Category Archives: film

Wes Anderson @40

Wes Anderson @40

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6l8zrsf4LY]

Seu Jorge sings [1] “Life on Mars?” in Portuguese in The Life Aquatic

Wesley Wales Anderson (born May 1, 1969) is an American writer, producer, and director of films and commercials. In Europe, Anderson came to mainstreamish attention with The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) but my favourite of his films is The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004), not in the least because the film is his most surreal effort to date and was rather poorly received compared to his other films. Future films to be expected from Anderson are Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), an animation of a Roald Dahl story and My Best Friend, an adaptation of the film by the same name by personal fave Patrice Leconte.

With the exception of Bottle Rocket, his films employ a similar art direction, primarily through the use of vivid primary colors. He often uses folk music and early rock as the background music in scenes. The depiction of escapism and companionship through chemicals is also one of his trademarks. Anderson, like many European art film directors before him makes use of ensemble casts of the same actors, crew members, and other collaborators. For example, the Wilson brothers (Owen, Luke, and Andrew), Bill Murray, Seymour Cassel, Anjelica Huston, Jason Schwartzman (I Heart Huckabees) and Eric Chase Anderson (Anderson’s brother). Other frequent collaborators are writer Noah Baumbach, who co-wrote The Life Aquatic, and wrote/directed his own film, The Squid and the Whale, with Anderson as producer. Also cinematographer Robert Yeoman and composer Mark Mothersbaugh.

If you like Anderson’s work, you should check  the following directors working in North America: David O. Russell, P. T. Anderson, Michel Gondry, Charlie Kaufman, Spike Jonze, Vincent Gallo, Hal Hartley, Alexander Payne and Terry Zwigoff, a group of directors currently being denoted as indiewood.

RIP Jack Cardiff (1914 – 2009)

RIP Jack Cardiff (1914 – 2009)

Jack Cardiff OBE, B.S.C. (18 September 1914 – 22 April 2009) was British cinematographer (Black Narcissus, A Matter Of Life And Death), director and photographer.

He was best known for his influential cinematography for directors such as Powell, Huston and Hitchcock.

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEOwybriej4&]

The Girl on a Motorcycle (music by Les Reed)

Of importance to the Jahsonic canon is his film The Girl on a Motorcycle (1968) starring Marianne Faithfull and Alain Delon. The film is based on the story La Motocyclette by André Pieyre de Mandiargues[1], co-written by Cardiff himself, Ronald Duncan (The Rape of Lucretia) and Gillian Freeman (The Undergrowth of Literature).

A married woman leaves her husband, zooms off on her motorcycle to see her lover, and crashes to her death while indulging in sexual reverie, a motif –or variant thereof — also to be found in Ballard’s Crash.

The film isn’t all that great, I suspect, it’s just one of those films where the idea of the film, and its paratext, are more interesting than the film in itself.

See “When the paratext is more interesting than the text.”

Cheri: New Michele Pfeiffer film

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCUdEXqiNZ0]

Cheri

Cheri is an upcoming film starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Rupert Friend (The Libertine), and directed by Stephen Frears. It is an adaptation of the novel by French author Colette. The film premiered at the 2009 Berlin International Film Festival. Set in 1920s Paris, Cheri tells the story of the end of a six-year affair between an aging retired courtesan, Léa, and a pampered young man, Chéri. Turning stereotypes upside-down, it is Chéri who wears silk pajamas and Léa’s pearls, and who is the object of gaze.

The film also stars Kathy Bates (Misery) and Anita Pallenberg (Performance).

World Cinema Classic #98

Via Ian Kerkhof‘s incredibly prolific blog[1] comes our 98th World Cinema Classic, an ongoing project at the Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia.

This entry goes to The Dogway Melody [2] (1930), one of the Dogville shorts.

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=II1BkpX03-M]

The Dogway Melody is a 1930 comedy short film that recreates scenes from early musical films, particularly The Broadway Melody. The entire cast are trained dogs with human voiceovers. It was directed by Zion Myers and Jules White and it forms part of the MGM produced series of Dogville shorts.

