Martin Red
07-22-2003, 08:10 AM
Enjoyed this twisted dark comedy set around Nottinghill Carnival in London.........
http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-tucker.jpg http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-1.jpg http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-3.jpg http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-2.jpg http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Film/Film_Hush_Hush/Hush_Hush/1999/10/11/lava.jpg
Tuesday October 19, 1999
If you sampled this year's Notting Hill carnival, it is just possible that between the floats, sounds systems and jerk chicken stands - not to mention a few thousand revellers - you might have come across a smallish film crew, dodging the party traffic and soaking up the carnival atmosphere on to indelible celluloid. The film in question is Lava, and it is set smack in the middle of the west London locale already made famous by Julia Roberts, Hugh Grant and co.
According to producer Michael Riley, it even features Notting Hill's "famous blue door" in a passing shot, but there the similarities end. As Riley puts it, "I hope we get as much money as that film, but I hope we don't get compared to it." For Lava is an entirely different kettle of fish. It's a thriller which shares a certain sensibility with the celebrated British crime flick, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.
Filming has just wrapped on Lava, a modestly budgeted £1 million black comedy. It marks Joe Tucker's directorial debut, and according to Riley, the experience was something of "a baptism of fire". The director is no stranger to the film world, however. He appeared as an actor in Mike Leigh's Career Girls and Carine Adler's Under the Skin, and in Lava he also stars alongside Tom 'Wish You Were Here' Bell and TV regulars, Nicola Stapleton and Leslie Grantham (both of EastEnders fame).
The multi-talented Tucker also wrote the screenplay, which concerns two friends intent on revenge. He came up with the idea three years ago, after witnessing a man getting beaten up in a pub over a trivial matter. Imagining would have happened had that man taken revenge on his attacker, Tucker made this the basis for his script.
Lava's central characters are hunting the man responsible for physically and mentally handicapping one of their brothers. Trouble is, the criminal in question lives on the carnival path, and setting off with murder on their minds, the pair have not anticipated the mess that is Notting Hill on Bank Holiday Carnival. Riley believes they are the only people to have filmed the carnival for inclusion in a feature film.
The plot is reminiscent of Mark Addy's most recent - and largely panned - action drama, The Last Yellow, but Riley insists that this film is a more energetic, experimental and "zingier" take on the theme of revenge.
Certainly, Addy's London thriller lacked the defining presence of a posse of Yardies, who supply Tucker's character with some fairly potent cocaine. "I did some research and talked to some authentic Yardies," he told Hush Hush. "They didn't say much, but asked that we didn't stereotype them."
As for the title, Riley was keeping it cryptic. "I can't explain it? it's similar to Trainspotting in that it's more suggestive than anything else. One thing's for sure, though, it's got nothing to do with Dante's Peak or Volcano
__________________________________________________ ________________________________
"Starting out as another guns and gangsters retread, it soon mutates into a black farce that's funnier, more bizarre and much more disturbing. Yes, it's bloody, but the film has its own look and the characters have their own voices, so if you can stomach Reservoir Dogs remade by Rik Mayall and Ade Edmundson, LAVA is for you."
- Nicholas Barber, Independent On Sunday
"Well directed and acted" - Henry Fitzherbert, Sunday Express
"*** A world away from Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts, this Notting Hill-set black comedy gives a whole new perspective on W11. Original, attitude-filled and lively."
- Neil Edwards, Boyz
"Joe Tucker's absurd thriller is graced with a dark fringe of authenticity that grows out of the chaos of the Notting Hill Carnival. Top Ten Film."
- Ian Nathan, Times Play
"LAVA injects welcome humour into the vein of noisy violence. While the plot, situations and characters become more outrageous by the minute, Tucker rarely runs out of steam."
- Alan Frank, Star Time
"A vibrant new comic thriller with a colourful, crackling script and camerawork to make the head spin, LAVA also has a vein of concentrated wit to gladden the heart. Unique and uncompromising. Tucker has excelled himself as a mordantly funny actor, a fearless director and an attentive dramatist. Certainly, there are few characters in cinema like the hilariously deluded, military-fixated Smiggy. A sure-fire Andy McNab reader if ever there was one, he marks the point where Travis Bickle and Alan Partridge overlap in the Venn diagram of modern sociopaths."
- Ryan Gilbey, The Independent
"LAVA has a mad, distinctive wit. Tucker writes, directs and acts with a disciplined dottiness. The horror is funny, the fun is horrible, the style is weird and individual."
- Nigel Andrews, Financial Times
"A gritty black comedy that's shocking, entertaining and amusing all at once."
