Now showing at two local cinemas is London, the Modern Babylon, director Julien Temple’s time-travelling voyage to the heart of his hometown.
Temple, perhaps best known for his work on The Great Rock & Roll Swindle, reaches back to London’s past from the late 19th century onwards, weaving together a patchwork of archival clips, songs, poems, and interviews with the city’s denizens. He makes heavy use of London as a location, splicing in clips from Hitchcock’s Blackmail, Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom, John Mackenzie’s The Long Good Friday and his own lavish musical flop, Absolute Beginners, between newsreel flashbacks.
Temple is also an unabashed fan of the poets, writers, artists and musicians who have made London their home over the centuries, and good use is made of the words of WB Yeats, William Blake and TS Eliot, among others, in addition to archive cameos London icons including Michael Caine, David Bowie, Terence Stamp, Julie Christie, Quentin Crisp and the Rolling Stones, plus a background chorus of storekeepers, dock workers, market traders and other cockney archetypes. Narration comes from a stellar cast two, including Michael Gambon, Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton and Andy Serkis.
The film is very upfront about the vital importance of successive waves of immigrants to London’s unparalleled cosmopolitan outlook, and how the city has been reshaped and revitalized by groups including (but not limited to), Jews from Eastern Europe, and Irish, Caribbean, Pakistani, Indian, Vietnamese and Afghani migrants. But London, the Modern Babylon does not shrink from showing the ugly racial tensions newcomers often faced.
London, the Modern Babylon • Director: Julien Temple • Producers: Amanda Temple, Stephen Malit • Editor: Caroline Richards • Not Rated. 128 minutes
Showing at: Laemmle’s Playhouse 7 – 673 East Colorado Boulevard, Pasadena and Laemmle’s NoHo 7 – 5240 Lankershim Boulevard, North Hollywood
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