Lan Nghiem-Phu

Hedgehogs and Foxes

2012-01-29T03:07:00.001-05:00

I hesitated, but what the heck... let's embark on a theme that is almost universally found in movies... not only American movies, but worldwide in international films, and that is love and sex. However, I am not so sure how daring I can be to approach the many movies that are very very saucy... the likes of Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct or even In the Realm of the Senses... That is to be decided as we go along in this blog. To begin, let's talk about... the Hedgehogs and the Foxes.

In way of background, I think I should mention in passing that it helps to have some background of Darwin's work and if you are philosophical in nature, you'll feel right at home here. You may also want to look up a subject named "The Botany of Desire." Yes, all the aforementioned have something to do with love and sex... and orgasm.

In movies, I'd say Woody Allen is the best director who can approach sex and love (and also death) with panache and at the same time, he educates the mass with deep philosophical thinking that easily get lost for the casual movie watchers. Take his Husbands and Wives (1992,) a famous scene from which much have been talked about and analyzed in depth by many scholars at many famous learning institutions. The real subject under consideration was anorgasmia. You know that in medical parlance, many nouns that terminate with the suffix "mia" are bad for you: anemia, leukemia, arrhythmia... The prefix "a" says that something is missing. So "anorgasmia" must be bad for you because that says you cannot experience orgasm. That's a major theme in this Allen's movie. Why don't you watch this clip first.. then we'll talk when you return...

Well, what did you get from the clip? Let's make sure you got it by dotting the i's and crossing the t's: The movie revolves around two married couples: Jack (Sydney Pollack) and Sally (Judy Davis;) and Judy (Mia Farrow... did you notice that? Mia is a bad omen as a name, medically speaking as explained above) and Gabe (Woody Allen.) Sally and Jack separated and took on new lovers, Jack with Sam (Lysette Anthony) and Sally with Michael (Liam Neeson.) The scene is when Michael was finally able to convince Sally and take her to bed. This is when you realize that she is anorgasmia, from a session with her psychiatrist, when she confesses her continued frigidity while with her husband Jack. What you hear in the clip is her infamous "hedgehogs and foxes" analysis. She was asked: "Why were you able to have an orgasm with Michael and not with your husband?...What makes it so difficult for you?" Her answer was:

"I didn't. I was trying very hard to go with it. I was tense. I came close... (She lied, she was nowhere close!) My mind just gets racing with thoughts. You'd laugh if I told you. I get so mentally hyperactive....I thought that I liked what Michael was doing to me, and it felt different from Jack. More gentle and more exciting. And I thought how different Michael was from Jack. How much deeper his vision of life was. And I thought Michael was a hedgehog and Jack was a fox. And then I thought Judy was a fox, and Gabe was a hedgehog. And I thought about all the people I knew, and which were hedgehogs, and which were foxes. Al Simon, a friend, was a hedgehog, and his wife Jenny was a hedgehog. And Cindy Salkind was a fox. And Lou Patrino was a hedgehog..."

It is the writing for scenes like this that this movie was called a "philosophical film." The "Hedgehog and the Fox" is a famous and popular essay by the liberal philosopher Isaiah Berlin. The title is a reference to a fragment attributed to the ancient Greek poet Archilochus: "The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing." Berlin expands upon the original idea and divides writers and thinkers into two categories: hedgehogs, who view the world through the lens of a single defining idea: Plato, Lucretius, Dante, Pascal, Hegel, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Ibsen, and Proust; and foxes who draw on a wide variety of experiences and for whom the world cannot be boiled down to a single idea: Herodotus, Aristotle, Erasmus, Shakespeare, Montaigne, Molière, Goethe, Pushkin, Balzac, Joyce, Anderson. Tolstoy, was considered different. He had multiple talents like a fox, but was a giant thinker that qualifies him as a hedgehog.

With that as a background... Many a discussions I found about this scene immediately delved deeply into the philosophy of thinkers originated by Berlin, and none really tried to interpret what Sally was really saying. I bet you a cookie that Woody Allen was trying to say something about how hedgehog and fox relate to orgasm, which is a big thing! Only hedgehog can achieve it, because foxes only circle the wagon and generally miss the mark. What do you think?

The Worst Movie Ever

2012-01-23T10:09:00.022-05:00

Today is the first day of a brand new lunar year, the year of the Water Dragon. Let's celebrate and watch a clip of the worst movie you'd ever find: Super Shark!

This is my verdict: Worst movie, worst director, worst actors, worst actresses...But they have the best shark, and it is much better than the one used in Jaws!

Remember this name: Fred Olen Ray. He's a movie director and easily made it to my list of worst movie director ever! The man likes women in bikini, obviously, judging from the movies he made over the years: "Bikini Time Machine", "Bikini Frankenstein", "Bikini Royale", "Bikini Royale 2," "Bikini Jones and the Temple of Eros," "Super Ninja Bikini Babes," "Bikini Chain Gang," "Bikini Drive-In", "Bikini Hoe-Down", "Bikini Round-Up." I never saw any of his movies and am not qualified to say much, except that I have seen a clip of his latest movie: Super Shark, a new movie that will be released in DVD soon, on February 7th of this year. What? No bikini word in the movie title? That's a first! But, as expected, all the women appearing in this movie wear bikinis. This movie is so bad, I'll let you watch its climactic scene, which really is a movie spoiler, and be the judge yourself. So, a word of warning... if you intend to see this movie because that's the kind of movie you like, do not watch this clip because it's a spoiler. Here we go... watch and grin... or cringe. Here he comes, the Super Shark!

The premise of the final scene is this: the military has a walking tank to battle the WALKING shark (it's super, remember?) the super plan is to have a radio station with a super DJ to broadcast and taunt the shark so he'll swallow the radio baited with dynamite and blow itself up! Good enough? Wait until you see the tank karate kicks the shark, it's a scene not to miss! It's only 9 minutes and 13 seconds so you will not suffer too long.

Toshiba English Intelligence

2012-01-22T16:09:00.002-05:00

Do you know that today is the eve of the new lunar year, the year of the Water Dragon? Let's have a festive time with something not quite serious or Academy Award caliber, but funny. This film is as silly as George of the Jungle, and it helps to bring a chuckle or two, or more... to our lives. It does mine!

Johnny English is a 2003 British action comedy film parodying the James Bond secret agent genre. The film stars Rowan Atkinson as the incompetent titular English spy, MI7 Agent Johnny English. The film received a largely mixed response from critics.

A sequel, Johnny English Reborn, began filming in September 2010 and released on October 7, 2011 in the United Kingdom, and on October 31, 2011 in the United States, in which Johnny was shown to be training in Tibet when MI7 head Pegasus calls him back to London, where Johnny is sent on a mission to investigate a plot to assassinate the Chinese premier. Here is how it started. Have fun watching this very short clip of only 6 minutes 26 seconds. I turned on the English subtitles so you don't miss any of the jokes.

Sophia

2012-01-18T10:05:00.000-05:00

Let's rewind the clock 40 years and revisit a young and sexy Sophia Loren in a film by Vittorio de Sica, Sunflower. de Sica was a great Italian movie director with films like The Bicycle Thief in 1948 and The Garden of the Finzi-Continis that won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Movie in 1970. Sunflower was also produced in 1970 when Sophia Loren was 36 year old. There are three clips combined into one: when she met, fell in love and married Marcello Mastroianni... He then was sent to the Russian front during the war and did not return. The second scene shows an almost universal anti-war theme in Italian movies: Sophia went to Russia to look for him. The sunflowers are metaphors for the longing of the missing soldiers. The third and last clip shows a radiant Sophia looking for new love after she found the husband with a new wife and daughter in Russia.

This film shows the world how beautiful Sophia Loren was and how Italian women rode motorcycles... not so tame as the way Audrey Hepburn did it in Roman Vacations. Of course, Sophia had to show off her beautiful legs so the director made them fall off the motorcycle as a pretext. Sophia is now 77 year of age, but remains as sexy as ever. Her last film appearance was in Nine, with the role of Mama, Guido's stunning mom.

TinTin

2011-12-28T20:09:00.002-05:00

I am a die hard Tintin fan and I can prove it. Look at the photo below to see the main characters in that Belgium/French world famous bandes dessinées. I have the entire cast and all the books of Tintin in my collection and many books about Tintin. Of course I wanted to see what the latest Tintin movie is about. Based on the series of books by Hergé, the film is produced by Steven Spielberg, Peter Jackson and Kathleen Kennedy. This is a big budget movie estimated at a cost of US $ 130 Millions that recently opened in the Czech Republic on 23 October 2011. This 3D motion-capture and CGI extravaganza cleverly combines three of Tintin's original stories: The Crab with the Golden Claws, The Secret of the Unicorn and Red Rackham's Treasure (Le Crabe aux Pinces d'Or, Le Secret de la Licorne and Le Trésor de Rackham le Rouge.) If you watch the film, which I think is very good, you can see from the mascots on my photo that Spielberg and Co. have done a very good job. The computer rendering of all of Hergé's (that's his way to nickname himself from his real name Georges Rémi, from the French pronunciation of his initials) characters is amazingly well done. To the right in the photo is the diva Bianca Castafiore. From the comic books (I really prefer their real name of "bandes dessinées") you know that she is a soprano whose voice is feared of being able to shatter glass but that never actually happened in the books. Instead, her singing voice was the terror for Captain Haddock and Tintin's dog Snowy (Milou.) The film worked that into its own story and Ms. Castafiore was given the job to shatter the glass container of the model boat named Licorne with the high note at the end of her recital.

This naturally involves operatic work again. In all of Tintin's books, Ms. Castafiore always and only sang one song: Gounod's Jewel Song from his opera Faust: Ah! Je Ris... I was looking forward to that scene in the movie but was surprised to see that a different opera was used. The song you hear is "Je Veux Vivre" sung by American soprano Renée Fleming. That song is known as "Juliet's Waltz" from the opera Roméo et Juliette, also by Gounod. To even confuse the viewers more, John Williams opened the diva's singing scene with music from Rossini's The Barber of Seville! My guess is that "Je Veux Vivre"'s climatic ending has a higher note than that of the "Jewel Song" and that is more realistic of it shattering all the glasses in the audience. Since it's always nice to know what they are singing about, the French lyrics are below... with translation for you.

If you like this, go see the movie and get to know Tintin. Spielberg and Co. will be producing at least two more Tintin movies that will come along in the future.

Gounod: Roméo et Juliette

Je Veux Vivre (Juliet's Waltz)

Ah! Je Veux Vivre.... Ah! I want to live
dans ce rêve qui m'enivre.... in the dream that intoxicates me
ce jour encore. .... this day again
Douce flamme.... Sweet flame
je te garde dans mon âme.... I keep you in my soul
comme un trésor. .... like a treasure.

Cette ivresse.... This drunkenness
de jeunesse.... of youth
ne dure, hélas, qu'un jour.... lasts, alas, but a day
puis vient l'heure.... then comes the hour
où l'on pleure.... when one weeps
le coeur cède a l'amour.... the heart yields to love
et le bonheur fuit sans retour. .... and happiness escapes without returning.

Je veux vivre.... I want to live
loin de l'hiver morose.... far from that sullen winter
laisse-moi sommeiller.... let me linger and rest
et respirer la rose.... and breath the rose
avant de l'effeuiller. .... before stripping it of its petals

Ahhhh ahhh ahhh

Douce flamme.... Sweet flame
reste dans mon âme.... stay in my soul
comme un doux trésor.... like a precious treasure
longtemps encore. .... a long while still.

