Aproveitando que o Pedro Seiler já divulgou aqui o Vale Open Air, vamos dar uma dica para o seu final-de-semana. Amanhã, dia 28/11, tem a pré-estréia de “O Mundo Imaginário do Dr. Parnassus” no evento que está acontecendo no Jockey Club, na Gávea.

Escrito e dirigido por Terry Gilliam, o longa fantástico chegou a ser cancelado por causa dos vários problemas que ocorreram durante a filmagem: desde uma chuva torrencial até a morte de um dos protagonistas, o “Coringa” Heath Ledger. Felizmente Johnny Depp, Jude Law e Colin Farrel se ofereceram para continuar o papel de Ledger, o que acabou se tornando uma boa adição ao longa, já que o personagem Tony transita apenas pela imaginação do Dr. Parnassus, onde tudo pode acontecer.

O filme promete e está sendo bastante aguardado pelos fãs do diretor que fez o clássico do humor “Monty Python e o Cálice Sagrado”

Logo após a exibição vai rolar a festa Moo, que vem se tornando referência da noite carioca.

Filme + Festa é um bom combo pro sábado à noite, não é?

Happy Friday, everyone.

Friday’s are usually pretty quiet here at the office, so I usually make myself busy with checking out the blogrolls and other projects.  This morning, I wrote my sponsor child in the Philippines a letter, sorted out some OSAP details, and sent out a query letter.  Shhhhhhhhhh, don’t tell anyone!  I’m also in the homestretch of my NaNoWriMo novel (or, as Rikki says, Nanaimo novel!) and at 43,000/50,000 words, I have nowhere else to go.  In a desperate attempt for some online inspiration, I’ve found the following things to stir my imagination.

Enjoy!

Video Love

I love stop motion!  Which reminds me of these …

This has been making the rounds on the Internets lately, and what kind of (sometimes) book blogger would I be if I didn’t link to it too?

More stop motion loveliness.  I love this lyric:  She pours a daydream in a cup / A spoon of sugar sweetens up … 

I must, must, MUST see this movie!!!  It’s inspiring much of the feel of my next novel (yep, already thinking of the next one because I’m a glutton for punishment) Visually stunning and so fantastical!  And Jude Law, Johnny “Sexiest Man Alive” Depp, Christopher Plummer, Colin Farrell, Terry Gilliam, and the late, talented Heath Ledger? Yes, please!

Quote love

Wine is sunlight, held together by water  – Galileo 

Well, darkness exists so the stars can shine, darling  –  Source Unknown (if someone knows the source, please let me know!  If this is a quote from One Tree Hill or something, I will kick a pigeon.  Just kidding.  I don’t advocate violence towards animals.  But I will feel terribly, terribly let down by the universe.)

Love is the extremely uncomfortable realization that something other than oneself is real  – Irish Murdoch

Sexy authors and historical figures love

Sir Isaac Brock. You know you can't resist that hand on the hip pose!

Andrew Sean Greer, author of "The Confessions of Max Tivoli," a very beautiful book

Neil Gaiman ftw!

Joseph Boyden: hot AND Canadian!

A young Nathaniel Hawthorne could give ME a scarlet letter ... *wink wink!*

Lord Byron: HE walks in beauty, like the night

And because I pretty much have to …

Listen to Wiretap. For Jonathan Goldstein.

Read Broken Pencil magazine. For Hal Niedzviecki.

That’s all I’ve got for now.  May your weekends be as busy or as lazy as you wish them to be.  Other than writing like the madwoman in the attic (rereading Jane Eyre for the billionth time; couldn’t resist!), I plan on having a schedule-free one.

Actors, designers, pop stars have all got behind the hot new ethical campaign: food. From saving species to investigating conditions for pigs, star quality is pushing it to the foreground

It is, by anybody’s standards, an arresting image: a truly beautiful photograph of a luscious, radiant creature, all shiny eyes and silky skin. And Greta Scacchi, who is pictured clutching the cod to her naked body, doesn’t look bad either. In the months and years to come, this picture, flashed throughout the British media last week, will doubtless come to be seen as the seminal image for a particular moment, when the gruelling, knotty business of campaigning around food issues finally became sexy. The use of celebrity skin to push an ethical issue is nothing new, of course. In the 1990s, Peta – People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals – convinced a bunch of supermodels, including Naomi Campbell, to appear in the buff under the legend “I’d rather go nude than wear fur”. But fur is just so passé. And, in any case, Campbell proved just how fickle the modern celebrity can be by soon deciding that actually, come to think of it, she would much rather wear fur than go nude, and did so on the catwalk in Milan.

Where celebrities are concerned, it seems, food is the new fur. The current set of images featuring Scacchi alongside actress Emilia Fox, director Terry Gilliam and actor Richard E Grant, were launched to back the cinematic release of The End Of The Line, a film about the threat of overfishing – but they are only a part of it. Tomorrow, Paul McCartney and his daughters Stella and Mary are launching a campaign to convince the public to go meat-free for one day a week. Another movie, Food Inc, which looks at the excesses and foul side-effects of industrial food production has just been released in the US and will shortly arrive here. Plus there is a major investigation by environmental campaigner Tracy Worcester into the dark underbelly of the global pig-rearing business which is about to be screened on digital channel More4. Food, and more importantly, really bad food, is hot.

What marks out these campaigns is their sophistication. It began a couple of weeks ago with the news that Nobu, the global high-end chain of Japanese restaurants favoured by the glitterati, was still serving bluefin tuna despite it being an endangered species. The restaurant had added a note to its menu pointing out the threat to the magnificent bluefin and inviting diners to ask for an alternative, but had refused to stop serving it, unlike big-name chefs such as Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver.

This was an old story; it had first been reported in September. It reared its head again because it features in The End Of The Line, the film version of a book by respected journalist Charles Clover.

