#tender are the nighthawks

[sheltiechicago]

Two-hour party people: the very-late-night Londoners – in pictures

Guardian photographer Sarah Lee shares images from Tender Are the Nighthawks, her ongoing series about the city’s liminal zones and its weary travellers, taken between the hours of 2am and 4am

[thatdelusionalnerd]

some of the best lines of npmd

not in any order, just the ones I remembered first

M’bahbeque

Everyone’s got their secrets, and this one’s mine - I love Jesus 🥺

My titties are tenderized 😡

She’s bisexual and she’s dead where else do you think she’d be

Did you just throw your hand between the hammer and the phone

You and Steph? It’s a fantasy. Just like a boy and his anime love pillows

Oh it’s all right Grace! -Don’t comfort her she’s fucking weird

NONO this is like the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me

Mom will you pass the butt stuff

No we’re gonna be cool beans let’s keep these beans cool 

I AM GOD GOOO NIGHTHAWKS

We understand you and we support you but you fucking reek man

I love being alive! (This isn’t my favorite because it’s so tragic but that’s why I put it here)

I WANT SOME HOT WATER AND MAKE IT STRONG 🤬

we don’t give a shit about your phone

[colonellickburger]

Sarah Lee. Tender Are the Nighthawks. London

[thehatchettownchronicles]

Good morning Hatchetfield and other readers!

It’s a beautiful day in Hatchetfield today; a little overcast but the sun is starting to shine after a cold winter.

Coming up tonight we have a big football game! Two of our own local highschools are competing; the Hatchetfield High Nighthawks and the Sycamore High Timberwolves! Who are you all rooting for? I graduated from Sycamore (Go T-Wolves!!) last year actually! I’m rooting for my old team, but I just hope everyone has fun :)

In other saddening news, we regret to inform you of the passing of Peanuts, the Hatchetfield Pocket Squirrel :(

Peanuts passed away at the tender age of three due to a horrible prank gone wrong at the hands of the Clivesdale Chemist football team. Screw you Clivesdale! >:(

A celebration of life will be held at the Hatchetfield Park and Recreational Center. All are welcome to attend! It would be wonderful to give Ed, Peanuts’ adoptive father, some flowers. Let’s come together as a community and grieve this loss together.

I think that’s all I have for now! Please check out Morning Cup O’ News for more riveting stories featuring our hosts Dan Reynolds and Donna Daggit!

[emsuemsu]

@hprecfest day 15: most recent bookmark

I don’t bookmark and I consider it my biggest flaw. Like I just slam everything down to ”marked for later”-list and hope for the best when trying to find something from there. It’s chaotic. I’ll go into 2024 with two resolutions: quit smoking and start to bookmark my shit. Here’s my two most recent reads worthy of a bookmark though, maybe I’ll start my bookmarking career with these:

Former Things Come to Mind 🩵 64,073 words, draco/harry

Harry Potter has had a headache for seven and a half years.

This is from this years @hd-erised, fresh from the oven just published yesterday, and let me tell you how I screamed and creamed reading those tags (omorashi???? jfc). I cried myself through this fic. It's incredibly raw and tender and loving and painful and the state this fic left me... a mess. An utter, complete mess. An absolute unit of a story that ruined me in the best way possible.

Nighthawks by @m0srael 🩵 13,555 words, draco/harry

"The more he’d thought about it–and he had thought about it–the less certain he’d become that Draco had really been there, glowing in the murky glass of the diner window next to Harry’s stunned reflection like some cruel mockery of the Mirror of Erised. The longer he’d lain in bed, awake and fully clothed, the more convinced he was that he’s having some sort of mental breakdown. The long days and even longer nights must finally be getting to him, just like Hermione said they would. Because the fact of the matter is that Draco Malfoy couldn’t have been in this diner, his diner. Draco is thousands of kilometers, and a whole lifetime, away." In which Harry and Draco frequent the same diner when they can't sleep. Except--Draco left the UK five years ago, right after he broke Harry's heart.

Oh how I love this story. Right up my alley with the longing, the angst, the feels, the lonely diner in the rain vibes, the flashbacks... everything in this fic is heaven sent. Break up-make up has my heart, and this is an A+ example of it.