In the clip you see by clicking on the photo below, Tintin and Capitain Haddock followed the trail to the third model of the Unicorn that contains the third parchemin to the treasure of Red Rackham. The arch-villain Ivanovich Sakharine has a plan to shatter the glass container protecting that boat and grab the parchemin.

Queen of the Night... Not

2011-12-12T00:55:00.000-05:00

You heard a mezzo-soprano already. Mezzo-soprano ("medium" soprano) voice usually extends from the A below middle C to the A two octaves above (it is written as A3-A5 in scientific pitch notation, where middle C = C4). Push comes to shove, some may have the range from G3-C6. Soprano, on the other hand, especially Dramatic coloratura soprano, has range from B3 to high F6! F6 is very very high! That note naturally brings me to talk again about Mozart's Magic Flute opera where his Queen of the Night aria reaches the note F6 not one but four times. I had an old blog of this aria from the movie "The Magic Flute," but that soprano is not among the best sopranos who sang this aria. Here is a better rendition by Diana Damrau. This opera was in German and the words are below to help you understand what the Queen was raging about while ordering her daughter princess Pamina to kill her father, the Queen's husband Sarastro:

Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen, (The revenge of Hell cooks in my heart,)
Tot und Verzweiflung flammet um mich her! (Death and despair flame around me!)
Fühlt nicht durch dich Sarastro (If Sarastro does not feel through you)
Todesschmerzen, (Death’s pain,)
So bist du meine Tochter nimmermehr. (Then you will never again be my daughter.)
Verstossen sei auf ewig, (you’ll be Disowned eternally,)
Verlassen sei auf ewig, (Abandoned may you be eternally,)
Zertrümmert sei'n auf ewig (Destroyed be eternally)
Alle Bande der Natur (All bonds of nature,)
Wenn nicht durch dich (If not by you)
Sarastro wird erblassen! (Sarastro becomes pale! (as death))
Hört, Rachegötter, (Hear, the revenge of the Gods,)
Hoert der Mutter Schwur! (Hear the mother's oath!)

Everybody wants to sing this aria. Following Ms. Damrau is a hilarious attempt by a nobody soprano. Pay attention to the amusement felt by the violinist sitting behind the singer. She can't reach the high notes, but she's so willing to try!

Womanizer

2011-12-11T00:13:00.000-05:00

From the sacred to the profane, Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle to Womanizer! Well, just a matter of speech and not really profane so please do not be offended if you love Britney. I love her too and I think she's just perfect! This clip is to prove that I am not always old fashion, and here comes Britney! This is really a practice run for me to see how the video codecs behave in HTML5 when the source is high definition (HD.) To accommodate the non-Flash world, I think the price is pretty high. The video requirement is about triple in size and the processing is painfully slow. Too bad Apple does not like Flash! Fair warning, she's nude at times!

Agnus Dei

2011-12-09T22:00:00.000-05:00

Time to take the plunge and from now on, my video clips will be encoded using the new HTML5 protocol. I am sure there will be issues to resolve such as aspect ratio, subtitles etc..., but these videos will play on iPhones and iPads.

You may remember in some of my previous blogs of Fellini's "And the Ship Sails On," there were a couple of references to Agnus Dei from Rossini's "Petite Messe Solennelle," here and here. (Remember, these older blogs will not play on Apple's devices that do not support Flash.) I felt it incomplete to leave that work without returning to it today. I am far from being religious, but many if not all of the great composers wrote divine music especially for religion, and one cannot escape the reality that it is an integral part of life. Here is a complete performance (length 7 minutes 13 seconds) of Rossini's Agnus Dei. Listening to this kind of music, don't you wonder what the singing is about? I do! Without appropriate background, it will be tough to know what the words say... so I did my homework just to satisfy my curiosity... and you can read about it here:

From this, I plagiarized the following..."In Liturgy, Agnus Dei is a name given to the formula recited thrice by the priest at Mass (except on Good Friday and Holy Saturday) in the Roman rite. It occurs towards the end of the Canon, after the prayer "Haec commixtio", etc. Having finished saying this prayer, the priest covers the chalice with the pall, genuflects, rises, inclines his head (but not his body) profoundly towards the altar and, with hands joined before his breast (and not, therefore, resting on the altar), says with a loud voice: "Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis" (Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us), repeats the formula unchanged, and still a third time, substituting now "dona nobis pacem" (grant us peace) for "miserere nobis", meanwhile striking his breast thrice, once at each "miserere nobis" and once at "Dona nobis pacem", with the right hand (the left hand resting throughout, from the first "Miserere", on the altar)."

Now listen to the mezzo-soprano Manuela Custer (born in Novara, received her diploma from the "Giuseppe Verdi" Conservatory in Turin under the guidance of Elio Battaglia. She made her debut in 1985 as ENRICO in Rossini's Elisabetta, Regina d'Inghilterra with Lella Cuberli, Rockwell Blake, and Daniela Dessì, conducted by Gabriele Ferro,) and the choir, that's what they are singing. I am not sure why they cannot memorize these lyrics and have the need to each carry the pages that they hold in front of them. The words are not that complicated admittedly it's Latin. I am sure I can remember this if I were paid to sing this in a choir... but they will have to pay me handsomely! A king's ransom would do!

Pina in HTML5

2011-11-30T02:03:00.002-05:00

OK. It's time to adapt! For years, I have used Flash as the format of the video clips I post here. That is fine and dandy, but my clips cannot be played by devices that do not support Flash such as Apple's iPhones and iPads. To solve that problem, I am now using HTML5. This is the same clip of the movie Pina, in HTML 5. This should work with all browsers but Chrome should be the best one to use; AND also this should work with the Safari browser native to the iThings of Apple. If you have any problems, please let me know.
Correction: Google Chrome is not the best browser to view my new HTML formatted streaming videos because it does not allow the full screen mode. Safari does.
Pina.

Cremation

2011-11-25T23:43:00.000-05:00

The Darjeeling Limited (2007,) a film by director Wes Anderson is a fine comedy exposing American materialism and its often times comedic spiritualism in a subtle and quite funny critical manner. This film has a very moving scene depicting a traditional Indian cremation burial of a young boy and his father's grief during the dispersion of the child's remains in the river. But if you find this too gloomy, and you want something more uplifting, another scene of that movie was blogged here.

Pina

2011-11-10T20:52:00.006-05:00

Although I have quite a few videos about ballet, I rarely pay much attention to them... There is just not enough time for everything. I was always intrigued about dance sequences in movies by talented directors. There is one that is very famous in the movie Hable Con Ella by Pedro Almodóvar, in which he showed a scene excerpted from "Cafe Mueller" by surrealist choreographer Pina Bausch (the scene with two sleep walkers and the chairs.) Being surreal (one can define it as marked by the intense irrational reality of a dream which may be unbelievable and fantastic at the same time,) on first blush, that kind of dance seems to be very strange, but once you pay close attention, you realize that there is something to it and you want to see more, perhaps by sheer curiosity. Recently, there is a newly released movie by Wim Wenders, who was made famous by his classic movie Wings of Desire. Wenders made this movie to eulogize her death and to honor Pina Bausch for her work. That 3D movie is named Pina, which is a feature-length dance film with the ensemble of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch who untimely died in the summer of 2009.

Wim Wenders' 1hr 46min documentary takes the audience straight onto the stage and follows the dancers out of the theatre into the city and the surrounding areas of Wuppertal - the place, which for 35 years, was Bausch's home. "Pina" had its world premiere at the Festival in Berlin in 2011, where it was highly appreciated. It was screened in Romanian cinemas starting in September of this year. Just last week, Wim Wenders attended a premiere during the 6th International Rome Film Festival on October 31, 2011 in Rome, Italy. He was also at the AFI Fest 2011 premiere of Pina held at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, California on May 11th, 2011. Ottawa will premiere Pina on November 22.

The clip below lasts 15 minutes and 37 seconds and it contains some scenes I selected from Pina which reflect my personal bias about this surreal art form. I think Bausch was very obsessed with visual art, gravity and repetitiveness... which makes me want more to see what she'll show next, and what the dancers will do to their bodies next. The scenes are quite surreal but at the same time quite beautiful... the dance energetic, stochastic, athletic but has its own beauty; and the music is just what I like too. The audio is in German and I am sorry I did not have the time to turn on the English subtitle. The strange group dance is to illustrate the four seasons: Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter. The dialogue is sparse and it's easy to guess.

According to some critics, the 3D does add another dimension to the movie (of course, it's 3D) so watching my clip does not do justice to Wenders' work. If you like this kind of art and are curious, go see the entire movie in 3D. There is a lot more than what you see here.

Dull Boy Jack

2011-10-31T17:37:00.000-04:00

It's Halloween and you want to be scared silly. "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" is a proverb. It appeared in James Howell's Proverbs in English, Italian, French and Spanish (1659.) While the proverb is used in several examples of popular media (from James Joyce's short story, "Araby", to Jack Kerouac's Big Sur, to the 1957 movie, The Bridge on the River Kwai,) I think the most famous example appears in the 1980 movie The Shining, in the clip below. The proverb's psychotic use in The Shining has profound effect on popular culture, inspiring several other works in more recent movies and videos.

It doesn't matter how many times I watch this scene, it continues to scare the daylight out of me. Put yourself in Wendy's shoes: she has an only son, Danny, who seems to have strange and scary mental "shines;" she is cooped up with her son and a husband, Jack, who behaves more and more psychotic by the day; who works day and night on his book; they are alone and snow bound in a huge and creepy hotel... Then she discovers what his book is about... That amply justifies why she holds on to the baseball bat with dear life when walking the hallways of the Overlook hotel. It's Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining!" Perfect for a Halloween night! You want more? Watch this!

Automaton

2011-10-29T00:39:00.000-04:00

While I am trying to tickle your funny bones, let me show you an old clip that I never had a chance to get to this blog...

Shower (洗澡) is a 1999 Chinese comedy-drama film about a family-run bath house in Beijing, directed by Zhang Yang. It premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on 14 September 1999 and won the FIPRESCI Prize (International Critics' Award.) Shower was selected for numerous film festivals, including San Sebastian Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, and Seattle International Film Festival, where it received many awards.

This movie has very good rating... not that that really matters because I think movie rating is very subjective and you should be the ultimate reviewer for yourself. This clip is designed to declare that this is a comedy... but this movie is more dramatic than comedic. The opening shower scene is obviously a spoof of a car wash to get laugh. Did you see that the brushes are only for the rear end? Don't they wash the front end too? There is also a woman getting in the booth nearby. Now, that is a huge challenge because the topology is quite different and I would like to see this set up for the female customers.

Indians and Cowboys

2011-10-27T09:50:00.000-04:00

I feel bad for the kids of today. I think their entertainment is largely controlled by adults with adults' taste and ethics. Being kids, their tastes may be different. In my days, this is the kind of fun we had, non-sensical, full of stereotypical and in today's standards, offensive material but full of fun. Of course, there were too many Indians getting killed but being kids, we loved it.

Here is my favorite scene from The Son of Pale Face. I still laugh out loud when I see it again. No physics, no politics, just pure fun. The cowboy on the fast horse was Roy Rogers riding his famous horse Trigger. You can see the Harvard logo on the car driven by the son of pale face and I love the umbrella scene.

Love At First Sight

2011-10-25T07:45:00.001-04:00

Some told me I'm too dark, as reflected from the clips I chose... Some accused me of old fashion from the clips I chose... Some asked me to lighten up... So here is what all of us should love, light as a feather... bright like a sunny day... still old fashion, yes, but that's me. Of course you all know what that music is: Sleeping Beauty - Waltz, by the great Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893.)

Frida Kahlo

2011-10-07T01:35:00.004-04:00

In December 12, 2006, I blogged a clip from the movie Frida but did not say anything about or even named that movie. Let's now elaborate a bit more...