Cue a letter from a familiar roster of celebrities – Jemima Goldsmith, Trudie Styler, Elle Macpherson – demanding Nobu remove it from their menus so they could eat at the restaurant with a clear conscience. Stephen Fry took to twittering about the issue. “It’s astounding lunacy to serve up endangered species for sushi,” he later said. “There’s no justification for peddling extinction, yet that is exactly what Nobu is doing in its restaurants around the world.” For its part, Nobu has refused to change its policy; apparently it feels it can do without the custom of Trudie and Stephen.

The producers of The End of The Line weren’t finished, though. Clover had been discussing how to publicise the film with Nicholas Rohl and Elizabeth Bennett, friends of his who run the highly regarded ethical London sushi restaurant Soseki and who have helped pioneer sustainable fishing methods. “It was they who suggested getting celebrities on board,” Clover says. “It was basically using celebrities to shame other celebrities and I’m rather keen on that.”

Nicholas Rohl, who as well as co-owning Soseki is a screenwriter, has long known Scacchi. “I contacted her and she opened up her address book,” he says. “It took us two or three weeks to set up. We sent out hundreds of emails and made hundreds of calls, but eventually we got the names together.”

The photographer Rankin agreed to take the shots. Richard E Grant, pictured bare-chested with two feet of lovely, silvery, long-snouted fish, says he was motivated to get behind the campaign by his 30 years of scuba diving. “Commercial sea-floor dredging is an abomination,” he says. “And free celebrity endorsement is the cheapest way to publicise an issue without wasting valuable funds, which are better spent on the cause itself.”

Clover agrees. “The fact is that if you want to put an issue into the popular mind you have to get it into Heat magazine,” he says. Scacchi even appeared on the Today programme to argue the case. “She’s much better suited for doing something like that than me, and catches people’s attention in the way I can’t,” Clover adds. But isn’t it frustrating that, because of the way the media work, an actress who knows almost nothing about the subject is favoured over the man who literally wrote the book? Clover says not. “When you start hearing what you’ve been saying for five years in the mouth of someone who didn’t know anything about it until five minutes before, it’s awesome. It blows your mind.”

Food writer and television cook Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, who has used his shows to argue for improvements in the way cheap chickens are raised in this country, sees nothing intrinsically wrong in non-expert celebrities getting involved. “What matters is how well they carry the message and whether they are in it for the long haul,” he explains.

Nevertheless, there are bound to be some complications with celebrity-driven campaigns, not least the way they are, by habit, completely micro-managed. For example, Paul McCartney has sent letters to people in the media inviting them to a lunch tomorrow to launch his meat-free Monday campaign.

“Livestock continues to have a greater impact on climate change than the combined transportation sector,” he writes. “This industry amounts to a huge 18% of the global warming effect – a terrifying statistic … Help us to encourage the nation to reduce their meat intake by cutting it out just one day a week.”

It sounds like an eminently sensible idea, but no more can be said about it, because the McCartneys have agreed an exclusive interview deal with another, unnamed newspaper and so will not talk to us, or anybody else for that matter, until tomorrow.

So why are all these campaigns happening now? Fearnley-Whittingstall believes the current burst of interest around food is a direct response to government inaction. “I certainly thought it was worth doing something like the chicken campaign, because government wasn’t doing enough,” he says. “If you want to save fish stocks or improve conditions for livestock, do you take it to politicians or do you take it to television and cinema? The latter seems the better way to work right now.”

He credits Jamie Oliver with paving the way for campaigns like his, both by his efforts to improve school meals and his project to recruit jobless youngsters for his restaurants. “His shows marked a crossover for campaigning TV from dry documentary to more mainstream popular TV,” he says. “The crunch question is to what degree the audience are converted.”

It is a question Food Inc tries to answer. The feature-length documentary digs deep beneath the glossy, groaning piles of fresh produce in US supermarkets to reveal the less than appetising methods used to produce them – which have been held responsible for fatal outbreaks of e. coli and salmonella. The film is designed to be a wake-up call, its creators say. They include Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation, and Michael Pollan, author of In Defence of Food, who narrates the movie. “A lot of it is hard to watch,” Pollan has said, “but I think people are ready to take a good, unflinching look at how their food is produced.”

Naturally it comes with celebrity endorsement from the likes of US chef Alice Waters and lifestyle guru and sometime jailbird Martha Stewart, for no food campaign would be complete without that. But perhaps more intriguing is the 300-page book published alongside the film, full of essays on issues surrounding climate change, the environment and agriculture and offering advice on what consumers can do to make a difference.

“This is one of the most interesting social movements afoot right now,” Pollan told Newsweek last week. “The politicians haven’t quite recognised it yet. Hopefully this movie will be a part of the change.”

Those who regard issues around food, which affect everything from the environment to healthcare and economic sustainability, as one of the greatest challenges currently facing the developed world will hope that he’s right. They will also hope that no well-meaning celebrities have a Campbellesque change of heart and are caught feasting on bluefin tuna sashimi with a side order of baby panda rissoles any day soon.

They are what we eat

• Jamie Oliver has campaigned on many food issues. He caught public attention with his Jamie’s School Dinners TV series in 2005 which campaigned to improve the standard of school meals. Jamie Saves Our Bacon this year highlighted the plight of many pigs reared in the UK and abroad.

• In 2008 Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall presented Hugh’s Chicken Run in which he created three chicken farms, one intensive, one free range, and a community farm staffed by volunteers.

• Eric Schlosser examined the global influence of the US fast food industry in Fast Food Nation, published in 2001. The book was made into a 2006 film, including graphic footage from a slaughterhouse.

• American film-maker Morgan Spurlock, above, demonstrated the health effects of McDonald’s food in his documentary Super Size Me by eating nothing but the chain’s meals three times a day, every day, for 30 days.

