It’s the one year anniversary of “I’m ready for my close-up“, so to celebrate the occasion we have a couple of shows about the birth of cinema and how it is still relevant and appreciated today.
In the first show, Alex Fitch is talking to Alex Hogg from the band Minima who are touring the country with a print of the 1928 film ‘The Seashell and the Clergyman’ written by Antonin Artaud. The film was infamously banned on first release in this country with the BBFC quoted as saying: “This film is so obscure as to have no apparent meaning. If there is a meaning, it is doubtless objectionable“.
Minima provide a terrific new soundtrack to the film and there will be extracts in tonight’s show which concludes with the start of an interview with Matthew Sweet, author of Silent Britain and Shepperton Babylon, and this will be continued in the next installment.

Links: Info about tonight’s performance at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol
Watch excerpts of The Seashell… with music performed by Minima
Watch the 30 min silent version of The Seashell… on youtube
Minima’s myspace page which has info on forthcoming performances
IMDb page on ‘The Seashell & the Clergyman’
Wikipedia page on Artaud
Director Germaine Dulac’s battle for authorship

Originally broadcast 1st February 2007 (mp3 format, 27mb)