aren’t doing anything else while talking. They. Just. Stand.)

SEASON 2 IMPROVEMENTS

S2 improved some things- Lyra's characterisation was more book-accurate, her dynamic with Will was wonderful. Citigazze looked incredible. LMM won lots of book fans over as Lee. Mary was brilliantly cast. Now there are less Daemons, they're better characterised- Pan gets way more to do now and Hester had some lovely moments.

I genuinely believe 2x1, 2x3, 2x4 and 2x5 are the best HDM has been.

But new problems arose. The Subtle Knife lost the central, easy to understand drive of Northern Lights (finding the missing kids) for lots of smaller quests. As a result, everyone spends the first two episodes of S2 waiting for the plot to arrive. The big inciting incident of Lyra’s plotline is the theft of the alethiometer, which doesn’t happen until 2x3. Similarly, Lee doesn’t search for John until 2x3. Mrs Coulter doesn’t go looking for Lyra until 2x3.

On top of missing a unifying dramatic drive, the characters now being split across 3 worlds, instead of the 1+a bit of ours in S1, means the pacing/crosscutting problems (long establishing shots, repetition of information, undercutting momentum) are even worse. The narrative feels scattered and incohesive.

These flaws are inherent to the source material and are not the show’s fault, but neither does it do much to counterbalance or address them, and the flaws of the show combine with the difficulties of TSK as source material and make each other worse.

A lot of this has been entitled fanboy bitching, but you can't deny the show is in a bad place ratings-wise. It’s gone from the most watched new British show in 5 years to the S2 premiere having a smaller audience than the lowest-rated episode of Doctor Who Series 12. For comparison, DW's current cast and showrunner are the most unpopular since the 80s, some are actively boycotting it, it took a year-long break between series 11 and 12, had its second-worst average ratings since 2005, and costs a fifth of what HDM does to make. And it's still being watched by more people.

Critical consensus fluctuates wildly. Most laymen call the show slow and boring. The show is simultaneously too niche and self-absorbed to attract a wide audience and gets just enough wrong to aggravate lots of fans.

I’m honestly unsure if S3 will get the same budget. I want it to, if only because of my investment in the books. Considering S2 started filming immediately after S1 aired, I think they've had a lot more time to process and apply critique for S3. On the plus side, there's so much plot in The Amber Spyglass it would be hard to have the same pacing problems. But also so many new concepts that I dread the exposition dumps.

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robin-blogs · 3 years

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10.02.2021 – Wednesday Lecture, Keira Greene

This week’s Wednesday lecture as about a filming artist Keira Greene. When the lecture first started, she showed a film interview she did with another artist Anna Halprin who focuses on performative and dance-based artwork. The interviews filming consisted of a series of both still images and brief shots of nature and the area she worked. Each shot was filmed in the same aspect ratio and all the nature// landscape shots didn’t have any clear focal points or areas of interest; it was more as if the full image itself acted as the main point of interest. Although there were also other filmic shots such as Halprin dancing on a stage as the camera focused solely on the movement of her feet as she dances from left to right until the shot ended. I found this choice of shot and movement to be visually interesting when compared and contrasted to the still images of nature that would become before and after it. I additionally found the decision of having a mix of still images and small filmic shots to add more to the concept of the interview. It also made me think about the details of Greene talking to Halprin as the stillness of the visuals made me think more into the conversation whereas if the filmic side of the interview consisted of constantly moving and dynamic imagery it would have taken some of my focus away from the actual interview. There was a quote I took rom the interview that really stuck with me in which Halprin said: “The wind reminded us of the feeling of our own breath, the clouds passing over the sun reminded us of shadow and light and how to move from shadow to light and also how shadow and light moves in psyche”. I personally found this quote to be inspiring as it reminded me of my own experiences, especially throughout lockdown. I have barely gone outside if at all during lockdown, so the brief times ill open a window or let my cat outside, ill catch a cool crisp breath of fresh air and it reminds me of how beautiful the outside really is. Considering my bedroom is in the attic of my house, I have windows that look out from the roof and as a result the only thing I see consistently every day is the clouds and the sky, along with the stars that follow them when the sun sets. I’ve started to develop a fear of being outside from my anxiety as I feel like Ill be punished or shouted at for simply being outside even though we are still allowed to go outside to exercise once per day. I just feel scared of associating with the outside and I prefer to stay inside where I know I won’t be shouted at and where I can stay comfortable and isolated. Even as I’m writing this, I have a clear view of the sky, and it’s a sight I’ve come to find gives me a lot of comfort. I have started to keep my blinds open of a night too so I can slowly see the stars appear in the sky each night. The smell of fresh air reminds me that its good to be outside, how refreshing it is to feel cool air on your face and see the shadows and lights pass throughout the clouds in the sky. Although I didn’t relate personally or with my practice when considering the performance and interview aspect of this video, I did however connect with that one quote and how I found it to truly resonate with me and my experiences during lockdown.