Source: Guardian.co.uk Caroline White

Parnassus – L’uomo che voleva ingannare il diavolo

Film presentato fuori concorso al Festival di Cannes 2009

Date e orari delle proiezioni:

• giovedì 17 dicembre 2009, ore 21:00

Scheda:

• Paese: Canada, Francia, Gran Bretagna, Stati Uniti
• Durata: 2h e 02′
• Genere: Fantastico
• Regia: Terry Gilliam
• Anno: 2009
• Distributore: Moviemax Italia

Sinossi

Il Dottor Parnassus viaggia per il mondo alla guida del suo straordinario ‘Imaginarium’, fiera itinerante che offre ai suoi spettatori la possibilità di vivere esperienze fantastiche e che travalicano la normale realtà grazie ad uno specchio magico in suo possesso. Parnassus è anche in grado di guidare l’immaginazione del prossimo grazie ad un patto che ha stretto con Mr. Nick, alias il Diavolo in persona. Il problema è che Mr. Nick inizia a pretendere da Parnassus il compenso che gli era stato promesso, ovvero l’anima dell’affascinante figlia Valentina. Per evitare di perdere l’amata figlia Parnassus negozia un nuovo patto: Valentina sarà di chi sedurrà cinque anime. Ad aiutare Parnassus nella sua opera sarà un nuovo arrivato dell’Imaginarium’, Tony, misterioso personaggio salvato dal cappio e dal passato misterioso, che pare affascinato più dalla bella Valentina che dalla filosofia degli artisti di strada…

Sito ufficiale: http://www.parnassus.it/

J’ai trouvé les critiques assez sévères à propos du dernier film de Terry Gilliam. À les entendre, le cinéaste anglais n’aurait gagné ses lettres de noblesse qu’avec Brazil pour ensuite s’embourber dans une réputation d’artiste maudit dont les films auraient moins d’intérêt que leur making-off (on se souvient des fiascos que furent Munchausen et surtout Don Quichotte dont le tournage fut interrompu). Moi qui ne suis pas particulièrement fan du bonhomme, je lui reconnais tout de même une signature et des thèmes qui lui sont propres. L’Imaginarium du Docteur Parnassus est un exemple parfait : lors du visionnage, on ne peut attribuer l’imaginaire qui se déploie sous nos yeux à personne d’autre qu’à Terry Gilliam. Même Tim Burton, à qui on le compare souvent, ne se serait pas envolé aussi loin dans l’abstraction. Alors, pourquoi ôter le titre d’ « auteur » à un cinéaste dont le style est reconnaissable entre mille ?

L’histoire nous emmène en Angleterre parmi les saltimbanques d’un spectacle de rue dirigé par le Docteur Parnassus (Christopher Plummer). Capable de matérialiser les rêves d’autrui, le vieil homme est pourtant loin de rameuter les foules. Les temps sont durs, d’autant plus que sa fille (Lily Cole) approche des 16 ans. Or, il y a des années de cela, il fit un pacte avec le diable (Tom Waits) et lui promit de lui donner l’âme de sa progéniture une fois atteint l’âge en question. C’est alors qu’un soir, la troupe tombe sur Tony (Heath Ledger), un escroc qui tente de remettre sur pied le commerce de Parnassus et, tant qu’à faire, à briser la malédiction qui plane sur sa fille.

Comme toujours chez Gilliam, le scénario mérite un grand coup de sécateur. Bien que touffu, il n’est pas pour autant à ranger parmi les désastres inextricables qu’étaient Les Frères Grimm ou Tideland. L’Imaginarium fonctionne sur l’opposition traditionnelle entre rêve et réalité. Ceci dit, chez Gilliam la différence est difficile à faire tant la réalité ressemble au rêve : des nains et des magiciens s’y promènent, de même que le diable qui parfois passe faire un petit coucou. On serait donc plus tenté de parler d’opposition entre rêve et cauchemar.

Comme toujours, le cinéaste exploite son thème fétiche : l’imagination. En cela, le film fait figure de mise en abyme. L’Imaginarium est un film-nuage, aussi merveilleux qu’insaisissable. Le théâtre de Parnassus rappelle celui des films de Méliès. Gilliam se présente en hériter, et sa fantaisie se veut tout aussi débridée. Les moments les plus merveilleux du film éclatent lorsque le personnage d’Heath Ledger accompagne les clients de l’imaginarium de l’autre côté du miroir. Dans les rêves de Monsieur et  Madame Tout-le-monde, on croise des friandises géantes, des échelles qui montent jusqu’au ciel, des gendarmes en bas résille et des rivières qui se transforment en serpent. C’est extravagant, incohérent, et pourtant on se laisse embarquer. C’est dans la folie pure que le génie de Gilliam atteint son paroxysme.

En revanche, lorsqu’on retombe dans la réalité/cauchemar, l’intrigue patine. Les personnages tombent un à un dans la caricature et finissent par complètement nous échapper. Heath Ledger est seul à faire exception. Le décès de l’acteur en plein milieu du tournage aurait pu pousser le film à rejoindre Don Quichotte dans la fosse des films maudits. Le choix de recourir à trois acteurs différents pour l’incarner dans les scènes rêvées (Johnny Depp, Jude Law et Colin Farrell) confère à son personnage une dimension schismatique inattendue et féérique. C’est finalement quand Gilliam fait preuve des audaces les plus extravagantes que son cinéma gagne en intérêt. Après tout, l’art est un langage universel auquel les fous ont aussi accès. Je déplore d’ailleurs qu’il y en ait si peu.

