RIP Krzysztof Penderecki (1933 – 2020)

Krzysztof Penderecki was a Polish composer of 20th century classical music, a period characterized by the use of dissonance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHIjVdHBEi8

Outside of the classical music domain his music has been popular in horror films. The piece Polymorphia (1962) for example, is used in The Exorcist (1973) and in The Shining (1980).

And then there is his opera based on the book The Devils of Loudun (1952) by Aldous Huxley. The story of the Loudun possessions is highly remarkable and any occasion to bring it to your attention, shall be grasped.

RIP Nina Auerbach (1943 – 2017)

Nina Auerbach was an American scholar. She published in the fields of Victorian literature, theater, cultural history, and horror fiction and film.

Our Vampires, Ourselves (1995) by Nina Auerbach
[Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]

“Vampires and American presidents began to converge in my imagination, not because all presidents are equally vampiric, but because both are personification of their age […] Since I loved vampires before I hated Republicans, this book also reflects my idiosyncrasies.”

Our Vampires, Ourselves (1995) by Nina Auerbach, p. 3

I’ve only read scraps of Auerbach: her remarks on the Carroll photos of Evelyn Hatch and her funny remarks in Our Vampires, Ourselves (above).

Her work is in the tradition of Mario Praz, Bram Dijkstra and Camille Paglia.

RIP Stuart Gordon (1947 – 2020)

Incredibly Strange Film Show on Stuart Gordon (part one)

Stuart Gordon is a film director is best-known for his Re-Animator (1985), based on H. P. Lovecraft’s “Herbert West—Reanimator” (1922).

Incredibly Strange Film Show on Stuart Gordon (part two)

The story starts with these lines ominous lines, in keeping with Lovecraft’s sinister oeuvre:

“Of Herbert West, who was my friend in college and in after life, I can speak only with extreme terror. This terror is not due altogether to the sinister manner of his recent disappearance, but was engendered by the whole nature of his life-work, and first gained its acute form more than seventeen years ago, when we were in the third year of our course at the Miskatonic University Medical School in Arkham. While he was with me, the wonder and diabolism of his experiments fascinated me utterly, and I was his closest companion. Now that he is gone and the spell is broken, the actual fear is greater. Memories and possibilities are ever more hideous than realities.”

H. P. Lovecraft’s “Herbert West—Reanimator” (1922)

The television documentary series Incredibly Strange Film Show did a special on Gordon in 1989 where they interviewed him in the La Brea Tar Pits

RIP Manu Dibango (1933 – 2020)

“Soul Makossa” (1972) single

Another covid-19 victim.

Manu Dibango was a Cameroonian saxophonist best-known for his composition “Soul Makossa” (1972), a crucial proto-disco recording.

I also had Gone Clear (1980) and Electric Africa (1985) in my collection.

Soul Makossa (1972) album

Only today do I listen for the first time to the whole Soul Makossa (1972) album. I already was familiar with “New Bell” (which had been covered on the electro scene) but “Hibiscus” was new to me and totally exquisite.

Now that I listen to “Soul Makossa” today, I hear in the bassline resonances of acid house. Do you hear it too?

RIP Lucia Bosè (1931 – 2020)

Toute la mémoire du monde (1956)

Lucia Bosè was an Italian actress with a long and fruitful career.

I choose to remember her by a documentary film she did not act in.

In Toute la mémoire du monde (1956), an identified photo of her is on the cover of a fictional book with the title Mars.

The cover of that book is unveiled at 9:42. The audience follows the book around the library as it makes its way to the shelves.

RIP Suzy Delair (1917 – 2020)

Suzy Delair was a French actress with a long and fruitful career.

I choose to represent her with one film, Atoll K (1951), the final film of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy in which she is a marooned cabaret singer.

The film is strangely relevant today in its goofy discussion of statelessness and open borders.

There is one scene where this all comes together when they wish to establish their island as a new republic, with Hardy as president and Laurel as “the people.”

They write a constitution declaring their atoll will have no laws, no taxes, and no immigration controls.

 Atoll K (1951)

Oliver asks:

Now, what kind of government do we want?

Very little government would be good, I think.

– Without too many laws.
– And no passports.

No passports.

– And no prisons.
– No prisons.

What?

– No taxes.
– No taxes.

This is getting to be a perfect government.

And I will add…
No laws and no money.

—Atoll K, 1:02:00