LWLies 87: The Mank issue – On sale now!

If you’re read­ing these words, there’s a like­li­hood you’re in the midst of a sec­ond lock­down and unable to stroll down to your local newsagent to pick up the lat­est LWLies. Well, for this issue, we’d urge you to stay indoors, not because we don’t want you to pick up the mag­a­zine, more because you won’t find it for a while, as the lion’s share of our stock­ists will be closed for busi­ness until Decem­ber at the ear­li­est. As such, the best way to get hold of this new issue is via our web shop, which also sells sub­scrip­tions too. All being well, this issue should be on shelves as soon as shops in the UK open again.

With that out the way, please extend a big, hearty wel­come to our new issue, which is inspired by David Fincher’s Mank. First a lit­tle bit of back sto­ry: the film was adapt­ed from a script writ­ten by Fincher’s father, Jack, who took it on as a project set by his son (who was mak­ing his ear­ly incur­sions into Hol­ly­wood at the time) to liv­en up his retire­ment years. This was back in the ear­ly ​’90s, and once it was ready, Finch­er Jr hit some­thing of a brick wall when it came to con­vinc­ing stu­dios to fund this black and white ren­der­ing of a vital moment in old Hol­ly­wood lore.

The title refers to the nick­name giv­en to ace scribe, wit and racon­teur, Her­man J Mankiewicz, and how after years of coast­ing on his genius, he final­ly alien­ates enough pro­fes­sion­al cohorts to write some­thing big, mean­ing­ful and dan­ger­ous. The 200 page script he end­ed up with was named Amer­i­can, but it end­ed up being released into cin­e­mas (albeit not very many cin­e­mas) under the name Cit­i­zen Kane, direct­ed by Orson Wells. Mank is the sto­ry of how that script came into being, but is also a hard-nosed explo­ration into the malev­o­lent nature of cre­ativ­i­ty, and the cru­el aspect of par­lay­ing real lives into a fic­tion­al context.

On the cover

We worked with the Brook­lyn-based illus­tra­tor Kather­ine Lam on a series of por­traits inspired by cinema’s arch out­siders for our Shape of Water issue, and so she was our first choice to attack a cov­er about anoth­er fringe Hol­ly­wood fig­ure being placed in the lime­light. Her stun­ning por­trait of Gary Old­man as Mank is obscured by reels of the film he had an impor­tant (but large­ly spec­tral) hand in bring­ing to life.

In this issue

A review of David Fincher’s Mank
Han­nah Wood­head ver­bal­ly spars with this sump­tu­ous evo­ca­tion of clas­sic-era Hollywood.

It’s All True: A Con­ver­sa­tion with David Finch­er
David Jenk­ins talks to the mas­ter film­mak­er about real­is­ing a pas­sion project after a 30-year wait.

The Hero­ine
Caitlin Quin­lan pro­files one of our favourite actors work­ing today, Tup­pence Middleton.

F For Fake
On the mag­ic tricks behind select­ing cos­tumes to show up on black-and-white film.

The Dream­ers
Adam Wood­ward scours the cred­its of Cit­i­zen Kane for the lost mas­ters of cinema.

Touch of Evil
Charles Bramesco revis­its the lit­tle-known 1973 TV movie filmed on the MGM lot as it was being bulldozed.

Too Much John­son
A com­plete time­line of how we came to col­lec­tive­ly wor­ship cer­tain movies in the West, by Lil­lian Crawford.

The Oth­er Side of the Wind
Matt Thrift cel­e­brates the preser­va­tion and cura­tion work done by the UK’s bou­tique Blu-ray labels.

Threads: The Majorette cos­tume
Christi­na New­land picks apart the screen iconog­ra­phy of cheer­leader garb in all its guises

Illus­tra­tion in this issue by Rumbidzai Mar­i­lyn Savan­hu, Calum Heath, Stephanie Sergeant, Jill De Haan, Francesca Pusced­du

In the back section

Zeina Dur­ra
Leila Latif talks to the direc­tor of Lux­or, which sees Andrea Rise­bor­ough tak­ing a moment of pause to reflect on life in the Egypt­ian city.

Pietro Mar­cel­lo
Sophie Monks Kauf­man meets this tal­ent­ed Ital­ian direc­tor and dis­cuss­es how he trans­posed Jack London’s tome, Mar­tin Eden, to the big screen.

Bran­don Cro­nen­berg
Like father like son – Leila Latif talks to Cro­nen­berg Jr about his idea-rich, gore-heavy hor­ror satire, Possessor.

Leonie Krip­pen­dorff
The Ger­man film­mak­er behind the sweet, les­bian com­ing-of-age film Cocoon talks about cap­tur­ing the spir­it of youth on film.

In review

Chloé Zhao’s Nomad­land
Roy Andersson’s About End­less­ness
Matt Wolf’s Recorder: The Mar­i­on Stokes Project
Zeina Durra’s Lux­or
Har­ry Macqueen’s Super­no­va
Tim Mielants’ Patrick
Ale­jan­dro Fadel’s Mur­der Me, Mon­ster
Steve McQueen’s Lovers Rock, Man­grove and Red, White and Blue
Pietro Marcello’s Mar­tin Eden
Thomas Vinterberg’s Anoth­er Round
Pete Doc­ter and Kemp Pow­ers’ Soul
Eva Mul­vad, Lea Glob and Morten Ranmar’s Love Child
Alexan­der Nanau’s Col­lec­tive
Thomas Bezucha’s Let Him Go
Michele Pennetta’s Il Mio Cor­po
Bran­don Cronenberg’s Pos­ses­sor
Vig­go Mortensen’s Falling
Leonie Krippendorff’s Cocoon
David Cronenberg’s Crash 4K
A selec­tion of the best Home Ents Releases.

LWLies 87 is out 10 Novem­ber. Order your copy and sub­scribe here.