‘

THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS (UK-Canada-Fr., 2009) R. : Terry Gilliam ; Sc. : T. Gilliam, Charles McKeown ; Ph. : Nicola Pecorini ; M. : Jeff Danna, Mychael Danna ; Int. : Heath Ledger / Johnny Depp / Jude Law / Colin Farrell (Tony), Christopher Plummer (Dr. Parnassus), Lily Cole (Valentina), Tom Waits (Mr. Nick), Andrew Garfield (Anton), Verne Troyer (Percy) . Couleurs, 122mn.

L’IMAGINARIUM DU DOCTEUR PARNASSUS
Quel beau titre. Bien barré. Loufoque et érudit. Anachronique. Mi-latin, mi-raisin.
Imaginarium fait penser à aquarium, pour les optimistes ou funérarium, pour ceux à qui l’automne rappelle le sapin.
Accolé à Parnassus, docteur fait tache, incongru. Pourquoi pas Folamour ou Mabuse, pendant qu’on y est ? Méfions-nous des films avec un nom de docteur. Dans la plupart des cas, des ouvrages destinés à jeter le discrédit sur la corporation médicale, qui montrent des médecins sans malades. Des pervers. Des psychopathes. Des illuminés. Des dingues prêts à faire sauter la planète.
Et aussi, ce Parnassus, nom de famille tout à fait tombé en désuétude. Il y a bien la Tour Montparnasse, mais il s’agit, pour quelques mois encore, du plus haut édifice de France. Pas du médecin de Jules-César.
On voit bien à quel point ce titre est branlant. A côté de la plaque. Mal peigné. Mal réveillé. Mélancolique. Perdu. Brillant. Étranger. Extra-terrestre. Comme Terry Gilliam. Comme le film. Comme Heath Ledger qui finit par s’endormir pour de bon à force de ne plus trouver le sommeil.

Excesiva. Barroca. Desmesurada. La última película de Terry Gilliam, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, es todo eso. Y mucho más. Es una obra maestra. Es una película imprescindible. Porque Terry Gilliam ya ha demostrado varias veces (Brazil, The Fisher King, 12 Monkeys) que posee un universo absolutamente propio y eso es algo que casi ha dejado de ocurrir en el cine moderno. Hoy lo que única que importa es la taquilla, así que las sagas y los remakes, que son los que garantizan recaudaciones de nueve cifras son el producto que manda. Y sobre esta ola de mercantilismo asfixiante, un creador como Terry Gilliam tiene que pelear incansablemente para llevar a la pantalla un nuevo y casi siempre desaforado experimento. Esta vez, por suerte, lo ha conseguido.

Hablando de la película en sí, aunque el reclamo publicitario (lógico, por otra parte) es que se trata de la última película del malogrado Heath Ledger, lo cierto es que para mí este película se resume en dos nombres: Christopher Plummer y Tom Waits. Ambos, Parnassus y Mr. Nick, establecen una relación tan especial, tan mágica y tan divertida (en cierto sentido) que cada diálogo resulta impagable. En especial, me ha sorprendido muchísimo y muy gratamente volver a ver al gran Christopher Plummer (a quien echaba mucho de menos en la gran pantalla) en un papel tan hermoso como difícil, a la altura de su talento.

Heath Ledger, merece la pena comentarlo, está bien. Incluso podría decir que muy bien. Y su desafortunada desaparición, cuando aún no había terminado el rodaje, llevó al equipo a una solución tan ingeniosa y brillante que mejora incluso el planteamiento original. Y de todos los Heath Ledger posibles… me quedo con Johnny Depp (tendréis que ver la peli para seguirme en esto… y de hecho es lo que trato de que hagáis!!!).

En fin, no os perdáis Doctor Parnassus, dejaos introducir en el mundo circense y alucinado de este gran creador y descubrid a este personaje, tan maravilloso como trágico, consciente (como nadie) de que el universo sigue existiendo porque, en algún lugar, alguien está contando una historia.

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is Terry Gilliam’s new fantasy film about a traveling theatre that has to embark on a crazy rescue mission to save the immortal Dr. Parnassus’s daughter from the Devil that has come to collect on a prior arrangement made by the thousand-year-old doctor.
Christopher Plummer, Tom Waits, and Heath Ledger lead off the cast. Ledger’s unfortunate death did put a spin on the film’s production a third of the way through filming. Ledger’s character Tony was recast with Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell portraying different transformations of the role as he travels through a lucid vortex of parallel worlds to rescue Valentina. Opening December 25th, 2009. Take a look at the trailer.

Terry Gilliam hör till de regissörer jag verkligen tycker mycket om. Det innebär inte att allt han gör är mästerligt. Terry har ett skönt sinne för det märkliga och udda och en likaledes egen humor, men han är långt ifrån en säker kassakossa eller en studioälskling, vilket gör att hans produktioner regelbundet råkar ut för problem av ett eller annat slag. Ibland skjuter han över målet och man anar hur hans vision sett ut men den färdiga filmen når inte hela vägen fram.

Men jag tycker om de flesta av hans filmer som jag alls har sett (det finns skamligt nog ett par luckor fortfarande). Hans främsta signaturfilm går i SVT2 på torsdag: Brazil. Den är förmodligen den bästa och — på gott och ont — den mest gilliamska han lyckats åstadkomma: en mardrömsmörk men rolig satir full av märkvärdiga bilder, snudd på psykedelisk, och med en story som inte är helt och hållet glasklar. Det är också precis den kritik som riktats mot den: att Gilliam släppte fantasin fri på bekostnad av disciplin och klarhet. Men eftersom jag gärna brukar säga att “too much is never enough” så är Brazil en solklar rekommendation.

För övrigt är det en av mitt yrkeslivs mest påtagliga besvikelser att jag inte fick chansen att intervjua vare sig Terry Gilliam eller David Cronenberg när de besökte Stockholms filmfestival 2005. En mig överordnad person tyckte inte att det var nödvändigt. Jag är fortfarande osäker på om vederbörande hade en aning om vilka Gilliam och Cronenberg var. Såhär i efterhand borde jag förstås ha skitit i det och bokat upp intervjuerna i alla fall, men det är så dags att tänka på det nu.

