Ennio Morricone Archives - Jeremy C. Processing

Director – Jalmari Helander – 2022 – Finland – Cert. 15 – 91m

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A gold miner taking time out from WW2 must get past a Nazi unit in the Lapland wilderness in order to deposit his gold at the bank – entertaining but violent gorefest is out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 26th

1944. Lapland. A man (Jorma Tommila from director Helander’s Big Game, 2014; Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale, 2010) has withdrawn from the war to search for gold in the wilderness. The retreating German army, meanwhile, is pursuing a ‘scorched earth’ policy, destroying everything in its path. The man digs. He finds a rich seam of gold. He fills his saddlebags. Now all he has to do is get them to the nearest bank in the nearest town.

He sets off with his horse and his dog. Between him and his destination is a Nazi unit with a ruthless, sadistic commander (Aksel Hennie from The Middle Man, Bent Hamer, 2021, The Martian, Ridley Scott, 2015; Pioneer, Erik Skjoldbjærg, 2013; Headhunters, Morten Tyldum, 2011), a tank and two lorries carrying German infantry and Finnish women prisoners respectively.

All this takes place in a world where everyone, Finns and Germans, speak English.… Read the rest

Ennio: The Maestro
(Ennio)

Director – Giuseppe Tornatore – 2021 – Italy – Cert. 15 – 156m

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Documentary Ennio: The Maestro looks at the career of Italian film composer Ennio Morricone – out in cinemas on Friday, April 22nd

It’s difficult to know where to start with Ennio Morricone, whose career in film music covers some 70 years. Tornatore adopts the chronological approach, starting with his early life. The composer’s father was a trumpeter who pushed young Ennio to learn that same instrument, leading to entry into Rome’s Santa Cecilia Conservatory where he studied both trumpet and composition. His father had raised him with a strong work ethic – using the trumpet to feed your family – and much of his early work was as a trumpeter on movie soundtrack sessions, including Othello (Orson Welles, 1951).

His wife secured him a brief stint at TV channel RAI where she was working, but on being told that he wouldn’t be able to perform anything recorded there anywhere else, Morricone quit almost immediately. Inspired by seeing experimental composer John Cage perform live, he formed the Nuovo Consonanza Improvisation Group to experiment with what he called “traumatic sounds”. This approach would inform a number of his later soundtracks.… Read the rest