Less than a week ago, I learned that the filmmaker Terence Davies was seriously ill. This came as a shock; only a week previously had I led a discussion about Distant Voices, Still Lives with students at the London Film School. Seeing the film again had been a very pleasurable reminder of his particular cinematic … Continue reading Terence Davies: A Remembrance
If I’m a little late to the wake with this tribute to Bertrand Tavernier (1941-2021), that has nothing to do with my feelings about the man or his films, and everything to do with other obligations. I’ve been pleased (and not a little surprised) to see his passing marked so widely with obituaries and remembrances, … Continue reading The Man Who Lived Movies: a Tribute to Bertrand Tavernier
When I heard, from a friend who works for Time Out, that Tony Elliott (1947-2020) had died the previous evening, I wasn’t entirely surprised; though he appeared, on the last occasion I saw him in late January, to be in reasonable health and good spirits, I knew that he’d been engaged in a grim battle … Continue reading Two or three things I know about Tony Elliott
Some hours after the announcement of the death of Agnès Varda, my friend Nick James – editor of Sight & Sound magazine – felt moved to tweet that his Twitter feed was so choked with tributes, it felt as if Varda was the Bowie of cinema. ‘Perhaps she was,’ he added. It was an intriguing … Continue reading Agnès Varda par…
I am far from the first to lament the recent loss, within a couple of days, of both Nicolas Roeg and Bernardo Bertolucci, and I certainly won’t be the last. What follows is not some sort of double obituary, but merely a brief, personal appreciation of two major filmmakers, both of whom proved to be … Continue reading Nicolas Roeg and Bernardo Bertolucci: two film greats remembered.
I’m certainly not planning to write many memorial blogs for filmmakers, but at the unexpected and very saddening news of the death of the American director Jonathan Demme, aged 73 (portrait above by Peter Hapak), I felt moved to do so. I never got to know him well or count him as a friend, but … Continue reading Jonathan Demme, Man from Long Island
I was very sad, though not surprised, to learn this morning that John Hurt had died, aged 77. I first met him twenty years ago, when I interviewed him for Time Out about his role in Love and Death on Long Island, Richard Kwietniowski’s terrific adaptation of Gilbert Adair’s novel. John’s performance in that movie … Continue reading Remembering John Hurt
This tribute was written for and first published by the BFI at http://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/comment/obituaries/geoff-andrew-remembers-abbas-kiarostami With Abbas Kiarostami and translator Massoumeh Lahidji on stage at the Marrakech Film Festival, December 2015 When I first met Abbas Kiarostami on the evening of 21 June 1999 – I know the date because it was the night before I interviewed him on … Continue reading Abbas Kiarostami: a remembrance
notes and observations by Geoff Andrew 