Frida is a 2002 biographical film depicting the professional and private life of the surrealist Mexican painter Frida Kahlo. It stars Salma Hayek in her Academy Award nominated portrayal of Kahlo and Alfred Molina as her husband, muralist Diego Rivera.

The movie was adapted by Clancy Sigal, Diane Lake, Gregory Nava, Anna Thomas and Edward Norton from the book Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera. It was directed by Julie Taymor and won Oscars for Best Makeup and well deserved Best Original Music Score by Elliot Goldenthal.

This clip has the beginning and ending of the movie, in which Frida, bedridden and dying, determined to attend a solo exhibition of her paintings in Mexico. The movie begins with Frida and her bed being transported to the exhibition where Lila Downs sings the song "La Llorona" accompanied by a mariachi band. During her cremation, the song you hear is "Burn It Blue" by Caetano Veloso and Lila Downs.

Me Love You Long Time

2011-09-26T22:39:00.000-04:00

Here is one clip from a hard hitting Viet Nam war movie: Full Metal Jacket which is a 1987 war film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick. It is an adaptation of the 1979 novel The Short-Timers by Gustav Hasford and stars Matthew Modine as the main character nicknamed "Joker." In this scene, Joker was having some off time just prior to the 1968 big famous Tet offensive that was the definitive turning point of the Viet-Nam war. This scene was famous with Nancy Sinatra's These Boots Are Made for Walkin' and the "Me So Horny" and "Me Love You Long Time" of the Da Nang's hooker. This is the only light moments of this very tense war movie full of scenes not for the faint of hearts, especially that of the deranged marine who killed the drill sergeant and committed suicide after his famous uttering "Seven-six-two millimeter. Full metal jacket" which was the specification of the ammunition used by the infantry riflemen during this war.

Willie

2011-09-21T00:46:00.002-04:00

How about some country music for a change? Willie Nelson was joined on stage by some of the biggest names in country music for a concert to celebrate his 70th birthday in 2003. The live event was released on a DVD entitled "Willie Nelson & Friends: Live & Kickin." This clip is a 14 minute excerpt from that DVD. If you didn't like the operas, you may like this.

Miminashi Hoichi

2011-09-20T17:24:00.000-04:00

Hoichi the Earless (耳なし芳一 Miminashi Hōichi) is a character from Japanese mythology. His story is well known in Japan, and the best-known English translation first appeared in the book Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things by Lafcadio Hearn.

A version of this story appears in the film Kwaidan, as well as the play The Dream of a Summer Day, which are both based on Hearn's work. Hoichi the Earless is closely associated with Akama Shrine in Shimonoseki, as his story takes place at the Buddhist temple Amidaji, which preceded the shrine before Shintō became the state religion of Japan. According to legend, Hoichi was a blind minstrel (or biwa hoshi) with amazing gifts for the biwa (a loquat-shaped Japanese lute). He was particularly good at performing the Tale of the Heike, an epic describing the fall of Emperor Antoku, who is buried at Amidaji Temple. His performances were so wonderful that "even the goblins could not refrain from tears."

The ghosts of Emperor Antoku's dynasty came and lead Hoichi to nightly performances at the palace that really is the cemetery among the tombs. It is also well known that a person that has developed a relationship with the world beyond would eventually expire due to these nefast influences... as it is evident on the face of Hoichi. That didn't escape the attention of the head priest of the Amidaji temple and he decided to help Hoichi with an eastern version of exorcism... or rather a preemptive move to ward off the ghosts' attempts. The standard most effective remedy is to paint Hoichi's body with the Kanji characters of the Heart Sutra for protection that makes him invisible to the ghosts. Unfortunately, a grievous oversight took place and his ears did not get any of the magic Kanji letters. The ghosts came, they only saw the ears so they took them to their Emperor as proof that they did their diligence. Thus Hoichi became the Earless but survived to continue playing his biwa.

This clip comes from the movie Kwaidan in the Criterion collection. This movie is pretty dark and scary with many ghosts. I no longer watch Kwaidan because I will surely get a heart attack if I do. I told you I'm afraid of ghosts, especially the beautiful ones in form of beautiful but lethal women who usually are either snakes or worse, foxes. Not for me! Besides, if the head priest wants to paint my body with Kanji stuff, he'll tickle me to death way before the beautiful women get to me.

Easy To Love

2011-09-12T00:21:00.003-04:00

A recent blog of the movie "Midnight in Paris" highlighted Cole Porter. To know who Cole Porter was, you ought to watch the movie "DeLovely." You can find several blogs I made of this movie, one of which is here. That clip has a well loved song by Porter "Easy To Love." You may want to see my clip of March 2007 to see Kevin Kline play the piano and hear him sing this Cole Porter tune when he was declaring to divorcee Linda Lee Thomas, played by my favorite actress Ashley Judd.

This famous song was featured in many movies and recorded by all of the best vocalists. Today's clip is from a movie by Woody Allen (again... that's because his movies always have fabulous choice of music that is worth showcasing,) Anything Else. Christina Ricci, also my favorite actress, is in the role of adorable Amanda, always arriving late to her dates. This movie starts with a sound track of Billie Holliday singing "Easy To Love."

Click on this player to hear "Easy To Love" by Billie Holliday.

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Click on this player to hear "Easy To Love" by Ella Fitzgerald.

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Shooting Fish in a Barrel

2011-09-09T00:45:00.016-04:00

The guitar is still stuck in my mind, so here is another clip about that musical instrument.

Early in his career, in 1969, Woody Allen signed a contract with United Artists. He wrote "The Jazz Baby," a screenplay about a jazz musician set in the thirties but that was turned down by the UA executives. He replaced that with "Bananas," which I do not like much. In 1998, he returned to his original idea and out came "Sweet and Lowdown," telling the story of a fictional arrogant, obnoxious, alcoholic jazz guitarist named Emmet Ray (played by Sean Penn after they could not get Johnny Depp because he was not available) who regards himself as perhaps the best guitarist in the world, or second best, after his idol, Django Reinhardt.

Sweet and Lowdown was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Sean Penn) and Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Samantha Morton.) Morton played the role of Hattie, a lovable young mute girl who did not utter a single word of dialogue in the film. Her performance was met with lots of critical acclaim.

The music for the film was arranged and conducted by Dick Hyman. All of the guitar solos were played by guitarist Howard Alden. Alden also coached Sean Penn on playing the guitar for his role in the film. The soundtrack of this movie is excellent, containing 15 memorable songs mostly to showcase the guitar solos.

In this clip, Penn went cruising with his buddy and they picked up two young women. After a short straw decision, Penn was stuck with Hattie, who was mute, and took her to his room with a promise to play the guitar for her, a promise he kept. She instantly fell in love with his playing... If you can find the time, watch this movie. It's refreshingly good and very entertaining.

At Sea Funeral

2011-09-08T00:33:00.001-04:00

This is why the Gloria N. sailed to the island of Erimo, to spread soprano Edmea Tetua's ashes in the waters of the island of her birth. I think that no matter how much you hate a person, you probably would shed some tears at that person's funeral because death is so final! Again, the somber mood is reintroduced with the sad piano score of Rossini's Agnus Dei. After a brief ritual, the soprano's voice is heard from a gramophone. What you hear is the great and very well known aria from the third act of Verdi's Aida: O Patria Mia. That aria is sung by an Ethiopian princess, daughter of king Amonasro, held captured as slave by the Egyptians. In love with Radames, an Egyptian general, she is lamenting that her love is lost and she intends to commit suicide in the river Nile, and will never again see her country. Well... I am sorry to be so dramatic in my explanation, but that is what operas are about.

Despite intense jealousy and envy, soprano Cuffari broke down along with others in attendance. The very brief shot of Tetua's lover is shown again just prior to the frames showing that all ashes have been dispersed by the wind.

If you have not seen this movie, try to watch it. "E La Nave Va"'s music score is truly exquisite, and there are so many interesting characters to enjoy, including that of a love sick rhinoceros! What? Watch this movie to see the final scenes.

Operatic Impromptu

2011-09-07T23:27:00.001-04:00

Stark contrast between society classes in Italy in the 10s is obvious in "E La Nave Va." It is seen repeatedly throughout the movie but none is as eloquent as this clip is showing you: the huge difference between the poor working class and the high upper echelon that the operatic stars represent. In the first clip when the ocean liner departs, a quick glimpse of the sweating men stoking the boiler was shown during the choral of Verdi's "La forza del destino (The Force of Destiny)." In this clip, during a tour given by the ship's captain, the working men asked the most prominent diva, soprano Ildebranda Cuffari, to sing for them. She was immediately upstaged by tenor Aureliano Fuciletto. What follows is a fierce competition from all the others, to the delight of the crew. If you watch again the first clip, you would have seen the disdain tenor Fuciletto displayed for soprano Cuffari when she arrived in her car.

The point here is that these voices are so marvelous, they can compete against the deafening noise from the engine in the boiler room. I will add one more clip from this film, the actual at sea funeral... before moving on to a different movie. Another Fellini? How about Casanova? Now, that movie is INTENSE!

Glass Symphony

2011-09-06T20:27:00.001-04:00

Confined in a ship inching to the island of Erimo in the Adriatic Sea, what are the music giant maestro, conductors, composers, entertainers to do? The maestro in this clip are creating an impromptu symphony to entertain the workers in the kitchen. To their delight, Schubert's Moment Musical No. 3 in f minor is in the program, played on crystal glasses and bottles. Below is an MP3 player on which you can click to hear a recital by Valerian Shiukshvili of the same Schubert piece on the piano... To be continued...

Click on the player to hear the music track.

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E La Nave Va

2011-09-06T01:42:00.005-04:00

And the Ship Sails On (Italian: E la nave va) is a 1983 Italian film by Federico Fellini. It depicts the events on board a luxury liner filled with the friends (and some enemies as well) of a deceased opera star, diva Edmea Tetua. Many of Italy's most famous operatic names gathered to mourn her death.

In December 2006, I blogged three clips from this movie. Those video streams are no longer viewable and I decided to repeat them here because I think this movie is truly underated and regrettably is largely unknown. I place this movie to the same level as Felllini's Amarcord. It is a second Amarcord with a great soundtrack to boast. Felini was known to hate operas. Somehow, he made this movie that is populated with nothing less than numerous characters to portray an entire ensemble of the most famous stars of the operatic world.

The movie is about a special ocean voyage that was commissioned in 1914, only a few weeks before World War 1 broke out, to scatter the ashes of Edmea Tetua, the world-famous opera star who passed away. She was born in the island of Erimo, and wished to have her remains scattered in its waters. The cruise ship Gloria N. was setting sail from Naples harbor. You must know that this movie was shot entirely in Rome's Cinecitta studios, and there was no ocean liner or battle ship. The huge sets were constructed by Oscar-winning set designer Dante Ferretti.

The first clip shows a very original way that Fellini conveyed the time stamp of his story: the time of silent movies in sepia colors of the 1910s, when the cameras were hand held. While the reporter Orlando assigned to cover this event prepares for his job with the cameraman, many of the main characters of the movie arrive to board the ocean liner, including the proud soprano Ildebranda Cuffari who wants to take the coveted place of Tetua now left vacant. After more than 4 minutes with only the cracking noise of the hand-cranked camera, the music comes alive with Agnus Dei - from Petite Messe Solennelle by Gioachino Rossini with Gianfranco Plenizio at the piano. Now the audience realizes it is a funeral and the ashes of Edmea Tetua is being carried onto the ship. It is not clear who the sole woman in black veil who follows the urn was, but the man wearing a scarf you see blowing a kiss to the urn was Tetua's lover.