After showing this interview Greene then shoed another video which was another performative piece. Although, differently to the interview, this video didn’t have any speech behind it and it instead had subtitles running throughout it. I found this to be an interesting contrast when compared to the format of the interview. Although some things about the choice of presentation remained the same, for example there was still a mix of both still images and filmic// performative clips throughout. There were also a range of key differences too such as the audio of this video being less consistent and almost non-existent in some areas. I decided to re-watch this video after the lecture as when I first watched it I didn’t fully understand what was happening or what it was for. After watching through it a second time I started to realise in my own way that it was commenting on the flow of life and what its like to be human. The video also showed a woman ((who I assumed to be Greene)) doing a performative piece by contorting her body around on the floor in segments in between shots. Overall, I didn’t find myself enjoying or engaging with this piece as much as I did with the interview. I found it intriguing to see how Greene decided to present this piece in contrast with the interview, but overall I didn’t find I connecting with me and after a while of reading/ watching it I found myself becoming more and more disinterested and disconnected. Overall, I feel as If I enjoyed the ideas behind Greene’s work, although I ended up becoming largely disinterested when it came to the end. But her work around performance has made me have more respect for those who choose to go down the route of performance art, as after her second video she then showed the process and planning behind the piece, which I found to be incredibly interesting as I never see the innerworkings of performance pieces; specially those I have seen as a result of the lectures. As a result of this I found Greene’s work around performance art to be more engaging as she is the first performative artist, I have seen show her workings behind the piece. I feel this is one of the main reasons I have come to find a disliking of performance art for its deliberate oddness and confusion. Whenever I hear artists call themselves performance artists, every time I imagine the stereotype of black and white surreal performances where people are randomly dancing without any clear meaning. This is especially solidified for me as with all of the performative pieces I have seen within the lectures have all reflected this assumption I have of performative art, with the oddly disjointed narratives and seemingly all black and white colour scheme without any true sense of colour. It makes me become very bored of performance art very quickly. I feel this is the main reason the last video in particular of Greene’s fell very flat for me, because it just seemed to repeat the same core themes and ideas I have around performance art, and I suppose art of me flat disappointed not to see something new and different.

Overall, I found this week’s Wednesday Lecture to be interesting, although I didn’t end up feeling fully engaged when it came to the conclusion of the lecture. I hope the next performative artist I see within one of the lectures does something new with the medium of performance art, or at least brings some colour to the art form.

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vileart · 7 years

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A Girl and a Dramaturgy: Louise Orwin @ Edfringe 2017

A Girl & A Gun by Louise Orwin

Venue: Summerhall, Anatomy Lecture Theatre, Venue 26

Dates: 2-27 Aug (not 3, 7, 14, 21)

Time: 18.00 (70 mins)

What was the inspiration for A Girl & A Gun?

