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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRVncgtT6GE

Talking Heads (1980), directed by Krzysztof Kieślowski, a Polish art-house filmmaker. 

A beautifully made short documentary that reminded me of cinéma vérité , a style of documentary in which the subjects, compelled by the presence of a camera, reveal some sort of “truth”. I’ve forgotten how fond I am of cinema verite. Talking Heads lead me to revisit Chronicle of Summer (1961), directed by Jean Rouch. I think I might have written about this film at some point, when I was at Cal. I really wished I kept all of my essays and books from my film classes. Oh!  I still have  textbook from my avant-garde documentary class. I’ll have to remember to bring it with me back to NY. 

What would happen if I make a similar film now? (Would it be okay if I made a film that posed the same questions?) I’d like to ask people in my college the same questions: what year were you born in, who are you, and what do you wish for? What other questions would be more meaningful to ask? I can’t think of any other. 

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Ocean Waves 海がきこえる (1993), directed by Tomomi Mochizuki and written by Kaori Nakamura . 

From John Lassetter’s intro in a biography book of H. Miyazaki -- it’s all about scale and pacing. This film exemplifies the excellent use of both. I am most interested in this type transitional framing though. The unconventional use of white space serves both as a distancing and focusing of a moment --  like an extra beat in poem. We are moving away from this moment, and as we move back, we seem to get more clarity. 

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ゴーイング マイ ホーム (Going My Home) 2012; Director: Hirokazu Koreeda

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Beau Travail (dir. Claire Denis, 1999)

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Beau Travail // dir. Claire Denis

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Vertigo 1958, Alfred Hitchcock ( Portrait of Carlotta Valdes )

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ang ganda talaga ng script ng vertigo kahit kelan~~

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Vertigo (1958) - still by Advertising Hitchcock on Flickr.

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Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959), Alain Resnais

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beautiful

Hiroshima, Mon Amour (Alain Resnais, 1959)

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"Thro.out Greek Style": a pillar-turned-trash-bin. I'd buy something like that. 

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Playtime (1967)

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Steven Soderbergh: The state of cinema

At the recent San Francisco Internation Film Festival, Steven Soderbergh gave a keynote about the current state of cinema. It is worth reading if you enjoy movies or are engaged in any sort of creative work.

But before we talk about movies we should talk about art in general, if that’s possible. Given all the incredible suffering in the world I wonder, what is art for, really? If the collected works of Shakespeare can’t prevent genocide then really, what is it for? Shouldn’t we be spending the time and resources alleviating suffering and helping other people instead of going to the movies and plays and art installations? When we did Ocean’s Thirteen the casino set used $60,000 of electricity every week. How do you justify that? Do you justify that by saying, the people who could’ve had that electricity are going to watch the movie for two hours and be entertained - except they probably can’t, because they don’t have any electricity, because we used it. Then I think, what about all the resources spent on all the pieces of entertainment? What about the carbon footprint of getting me here? Then I think, why are you even thinking that way and worrying about how many miles per gallon my car gets, when we have NASCAR, and monster truck pulls on TV? So what I finally decided was, art is simply inevitable. It was on the wall of a cave in France 30,000 years ago, and it’s because we are a species that’s driven by narrative. Art is storytelling, and we need to tell stories to pass along ideas and information, and to try and make sense out of all this chaos. And sometimes when you get a really good artist and a compelling story, you can almost achieve that thing that’s impossible which is entering the consciousness of another human being - literally seeing the world the way they see it. Then, if you have a really good piece of art and a really good artist, you are altered in some way, and so the experience is transformative and in the minute you’re experiencing that piece of art, you’re not alone. You’re connected to the arts. So I feel like that can’t be too bad.

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