The next clip follows with Verdi's Overture to The Force of Destiny for the departure of the ocean liner. The conductor is Il Maestro Albertini. The film moves from the kitchen to the luxury dining room with Piotr Ilich Tchaikovsky's Waltz of the Flowers from "The Nutcracker." To be continued...

Carmen

2011-09-04T23:10:00.000-04:00

Back in 2007, I blogged 2 clips: Gypsy & Toreador from a great screen opera of Bizet's famous Carmen. But that was done very low key and I did not say much about this production. Now, let's give it a second look. Shot entirely on location in Andalusian Spain, this screen version of Bizet's Carmen has been hailed as the definitive version of this classic opera. In this version, Placido Domingo and Julia Migenes-Johnson sing and dance to tell the story that took place in 19th century Seville. This story is well known: tempestuous Carmen (Migenes-Johnson) seduces a naive Army corporal, Don Jose (Domingo), newly assigned to the village fortress. Madly in love, Jose abandons his career, his fiancée and his dying mother to follow the sultry gypsy in her nomad life style. Soon, Carmen abandons him for her new conquest, toreador Escamillo (Ruggero Raimondi). Crazed with jealousy, Jose begs Carmen to return to him, but her taunting declaration of independence results in tragedy.

This clip lets you hear a small portion of Bizet's intoxicating melodies and his famous "Habanera" in a production that sets itself apart from all other performances. The clip ends with a Don Jose hopelessly fallen for his Carmencita that he just met.

Cinema Paradiso

2011-09-01T19:58:00.000-04:00

You are Sicilian, You live in the late 40s after World War II. What do you do for entertainment? Thank heaven to "Cinema Paradiso!" This clip shows you that nostalgic period of time when life was simple, the pleasure of life was few but lasting long and deep. In this clip, you see an adolescent Toto. Salvatore is now a handsome young man who takes over the projectionist job after Alfredo was blinded by a fierce fire that demolished the older "Cinema Paradiso." Toto is seen holding a pack of books at the beginning of the clip, near Ciccio, the man on the phone who is the new owner of the cinema. If you want to know about the sad love story between Toto and a local beauty Elena, find and watch this movie. It's worth your time and you'll love the beautiful ending.

Toto and Alfredo

2011-08-31T21:30:00.000-04:00

Nuovo cinema Paradiso, internationally released as Cinema Paradiso, is a 1988 Italian film written and directed by Giuseppe Tornatore. The film stars Jacques Perrin, Philippe Noiret, Leopoldo Trieste, Marco Leonardi, Agnese Nano and Salvatore Cascio; produced by Franco Cristaldi and Giovanna Romagnoli. The movie was shot in director Tornatore's hometown Bagheria, Sicily and in Cefalù on the Tyrrhenian Sea. The short version of 123 minutes was released internationally to an instant success. It won the Special Jury Prize at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival and the 1989 Best Foreign Language Film Oscar.

This clip introduces Toto, a charming and witty kid living in this Sicilian village with his mother while his father went to war never to return. Toto is the altar boy of the local priest who, after the Sunday mass, doubles in the role of the village's head of the censorship committee of one. Alfredo, the projectionist of the only movie theater "Cinema Paradiso" shows private viewings of all movies to the priest who makes decisions and commands Alfredo who cuts out all kissing scenes. Alfredo has to re-splice the cutting scenes before returning the movie reels to the distributor. Toto befriends Alfredo and gets to watch all these censored scenes. He develops a special bond with Alfredo who gives him a father figure he longs for; and a deep passion for movies which later shapes his life.

The Wizard of Oz

2011-08-30T15:06:00.000-04:00

Are you blue? Life is tough on you? Your stocks went South? Are you melancholy? Lovesick? Sad? Leave your trouble outside... come in here for 13 minutes to listen to Over the Rainbow with a twist. This will cheer you up!

Recuerdos de la Alhambra

2011-08-29T03:02:00.003-04:00

My last blog lead me to the guitar of Orpheus. That reminds me of my old classical guitar days. I gave up after getting tired of trying the tremolo. One thing leads to another and I must show you a great piece of classical guitar music: Recuerdos de la Alhambra, composed in 1896 by Spanish composer and guitarist Francisco Tárrega. This work was done in Granada where you find the Alhambra, the most important and also the best conserved Arabian palace in Spain. The name Alhambra comes from an Arabic root meaning "red or crimson" suggesting the hues of its towers and walls. Originally designed as a military area, the Alhambra became the residence of royalty and of the court of Granada in the middle of the thirteenth century. It is for this fortress that Tárrega wrote his great recuerdos, meaning memory or I remember (remember Amarcord? It's the same idea.)

This composition is a must for all classical guitar players to master. It's a test of endurance for the tremolo, which is the playing continuously a guitar string using the annular, middle and index fingers to produce an uninterrupted string of crisp notes. I can tell you from personal experience, it ain't easy. The tremolo is designed to create the illusion that the music is a duet of two guitars, but it is a solo performance. This composition is in the A minor key transitioning into the major A in the latter part, so Granada, so melancholy but oh so romantic!

All classical guitarists have recording of this composition. This clip is by Sharon Isbin, a world class classical guitarist. I selected her performance over many others, including that of Andreas Segovia because you may agree with me that her entire soul is in her playing. The clip is from a Korean TV re-recording so the quality is abysmal, but that's all I can find.. for now.

Orfeu Negro

2011-08-26T22:05:00.006-04:00

Black Orpheus (Original Intl. release title: Orfeu Negro): The Film. Dispat Films, December 1959, is a great classic Portuguese-language film by French director Marcel Camus and based on a play by Vinícius de Moraes. The music of this film became known throughout the world.

"Manhã de Carnaval" ("Morning of Carnival"), is the title of the most popular song by Brazilian composers Luiz Bonfá and Antonio Maria. Particularly in the USA, the song is considered to be one of the most important Brazilian Jazz/Bossa songs that helped establish the Bossa Nova movement in the late 1950s. Manhã de Carnaval has become a jazz standard in the USA, while it is still performed regularly by a wide variety of musicians around the world in its vocalized version or just as an instrumental one.

In the USA, the song is also known as "A Day in the Life of a Fool", "Carnival", "Theme from Black Orpheus", or simply "Black Orpheus". In France, the song is also known as "La Chanson D'Orphée." The song is also known by the Spanish title "Mañana de Carnaval". All versions of foreign texts were written by different people using Bonfá's original music. The list of Recordings of Manhã de Carnaval is impressive, litterally by everyone who's who in the world of music.

Although most of the songs in the film, Orfeu Negro (Black Orpheus) were composed by Antônio Carlos Jobim and Vinícius de Moraes, Manhã de Carnaval was one of two by composer Luiz Bonfá (the other being "Samba de Orfeu"). Manhã de Carnaval was by far the song that got branded popularly as the movie theme in "Black Orpheus." Luiz Bonfá's success with his 1959 hit song was great, and made his name so well known in the music industry internationally that on several occasions US producers brought him from Brazil to the USA for TV presentations. "Manhã de Carnaval" was originally sung by Elizete Cardoso and Agostinho dos Santos.

The first clip from Black Orpheus was blogged in December of 2006 here. In that clip, Orpheus was singing Manhã de Carnaval to the two kids who believe that Orpheus has the magical power of making the sun rise by playing his guitar and singing. During this song, he was heard by Eurydice in her room next door, and love was born.

Today's clip is the second famous song, Felicidade, sung by Orpheus to Eurydice while a fabulous new sun was rising over the slumps of Rio de Janeiro where the story took place.

Felicidade
Music: Antônio Carlos Jobim
Lyrics: Vinicius de Moraes

A minha felicidade esta sonhando..... My happiness is dreaming
Nos olhos da minha namorada..... In the eyes of my girlfriend
E como esta noite, passando, passando..... It's like this night, passing, passing

Em busca da madrugada..... Seeking the dawn
Falem baixo, por favor..... Speak low, please
Pra que ela acorde alegre com o dia..... So she might wake up happy
Oferecendo beijos de amor..... Offering a kiss of love

Tristeza nao tem fim..... Sadness has no end
Felicidade sim..... Happiness does

A felicidade é como a gota..... Happiness is like a drop
De orvalho numa pétala de flor..... of dew on a flower's petal
Brilha tranquila..... Brilliant and tranquil
Depois de leve oscila..... Then quivering

E cai como uma lagrima de amor...... Then falling like a tear of love.

You can read the English translation in the subtitle of the clip.

In case you are really interested in this movie, its original soundtrack has 14 tracks. The second is heard at the very beginning of the movie when the credit runs. It is an introduction to Felicidade, the lyrics of which is below:

Tristeza não tem fim
Felicidade sim

A felicidade é como uma gota de orvalho
Numa pétala de flor
Brilha tranquila
Depois delevocila
E cai como uma lágrima de amor

A felicidade do probre parece
A grande ilusão do carnaval
A gente trabalha o ano inteiro
Por um momento de sonho para fazer a fantasia
De rei ou de pirata ou de jardineira.
Pra tudo se acabar na quarta feira.

Tristeza não tem fim
Felicidade sim

A felicidade é como uma pluma
Que o vento vai levando pelo ar
Voa tão leve
Mas tem a vida breve
Precisa que haja vento sem parar.

Tristeza não tem fim
Felicidade sim
Click on the player to hear this original track.

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I Want a Woman

2011-08-24T09:47:00.000-04:00

In Amarcord, Fellini created a large cast of characters to populate his fictitious Borgo to represent the Rimini of his childhood. Each of the personalities has his/her own charm.

Fiorella and her sister Gradisca (Magali Noël), the village beauty, the blind accordion player (Domenica Pertica) relentlessly tormented by schoolboys; Volpina (Josiane Tanzilli), the stringy blond nymphomaniac; the stout and buxom tobacconist (Maria Antonietta Beluzzi); Titta (Bruno Zanin), the rosy-cheeked adolescent protagonist based on Fellini's childhood friend; Aurelio (Armando Brancia), Titta’s father, a construction foreman of working-class background. Modest and reserved, Aurelio responds in frenzied anger to Titta’s pranks while Miranda (Pupella Maggio), his wife, always comes to her son’s defense. Miranda’s brother, Lallo (Nando Orfei), lives with Titta’s family, sponging off his brother-in-law. In tow are Titta’s grandfather (Peppino Ianigro), a likeable old goat with an eye on the family’s young maid, a street vendor, Biscein (Gennaro Ombra), the town’s incorrigible liar; and many more unique characters...

In this clip, during one summer afternoon, the family visits uncle Teo (Ciccio Ingrassia), Aurelio’s brother, confined to an insane asylum. They take him out for a day in the family's country farm house but he escapes into a tree yelling, "Voglio una donna!" ("I want a woman!"). After 5 hours, they managed to get him down. "We are all mad at times," is the message of this clip. Watching this clip, do not miss it when Titta asked his father if he should go get Volpina to help getting his uncle Teo down from the tree.

This movie is well known for a scene about the protagonist Titta having his unforgettable encounter with the village's huge tobaccconist in her store. If you want to see that scene, you must see this movie because I do not really want to blog it here. Should I?

Amarcord

2011-08-23T23:50:00.000-04:00

Back in December 02, 2006, I blogged my favorite segment from the movie Amarcord, but that clip is no longer viewable. Let's redo it here. Today's clip may be a bit longer... but it is still my very favorite excerpt from that movie.

Amarcord is a 1973 Italian film directed by Federico Fellini, a semi-autobiographical tale that combines poignancy with history and yes, comedy. It tells the story of a wild cast of characters inhabiting the fictional Borgo based on Fellini's hometown of Rimini in 1930s Fascist Italy. Amarcord is Romagnolo for "I remember."