Andra bloggar om film, tv, terry gilliam

In occasione della presentazione dell’Immaginario Festival (che si terrà a Perugia dal 3 all’8 dicembre) Terry Gilliam in persona sarà al Cinema Teatro Pavone il 24 novembre per presentare il suo ultimo visionario capolavoro: “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus“.

Chi vuole ascoltare Gilliam dal vivo, fargli domande o semplicemente subire il suo fascino boschivo potrà presentarsi martedì 24 novembre alle 17 o alle 20 al Cinema Teatro Pavone in Piazza della Repubblica, Perugia. Si consiglia di andare lì almeno 30 minuti prima per ritirare uno dei 400 biglietti gratuiti messi a disposzione dal cinema.

E’ indubitabilmente un evento straordinario: non possiamo mancare!

Terry Gilliam a Perugia

Marco Morello di supersalute.com

When Heath Ledger passed away, there was a lot of stupid talk that focused on whether or not he finished his scenes in The Dark Knight. Being young(er) and stupid, I was guilty of making jokes about this. However, when people realized what was lost in terms of Ledger’s talent, the focus changed to lamenting his unfortunate demise.

Now, comes the trailer for Ledger’s last film.  Whoa, Terry Gilliam, lots of spectacle and magic there!

It will be interesting to see where Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell, and Jude Law (minus his semester abroad) take the role.  It will also be verrrrry interesting watching Tom Waits play the devil.

Terry Gilliam

Anteprima di Immaginario  Festival


martedì 24 novembre
2009
Perugia, Teatro del Pavone, Piazza della  Repubblica

Ore 17.30:
Incontro con il regista TERRY GILLIAM
A seguire proiezione del film
TIDELAND (Canada/UK 2005, 120’, 35mm)

Ore 21.00:

Anteprima Immaginario Festival.
Incontro con il regista TERRY GILLIAM
A seguire proiezione di:
STORYTIME (UK/1965, 5’)
THE MIRACLE OF FLIGHT (UK/ 1974, 5’)
THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS
(Francia/ Canada/ UK 2009, 122’, 35 mm)
intervengono:
GIULIO MASCIARRI
Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Perugia
ALESSANDRO CAMPI,
Università degli Studi di Perugia
ALESSANDRO RICCINI RICCI,
Immaginario Festival

Gli ingressi sono liberi fino ad esaurmento posti

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THIS PORTRAIT IS COURTESY OF THE SUN “THE BEST IN THE U.K FOR NEWS, SPORTS, CELEBRITIES & TV”  <—- I WOULD ADD MUSIC AND GOSSIP IN THERE, BUT I AM UNFORTUNATELY NOT EMPLOYED BY THE SUN (YET);)  THIS STARTED OFF AS A SHORT BLOG ABOUT LEO’S LATEST GIRLFRIEND AND HOW HOT SHE WAS AND I IMMEDIATELY WENT OFF ON A RANT ABOUT HEATH LEDGER BEING THE BEST ACTOR OF MY GENERATION.. PLEASE CHECK IT OUT IF YOUR FELLING CHEEKY~

DAMN, I WISH I WAS BRITISH = I GUARANTEE THAT I WOULD BE A SUCCESSFUL MUSICIAN OVER THERE BECAUSE THEY APPRECIATE ART AND MUSIC THAT TAKES RISKS AND BREAKS MOLDS AND DOESN’T FOLLOW ANY TYPE OF FORMULA AND I BELIEVE I DO THAT BETTER THAN ANY AMERICAN ARTIST/MUSICIAN THAT ISN’T SIGNED.. IN MY NEXT POST, I WILL DELVE FURTHER INTO WHAT I MEAN.. CHEERS~ LIKE ELLIOTT SMITH WOULD SAY:  xo

THANK YOU TO MOONDOG, I JUST SAW A COUPLE OF PICTURES OF LEO DiCAPRiO’s NEW GIRLFRIEND. HE IS SO DAMN LUCKY. FIRST OFF, HE IS ONE OF THE BEST ACTORS OF HIS GENERATION, ESPECIALLY SINCE THE UNFORTUNATE PASSING OF HEATH LEDGER WHO I BELIEVE WAS ON HIS WAY TO BEING THE GREATEST OF MY GEN~ MAN, IT STILL FN PISSES ME OFF THAT HE DIED BEING STUPID, I MEAN A LOT OF US HAVE EXPERIMENTED WITH SHIT AND EVEN TAKEN IT TOO FAR FROM TIME TO TIME, BUT FROM WHAT I UNDERSTAND OF HIS PILL INTAKE, IT WAS UNREAL & HIS DOCTOR’S SHOULD BE PUT IN JAIL.. WELL, I GUESS WHEN YOUR AS RICH & POWERFUL AS PEOPLE LIKE HIM, YOU CAN & WILL GET WHATEVER YOU WANT. IT JUST SUCKS, SO MUCH TO LIVE FOR.. A BABY GIRL.. THE BIGGEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME THAT HE NEVER EVEN GOT TO SEE.. AN OSCAR FOR HIS AMAZING PERFORMANCE IN A “SUMMER BLOCKBUSTER” THAT NEVER GET NOMINATED FOR OSCARS, LET ALONE WIN THEM. IT JUST PISSES ME OFF.. HE HAD JUST FINISHED A VIDEO FOR “KING RAT” BY MODEST MOUSE & NOT ONLY IS IT AMAZING, BUT IT STANDS FOR SOMETHING AND JUST LIKE THE GREAT ISAAC BROCK WOULD DO, HE GAVE ALL PROCEEDS FROM THE VIDEO TO A CHARITY PROTECTING WHALES FROM THE SCUMBAGS THAT HUNT THEM~

