#thomas sternberg

[basicallyanotherwitchesthing]

Thomas Sternberg - The Dialect and Folk-Lore of Northamptonshire - S.R. Publishers Limited - 1971

[abmediumaevum]

(BL Egerton MS 2781; The "Neville of Hornby Hours"; 14th c. f.76v)

Today (Nov. 30th) is Andermas, the feast day of Saint Andrew: apostle, martyr, and patron saint of Scotland (amongst many other patronages). Traditionally, Saint Andrew's Day marks the beginning of Advent (starting the Sunday closest to November 30th) in both the Eastern and Western Christian liturgical calendar.

Saint Andrew has been the patron saint of Scotland for some 700 years, beginning in 1320 with the Declaration of Arbroath addressed to Pope John XXII. Written and sealed by fifty-one Scottish barons and magnates in the reign of King Robert I - popularly known as 'the Bruce' - (r.1306-1329) the Declaration was part of a broader diplomatic effort to assert Scotland's position as an independent kingdom during the First War of Scottish Independence (1296-1328) in spite of the Pope's recognising of King Edward I of England's claim to overlordship of Scotland in 1305 and his excommunication of Robert from the Church in 1306.

(National Records of Scotland; The Declaration of Arbroath [Online], URL: https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/Declaration)

Elsewhere in the United Kingdom, such as in Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Northamptonshire, 'Tandrew' or 'Tandry' - as St. Andrew's Day was colloquially known - was traditionally once a major festival in many rural villages. Thomas Sternberg, describing popular customs in mid-19th-century Northamptonshire writes that "the day is one of unbridled license [...] drinking and feasting prevail to a notorious extent. Towards evening the villagers walk about and masquerade, the women wearing men's dress and the men wearing female attire, visiting one another's cottages and drinking hot elderberry wine, the chief beverage of the season." (Sternberg, 1851: pp.183-85).

--

As the nights grow longer, Christmas steadily begins to come into our view, be sure to think upon this old folk-rhyme on this chilly night.

(Northfall, G.F. (1892), "English Folk Rhymes: A collection of traditional verses relating to places and persons, customs, superstitions, etc.", (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co. Ltd.), p.455)

[derekfoxwit]

The Best Picture Oscar My Way (1980-1999)

Here’s Part 2 of Best Picture My Way (as started here). All information about my approach with this category can be found on that linked first part.

For convenience sake, I’ll relay this message. Only the films I add onto here as nominees will have listed nominated producers next to the movie’s title. (Here’s the Wikipedia page for the rest.)

1980

The Empire Strikes Back - Gary Kurtz

Raging Bull

The Elephant Man

Coal Miner’s Daughter

Ordinary People

1981

Raiders of the Lost Ark

Das Boot - Gunter Rohrbach; Michael Bittins

Reds

On the Golden Pond

Chariots of Fire

1982

Tootsie

E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial

Fitzcarraldo - Werner Herzog; Willi Segler; Lucki Stipetic

Missing

Gandhi

1983

Fanny and Alexander - Jorn Donner

Terms of Endearment

Scarface - Martin Bregman

Mender Mercies

The Right Stuff

1984

Amadeus (still)

The Terminator - Gale Anne Hurd

Love Streams - Yoram Globus; Menahem Golan

Ghostbusters - Ivan Reitman

A Passage to India

1985

Back to the Future - Neil Canton; Bob Gale

The Color Purple

After Hours - Robert F. Colesberry; Griffin Dunne; Amy Robinson

Ran - Masato Hara; Serge Silberman

Witness

1986

Platoon (still)

Misery - Rob Reiner; Andrew Scheinman

Hannah and Her Sisters

A Room with a View

Blue Velvet - Fred C. Caruso

1987

The Last Emperor (still)

The Princess Bride - Rob Reiner; Andrew Scheinman

Broadcast News

Moonstruck

Fatal Attraction

1988

Who Framed Roger Rabbit - Frank Marshall; Robert Watts

Rain Man

Dangerous Liaisons

Mississippi Burning

The Last Temptation of Christ - Barbara De Fina

1989

Do The Right Thing - Spike Lee

Driving Miss Daisy

Dead Poets Society

My Left Foot

Cinema Paradiso - Giovanna Romagnoli

1990

Goodfellas

Dances with Wolves

Edward Scissorhands - Tim Burton; Denise Di Novi

Ghost

The Godfather Part III

1991

The Silence of the Lambs (still)

Thelma & Louise - Ridley Scott

Beauty and the Beast

Boyz in the Hood - Steve Nicolaides

JFK

1992

Unforgiven (still)

A Few Good Men

Malcolm X - Spike Lee; Marvin Worth

Reservoir Dogs - Lawrence Bender; Harvey Keitel

Aladdin - Ron Clements; John Musker

1993

Schindler’s List (still)

The Piano

Philadelphia - Jonathan Demme; Edward Saxon

In The Name of the Father

The Fugitive

1994

The Lion King - Don Hahn

Forrest Gump

Pulp Fiction

The Shawshank Redemption

Eat Drink Man Woman - Kong Hsu; Li-Kong Hsu

1995

Toy Story - Bonnie Arnold; Ralph Guggenheim

Se7en - Phyllis Carlyle; Arnold Kopelson

The Postman (Il Postino)

Before Sunrise - Anne Walker-McBay

Braveheart

1996

Fargo

Trainspotting - Andrew Macdonald

Secrets & Lies

Jerry Maguire

The English Patient

1997

Titanic (still)

Good Will Hunting

L.A. Confidential

Princess Mononoke - Toshio Suzuki

Boogie Nights - Paul Thomas Anderson; Lloyd Levin; John S. Lyons; JoAnne Sellar

Lost Highway - Deepak Nayar; Tom Sternberg; Mary Sweeney

As Good as It Gets

The Full Monty

1998

Saving Private Ryan

Life is Beautiful

The Thin Red Line

The Big Lebowski - Joel and Ethan Coen

Mulan - Pam Coats

Central Station - Arthur Cohn; Martine de Clermont-Tonnerre; Robert Redford; Walter Salles

The Truman Show - Edward S. Feldman; Andrew Niccol; Scott Rudin; Adam Schroeder

Rushmore - Barry Mendel; Paul Schiff

Shakespeare in Love

1999

The Matrix - Joel Silver

American Beauty

The Green Mile

The Sixth Sense

Magnolia - Paul Thomas Anderson; JoAnne Sellar

The Straight Story - Neal Edelstein; Mary Sweeney

Man on the Moon - Danny DeVito; Michael Shamberg; Stacey Sher

Being John Malkovich - Steve Golin; Vincent Landay; Sandy Stern; Michael Stipe

[twittercomfrnklin2001-blog]

Macao

Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell had such great chemistry it’s a pity they only co-starred in two films, mainly because their studio, RKO, was in such a state of disarray in the 1950s it’s a wonder any films got made there. They’re not just two of the most insolent actors on screen. They also knew how to let their guard down and connect on a more vulnerable level. Josef von Sternberg and others’ MACAO (1952, Criterion Channel, TCM) is a genial mess salvaged by the lead actors’ charm. It took four directors and nine writers (including Mitchum during retakes) to tell the only vaguely coherent tale of two drifters (Mitchum and Russell) who dock in the wide-open city of Macao (what would the movies do without cities like this) and eventually land at the casino run by gangster Brad Dexter. Dexter thinks Mitchum is a police officer trying to get him into international waters so he can be arrested, but is he? Everybody has an agenda, and sometimes even the actors aren’t too sure what that is. But the film looks great, particularly a nightmarish late-night waterfront chase von Sternberg fills with shadows and nets.