Amarcord won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, and was nominated for two Academy Awards: Best Director and Best Writing, Original Screenplay. If you have not seen that movie, you must! I'll blog another clip here soon...

Mr. Bojangles

2011-08-22T00:23:00.000-04:00

Mr. Bojangles is the title of a song originally written and recorded by American country music artist Jerry Jeff Walker for his 1968 album of the same title. Since then, it has been covered by many other artists, including American country music band The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, whose version (recorded for the 1970 album Uncle Charlie & His Dog Teddy) was issued as a single and rose to number nine on the Billboard Hot 100 pop chart in 1971.

Walker has said he was inspired to write the song after an encounter with a street performer in a New Orleans jail. Walker said while in jail for public intoxication in 1965, he met a homeless white man who called himself "Mr. Bojangles" who told a story about his dog and when it turned too sad, he escaped with a tap dance.

Walker's song has been re-recorded by many popular artists, including Harry Chapin, J.J. Cale, Sammy Davis Jr., Chet Atkins, Rod McKuen, Whitney Houston, Billy Joel, Harry Nilsson, Bob Dylan, Don McLean, The Byrds, Harry Belafonte, Frank Sinatra, Bobby Cole, Elton John, Lulu, Arlo Guthrie, Nina Simone, Esther Phillips, John Denver, David Bromberg, Neil Diamond, Tom T. Hall, King Curtis, Radka Toneff, John Holt, Kristofer Åström, Bermuda Triangle Band, Robbie Williams, David Campbell, Jamie Cullum, Ray Quinn, Edwyn Collins, Frankie Laine, Cornell Dupree, Jim Croce, Todd Snider, Jim Stafford, Jamie Walker and Cat Stevens. Furthermore, composer Philip Glass makes reference to "Mr. Bojangles" in his minimalist opera Einstein on the Beach. A French version of the song was recorded in 1984 by Hugues Aufray on his album L'enfant Sauvage. Jim Carrey has allso preformed this song on his earlier stand up stuff plus at his first movie copper mountain.

I think that Sammy Davis Jr. had his signature on this song and owned it in this performance. This is quite a sad song.

Ya Ya

2011-08-20T03:39:00.001-04:00

Stanley Kubrick (July 26, 1928 – March 7, 1999,) an American movie director, made many memorable movies. A perfectionist, he always paid meticulous attention to the details of his movies, each one of which is a work of its own, distinct from all of his others. I have blogged two of his movies: Paths of Glory and Eyes Wide Shut. This is Lolita, a 1962 film based on the classic novel of the same title by Vladimir Nabokov. The film stars James Mason as Humbert Humbert, Sue Lyon as Dolores Haze (Lolita, a nickname that forever after associated with a nymphet) and Shelley Winters as Charlotte Haze with Peter Sellers as a devilish character named Clare Quilty.

Due to the Motion Picture Association of America's (MPAA) restrictions at the time, the film could not faithfully recreate the far more provocative aspects of the novel, leaving a lot to the viewers' imagination. The actress who played Lolita, Sue Lyon, was fourteen at the time of filming.

The prudish censorship of the time severely restricted Kubrick's artistic creativity. He later commented that, “because of all the pressure over the Production Code and the Catholic Legion of Decency at the time, I believe I didn't sufficiently dramatize the erotic aspect of Humbert's relationship with Lolita. If I could do the film over again, I would have stressed the erotic component of their relationship with the same weight Nabokov did.” In a 1972 Newsweek interview, Kubrick said that had he realized how severe the censorship limitations affected his movie, he "probably wouldn't have made the film."

Lolita's age was raised to fourteen, as Kubrick believed that this was the right age. He has commented that, “I think that some people had the mental picture of a nine-year-old, but Lolita was twelve and a half in the book; Sue Lyon was thirteen.” (Actually, Lyon was 14 at the time of filming: she was born in July 1946 and it was shot between November 1960 and May 1961.)

When released, Lolita was Rated BBFC X by the British Board of Film Censors, meaning no one under 16 years of age was permitted in theaters where it was showing.

This clip is when Humbert came to see Charlotte Haze, Lolita's mom, looking to rent a room for the summer. Charlotte, desperate widow, immediately came on strongly to Humbert after learning that he was divorced. Watch to see how she does that, which turned him off completely and he was ready to get away from her... until he saw the "Decisive Factor" which is the name of the movie chapter when he first saw Lolita. Alea iacta est!

Veteran arranger Nelson Riddle composed (with Bob Harris) and conducted the music for Kubrick's Lolita. The song introducing Lolita throughout the movie is "Ya Ya," with its loping guitar riff and baby doll "ya-ya-wo-wo-ya-ya" vocal. Below is the Lolita Ya Ya sung by Sue Lyon.

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Metafora

2011-08-12T10:27:00.001-04:00

This clip is from a charming 1995 movie, "Il Postino." It was produced with a modest budget of about US $3 Million, and grossed more than $ 75 Million worldwide. At release, the film was so successful its theatrical run in New York City lasted almost 2 years.

Pablo Neruda (Philippe Noiret,) the famous Chilean poet, is exiled for political reasons to a small fishing island in Italy. There, a postman, Mario Ruoppolo (Massimo Troisi) is created to deliver Neruda's mail as his personal "Il Postino." Using Neruda's poems, Mario got into trouble with Rosa, aunt of beautiful Beatrice (Maria Grazia Cucinotta) who fell for Mario's borrowed poems. This clip is so charming, I redo it here and make it longer with subtitle, more complete than the blog "Nude Madreselva" on December 09, 2006, yes, 5 years ago!

Writer/co-director/star Massimo Troisi postponed heart surgery so he could complete the film. The day after filming was complete, he suffered a fatal heart attack. Massimo Troisi was so weak that it was only possible for him to work for about an hour each day. Most of his scenes were shot in one or two takes. A shooting schedule was designed to allow the film to be shot around him. His stand-in had striking resemblance to the real Troisi and was used for all back to camera, long/medium shots and most of the bicycle riding sequences.

The beautiful tango scene's music is "Madreselva"
Written by Francisco Canaro (as F. Canaro) and Luis César Amadori (as L.C. Amadori), performed by Carlos Gardel.

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Time Travel

2011-08-07T11:10:00.000-04:00

Owen Wilson, in the role of Gil is transported in time from Paris present to Paris in the 20s. This is his first encounter. At the stroke of midnight, an antique limousine picks him up and upon arrival he finds himself in company of famous luminosities of the Golden Years. In this clip, he is in a party thrown for Jean Cocteau (Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau, 5 July 1889 – 11 October 1963, was a French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, playwright, artist and filmmaker. His circle of associates, friends and lovers included Kenneth Anger, Pablo Picasso, Jean Hugo, Jean Marais, Henri Bernstein, Marlene Dietrich, Coco Chanel, Erik Satie, María Félix, Édith Piaf and Raymond Radiguet,) where Cole Porter was entertaining his friends with my favorite tune of "Let's Do It, Let's Fall in Love." Listen to this song, and I am sure you will. Then Wilson couldn't believe it when he meets Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald. Zelda is so lively here, and I absolutely love her 'Bama accent. The next car ride took Wilson to a "drop dead" street dancing scene by Josephine Baker after which he'll meet Ernest Hemingway and Co. In case you are too young to know who Josephine Baker was, she made the bananas famous by dancing and singing wearing just a banana skirt. Would you like to see that clip?

Although I think this is not Allen's best movie, it is very good. This is the only clip of this movie that will make it to this blog. The guitar background is guitarist Stephane Wrembel playing Bistro Fada.

Midnight in Paris

2011-08-06T17:40:00.001-04:00

There is a new Woody Allen movie that came out recently and I need to see it. But while I wait to find time, here is its opening sequence. Having lived in Paris for a while, I can recognize most of the locations in this clip. I want to go back, not at the contemporary time, but at time bygones. This movie is about just that, a nostalgic time travel to Paris' past of the 20s with encounters of the like of Scott Fitzgerald, Cole Porter, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Picasso, Matisse, Salvador Dali, T. S. Elliot, Djuna Bames, Josephine Baker, Luis Buñuel, Man Ray and others. This movie got a rare 92% rating from Rotten Tomatoes and I will block some of my time to watch it soon. I may even blog a few things from it. The opening Bechet tune is called "Si tu vois ma mere" which means "If you see my mother.".

A Gift To You and To Me

2011-08-03T08:02:00.004-04:00

The Hable Con Ella CD has 20 tracks, only 6 are selected to be included here. Select one of them to play then click mouse on the track of your choice. These are my favorite tracks. Enjoy!

Hable Con Ella

2011-08-03T00:49:00.000-04:00

Talk to Her (Spanish: Hable Con Ella) is a 2002 Spanish film written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar (one of my very favorite motion picture directors,) starring Javier Cámara, Darío Grandinetti, Leonor Watling, Geraldine Chaplin, and Rosario Flores. The film won the 2002 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and the 2003 Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign-Language Film. In 2005, it won a large number of awards as Best Foreign Film, too numerous to list here. Time magazine film critics Richard Corliss and Richard Schickel included Talk to Her in their list of the All-TIME 100 Greatest Movies. This is, in my book, a great movie to be watched again many times to fully appreciate it. If you do,pay full attention to the music.

In 2006 and 2007, I blogged two short clips from this movie, but they did not really do justice to it. This time, this blog gives a better glimpse of Hable Con Ella. This movie partly owes its great success to its sound track, which I adore.

Continuing the successful collaboration that begun on 1995's The Flower of My Secret, composer Alberto Iglesias works with director Pedro Almodóvar to produce a quietly sophisticated music ensemble to accompany a fascinating story in 2002's Hable Con Ella. If you never heard of Brazilian vocalist Caetano Veloso, listen to his "Cucurrucucu Paloma" by Tomás Méndez (as Tomás Méndez Sosa) here; or listen to a teaser of "Raquel" By Rufino Almeida & Africa Nostra, from the album "Tôp d'Coroa" by Bau.

Today's clip from "Hable Con Ella" is about Lidia, the female professional bull fighter. The first half of the clip's soundtrack is the haunting "Por toda a minha vida" written by Antonio Carlos Jobim (as Tom Jobim) and Vinicius de Moraes, performed by Elis Regina, a famous Brasilian singer who died at the very young age of 35. The song's Portuguese lyrics essentially says "Love is the saddest thing when it goes away." This is a very famous song and the next clip lets you hear it rendered by the master crooner Caetano Veloso himself (I got that from Youtube so the quality of the video is not so good.)

The second half of the Lidia clip shows you a very rare close up of how a toreador (that's the bull fighter's name) is clothed for the very horrific and theatrical bull fights in Spain's bloody arenas. The bulls' bloodiness in this film is real. An ecological group in Madrid tried to sue Pedro Almodóvar for ill treatment of the animals, blaming society for accepting it. Almodóvar said that he had the permission of the bulls' owners to kill them. The story line of the movie has it that Lidia is gored by the bull and never recovered from her coma resulting from her injury. The music during the bull's rampage is "A Portagayola." Return here to hear some of the better movie soundtracks from "Hable Con Ella" in my next blog.

Here is the Youtube clip of "Por toda a minha vida" by Caetano Veloso who has aged a bit since his singing "Cucurrucucu Paloma" in "Hable Con Ella."

Valtzer Triste

2011-07-29T02:43:00.001-04:00

Valse triste (Sad Waltz), Op. 44, No. 1, is a short orchestral work in waltz form by the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius. It was originally part of the incidental music he composed for his brother-in-law Arvid Järnefelt's 1903 play Kuolema (Death), but is far better known as a separate concert piece, which was performed in Helsinki on 25 April of that year as Valse triste. It was an instant hit with the public, and remains one of Sibelius' signature pieces.

