Synchronic movie and... Alan Moore

Watch Synchronic trailer HERE.

Excerpts from an interview with film-makers Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson regarding their last sci-fi horror film Synchronic. The complete interview is available HERE. 

Watch Synchronic trailer HERE.

Moorhead: [...] You get the idea. And at lunch, I believe, Justin's like, "I had this idea based around this idea that Alan Moore uses a lot in a lot of his stuff," in Watchmen , in Jerusalem and a few other things, called eternalism or "block state universe," where time is all happening simultaneously. There's no distinction between the past, present, and future. And he thought, What if somebody could take a drug and see it that way? [...] what if you could just take that and it lets you see time the way that Doctor Manhattan sees it?

[...] Benson: Also, from an emotional standpoint, I think the person who put it best is Alan Moore. He said, with this theory, yes, it can be very scary to think that you're not experiencing time as it actually is, that's unsettling. But isn't it nice, isn't it beautiful that anyone you've ever known who's passed away, anyone you've ever loved, any structure you have ever left, anything, it's not gone? It's not behind you. It's just elsewhere. That's all. Hidden from your perception, but it's not gone.

John Constantine by Warren Pleece

Art by Warren Pleece.

Above, an intense Constantine pencil sketch by British comic book illustrator WARREN PLEECE. It was a great gift for me during Bristol Comic Festival 2002.

For more info about Warren Pleece visit his site: here.

On journalism and Hawkwind

Excerpt from "Ripping Yarns", an interview by Simon Lewis from Uncut n. 40, September 2000.

I did a little hit of rock journalism myself. I did a strip in Sounds called 'Roscoe Moscow', and occasionally I'd supplement my income by interviewing people like Hawkwind. Unfortunately if Nik Turner made me a cup of tea while I was interviewing them I couldn't write anything nasty about them. So I figured journalism wasn't for me. 

--- Alan Moore

Alan Moore writes an article about Hawkwind published on Sounds issue dated Nov 6, 1982 and titled Wind Power – Alan Moore joins the congregation at the church of Hawkwind.

Jon Osterman by Luca Genovese

Art by Luca Genovese.

Above, a shining portrait of Jon Osterman captured at the moment that marked his entire existence. 

Art by Italian comic book artist LUCA GENOVESE, realized as contribution to Watchmen 20 anni dopo, an Italian tribute book to Watchmen published in 2006 by Lavieri. 

"The Watchmaker chapter is my favorite one... I am a bit of a watchmaker myself so...
I wanted to capture Jon at his last moment as human being, watching time takes apart under a terrible light." - Luca Genovese

Preliminary sketch by Luca Genovese.

Arthur Machen and Alan Moore

Art by HUNT EMERSON.

Above, Alan Moore appearance in the Arthur Machen biography included in Lives of the great occultists by Kevin Jackson and HUNT EMERSON (previously published on Fortean Times' pages).

 

I strongly recommend Emerson's Lives of the great occultists: it's a fabulous reading and has lots of links with Moore's interests. Check it HERE!

For more info about EMERSON visit his site: HERE.

Dr. Manhattan by Mike McKone

Art by Mike McKone.

Above, a Dr. Manhattan portrait by British comic book artist Mike McKone.

You can follow McKone on his Twitter, HERE. 

Check his original art at TD Art Gallery, HERE.

Edward Blake by Carmine Di Giandomenico

Art by Carmine Di Giandomenico.

Above, a fantastic Edward Blake portrait, The Comedian, by acclaimed Italian comic book artist CARMINE DI GIANDOMENICO who drew several series for Marvel and DC Comics. 

 

The illustration has been realized as contribution to Watchmen 20 anni dopo, an Italian tribute book to Watchmen published in 2006 by Lavieri. 

"I wanted to draw a perspective cut that seemed like a CCTV frame, a sort of snapshot of the Comedian's private life.
It is a moment of reflection for the character; it's how he sees himself, alone and sad, disguised behind a bold and cynical attitude; he is searching for his own reflection, with the hope of meeting the best image of himself." - Carmine Di Giandomenico

Alan Moore and.. the lockdown

The Show!

 Excerpt from an interview published the 9th of October on Deadline.com.

DEADLINE: Hi Alan, what’s your lockdown experience in Northampton been like?
ALAN MOORE: Me and my wife Melinda are still effectively living in late February – it’s about the same temperature. We are ignoring all advice from the government because we don’t think they have our best interests at heart, we’re just doing what we think is the most sensible thing, we’re maintaining distancing, having our stuff delivered. We haven’t seen or touched anybody in the last six months.

