70x70: Unlicensed Preaching: A Life Unpacked In 70 Films

Turning 70 years old on 11th June 2013, Iain Sinclair – writer, filmmaker, poet, walker, perpetual seeker of the perimeter and reluctant magus of the media school of psycho-geography – found it hard to resist the offer of the opportunity to make his choice of 70 films that related to, and are oft interwoven across his entire writing career. This was a chance to have these films shown in a variety of venues and resonant locations across London – a city Sinclair has made his own, a city he has (re)defined. This book features both Sinclair’s initial 17,000 word explanation of the films chosen and their relationship to his novels and his life along with the resultant forensic documentation of this epic curatorial journey – film as mirrors, film as portals, film mutated through radio waves –additions to the teaming city ghost voices, film as a journey to no fixed abode. Sinclair spoke at many of the events, a constant updating and realigning, placing his choices in the here and now and soon to come. Predicting, proposing, provoking. He was aided and abetted by old friends, fellow writers Alan Moore and Robert Macfarlane, film-making co-conspiriators Andrew Cotting (Swandown) and Chris Petit (London Orbital), along with film academics Colin MacCabe and Gareth Evans and other manifestations from his fictional/factional role call. All seventy of the events were documented and these words and images now form an impressionistic memento of Iain Sinclair’s 70x70 year, a defining corollary to this writer’s extraordinary life. Films featured: A Time for Dying The Act of Seeing with One’s Own Eyes Aguirre, the Wrath of God Ah! Sunflower (Allen Ginsberg in London) Allemagne Année 90 Neuf Zéro Around the World with Orson Welles Asylum/The Final Commission Beat The Beat Generation Berlin Alexanderplatz The Bridegroom, the Actress and the Pimp Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia British Sounds Bronco Bullfrog Candy Mountain The Cardinal and the Corpse Chappaqua Confidential Report/Mr Arkadin Content The Criminal The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz Cul-de-Sac The Cutting The Dark Eyes of London Downriver/Vessels of Wrath Estate, a Reverie The Face on the Fork The Falconer Flight to Berlin Germany in Autumn Girl Chewing Gum/The Man Phoning Mum Il Grido Hackney 8mm Diary Films Hackney Marshes Hackney Shorts (Automaton and The Last Days of Dobson) Hangover Square In a Lonely Place In the Wake of a Deadad It Always Rains on Sunday The Killing of a Chinese Bookie King Lear (Brook) King Lear (Godard) The Last Movie The Last of England The Lineup The Long Good Friday Mabuse Saga: Dr. Mabuse der Spieler, Das Testament des Dr. Mabuse, Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse Maggot Street/Maggid Street Marine Court Rendezvous Memo Mori Le Mépris Niagara Nostalgia for the Light Psycho The Return of Frank James The (Rudy) Wurlitzer Documentary The Small World of Sammy Lee The Sorcerers Stromboli Swandown Sympathy for the Devil The Tarnished Angels This Our Still Life Too Hot to Handle Tornado Touch of Evil Two Weeks in Another Town Vulcano Walk the Walk Written on the Wind