Originally, the play Kuolema depicted the final moment of the life of a sick mother while her son kept vigil at her bed side. The incredibly sad waltz of Sibelius ended with her last breath. It is far too sad, and I have no wish to show it here.

Instead, also intensely sad, I think it is somewhat better you hear this great piece of composition in a gem of an animation feature: Allegro Non Troppo. It is a 1976 Italian animated film directed by Bruno Bozzetto. This film features six pieces of classical music. Allegro Non Troppo is a parody of Disney's Fantasia, but I think it is a class above.

Among the six, Valse Triste in "Feline Fantasies" hits you in your gut, and I am sure you will be misty and will not soon forget this gem. Enjoy, and get out your handkerchief!

The original music is from DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHONE 2536 400: "ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACK FROM BRUNO BOZZELLO'S FILM ALLEGRO NON TROPPO. BERLINER PHILHARMONIKER HERBERT VON KARAJAN."

Taboo

2011-07-27T00:48:00.001-04:00

While doing the "Henry & June" blog, my mind was locked in the era of the 30's... Now, allow me to talk about "Taboo," which comes to mind when one sees the movie "The Lover," reliving a story that took place in VietNam's 1929. A taboo is a strong social prohibition relating to any area of human activity or social custom that is sacred and forbidden based on moral judgment and religious beliefs. High on the list is that of forbidden love. And that is the subject of "The Lover." Many discussions about this movie always are focused on the sex scenes. I believe there are four of them, but that is not the only, nor is it the most interesting subject to talk about.

The Lover (French: L'Amant) is a 1992 film produced by Claude Berri and directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud. Based on the short Goncourt prize winning semi-autobiographical 1984 novel by Marguerite Duras, the film details the illicit affair between a teenage French girl and a wealthy Chinese man in Indochina, later known as Viet-Nam when it was still a colony of France, in 1929. In the screenplay written by Annaud and Gérard Brach, the girl's age is changed from 15½ to 17 and is portrayed by actress Jane March, who turned eighteen shortly after filming began.

Production began in 1989, with filming commencing in 1991. The film made its theatrical debut on 22 January 1992, with an English release in the United Kingdom in June and in the United States in October of the same year. The film won the Motion Picture Sound Editors's 1993 Golden Reel award for "Best Sound Editing — Foreign Feature" and the 1993 César Award for Best Music Written for a Film. It received mostly negative reviews from American critics. However the film's performances and cinematography were generally praised.

It is noteworthy that the movie director Annaud almost gave up to have the movie filmed in VietNam due to difficulties found in the country. Realizing they must film their movie in VietNam to retain authenticity, the team returned to VietNam and began filming. Despite tight censorship from the VietNamese government, the movie does contain steamingly hot sex scenes which are not of interest in this blog. Instead, this clip is shown because it contains very nostalgic imagery of the trip from Sa-Dec to Saigon via route 1, about 140km away. From Sa-Dec, where the teen-aged girl lived, passengers must cross one of the branches of the great Mekong river by ferry to reach route 1 by automobile. Route 1 first passes by Vinh Long, another river town downstream then to Saigon. The ferry name was Vam Cong, in the southern province of Dong Thap. The car used in this movie was an authentic Morris Léon-Bollée as it was identified in the book.

The scenery in this clip is strongly suggestive of VietNam in the 30s under French colonialism but the filming was in the 90s and on location. It is hard to believe that VietNam's Sa-Dec in the 90s still looks and sounds like what the movie is showing. I would love to find the behind the scene documentary of this movie to learn how this was done. Did you see the car traversing the wooden bridge? Is it real? There are many more scenes at various on site locations in this movie that tempt me to look further in its making... and keep me wondering how did they do that? But... if you are curious about the sex scenes, you probably will not see them here. The voice you hear recounting the teen-aged girl's life is that of the lovely French actress, singer, screenwriter and director Jeanne Moreau, a legend in her own right.

Henry & June Soundtrack

2011-07-26T00:54:00.001-04:00

The Henry and June CD has 18 tracks, scroll the list to select one of them to play using the scroller at right then click mouse on the track of your choice. Enjoy!

The back cover states that "The material on this disc was recorded over a period of sixty years (tracks 1 & 18, 1930; 5, 1932) and in a variety of locations" so the quality of the sound is uneven.

Je M'Ennuie

2011-07-25T01:03:00.013-04:00

OK. I am going to finish this Henry & June series with this clip that some of you may not like because the scene takes place in a lesbian night club. However, you need to realize that Paris in the 30s and 40s was truly like what this movie is trying to show the audience.

This is the last night that June and Anais spent together before June leaves for New York. Anais is in distress because she began to fall deeply for June after the short time they spent together. The music you hear is one of my very favorite piece and it is played throughout the entire clip in the background. It was arranged by Mark Adler and this song was made popular by none other than diva Marlene Dietrich, entitled "Moi... Je M'Ennuie," music by de Wal-Berg and lyrics by Camille Francois. Dietrich (1901-1992) recorded this song in Paris on July 15th, 1933. If you are interested in that recording, you can hear it using the MP3 player below.

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The French lyrics are quite "benign" but don't forget that it was the 1930s... If you never heard Dietrich sing, here's your chance.

De ce que fut mon enfance,
Je n’ai plus de souvenirs.
C’est peut-être que la chance
Ne m’offrit pas de plaisirs.
Et chaque jour qui se lève
Ne m’apporte aucun espoir.
Je n’ai même pas de rêve
Quand luit l'etoile du soir.

Moi, je m’ennuie,
C’est dans ma vie
Une manie.
Je n’y peux rien..
Le plaisir passe,
Il me dépasse.
En moi sa trace
Ne laisse rien.
Partout je traîne,
Comme une chaîne,
Ma lourde peine,
Sans autre bien.
C’est dans ma vie
Une manie.
Moi, je m’ennuie...

Par de longs vagabondages,
J’ai voulu griser mon coeur,
Et souvent, sur mon passage,
J’ai vu naître des malheurs.
Sur chaque nouvelle route,
A l’amour j’ai dû mentir ;
Et le soir, lorsque j’écoute
La plainte du vent mourir...

Moi, je m’ennuie...
C’est dans ma vie
Une manie.
Je n’y peux rien..
Le plaisir passe,
Il me dépasse.
En moi sa trace
Ne laisse rien.
Partout je traîne,
Comme une chaîne,
Ma lourde peine,
Sans autre bien.
C’est dans ma vie
Une manie.
Moi, je m’ennuie...

Many reviews of this movie gave a lot of compliments about the cast chosen for this film, and I do agree with everything said... except that... if you read Anais Nin's biography book by Deirdre Bair, you would have discovered that Nin, although slim, was not the petite woman described by many writers. She was five foot six inches tall and she towered over the tiny June who was about five foot two. Uma Thurman, who is five foot 11 inches is too tall for June, but her Brooklyn accent (along with Fred Ward's as Henry Miller) and her demeanor were perfect to impersonate June Miller while Maria de Medeiros fit Nin to a T although she is shorter than the real Nin. So the casting was truly well done making this movie a pleasure to watch multiple times to appreciate the music and the work devoted to its making.

According to Nin's diary, her relationship with June stopped here at the end of the clip. The movie has some steamy scenes with June but that were only in her imagination as Kaufman has skillfully orchestrated according to his screen play.

Interestingly, I found another blog devoted to this same film here. I will try to find some time and post the soundtrack of this movie in the next blog.

June and Anais

2011-07-24T15:06:00.000-04:00

It's time to lower the curtain on Henry & June... and this is the next to last blog about this movie. There is a book written by Deirdre Bair who, it was said, had unlimited access to the unpublished writings of Anais Nin, including more than 250,000 handwritten diary pages: "Anais Nin. A biography" was published in 1995 by Putnam, New York, in hardback, and in 1996 by Penguin in paperback. The relationship between the two women was complicated and Bair said a few things that were relevant to Henry and June, the movie. June was known to be a compulsive liar and Henry Miller had told Anais Nin about June's several lesbian affairs in New York. Nin's and Bair's writings are very important readings for the audience to fully appreciate the directing of Kaufman in this movie, and particularly in this clip. In this scene, June abruptly announces her trip to New York after more lies about her upbringing. Later, the clip highlighted the usual way June negotiates to get what she wants in life. Again, Debussy's "Pour l'Egyptienne" is heard in the background. This scene is a prelude to my last Henry and June clip that includes the great famous song "Je M'ennuie," coming here soon...

Louveciennes

2011-07-23T01:01:00.002-04:00

I am always interested in learning how a movie director creates a scene in his films to tell a story. The authenticity of a scene is so crucially important that it can make or break a movie, especially if it is a film telling a historical event, whether it is embellished and dramatized or not. It is the attention to details that makes a story believable. Henry and June was a labor of love for Philip Kaufman and his wife Rose, and it showed.

The story begins when Anais Nin and her husband Hugo lived in a house in Louveciennes, from 1930 to 1936 at 2 bis, rue Montbuisson. The house shown in the Henry and June movie looks remarkably similar to the real home in Louveciennes that is now listed for sale at about 4,000 Euro a square meter.

Louveciennes is a commune in the Yvelines department in the Île-de-France region in north-central France. It is located in the western suburbs of Paris, between Versailles and Saint-Germain-en-Laye, adjacent to Marly-le-Roi, and was frequented by impressionist painters in the 19th century. According to the official site, there are over 120 paintings by Renoir, Pissarro, Sisley, and Monet depicting Louveciennes. Even Marcel Proust and Maupassant came to this town to escape Paris regularly. The well known composer Camille Saint-Saëns lived in Louveciennes from 1865 to 1870; and Marie Louise Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, the most famous female painter of the 18th century, died in Louveciennes 30 March 1842; Louis, 7th duc de Broglie, physicist and Nobel Prize laureate, died in Louveciennes 19 March 1987. It was thus very significant that Anais Nin started her career as an author in this very special town.

This clip shows the brief time Henry and June Miller were staying with Anais Nin and her husband Hugo in their home in Louveciennes as guests. Nearby is the forest de Marly, renamed from the ancient name of forest of Crüye at the end of the 17th century by Louis XIV who used it as hunting ground. The bicycle riding scene through the forest looks so authentic, and I really would like to know where it was filmed. During this visit, the Millers were not shy to show the great desire they have for each other and that openly charged energy and the aggressiveness of June did not escape Nin's silent fascination. Later on, back at the house, during the classic French match of "petanque" between Henry Miller and Hugo, the wide eyed Nin was the object of June's intense seduction. I am surprised that Kaufman did not play Debussy's Pour l'Egyptienne during that scene. He left the images speak silently without any musical background. You should try to find and read Nin's diary for this particular encounter. During the bicycle ride, the music you hear is Claude Debussy's Petite Suite - Ballet.

Tropic of Cancer

2011-07-22T00:55:00.003-04:00

This is a very short clip, reflecting the way Philip Kaufman told the story of Henry & June... in short apparently disjoint but connected segments. The entire movie is revolved around Henry Miller's struggle as a writer inking out what eventually became his famous "Tropic of Cancer." I often wondered why that name was chosen... and this my theory:

The Tropic of Cancer, also referred to as the Northern tropic, is the circle of latitude on the Earth that marks the most northerly position at which the Sun may appear directly overhead at its zenith. This event occurs once per year, at the time of the June solstice, when the Northern Hemisphere is tilted toward the Sun to its maximum extent. So, it made sense for Miller to write the biography of his wife whose name is "June," and associated it to the Tropic of Cancer. The imaginary line is called the Tropic of Cancer because when it was named, the Sun was in the direction of the constellation Cancer (Latin for crab) at the June solstice. However, this is no longer true due to the precession of the equinoxes resulting in an annual drift of this imaginary line of latitude. According to International Astronomical Union boundaries, the Sun now is in Taurus at the June solstice. So, a modern day's name for this book would have to be "Tropic of Taurus!" I like Cancer better. Of course, you know about the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern hemisphere. Let's keep that for another blog in the future.