Mitchum is his usual relaxed self, and Russell is an expert at cracking wise. She also has two songs, including a surprisingly resonant rendition of “One for My Baby” when she thinks Mitchum has cheated on her with Gloria Grahame. Grahame is pretty darned insolent, too, but she’s saddled with a character that makes no sense. Does she want Dexter or Mitchum or diamonds or whatever she can get? She complained that the writers couldn’t tell her if she was supposed to be Eurasian, White Russian or just Marge, and suddenly I’m hearing Julie Kavner read “You’re up early for a loser.” William Bendix is also on hand as a salesman with an agenda of his own.

Those with 21st century sensibilities should be warned that the film offers a pretty strong dose of Hollywood Orientalism, combining an explosion of Chinoiserie built on the studio back lot with location footage in the actual Portuguese protectorate. It’s hard to tell what’s more offense, the depiction of Asians as inscrutable (particularly the wonderful Phillip Ahn, who deserved lots better than his role as Dexter’s assistant), the crooked, sweating Portuguese police sergeant played by Thomas Gomez, however expertly, or the stock blind beggar endowed with super senses.

[theologyforthelayman]

German Synodal Assembly allows women to preach at Mass

The final assembly also clears the way for blessing ceremonies of same-sex couples in the Catholic Church in Germany Thomas Sternberg (right), president of the Central Committee of German Catholics, and Georg Bätzing, bishop of Limburg and president of the German Bishops’ Conference, open the Second Synodal Assembly of the Catholic Church in the Forum […]German Synodal Assembly allows women to…

[chloefashionthroughtime]

Hollywood in the roaring twenties:

By the early 1920s, Hollywood had established itself as the world's film centre. It produced practically all films exhibited in the United States and got 80 percent of the money from films shown abroad. During the 1920s, Hollywood strengthened its position as the world's leading film industry by attracting many of Europe's most talented actors and actresses, such as Greta Garbo and Hedy Lamarr, directors such as Ernst Lubitsch and Josef von Sternberg, as well as camera operators, lighting technicians, and set designers. By the conclusion of the decade, Hollywood claimed to be the country's fifth biggest business, accounting for 83 cents of every $1 spent on entertainment in the United States. Hollywood had also come to represent the 1920s' "new morality"—a blend of extravagance, glamour, hedonism, and pleasure. Attendance at movies increased dramatically throughout the 1920s. By the middle of the decade, 50 million people a week went to the cinema - the equivalent of half the nation's population. In Chicago, in 1929, cinemas had enough seats for half the city's population to see a movie each day. The movie-going experience changed dramatically as attendance increased. During the first two decades of the twentieth century, moviegoing tended to adhere to class and ethnic distinctions. Urban workers frequented cinema halls located in their own working class and ethnic districts, where entry was extremely affordable (averaging just 7 cents in the during the teens), and a movie was typically accompanied by an amateur talent show or a performance by a local ethnic troupe. These working-class theatres were raucous, high-spirited gathering places where mothers brought their newborns and crowds applauded, jeered, screamed, whistled, and stamped their feet.

The theatres patronised by the middle class were substantially different. Late in the first decade of the new century, theatres in downtown or middle-class districts grew increasingly lavish. Many of these theatres were initially created in the same designs as many other public buildings, but by the mid-1900s, movie houses began to incorporate French Renaissance, Egyptian, Moorish, and other exotic decors. The Strand Theater in Worcester, Massachusetts, advertised "red plush seats," "luxurious carpets," "rich velour curtains," "finely fitted bathroom facilities," and a $15,000 organ. Unlike working-class movie theatres, which exhibited pictures constantly, these high-class cinemas featured set show hours and well-dressed, uniformed stewards to maintain decorum standards. During the late 1920s, regional and national corporations purchased local neighbourhood theatres that catered to a specific working-class demographic. As a result, moviegoing grew more standardised, with working-class and middle-class cinemas providing the same programmes. Many working-class movie theatres closed down with the advent of "talkies," unable to cover the cost of upgrading to sound. Engineers had been looking for a feasible way to integrate synchronised recorded sound to pictures for decades. In the 1890s, Thomas Edison tried unsuccessfully to popularise the "kinetophone—which combined a kinetoscope with a phonograph. In 1923, Lee De Forest, an American inventor, demonstrated the practicality of placing a soundtrack directly on a film strip, presenting a newsreel interview with President Calvin Coolidge and musical accompaniments to several films. But the film industry showed remarkably little interest in sound, despite the growing popularity of radio.

Warner Brothers, a struggling newcomer to the industry, turned to sound to compete with its larger rivals. The cost of live entertainment was eliminated by using a taped musical sound track. Don Juan, the first picture with a synchronised film score, was produced by Warner Brothers in 1926, along with a programme of talking shorts. The success of The Jazz Singer, which was released in 1927, dispelled any reservations about the popularity of sound, and 300 theatres were wired for sound within a year. The introduction of sound caused a dramatic increase in cinema attendance, which increased from 50 million per week in the mid-1920s to 110 million in 1929. However, it also resulted in a number of fundamental changes in the films themselves. As Robert Ray has demonstrated, sound made pictures more American. "You ain't heard nothing yet," said Al Jolson haven The Jazz Singer, heralding the debut of sound in cinema. Distinctive American dialects and inflections immediately arose on the film, such James Cagney's New Yorkese or Gary Cooper's Western drawl. The introduction of sound also fostered new cinema genres - including the musical, the gangster picture, and comedy. Furthermore, the talkies transformed the moviegoing experience, particularly for the working class. Where many working class audiences had endowed silent films with a spoken dialogue, movie-goers were now expected to stay quiet. According to one cinema historian, "the talking audience for silent films became a quiet audience for talking images." Moreover, the stage performances and other types of live entertainment that had existed in silent cinema theatres rapidly disappeared, replaced by newsreels and animated cartoons.

Referencing:

[rwpohl]

*

[erstwhile-punk-guerito]

[presseonline]

Missbrauchs-Konferenz im Vatikan Zentralkomitee der Katholiken dämpft Erwartungen an Missbrauchs-Konferenz #Katholiken,#ThomasSternberg#,MissbrauchsKonferenz ,#Vatikan,#News,#Nachrichten,#Presse,#Aktuelles

[brokehorrorfan]

Final Justice will be released on Blu-ray on August 24 via MVD’s Rewind Collection. The 1985 Italian-American action film was riffed on Mystery Science Theater 3000's tenth season.

Greydon Clark (Without Warning, Uninvited) writes and directs. Joe Don Baker stars with Rossano Brazzi, Venantino Venantini, Patrizia Pellegrino, Bill McKinney, Helena Dalli, Lino Grech, and Tony Ellul.

Final Justice is presented in high definition with LPCM 2.0 Stereo audio. A mini-poster is included. Special features are listed below.

Special features:

Audio commentary with Tony Piluso, Newt Wallen, and Crystal Quin of Hack the Movies (new)

The Making of Final Justice - Interviews with writer-director Greydon Clark, editor Larry Bock, and cinematographer Nicholas Josef von Sternberg (new)

Theatrical trailer

Thomas Jefferson Geronimo, III (Joe Don Baker) is a deputy sheriff working in a small town in South Texas. When Joseph Palermo (Venantino Venantini) and his brother Anthony, two Mafia hitmen, attempt to escape across the border into Mexico, Geronimo moves into action. With lightning speed he kills Anthony and captures Joseph, but Geronimo’s fight with the underworld isn’t over yet. He is ordered to escort Palermo back to his native country, Italy. But Geroinimo is unprepared for the battle that awaits him as Palermo’s cohorts plan for their expected arrival and plot to halt his Final Justice.

Pre-order Final Justice from Amazon.

