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The Films of Derek Jarman
THE FILMS OF DEREK JARMAN
"The compensation for making Sebastiane for £30,000 or Edward II for £800,000 is that I can be certain that these films, which are now involved in a struggle, will be shown thirty or forty years from now." - Derek Jarman
Of course, Derek has worked on many more projects than these, as a designer, cinematographer, writer and actor but we can only list a small part of his work.

For the complete list, visit the Internet Movie Database
Visit the Shrine of our Beloved Saint Derek of Jarman
Links to other sites dedicated to Derek Jarman
great site dedicated to keeping Derek Jarman's work and memory alive and created by our own Brother Blonde
Sebastiane - 1976
"Sebastian. Renaissance.  Pretty boy smiles through the arrows on a thousand altar pieces - plague.  Saint.  Captain of Diocletian's guard.  Converted, stoned, and thrown into the sewers.  Rescued by a Holy Woman. Androgyne icon banned by the bishop of Paris.  Danced by Ida Rubenstein.  Impersonated by Mishima.  In love with his martyrdom.
February 1975, Sloane Square; James wants an oil and vanilla film full of Steve Reeves muscle men working out in locker rooms.  Paul Humfress, who is to edit, wants a very serious art film, slow and ponderous.  I want a poetic film full of mystery.  The debate rages as I write, and the script is caught in a tug-of-war between the grey mirrors of Sloane Square."  Derek Jarman on Sebastiane, Dancing Ledge
"With Jubilee the progressive merging of film and my reality was complete.  The source of the film was often autobiographical, the locations were streets and warehouses in which I had lived during the previous ten years.  The film was cast from among and made by friends.  It was a determined and often reckless analysis of the world which surrounded us, constructed pell-mell through the early months of 1977.  The shooting script was is a mass of xeroxes and quick notes on scraps of paper, torn photos and messages from my collaborators, and the resulting film has something of the same quality.  Just as it seems that it is settling down it's off in another direction, like a yacht in a squall. Whereas in Sebastiane we lived in a world outside the film, in Jubilee our world became the film.  A first note to myself makes the position clear -
JUBILEE
is a fantasy documentary fabricated so that the documentary and fictional forms are confused and coalesce."
Derek Jarman on Jubilee, Dancing Ledge
Jubilee -1977
 "November, 1978 - February, 1979: During November I took out the scissors and cut up the play for the third time.
Having decided on the format of a dream film, one which enabled me to take the greatest possible freedom with the text.  I cut away the dead wood (particularly the obsolete comedy) so that the great speeches were concertinaed.  Then the play was rearranged and opened up: the theatrical magic had to be replaced.
The endless corridors and lost rooms of Stoneleigh suggested servants, romantic scholars with opium pipes, young girls with dresses spun from gossamer and frosted with shells and feathers.  By the time filming was commenced, on 14 February, we were living in another world.  The cameras began to turn with the house in darkness, its shutters closed against the blizzards outside." Derek Jarman on The Tempest, Dancing Ledge
'Love is too young to know what conscience is, but who knows not conscience is born of love.'
"The Angelic Conversation is a journey of discovery, my journey of discovery through the summer of '84.  After everything was finished I placed the sonnets in the soundtrack that Coil composed.  I had always wanted to make a film for them.  I asked Judi Dench to read them, I wanted a woman's voice so that there was no confusion. If I had used a man's voice it would have seemed that one of the young men was talking about the other.  One of them would have had the dominant voice, and I didn't want that to happen, so the voice became that of an observer, leaving the imagery autonomous.  It also established the feminine in the film, which otherwise would have been lacking.  It completed it." Derek Jarman on The Angelic Conversation, Kicking the Pricks
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All quotes on these film pages are copyright to the Estate of Derek Jarman.
They are used here in hopes of inspiring others to read his beautiful and moving journals
and to see his amazing visionary films for themselves.  

 

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