There are many very interesting histories about this famous book. Tropic of Cancer was first published in 1934 by the Obelisk Press in Paris, France. Its publication in 1961 in the United States by Grove Press led to an obscenity trial that was one of several that tested American laws on pornography in the 1960s.

While famous for its frank and often graphic depictions of sex, the book is also widely regarded as an important masterpiece of 20th century literature. In 1998, the Modern Library ranked Tropic of Cancer 50th on its list of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. Time magazine included the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.

The book was distributed by Frances Steloff at her Gotham Book Mart, in defiance of censorship pressures.

In 1964, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Grove Press, Inc. v. Gerstein, cited Jacobellis v. Ohio (which was decided the same day) and overruled state court findings of obscenity.

Again, in this clip, because of June's presence, Philip Kaufman inserted Debussy's "Pour l'Egyptienne" motif in the background.

June Mansfield

2011-07-21T02:40:00.000-04:00

This clip introduces the first meeting between June Miller and Anais Nin. Here, you hear Claude Debussy's "Pour L'Egyptienne" From "Six Epigraph Antiques," performed by Ensemble Musical de Paris. This is the motif used by movie director Philip Kaufman to accompany Uma Thurman portraying June Miller repeatedly. The atmosphere of this clip reflects well what Anais Nin wrote in December 1931 in her diary shortly after meeting June for the first time. It was published later as Henry & June, page 14:

"A startingly white face, burning eyes. June Mansfield, Henry's wife. As she came towards me from the darkness of my garden into the light of the doorway I saw for the first time the most beautiful woman on earth.

Years ago, when I tried to imagine a pure beauty, I had created an image in my mind of just that woman. I had even imagined she would be Jewish. I knew long ago the color of her skin, her profile, her teeth.

Her beauty drowned me. As I sat in front of her I felt that I would do anything she asked of me. Henry faded, She was color, brilliance, strangeness."

Parlez-moi D'Amour

2011-07-20T01:02:00.000-04:00

In the book and the movie Henry & June, according to her diaries, Anais Nin, although married to her husband Hugo, formed a triad of lovers with Henry and June Miller. If you only watch this movie superficially, you may misunderstand her true relationship with June. Henry & June, the movie, because of its frank and quite tasteful treatment of sexual themes that were openly and widely accepted in France in that period of time, was threatened with an X-rating, that later was toned down to NC-17. So, who was Anais Nin? Nin was born Angela Anaïs Juana Antolina Rosa Edelmira Nin y Culmell, (February 21, 1903 – January 14, 1977.) She was a French-Cuban author who lived first in France and later in the United States where her journals were published. Her diaries spanned more than 60 years, beginning when she was 11 years old and ending shortly before her death, that is her erotic literature and short stories were published posthumously. She was raised a Roman Catholic and spent her childhood and early life in Europe. After her parents separated, her mother moved Anaïs and her two brothers, Thorvald Nin and Joaquin Nin-Culmell, to Barcelona, and later to New York City. On March 3, 1923, in Havana, Cuba, Nin married her first husband, Hugh Parker Guiler (1898–1985), a banker and artist. The couple moved to Paris the following year, where Guiler pursued his banking career and Nin began to pursue her interest in writing. According to her diaries,Vol.1, 1931–1934, Nin shared a bohemian lifestyle with Henry Miller during her time in Paris. Hailed by many critics as one of the finest writers of female erotica, her diaries recounted that, faced with a desperate need for money, Nin, Miller and some of their friends began to write erotic and pornographic narratives for an anonymous "collector" for a dollar a page in the 1940s. Some of her early work were eventually published as Delta of Venus and Little Birds.

This clip shows one of her outing with Henry Miller who was portrayed as a shameful vagabond with an abandon life style that fascinated Nin. The scenery depicted with some fidelity Paris showing the infamous street urinoirs and nude prostitutes waiting for customers in brothels of shady quarters. After taking some money from Nin, Miller immediately entered a brothel, followed by Nin, wide-eyed in bewilderment that later turned into an obsession and ardent infatuation with Miller. Again, period music is heard in the French well known tune "Parlez-moi D'Amour" by Jean Lenoir & Bruce Slevier. This song was performed by Lucienne Boyer.

Sous Les Toits de Paris

2011-07-19T16:10:00.004-04:00

This series of blogs turns out to be more complicated than I anticipated and takes more time too. For those of you reading this blog and did not know what "Nin" of my previous blog stood for, it's Anais Nin, and that clip was a scene at the beginning of the 1990 movie "Henry & June." I believe that movie got a lot of bad press because it had the dubious distinction to have received the first ever (and thus created) the American motion picture rating of NC-17. In the US, a movie is rated before it can be shown in theaters. The highest rating of R, which means the movie should be for adults only is OK and it is quite common. An X rating is reserved for pornographic movies that cannot be shown in main stream movie theaters. The NC-17 (no children under 17) is almost a financial kiss of death because its showing is severely restricted. As you can see then, it's all money driven, and movie directors must pay close attention to what they can and cannot do, or what they want or do not want to show in their movies, unless they do not care about making a profitable movie, and put in films what they really want to show. Phillip Kaufman made Henry & June, and he took the NC-17 rating stoically. Interestingly, it is said that the NC-17 rating was caused mainly by the showing of a postcard that Anais Nin was looking at at the beginning of the movie. Fancy that! Having lived in Europe for many years, I frankly do not understand what the big fuss is about. Henry & June is, in my opinion, a great movie that teaches the audience about many interesting things provided it cares to pay attention to what is shown. To start, director Philip Kaufman read Henry Miller's book "Tropic of Cancer" when he was student at the university of Chicago. He recalled that at that time, EVERY ONE was reading that book because it was banned due its strong sexual nature. He also met Anais Nin in 1962. Kaufman's movie closely followed the book of the same title, Henry and June: From the Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (full title Henry and June: From A Journal of Love: the Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1931–1932)) published in 1986, one year after the death of her husband Hugo according to her wish to shield Hugo from all the details of her love for Henry. If you plan to watch this movie, you ought to read about Anais Nin's work and her passionate love affair with Henry Miller. In 1973 Anaïs Nin received an honorary doctorate from the Philadelphia College of Art. She was elected to the United States National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1974. Not to bore you here with too many details, you can watch this video clip. In this clip, you can hear "Sous les Toits de Paris" which is Kaufman's homage to the first French film with sound and its great movie director Rene Clair. In this clip, after meeting Henry Miller for the first time, Anais Nin wanted to let him use her typewriter. She delivers it herself to the apartment of Osborn, a colleague of her husband Hugo. Osborn lets Miller share a room in his apartment. This clip introduces for the first time June Miller, Henry's wife. Her picture was shown with only a few notes of the music motif from Claude Debussy's "Pour l'Egyptienne," which is the motif associated with June Miller throughout the movie. Uma Thurman portrayed June Miller with great intensity in this movie to match with the gravity of Debussy's "Pour l'Egyptienne." There are more clips that I intend to post here, time permitted, I'll get to the music tracks of this movie, as I usually do with movie soundtrack.

Nin

2011-07-02T17:13:00.001-04:00

Beautiful period music... If that's what you want and more, come back here... This is just to whet your appetite.

The Real ITMFL

2011-06-29T14:01:00.001-04:00

I wanted to blog this for years, and now I'm glad it's finally done.

"In the Mood for Love" is a stylistic masterpiece in movie making. Its title is (Traditional Chinese: 花樣年華; Simplified Chinese: 花样年华; Pinyin: Huāyàng niánhuá; Yale: Fa yeung nin wa (Fā yeuhng nìhn wàh), literally "the age of blossoms" or "the flowery years", which is a Chinese metaphor for the fleeting time of youth, beauty and love.) ITMFL is a 2000 Hong Kong film directed by Wong Kar-wai, starring Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung. The film premiered on May 20, 2000, at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival where it was nominated for the Palme d'Or. The English title derives from a Bryan Ferry cover of the song "I'm in the Mood for Love" that was not included in the film. The story was set in 1962 Hong Kong.

Chow Mo-wan (Tony Leung) and Su Li-zhen (Maggie Cheung) are neighbors living in commune rental apartments. Each has a spouse who works and often leaves them alone on overtime abroad. A recurring motif in this film is the loneliness of living and eating alone, and the film documents the lead characters chance encounters, each making their individual trek to the street noodle stall. In the context of a socially conservative 1960s' Hong Kong, friendships between men and women always incite scrutiny. The relationship between Chow and Su is platonic, and defiantly so after they discovered that their spouses were having an affair, believing they would be degraded if stooped to the same level as that of their spouses. As time passes, however, they eventually fell in love with each other. Against all temptations, their love relationship remained platonic. The film ends at Siem Reap, Cambodia, where Chow is seen visiting the Angkor Wat. At the site of a ruined monastery, he whispers into a hole in the wall and plugs it with mud.

Now you know the origin of my blog's introduction on top.

From an essay by Joanna C. Lee, the main love theme (twice accompanying the encounters between Chow Mo-Wan [Tony Leung] and Su Li-Zhen [Maggie Cheung]) is borrowed from Shigeru Umebayashi's Yumeji's Theme (from Suzuki Seijun's film of the same title). This alluring waltz, entrancing in its string ensemble arrangement, is symbolic of the tentative, romantically intriguing steps of the male and female dancers. The dance rhythm also embodies the paradox of passion and socially conformist duties of the sexes. Wong recreates his memory of radio days with a new commission with Michael Galasso who wrote the music accompanying Chow's solitary visit to Angkor Wat, four years after his platonic affair with Su. The sense of remorse, especially the haunting strings throughout these short pieces, complement well Umebayashi's theme.

The two first clips below express the loneliness felt by the main characters as they cross paths numerous times. The music is the haunting theme by Shigeru Umebayashi: "Yumeji's Theme" (originally from the soundtrack of Seijun Suzuki's Yumeji.)

As they struggle to imagine how they were betrayed during their many secret meetings, both fell in love (thus the movie's title) but resisted to remain platonic throughout the entire film. The third clip, after a brief historical documentary showing French general De Gaulle visiting Cambodia's prince Norodom Shihanouk, features music by Michael Galasso: "Angkor Wat Theme" that shows a heart broken Chow alone in Cambodia fulfilling the ancient oriental myth.

Wong Kar Wai has selected a mosaic of music in this luscious film, creating a sound world of Hong Kong in the 1960s. Other pieces of music heard in the film are: "ITMFL", "Casanova/Flute" and two memorable songs from Cole en Espanol: "Aquellos ojos verdes" and "Quizas, Quizas, Quizas."
(You need HTML 5 to use the new audio tool below. Use the one below it if you have Flash...)

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The inspiration for the English title, by Bryan Ferry: "I'm in the Mood for Love" , found on the French 2 CD Soundtrack, is not in the film.

In the Mood for Love received raving reviews and many awards. It grossed HK$8,663,227 during its Hong Kong run and finished its North American run grossing of $2,738,980. The film's total worldwide box office made US$12,854,953.

