Awestruck is probably the right word. I'm not normally the type to get
enthusiastic about "celebrities", but sitting in the NFT watching BN
with Columba, Susan, and Kathleen's daughter a couple of rows in front
of me was one of those times where you just have to pinch yourself.
Kathleen was a bit nervous (wouldn't you be with a few hundred fans
sat in the audience hanging on every word you were saying?), but on
fine form - loved the story about the cat in SBR (no doubt Steve will
give a full recap, so I won't steal his thunder. It was great to meet
Nicky, Richard, Steve, and (briefly) Natacha and to not realise I was
meeting Susan and Columba until it was too late (despite knowing them
from the pictures!)
BN went down very well with the audience - quite a bit of laughter
(more to do with the period dialogue than anything else). I personally
spent the first couple of minutes giggling trying to convince myself
that the Mother Superior wasn't the Emperor in Star Wars - it was the
headgear, the weathered face, the voice, and the dialogue that did it
("Our plans at Mopur are in place" - pure Darth Vader)
It was stunning on the big screen - Clodagh's flashback to her Irish
idyll was more emotive than normal, and that dissolve back to the
chapel is just totally awesome. The print was very good, and although
the shadows were darker than I remember on TV this added to the menace
of the final scenes. What I hadn't noticed before is the UFA influence
- the shots of peasants working in the fields are pure Reifenstahl,
and some of the shots of Sister Ruth in the end sequence reminded me
of Nosferatu.
And David Farrar did a very good job of burning a hole in the screen
(and Kathleen did like his shorts!) If they'd started making Bond
movies earlier he would have made an excellent Bond.
Alan Head
