A FILM BY ELAINE CONSTANTINE

This is a story of a youth culture that changed a generation and influenced songwriters, producers, DJs and designers for decades to come.

This is the story of Northern Soul.
Award-winning director Elaine Constantine will begin shooting her first feature-length film Northern Soul in January 2012 under Stubborn Heart Productions and in association with Baby Cow Films.

The film will tell the tale of two Northern boys whose worlds are changed forever when they discover black American soul music. 

Northern Soul was phenomenally popular with British youths in the 1970s, taking the North of the country by storm.

Northern Soul the film intends to appeal to those generations of fans while attracting a modern audience who can relate to youth culture from another era. If you were there, you’ll know. If you weren’t there, you’ll wish you had been.

www.northernsoulthefilm.com
Photo: Elaine Constantine

Fahrenheit 451 takes place in an unspecified future time (some dialogue places it after 1990) in a hedonistic anti-intellectual America that has completely abandoned self-control. This America is filled with lawlessness in the streets ranging from teenagers crashing cars into people to firemen at a station who set their ‘mechanical hound’ to hunt various animals by their scent for the simple and grotesque pleasure of watching them die. Anyone caught reading or possessing books is, at the minimum, confined to a mental hospital while the books are burned by the firemen. Burnt books mainly include famous works of literature, such as William Shakespeare, Walt Whitman and William Faulkner, as well as the Bible and all historical texts.

In the late 1950s, Bradbury observed that the novel touches on the alienation of people by media:In writing the short novel Fahrenheit 451 I thought I was describing a world that might evolve in four or five decades. But only a few weeks ago, in Beverly Hills one night, a husband and wife passed me, walking their dog. I stood staring after them, absolutely stunned. The woman held in one hand a small cigarette-package-sized radio, its antenna quivering. From this sprang tiny copper wires which ended in a dainty cone plugged into her right ear. There she was, oblivious to man and dog, listening to far winds and whispers and soap-opera cries, sleep-walking, helped up and down curbs by a husband who might just as well not have been there. This was not fiction.

Directed by François Truffaut. Produced by Lewis M. Allen. Written by Jean-Louis Ricard, François Truffaut, Ray Bradbury (novel). Starring Julie Christie, Oskar Werner, Cyril Cusack, Anton Diffring. Music by Bernard Herrmann. Cinematography Nicolas Roeg. Studio Anglo Enterprises, Vine yard Film Ltd. Distributed by Universal Pictures. Release date(s): November 14, 1966. Running time: 112 minutes.
(Source Wikipedia)

Northern Soul has been enjoying a steady revival for a while now and Dean Chalkley’s much anticipated film is a case in point. Initially commissioned as a photoshoot for our Religion Issue, Dean spent months finding the perfect movers and shakers to form his cast, immersing himself in the scene like a method director and last night we were pleased to show the the finished result at a special screening and party at the Bethnal Green Working Man’s Club.
Dean introduced the first screening which received rapturous applause from a crowd of soul insiders and new converts to the movement, the cast then took to the floor, showing us all how its done. But for those of you unable to make it to the venue we have the film here, exclusively on 125magazine.com. (txt from 125magazine.com)

1st June 2011 in teathers.

In 1963, Charles Xavier starts up a school and later a team, for humans with superhuman abilities. Among them is Erik Lensherr, his best friend… and future archenemy.

Directed by Matthew Vaughn. – Produced by Gregory Goodman, Simon Kinberg, Lauren Shuler Donner, Bryan Singer.
Screenplay by Ashley Edward Miller, Zack Stentz, Jane Goldman, Matthew Vaughn.
Story by Sheldon Turner, Bryan Singer
Based on Characters by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Chris Claremont

Starring:

• James McAvoy
• Michael Fassbender
• Rose Byrne
• January Jones (from « Mad Men »)
• Oliver Platt
• Kevin Bacon

Music by Henry Pryce Jackman

www.x-menfirstclassmovie.com

In the early 1960s, Marvel Comics editor/writer Stan Lee, artist Jack Kirby and several other illustrators produced a number of superhero titles which stressed character personalities and personal conflict as much as action and adventure, including The Fantastic Four, The Incredible Hulk and Spider-Man. X-Men was one of the last titles of this Silver Age renaissance, appearing in September 1963.

Cover-billed as ‘the strangest heroes of all,’ the original X-Men consisted of five teenagers still learning to control their powers:- Cyclops (Scott Summers), who emitted powerful “optics blasts” from his eyes that could only be controlled by a « ruby quartz » visor. He would become the X-Men’s field leader.- Marvel Girl (Jean Grey), who possessed telekinetic powers and later developed telepathy.- Angel (Warren Worthington III), who flew from two feathery wings that extended from his back.- Beast (Hank McCoy), who possessed ape-like strength and agility.- Iceman (Bobby Drake), who froze moisture in the air around him and who could cover his body with snow and later developed the ability to turn himself into solid ice.

Despite the philosophical concepts which appeared in X-Men, Lee has said he invented genetic ‘mutants’ to find a way to create a number of super-powered characters without having to come up with a separate and interesting origin for each one.
X-Men #1 also introduced the team’s arch-nemesis, Magneto, who controlled magnetism and who felt that mutants should rule over normal humans. Magneto’s character would later be fleshed out to reveal that he once shared a friendship with Professor X and that his decree that mutants must conquer or be conquered grew from his experiences as a Holocaust survivor. X-Men #4 introduced Magneto’s team, the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.

While a few other important villains debuted during the 1960′s — such as Professor X’s superhumanly strong stepbrother the Juggernaut and the mutant-hunting robot Sentinels — the X-Men often fought easily-forgotten mutant criminals, alien invaders and brutish monsters. As a result, this era is largely regarded as unremarkable and X-Men became one of the less successful Marvel series during the 1960′s.

Thunder Soul
Theatrical Release Date: 09/23/2011
Presented by Jamie Foxx, ‘Thunder Soul’ follows the extraordinary alumni from Houston’s storied Kashmere High School Stag.
Official Trailer 2011 HD