RIP Marilyn Chambers (1952 – 2009)

RIP Marilyn Chambers

Behind the Green Door

Marilyn Chambers (April 22, 1952 – April 12, 2009) was an American pornographic actress, exotic dancer, and vice-presidential candidate. She was best known for her 1972 hardcore debut porno chic title Behind the Green Door. For a brief time, mainstream cinema noticed Chambers, who in 1977 nabbed a major role in David Cronenberg‘s low-budget Canadian-made  body horror film Rabid.

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-petXcizF1E]

Rabid

Behind the Green Door (1972) was the first hardcore pornographic movie widely released in the United States. Directed by the Mitchell brothers and starring Marilyn Chambers as Gloria Saunders, the movie depicts her abduction to a sex theater, where she is forced to perform various sexual acts in front of an audience, with characters including nuns and trapeze artists. The Mitchell brothers appear in the film as her kidnappers. In a psychedelic and colorful key sequence, an ejaculation on Chambers’ face is shown with semen flying through the air for seven minutes. Along with Deep Throat, released later in the same year, the movie launched the “porno chic” boom and started what is now referred to as the “Golden Age of Porn“. The production of the movie is dramatized in the movie Rated X[1] starring the brothers Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez as Artie and Jim.

Rabid (1977) – David Cronenberg [Amazon.com]

Picture shows Marilyn with orifice under an armpit, within it hidden a phallic stinger

Rabid is a 1977 body horror film written and directed by David Cronenberg starring Marilyn Chambers and Robert A. Silverman. The plot is about a critically-injured woman (Chambers) victim of a motorcycle accident is taken to the plastic surgery clinic of Doctor Dan Keloid, where some of her intact tissue is treated to become “morphogenetically neutral” and grafted to fire-damaged areas of her body in the hope that they will differentiate and replace the damaged skin and organs.

Unfortunately, the woman’s body unexpectedly accepts the transplants: she develops an orifice under an armpit, within it hides a phallic stinger. She uses it to feed on the blood of other people, and afterwards wiping their memories of their incidents with her.

It soon is apparent that her every victim transforms to a rabid zombie whose bite spreads the disease, eventually causing the city to fall into chaos before the outbreak can be contained.

Landru @140

Henri Désiré Landru (born April 12, 1869 in Paris, France – executed February 25, 1922 in Versailles, France) was a notorious French serial killer and real-life Bluebeard. Landru was the inspiration for Charlie Chaplin‘s film Monsieur Verdoux (1947).

Landru by you.

Henri Désiré Landru (born April 12, 1869 in Paris, France – executed February 25, 1922 in Versailles, France) was a notorious French serial killer and real-life Bluebeard who was guillotined for at least 11 murdered women. Landru was the inspiration for Charlie Chaplin‘s film Monsieur Verdoux (1947). The method of lonely hearts killing was also used by the real-life couple portrayed in The Honeymoon Killers.

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72B8SAe8Pk4&]

I was surprised to find in that film, Verdoux, references to Schopenhauer. When Verdoux is told that he appears to dislike women, he protests: “On the contrary, I love women, but I don’t admire them. He goes on with a chthonic trope and adds “Women are of the earth, realistic, dominated by physical facts.”

Last time I heard [an implied]  Schopenhauer mentioned in a film was Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt. Verdoux thus becomes World Cinema Classics #95.

P.S. There is a pretty good YouTumentary on the guillotine here[1] with an incredible soundtrack, “Élégie” by Igor Stravinsky.

Bernd Eichinger @60

Bernd Eichinger @60

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mG6sXLQwlJU&]

Christiane F. (1982, directed by Uli Edel)

To the sound of “Heroes” by Bowie

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAyCi4cObmI]

Der Baader Meinhof Komplex (2008, directed by Uli Edel)

Bernd Eichinger (born April 11, 1949 in Neuburg an der Donau) is a German film producer and director. He attended film school in the 1970s, and bought a stake in the fledgling studio company Constantin Film but continues to produce some films independently (for example The Downfall). He has only directed two movies himself. Eichinger’s latest film is about the left-wing terrorist group Red Army Faction (RAF) based on the book Der Baader Meinhof Komplex (“The Baader-Meinhof Complex“) by Stefan Aust. He debuted as producer with The Wrong Move by Wim Wenders.