[collegeoftheholyspirit]

https://www.apertureuk.com/aperture-gallery/exhibitions/sarah-m-lee-tender-are-the-nighthawks/

[endearingmess]

Remembrance and Renewal Museum: Musée des Mémoires Brutes

About Us:

With each stroke of a brush and each sculpture she curated, Sydney reclaimed fragments of peace and dignity. She chose to embrace the world of art, not merely as a profession but as a lifeline—a means to transcend the pain that had etched itself into her past. Her journey led her through galleries and museums, where she learned to harness the power of creativity to heal both herself and others.

Piece of Keepsakes:

"The Birth of Venus" by Sandro Botticelli

Botticelli's masterpiece from the late 15th century depicts the goddess Venus rising from the sea, symbolizing beauty and love. Its serene composition and mythological theme have made it an enduring symbol of the Renaissance.

"The Starry Night Over the Rhône" by Vincent van Gogh

Painted in 1888, van Gogh's depiction of the night sky over the Rhône River in Arles captures the artist's fascination with the night and his expressive use of swirling brushstrokes to convey movement and emotion.

"The Kiss" by Auguste Rodin

Rodin's sculpture from 1889 beautifully captures a moment of passion and tenderness between lovers, rendered in marble with remarkable detail and realism that evoke a range of emotions from viewers.

"The Thinker" by Auguste Rodin

Created between 1880 and 1881, Rodin's iconic sculpture of a man deep in thought embodies the contemplative spirit of humanity, symbolizing philosophical introspection and the quest for meaning.

"Wanderer above the Sea of Fog" by Caspar David Friedrich

Friedrich's Romantic painting from 1818 portrays a solitary figure standing on a precipice, contemplating the vastness of nature shrouded in mist. It reflects the Romantic ideals of individualism and awe of the sublime in nature.

"Nighthawks" by Edward Hopper

Hopper's 1942 painting captures a moment of urban isolation and quietude in a late-night diner scene. The stark lighting and composition convey a sense of loneliness and introspection amidst the bustling city.

"Composition VII" by Wassily Kandinsky

Kandinsky's abstract masterpiece from 1913 features dynamic shapes and vibrant colors that convey a sense of spiritual and emotional depth. It exemplifies his pioneering exploration of abstraction and synesthetic experiences.

"Woman with a Parasol - Madame Monet and Her Son" by Claude Monet

Monet's 1875 painting portrays his wife and son in a sunlit meadow, capturing a moment of leisure and natural beauty with his characteristic use of light and color to evoke a sense of joy and tranquility.

"The Arnolfini Portrait" by Jan van Eyck

Painted in 1434, van Eyck's masterpiece is a detailed depiction of a wealthy couple in a lavishly furnished interior, rich in symbolic elements that convey their social status and the sanctity of marriage.

"Les Nabis Series" by Pierre Bonnard

Bonnard's series of paintings from the late 19th to early 20th century depict intimate domestic scenes and landscapes with a focus on vibrant colors and decorative patterns, reflecting the artist's unique perspective on everyday life.

[me4ttzar]

From the 1995 press release of Shag Tobacco

Gavin Friday begins 1995 with one of the most startling and inspired albums you will hear all year, Shag Tobacco. Friday has created, with partner Maurice Seezer and producer Tim Simenon, a 21st century neon cabaret, where spirits of Leonard Cohen, Marc Bolan, Jacques Brel and Scott Walker collide in a vision of thirties Berlin decadence transposed to a Las Vegas of the future.

The unusual characters that inhabit this album are both real and imaginary: Mr. Pussy, the glamorous drag queen hostess, the living “Dolls” of New York’s nightlife, and glittering, androgynous “The Slider” (resurrected from the T-Rex back catalogue), meet the housewives from suburban hell and the star-crossed lovers of the title track.

“As we come to the end of the century, everything’s going ballistic,” notes Mr. Friday, “and a lot of stuff is being cleared out from under the carpet. When I went to work on this album, I had this thing of being obsessed with the Twenties, Thirties, and Forties, the fascinating, between-the-Wars era when decadence was tempered with darkness, and transporting that into the Nineties.

Mr Pussy who appears in person on the track written in his honor, is a major celebrity in Dublin A former friend of Judy Garland and Johnny Ray, Mr. Pussy was the hostess of Gavin’s own now-defunct cabaret cafe, the celebrated Mr. Pussy’s Cafe Deluxe a place where passing glitterati ate egg and chips and played bingo at three in the morning. “The cafe was very much a wedding banquet on acid vibe,” enthuses Friday, “It’s like a cross between a brothel and your granny’s bedroom. Really mad trannies went there, ones who looked like your da in drag; farmers in stilettos, mingling with your clubbers, your nighthawks and your down and out drunks.” But it’s not just the glamorous to whom Gavin turns his attentions on Shag Tobacco – real people also fill his music with their passions and their pain.

