five senses Archives - Jeremy C. Processing

Artists / Directors – Barney Steel, Ersin Han Ersin, Robin McNicholas – 2026 – UK – 25m

*****

A sensory experience centred around a moving image of the Thames as part of the global water network based on data sets – installation at St. Martin-in-the-Fields crypt 12:30-21:00 hours from Saturday, October 3rd to Sunday, October 18th as part of the London Film Festival’s LFF Expanded strand

A little waiting area shows a series of hand-crafted hangings by artist Elena Landinez showing various river tributaries before you enter the experience space proper. Before entering that space, you are alerted to the fact that the experience includes a total blackout section, also that there are pottery vessels handmade by ceramicist Ludmilla Balkis inside the space for you to take containing water that was cloud some two weeks ago, from which you can drink. Seating is mostly bean bags on the floor, and a single row of conventional seating at the back.

So I’m sitting on a seat at the back – or is it the back? – not really knowing what to expect. The lights go down: total blackout. All around me, sounds. (These started, I think, before the blackout, as if little rivulets of water were running somewhere.)… Read the rest

Perfect Sense

Director – David Mackenzie – 2011 – UK – Cert. 15 – 92m

*****

Love story set in a pandemic captures something of the emotions felt during the 2020 COVID-19 crisis, when this review was written (one of the first to appear on this then fledgeling site) – streaming on the Arrow Channel from Friday, March 24th to Sunday, April 30th 2023

Glasgow, Scotland. Michael (Ewan McGregor) is a chef. He likes to sleep alone, so if he takes a woman to bed, he’ll turf her out afterwards to get back his space. That changes when he meets Susan (Eva Green), who then does the same thing to him. And yet, there’s something between them. They’re drawn to one another. A relationship ensues.

Which might sound like just another boy meets girl movie, but Perfect Sense is different. Behind the foreground of walking along river banks and sleeping together lies a very different backdrop. Susan is an epidemiologist at a local hospital. A man has lost his sense of smell and is kept in isolation. There are other cases all over the country. Suddenly, people are being overwhelmed with grief and losing their sense of smell. Some time later, they eat ravenously then lose their sense of taste.… Read the rest