Some well-known films produced by Eichinger include:

Max von Sydow @80

Max von Sydow @80

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCjoNt0iCzY]

Break-up scene in Hannah and Her Sisters

Max Carl Adolf von Sydow, (born 10 April 1929 in Lund) is a Swedish actor (also French, since obtaining citizenship in 2002), known in particular for his collaboration with filmmaker Ingmar Bergman. He has acted in films as diverse as The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries, Hour of the Wolf, The Exorcist, Illustrious Corpses, Death Watch, Hannah and Her Sisters, What Dreams May Come and Minority Report.

The Seventh Seal (Swedish: Det sjunde inseglet) is an existential 1957 Swedish film directed by Ingmar Bergman about the journey of a medieval knight (Max von Sydow) across a plague-ridden landscape. Its best-known scene features the knight playing chess with the personification of Death, his life resting on the outcome of the game. The film has long been regarded a masterpiece of cinema.

Wild Strawberries is a 1957 film written and directed by Ingmar Bergman. The original Swedish title is Smultronstället, which literally means The Wild Strawberry Patch. The cast includes Bergman regulars Bibi Andersson, Ingrid Thulin and Gunnar Björnstrand. Max von Sydow also appears in a small part. Bergman wrote the screenplay while in the hospital.

Hour of the Wolf is a Swedish film from 1968. It is Ingmar Bergman‘s only horror film. Hour of the Wolf originated from a manuscript with the working title “The Maneaters”. Bergman started working on it in the spring of 1965, during which time he suffered a minor nervous breakdown. In the end, the manuscript resulted in not one but two movies, Persona and Hour of the Wolf. Together with the former movie, Hour of the Wolf is probably one of Bergman’s most personal films, though he deals with himself in one way or another in almost all of his movies. It is filmed as if it is a true story about an artist who has disappeared. The story of the artist and his life just before his vanishing is based on interviews with his wife, and on his diaries.

The Exorcist is a 1973 American horror film, adapted from the 1971 novel of the same name by William Peter Blatty, dealing with the demonic possession of a young girl, and her mother’s desperate attempts to win back her daughter through an exorcism conducted by two priests. The film features Ellen Burstyn, Linda Blair and Max von Sydow. Both the film and novel took inspirations from a documented exorcism in 1949, performed on a 14-year-old boy. The Film is one of a cycle of ‘demonic child‘ movies, including The Omen series and Rosemary’s Baby.

Cadaveri eccellenti

Illustrious Corpses poster designed by Enrico Baj.

Illustrious Corpses (Cadaveri eccellenti) is a 1976 thriller film directed by Francesco Rosi and starring Lino Ventura. The film was adapted from Leonardo Sciascia‘s novel Equal Danger a novel on organized crime. Its Italian poster art was designed by Enrico Baj. Cadaveri eccellenti literally means Excellent Cadavers and is also the name of a surrealist technique known in English as exquisite corpse.

Death Watch (French: La Mort en direct) is a 1980 French science fiction film directed by Bertrand Tavernier. It based on the novel The Continuous Katherine Mortenhoe by David G. Compton. Romy Schneider plays the dying heroine with whose death is being recorded on national television in an ongoing soap opera of morbid reality tv. Much of the filming took place in and around Glasgow.

Hannah and Her Sisters is an Academy Award-winning 1986 romantic comedy film which tells the intertwined stories of an extended family, told mostly during a year that begins and ends with a family Thanksgiving dinner. The movie was written and directed by Woody Allen and stars Mia Farrow as Hannah, with Barbara Hershey and Dianne Wiest as her sisters. The film is Allen’s biggest box office hit thus far, without adjusting for inflation, with a North American gross of $41 million. Adjusted for inflation it falls behind Annie Hall and Manhattan, and possibly also one or two of his early comedies.

What Dreams May Come is a 1998 dramatic film, starring Robin Williams, Cuba Gooding, Jr., and Annabella Sciorra. The movie is based on the 1978 novel by Richard Matheson, and was directed by Vincent Ward. The title is taken from a line in Hamlet‘s To be, or not to be soliloquy.

Heath Ledger @30

Heath Ledger @30

Heath Andrew Ledger (4 April 1979–22 January 2008) was an Australian actor who died young by committing suicide. He was only 28.

People do not die in this universe. Did James Dean die? Or Marilyn Monroe? They have become part of modern mythology. Watch the unusual Western Brokeback Mountain (2005). It is World Cinema Classic #91.

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xuugq7fito]

Brokeback Mountain