[thirdrowcentre]

I kept up last year’s resolution of watching as many films I’ve never seen before as possible - this time I managed 377. These are a few that stayed with me, in one way or another: 

JANUARY

Tales of Hoffman (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1951. Watched 04.01.2021)

Babyteeth (Shannon Murphy, 2019. Watched 11.01.2021)

Snowpiercer (Bong Joon-Ho, 2013. Watched 29.01.2021)

FEBRUARY

David Byrne’s American Utopia (Spike Lee, 2020. Watched 01.02.2021)

Hi Mom! (Brian de Palma, 1970. Watched 08.02.2021)

Dead Pigs (Cathy Yan, 2018. Watched 16.02.2021)

Yojimbo (Akira Kurosawa, 1961. Watched 21.02.2021)

Elvis: That’s the Way it Is (Denis Sanders, 1970. Watched 27.02.2021)

MARCH

Minding the Gap (Bing Liu, 2018. Watched 11.03.2021)

Tomboy (Céline Sciamma, 2011. Watched 25.03.2021)

La Terra Trema (Luchino Visconti, 1948. Watched 28.03.2021)

APRIL

Audition (Takashi Miike, 1999. Watched 08.04.2021)

Palm Springs (Max Barbakow, 2020. Watched 10.04.2021)

Songs My Brothers Taught Me (Chloé Zhao, 2015. Watched 12.04.2021)

Harlan County USA (Barbara Kopple, 1976. Watched 13.04.2021)

MAY

Cold War (Pawel Pawlikowski, 2018. Watched 11.05.2021)

Minari (Lee Isaac Chung, 2020. Watched at Prince Charles Cinema 22.05.2021)

Nomadland (Chloé Zhao, 2020. Watched at Prince Charles Cinema 22.05.2021)

Sound of Metal (Darius Marder, 2019. Watched at Prince Charles Cinema 23.05.2021)

First Cow (Kelly Reichardt, 2019. Watched at the BFI Southbank, 29.05.2021)

JUNE

Shiva Baby (Emma Seligman, 2020. Watched at Barbican, 09.06.2021)

John Wick Chapter 2 (Chad Stahelski, 2017. Watched 13.06.2021)

Time (Garrett Bradley, 2020. Watched 14.06.2021)

McCabe & Mrs Miller (Robert Altman, 1971. Watched at the BFI Southbank 20.06.2021)

JULY

Another Round (Thomas Vinterberg, 2020. Watched at Rich Mix, 04.07.2021, Barbican 08. 07.2021)

Shoah 1ère époque (Claude Lanzmann, 1985. Watched 20-22.07.2021)

Daisies (Vera Chytilová, 1966.Watched 22.07.2021)

AUGUST

High Life (Claire Denis, 2018. Watched 03.08.2021)

Shoah 2ème époque (Claude Lanzmann, 1985. Watched 04-06.08.2021)

Midnight Special (Jeff Nichols, 2016. Watched 28.08.2021)

SEPTEMBER

A Bagful of Fleas (Vera Chytilová, 1963. Watched 04.09.2021)

The Unbelievable Truth (Hal Hartley, 1989. Watched 21.09.2021)

Simple Men (Hal Hartley, 1992. Watched 24.09.2020)

Salut les Cubains (Agnès Varda, 1963. Watched 26.09.2021)

OCTOBER

Cow (Andrea Arnold, 2021. LFF screening, BFI Southbank, 09.10.2021)

C’mon C’mon (Mike Mills, 2021. LFF screening, Royal Festival Hall, 11.10.2021)

Petite Maman (Céline Sciamma, 2021. LFF screening, Prince Charles Cinema, 16.10.2021)

The Power of the Dog (Jane Campion, 2021. LFF screening, BFI Southbank, 17.10.2021)

The Green Knight (David Lowery, 2021. Watched at Rich Mix 18.10.2021)

L’amour à la mer (Guy Gilles, 1965. Watched 25.10.2021)

NOVEMBER

Hoop Dreams (Steve James, 1994. Watched 05.11.2021)

After Hours (Martin Scorsese, 1985. Watched 19.11.2021)

Pickpocket (Robert Bresson, 1959. 35mm. Watched at Prince Charles Cinema 21.11.2021)

Crossfire (Edward Dmytryk, 1947. Watched 25.11.2021)

I Wanna Hold Your Hand (Robert Zemeckis, 1978. 35mm Watched at Prince Charles Cinema, 29.11.2021)

DECEMBER

Get Back (dir. Peter Jackson/Michael Lindsay Hogg, 2021/1969. Watched between 01.12 and 08.12.2021)

Ma vie de Courgette (Claude Barras, 2016. Watched 09.12.2021)

Sorry, Wrong Number (Anatole Litvak, 1948. 18.12.2021)

Fear (Roberto Rossellini, 1954. Watched 18.12.2021)

Shanghai Express (Josef von Sternberg, 1932. Watched 21.12.2021)

West Side Story (Steven Spielberg, 2021. Watched at Vue Islington, 30.12.2021)

Licorice Pizza (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2021. 70mm. Watched at Picturehouse Central, 31.12.2021)

[architectnews]

RIBA reveals UK's best buildings for 2021

The Royal Institute of British Architects has announced 54 winners of the 2021 RIBA National Awards for architecture including a floating church, the MK gallery and a mosque in Cambridge.

Awarded annually since 1966, the RIBA National Awards celebrates the best buildings in the UK.

This year's 54 winning projects were chosen from the shortlist for the 2020 RIBA Regional, RIAS, RSUA, and RSAW Awards after last year's awards were postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

"Ranging from radical, cutting-edge new designs to clever, creative restorations that breathe new life into historic buildings, these projects illustrate the enduring importance and impact of British architecture," said RIBA president Simon Alford.

The Cambridge Mosque by Marks Barfield Architects was one of the 54 winners. Photo is by Morley von Sternberg

Included on the list are numerous educational projects, including the Centre Building at LSE by Rogers Stirk Harbour & Partners and the School of Science and Sport by OMA at Brighton College.

"There are a good number of well-designed school and university buildings that are powerful investments in the future, and I am sure they will inspire young people, their teachers and communities," said Alford.

"I am also thrilled to see many of these make creative use of existing structures. Well-designed education facilities should be the rule rather than the exception – every child deserves an effective learning environment, and these projects provide rich inspiration."

Grimshaw's Bath Schools of Art and Design was one of several educational winners. Photo is by Paul Raftery

Alford also drew attention to the number of projects that adapt and extend existing buildings.

These included the extension to the MK Gallery in Milton Keynes by 6a Architects (pictured top) and Grimshaw's renovation of its former Herman Miller factory into a building for Bath Schools of Art and Design.

"When a new building is essential, we need to make sure it will last and serve the future well – so it needs to be flexible and reusable," he said. "Long life; loose fit; low energy architecture is the present and the future."

"It is therefore very encouraging to see restoration and sensitive adaptation feature so prominently this year; with many buildings acknowledging their history, the needs of the present and the potential of their dynamic future," he added.

Floating church by Denizen Works was also a winner. Photo is by Gilbert McCarragher

The 54 national winners form the longlist for the Stirling Prize – the UK's most prestigious architecture award. The Stirling Prize shortlist will be announced next week with the winner revealed on 14 October.