I started researching the basis of the show, when I began re-thinking Godard’s famous statement: ‘All you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun.’ I’ve always been a massive fan of film, and the French new wave in particular, but as my politics developed I began to wonder exactly what it was that Godard was saying when he uttered those words. I felt like there was perhaps a clue in those words as to who he was making film for (spoiler

alert: MAN). Thinking about the male gaze in cinema is nothing new- I am fanatic about Laura Mulvey’s work on this topic, but at this point in time I began to really think about my own appetite for these kind of images as a reasonably well-informed, politically engaged young woman.

At the same time as pondering these ideas a few other things happened. Beyonce released her music video for ‘Videophone’ featuring her and Lady Gaga scantily-clad bearing multi-coloured guns as props; I watched Springbreakers and the scene where two teenage girls lie on a bed surrounded by guns and using them a sexual props stuck with me; and I came across the work of B-movie mogul Andy Sidaris, who essentially makes low-grade Bond-esque action films which always star playboy bunnies running around with guns. I kept thinking about the references to guns in each of these contexts, how the images were stuck in my head, how they all elicited different reactions from me (but overwhelming a mix of being reviled and attracted at the same time), I wondered about the economy of power when a woman in a bikini holds a gun (is it/can it ever be empowering), I wondered who these images were for. I then started thinking about my own appetite for these kind of images, perhaps starting to realise that it was an appetite that had started at quite a young age.

Realizing that there was something almost unconscious about my response to these kind of films, I decided I wanted to make a show that interrogated the allure of the image of the girl and the gun on film, and interrogated how deeply embedded these kind of films can become in our psyches.

Is performance still a good space for the public discussion of ideas?

Yes. I mean, I hope so. If it’s not, I’ll stop what I’m doing right now…. But, honestly, it is absolutely my belief that performance is one of the best arenas to tackle big issues. We live in a confusing world, I believe, now more than ever. With its half-read, click-bait, list-icles, and its ever-increasing platforms for political discussion, speech and demonstration, its fake news and its echo chambers. I think its hard to find spaces to really chew over ideas, to consider the grey areas, to ask the difficult, big questions. I think theatre and performance spaces are brilliant for doing just that. If done right, they can provide an hour long meditation for audiences to consider topics and issues in all their complexity. And crucially, they can do this in very different means to the mediums we are used to, which I believe can help people understand issues in different lights.

In my work, I use ambiguity as a driving force to help open up, and grease discussion for topics that irk me, or anger me, or confuse me. I dislike being preached to, and I think many people feel the same. In my mind, ambiguity can activate an audience- keeps them alive with questions, and thus part of the conversation. That’s not to say that I don’t have strong opinions, but often the work I make covers a topic where there isn’t black or white. I want to make work that provokes discussion and debate, that keeps you thinking, or keeps coming back to you, niggling at you long after you’ve left the theatre.

How did you first become interested in making performance?

I did a BA in Drama and English at Bristol which had a real emphasis on avant-garde work and film/mixed media performance which has undoubtedly had a huge impact on my work, but it was only after graduating from my MA in Performance Research from RCSSD in 2011 that I began working as a solo artist. My MA was basically a research-led course, so I spent a year in a studio banging my head against a wall trying to figure out what my practice was, and lo and behold a year later I emerged a fully-formed practitioner. Which is obviously a complete lie- it was when I graduated that’s when the real work began. But that year set me in really good stead for asking difficult questions about my practice, and the work I wanted to make. I remember a course tutor saying to us: ‘what’s that thing that itches at you? The thing that won’t go away no matter how hard you scratch at it?’ I find that’s where the good work always is- it’s a problem waiting to be worked out, worked through. And there’s a good chance that if it’s itching so much at you, its probably itching at other people as well. I guess it’s there that I realized that I had really specific things I wanted to itch at, and that it felt like performance was the only way I was going to get at them.

Is there any particular approach you took to the making of the show?

