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| Cover of Velevet Goldmine, unknown, Screenshots / Edit by Laetitia |
✨ Indeed, ๐ฝ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ฎ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ was nominated and won the award for the ๐๐๐ฌ๐ญ ๐๐ซ๐ญ๐ข๐ฌ๐ญ๐ข๐ ๐๐จ๐ง๐ญ๐ซ๐ข๐๐ฎ๐ญ๐ข๐จ๐ง ๐๐ญ ๐ญ๐ก๐ ๐๐ง๐ญ๐๐ซ๐ง๐๐ญ๐ข๐จ๐ง๐๐ฅ ๐ ๐ข๐ฅ๐ฆ ๐ ๐๐ฌ๐ญ๐ข๐ฏ๐๐ฅ. When you think about it, it's not surprising at all ! The film is marked by a very strong aesthetic concern.
✨ Glam rock is not only about music. It was also a style of dressing. It emphasized outrageously flamboyant fashions: platform shoes, sequined suits, women's make-up for men, flashy jackets, and many other accessories outside 'the norm'. Bowie was the most important trendsetter, and his image was at least as important to many fans as the music itself.
✨ It is a revolution that emphasizes the self and experiments with identity, self-expression and sexuality. Glam rock is arguably more about style and individuality than about music.
✨ As ๐ป๐๐ ๐ ๐ฏ๐๐๐๐๐ himself reveals, ๐ฝ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ฎ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ was a long-term project, requiring a lot of investigative work (see quote below).
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| Photo credit: Screenshots from Velvet Goldmine |
⭐ ๐ฝ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐
A glittering evocation of the glam rock world of the 1970s. Awarded Best Artistic Contribution at the last Cannes Film Festival.
Beware of appearances: "Velvet Goldmine" is not a nostalgic film about the seventies, but rather an initiation film, like initiation novels. Of course, it retains the music (the director warns us to turn the sound up as loud as possible), the style (the glitter, the platform boots and the sexual ambiguity), and the legendary figures: David Bowie of "Ziggy Stardust", Iggy Pop of the Stooges and Lou Reed of "Transformer". For those in their forties who are in search of memories, the film may be a good choice, but it also leads the viewer into a kaleidoscope of stories, images and impressions where it is easy to get lost.
What would you expect from an American filmmaker of the 90s, telling the story of an English journalist of the 80s who investigates a rock star of the 70s ? A film that ultimately resembles "glam rock", where everything is fake enough to seem real. A film about identity under the mask, suffering under the provocation and the passage from a tormented adolescence to an adulthood where everything is not rosy. It is far from nostalgia…
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| Jonathan Rhys Meyer by Max Vadukul |
Strangely, the film begins with an evocation of the childhood of Oscar Wilde who dreamed of becoming a rock star. More than the writer, it is the dandy and the sulfurous artist, condemned for his "deviant" morals, that director Todd Haynes refers to. He finds in this character two of the ingredients of his film: glitter and bisexuality. But behind it all, there is the eternal story of the rising generation that takes pleasure in shattering the certainties of the previous one. And the "glam rock" generation has done so brilliantly, sweeping away the rustic and naive desire for authenticity of "flower power" with an open cynicism, a taste for kitschy excess and a new sexual revolution that their elders had not foreseen.
"Velvet Goldmine" does not escape (it seems) certain formal defects, often due to the back and forth between past and present. But its tone and the presence of actor Christian Bale _ excellent as a teenager and then as a journalist in search of his own identity _ quickly make you forget them. The past, as told by a former manager, a former wife and a former partner-lover, could be tinged with bitterness, but the memory remains velvety.
If the soundtrack seems to have retained more the dark side of "glam rock" than its "glitter" side, the era is indeed there with its immaturity and energy, its ambiguity and certainties. It remains in the film until the end, which, with its aftertaste of unfinished business, reminds us that the glitter quickly faded and eventually disappeared. "They wanted to change the world and they only succeeded in changing themselves", says one of the characters, a replica of 1970s Iggy Pop in the film. Indeed, the open cult of emptiness and worked-out belonging have led nowhere. The music and the decadent baroque are there again. And, in the end, nostalgia may not be so far away. They provide the material for an ambitious, original, eye-catching and ear-catching film that will appeal to all those who are not put off by "glam rock" and its decorum.
✔️ ๐น๐๐๐-๐ผ๐๐๐ ๐ด๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ก ๐๐๐ ๐ป๐๐ ๐ด๐๐๐๐ - ๐ณ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ท๐บ, ๐ท๐ฟ๐ฟ๐พ
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| Photo credit: Screenshots from Velvet Goldmine |
๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
๐ฌ Before I even shot Safe, I worked on Velvet for four years, which involved a lot of research, documentation of the period, and many versions of the script. I didn't live through that Glam period directly. I was living in the States at the time, I was 12 years old, and it was much more underground in California than in England. They had nail polish and lipstick in violent colours, they smoked in the street, and they talked to each other about Iggy, Ziggy, Bowie, and people who were all bi. I remember the cover of Bowie's Aladdin Sane album, which I found disturbing and fascinating, and which I never dared to buy at the time. I didn't realize until later, in college, that all the music I loved, Bowie, Iggy Pop, Lou Reed and Roxy Music, was born out of that little-known chapter in pop history, which mixed American underground rock with a very British excess, showmanship and provocation.
