This is Not a Prometheus Thinkpiece

I’m enjoying reading all these Prometheus thinkpieces. (Indiewire collected some of the more notable ones here.) In a way, I’m getting more out of those pieces than I did out of Prometheus itself. Not to say I didn't like the film -- I did. But going in I was told to expect a Big Idea movie, that if I went in anticipating an Alien flick I might be let down – the way that had I gone into Blade Runner expecting a kick-ass Harrison Ford sci-fi movie, say, I might have been similarly disappointed 30 years ago. That the last thing I should expect from Prometheus was Alien 5. Except that what Prometheus presented me with was exactly that. And not in a bad way.

Thinking of England: "World Garden" and the Films of the British Council

World Garden (1941) from British Council Film Archive on Vimeo.

“They come to Kew in early Spring when yellow daffodils bring thoughts of Summer sunshine. They come to Kew in the bright light of May, when the cherry blossom is falling.”

My pal Faisal Qureshi passed this along. It’s a lovely, short, glorious color journey through Kew Gardens directed by Robin Carruthers and shot by the great Geoffrey Unsworth (2001: A Space Odyssey, Cabaret). The cinematography, as you might imagine, is marvelously textured, taking full advantage of Technicolor’s vibrancy and depth. Needless to say, it’s not exactly the kind of thing we think of nowadays when we say “documentary.” It’s more like a non-fiction fantasy of Kew Gardens, a brief little daydream made all the more poignant by the fact that it’s dated 1941.