This show was quite interesting for me in terms of process, because the concept or conceit of the show (whereby the show is performed by me and a new male performer every night, reading our lines and following stage directions from a live autocue) came quite early on in the process. This meant that the show became quite fixed in its development early on. With other shows I tend to have a really long research and development phase, followed by a phase of making and writing where I let myself create without restriction, without fear of it being shit- I just produce and produce and produce. And then after this the editing phase happens. With this show, I knew I had certain things that needed to happen when I was writing: I knew that the male part needed a specific arc of narrative or development, I knew that I needed to take into account the fact that there are constantly two cameras on stage, I knew that my role on stage would have to be performer, but also stage manager, and so on.

It was also the first time I’d ever written a film script- which was interesting and fun, and a very different challenge. My work is always very visual, so I’m quite used to story-boarding my work anyway, but this was a whole new kettle of fish.

Technically, it was quite a difficult script to write. Although I could plan for my scenes, as the character of ‘Him’ is played every night by someone who hasn’t seen the script before, it was a balancing act between trying to be as clear and demonstrative as possible for that person, while still staying true to the ‘experiment’ of having an unprepared performer on stage with me. Not knowing quite what this performer will do, or how they will perform their role is exciting, but you still need to make sure that the show holds together as much as possible.

Does the show fit with the style of your other productions?

Yes, there are definitely elements in it which I think are very ‘Louise Orwin ™’ – its use of mixed-media on stage, its participatory engagement, its tone which is playful and possibly slightly threatening at the same time, its willingness to provoke an audience in dark and surprising ways. But the format is probably something which is very different to other shows of mine too. Plus it’s the first time I’ve assumed an actual ‘character’.

When I’m on stage I’m normally playing some heightened version of myself, I call her ‘Louise in inverted commas’. The role I play in this, ‘Her’, is like a development of that- she is very campy with her Southern Belle accent, and her cherry stalk twirling and her flirtatious gestures, but in other ways she is also just an extension of myself. She is the femme fatale character I wanted to grow up to be as a child, she is everything I love and hate about hyper-femininity, and in this way she is everything I feel about my own femininity made physical, visible on stage.

I like to play with audience perception of myself, and so there are moments when this character might slip- but the audience will struggle to identify whether this slippage is real or another part of the production. I like to keep my audiences guessing, keep them alive in the experience. If you give them everything, with no work of their own to do, you might as well just let them sleep through the show and deliver them a FAQ after.

What do you hope that the audience will experience?

People often leave the auditorium feeling like they’ve been ‘part of something’. I think the device of using an unprepared performer on stage can make the audience feel as if they are watching one of their own up there. There is always laughter, and also a few tears. I’ve had women come up to me and tell me that the show spoke to them about how they seem themselves in society, or about struggling with past abusive relationships. I’ve had young men come up to me and tell me that they’ll never be able to watch their favourite films in the same way again.

There are loads of hidden references all over the script and staging to popular cinema which makes the show feel super familiar to audiences- people have come up to me afterwards asking me if parts of the script are directly lifted from films, but its all original. This was a deliberate choice to give my audiences a feel of the uncanny whilst they’re watching, in the hope that this may help they see anew.

I’m really excited to bring the show to Edinburgh too, with its plethora of performers (fresh meat!) and its saturation, and excitement, and its jaded audiences. I’m wondering how the show will develop and change each night, and how it might change doing the show for such a long time too.

vimeo

A Girl and A Gun Trailer from Louise Orwin on Vimeo. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Times} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Times; min-height: 14.0px} p.p3 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Tahoma} p.p4 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Tahoma; min-height: 14.0px} span.s1 {font: 12.0px Times} from the vileblog http://ift.tt/2uvsrxo

#Theatre #Blogger #visual art #Edinburgh Fringe #Experimental Critique

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markcira · 7 years

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1. Silence

Directed by Martin Scorsese

Once in a blue moon, you will have a major studio film that asks inscrutable questions, enveloping its answers into intangible moments that don’t sing or scream but quietly stare into you, begging to ask even more questions.

