Wetherby Pond

They can't sustain it on the present diet of celebrity gossip and puff pieces - they'll run out of material by issue three!

The basic problem is that I never really got a sense of what it thought its target audience was. I mean, whatever you think of Empire, Total Film or Sight & Sound, it's obvious from more or less every page who they're aimed at, and I think all three mags do a very good job of catering for their respective audiences.

But who's going to buy a mag dedicated almost entirely to present-day British films? There aren't enough being made to sustain an issue every month (or at least not enough worth covering), and unless they start shelling out money on decent writers who can produce something more substantial than rewritten press releases, fawning 'Hello!'-style profiles and "reviews" which don't adopt any critical perspective (the current editorial line seems to be "if it's British, it's automatically wonderful, so a mere description will suffice"), I think it'll be lucky to last beyond the end of the year.

It's a pity, as I wished it well on principle (enough to actually buy a copy), but it's got to develop a far stronger identity if it's to stand a chance of survival.

Jennie_Kermode

Hmm. I thought as much when I saw the name 'Barry Norman' so prominently displayed in the advert. I guess they're playing it safe, but that doesn't seem a likely winning strategy. British film is a difficult thing to market in this kind of exclusive form in any case, because a lot of people will perceive it as snobbish and inherently austere. The people to whom it does appeal would seem unlikely to be those attracted by this kind of glossy celebrity-cover format.

To my mind, more success might be had with a publication which focused _mostly_ on British film but didn't market itself too heavily that way, and which featured the sort of writing more likely to create controversy. To succeed in such a difficult market, a new magazine needs to grab people's attention. It won't do that by looking just like everything else. It needs to get itself talked about. It needs an edge, and I don't see that here.

Jennie

sanndevil

Yes, mind you I suspect that by issue 4 the qualification instead of being "Made in Britain" will be "exhibited in Britain"

Wetherby Pond

That's pretty much spot on. I've already complained about the lack of a historical perspective, but you're right that there's also a lack of any international perspective.

Some of the most passionate British film buffs in the world are people like Bertrand Tavernier (who was Ken Loach's French publicist before he turned director) and Martin Scorsese (who is currently working on the third of his "personal journey" documentaries, about British cinema) - their knowledge of British cinema is quite staggering, and puts that of almost any non-specialist British critic to shame.

Almost by definition, such people's views are going to be more interesting than Barry Norman's over-familiar reminiscences, if only because they're filtering their British film viewing through a completely different mindset. Scorsese was one of the first people to really champion Powell & Pressburger, whose films he discovered on black and white TV as a New York teenager - he clearly spotted something that most Britons of the time didn't.

And I'd say there's also loads of scope for analysing just what it is that countries like China, Japan and South Korea are currently doing right that British cinema isn't. South Korea in particular has had a huge impact on the international marketplace from a more or less standing start a few years ago, and I can guarantee that festival buyers are going to be far more interested in the latest Far Eastern films than they are in the latest British films. And since British films don't make much of an impact at the domestic box office either, this does rather call into question why they're made in the first place.

Obviously, anything like this would need to be balanced with something more upbeat, but I'm much more impressed by magazines that aren't afraid to get their reader's backs up than I am with those that simply spoonfeed them.

Jennie_Kermode

The biggest difference I see between successful South Korean films and British ones is confidence. Many modern British films lose their edge because they're overly self-conscious, which leads to too many compromises - in trying to please everybody, they fail to follow any distinct vision. I fear that magazines which pander to them like this one are adding to the problem, presenting them as something we're supposed to be kind to rather than demanding that they become something we can't help but like.

Jennie

Wolfgang

I do not think magazine solely dedicated to British film will sell. Maybe if Great Britain had thriving film industry it could just about pull it off, but magazine cannot appeal beyond what it is reporting on. I think it is clear from this forum readership alone that fans of British film tend to veer towards older British films too so there is no real demand for very contemporary coverage.

Empire Magazine likes to think of itself as championing British film (this primarily extends to British actors having their own category at Empire Awards - undoubtedly they know their readership would never vote for British talent otherwise). I wrote to them suggesting they should have dedicated section to British film - talent, current productions and retrospectives and that sort of thing. I received no reply, but Germans are determined if nothing else (we believe in trying again and again until we at last succeed), so over subsequent weeks I sent them several ideas, but they never reply.

Wetherby Pond

Exactly - and the silly thing is that when we do make films that are proudly and unselfconsciously British, they tend to do better internationally than films that are slavishly trying to imitate commercial American films (a doomed exercise, since the budgets are invariably far lower).

