Originally posted by mongrel:
My take on it is that the 'film-makers' and even the 'Weisz-Bryant archive' are a construct; however much of the footage itself is genuinely found and old - collected by Foxx and Barker and assembled by themselves.
Some of the footage is clearly shot for the project, like [b]The Projectionist - and maybe Hand-Held Skies .
The artifice is part of the project and gives it a structure as well as enabling them both to work within necessary constraints.
Or I might be totally wrong.....[/b]
I agree with you. I wrote at the time TCM came out that I thought the Arnold Weicz-Bryant character did not exist - try a Google search - there is absolutely nothing apart from a Foxx reference.
Of the other names, I can find no references to them as film makers, although several names are those of musicians and composers.
Here are some clues which, like a Ballard short-story, you may re-arrange or discard at will:
'Jerry Golden' is (according to Wikipedia) the name of the first radio reporter to announce that shots had been fired at JFK in Dallas (classic Foxx/Ballard territory.)
One website connects 'Alan Marker' with 'Chris Marker' who made a film called 'La Jetee' (see this link:
http://www.ballardian.com/john-foxx-interview).
Perhaps fancifully we can combine Max Forbert and Earnst Lubin and get the artist of 'Europe After The Rain.'
The shots of burnt shoes in 'Points of Departure' bring to mind the burnt suit of the first Ultravox album, as well as the empty suit on the cover of 'Miles Away.' Also, the mention of 'habitual walks through London' is another Foxx trope, reminiscent of the Quiet Man.
The 'Peripheral Character' I thought looked like several different actors!
The quote in "Hand Held Skies", supposedly by Johnathan Lloyd sounds exactly like a Foxx quote: "...techno Turner, Hollywood Monet..."
Finally, I thought it was interesting that Mike Barker was recording the performance with a couple of cameras (one on stage pointing at the audience and one on the balcony above, pointing at the stage.) It's as though the hoax element of the performance was being recorded for posterity.
