Week Four
21st -27th January 2019
I started this week with a bunch of horny teenagers and ended it with a couple in their 40s desperate to have a baby. It was an interesting contrast.
I also got in gear to tick off all the films that won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay with a credited female writer. I’m lucky that I’ve seen 5/8 so I only needed to see The Seventh Veil, Interrupted Melody, and Coming Home. And now, The Favourite.
Also this week on twitter, writer/director Oonagh Kearney has sparked off a remote film club watching the work of Early 20th Century Female Directors.
You can join the Watching Women 2019 facebook group if you want to know more about the film club – our first film is The Hitch-Hiker and we’re discussing in the group at 9.30pm (GMT) on the 30th January 2019.
You can find me on twitter @lisaonscript
Sex Education (2019) - Series 1
Creator: Laurie Nunn
Series Directors: Kate Herron, Ben Taylor
Where I watched it: Neflix
This series owes a huge debt to 10 Things I Hate About You – which is not a bad thing.
Full of quirky supporting teen and adult characters, this “High-school” comedy-drama about a teenage sex therapist is funny, full of heart, and wonderfully diverse in terms of gender, class, and race representations. The stunning Ncuti Gatwa as Eric, comic genius Tanya Reynolds as Lily, and the ever-excellent Gillian Anderson as Jean are the standouts for me in a brilliant cast - I could listen to Asa Butterfield read the phone book.
My one sore point is Maeve – Emma Mackey gives a fine performance - but the character is more idealisation of a type than a believable human being. She’s too perfect – she needs more flaws.
Contrast that with Adam – the school bully. He is aggressive, outright violent, apparently homophobic, a bit of a stalker, and happy to cheat. BUT we also understand that he’s embracing these aspects of his personality because rather than striving for his father’s affection coming up short, he’s decided to fail big. There is more to Adam than the playground bully – I hope we get to see more of that journey.
Maeve comes from a trouble background too – but luckily she’s really, really smart. And pretty. Yeh, she might snap at you but she’ll probably apologies and forgive you for fucking up – cause at her core she’s sweet and caring. It’s not her fault she’s forced to be all brusque and cool.
Eric is definitely my favourite character – and considering the posts on social media, I’m not alone in this. He is joyous and optimistic and naïve. He has a wonderful series arch from a boy who accepts his sexuality but not his presentation of that sexuality – we see him hiding his make-up skills from his parents – to a confident, fierce-as-fuck young man who is able to stand up to Adam.
And his series arc doesn’t shy away from issues affecting LBGTQ+ teenagers but also doesn’t feel to punish him. Something happens that shakes his confidence – and he retreats. I loved that what brought him out of his funk was not the validation of his white, best-friend but opening himself up to his family and their church and finding acceptance and love there – and using that to flower. His relationship with his father is awkward but full of love and care.
This seems to be guaranteed a second series and so I look forward to see where creator Laurie Nunn takes it next.
Catastrophe (S3: Ep2-4)
Co-Creators/Writers: Sharon Horgan & Rob Delaney
Director: Ben Taylor
Where I watched it: ALL4
Enjoying this a lot more than series Two. More when I finish Series 3.
The Seventh Veil (1945)
Director: Compton Bennett
Writers: Muriel Box & Sidney Box
Where I watched it: ALL4
This was the first film with a credited female writer to win the Oscar for the Best Original Screenplay.
It’s very of its time and the gender politics are a bit all over the place - it claims to be a psychological drama but descended into romantic melodrama at the end - who will she pick? Look, we’ve all read Twilight, the story of a timid girl with lots of men after her is usually a winner.
And ultimately (spoiler) she chooses the man who has controlled her since she was a teenager - because he finally expresses a little kindness.
Eyeroll.
Except - he’s also the only one of the three who really appreciates her career as a concert pianist and wants that to continue.
Muriel Box went on to direct her own films - and set-up her own feminist publishing company. Maybe I’m reading too much into The Seventh Veil but I think there is the the whisper of that feminist voice in this film - a recognition of how hard it is to be a creative woman.
It’s also interesting that Box never had children herself and motherhood is completely absent from this film. Romantic love and a creative fulfilment are the only important factors in the central character’s life: the fear of losing her career drives her to attempt suicide, while finding a way to combine both love and art brings her back from the edge.
Shame she’s so passive and needs a clever (male) doctor to guide her there.
Also super creepy the idea of marrying the man who raised you from the age of 14.
Like I said - a whisper of feminist, a whisper.
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (S4:E11)
Show-Runners: Aline Brosh-McKenna & Rachel Bloom
Episode Director: Erin Ehrlich
Episode Writer: Michael Hitchcock
Where I watched it: Netflix
Oh, I loved this episode. And if you love romantic comedies and meta-examinations of the tropes of those romantic comedies, you will enjoy this too.
And yay – seems like they are closing of Nathaniel as a potential End-game match for Rebecca. I am still #teamgreg.
Private Lives (2018)
Written & Directed by Tamara Jenkins
Where I watched it: Netflix
There’s a weird dissonance when you’re trying to watch a film about a couple struggling with infertility and you have to stop every 20 minutes to try and settle your 3-year-old who finds sleep boring.
I’ve never faced this issue personally but the depiction feels real - the strain that is put on a loving marriage by the pursuit of something that feels essential to its protagonists but appears unachievable. Hahn and Giamatti are excellent. This is very poignant, while still managing to find humour where it can. And Tamara Jenkins has a knack at telling stories of arty people struggling with life - without disappearing up her own arsehole.
Lovely and full of heart and pathos.
Otherwise
Just the usual Cbeebies. And Trolls. God, that child loves Trolls.
Hunted – I want the solo Essex girl to win.