The Long Day Closes

"The Long Day Closes" is one of the stranger films I've ever seen. In many ways, it's a lovely and highly artistic film. But, sadly, it's also pretty much plotless (at least in the traditional sense) and dull. In other words, it's an artsy film that the average viewer will hate but 'smart' people will adore. The story is like looking into an adult's mind and pulling out pieces of their childhood. The pieces are not always connected and mostly show snippets of the child's life during a short period of time...and it's all set to an ever-present sound track...almost like a music video. If you want a plot, connections between scenes and a fast (or even normal) pace, try another film. While it looks almost like poetry put to life, the story is also amazingly lifeless and uninvolving.

This is among the ten best films I have seen of childhood and of life in a family. Admittedly, the father is missing - one might say, mercifully - but this film shows the tenderness and humanity among the mother and children tenderly and, surprisingly, joyfully. The mother is the centre of the piece and superbly portrayed. For those who want a vision of childhood, not romanticized, this is as good as it can get.

My one-line summary might seem to limit one's approach to Terence Davies' magnificent meditation; however, I stand by my assessment: this is the richest (visually and emotionally) and most rewarding cinematic rumination on awakening self-awareness that English-speakers currently have. Though highly personal, there's more here in a single sequence on the loneliness and isolation of realizing and growing into one's queerness, one's affinity with a particular bent of art and aesthetics than the entire oevre of Peter Greenaway. Like Jarman, but at once both more poetic and passionate, The Long Day Closes is non-linear, meant to be savored one aching moment at a time.

A stunning exercise in pure cinema. This is the third and final part of his autobiographical Childhood Trilogy. He uses very a very stylized presentation of snippets of memory (Proust-like) overlaid with snips of movie soundtracks and songs to evoke the emotional content of coming to terms with himself in a loving family (at last). If you have seen Visions of Light, this is what it was all about. There is not a wasted frame in this film. Beautifully conceived jump shots, sound over lays and an overhead tracking jump shot that is simply amazing. If you a looking for a plot line or "story telling" you will not find it here. If you are looking for amazingly true and honest cinema that is like moving frames of Vermeer, this is for you.

A sad and lonely boy, Bud (Leigh McCormack) struggles through his days. With cinema as his main source of solace, he haunts the local movie-house. All the while, his family looms large in our peripheral vision as do the menacing bullies of his school, but Bud is the center of attention both from the camera's angle and from his doting family. This is a love letter to film, with plenty of classic film references and an endless soundtrack of classic music. The story itself is not important, other than for us to realize that movies offer us an escape no matter how dreary our lives may be. Most of us, thankfully, do not live as sad an existence as Bud. But most of us love movies to a greater or lesser degree and have a favorite that we can dive into when times are bad.