See the full list of winners, divided by RIBA region, below:

East › Cambridge Central Mosque by Marks Barfield Architects › Imperial War Museums Paper Store by Architype › Key Worker Housing, Eddington by Stanton Williams › The Water Tower by Tonkin Liu

Peter Barber Architects' Peckham housing was one of the winners. Photo is by Morley von Sternberg

London › 95 Peckham Road by Peter Barber Architects › Blackfriars Circus by Maccreanor Lavington › Caudale Housing Scheme Mae Architects › Centre Building at LSE by Rogers Stirk Harbour & Partners › Centre for Creative Learning, Francis Holland School by BDP › English National Ballet at the Mulryan Centre for Dance by Glenn Howells Architects › Floating Church by Denizen Works › House-within-a-House by Alma-nac › Kingston University London – Town House by Grafton Architects › Moore Park Mews by Stephen Taylor Architects › North Street by Peter Barber Architects › Royal Academy of Arts David Chipperfield Architects › Royal College of Pathologists by Bennetts Associates › The Ray Farringdon by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris › The Rye Apartments by Tikari Works › The Standard by Orms › The Student Centre, UCL by Nicholas Hare Architects › Tiger Way by Hawkins\Brown › Tottenham Hotspur Stadium by Populous › Wooden Roof by Tsuruta Architects › Zayed Centre for Research into Rare Disease in Children by Stanton Williams

Windermere Jetty Museum won one of two awards for Carmody Groarke. Photo is by Christian Richter

North East › Lower Mountjoy Teaching and Learning Centre Durham University by FaulknerBrowns Architects

North West › Pele Tower House by Woollacott Gilmartin Architects › The Gables by DK-Architects › The Oglesby Centre at Hallé St Peter's by Stephenson Hamilton Risley Studio › Windermere Jetty Museum by Carmody Groarke

Brighton College was another winner. Photo is by Laurian Ghinitoiu

Scotland › Aberdeen Art Gallery by Hoskins Architects › Bayes Centre, University of Edinburgh by Bennetts Associates › Sportscotland National Sports Training Centre Inverclyde by Reiach and Hall Architects › The Egg Shed by Oliver Chapman Architects › The Hill House Box by Carmody Groarke

South & South East › Brighton College – School of Science and Sport by OMA › Library and Study Centre St Johns College Oxford University by Wright & Wright Architects › MK Gallery by 6a architects › Moor's Nook by Coffey Architects › The Clore Music Studios New College Oxford University, John McAslan + Partners › The Dorothy Wadham Building Wadham College Oxford University, Allies and Morrison › The King's School, Canterbury International College by Walters & Cohen Architects › The Malthouse, The King's School Canterbury by Tim Ronalds Architects › The Narula House by John Pardey Architects › Walmer Castle and Gardens Learning Centre by Adam Richards Architects › Winchester Cathedral South Transept Exhibition Spaces by Nick Cox Architects with Metaphor

Tintagel Castle Footbridge was designed by Ney & Partners and William Matthews Associates. Photo is by David Levine

South West › Bath Schools of Art and Design by Grimshaw › Redhill Barn by TYPE Studio › The Story of Gardening Museum by Stonewood Design with Mark Thomas Architects and Henry Fagan Engineering › Tintagel Castle Footbridge for English Heritage by Ney & Partners and William Matthews Associates › Windward House by Alison Brooks Architects

Maggie's Cardiff was the only winner in Wales. Photo is by Anthony Coleman

Wales › Maggie's Cardiff by Dow Jones Architects

West Midlands › Jaguar Land Rover Advanced Product Creation Centre by Bennetts Associates › Prof Lord Bhattacharyya Building University of Warwick by Cullinan Studio

The post RIBA reveals UK's best buildings for 2021 appeared first on Dezeen.

[silent-era-of-cinema]

Evelyn Brent (born Mary Elizabeth Riggs, October 20, 1895 – June 4, 1975) was an American film and stage actress.

Brent was born in Tampa, Florida, and known as Betty. When she was ten years old, her mother Eleanor (née. Warner) died, leaving her father Arthur to raise her alone.

She moved to New York City as a teenager, and her good looks brought modeling jobs that led to an opportunity to become involved in the still relatively new business of making motion pictures.

She originally studied to be a teacher. While attending a normal school in New York, she visited the World Film Studio in Fort Lee, New Jersey. Two days later, she was working there as an extra, earning $3 a day.

She began her film career working under her own name at a New Jersey film studio then made her major debut in the 1915 silent film production of the Robert W. Service poem, The Shooting of Dan McGrew.

As Evelyn Brent, she continued to work in film, developing into a young woman whose sultry looks were much sought after. After World War I, she went to London for a vacation.

She met American playwright Oliver Cromwell, who urged her to accept an important role in The Ruined Lady. The production was presented on the London stage. She remained in England for four years, performing on stage and in films produced by British companies before relocating to Hollywood in 1922.

Her career received a major boost the following year when she was chosen as one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars. Douglas Fairbanks Sr. signed her but failed to find a story for her; she left his company to join Associated Authors.

Brent made more than two dozen silent films, including three for the noted Austrian director Josef von Sternberg. One of these was The Last Command (1928), an epic war drama for which Emil Jannings won the first Academy Award for Best Actor and featured a pivotal supporting performance for William Powell.

Later that same year, she starred opposite William Powell in Paramount Pictures' (and her own) first talkie. Although one film, Interference (1928), did not live up to expectations at the box office, Brent played major roles in several more features, most notably The Silver Horde and the Paramount Pictures all-star revue Paramount on Parade (both 1930).

By the early part of the 1930s, she was busy working in secondary roles in a variety of films as well as touring with vaudeville shows. In 1936 she played William Boyd’s love interest/femme fatale in Hopalong Cassidy Returns. However, by 1941, her screen career was at its least prestigious point. Having become too mature for ingenue roles, and no longer in demand by major studios, she found plenty of work at the smaller, low-budget studios in B movies.

She photographed attractively opposite leading men who were also at advanced ages and later stages in their careers: Neil Hamilton in Producers Releasing Corporation's production Dangerous Lady, Lee Tracy in the same studio's The Payoff, and Jack Holt in the serial Holt of the Secret Service, produced by Larry Darmour for Columbia Pictures. Her performances were still persuasive, and her name was still recognizable to moviegoers that when marketing films theater owners often put her name on their marquees. In the early 1940s she worked in Pine-Thomas B action features for Paramount Pictures releases. Veteran director William Beaudine cast her in many such productions as well, including Emergency Landing (1941), Bowery Champs (1944), The Golden Eye (1948), and Again Pioneers (1950). After performing in more than 120 films, she retired from acting in 1950 and worked for a number of years as an actor's agent.

She returned to acting in television's Wagon Train for one episode in 1960, "The Lita Foladaire Story", starring Ward Bond and Diane Brewster. Brent played a housekeeper.

Evelyn Brent was married three times: to movie executive Bernard P. Fineman, to producer Harry D. Edwards, and finally to the vaudeville actor Harry Fox for whom the foxtrot dance was named. They were still married when he died in 1959.

Brent died of a heart attack in 1975 at her Los Angeles home. She was cremated and interred in the San Fernando Mission Cemetery in Mission Hills, California.

In 1960, Brent was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame with a motion pictures star for her contributions to the film industry. Her star is located at 6548 Hollywood Boulevard.

[timeless-hollywood-classics]

Robert Charles Durman Mitchum (August 6, 1917 – July 1, 1997) was an American actor, director, author, poet, composer, and singer. Mitchum rose to prominence for starring roles in several classic films noirs, and his acting is generally considered a forerunner of the antiheroes prevalent in film during the 1950s and 1960s. His best-known films include Out of the Past (1947), The Night of the Hunter (1955), Cape Fear (1962), and El Dorado (1966). Mitchum was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for The Story of G.I. Joe (1945). He is also known for his television role as U.S. Navy Captain Victor “Pug” Henry in the epic miniseries The Winds of War (1983) and sequel War and Remembrance (1988).

Mitchum is rated number 23 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest male stars of Classic American Cinema.

Robert Mitchum was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, on August 6, 1917, into a Norwegian-Irish Methodist family. His mother, Ann Harriet Gunderson, was a Norwegian immigrant and sea captain's daughter; his father, James Thomas Mitchum, was a shipyard and railroad worker of Irish descent.[3] His older sister, Annette (known as Julie Mitchum during her acting career), was born in 1914. Their father, James Mitchum, was crushed to death in a railyard accident in Charleston, South Carolina, in February 1919. Robert was one year old, and Annette was not yet five. Their mother was awarded a government pension, and soon realized she was pregnant. Her third child, John, was born in September of that year. Ann married again to Major Hugh Cunningham Morris, a former Royal Naval Reserve officer. Ann and Morris had a daughter together, Carol Morris, born July 1927, on the family farm in Delaware. When all of the children were old enough to attend school, Ann found employment as a linotype operator for the Bridgeport Post.