“Kitchen Sink Drama” documents the decline of a suburban housewife, who is “anaesthetized by mundanity, has given everything up for her husband and family and whose only companion is the ‘Angel’ Valium,” the author explains. “In the end she can’t cope, and the last line has her going out to “the sweet smell of butane.” And “The Last Song I’ll Ever Sing” is a tender but defiant paen to a friend who died of AIDS; “The biggest way you can get fucked over in love is to die of AIDS,” Friday points out. “The song is a tribute to the divas and crooners who have nothing to give except for the everything that they put into the last song they ever sing, and about the light that burns twice as brightly, burning half as long.” The album’s closing track, “Le Roi D’Amour,” meaning “The King Of Love,” is for Gavin, “like the grand finale, the curtain going up and the credits rolling.”

Not surprisingly, the singular Mr. Friday is dismissive of the moribund musical climate into which Shag Tobacco is being released. “Music is not a business,” he states, “it’s a way of life. The Virgin Prunes were me growing up in public, they were fueled by a lot of anger and frustration and I suppose I’m still an angry man – happily angry. Real music is when you don’t really know what you’re doing – it’s just your instincts at work. I love that. I love going in at the deep end and struggling and fighting and hopefully coming out… into the light.”

[pigeonwhumps]

Immortal Cannon Fodder masterlist

Phoenix, an immortal hero, joins a team that hurts them and uses them as cannon fodder. But their teammates are only doing what's necessary to help them all survive. Phoenix's regular sacrifices are necessary. And it's not like they've got anywhere else to go anyway.

It takes the arrival of Kai, a wolf-shifter and telekinetic, to help them see what's going on. But a friendship and a promised eventual transfer can't fix everything.

(banner by @inscrutable-shadow)

(This series partially crosses over with @i-eat-worlds Alex and Friends. Crossover pieces are denoted by an * and pieces written by worlds are purple)

Contains team whump, immortal whumpee, hero whump, outcast whumpee, disabled whumpees (Phoenix and Brynn have stutters, Morfydd is an ambulatory wheelchair user), QPR with Phoenix, Brynn and Santhiya later on, oblivious T4T gays, lady whump

General CWs: Abuse, past abuse, immortal whumpee

Character profiles (including piccrews):

Abbie, Indigo, Segun, Aaron, Kai, and Phoenix

Electrocus/Ifa, Silver Shadow/Alex, and Bayou/Shea

Santhiya, Morfydd, Lian, and Gemma

Sophia, Black Ice, Nighthawk, and Alicia

Brynn, Horus, Sovereign

Main works:

Most recent piece in each section is bolded. Tiny writing is WIPs.

Prequels

Homecoming

School Struggles

Laces

An End and A Beginning

Abolition

Christmas*

Full Moon*

Faint at First Sight

Disowned

Before Kai

Auction pt 1

Auction pt 2

Auction pt 3

Auction pt 4

Crucifixion pt 1

Crucifixion pt 2

Crucifixion pt 3

Memorial*

That's gonna need stitches

Kai on the Team

Original drabble

A long-overdue medical

Mission: Preparation

Mission: Confrontation

Mission: Home

Mission: Recovery

An attempt at training

Cold

"Did I do good?"

Go to bed

Nightmare

Intubation

Christmas plans

Letters

Mercy killing

Sleepy

Bleeding out*

Kai off the Team

Mouth stitched shut *

Tears* (Joseph pov)

Tenderness*

A Late Night Discovery *

Aftermath

Tour *

Infection

Stab o'clock*

🩹 for Kai :)

Running pt 1

Beaten

A New Team

Scars

Small spaces

Hostage

Check-up

Alex and Friends* (Worlds' main story - Phoenix et al enter mostly from part 19 onwards, but please read the whole thing!)