On the other hand, we’re finding that we’re closer to people even though we haven’t seen them in the flesh for ages. We’re spending a lot more time calling up and reading stories to our grandchildren, which is a lot of fun. Things that we didn’t find the time for back when the world was trundling ahead. Yes we miss everybody, but at the same time I can see different sorts of bonds forming. We will keep informed by listening to proper doctor and scientists.

The complete interview is available HERE.

Alan Moore by Alessandro De Bei

Art by ALESSANDRO DE BEI.

Above, an intense Alan Moore portrait by Italian engraver and painter ALESSANDRO DE BEI, part of his "Esoteric prospections" series.

 

More info about the artist HERE (in Italian).

Alan Moore: A Critical Guide

Alan Moore: A critical guide

"A complete guide to the comics work of the writer Alan Moore, this book helps readers explore one of the genre's most important, compelling and subversive writers." 

By Jackson Ayres. To be released by Bloomsbury in April 2021.

Book's chapters are:

1. Introduction

Do We Need Moore?

The Original Writer

A Guide to this Guide

2. Historical and Biographical Contexts

Mage of the Midlands

Thatcherism

The British Invasion

Creator Rights

3. Key Texts, Part One

Invading British Comics

Origins

2000 A.D.: Short Stories, Skizz, DR and Quinch, and The Ballad of Halo Jones

The Bojeffries Saga

Reinventing Superheroes: Britain

Marvelman/Miracleman

Captain Britain

V for Vendetta

Reinventing Superheroes: America

The Saga of the Swamp Thing

Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?

The Killing Joke

Watchmen

4. Key Texts, Part Two

Horrors of History

From Hell

A Small Killing

Big Numbers

Brought to Light

Re-Imagining Superheroes

1963

Supreme

Moore's '90s Superheroes

Cultural Commons

“In Pictopia”

Lost Girls

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

America's Best Comics

Tom Strong

Tomorrow Stories

Top 10

Promethea

Histories of Horror

Lovecraft Cycle: The Courtyard, Neonomicon, and Providence

Crossed + 100

Cinema Purgatorio

5. Critical Questions

Themes and Techniques

Intertextuality

Magic

Psychogeography

Englishness

Representations

Race

Sexuality

Sexual Violence

6. Social and Cultural Impact

Authorship and Ownership

The Revised Superhero

Mature Readers?

Politics and/of Comics

Cultural Remixing

Moore After Comics, Comics After Moore

More info HERE.

The Show is... here!

The Show!

Dreams of serious things.

 

From the mind of Alan Moore comes a new feature film directed by Mitch Jenkins starring Tom Burke, Siobhan Hewlett, Alan Moore, Ellie Bamber, Darrell D'Silva, Richard Dillane, Christopher Fairbank, and Sheila Atim. Watch the trailer HERE!

 

More info HERE. 

John Dee: a living and progressive force

Fossil Angel. Art by Marjorie Cameron.

Excerpt from Fossil Angels, an article about Magic written by Moore in 2002, intended for Kaos magazine n.15, which was never published. 

The article is available at Glycon Journal with Moore's permission: HERE and HERE.

John Dee, conversely, was perhaps more wilfully awake than any other person of his day. More focussed and more purposeful. He did not need to search for antecedents in the fictions and mythologies available to him, because John Dee was in no sense pretending, was not playing games. He inspired, rather than was inspired by, the great magic fictions of his times. Shakespeare’s Prospero. Marlow’s Faust. Ben Johnson’s piss-taking The Alchemist. Dee’s magic was a living and progressive force, entirely of its moment, rather than some stuffed and extinct specimen, no longer extant save in histories or fairytales. His was a fresh, rip-roaring chapter, written entirely in the present tense, of the ongoing magical adventure. By comparison, the occultists that followed some three centuries down the line were an elaborate appendix, or perhaps a bibliography, after the fact. A preservation league, lip-synching dead men’s rituals. Cover versions. Sorcerous karaoke. Magic, having given up or had usurped its social function, having lost its raison d’etre, its crowd-pulling star turn, found itself with just the empty theatre, the mysterious curtains. Dusty hampers of forgotten frocks, unfathomable props from cancelled dramas. Lacking a defined role, grown uncertain of its motivations, magic seems to have had no recourse save sticking doggedly to the established script, enshrining each last cough and gesture, the by-now hollow performance freeze-dried, shrink-wrapped; artfully repackaging itself for English Heritage. [Alan Moore]