✔️ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ท๐๐ข๐๐๐ - ๐๐๐๐๐๐-๐๐๐๐.๐๐๐
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๐ฌ I was shaking up real history with [Velvet] Goldmine and people resented that. They want their historical dramas to be authentic and that was the least of my intentions because it was the least of the intentions of glam rock itself. I took [the glam] tenets — dressing up and being fantastical and non-authentic — and tried to apply them to a film. But I think people — at least people in the rock world — missed that. Unfortunately.
✔️ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ท๐๐ข๐๐๐ - ๐ท๐๐๐๐๐.๐๐๐
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๐ฌ The mixture of those elements, the theatricality mixed in with the raunchy sex, franc sexuality of it all is apparent in the music itself. You don't even have to listen to the words or understand them to feel that in the music.
✔️ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ท๐๐ข๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ถ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
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| Photo credit: Screenshot from Velvet Goldmine |
You can watch it here ๐ฅ https://bit.ly/3M7AfZT ๐
๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
๐ข ๐๐๐๐ฉ ๐๐๐ ๐ฎ๐ค๐ช ๐ก๐ค๐ค๐ ๐ก๐๐ ๐ ๐๐ฃ ๐ฎ๐ค๐ช๐ง ๐จ๐ฉ๐๐๐ ๐๐ก๐ค๐ฉ๐๐๐จ ?
๐ฌ ๐ฉ๐๐๐๐: Steve looked like one of the Jacksons.
๐ฌ ๐บ๐๐๐๐: Yeah, Latoya Jackson. I had Jimmy Page's pants on with all these flames down the side of the flared legs and big red platforms. And I had all this mad long hair extensions in. I looked like a big sexy lion.
๐ฌ ๐ฉ๐๐๐๐: We all looked pretty stupid, basically.
✔️ ๐ผ๐๐๐๐๐ข ๐ผ๐๐๐๐ - ๐พ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ท๐ฟ๐ฟ๐พ
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๐ข ๐พ๐๐ ๐ ๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ฝ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ฎ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐-๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ?
๐ฌ ๐ฉ๐๐๐๐: Because you obviously didn’t understand it. It’s a great love story, it’s a feast of colour and music.
๐ฌ ๐บ๐๐๐๐๐: And it has the most beautiful scene of two men kissing, ever.
✔️ ๐ฝ๐ผ๐ด - ๐ณ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ท๐ฟ๐ฟ๐พ
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| Photo credit: Screenshots from Velvet Goldmine |
20๐๐ ๐ช๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ฉ๐๐ ๐ฅ https://bit.ly/3NKsZEt ๐ต
๐ฌ That version wouldn't never be made by ourselves, just for the pleasure of it. It is not a song that has a special cling to us, we did the version cause it was needed for the film. We don't even own any T-Rex records. But naturally it was a song that we knew for many years..we listened to it on the radio. We have never been T-Rex fans, and we just do versions of songs that we like and from artists we are fond of.
✔️ ๐ฑ๐๐๐๐ ๐ผ๐๐๐๐ - ๐ณ๐ฝ๐ผ๐ฐ๐๐ - ๐พ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ธ000
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๐ข 20๐ฉ๐ ๐๐๐ฃ๐ฉ๐ช๐ง๐ฎ ๐๐ค๐ฎ ๐๐ฎ ๐-๐๐๐ญ. ๐๐๐ฎ ๐๐ค๐ซ๐๐ง๐๐ฃ๐ ๐๐๐ง๐ ๐ฝ๐ค๐ก๐๐ฃ ๐๐ฃ๐จ๐ฉ๐๐๐ ๐ค๐ ๐ฟ๐๐ซ๐๐ ๐ฝ๐ค๐ฌ๐๐ ?
๐ฌ Maybe because Bowie would have been too obvious... And then, this cover was commissioned for Todd Haynes' film Velvet Goldmine about the glam-rock epic, so it's in the film. By the way, as surprising as it may seem to you, none of us have any T-Rex albums at home. I promise, none of them !
✔️ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐พ๐๐๐๐๐ - ๐ผ๐๐๐ ๐ป๐๐๐๐ - ๐พ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ธ๐ฝ, ๐ธ00๐น
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๐ข ๐๐๐๐ฉ ๐ฌ๐๐จ ๐ฉ๐๐ ๐๐๐ง๐๐๐จ๐ฉ ๐ฅ๐๐ง๐ฉ ?
๐ฌ Finding myself standing onstage without a guitar for the first time in my life and not knowing what the f*** to do. I thought "Hmm, I haven't researched this, have I ?" Steve had to be my Seventies dancing coach. He showed me some moves, lots of legs kicks and ass wiggles.
✔️ ๐ฑ๐๐๐๐ ๐ผ๐๐๐๐ - ๐ผ๐๐๐๐๐ข ๐ผ๐๐๐๐, ๐พ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ธ๐บ๐๐ ๐ท๐ฟ๐ฟ๐พ
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| Photo credit unknown |
✨ I would share this excerpt of the film, the video Tumbling Down, fantastically performed by Jonathan Ryhs Meyer. This clip is, in my opinion, a concentration of what Haynes wanted to dismantle in this film, which is to take "๐กโ๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ก๐๐๐๐ก๐ - ๐๐๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐ ๐ข๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ก๐๐ ๐ก๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐-๐๐ข๐กโ๐๐๐ก๐๐ - ๐๐๐ ๐ก๐๐๐๐ ๐ก๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ฆ ๐กโ๐๐ ๐ก๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐. "
๐ป๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ซ๐๐๐ ๐ฅ https://bit.ly/3zaLgX8 ๐ต
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Photo credit: Screenshots from Velvet Goldmine |
