On Friday October 17th 2008, in Bristol at The Cube Cinema, there’s going to be an event that I’ve been looking forward to for quite a while. My good friend Tom Stubbs (one half of the back-porch, West-country, banjo-xylophone-mandolin-guitar duo My Two Toms, one quarter of lo-fi supergroup The Lonely Ponies, community film-maker, artist, animator and alter-ego of Graham Lightside) is showing three films that he has directed or co-directed. They are the following:
The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner (on bicycle)
Shot in a frantic week in September 2007, and only recently finished ‘The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner (on bicycle)’ is a travelogue that cycles in the footsteps of the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge whilst also somehow being lost at sea with The Ancient Mariner.
Armed with a photocopy of the poem four intrepid Artists travel a route that Coleridge would’ve regularly walked, from Nether Stowey to Bristol. Along the way they drew as many people as they could into The Mariner’s plight.
The team worked with a primary school, a school for people with learning difficulties, several community groups, two homes for elderly people and a pub.
The film knits together The Mariner’s tale with drama, reminiscence, writing & animation, to make a psychedelic yet perfect mix between entertainment, community outreach and human interest.
Directed by Tom Stubbs, co-directed by Jay Kerry, Jon Nicholas and Joff Winterhart. Produced by Wolf + Water. Running time 50 minutes.
Shape UP
20 min video about healthy eating for adults with learning difficulties
written by Stephen Clarke + Tom Stubbs
A biggerhouse production for Learning Disability Services, Somerset in association with the engine room
Light and Dark
A Phantasmagorial autobiographic masterpiece exploring the minds of Michael Smith and Tom Stubbs, both have alter-egos, but whereas Michael’s Alter-ego is a muscled anthromorphic fox with a taste for sex, dark humour and violence, Tom’s Alter-ego is an earnest, technology obsessed video engineer.
All the films are superbly realised and beautifully produced. At the same time they are laced with humour, yet moving and engaging. I’ve been meaning to blog about The Rime of The Ancient Mariner (on bicycle) for ages, it’s just so marvelous that I want to share it with everyone, but it utterly defies description. It has too many lovely moments – Joff drawing the scenes described by residents of an old peoples’ home as they share their memories, A drunken narration of the poem in a rowdy west-country pub as the locals cheer on the press-ganged reader, a serendipitous meeting with a descendant of Wordsworth come to trace the same route, the way the primary school children throw themselves into the task of telling the tale, the double-booked hall.. it’s all good.
When I saw Light and Dark for the first time I was blown away. It’s very short and as soon as it finished I watched it again immediately. Again it defies description, all I can say is turn up on Friday 17th, watch and enjoy.
Music will be provided by the aforementioned My Two Toms and Bucky.
Admission £6 (£5 concession)
Friday 17th October 2008
Doors open 7.30
For directions and a map to the Cube click on the link below.
http://microplex.cubecinema.com/cubewebsite/directions.html
I hope to see some of you there.
The Highway Cycling Group 
i read this. i went. i sat at the end of the second row and turned around and stared a bit trying to remember what you look like from your pictures. i enjoyed it. i ate cake.
Hi mair, I did see you, but assumed you must have been someone I knew from ages ago that I couldn’t remember the name of, I spent much of the evening trying to ‘remember’ you, about three in the morning I suddenly wondered if you were someone who read the blog post and came along! Doh! We smiled as we passed at the bar. You had a florescent waistcoat on.
It was a very entertaining evening I thought. Although I love the Coleridge film, my favourite was definitely Light and Dark – Michael Smith stole the show. I took some video so I’ll load it up and post it as well.
Did you stay for the bands?
Hee, yes, that was me. I forgot about the waistcoat till I was sitting down and then couldn’t be bothered to remove it. Yeah – I wasn’t going to stay for the music but they seemed like fun and I wanted to see Michael drawing live, so I did in the end, then zipped off to my sis/bro-in-law who were expecting me a bit earlier than that 😉
Cool. Well I’m really glad you came, even if we didn’t get to speak. Thanks for coming along.
[…] a great evenings entertainment courtesy of the Cube Cinema and my chum Tom Stubbs. I advertised the Rime of the Ancient Mariner (on bicycle) event a while back, but I didn’t mention that I was going to cycle there. I thought it would be […]
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