The last studio picture that comes to mind was Terrence Malick’s Tree of Life. That was nearly five years ago. Today we have Martin Scorsese’s Silence. Both took over a quarter of a century to come into fruition, both offer the monumental prospects of seasoned directors fighting into their twilight years, and both happen to surround themselves with the questions around God.

God as Man is a repeated theme in Scorsese’s work, whether it’s Jordan Belfort being worshipped by his league of greedy young “pond scum” in The Wolf of Wall Street or Howard Hughes soaring through the Heavens in The Aviator or Jake LaMotta being crucified in the ring in Raging Bull.

But the subject around the responsibility of being God is never quite deliberated like it is through Andrew Garfield’s character of Father Rodrigues in Silence. A man who, despite being stripped away of everything he is, remains somehow intact.

Silence is essentially Scorsese also stripped away of the aesthetic panache to which he’s built his cult following around. No frenetic cuts, no colourful or outlandish characters, no offbeat visual trademarks, and no inundation of sound design.

With the exception of the subject matter and first person voiceover, this film feels distinctly un-Scorsese.

When going to camera for the film, Scorsese's cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto spoke of this minimalism:

“From the beginning, we talked about the restraints in terms of shooting. Marty is known for his elaborate cinematic language; designing complex shots comes naturally to him. He felt this story required a simpler language.”

What strikes me the most about Silence is its quiet sensibility of a bygone era of cinema, where directors didn’t draw roadmaps for you (even this year’s brilliant Toni Erdmann and The Salesman are comparatively perspicuous in their morality), when moments could breathe and where characters are truly challenged as is their audience. This confidence (or is it arrogance?) is markedly absent in filmmaking today.

It was this calm, rational style which distinguished Japanese cinema from the overly expressive European and North American cinema around the same time.

While American and European directors (sans Bergman or Dreyer) like Ophüls and Wilder were compelled to cram as much dialogue and camera trickery into a single frame, Mizoguchi and Ozu were producing films built on a type of objective minimalism.

This trend continued. American films became louder and commanded the senses with ostentatious authority. In 1993, after Scorsese sent a cut of Age of Innocence to Akira Kurosawa upon completion, Kurosawa wrote back:

“I must caution you. I must admonish you on the use of music. Like all Hollywood films, you’re using music too much.”

Silence is not only a letter back to the long-passed Master of Japanese cinema, possessing almost no music throughout, it is a love letter to all of Japanese cinema.

It bears the fingerprints of other past masters: the obsession over the perfect Ozu master shots, the Mizoguchian use of dissipating mist, the jump cuts from medium to close-ups that Kurosawa famously employed, the quizzical and unwavering focus of lower-class society Imamura longed for, the haunting tall reeds that shroud the close-ups in Shindo’s Onibaba, the explicit criticism of militaristic tyranny within Masaki Kobayashi’s work and of course the brutal slaughtering confined brilliantly within the wide 2:35 frames of Masahiro Shinoda, the director who first adapted Silence in 1971.

It is Scorsese as something he is not, adopting the style and etiquette of a far off land and bringing it into the West in hopes of transforming a few people.

One might argue that this film is at conflict with itself in that its form is of the East, but its story is of the West. But that would be a gross injustice to the nature of the film because in the same breath, you find the echoes of brilliant compositions found in John Ford’s The Searchers.

Also found throughout are the intimate moments between Garrpe and Rodrigues which mirror those of John Wayne and Montgomery Cliff in the seminal Red River by Howard Hawks, a film about a pilgrimage of its own.

One scene has Father Rodrigues and Garrpe escaping the confines of their cabin, a safe haven, only to find sight of yes that’s right, a Hawk floating effortlessly in the sky. They refer to him as a sign of “God,” just as Kurosawa spotted the Westerns of America and later openly worshipped John Ford.

