Life in Squares (2015)

Fantastic!

An absolute waste of money

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Swedish television and film director Simon Kaijser's television miniseries which was written by English author and screenwriter Amanda Coe, is inspired by real events which took place in England in the early 20th century. It premiered on English television in 2015, was shot on locations in England and is a UK production which was produced by producer Rhonda Smith. It tells the story about a twenty-three-year-old author who was born in Kensington, Middlesex, London in England in the early 1880s.Distinctly and precisely directed by Swedish filmmaker Simon Kaijser, this quietly paced and somewhat fictional tale which is narrated by and mostly from the main characters' viewpoints, draws a perspicacious portrayal of a twenty-six-year-old sister. While notable for its distinctly atmospheric milieu depictions, cinematography by cinematographer Allan Almond, production design by production designer David Roger and costume design by costume designer Claire Anderson, this dialog-driven and narrative-driven story about English history which was made a century after an English painter named Vanessa Stephen Bell (1879-1961) and a Scottish painter from Rothiemurchus, Aviemore, Scotland named Duncan Grant (1885-1978) arrived in Charleston, Sussex, England (1916), depicts several interrelated studies of character and contains a great and timely score by composer Edmund Butt.This conversational and cinematographic retelling which is set in England in the early 20th century more than a century after a photograph called "Julia Jackson" (1867) and where poets and painters create a group, is impelled and reinforced by its cogent narrative structure, substantial character development, rhythmic continuity, comment by Leonard: "Our whiff of shot in the cause of freedom." and the reverent acting performances by English actresses Lydia Leonard, Phoebe Fox, Catherine McCormack and Eve Best. An androgynous miniseries.

I recorded this mini series because being a fan of Woolf's writing and being interested in Keynes I was interested in the topic. I delayed watching it because of the potential for lascivious sexism and cliché I have observed in other artistic works regarding the Bloomsbury set. I started watching it when I was ill and was gripped. I like the way the author focused on Vanessa Bell and the avoidance of sexist representations of the women, as is so often the case, especially where there is a break from accepted relationship convention.I was so glad the author just introduced some characters by name and didn't over explain who everyone was and list their achievements. Unlike a previous reviewer I was glad the snobbishness and self importance and flaws of individuals was not written out. I particularly enjoyed the inclusion of angelica's experience. This took the examination of the group far beyond previous works I have encountered, giving the story some real emotional meaning.Over all this series seemed to me to be an exploration of relationships. It reminded me of Phillip Larkin's poem of parenthood.

It's part two of Life in Squares tonight about the Bloomsbury Group and Virginia Woolf on BBC2 tonight at 21.00. In the first episode we romped through nearly ten years and saw how the embryonic group grew out of some Cambridge male graduates in the modern Bohemian squares of Bloomsbury. They were young free and single and OK. for money and everything was exciting. We saw how the complex relationships of Vanessa (nee Stephen) Bell, Virginia (nee Stephen) Woolf and the death of Thoby Stephen who brought the group together for their Thursday evening meetings. Painter Vanessa Stephen and her writer sister Virginia embarked on a life of unexpected and emerged from the whaleboned strictures of Victoria England. It was a remarkably accurate portrayal and covered a lot of ground in a short hour long program. I loved the lighting and treatment of some difficult subjects which set up tonight's second episode for an exciting continuation.

I TRIED (I really did) with the first episode of LIFE IN SQUARES but after twenty minutes my brain started to dig a tunnel through my spine and tried to escape the UTTER TEDIUM of this smug little series. Worse, the episode moved with all the speed and urgency of a glacier, unlike my brain digging the escape tunnel. It was like being trapped in a room with a gang of self-regarding teenage Hipsters and Emos all moving in slow motion because of clinical depression. Frankly (and this is rare) I gave up after that twenty minutes and I won't be returning.Were the Bloomsbury Set a significant collection of artistic types who paved the way for the freedoms we enjoy today or a bunch of tedious and ultimately irrelevant posers only of interest to similar posers who write long serials for the BBC? Discuss.