Writer. Film Scholar. Journalist. Editor.
ORCHESTRATOR OF STORMS : THE FANTASTIQUE WORLD OF JEAN ROLLIN will have its European premiere at ArrowFrightFest on Friday 26 August 2022 at 3:50pm. There will be a Q&A after the film with the formidable Brigitte Lahaie and me. Directed by Kat Ellinger and Dima Ballin, produced by Kier-and Jonathan Zaurin. Book tickets: http://frightfest.nuwebgroup.com/events/21472
I had the great pleasure to contribute to the unprecedented documentary on Jean Rollin directed by Kat Ellinger and Dima Ballin, which will premiere at the Fantasia Festival on Saturday 16th July. Here's the Fantasia Festival's description of the film by Mitch Davis: Has there been a genre artist more fundamentally misunderstood and inappropriately discussed... Continue Reading →
I will be speaking at the Suspirias symposium on Saturday 11th June at Queen Mary University. Tickets are free, registration essential. This symposium considers Dario Argento’s 1977 giallo horror Suspiria alongside Luca Guadagnino’s 2018 film of the same name. The 2018 film has been positioned in a cycle of ‘serious’ horror films, an arthouse spin... Continue Reading →
I will be part of a panel exploring Japanese cinema in the second half of the 20th century as part of the BFI's Japan 2021 season on Thursday 2nd December with season co-programmer Alexander Jacoby, author, filmmaker and curator Jasper Sharp, academic and author Rayna Denison and film scholar, writer and editor Virginie Sélavy. Buy... Continue Reading →
As part of Monstrum Society's autumn 2021 'Gothic Excursions, Disrupted Histories' series, I will be delivering an online lecture on how Jean Rollin's virgins and vampires, under the influence of Georges Bataille, revitalised the subversive potential of the Gothic heroine in the 1970s. Lecture available from Monday 18th October on the Monstrum Society website. Other... Continue Reading →
I will join academic and critic Catherine Wheatley for a discussion of stylishly disquieting scientific fiction Little Joe (Dir. Jessica Hausner) chaired by film programmer Jo Duncombe at BFI Southbank. Thursday 27 February 2020, 20:15, BFI Reuben Library, run time: 60 mins.
For The Final Girls' event I present an overview of the figure of the witch in film, from silent masterpiece Häxan to glamorous Hollywood comedies I Married a Witch and Bell Book and Candle, to the 1970s hallucinatory sorcery of Suspiria and the suburban unease of Season of the Witch, to the 1990s teen witchery... Continue Reading →
Due to popular demand, I will be running my 4-week course on Surrealism in cinema again in November at Close-Up. I have been running this course once or twice a year in London since 2017. Surrealism is one of the art movements that has had the strongest influence on cinema and its impact has lasted to... Continue Reading →
What power does the word 'bitch' hold? Can it be reclaimed and used in relation to some of the female roles in film and TV? What is the power of female actors who have played a character who we could call a ‘bitch’ on screen? How are these screen roles created in cinema and TV,... Continue Reading →
From the very first films by the Lumière brothers, French cinema has been perceived as tending towards the real; but there’s an alternative tradition that also stretches back to the dawn of cinema – that of the fantastique. It incorporates elements of fantasy, horror and science fiction into bizarre, atmospheric tales in which the unexplained... Continue Reading →
Virginie Sélavy 