- Annette Dasey, Big Screen
More info: - http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/htdi.html
http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-tucker.jpg http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-1.jpg http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-3.jpg http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/images/lava-2.jpg http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Film/Film_Hush_Hush/Hush_Hush/1999/10/11/lava.jpg
Tuesday October 19, 1999
If you sampled this year's Notting Hill carnival, it is just possible that between the floats, sounds systems and jerk chicken stands - not to mention a few thousand revellers - you might have come across a smallish film crew, dodging the party traffic and soaking up the carnival atmosphere on to indelible celluloid. The film in question is Lava, and it is set smack in the middle of the west London locale already made famous by Julia Roberts, Hugh Grant and co.
According to producer Michael Riley, it even features Notting Hill's "famous blue door" in a passing shot, but there the similarities end. As Riley puts it, "I hope we get as much money as that film, but I hope we don't get compared to it." For Lava is an entirely different kettle of fish. It's a thriller which shares a certain sensibility with the celebrated British crime flick, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.
Filming has just wrapped on Lava, a modestly budgeted £1 million black comedy. It marks Joe Tucker's directorial debut, and according to Riley, the experience was something of "a baptism of fire". The director is no stranger to the film world, however. He appeared as an actor in Mike Leigh's Career Girls and Carine Adler's Under the Skin, and in Lava he also stars alongside Tom 'Wish You Were Here' Bell and TV regulars, Nicola Stapleton and Leslie Grantham (both of EastEnders fame).
The multi-talented Tucker also wrote the screenplay, which concerns two friends intent on revenge. He came up with the idea three years ago, after witnessing a man getting beaten up in a pub over a trivial matter. Imagining would have happened had that man taken revenge on his attacker, Tucker made this the basis for his script.
Lava's central characters are hunting the man responsible for physically and mentally handicapping one of their brothers. Trouble is, the criminal in question lives on the carnival path, and setting off with murder on their minds, the pair have not anticipated the mess that is Notting Hill on Bank Holiday Carnival. Riley believes they are the only people to have filmed the carnival for inclusion in a feature film.
The plot is reminiscent of Mark Addy's most recent - and largely panned - action drama, The Last Yellow, but Riley insists that this film is a more energetic, experimental and "zingier" take on the theme of revenge.
Certainly, Addy's London thriller lacked the defining presence of a posse of Yardies, who supply Tucker's character with some fairly potent cocaine. "I did some research and talked to some authentic Yardies," he told Hush Hush. "They didn't say much, but asked that we didn't stereotype them."
As for the title, Riley was keeping it cryptic. "I can't explain it? it's similar to Trainspotting in that it's more suggestive than anything else. One thing's for sure, though, it's got nothing to do with Dante's Peak or Volcano
__________________________________________________ ________________________________
"Starting out as another guns and gangsters retread, it soon mutates into a black farce that's funnier, more bizarre and much more disturbing. Yes, it's bloody, but the film has its own look and the characters have their own voices, so if you can stomach Reservoir Dogs remade by Rik Mayall and Ade Edmundson, LAVA is for you."
- Nicholas Barber, Independent On Sunday
"Well directed and acted" - Henry Fitzherbert, Sunday Express
"*** A world away from Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts, this Notting Hill-set black comedy gives a whole new perspective on W11. Original, attitude-filled and lively."
- Neil Edwards, Boyz
"Joe Tucker's absurd thriller is graced with a dark fringe of authenticity that grows out of the chaos of the Notting Hill Carnival. Top Ten Film."
- Ian Nathan, Times Play
"LAVA injects welcome humour into the vein of noisy violence. While the plot, situations and characters become more outrageous by the minute, Tucker rarely runs out of steam."
- Alan Frank, Star Time
"A vibrant new comic thriller with a colourful, crackling script and camerawork to make the head spin, LAVA also has a vein of concentrated wit to gladden the heart. Unique and uncompromising. Tucker has excelled himself as a mordantly funny actor, a fearless director and an attentive dramatist. Certainly, there are few characters in cinema like the hilariously deluded, military-fixated Smiggy. A sure-fire Andy McNab reader if ever there was one, he marks the point where Travis Bickle and Alan Partridge overlap in the Venn diagram of modern sociopaths."
- Ryan Gilbey, The Independent
"LAVA has a mad, distinctive wit. Tucker writes, directs and acts with a disciplined dottiness. The horror is funny, the fun is horrible, the style is weird and individual."
- Nigel Andrews, Financial Times
"A gritty black comedy that's shocking, entertaining and amusing all at once."
- Annette Dasey, Big Screen
More info: - http://www.moviemaker.com/issues/49/htdi.html