Fainting/exhaustion*

Cornered*

Telepathy and doctors

Mistaken Identity part 1

Mistaken Identity part 2

Imprisonment

Hospital stay

Brynn

Helpless

Brynn and Gemma

Kidnapped (Brynn-centric AI-less Whumptober miniseries)*

Far-future (feat Phoenix and Brynn)

Out

Reunion

AUs:

One-shots

Electrocus rescues Phoenix from prison

Begging for a quick death

Gemma rescues Phoenix

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Guilt

Villain whumpee/hero caretakers

Character picrews

Farai and Phoenix

Aaron and Kai

Santhiya and Rhian

Works

Farai in prison (art)

Part 1

Crossover with @wolfeyedwitch's And Still series:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Extras:

Incorrect quotes

Kai in wolf form carrying Phoenix (sketch)

Halloween costumes (edited picrews)

Phoenix character sheet

Hero outfits: Abbie, Indigo, Segun, Aaron, Kai, Phoenix, Santhiya, Morfydd, and Lian (picrews)

Rescue drabble (maybe not quite canon?)

Phoenix's camouflage going haywire (needs some changes to be canon but I still like it)

Character asks

Phoenix

What is the worst thing they have ever done to someone else?

What torture technique are they most afraid of? Has it ever been used on them? If so, why and by whom?

What would safety feel like for them?

How loosely or strictly do they use the word ‘friend’?

Do they have any scars or tattoos? (Between A long-overdue medical and Cold)

What was the last time they cried, and under what circumstances? (just before Cold)

🍐 What is Phoenix's mentality? Are they overall positive? Negative? A bit of both? Describe their thought patterns and reasoning behind their choice making!

What qualities does your OC most value in a friend? Loyalty? Shared sense of humour? Or something else?

To what extent does your OC believe in the value (or even existence) of true altruism? Do they see an unselfish concern for the welfare of others as being naïve or foolish? Or as a moral quality to which people should aspire?

👀 phoenix, what is your biggest mistake?

4. When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?

5. Do you have any role models? Tell us a little bit about them.

7. How would you describe yourself in three words?

10. What’s your biggest goal? How do you hope to achieve this?

14. Where are you happiest?

🎫

Aaron

🌹 How easy is it for Aaron to connect with others and make friends? On the flip side how easy is it for him to make an enemy of someone? Are they the kind of person who hangs around the food table at a party and never talks to anyone or are they the type who can talk to anyone?

Kai

⭐ What is Kai afraid of? Any crippling phobias or some such? How does he act when scared and what helps him calm down? Does anyone ever find him scary? Why?

☾ - sleep headcanon

[xostrawberry-milkyox]

Hello, I love your blog!! I, too, am an Hawks simp XD annnd I was wondering of you have some Hawks-centric fic rec?

Awe thank you anon, I'm glad you're enjoying my blog!

There's a variety of sfw and nsfw and since I'd only recommend adult content to other adults the nsfw recs will be under the cut.

Sfw

Atavistic (fluff with angst) - @teesumu

First Flight (dad Hawks) - @hxwks-gf

Vulnerability in the Small Hours (dad Hawks) - @churoomiii

A little tenderness (fluff) - @hawnks

Nsfw

Nighthawk - @keigosbirdie

Balmy (...more dad Hawks xD) - @keigosbirdie

A much-needed meal - @keilemlucent

Please daddy? - @hawnks

[bookgeekgrrl]

My media this week (6-12 Feb 2022)

📚 STUFF I READ 📚

🥰 The Thursday Murder Club (Thursday Murder Club #1) (Richard Osman, author; Lesley Manville, narrator) - I found this to be a charming & entertaining mystery with some very delightful characters. Especially Bogdan. The plot was nonsense but no more so than most of cozy mysteries.

😍 Knife Skills (Hark_bananas) - 72K of SHEER PERFECTION in a post-WS divergent AU - "He has an apartment and a routine and a favorite diner and a job that he’s really good at and purple socks with bananas on them, and he knows that all of those things are immaterial in the face of his continuing safety, survival, and freedom. But at the same time, they’re not, actually. They’re the things that make his continuing safety, survival, and freedom worth it. He’s done the nameless assassin thing, the Tour of Vengeance thing, the running and hiding and living out of a duffle bag in shitty motels thing, and it sucks, and it very much does not make life worth living, not if there’s another way to go about it, instead."