As a child, Mitchum was known as a prankster, often involved in fistfights and mischief. When he was 12, his mother sent him to live with her parents in Felton, Delaware; the boy was promptly expelled from middle school for scuffling with the principal. A year later, in 1930, he moved in with his older sister Annette, in New York's Hell's Kitchen. After being expelled from Haaren High School, he left his sister and traveled throughout the country, hopping on railroad cars, taking a number of jobs, including ditch-digging for the Civilian Conservation Corps and professional boxing. At age 14 in Savannah, Georgia, he said he was arrested for vagrancy and put on a local chain gang. By Mitchum's own account, he escaped and returned to his family in Delaware. During this time, while recovering from injuries that nearly cost him a leg, he met Dorothy Spence, whom he would later marry. He soon went back on the road, eventually "riding the rails" to California.

Mitchum arrived in Long Beach, California, in 1936, staying again with his sister, now going by the name of Julie. She had moved to the West Coast in the hope of acting in movies, and the rest of the Mitchum family soon joined them. During this time, Mitchum worked as a ghostwriter for astrologer Carroll Righter. Julie convinced him to join the local theater guild with her. At The Players Guild of Long Beach, Mitchum worked as a stagehand and occasional bit-player in company productions. He also wrote several short pieces which were performed by the guild. According to Lee Server's biography (Robert Mitchum: Baby, I Don't Care), Mitchum put his talent for poetry to work writing song lyrics and monologues for Julie's nightclub performances.

In 1940, he returned to Delaware to marry Dorothy Spence, and they moved back to California. He gave up his artistic pursuits at the birth of their first child James, nicknamed Josh, and two more children, Chris and Petrine, followed. Mitchum found steady employment as a machine operator during wartime era WWII, with the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation, but the noise of the machinery damaged his hearing. He also suffered a nervous breakdown (which resulted in temporary blindness), due to job-related stress. He then sought work as a film actor, performing initially as an extra and in small speaking parts. His agent got him an interview with Harry Sherman, the producer of Paramount's Hopalong Cassidy western film series, which starred William Boyd; Mitchum was hired to play minor villainous roles in several films in the series during 1942 and 1943. He went uncredited as a soldier in the Mickey Rooney 1943 film The Human Comedy. Also in 1943 he and Randolph Scott were soldiers in the Pacific Island war film Gung Ho.

Mitchum continued to find work as an extra and supporting actor in numerous productions for various studios. After impressing director Mervyn LeRoy during the making of Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, Mitchum signed a seven-year contract with RKO Radio Pictures. He was groomed for B-Western stardom in a series of Zane Grey adaptations.

Following the moderately successful Western Nevada, RKO lent Mitchum to United Artists for The Story of G.I. Joe (1945). In the film, he portrayed war-weary officer Bill Walker (based on Captain Henry T. Waskow), who remains resolute despite the troubles he faces. The film, which followed the life of an ordinary soldier through the eyes of journalist Ernie Pyle (played by Burgess Meredith), became an instant critical and commercial success. Shortly after filming, Mitchum was drafted into the United States Army, serving at Fort MacArthur, California, as a medic. At the 1946 Academy Awards, The Story of G.I. Joe was nominated for four Oscars, including Mitchum's only nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He finished the year with a Western (West of the Pecos) and a story of returning Marine veterans (Till the End of Time), before filming in a genre that came to define Mitchum's career and screen persona: film noir.

Mitchum was initially known for his work in film noir. His first foray into the genre was a supporting role in the 1944 B-movie When Strangers Marry, about newlyweds and a New York City serial killer. Undercurrent, another of Mitchum's early noir films, featured him as a troubled, sensitive man entangled in the affairs of his brother (Robert Taylor) and his brother's suspicious wife (Katharine Hepburn). John Brahm's The Locket (1946) featured Mitchum as bitter ex-boyfriend to Laraine Day's femme fatale. Raoul Walsh's Pursued (1947) combined Western and noir styles, with Mitchum's character attempting to recall his past and find those responsible for killing his family. Crossfire (also 1947) featured Mitchum as a member of a group of World War II soldiers, one of whom kills a Jewish man. It featured themes of anti-Semitism and the failings of military training. The film, directed by Edward Dmytryk, earned five Academy Award nominations.

Following Crossfire, Mitchum starred in Out of the Past (also called Build My Gallows High), directed by Jacques Tourneur and featuring the cinematography of Nicholas Musuraca. Mitchum played Jeff Markham, a small-town gas-station owner and former investigator, whose unfinished business with gambler Whit Sterling (Kirk Douglas) and femme fatale Kathie Moffett (Jane Greer) comes back to haunt him.

On September 1, 1948, after a string of successful films for RKO, Mitchum and actress Lila Leeds were arrested for possession of marijuana.[10] The arrest was the result of a sting operation designed to capture other Hollywood partiers as well, but Mitchum and Leeds did not receive the tipoff. After serving a week at the county jail (he described the experience to a reporter as being "like Palm Springs, but without the riff-raff"), Mitchum spent 43 days (February 16 to March 30) at a Castaic, California, prison farm. Life photographers were permitted to take photos of him mopping up in his prison uniform. The arrest inspired the exploitation film She Shoulda Said No! (1949), which starred Leeds. The conviction was later overturned by the Los Angeles court and district attorney's office on January 31, 1951, after being exposed as a setup.

Despite, or because of, Mitchum's troubles with the law and his studio, his films released immediately after his arrest were box-office hits. Rachel and the Stranger (1948) featured Mitchum in a supporting role as a mountain man competing for the hand of Loretta Young, the indentured servant and wife of William Holden. In the film adaptation of John Steinbeck's novella The Red Pony (1949), he appeared as a trusted cowhand to a ranching family. He returned to film noir in The Big Steal (also 1949), where he reunited with Jane Greer in an early Don Siegel film.

In Where Danger Lives (1950), Mitchum played a doctor who comes between a mentally unbalanced Faith Domergue and cuckolded Claude Rains. The Racket was a noir remake of the early crime drama of the same name and featured Mitchum as a police captain fighting corruption in his precinct. The Josef von Sternberg film, Macao (1952), had Mitchum as a victim of mistaken identity at an exotic resort casino, playing opposite Jane Russell. Otto Preminger's Angel Face was the first of three collaborations between Mitchum and British stage actress Jean Simmons. In this film, she played an insane heiress who plans to use young ambulance driver Mitchum to kill for her.

Mitchum was fired from Blood Alley (1955), due to his conduct, reportedly having thrown the film's transportation manager into San Francisco Bay. According to Sam O'Steen's memoir Cut to the Chase, Mitchum showed up on-set after a night of drinking and tore apart a studio office when they did not have a car ready for him. Mitchum walked off the set of the third day of filming Blood Alley, claiming he could not work with the director. Because Mitchum was showing up late and behaving erratically, producer John Wayne, after failing to obtain Humphrey Bogart as a replacement, took over the role himself.

Following a series of conventional Westerns and films noirs, as well as the Marilyn Monroe vehicle River of No Return (1954), Mitchum appeared in Charles Laughton's only film as director: The Night of the Hunter (1955). Based on a novel by Davis Grubb, the thriller starred Mitchum as a monstrous criminal posing as a preacher to find money hidden by his cellmate in the cellmate's home. His performance as Reverend Harry Powell is considered by many to be one of the best of his career.[15][16] Stanley Kramer's melodrama Not as a Stranger, also released in 1955, was a box-office hit. The film starred Mitchum against type, as an idealistic young doctor, who marries an older nurse (Olivia de Havilland), only to question his morality many years later. However, the film was not well received, with most critics pointing out that Mitchum, Frank Sinatra, and Lee Marvin were all too old for their characters. Olivia de Havilland received top billing over Mitchum and Sinatra.

