Richard Ayoade - The Grip of Film

If Ive recently learned one thing, its to never again accept a two-book publishing deal. Ive come to realise that I dont have ideas as such, and if I were to have one, I certainly wouldnt consign it to the anachronistic abstraction of prose. I am technically able to write out words, having attended school most years between the ages of six and nine, but Im never certain when (or if) they are in the right order. But as I became more and more celebrated as a visionary filmmaker, my management squad thought it would be wise to fend off the inevitable gush of unauthorised biographies (however flattering) that would soon flood the market. That gushy flood, like in Vol. 1 of the Bible, never happened, but my advance had been cashed, another copter was in the hangar and my bleach shares had plummeted. One week later, I delivered the first and final draft of what I wished was my only book. Its title?

Ayoade on Ayoade: A Cinematic Odyssey.

The book became an instant bestseller, but the critical response to AOA: ACO deeply upset me. in the town centre, plowing through candyfloss while nursing a jumbo isotonic sports drink, its increasingly non-directional sports nozzle foiling my desperate attempts to rehydrate.

Tears, Lucozade and spittle had drenched my jodhpurs. A crowd had gathered. I had hit Rock Bottom.

My mobile phone sounded, but my hands, tacky with floss, could not slide to answer. I had to call back, at my own expense.

AYOADE

Hello?

NAMELESS PUBLISHER

Why are you doing a Mick Jagger impression?

AYOADE

Too much lip salve. Who is this?

NAMELESS PUBLISHER

Its Walter, your nameless publisher. Something interestings come in. It concerns one of those books that tell you how all films work.

AYOADE

You mean an AZ of film? One of the many definitive tracts that hubristically claim to unpack long-held principles of movie narrative?

NAMELESS PUBLISHER

Thats right. Were really excited about it, but theres a problem.

AYOADE

Hit me.

NAMELESS PUBLISHER

Id rather tell you Ive temporarily quelled my desire to strike you.

AYOADE

Youre the Nameless Publisher its your pom-pom party.

NAMELESS PUBLISHER

I dont know if thats an obscure reference or a malapropism.

AYOADE

Welcome to Me.

NAMELESS PUBLISHER

Well, the problem is that the book which you just defined so concisely is written by someone that no ones heard of.

AYOADE

Try me. But please dont end a sentence with a preposition. Im a serious literary voice.

NAMELESS PUBLISHER

His name is Gordy LaSure.

That was the first time that I heard the name Gordy LaSure. It wouldnt be the last. Nor the penultimate. Shoot, I wasnt even halfway.

My Nameless Publisher, sensing the aridity of my creative well, was offering me salvation. By presenting Gordy LaSures book (i.e. writing this Ante Foreword and adding some intermittent, but admittedly prescient, footnotes), I could rid myself of my contractual obligation and settle most of my dry-cleaning bills. But what started as a job for hire turned into an opportunity to drink both personally, intimately and greedily from the private fountain of a master. Id like to thank Gordy for engorging my well, and for wetting its perimeter with his uniquely salty waters.

But this isnt my book, its Gordys. So lets hear a little more about him

Or if theyre even words! Sometimes they look like demons!

Eulogies are so limiting what about the things you forgot to praise?

This was coincidental. A new Greggs was opening and people wanted to taste London food.

Please note that from now on, my [Ayoades] footnotes will be signed Ayo.

Except w/r/t royalties, which are split more or less equally Ayo.

Gordy LaSure wouldnt want this introduction. He cares too much about directness, plainness and integrity to have Some Notable uncase his drum brushes and start giving it the Big Soft Roll. No, Gordy LaSure would sooner pull out his thick penis and piss on a plaudit than waste a single one of his Few Remaining Goddam Minutes prizing one. Not for Gordy LaSure the shrill hiss of hype, the tinny clang of gongs, the flaccid rim of flattery. When the spotlight arcs into life, distilling its dazzle down onto the stage, youre more likely to see the shifting cirrus of Gordy LaSures dust than The Man Himself. Youll find him, if you can get a seat, at one of his seminars, where his eager students await his piercing insights on film structure. Gordy literally and legally owns that room, his wise eyes shadowed by a forehead rammed full of insight, his expressive arms sinewed from a lifetime of tearing down expectations. And if, after Gordy LaSure flings out a stack of his legendary lecture notes, youre foolish enough to Blow Smoke Up Gordy LaSures Ass, hell tell you how that particular expression refers to the eighteenth-century practice of rectally resuscitating the near-victims of drowning. Dont believe him? Wait till he whips out his copper-nozzled bellows!

Gordy LaSure sure as hell wouldnt want this introduction. Fuck you! I can hear him say. Get the hell off my property, you no-neck fuck! I dont care how many Oscars youve won. taking refuge behind the newly installed Lat Pull Down while he drunkenly fumbled with his Luger.

Lets be as clear as a disinfected mountain river: Gordy LaSure fucking hates introductions. Wanna know how to write a good scene? Show up as late as you can, then get the hell out of there. And hes right. Aint nothing worse than a piece-of-shit Foreword.

But and heres the dumb-fuckery of it all Gordy LaSure needs an introduction. Not because hes an unknown. On the contrary, his name is whispered with awed approbation by studio heads, filmmakers and his remaining students, all paying witness to his unbridled brilliance, his relentless perspicacity and, before a minor operation on his glands, his persistent perspiration. Gordy LaSures passionate about film. He eats film, he drinks film and sometimes hell even watch a film. But most of all he loves talking to people about film, whether a comely student with low confidence and a father complex, a studio development exec who doesnt trust his own judgment, or the countless people Gordy LaSures encounters in his capacity as the web moderator on an Excessive Sweating Discussion Forum. Gordy LaSures always talking about films and how theyd be a shit-ton better if only people would pull their asses out of their ears and listen to Gordy LaSure.

Lets throw up a few of his achievements from his tenure at the South Los Angeles Drop-In Center (a place that hes transformed from a glorified Vegetarian Taco Stand to the vibrant, if necessarily transient, community it is today). Thus far Gordys founded the Critical Film Study Doctorate Program; the Film as Text Doctorate Program; the Text Cant Be Film Until Filmed Program; the Society for the Study of Film in Society Program; the School of Film, Theater, Television, and Other Formerly Relevant Media Program; and the Red Meat Only Taco Stand. Not too shabby for a Limey Son of a Bitch from Glasgow, England.

But hes left his true legacy in, and sometimes on, the body of his students. Gordy LaSure has taught over thirty thousand different classes at SLADIC, and hes dished out a hell of a lot of meaty tacos. Countless men, women and vagrants have attended his all-night seminars where, fueled by peppery beef, consensual neck rubs and the music of Tony Bennett, he eulogizes long into the night over film and film structure, pausing only to vomit or manage his dwindling property portfolio. Indeed, his understanding of every aspect of movie storytelling is so masterful its surprising that hes never written a script himself.