Love’s Long Listen-In
Broadcast Australian tour video Broadcast is just a week away. Can’t remember the last time I was this thrilled about an international tour. It’s nice to feel a teen exhilaration a good decade after the fact. Australian tour dates & tickets here, so come along, why don’t you?
The Pirate & the Crystal Ball
A short fantasy sequence made for/by The Incredible String Band in 1969, featured in Be Glad For the Song Has No Ending originally planned to screen on BBC Arts Omnibus program. The pirate’s costume is totally panto steez (he’s behind you!) but the coven looks cosy. Found in a roundabout way via Stopping Off Place
The =^-^= wore #-#
Až přijde kocour/ The Cassandra Cat / The Cat Who Wore Sunglasses / When the Cat Comes rewatch recently (’63 Cannes Special Jury Prize!). Even more than the scene in which the audience springs into colour once the sunglasses come off, I like the free feeling of the classroom at the beginning, the children painting [...]
Solar Flares
Not much spare time on my hands right now. When I do get a bit of hush, you’ll find me spacing out to films like the one below that is feeling just RIGHT ON right now. The busy city turns country and then the landscape descends into a serious trip. Did I mention the mime? [...]
I got us a song
As part of my radio show, I see a lot of films. Most films, in fact. There are some that critics aren’t invited to (the review-proofs & the stinkers) and some that don’t quite fall into my jurisdiction, but most films that came out in the cinema this year, I’ve seen. The worst ones are [...]
“C’mon Jill, be a lady”
I was sad to come across the obituary for Jill Johnston in the NY Times today. Had never even heard of D.A. Pennebaker’s Town Bloody Hall ’79 documentary (how had I not?) that was mentioned in it, footage of a debate on the subject of women’s lib in ’71 in New York, chaired by Norman [...]
Merci
Above: from the set of Les Bonnes Femmes “Certainly I’m happy right now making these films about murder. My interest isn’t in solving puzzles, but in studying human behavior. Nothing else interests me so much. I’m not a chansonnier, a man obsessed with the events of the day. I am a Communist, certainly, but that [...]
Class Notes ’33
The Group & a Polish poster I saved many moons ago. Similar, no? Thanks to a pal’s knowhow, I recently managed to track down a copy of Sidney Lumet’s 1966 film The Group, based on Mary McCarthy’s (by all accounts, scandalous) novel. The first time I saw it was by accident, late one night on [...]
Vagabond
Since August 2008 I’ve been a vagabond. A girl with a hell of a hefty bindle. For two years now I have been either traveling or simply just not wanted to put my feet down firmly enough for a print to appear. Instead, there may as well be a colourful puff of smoke (I’m thinking [...]
And her Walkman started to melt
There may have been many Joan of Arcs on screen… The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer) 1928 The Trial of Joan of Arc (Dir. Robert Bresson) 1962 Joan of Arc of Mongolia (Dir. Ulrike Ottinger) 1989 …and let’s not forget Chloe Sevigny’s Halloween costume that caused the Smiths fan in me [...]