On March 8, 1955, Mitchum formed DRM (Dorothy and Robert Mitchum) Productions to produce five films for United Artists; four films were produced. The first film was Bandido (1956). Following a succession of average Westerns and the poorly received Foreign Intrigue (1956), Mitchum starred in the first of three films with Deborah Kerr. The John Huston war drama Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison, starred Mitchum as a Marine corporal shipwrecked on a Pacific Island with a nun, Sister Angela (Deborah Kerr), as his sole companion. In this character study, they struggle to resist the elements and the invading Japanese army. The film was nominated for two Academy Awards, including Best Actress and Best Adapted Screenplay. For his role, Mitchum was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actor. In the WWII submarine classic The Enemy Below (1956), Mitchum gave a strong performance as U.S. Naval Lieutenant Commander Murrell, the captain of a U.S. Navy destroyer who matches wits with a German U-boat captain Curt Jurgens, who starred with Mitchum again in the legendary 1962 movie The Longest Day. The film won an Oscar for Special Effects.

Thunder Road (1958), the second DRM Production, was loosely based on an incident in which a driver transporting moonshine was said to have fatally crashed on Kingston Pike in Knoxville, Tennessee, somewhere between Bearden Hill and Morrell Road. According to Metro Pulse writer Jack Renfro, the incident occurred in 1952 and may have been witnessed by James Agee, who passed the story on to Mitchum. He starred in the movie, produced, co-wrote the screenplay, and is rumored to have directed much of the film. It costars his son James, as his on screen brother, in a role originally intended for Elvis Presley. Mitchum also co-wrote (with Don Raye) the theme song, "The Ballad of Thunder Road".

He returned to Mexico for The Wonderful Country (1959) and Ireland for A Terrible Beauty/The Night Fighters for the last of his DRM Productions.

Mitchum and Kerr reunited for the Fred Zinnemann film, The Sundowners (1960), where they played husband and wife struggling in Depression-era Australia. Opposite Mitchum, Kerr was nominated for yet another Academy Award for Best Actress, while the film was nominated for a total of five Oscars. Mitchum was awarded that year's National Board of Review award for Best Actor for his performance. The award also recognized his superior performance in the Vincente Minnelli Western drama Home from the Hill (also 1960). He was teamed with former leading ladies Kerr and Simmons, as well as Cary Grant, for the Stanley Donen comedy The Grass Is Greener the same year.

Mitchum's performance as the menacing rapist Max Cady in Cape Fear (1962) brought him further renown for playing cold, predatory characters. The 1960s were marked by a number of lesser films and missed opportunities. Among the films Mitchum passed on during the decade were John Huston's The Misfits (the last film of its stars Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe), the Academy Award–winning Patton, and Dirty Harry. The most notable of his films in the decade included the war epics The Longest Day (1962) and Anzio (1968), the Shirley MacLaine comedy-musical What a Way to Go! (1964), and the Howard Hawks Western El Dorado (1967), a remake of Rio Bravo (1959), in which Mitchum took over Dean Martin's role of the drunk who comes to the aid of John Wayne. He teamed with Martin for the 1968 Western 5 Card Stud, playing a homicidal preacher.

One of the lesser-known aspects of Mitchum's career was his foray into music as a singer. Critic Greg Adams writes, "Unlike most celebrity vocalists, Robert Mitchum actually had musical talent." Mitchum's voice was often used instead of that of a professional singer when his character sang in his films. Notable productions featuring Mitchum's own singing voice included Rachel and the Stranger, River of No Return, and The Night of the Hunter. After hearing traditional calypso music and meeting artists such as Mighty Sparrow and Lord Invader while filming Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison in the Caribbean islands of Tobago, he recorded Calypso – is like so ... in March 1957. On the album, released through Capitol Records, he emulated the calypso sound and style, even adopting the style's unique pronunciations and slang. A year later, he recorded a song he had written for Thunder Road, titled "The Ballad of Thunder Road". The country-style song became a modest hit for Mitchum, reaching number 69 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart. The song was included as a bonus track on a successful reissue of Calypso ... and helped market the film to a wider audience.

Although Mitchum continued to use his singing voice in his film work, he waited until 1967 to record his follow-up record, That Man, Robert Mitchum, Sings. The album, released by Nashville-based Monument Records, took him further into country music, and featured songs similar to "The Ballad of Thunder Road". "Little Old Wine Drinker Me", the first single, was a top-10 hit at country radio, reaching number nine there, and crossed over onto mainstream radio, where it peaked at number 96. Its follow-up, "You Deserve Each Other", also charted on the Billboard Country Singles chart. He sang the title song to the Western Young Billy Young, made in 1969.

Mitchum made a departure from his typical screen persona with the 1970 David Lean film Ryan's Daughter, in which he starred as Charles Shaughnessy, a mild-mannered schoolmaster in World War I–era Ireland. At the time of filming, Mitchum was going through a personal crisis and planned to commit suicide. Aside from a personal crisis, his recent films had been critical and commercial flops. Screenwriter Robert Bolt told him that he could commit suicide after the film was finished and that he would personally pay for his burial. Though the film was nominated for four Academy Awards (winning two) and Mitchum was much publicized as a contender for a Best Actor nomination, he was not nominated. George C. Scott won the award for his performance in Patton, a project Mitchum had rejected for Ryan's Daughter.

The 1970s featured Mitchum in a number of well-received crime dramas. The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973) had the actor playing an aging Boston hoodlum caught between the Feds and his criminal friends. Sydney Pollack's The Yakuza (1974) transplanted the typical film noir story arc to the Japanese underworld. He also appeared in 1976's Midway about an epic 1942 World War II battle. Mitchum's stint as an aging Philip Marlowe in the Raymond Chandler adaptation Farewell, My Lovely (1975) was sufficiently well received by audiences and critics for him to reprise the role in 1978's The Big Sleep.

In 1982, Mitchum played Coach Delaney in the film adaptation of playwright/actor Jason Miller's 1973 Pulitzer Prize-winning play That Championship Season.

At the premiere for That Championship Season, Mitchum, while intoxicated, assaulted a female reporter and threw a basketball that he was holding (a prop from the film) at a female photographer from Time magazine, injuring her neck and knocking out two of her teeth. She sued him for $30 million for damages. The suit eventually "cost him his salary from the film."

That Championship Season may have indirectly led to another debacle for Mitchum several months later. In a February 1983 Esquire interview, he made several racist, anti-Semitic and sexist statements, including, when asked if the Holocaust occurred, responded "so the Jews say." Following the widespread negative response, he apologized a month later, saying that his statements were "prankish" and "foreign to my principle." He claimed that the problem had begun when he recited a racist monologue from his role in That Championship Season, the writer believing the words to be his own. Mitchum, who claimed that he had only reluctantly agreed to the interview, then decided to "string... along" the writer with even more incendiary statements.

Mitchum expanded to television work with the 1983 miniseries The Winds of War. The big-budget Herman Wouk story aired on ABC, starring Mitchum as naval officer "Pug" Henry and Victoria Tennant as Pamela Tudsbury, and examined the events leading up to America's involvement in World War II. He returned to the role in 1988's War and Remembrance, which continued the story through the end of the war.

In 1984, Mitchum entered the Betty Ford Center in Palm Springs, California for treatment of a drinking problem.

He played George Hazard's father-in-law in the 1985 miniseries North and South, which also aired on ABC.