I AM SURE THAT THESE PICTURES WOULD PUT A SMILE ON MR. LEDGERS FACE. HE OBVIOUSLY APPRECIATED BEAUTY AND THIS IS DEFINITELY A FORM OF IT. I HAVE HAD THE AMAZING OPPORTUNITY TO MEET ISAAC BROCK FROM MODEST MOUSE & UGLY CASANOVA AND EVEN THOUGH HE HAS PLATINUM SELLING RECORDS HAS HIT #1 ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS WITH  “WE WERE DEAD BEFORE THE SHIP EVEN SANK,” HE IS MORE HUMBLE AND DOWN TO EARTH THAN ALOT OF MUSICIANS I MET THAT WERE LITERALLY 3RD & 4TH GUITARISTS ON AN ARTISTS SIDE PROJECT.. ANYWAYS, ANY FRIEND OF ISAAC BROCK (HEATH LEDGER BEING ONE OF THEM) MUST HAVE BEEN A COOL ASS MOTHERF#CKER~

READ A COOL ARTICLE ON VH1 ORIGINALLY WRITTEN BY MTV. AREN’T THEY BOTH OWNED BY THE SAME FILTHY RICH GUY??!!

One of the greatest cinematic love affairs of the past half-century has been between British film fans and an angular, accident-prone beanpole of a Frenchman named Monsieur Hulot. The iconic comedy character created by the mime-turned-star and writer-director Jacques Tati has been tickling the funny bones of filmgoers since the release of the movie which introduced him – M. Hulot’s Holiday – in 1953. And it’s a love affair which is being celebrated at this year’s French Film Festival, with a retrospective of all of Jacques Tati’s screen work.

Tati may only have made a handful of films, but they have made a lasting impression on generations of viewers – and it’s not just the popular vote which they’ve earned. His admirers have included Orson Welles, David Lynch, Steven Spielberg and Belleville Rendez-Vous creator Sylvain Chomet who is currently transforming a previously unfilmed Tati script into an animated film.

Tati’s brilliance as a comedy actor has influenced at least two generations of comedians: John Cleese, Paul Merton and Rowan Atkinson, who described seeing M Hulot’s Holiday as “a defining moment in my life” (and paid homage to it in his 2007 film Mr Bean’s Holiday), are just some of the British comics who owe a clear debt to Tati and his very physical comedy style.

But what is it about Tati that makes him so well-loved – even by viewers who wouldn’t ordinarily go to see a foreign film? The main reason has to be his “everyman” appeal. Tati created easily identifiable types who everyone can recognise from their own experience – the postman who takes himself and his work too seriously in his 1949 film Jour de Fete (could he have been the inspiration for Cliff Clavin, the super-officious mailman in the sitcom Cheers?) and the eager-to-please social misfit M Hulot, who creates chaos out of order and is baffled by the technological trappings of modern life.

M Hulot’s fellow holidaymakers are also brilliantly drawn and would fit in to Fawlty Towers as comfortably as they do the Hotel de la Plage. There’s the veteran soldier who drones on about his wartime experiences, the meek, middle-aged sweety-wifey of a husband who is always several steps behind his banality-spouting spouse (“Oh, there’s another boat … and another … oh!”) during their saunters around the beach, and the workaholic businessman whose holiday is punctuated by frequent trips to the telephone (rather like the Tony Roberts character in Woody Allen’s Play It Again Sam).

The humour in Tati’s films is very physical – and therefore universal. Tati said that the way a comic actor used his legs was paramount, and he used his to maximum comedy effect, mixing loping strides with hesitant little shuffles as he tries to ingratiate himself into new people’s company. Physically, M Hulot is every bit as recognisable – even in silhouette – as Charlie Chaplin’s iconic Little Tramp.

The characteristic Hulot pose is of him tilting forward, with his head at a quizzical angle, his hat tipped over his eyes, his ubiquitous pipe at a right angle to his long nose, his arms bent behind him with his hands resting on his hips. Like Chaplin’s alter ego, he always wears the same kit – trousers that aren’t quite long enough, his Tyrolean-esque hat and stripy socks. He nearly always has his umbrella handy. He walks with a lolling gait, on well-sprung tiptoes and is undoubtedly a French cousin d’un certain Basil Fawlty.

Tati’s background as a mime meant that he was most at home devising visual gags, rather than writing and delivering one-liners or trading witter banter with another actor. Terry Gilliam, the Monty Python team member who became a director, has said: “One of Tati’s great qualities is that his films contain almost no dialogue. I find this particularly brilliant – these divinely French films that create no problem when it comes to subtitling. In terms of dialogue, Monty Python learnt everything from Tati. We owe everything to him.”

Tati’s films feature soundtracks of exaggerated, cartoon-like noises which heighten the effect of the visual comedy – the putt, putt, putt of M Hulot’s old jalopy as it chugs along the road, the be-doing of the restaurant door as the motley crew of hotel guests assembles for lunch, the crashing noise made by our hero’s racquet as he serves in the funniest tennis match in movie history.

The gags which Tati created for his films worked on a number of levels. Many of today’s Tati fans have grown up with M Hulot’s Holiday and have found that their appreciation of it has only increased with time, as they find more and more humour in it.

There’s the obvious, laugh-out-loud slapstick sequences, which appeal enormously to children, but most of the humour lies in the beautifully observed, often whimsical, details which are not flagged up, but are quietly unfolding in a corner of the screen. It pays to see Tati’s films in the cinema as so much happens in the background – and he actively avoided filming close-ups. Orson Welles once said: “There are performers who are only good in full figure. Move in on Tati and he literally disappears.”

