I don’t often talk about work projects, but I cant hold my tongue about this one. I’ve been rather excited about it for a while, and it went live today.
Adam Curtis is the documentary filmmaker behind ‘The Power of Nightmares‘, ‘The Century of the Self‘ and more. Recently, he’s done some pieces for Screenwipe about the rise and fall of the television journalist and another about ‘oh dearism’ in the news for Newswipe.
Well, he’s going to start blogging about his work and ideas on the BBC. In fact, the Adam Curtis blog launched today at bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis. Hurrah.
Adam writes: “This is a website expressing my personal views – through a selection of opinionated observations and arguments. I’ll be including stories I like, ideas I find fascinating, work in progress and a selection of material from the BBC archives.”
All rather exciting. Of course, the rights issues with some of the clips, and especially the music, make it hard to publish them all for an internet-wide audience and sadly some of the content has to be restricted to the UK for right reasons, but the plan is for as much as possible to be globally available as the blog goes forward.
Some related links:
- It Felt Like a Kiss – Adam Curtis and Felix Barrett with Punchdrunk, original music by Damon Albarn – Manchester International Festival, 2nd – 19th July 2009
- Guardian video about ‘It Felt Like a Kiss’
- The Register – inside Adam Curtis’ funhouse
- Update: (Saturday) – Charlie Brooker’s piece in this weekend’s Guide has an interview, and concludes with “TV industry! Here’s a little bombshell for you. From now on, all of Curtis’s work will be produced first and foremost for the internet…”
While I’m pimping BBC blogs, other recent-ish blog launches you might have missed:
- Mark Beaumont Cycling the Americas
- Last Chance To See with Stephen Fry and Mark Carwardine
- BBC Comedy
- Being Human
- Mark Kermode (which has been around for a while, but I absolutely love the way he’s responding to comments).
Yay!
I’ve really got into watching Adam Curtis documentaries of late, and so this is really wonderful news. I’d enjoyed his posts on the Editor’s Blog in the past, and so to have a place where all his work is shown off in its fascinating genius is great!
I think they might be two different instances of Adam Curtis. It is exciting though isn’t it?
In a brilliant bit of beeboid irony the other Adam Curtis is the Head of Editorial Standards, BBC Newsroom. The potential for amusing confusion is interesting to say the least.
This is fantastic and hopefully radical stuff, the McLuhanesque title is very appropriate.
I’d always assumed they were the same person, although now you come to point it out, it makes a lot more sense that they’re not.
Still, ace that the Adam Curtis I’m much more interested in now has a blog of his very own!
I could be wrong but in one interview he sounds as if he didn’t particularly like bloggers – that would be a ‘u’ turn, no?
Don’t know if I’d call it a U-turn Ian/Julia. I’d call it a journey of discovery for him, perhaps.