Mitchum starred opposite Wilford Brimley in the 1986 made-for-TV movie Thompson's Run. A hardened con (Mitchum), being transferred from a federal penitentiary to a Texas institution to finish a life sentence as a habitual criminal, is freed at gunpoint by his niece (played by Kathleen York). The cop (Brimley) who was transferring him, and has been the con's lifelong friend and adversary for over 30 years, vows to catch the twosome.

In 1987, Mitchum was the guest-host on Saturday Night Live, where he played private eye Philip Marlowe for the last time in the parody sketch, "Death Be Not Deadly". The show ran a short comedy film he made (written and directed by his daughter, Trina) called Out of Gas, a mock sequel to Out of the Past. (Jane Greer reprised her role from the original film.) He also was in Bill Murray's 1988 comedy film, Scrooged.

In 1991, Mitchum was given a lifetime achievement award from the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures, in the same year he received the Telegatto award and in 1992 the Cecil B. DeMille Award from the Golden Globe Awards.

Mitchum continued to act in films until the mid-1990s, such as in Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man, and he narrated the Western Tombstone. He also appeared, in contrast to his role as the antagonist in the original, as a protagonist police detective in Martin Scorsese's remake of Cape Fear, but the actor gradually slowed his workload. His last film appearance was a small but pivotal role in the television biopic, James Dean: Race with Destiny, playing Giant director George Stevens. His last starring role was in the 1995 Norwegian movie Pakten.

A lifelong heavy smoker, Mitchum died on July 1, 1997, in Santa Barbara, California, due to complications of lung cancer and emphysema. He was about five weeks shy of his 80th birthday. His body was cremated and his ashes scattered at sea, though there is a plot marker in the Odd Fellows Cemetery in Delaware. He was survived by his wife of 57 years, Dorothy Mitchum (May 2, 1919 – April 12, 2014, Santa Barbara, California, aged 94); his sons, actors James Mitchum and Christopher Mitchum; and his daughter, writer Petrine Day Mitchum. His grandchildren, Bentley Mitchum and Carrie Mitchum, are actors, as was his younger brother, John, who died in 2001. Another grandson, Kian, is a successful model.

Mitchum is regarded by some critics as one of the finest actors of the Golden Age of Hollywood. Roger Ebert called him "the soul of film noir." Mitchum, however, was self-effacing; in an interview with Barry Norman for the BBC about his contribution to cinema, Mitchum stopped Norman in mid flow and in his typical nonchalant style, said, "Look, I have two kinds of acting. One on a horse and one off a horse. That's it." He had also succeeded in annoying some of his fellow actors by voicing his puzzlement at those who viewed the profession as challenging and hard work. He is quoted as having said in the Barry Norman interview that acting was actually very simple and that his job was to "show up on time, know his lines, hit his marks, and go home". Mitchum had a habit of marking most of his appearances in the script with the letters "n.a.r.", which meant "no action required", which critic Dirk Baecker has construed as Mitchum's way of reminding himself to experience the world of the story without acting upon it.

AFI's 100 Years...100 Stars lists Mitchum as the 23rd-greatest male star of classic Hollywood cinema. AFI also recognized his performance as the menacing rapist Max Cady and Reverend Harry Powell as the 28th and 29th greatest screen villains, respectively, of all time as part of AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains. He provided the voice of the famous American Beef Council commercials that touted "Beef ... it's what's for dinner", from 1992 until his death.

A "Mitchum's Steakhouse" is in Trappe, Maryland, where Mitchum and his family lived from 1959 to 1965.

[ozu-teapot]

20 Favourite New-to-Me Films of 2019

That is my 20 favourite films I saw for the first time in 2019 (in no particular order):

Le testament d'Orphée | Jean Cocteau | 1960

High Life | Claire Denis | 2018

Coincoin et les z'inhumains | Bruno Dumont | 2014

Parasite | Bong Joon Ho | 2019

First Reformed | Paul Schrader | 2017

The Boy Friend | Ken Russell | 1971

Atlantics | Mati Diop | 2019

Shanghai Express | Josef von Sternberg | 1932

Bergman - ett liv i fyra akter (Bergman - A Life in Four Acts) | Jane Magnusson | 2018

The Miraculous Virgin | Stefan Uher | 1967

A Touch of Sin | Zhangke Jia | 2013

The Lighthouse | Robert Eggers | 2019

L'une chante l'autre pas | Agnès Varda | 1977

Gabbeh | Mohsen Makhmalbaf | 1996

Phantom Thread | Paul Thomas Anderson | 2017

Mikey and Nicky | Elaine May | 1976

The Servant | Joseph Losey | 1963

The Souvenir | Joanna Hogg | 2019

The System (AKA The Girl-Getters) | Michael Winner | 1964

Some notes: Unlike my re-watched films Letterboxd told me I’d scored a lot of the new-to-me films pretty highly, to the extent that it was very difficult to choose the top twenty (as usual) with a lot of great films left just outside. I do wonder if it’s just the thrill of seeing something new and great which leads to the high score, when a re-watch of a familiar film gets a more level headed response. (I often revise my ratings on re-watches, don’t we all). I kind of wanted to include the Zatoichi series of films as I’d enjoyed watching them over the year but it would have been wrong.

[miguelmarias]

NICHOLAS RAY: EL ESLABÓN PERDIDO

El tiempo y los «hombres-película» decidirán la importancia de su obra inconclusa, irregular, despareja, desequilibrada, fragmentaria, mutilada, imperfecta, pero también hiriente, candente, lacerante y sentida. De lo que ya no puede caber duda es del lugar central que ocupa en la historia del cine. Si se quiere entender la evolución del llamado séptimo arte más allá de la mera cronología y de los sofismas sociológicos, como relevo de miradas complementarias y sucesión de formas, que, a largo plazo, trazan lo que Godard llamaría «la línea discontinua de la continuidad», hay que estudiar a fondo las encrucijadas, los puntos de inflexión en que se rompe con el presente y se reenlaza con el pasado para dar un nuevo salto adelante. Después de la segunda guerra mundial, las «cabezas buscadoras del cine» —en expresión de Rivette— fueron fundamentalmente dos: Roberto Rossellini, en Europa, y Nicholas Ray, en América. Rossellini infundió nueva vitalidad a la quebrada tradición realista europea (casi siempre francesa: de Lumière a Renoir, pasando por Pagnol). La mediación de Ray fue, si cabe, más decisiva y menos consciente: procedente del teatro, la radio y la arquitectura, conocedor del jazz, la música popular, la geografía y las gentes de su vasta tierra, fue el único de su generación que supo tender un puente entre la estilización germánica del clasicismo narrativo alumbrado en el mudo y el cine del futuro, mayoritariamente europeo, influido por la libertad del primer Rossellini y deliberadamente empeñado en asimilar las enseñanzas (olvidadas o pervertidas) de todos los cineastas que le precedieron. Es decir, que Ray partió de Fritz Lang, que se consideraba a sí mismo «el último dinosaurio» (They Live by Night no disimula su deuda para con You Only Live Once, y no es difícil detectar en Johnny Guitar, Run for Cover o The True Story of Jesse James las huellas respectivas de Rancho Notorious, Fury o The Return of Frank James), para señalarle el camino a Jean-Luc Godard, que hoy se me antoja «el último piel roja» (À bout de souffle, Bande à part, Pierrot le fou, Masculin Féminin). ¿Quiere esto decir que la cadena se ha roto?, ¿que esta historia ha terminado? Es de temer que así sea, si alguien no le pone remedio de inmediato; si Wenders, Scorsese o Pialat no maduran y se definen, radicalizándose, si dejan que muera la generación quemada antes de aprender de sus películas un lenguaje y unos conocimientos que tanto costó adquirir y preservar. Pasó el tiempo del i can't get started, pues ya no queda más que el ghost of a chance de que dentro de unos años podamos decir the song remains the same: el cine se está jugando su propia supervivencia.