Of course, the films also appeal to anyone with a fondness for France and the French way of life. They celebrate the quaint, the eccentric and a lifestyle which Tati saw being replaced by a faster, more consumer and technology-driven one. Jour de Fete and M Hulot’s Holiday are lovely to look at, since they are set in unspoilt rural France, and they move at such a leisurely pace that you can soak up the detail of both the comedy and the setting.

Terry Jones, another Monty Python graduate, has said of Tati: “He was a visual genius. His films, without being silent, all have the qualities, the beauty and the richness of silent film.”

Even by the time he made his third film, Mon Oncle (1958), Tati was beginning to show signs of self-indulgence in his work. His subsequent films – PlayTime (1967),  Trafic (1971) and Parade (1973) – are reviled and revered in equal measure. But Jour de Fete and M Hulot’s Holiday are perfect comedies that showcase Tati’s comedy at its most pure – and most appealing.

* The Totally Tati retrospective is on at the Glasgow Film Theatre and the Edinburgh Filmhouse now. The BFI’s new box set of five Tati films is out now.

Dir: Terry Gilliam, 2009

The Imaginarium is a shoddy prop mirror, a cardboard frame containing two sheets of reflective plastic which form a kind of curtain. But when you step through the mirror, you are transported to a wondrous realm where your imagination is unchained and allowed to run riot. It could be seen as a metaphor for Terry Gilliam’s films. They always appear gritty and lived-in, lacking that Hollywood sheen. But if you allow yourself to step into the film, you can be rewarded with great depths of imagination. In The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, however, we seem to looking at the mirror from the other side. On the surface it’s all polish, that Hollywood sheen. And if you step through, you’ll be lucky to find anything at all.

The titular Doctor (Christopher Plummer) leads a theatre troupe, consisting of his daughter Valentina (Lily Cole), dwarf Percy (Verne Troyer) and leading man Anton (Andrew Garfield), around London in their combination stage/gypsy caravan. In alleyways, outside nightclubs, even in a Homebase car park, they invite members of the public to step through the mirror into their own imagination. It transpires that this is all part of a competition between Parnassus and the devil (also known as Mr. Nick, played by Tom Waits). Parnassus thinks he can save people’s souls through the power of imagination, while the devil thinks he can ensnare them through their vices.

There’s another, more sinister side to the competition. As Anton tells the audience at the beginning of each performance, Parnassus is thousands of years old. He achieved everlasting life through a bargain with the devil. In exchange for immortality, any children Parnassus begets will belong to Mr. Nick once they reach sixteen. Valentina’s sixteenth birthday is fast approaching, and in an attempt to save her, Parnassus enters another deal with the devil. The first to claim five souls wins, and the winner decides Valentina’s fate.

Much of the buzz surrounding The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus has centred around Heath Ledger’s performance as Tony, it being his last before his tragic death. Ledger brings a certain oily charisma to the apparent charity worker the troupe finds hanging under a bridge. Unfortunately, Ledger died before completing principal photography. In a bit of creative problem solving, Gilliam cast three other actors as Tony. Each seems to personify a different aspect of Tony’s character as he steps through the mirror: Johnny Depp is the charisma; Jude Law the selfishness; and Colin Farrell the womanising.

It’s an interesting idea, and works well within the film’s internal logic. But each of the three actors portraying a single trait, and when compared to Ledger’s more nuanced performance, they all come out as one-dimensional and uninteresting. This is perhaps the film’s biggest problem: Ledger’s death and the casting of Depp, Law and Farrell has given the character of Tony an almost mystical air. The problem is, Tony isn’t a particularly extraordinary character, and after the tour de force that was Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight, audiences may come away disappointed.

The rest of the cast doesn’t fare much better. While Christopher Plummer effectively combines nobility with dejection to give a surprisingly sympathetic performance, and Andrew Garfield’s easy charm works well against Ledger’s smarm, Tom Waits’ phoned-in performance does not impress, and Verne Troyer does dwarfs a disservice by displaying no acting ability whatsoever.

The same unevenness comes through in the film’s visuals. At times it looks stunning. A tracking shot up a decaying, quasi-Buddhist temple, for instance, or a giant stone bust of Parnassus bursting up from the ground. But, disappointingly for a Terry Gilliam film, these moments are rare. Most of the time the production design is bland and uninspired. It’s not bad; it just lacks Gilliam’s visual wit. Maybe it’s the overreliance on CGI; Gilliam is not a director who works well with computers. The charm of his earlier work, such as Jabberwocky or Time Bandits, came from the physically constructed sets and props. They gave the films soul. And soul is exactly what CGI has denied Gilliam’s latest.

Thematically, too, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is a mess. Gilliam and co-writer Charles McKeown want to say something profound about human nature, but never quite get round to it. At one point it seems the film is about the importance of stories. Or is it about the power of the imagination? Or maybe redemption? Unfortunately, it’s impossible to tell, as each potential theme gets buried underneath a series of chaotic set pieces. Ultimately, the film lacks the direction of Gilliam’s early work. Even The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, another film fit to burst with elaborate set pieces, was tied together by a singular purpose.

In some ways, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus treads the same ground as Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comic series. Both deal with the power of stories and the imagination, set against the backdrop of the real world and various fantastical realms. But, while Gaiman weaved a dense narrative with dazzling artwork and rich characterisation, Gilliam has constructed a thin veneer of visual sparkle with little underneath. All we can do is wait until he steps through to the other side of the mirror.

When Heath Ledger died last year, he hadn’t finished making Terry Gilliam’s film “The Imaginarium of Dr, Parnassus” leaving Gilliam with an incomplete project and a dead schedule.

Gilliam revealed Ledger improvised “half” of his comedic dialogue on set. “I really felt ‘We got a tiger by the tail here! I thought here’s somebody with the kind of energy I had when I was young.” When Ledger died in the midst of production, the role was recast to have Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell portray “physically transformed versions” of the character.

And Tom Waits plays the Devil!

