Movement 98

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-{ Want to go see a film? Who are Vou going to trust - patrician Barrv Norman on BBC1's Film '98 or Johnnie Vaughan's weeklv samplings from the proletariat on Channel 4's Moviewatch? Tim woodcock evaluates the viewer's right to choose... Auteurmatic tor the People With so many cultural choices we could do with the someone to sample them all for us-in the way that a King had a trusty courtier to test every morsel that might pass his lips (in case of poison). We have review programmes. And although they may be ostensibly the same -half an hour of film reviews interspersed with interviews and features-they can be profoundly different in outlook. Channel 4's Moviewatch is brash, pacy and aimed at the yoof of today. lt is a relative newcomer (although it has already notched up 100 episodes), but unlike most other shows of that description it is also intelligent and discerning. The effervescent Johnnie Vaughan is a charismatic but not over-bearing presenter. lt is broadcast at six in the eveningbefore you go out to the pub and talk endlessly, arranging to go and see some film you saw mentioned on t$e telly. You get back from the pub- it has been a long, strange night: Tuesday when you go out. Monday when you return!- the continuity announcer introduces ,,.'an quality program fr it, q r -!r 4 Top to Bottom: Moviewatch's Johnnie Vaughn; and Film '98's Uncle Barry Ar*p $ffi*{ffi# ffiffifituffiffiffi PSp RffiL$ruffi ffiffire A €L&S$ ffitr SFflffiffiRYfrom the BBC". The plodding themetune of Film 98 reassures you: here you are again almost ready for bed, whilst Uncle Barry sits in his swivel chair and harmlessly harangues about the state of cinema I like to imagine that when the recording is done Trevor MacDonald and John Geilgud pop round for a glass of sherry with him TF$AT WFXffiro WhfiH The opening credits indicatethediver- $AffiCSRmflFSG gS ffiffiF*ffi gence of approaches: Fitm e8 (n6e Fitm i/) TR€Vffiffi &*A#ffiffiru$L,ffi is much the same as it always was, sometimes the graphics are updated but the music remains. At the start of Moviewatch the uests grin into a distorting camera lens as they are introduced, "Annalise: shop manager and rock climber Passionate. Broad-minded. lmpatient!" These are the reviewers. an abnormally beautiful slice of the public who practice the underrated critical procedure of 'speaking your mind' Moviewatch is a model of simple democracy. The four panel members are sent out to the cinema and return bearing colourful numbers (marks out of ten), which are totalled to give the Recommendation of he Week. One member, ne vote. No all worthyilm short-lists. Film 98 is Barry orman. His opinion of movemsnt 14 a film is the only one given. Furthermore he is An Expert, a wise man committed to his art: someone who has sat in darkened rooms for so long that, so the rumour goes, he has rickets. Who else could sit on national television and say nonchalantly, "And as I've said before.."? Even if you take BarrY Norman The Film Expert's analysis with a generous pinch of salt it is still the dominant input; whereas Johnnie Vaughan earnestly asks his team, "Should I go and see this film?" -which after all is the crux of a review fi il-;KF Yffi greAffiTF$H programme. There is a plurality of opinions to respond to and sometimes you want to go to the flicks just to know who you agree with most; whereas Film 98 can degenerate into a one-man "smash or trash?" format. Ma Vie en Rose is a recent French film and of course has subtitles. Credit goes to both shows for reviewing it on an equal footing to the latest Hollywood offerings. lt deals with a 7 year-old boy who simply wishes he were a girl. Not an easy topic to discuss. Barry Norman glibly summarises: "...Ludo can't understand what the fuss is about, God had absent-mindedly mislaid one of his X chromosomes and sent him a Y instead. Could happen to anyone. But Ludo's parents aren't convinced and neither are the neighbours whose prejudice and homophobia soon become onlY too
apparent." This is plot synopsis rather than analysis and when we are told it is "a charming film" it seems to have " How much more refreshing to hear Ross ("medical student and people lover" ) confess his prejudices: "To be honest I wouldn't usually be a big fan of these small budget arty-house things. lt's great when you don't expect much from a film-and then it delivers and you come out and say 'Wow."' lncidentally Ma vie en Rose topped the table that week with 34 points. ls Moviewatch a dumbed-down, tarted-up version of Film 98? Possibly. The canine equivalent would be a wellgroomed Labrador and a mischievous but irresistibly cute mongrel. And I know which I prefer. But this about more than taste. Like many things it is about the use and abuse of power: the two shows represent almost perfectly two opposing approaches to knowledge. The first relies on a single knowledgeable figure (preferably male, preferably older); Wisdom and Experience are cited as justifications for their opinionated, idiosyncratic views on life. lt is easy to be persuaded as long as they are-like my Uncle Barry-charming and everpresent. Actually, I came to university expecting all my lecturers to be like that; but instead they are predominately '90s PC know-nothings-that is to say the younger and lower-paid members of staff. Talented and bright of course, but hopeless lecturers (no genuine opinions. only quotations); yet these people are far superior in tutorial discussions. They guide things along, share their expertise but do not dominate the input. Senior members of staff are. let's face it, often senile and very intimidating: therefore nobody speaks, so The Tutor does and again we are in a lecture. lf this observation is as true for teaching as it is for TV programming. the dangers are the same: intellectual