BIOFILMOGRAFÍA

RAYMOND Nicholas Kienzle nace el 7 de agosto de 1911, en La Crosse, Wisconsin. Hijo único, aspira a ser director de orquesta o teatro; mientras estudia, escribe, dirige radio y obtiene beca para la Universidad que prefiera del mundo: en 1927 ingresa en la de Chicago. Seleccionado con treinta y cuatro jóvenes para un seminario del arquitecto Frank Lloyd Wright (1929). En 1930 se casa, y al año nace un hijo, Anthony (Bob Younger en The True Story of Jesse James). Vuelve a Nueva York, con Houseman, que dirige el grupo teatral The Phoenix, y en 1942 le hace jefe de emisiones de la Office of War Information; adopta el nombre de Nicholas Ray. En 1943, con el OSS: emisiones para países ocupados; escritor y director radiofónico en CBS; teatro en Broadway. En 1944, ayudante de dirección del primer film de Kazan (A Tree Grows in Brooklyn), en Hollywood. Al llamar Dore Schary a Houseman, Ray le acompaña a Hollywood. Houseman produce en RKO el primer film de Ray, The Live By Night (1947), estrenado en Inglaterra —como The Twisted Road—, en 1948, y en 1949, en Estados Unidos, adaptación propia de Thieves Like Us, de Edward Anderson. En 1948 se casa con Gloria Grahame y nace Timothy Nicholas (que sale en Lightning Over Water). Dirige A Woman's Secret y —prestado a la productora de Bogart— Knock on Any Door (Llamad a cualquier puerta), que se distribuye en 1949. Con adaptación suya y para Houseman, otra vez, realiza On Dangerous Ground —Ida Lupino rodó algún plano al enfermar Ray—, que no se estrena hasta 1951, y también en 1949-50, de nuevo cedido a Santana/Columbia, su versión de In A Lonely Place, de Dorothy B. Hughes. Se separa en secreto de Grahame, aunque hasta 1952 no se divorcia; hace Born to Be Bad (1950) en Inglaterra Bed of Roses. En 1951, por primera vez en color, Flying Leathernecks (Infierno en las nubes), y rechaza el cargo de jefe de producción de RKO que le ofrece Howard Hughes; accede a completar Jet Pilot y Macao (Sternberg), The Racket (Cromwell) y Androcles and the Lion (Chester Erskine). Robert Parrish rueda una escena de The Lusty Men (1952), mientras Ray sana de quemaduras sufridas al salvar de un incendio a los cachorros de Bogart. Da por terminado su contrato con RKO; al parecer, estuvo en la «lista gris» de los seguidores de McCarthy. Una fuente le atribuye High Green Wall (?) en 1953, año en el que emprende Johnny Guitar (1954), como productor asociado, coguionista no acreditado y director. En 1954 emplea el procedimiento vistavision en Run for Cover (Busca tu refugio), que se estrena al año siguiente, y conoce a James Dean, protagonista de Rebel Without a Cause (Rebelde sin causa, 1955), primer Ray en Cinemascope, con argumento del cineasta (que interviene como figurante). Quiere producir con Dean Heroic Love, pero la muerte del actor, el 30 de septiembre, desbarata sus proyectos y le afecta profundamente. En 1955-56 rueda Tambourine, que se estrena como Hot Blood (Sangre caliente); en desacuerdo con la producción abandonó el montaje. En 1956 se edita en Francia su novelización de Rebel, La Fureur de vivre, y empieza el libro Rebel: Life Story of a Film, que nunca terminó. En París conoce a sus admiradores de Cahiers du Cinéma, futuros cineastas de la Nouvelle Vague. No consigue fundar, con Rex Cole, una compañía para hacer un guión de Eric Ambler; producida e interpretada por James Mason, realiza Bigger Than Life, con guión el crítico inglés Gavin Lambert, Clifford Odets y Ray (los tres sin acreditar). En 1956-57, The True Story of Jesse James (G. B.: The James Brothers; La verdadera historia de Jesse James), remontada por el productor con planos del ayudante Joseph E. Richards. En 1957 empieza a pasar temporadas en Europa; rueda en Francia y en el desierto libio Bitter Victory/Amère victoire, en scope blanco y negro, con Lambert y René Hardy de coguionistas y diálogos de Paul Gallico y Raymond Queneau. Filma en los pantanos de Florida, en color y panorámica, un guión de Budd Schulberg —que dirige algún plano—, Wind Across the Everglades, y luego, todavía en 1958, Party Girl (Chicago, año 30), en la que sale la bailarina Berry Utey, con la que se casa y tendrá dos hijos. Tras numerosos proyectos frustrados, rueda en Canadá, Inglaterra e Italia The Savage Innocents/Ombre bianche/Les dents du diable (Los dientes del diablo, 1959-60), con segunda unidad de Baccio Bandini y guión propio. El proyecto The Man of Nazareth se convierte en King of Kings (Rey de reyes, 1960-61) al hacerle venir a España Samuel Bronston; guión de Ray y Philip Yordan, segundad unidad de Noel Howard y Summer Williams; MGM rehace y mutila el montaje inicial. Más proyectos irrealizados: Circus World (El fabuloso mundo del circo), escrito con Yordan para Bronston en 1962, pasa a Capra, pero es Hathaway quien la dirige, en 1964. Segunda superproducción en 70 mm. con Bronston, 55 Days at Peking (55 días en Pekín), 1962-63), en la que interpreta un personaje; tras misteriosa enfermedad abandona el film, que acaban Howard Andrew Marton y Guy Green. Pone el restaurante Nicaa's, en Madrid (hasta 1968), rompe definitivamente con Bronston y tiene múltiples ideas y guiones que no ven la luz (sólo en 1967 está a punto de iniciar, en Yugoslavia, The Doctor and the Devils, guión escrito en 1953 por Dylan Thomas). Viaja por toda Europa: Polonia (monta la versión internacional de Popioly, 1965, de Wajda), Alemania, Francia, Checoslovaquia..., y rueda, cuando puede, en 8, súper 8, 16, súper 16, 35 mm. y video, experimentos de pantalla dividida. En 1968 vuelve a Chicago para filmar la Convención Demócrata y el proceso contra los Siete de Chicago, pero no acaba la película; algún material usado en American Revisited (1972), de Marcel Ophuls, y en We Can't Go Home Again, film que rueda entre 1971 y 1973 y que no llegó a montar definitivamente (aunque se proyectó en Cannes en 1974). En 1979, tras una embolia, pierde un ojo. Desde 1971 da clases prácticas de cine en Harpur College y otros centros universitarios; entre sus alumnos están Susan Schwartz, que se convierte en su cuarta esposa. En 1974 aparece en el documental-entrevista de David Helpern Jr. I'm a Stranger Here Myself, y dirige y protagoniza, en Europa, el episodio The Janitor/Der Hausmeister, en Wet Dreams (Sueños húmedos). Escribe un guión con el crítico inglés V. F. Perkins (1976); a punto de hacer City Blues (1976-77), no consigue financiación. En 1977 rueda un corto en 16 mm. Actor en Der amerikanische Freund (El amigo americano, 1976-77), de Wenders, y Hair (1978-79), de Forman. Se agrava su cáncer, y es intervenido varias veces (cerebro, pulmón). En marzo de 1979 pide a Wenders que le ayude a dirigir lo que ahora es Lightning Over Water/Nick's Movie/Nick's Film (Relámpago sobre agua, 1980), pero muere antes de terminar, entre el 16 y el 18 de junio de 1979 (las fuentes no se ponen de acuerdo acerca de cuál de esos tres días falleció).

Miguel Marías

Revista “Casablanca” nº 5, mayo-1981