Here’s a trailer:

Les Voyeurs #88 – Des Voyeurs dans l’avion

Diffusion le : jeudi 19 novembre 2009 à 18h sur Radio Grille Ouverte
vendredi 20 novembre 2009 à 18h sur Radio 16.
Rediffusion le samedi 21 novembre 2009 à 10h sur RGO.
En téléchargement pendant une semaine ici.
Et en écoute permanente là.

Actualité

Capitlism – A Love Story : Sortie au cinéma le 25 novembre 2009 du nouveau film de Michael Moore.
Spiderman 4 : Confirmation de la présence au casting de l’acteur Dylan Baker, interprétant le personnage du Dr Connors, devenant dans la BD le super-vilain Le Lézard.
Buffy, la tueuse de vampires : une web-série animée adaptant la 8ème saison des aventures en comics de la tueuse de vampires, va bientôt voir le jour, faisant donc suite à la 7ème saison de la série TV.
Delta Blues : la série créée en 2008 par Joshua Harto et produite par Georges Clooney à enfin trouvé son acteur principal en la personne de Jason Lee (le héros de “Earl”).
Prince of Persia – Les Sables du Temps :  Le prince de Perse doit combattre un Vizir rebelle désireux de s’emparer des Sables du Temps, un artefact conférant à son possesseur le contrôle du Temps. Adaptation cinéma de la célèbre licence de jeux vidéos. Réalisé par Mike Newell. Avec Jake Gyllenhaal. Sortie France 26 mai 2010. BA visible en VF pourrie ou VO HD.
L’actualité des Arcades : A l’origine ; L’Imaginarium du Dr Parnassus, Le Ruban Blanc (en VO), Away We Go, Micmacs à tire larigot, 2012, Twilight chapitre 2 : Tentation, Saw VI.
Les Beaux Gosses : Le beau coffret collector du film est disponible depuis le 12 novembre. Contient le film en édition collector 2DVD mais également le CD de la BO du film et surtout le “manuel pratique du puceau” !! Dépêchez-vous c’est pas cher !
L’actu du Sémaphore de Nîmes : L’Imaginarium du Dr Parnassus (en VO), mais aussi le film qui n’est plus à Alès et c’est dommage Panique au village !. Le Sémaphore organise également jusqu’au 26 janvier 2010 des projections des grands classiques du cinéma italien dont Affreux, sales et méchants, Les Monstres, Le Fanfaron, Hier aujourd’hui demain, L’Étranger. Plus de détails sur la programmation sur le site du cinéma ici => Sémaphore.

Dossier de la semaine : Des Voyeurs dans l’avion

La saga des “Airport”

Airport (1970) de Georges Seaton
Airport 75 (747 en péril – 1975) de Jack Smight
Airport 77 (Les Naufragés du 747 – 1977) de Jerry Jameson
Concorde : Airport 79 (Airport 80 Concorde – 1980) de David Lowell Rich

Les vols de l’extrême

L’Étoffe des Héros (The Right Stuff – 1983) de Phillip Kaufman
Des serpents dans l’avion (Snakes on a plane – 2006) de David R. Ellis
Des Zombies dans l’avion (Flight of the Living Dead : Outbreak on a plane – 2007) de Scott Thomas
Les Ailes de L’Enfer (Con-Air – 1997) de Simon West
Flight Plan (2004) de Robert Schwentke
Air Force One (1997) de Wolfgang Pertersen
Independence Day (1996) de Roland Emmerich
Die Hard 4 – retour en enfer (Die Hard 4.0 – 2007) de Len Wiseman

Les avions “cartoons” : les Z.A.Z. aux commandes

Les avions du futur

Furtif (Stealth – 2005) de Rob Cohen
D.A.R.Y.L. (1985) de Simon Wincer
Firefox, l’arme absolue (1982) de et avec Clint Eastwood

Coups de Cœur

Les Chevaliers du Ciel (2005) de Gérard Pirès
Aviator (2004) de Martin Scorsese

La bande originale de la semaine :

Papa Loves Manbo par Perry Como
Extrait de la bande originale du film Ocean’s Eleven (2001) de Steven Soderbergh

Chronique : La Carte Postale Sétoise

L’Enfer d’Henry-Georges Clouzot de Serge Bromberg et Ruxendra Medrea

Musique :
Who’s Driving Your Plane ? par The Rolling Stones

Extraits :
Airport 75 (747 en péril)
Des Serpents dans l’Avion
Firefox, l’arme absolue

Présentation : Cédric Cance, Erik Antolin, Jérôme Bauzon
Chronique : l’irremplaçable Jan Jouvert !
Technique : Jérémie Adrian

Taken straight from the pages of L.W.A.P.D. this is a video by the Architect’s Journal showing their top five comic book cities. All are fantastic cityscapes but one of the complaints is that Gotham City (the skyline to Batman’s caped crusades) is destroyed to match Tim Burton’s description for his first two films. Films though can also be a fantastic source of beautiful cityscapes of the future such as Terry Gilliam’s Brazil or even animations like Sky Blue but also interpretations of what cities can become if the world goes horribly wrong such as Children of Men, is perhaps slightly more interesting, even if less spectacular.

Cravendale are currently running some new adverts to promote their milk and website milkmatters.co.uk.

The ads are the brainchild of Wieden & Kennedy, an advertising with seven offices worldwide, one of those being based in London.

The current campaign kicked off in February with ‘Bad Bull’.

My current favourite is this, ‘Toe Tapping’:

I love the look of these ads and the random sounds that make up it’s dialogue. It almost reminds me of the Terry Gilliam Monty Python style of animation.

It’s been a while since I really enjoyed an advertising campaign, but this really makes me laugh. For all the money that is thrown on over the top, grandiose adverts which make me totally non-plussed, it is these low budget looking 30 second works of art that actually make me want to watch. Genius.