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Narrator (voice)
This chronicle of the Christchurch Commonwealth Games marked one of the National Film Unit's most ambitious productions. Though a range of events (including famous runs by John Walker and Dick Tayler), are covered, the film often bypasses the pomp and glory approach; instead it dares to talk to the injured and mention that most competitors lose. The closing ceremonies of the "friendly games" feature the athletes gathering to — as the official song's chorus put it — "join together". Four directors joined together to work on it: Arthur Everard, John King, Paul Maunder and Sam Pillsbury.
La doble vida del faquir (The magicians) returns to the scene of a school in the Catalan town of Sant Julià de Vilatorta where, in 1937, in the midst of civil war, a film-maker in hiding and a group of orphaned children dressed up as sultans and explorers shot an exotic adventure film. The films protagonists relive those childhood days when they were able to switch their school smocks for oriental turbans, while reality imposed its own fancy dress ball with military uniforms and priests dressed in civilian garb.
If there is one person Matthew Lancit can’t get out of his mind, it is his uncle Harvey. Dark rings around his eyes, pale, blind, his legs amputated. Like Harvey, the filmmaker also suffers from diabetes. He has the disease under control, but one question is always nagging at him: How much longer? His long-term (self-)observation reliably revolves around fears of infirmity and mutilation. He translates the feared body horror into film, stages himself as a zombie, vampire, a desolate figure. Lancit playfully anticipates his potential decline, serving up a whole arsenal of effects which – as video recordings prove – go back to his youth. It is not for nothing that the “dead” in the title is also reminiscent of “dad.” Because “Play Dead!” also negotiates his own role as a father.