This fostering of the Western approach to cinema polarized directors within Japan. By the 1970s, directors like Oshima criticized Kurosawa, “That Kurosawa had brought Japanese film to a Western audience meant that he must be pandering to Western values and politics.” (Wild, 80).

Was there a dissolution, a watering down of one’s true Japanese identity by pairing the two styles?

The freedom to worship is at the root of this story and I think is the reason why this film will resonate for many years to come. It’s been hundreds of years since the Japanese forced their Christian converts to silence and apostasy. But has much changed?

Just this past week, we’ve been subject to zealous anti-immigration laws that force newcomers to disavow their faith if they want to live peacefully within the United States and a white supremacist who opened fire at a Mosque in Quebec.

Remaining silent in the name of religious prosecution is a mainstay for any Draconian establishment to wield power. It’s how Inoue (Issei Ogata) keeps civil obedience in his villages. He just asks that they “step on their Jesus," ensuring them that it's a mere “formality.” That is unless they want to be hung upside down and bled out.

Intolerance is the common quality to any major power’s treatment of their adversaries. It is how they justify censorship or worse, the execution of the infidel.

This is why Silence is important to me. Within its narrative, you don’t find a regaling thesis on colonialism, but rather a story that wrestles with the ideas of tolerance, mercy and acceptance.

The schism of beliefs studied in the film are beautifully married, rendering any distinction between the styles indistinguishable. One doesn’t know who Scorsese is lifting his values from. Is it the spiritual conquest of a Rossellini film or an exercise in the masochism which predominates the work of Oshima?

After watching it for the third time, someone told me, “It’s like a conversation between Jesus and the Buddha.”

Or maybe a disagreement. Whatever the case, the conversation can exist and film can offer an open dialogue between two variant philosophies, while respecting both.

Despite Inoue’s horrendous accounts of murder and torture, Scorsese’s portrayal of this “smiling Buddha” dictator begs us to empathize with his cause and despite Rodrigues’ selfless martyrdom, asks us if it’s truly as magnanimous as it appears.

Nothing in Silence is as it appears.

There’s an unparalleled sensitivity to this work in its performances, its pace, its camerawork, even its lighting. I’d like to rhapsodize for one moment about just how subtle and nuanced Prieto’s cinematography is in this film. Watch the eye-lights in the characters eyes throughout the film. Watch how masterfully Prieto isolates one eye from another by simply blocking the light or how he makes them gleam and shine when Rodrigues cries amidst the burning bodies.

These subdued and deliberate choices is evidence of a master in full stride who, despite his self-imposed limitations, is but redefining his visual flare in the minutiae.

The performances of Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver are tremendous in their quietness. Starved of faith and food, they delicately portray these Jesuit priests with the cadence of a Handel concerto and their expressive eyes are something out of a Goya painting.

These are not the “oscar-bait” performances famous for forcing sympathy from their viewers. In fact, this story makes difficult any sympathy given their mission. Liam Neeson’s twenty minutes of screen-time could be the very best performance of the year. It’s chilling, deceptive and utterly convincing.

Given the moral ambiguity of the piece, its operatic pace, its asking to sympathize with colonial forces, and its conception of God, it comes to no surprise to me that it took Scorsese 28 years to produce and it comes as even less of a surprise that its having troubles finding its audience.

As the third act closes, Rodrigues’ hopeless pilgrimage prophetically mirrors Scorsese’s own at this juncture in his filmmaking career.

Does the audience want to accept his Gospel of “true cinema”? Has cinema been polluted over years, travelling further and further from “pure cinema”? Can younger generations flourish in this “poisoned soil” of blockbusters and sequels? Or is it all a narcissistic endeavour, an imposition of his “truth” in a world that seems to have already found it?

Just when we think we have the answer within the chambers of Rodrigues’ starved mind, the fog delicately dances into frame and all that’s left is the deafening burden of silence. Cut to black.

But then…some crickets.

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