😊 Salty Sweet (secondstar) - 46K, Sterek - no werewolves AU - Derek works in a sex shop, Stiles comes in to make some purchases, sex and feelings follow

😊 Heavy Lies the Head (odetteandodile, author; inflomora, art) - 59K, Stucky magical/fantasy AU - Prince Bucky is cursed & in exile with Steve as his bodyguard - there's lots of gardening and, to quote the tags, "tender forest blow jobs"

💖💖 +214K of shorter fic so shorter work shout out to these I really loved💖💖

Welcome Home, Son series (BeaArthurPendragon) - 50K canon-divergent, in which a post-CW Bucky recovers in Wakanda & makes a friend, then reunites with Steve and they live happily ever after in New Asgard.

The Season of the Witch series (emchant3d) - MCU: shrunkyclunks + everyday magic, 31K - absolutely love this pairing of Cap!Steve and nb/gnc kitchenwitch Bucky

Rhapsody in Pink (the1918) - MCU: Stucky, 28K - HYDRA basically kept Bucky chemically castrated as The Winter Soldier and now his body is waking up and trying to recalibrate.

hear your call (silentwalrus) - MCU: Stucky, 6K - just a short, great fic where Bucky wants it rougher and Steve is obliging (and find he really likes it)

📺 STUFF I WATCHED 📺

Spectre (2015)

Agatha Raisin - s4,e2: "Love, Lies & Liquor"

The Golden Girls - s1, e14-19

What's Up, Doc? (1972)

Great Art Explained: Nighthawks by Edward Hopper

Becky Chambers with Sarah Gailey — A Psalm for the Wild-Built [Third Place Books Event]

Great Art Explained: Vincent Van Gogh's The Starry Night

🎧 PODCASTS 🎧

Natalie Haynes Stands Up for the Classics - Penelope

Overinvested - Ep. 245: In the Heat of the Night

Endless Thread - Murph

You're Wrong About - Winter Book Club: The Amityville Horror w. Jamie Loftus (Finale)

Grim & Mild Presents - Sideshow 3: The Mother of All Humbugs

The Atlas Obscura Podcast - Quarantine at Malta Lazaretto

Lore - REMASTERED – Episode 21: Adrift

Last Seen - Episode 1: '81 Minutes'

Last Seen - Episode 2: 'Inside Job?'

Last Seen - Episode 3: 'Not A Bunch Of Jamokes'

Last Seen - Episode 4: 'Two Bad Men'

Last Seen - Episode 5: 'The Bobbys'

Last Seen - Episode 6: 'Befriend And Betray'

Last Seen - Episode 7: 'I Was The One'

Last Seen - Episode 8: 'Flimflammer'

Last Seen - Episode 9: 'The Big Dig'

Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities - Quite a Character

The Atlas Obscura Podcast - Leimert Park

Richmond Til We Die: A Ted Lasso Podcast - Ted Lasso S2E5: You Had Me at Coach

99% Invisible #476 - Reaction Offices and the Future of Work

The Atlas Obscura Podcast - The Theater of Electricity

Fansplaining - Episode 167: Our Secret Identities

Last Seen - Episode 2: Out of Time

Ologies with Alie Ward - Carnivore Ecology (LIONS, TIGERS, & BEARS) with Rae Wynn-Grant

Overinvested - Ep. 244: What's Up, Doc?

The Atlas Obscura Podcast - Milky Seas

Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities - Songsmith

Song Exploder - Brandi Carlile "You and Me On the Rock (feat. Lucius)"

Shedunnit - The Whodunnit In India

Last Seen - Episode 3: The Lost World

You're Dead To Me - The Witch Craze

You're Dead To Me - The History of Chocolate

Endless Thread - Li Ziqi: China's Quarantine Queen

Strong Songs - Strong Covers, Vol. 2

🎶 MUSIC 🎶

The Very Best of Enya (Deluxe Edition) [Enya]

Essential Skatalites [The Skatalites]

Yacht Rock Classics

Women of '90s Hip Hop

The Best of Hooverphonic

Trip Hop

The World of Lady Gaga

In These Silent Days [Brandi Carlile]

Green [Hiroshi Yoshimura]

90s R&B Girl Groups

Instrumental Pop Covers

Presenting Lindsey Stirling

Presenting Dvořák

[sheltiechicago]

Two-hour party people: the very-late-night Londoners – in pictures

Guardian photographer Sarah Lee shares images from Tender Are the Nighthawks, her ongoing series about the city’s liminal zones and its weary travellers, taken between the hours of 2am and 4am

[colonellickburger]

Sarah Lee. Tender Are the Nighthawks, London

[connie04]

Dinner in March

to the sound of people

in places warm

and worn with feet and

feats of love and lost and longing and

To a stranger! Who passes

the nighthawks who gather

through the pain

the glass that blurs the light

I hold tight

its an ode- its tender

[ophelia-coeur]

11/11/'21

One of my favourite paintings is "Nighthawks" by Edward Hopper, because it captures in one picture the depressing existence of a cityperson.