authoritarianism (idiosyncratic rambling with no reference to anyone else); or, in the case of Moviewatch and its ilk, becoming a triumph of style over content. Perhaps-on second thoughts-these two are not "opposing approaches" but complimentary discourses. The problem with that is that they must co-exist in the right proportions. The questions raised by these two programs are pertinent to our faith: Who should contribute? What is the most appropriate language? And most chillingly, what happens when Barry Norman dies? E CS Lewis Oh dear it's the Evangelical Christian's Renaissance Man Tut, tut don't be so flippant. CS Lewis is much bigger than any one pigeonhole of Christianity. Anyway, we have a lot to thank Clive Staples ("Jack") Lewis for Such As? Well, there's most of his fiction. The Narnia Chronicles are some of the best known and best-loved children's fiction of modern times. Ihe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe placed #21 in Waterstone's "Best 100 Books of the Century" survey. He also wrote some pretty good science fiction and a beautiful novel around the Greek Myth of Oural and Psychg Till We Have Faces. Oh I see, we're calling the column "Celebrity Fiction Writers" now lt goes without saying that much of his fiction is rooted in a desire to imaginatively re-tell the Christian story. and for the most part he does. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is as good a representation of the Easter story as anyone could hope for, and it works because he doesn't try a literal retelling, but gets at the allegorical roots of the story. Strange, I thought you just used the "allegory" word Lewis was, after all, a tutor at Magdalen College. What attracted him to Christianity was its enduring value as an allegoryhe was eventually converted sometime after JRR Tolkien said to him that with Christianity the "Dying God" myth (ie. Balder in Norse mythology) came true. But doesn't an allegorical approach fly in the face of the literalism of so many of Lewis' followers? That's the trouble many have with Lewis'fiction. Aslan et al don't fit into a systematic theology-by-numbers, like The Christian Mother Goose. He grasped that stories work through the emotional, mythical and archetypal resonances they give, rather than some thing more concrete. Did that filter through his theology? Not really. His autobiography Surprised 8y Joy makes his conversion sound like a carefully weighted rational process. Emotional factors, such as a sense of romantic longing, only held sway when they were compartmentalised into a rational argument. This showed in his apologetical works Ah yes, his apologetics Best known work is probably Mere Christianr?y based on a series of BBC lectures he did in the 1940's. He believed that Christianity could be rationally proved, and spends the first third of the book proving it. Go on then, don't keep me in suspense Lewis felt that because people are basically moralthey know that there's right and wrong-there must be a moral law that governs our actions. And if that's the case, then there must be a higher force beyond that law. He sort of lumps from there to proving that God exists Not the most coherent of apologists, is he? He only really wrote apologetic books during the 1940's, all of which were similarly murky. He stopped apologetics altogether idue n part to a debate with Catholic philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe at a Socratic Club which he chaired. Apparently, she beat the stuffing out of him, Socratically speaking, pointing out the flaws in his "moral" proof. What solt of a bloke was he anyway? He belongs to a part of 1930's and 1940's Oxford culture, hanging out with other academics-cum-artists JRR Tolkien and Charles Williams at the Eagle and Child pub as part of a group called "The lnklings". lt was there that Lord of the Rings and Narnia got their first readings. He lived mostly with his semi-alcoholic brother Warnie. Earlier in his lifq he took care of the mother of one of his army chums for a number of years. Recent biographies have begun to speculate in earnest why he did this. What about all that romancein Shadowlands? Yes, he did get married to Joy Gresham, an American, but whether it was as mushy as that movie makes it sound is highly debatable. He was, by all accounts, a terrific misogynist. By the way. the BBC version CS Lewis Through The Shadowlands is probably far more accurate than the film version (where Joy has both sons compressed into one); it's certainly better- for one thing, Joss Ackland makes a far superior Lewis than Anthony Hopkins. Died? 22 November 1 963, the same day as President Kennedy and Aldous Huxley. Don't bother - someone else already wrote a book about them talking together in limbo. i:1 Tim Woodcock is a student in Glasgow and a member of the Movement Editorial Board His legacy? Mostly purchased by an American evangelical seminary, Wheaton College. His theological and apologetic works are still read by people, but it's through his fictional worlds that people can really come to an understanding of the God he tried to all-too-rationally prove. movgmont 1b
Page 1 and 2: fnovefnent I I I I ll ,] I' il I I
Page 3 and 4: It's time to get our Vour hairshirt
Page 5 and 6: Cutting The Crap in Edinburgh lI /A
Page 7 and 8: that not everything about my icon w
Page 9 and 10: The question of gay and lesbian cle
Page 11 and 12: Hope Has Two Daughters \ A /:li; i'
Page 13 and 14: interesting because here in lreland
Page 15: Virtual Relationships a I ir l R V
Page 19 and 20: a writer you never can go back." Bu
Page 21 and 22: Tim Woodcock reviews Elvis Costello
Page 23 and 24: The writer of Judge Dredd and a bun
Page 25 and 26: Rosie Mifes on the collection of wr
Page 27 and 28: t lll!8stq$F ffiij'' " "' ri. $' af

Movement 98

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