Magic, Myth & Mutilation: The Micro-Budget Cinema of Michael J. Murphy, 1967–2015

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Winner of a Movie Maker Ten Best Competition Gold Star Award, this is probably Murphy's most narratively straightforward film yet. Murphy was, until very recently, a name that I thought I heard fleetingly some time ago but that my untrustworthy memory may well may be mistaking for someone else. We'd also occasionally have to repair damaged footage by resorting to SD inserts (this mostly applies to the very early work on Disc One, whose 16mm materials were sometimes in very rough shape). screens (well, 22 if you don't count the title cards) of stills, video covers and posters from Roxi and both versions of Skare. What looks like Murphy's own copy of the 2009 Skare screenplay, at least if the handwritten margin notes and 'this has been filmed' crossings out of whole scenes is anything to go by.

Murphy reveals that some of the dialogue was re-recorded in post to improve the acoustics, worries that an essentially silly premise is undermined by sequences that take it too seriously, winces at the memory of difficult to film scenes, and says of a lock used to keep the heavily muscled Dan from escaping, "That lock is so flimsy it I don't think that would stop a chihuahua trying to break in. Over the next five decades, Murphy would go on to make many more films across a variety of genres, dividing his production time between Greece, Portugal, and the UK, with family, friends, and local stage performers becoming his regular cast and crew in exchange for holidays in the sun. An alternative cut of the above that dispenses with most of the captions but ends with one that shouts in bright red, "Truly unbelievable," which is either a reflection of Murphy's tongue-in-cheek approach or really asking for it, depending on your viewpoint. I have little doubt that the do-it-on-the-cheap nature of Murphy's early works will make them easy targets for mockery for some, particularly those who have grown up in the digital age. It's well paced and directed, and the fight scenes are far more convincingly staged than the ones in Murphy's previous films.screens of production stills, posters, video and DVD covers, and even competition programme clippings for the films included on this disc. The soundtracks, which are presented here as Linear PCM mono or stereo, have also undergone restoration, and vary widely in quality from the crystal clear digital tracks on the later HD productions to the sometimes fluffy post-dubbed early work, where my raging tinnitus occasionally left me reliant on the welcome hard-of-hearing English subtitles that accompany every film. Murphy, MJM Archive maintainer and author of an upcoming book on the director, Wayne Maginn, is on hand to prove you wrong.

The only surviving film elements from Murphy's take on the Greek myth at the core of the 1981 Clash of the Titans, complete with a carboard Kraken that Perseus confronts with the head of Medusa. By the time I reached the end I found myself wistfully wishing that I had been, as what comes across in spades here is just how much Murphy loved making movies, and it's clear that his unwavering and cheerful enthusiasm drew others to him and infused them with the same level of drive and commitment.While all this is going on, the two escaped criminals, Mike (Steven Longhurst) Gary (Colin Efford), sneak in and make their way up to the loft with the aim of hiding out there for a few weeks after the performance ends and the theatre closes.

Not a 'making of' featurette in the usual sense, this consists of a single blue-screen shot of Murphy talking straight to camera in which he reflects on the experience of making Atlantis. A largely structureless collection of behind the scenes footage, fascinating for Murphy's microbudget working methods, particularly the watering can used to create the effect of rain in front of the camera.This is more like it, a trailer that captures the essence of the film, makes the drama and characters look interesting, and it chooses a choice line to sign off with. I was hit by a wave of nostalgia when watching Murphy shoot with the same Canon DV camera that I once worked with and the exact bargain basement dolly that I used for years, including on fellow site reviewer Camus's feature, Kelling Brae. While his earliest works were shot on an 8mm home movie camera, he quickly moved up to 16mm film, and later to mini-DV video and eventually HD.