The Long Day Closes
1992 Directed by Terence Davies
Synopsis
The story of eleven-year-old Bud, a sad and lonely boy. 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.
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Is there a British director who is as similarly talented yet as ignored as Terence Davies? His films present memories, some complete, others fractured, all wrapped in song and the lyrical sounds of Liverpool. He eschews the stylistic confines of social realism for something arguably more complex and abstract, the result being more similar to a symphony built up of layer upon layer of 40/50s music hall songs and singalongs.
The overall effect is extraordinary and distinctive, an individual hymn to a bygone era of Liverpudlian tenements, pubs and sometimes fraught family gatherings. No-one else captures this life and this city quite like him.
The dreamlike, episodic structure feels bewildering at first as threads and memories are picked at, left…
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The production values of The Long Day Closes are stunning. Michael Coulter’s cinematography practically caresses the screen with meticulously composed images of light, shadow, and fluid camera movements. The impressionistic narrative would like nothing more than to breathe into these sounds and images the epic memories Proust summoned from tea and a madeleine. But the end result is little more than a glorified scrapbook. Read the rest of my DCist review here.
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Terence Davies. Wow. Beautiful.
An atmospheric collection of childhood memories in Liverpool in the mid-50s. I am assuming they are the directors own. Poor kid. Whilst I accept the dreamlike qualities of the construction I still expected some form of narrative device to tie everything together. My expectations were not met, which in some ways makes the film even more memorable, if not better, and I'm left wondering, really, what was this film really about?
It's a crime that this and Davies other works are not more widely known. -
Some beautiful moments but sadly not for me.
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This is no ordinary film, but a time machine of sorts. The film blends real, imagined and cinematic memories and invites me to add mine into the mix. No, not invites, but takes me by the hand and says, we're going back. Then it asks, "You’ve experienced this in some way, yes? What here is familiar to you? Do you remember when?" The unhurried vignettes are a jumping off point for self reflection. I believe every time I watch The Long Day Closes, I will have a different experience. Whatever is on my mind before sitting down, will affect what I think about as the songs and images play over me. It’s that personal. Had I been listening to Pink…
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64/100
I need to take another look at this in a couple of years, now that I understand what it was shooting for. Part of the reason it didn't grab me first time through is I'm naturally resistant to this hazy, poetic, non-narrative approach to nostalgic childhood (see also, The Tree of Life - though at least this doesn't have the overbearing voice-over, hence I like this one better) because it doesn't resonate with how I remember my childhood at all. I don't mean in the details, obviously, but the actual form that my memories take today. They are short and completely lucid - if anything, time has stripped away the fat of imagination and I'm left with clear images…
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The only other film I've watched that feels so dreamy, floating like a collection of memories is Time Regained and that one lacks the intimacy that The Long Day Closes possesses (naturally, since this is autobiographical any way).
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The still life credits fading into the 20th Century Fox theme over a brick wall captures the film in a snapshot. Realism made lyrical, then finally cinematic.
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Is there a British director who is as similarly talented yet as ignored as Terence Davies? His films present memories, some complete, others fractured, all wrapped in song and the lyrical sounds of Liverpool. He eschews the stylistic confines of social realism for something arguably more complex and abstract, the result being more similar to a symphony built up of layer upon layer of 40/50s music hall songs and singalongs.
The overall effect is extraordinary and distinctive, an individual hymn to a bygone era of Liverpudlian tenements, pubs and sometimes fraught family gatherings. No-one else captures this life and this city quite like him.
The dreamlike, episodic structure feels bewildering at first as threads and memories are picked at, left…
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"Beautiful imagery, interesting visual effects, and I so wanted to like this story of a lonely boy who loses himself in the world of cinema .... but it didn't engage me and I was left wondering what on earth it was all about. It was almost as if I had been watching the film through all the rainstorms that featured in the film - I couldn't quite 'see' the film. Perhaps it is one to watch again, with a glass of wine in hand and a friend to talk to it about?"