Pulp a Fascinating Piece of Work on All Levels

New Zealand director Florian Habicht’s documentary on British rock band Pulp screens at the Docaviv International Documentary Film Festival in Tel Aviv on from 8-17 May.

“Habicht’s portrayal of British rock band Pulp is a fascinating piece of work on all sorts of levels,” the Jerusalem Post reports. “For starters, it is about one of the world’s most successful groups in the mid-1990s, but, more importantly, it’s about where the band members come from, musically, physically and emotionally, and about the northern English city they call home, Sheffield.

“There is no ‘rock god’ sentiment in the film, despite 38-year-old Habicht being an avowed fan of the band. It is simply a delightful portrait of a bunch of people who happen to be musicians, and happen to have experienced enormous success.

“Habicht and [Pulp’s lead singer Jarvis] Cocker met in London prior to the 2012 London Film Festival screening of Habicht’s film Love Story.

“He evidently liked what he saw because he and the New Zealander began meeting for cups of tea in London’s Soho district, and discussing their respective ideas for making a film about Cocker’s hometown.

“‘Both our ideas shared the exact same spirit,’ Habicht says. ‘They were about the people of Sheffield, and not about the band. It was a really nice coincidence that we had the same vision of a film, so that the band is not the centre of the universe.'”

In 2012, Love Story won the Audience Choice Award at the Pluk de Nacht Outdoor Film Festival in Amsterdam.

Original article by Barry Davis, The Jerusalem Post, May 8, 2014.