Look at Shaun of the Dead, a gloriously and unashamedly parochial film (remember the bitten zombie victim "running it under the tap"?) which did surprisingly well in the US. Or, on a smaller scale, there's Ken Loach's The Navigators, a film barely noticed in Britain - where it went straight to TV unless you caught a couple of its regional screenings - that got a proper cinema release in mainland Europe and was a top ten hit in Paris.

Indeed - there's nothing worse than being told to like something just because it's British, or indeed French, German, Italian, Czech or whatever. Of course, it doesn't help that distributors also think in crudely nationalistic terms - Spain was huge in the early 1990s; Denmark a few years later, then Iran, now South Korea - but since the market is becoming much more fragmented thanks to new distribution methods (notably DVDs), this is becoming less of an issue.

Mind you, this also begs the question of why we need a specifically British film magazine!

Wetherby Pond

Interestingly enough, I was leafing through the new Sight & Sound earlier today and saw they were running a three-page feature on the very wonderful Alastair Sim, complete with a full-page picture of yours truly alongside that ghastly harpy of a headmistress.

I've no idea why they printed it now - there's no obvious current tie-in that I can think of - but it's exactly the sort of piece that was conspicuously missing from British Film Magazine!

(It's also available on their website)

Clinton Morgan

Goodness me look at the cover.

http://www.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/index.html

Christopher Nolan talks about a comic book movie as if he's f***ing Carl Dreyer discussing 'Gertrud'.

Moral of the story. Don't try to struggle to break into the film industry, you'll only wind up making 'The Green Goblin Part 3'.

Gibbie

The reason why selling something as British meant something here and elsewhere in the old days was because old British (and I mean in the old patriarchal days), most of the time, had substance or was built sturdy. Not so today. British TV is not what it was. Quality has really dropped off. The anti-British British thing doesn't sell and people lose interest in sinking ship mentality. British TV ruled American public TV when I was a kid. Not anymore.

In America, we used to have a lot of quality in character, business, etc., but it has dropped off as well. Although, we have a lot of cash and there is always someone to give a try, therefore we have a bigger net that way. But, look at Hollywood, money can't buy substance!

Without substance and enough subject matter, the magazine will tank, especially if there is not the demographic audience. Nevertheless, I hope it succeeds.

AndrewLA

In my experience, when Americans love British films, they really love them. There's a fellow who works in our local bookstore on the west side of Los Angeles, a brilliant poet who makes no money from his own trade and therefore works at Dutton's. One day, he floored me by suddenly waxing lyrically about George Woodbridge, whom he had seen the previous night in a Hammer horror. Not that it was his first experience with George. This fellow knew his work so well, he could rattle off a bunch of Woodbridge titles. I doubt if I know a single person among my London friends who could identify George Woodbridge, let alone appreciate him. A couple of other friends adore discovering things like A KID FOR TWO FARTHINGS and THE OCTOBER MAN and the British GASLIGHT...

Marky B

Hi AndrewLA
Goerge Woodbridge is more familair to television viewers at Inigo Pipkin,the toy maker in a children's tv series. However,I remember him as the retiring and benign prison warden in the excellent Two Way Stretch,one of my favourite Peter Sellars movies.
Ta Ta
Marky B

I am special. The heavens always open for me.

Wetherby Pond

I see they're still selling the first issue in my local newsagents, over three and a half months after I bought it.

Does that mean it's not even going to make it to issue two, or are they going quarterly (or half-yearly)?

LAMP

Hi all,
this is ed..
I hate to cut in.... but if you're looking for a good magazine that's heavily slanted toward British film history, I've been getting one here in the states that I've really enjoyed..

It's new and on it's 3rd issue... the name is Cinema Retro..
It's put out by Solo Publishing in Dorset

It's primary focus seems to be 50s, 60s and 70s ...
The first issue had a LOT of behind the scenes on Bond and Monty Python.
One of the staff writers is Richard Kiel who played Jaws. Another staffer is Caroline Munro who was always one of my favorites.

The second issue included articles written by Christopher Lee and an article on Pinewood.
Not much fluff... crammed with lots of tidbits..

I'm waiting for my 3rd issue..
I don't know where you would see a copy over there, I got mine through subscription at CinemaRetro.com

catflap

Looking forward to Cinema Retro, I am waiting for the first two issues to arrive in the post from the UK. I ordered mine through FAB Press, along with a book on Tony Tenser. Some good reading coming up.