Of course, this isn't a revolutionary opinion. A lot of people love Hopper, love "Nighthawks", love sauntering the long corridors of a museum. My dad has a poster of "Nighthawks" hanging in his office.

Today I woke up deeply unhappy. I hadn't even stepped out of bed and I knew productivity would be under lock and key. Just a bad day. You get it.

A feeling of melancholy snuck in my ribcage and swallowed up my heart like the ivy by my front door, quick and sly, though not surprising. Just a bad day. I've learned to embrace it.

My room reeked of the collection of coffee cups, piled on every surface that could balance those ceramic heads, in my hand an optimistically made to-do list from the night before, mellow music drifting in the dull air to match my mood.

Or a cry for self-pity. Sometimes I don't know. I can be pretty dramatic.

From my window I only saw strange faces walk by, cyclists, the beer cans and broken bottles from the fight I diligently followed from the safety of my bedroom. Everything feels weird: my body, my skin, the air, the smell, the human.

I realised I was alone.

Again: not a revolutionary thought. The paradox of loneliness in a big city has filled books and essays and articles. A short trip to the library would prove my point. But I'll repeat myself anyway. I was lonely and alone.

Normally, I wouldn't do anything about it. Stay in bed. Mindlessly watching videos on Youtube. Not leave my room. Lovingly wearing the coffee stench as perfume.

Instead, I went to see "The French Dispatch" at the movies. On my own. I haven't done that before until today.

I've wanted to see the movie for a while, but never found anyone that felt the same level of enthusiasm for Wes Anderson and absurdism as I did. So, I went alone.

Roaring children and the smell of sticky candy froze my muscles the second I stepped inside the building, almost prompting me to turn around, but I was already there. No turning back.

I won't elaborate much about the movie. I'm not a critic, but I can honestly say it's Anderson's magnum opus. It's an ode to film. The best actors placed in beautiful, emotional stories while moving through sensational setpieces, a perfect score leading us from one beat to the next. It was great.

But most importantly: the movie is about people. Real people. Crazy, lonely, unhappy people. Or rather, people that struggle with these issues. It gave me a bizarre sense of perspective, as if Anderson balmed my tender heart and whispered, "Now it's okay. Now you can go on." My face was my face again. My body my body. My eyes focused, seeing the people on the street as friends, not foes.

After the movie I walked past my favourite coffee shop. Through the illuminated windows I saw the last customers drinking tea and coffee, alone or with friends, the scene oddly identical to "Nighthawks". Edward Hopper revived. There he was. On a barstool, hunched and troubled — but not alone.

[tilbageidanmark]

Movies I watched this week - 33

Toni Erdmann - An off-beat German comedy about a daughter and her weird father. The daughter is s a high-flying business woman in Bucharest, and her old father is a bizarre prankster who surprise-visits her there, trying to pull her out of her stiff comfort zone. 

At nearly 3 hours, it’s a bit long, but is fresh and original. 6+/10

✴️  

First glorious watch - Wong Kar-Wai’s romantic Chungking Express, with Tony Leung & Faye Wong.

I always thought it was an action flick, (probably because it “was Tarantino’s favorite movie”) so I avoided it until now.

Here is Dinah Washington explaining why it was a mistake not to watch it!

Best film of the week!

✴️

Michelangelo Antonioni X 2:

✳️✳️✳️ Back to my classics: Antonioni‘s The Passenger, with doomed Jack Nicholson as David Locke, AKA Robertson. Based on  W. Somerset Maugham's ‘Appointment in Samarra‘. This is why I love movies. 10/10.

When you travel to the very end of the world.

✳️✳️✳️  Blowup - In Swinging London, a selfish photographer discovers that, while shooting a couple in the park, he recorded a murder in the background. Shoutouts to David Hemmings’  convertible Rolls-Royce and his white Jeans. With a performance by the actual Yardbirds. 9/10

“Nothing like a little disaster to sort things out”...

✴️

Tom McCarthy’s latest film, Stillwater, got quite a bit of pushover for using the Amanda Knox saga as inspiration without proper acknowledgement or credit. So that is legitimate. However, the sentimental story of father and daughter’s fraught relationship is clearly fictionalized and the background of the murder is secondary to that.

Like all of McCarthy’s slow and tender films (with the exception of ‘Million Dollar Arm‘), I liked it a lot.

✴️

2 about old people at the end of life:

✳️✳️✳️ Diane Keaton, dying of cancer, starts a cheerleading squad at a retirement community at Poms. A predictable, cheesy story that worked for me.

✳️✳️✳️ Re-watching all of Alexander Payne’s previous films: Next - About Schmidt. John Joseph Nicholson was one of the screen’s greatest actors. Now an old man at the end of his career, he discovers that his mediocre life had been meaningless, but for one little act of kindness (Photo Above).

8/10

✴️                                                 

I also saw Alexander Payne’s last film, Downsizing. It was so disappointing, that I felt the need to write a longer critique of this muddled turd.

First, I liked Alexander Payne: He was a great filmmaker who made 6 small, personal art films. But as always, when studios eventually give such artists big budgets, they screw up.

Where to start? First it was ‘Honey I shrank Matt Damon’ for environmental reasons, then you build a gated community for the Tiny, rich Americans. Then his wife Kristen Wiig leaves him and disappear from the story. Then he takes ecstasy at a disco party (The only fresh line of dialogue in the whole movie, when he’s under the influence - ‘I’m going to take off my shoes’.) Then he discovers an underclass of tiny, poor Mexicans who clean and maintain the middle class and lives outside the gates - just like in ‘Real’ America. Then there’s a political subplot where he becomes active helping those poor servants. Then he falls in love with a one-legged Vietnamese ‘Refugee-Saint’ with a fake limp, and even faker Vietnamese accent. And finally, at (1:35) the world as we know it is about to end, and he must choose between joining the Norwegian survivors into the Tiny People’s ‘Seed Vault’ of the future, or flying with his Vietnamese lover back into the present, to help the poor, before everybody eventually dies.

In short, it was terrible.

✴️ 

Gifted, about a cute 7 year old mathematical genius living with her uncle, after her mom committed suicide. It’s a light and fluffy tear-jerker that has a kernel of sweetness. The court drama part of this (or any other family drama) doesn’t work. 5+/10

✴️

Philip Seymour Hoffman X 4:

✳️✳️✳️ PT Anderson's 2012 masterly The Master, with masterful performances and precise score. Re-watch.

The first half, which was mostly about tortured drifter Joaquin Phoenix, was terrific. The Scientology cult of charismatic conman Philip Seymour Hoffman was less compelling. And the two stories converged exactly in the middle, (1:07) at the strange “Go Roving” naked dance. 8/10

✳️✳️✳️ 

Sidney Lumet’s last film Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007). Another train wreck of a hack job: It’s always about money, crimes, robberies, death.

✳️✳️✳️ Charlie Kaufman’s “postmodern” Synecdoche, New York - I hated everything about it.

It made me regret everything I ever thought was important in my life, and come to realize that I’m sorry about everything.

✳️✳️✳️ My first Todd Solondz’s - the ironically misnamed, and depressingly morbid Happiness. It’s about 3 unhappy sisters and all the depraved people around them (including creepy masturbator Philip Seymour Hoffman).

Fortunately, my copy was truncated at the half mark. Big ouch.

✴️

I haven’t re-visited The good, the bad and the ugly for over 40 years until now, but I found Max Tohline’s analyses of Leone’s Editing style to be superior to the 3 hours film slog itself.

✴️                           

Before the Flood, Leonardo DiCaprio’s 2016 documentary about climate change. Before Greta Thunberg, and before trump, and before the End of The World.

Climate-deniers of the world, Unite in hell!

✴️

Wim Wender’s The end of violence: A big time Hollywood producer decides to become a simple Mexican gardener in LA. Unfortunately, he’s Bill Pullman.

I watched it because a scene in the film recreates Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks, but the film was terrible all over and for many reasons.

Nighthawks, explained.

✴️

Sallah Shabati ( סאלח שבתי ‎), a 1964 satirical Israeli film, the original Borat. Stereotypically primitive and unfunny. 1/10

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Throw-back to the art project:

Nighthawks Adora.

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(My complete movie list is here)