Awards:

2000 Cannes Film Festival - Won: Best Actor (Tony Leung Chiu-wai)

2001 Hong Kong Film Awards - Won: Best Actor (Tony Leung Chiu-wai,) Best Actress (Maggie Cheung,) Best Art Direction (William Chang,) Best Costume and Make-up Design (William Chang,) Best Film Editing (William Chang)

2001 Hong Kong Film Critics Society Awards - Won: Best Director (Wong Kar-wai)

2002 National Society of Film Critics (USA) - Won: Best Foreign Language Film and Best Cinematography (Christopher Doyle, Lee Pin-bing)

2001 César Awards - Won: Best Foreign Film

2001 German Film Awards - Won: Best Foreign Film

2001 New York Film Critics Circle Awards - Won: Best Foreign Language Film and Best Cinematography (Christopher Doyle, Lee Pin-bing)
2002 Argentinian Film Critics Association Awards - Won: Best Foreign Language Film

2000 Asia-Pacific Film Festival - Won: Best Cinematography (Christopher Doyle, Lee Pin-bing) and Best Editing (William Chang)
2001 British Independent Film Awards - Won: Best Foreign Language Film
2002 Chlotrudis Awards - Won: Best Movie and Best Cinematography (Christopher Doyle, Lee Pin-bing)

I'm In The Mood For Love

2011-06-15T14:39:00.000-04:00

I'm no Fellini, but I think that this peacock of mine is better than his. I know a place where I can find a large population of peacock. In the mornings, they are most active. In Fellini's Amarcord, he showed a very poetic scene of a lone peacock amidst the falling snow flakes. Yesterday, my recorded version of an Indian peacock was quite less poetic, but more down to earth. He was in love, or, should I say, he was in lust. The peahen he was after did respond with her own gesture, which remains mysterious to me. But this is a sad story, and my peacock was heart broken. I am trying to come up with a theory to explain away the failure of his conquest. I must have been the culprit, trying to be very indiscreet interfering in their romantic moment. One interpretation of her gesture could be "Hey, there's a guy watching and trying to blog us... Are you nuts?" After she walked away, he was pretty mad at me... he said a few unpleasant and loud words to me and tried to provoke a fight. I knew better and backed down, knowing that you can't win battling a guy who is now very po'ed at you. Sorry... I'll leave you alone the next time, but I need first to save money to buy a telephoto lens and some camouflage peahen outfits.

Neruda

2011-06-14T00:20:00.002-04:00

On December 09, 2006, almost five years ago, I blogged a clip from an excellent movie, Il Postino. This movie tells the story of Chilean poet Pablo Neruda while he and his wife were living in exile in a charming small fishing town in Italy. The sound track of that movie contains recitals of some of his poems by various artists. All fourteen are listed along with their audio tracks below. I hope you like them. Neruda was prolific and you may want to read more of his poems in his books. They are in Spanish, but widely available in many languages in translation. The words in print, found on the internet, that you read here are not always in sync with the recitals. When I have more time, this will be edited so they are.

2. Morning - Pablo Neruda / Read by Sting
Naked you are simple as one of your hands;
Smooth, earthy, small, transparent, round.
You΄ve moon-lines, apple pathways
Naked you are slender as a naked grain of wheat.

Naked you are blue as a night in Cuba;
you΄ve vines and stars in your hair.
Naked you are spacious and yellow
as summer in a golden church.

Naked you are tiny as one of your nails;
curved, subtle, rosy, till the day is born,
and you withdraw to the underground world.

As if down a long tunnel of clothing and of chores;
your clear light dims, gets dressed, drops its leaves,
and becomes a naked hand again.

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3. Poetry - Pablo Neruda / Read by Miranda Richardson
And it was at that age...Poetry arrived in search of me.
I don΄t know,
I don΄t know where it came from, from winter or a river.
I don΄t know how or when,
no, they were not voices,
they were not words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say,
my mouth had no way with names
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering that fire
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw the heavens unfastened
and open planets, palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated, riddled with arrows,
fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry void,
likeness, image of mystery,
I felt myself a pure part of the abyss.
I wheeled with the stars;
my heart broke loose on the open sky.

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4. Leaning Into Afternoons - Pablo Neruda / Read by Wesley Snipes
Leaning into the afternoons,
I cast my sad nets towards your oceanic eyes.
There, in the highest blaze my solitude lengthens and flames;
its arms turning like a drowning man΄s.
I send out red signals across your absent eyes
that wave like the sea, or the beach by a lighthouse.
You keep only darkness my distant female;
from your regard sometimes, the coast of dread emerges.

Leaning into the afternoons,
I fling my sad nets to that sea that is thrashed
by your oceanic eyes.
The birds of night peck at the first stars
that flash like my soul when I love you.
The night, gallops on its shadowy mare,
Shedding blue tassels over the land.

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5. Poor Fellows - Pablo Neruda / Read by Julia Roberts
What it takes on this planet,
to make love to each other in peace.
Everyone pries under your sheets;
everyone interferes with your loving.
They say terrible things about a man and a woman,
who after much milling about,
all sorts of compunctions,
do something unique,
they both lay with each other in one bed.
I ask myself whether frogs are so furtive,
or sneeze as they please.
Whether they whisper to each other in swamps about illegitimate frogs,
or the joys of amphibious living.
I ask myself if birds single out enemy birds,
or bulls gossip with bullocks before they go out in public with cows.
Even the roads have eyes and the parks their police.
Hotels spy on their guests,
windows name names,
canons and squadrons debark on missions to liquidate love.
All those ears and those jaws working incessantly,
till a man and his girl
have to raise their climax,
full tilt, on a bicycle.

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6. Ode To The Sea - Pablo Neruda / Read by Ralph Fiennes
Here surrounding the island,
There΄s sea.
But what sea?
It΄s always overflowing.
Says yes,
Then no,
Then no again,
And no,
Says yes
In blue
In sea spray
Raging,
Says no
And no again.
It can΄t be still.
It stammers
My name is sea.

It slaps the rocks
And when they aren΄t convinced,
Strokes them
And soaks them
And smothers them with kisses.

With seven green tongues
Of seven green dogs
Or seven green tigers
Or seven green seas,
Beating its chest,
Stammering its name,

Oh Sea,
This is your name.
Oh comrade ocean,
Don΄t waste time
Or water
Getting so upset
Help us instead.
We are meager fishermen,
Men from the shore
Who are hungry and cold
And you΄re our foe.
Don΄t beat so hard,
Don΄t shout so loud,
Open your green coffers,
Place gifts of silver in our hands.
Give us this day our daily fish.

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7. Fable Of The Mermaid & The Drunks - Pablo Neruda / Read by Ethan Hawke
All these fellows were there inside when she entered
utterly naked.
They΄d been drinking and began to spit at her,
recently come from the river, she understood nothing.
She was a mermaid who had lost her way,
the taunts flowed over her glistening flesh
Obscenities drenched her golden breasts.

A stranger to tears, she did not weep,
A stranger to clothes, she did not dress.
They pocked her with cigarette ends and with burnt corks
And rolled on the tavern floor in raucous laughter
She did not speak, since speech was unknown to her
Her eyes were the colour of far away love
Her arms were matching topazes
Her lips moved soundlessly in coral light
And ultimately she left by that door
Hardly had she entered the river than she was cleansed
Gleaming once more like a white stone in the rain
And without a backward look, she swam once more
Swam towards nothingness, swam to her dawn.

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8. Ode To The Beautiful Nude - Pablo Neruda / Read by Rufus Seavell
With a chaste heart - with pure eyes - I celebrate your beauty.
Holding the leash of blood so that it might leap out
and trace your outline while you lie down in my Ode
As in a land of forests or in surf,
in aromatic loam or in sea music

Beautiful nude -
Equally beautiful your feet
arched by primeval tap of wind and sound.
Your ears, small shells of the splendid American sea.

Your breasts, a level plenitude fulfilled by living light.
Your flying eyelids of wheat, revealing or enclosing
The two deep countries of your eyes.

The line your shoulders have divided into pale regions
Loses itself and blends into the compact halves of an apple,
Continues, separating your beauty down into two columns
Of burnished gold... fine alabaster
To sink into the two grapes of your feet
Where your twin symmetrical tree burns again and rises ..
Flowering fire... open chandelier,
a swelling fruit over the pact of sea and earth.

From what materials? agate? quartz? wheat? Did your body come together?
Swelling like baking bread to signal silvered hills.
The cleavage of one petal, sweet fruits of a deep velvet
until alone remained, astonished
the fine and firm feminine form.

It is not only light that falls over the world,
Spreading inside your body it΄s suffocated snow...
So much as clarity...taking its leave of you
As if you were on fire from within.
The moon lives in the lining of your skin.

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9. I Like You To Be Still - Pablo Neruda / Read by Glenn Close
I like for you to be still: it is as though you were absent,
and you hear me from far away and my voice does not touch you.
It seems as though your eyes had flown away
and it seems that a kiss had sealed your mouth.

As all things are filled with my soul
you emerge from the things, filled with my soul.
You are like my soul, a butterfly of dream,
and you are like the word Melancholy.

I like for you to be still, and you seem far away.
It sounds as though you were lamenting, a butterfly cooing like a dove.
And you hear me from far away, and my voice does not reach you:
Let me come to be still in your silence.

And let me talk to you with your silence
that is bright as a lamp, simple as a ring.
You are like the night, with its stillness and constellations.
Your silence is that of a star, as remote and candid.

I like for you to be still: it is as though you were absent,
distant and full of sorrow as though you had died.
One word then, one smile, is enough.
And I am happy, happy that it΄s not true.

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10. Walking Around - Pablo Neruda / Read by Samuel L. Jackson
It so happens I am sick of being a man.
And it happens that I walk into tailor shops and movie houses
dried up, waterproof, like a swan made of felt
steering my way in a water of wombs and ashes.

The smell of barbershops makes me break into hoarse sobs.
The only thing I want is to lie still like stones or wool.
The only thing I want is to see no more stores, no gardens,
no more goods, no spectacles, no elevators.

It so happens that I am sick of my feet and my nails
and my hair and my shadow.
It so happens I am sick of being a man.

Still it would be marvellous
to terrify a law clerk with a cut lily,
or kill a nun with a blow on the ear.
It would be great
to go through the streets with a green knife
letting out yells until I died of the cold.

I don΄t want to go on being a root in the dark,
insecure, stretched out, shivering with sleep,
going on down, into the moist guts of the earth,
taking in and thinking, eating every day.

I don΄t want so much misery.
I don΄t want to go on as a root and a tomb,
alone under the ground, a warehouse with corpses,
half frozen, dying of grief.

That΄s why Monday, when it sees me coming
with my convict face, blazes up like gasoline,
and it howls on its way like a wounded wheel,
and leaves tracks full of warm blood leading toward the night.

And it pushes me into certain corners, into some moist houses,
into hospitals where the bones fly out the window,
into shoe shops that smell like vinegar,
and certain streets hideous as cracks in the skin.

There are sulphur-coloured birds, and hideous intestines
hanging over the doors of houses that I hate,
and there are false teeth forgotten in a coffeepot,
there are mirrors
that ought to have wept from shame and terror,
there are umbrellas everywhere, and venoms, and umbilical cords.

I stroll along serenely, with my eyes, my shoes,
my rage, forgetting everything,
I walk by, going through office buildings and orthopaedic shops,
and courtyards with washing hanging from the line:
underwear, towels and shirts from which slow
dirty tears are falling.

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11. Tonight I Can Write - Pablo Neruda / Read by Andy Garcia
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
Write, for example, ΄The night is starry
and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance.΄

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes?

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is starry and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight tries to find her as though to bring her closer.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that΄s certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another΄s. She will be another΄s. As she was before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that΄s certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

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12. Adonic Angela - Pablo Neruda / Read by William Dafoe
Today I stretched out next
to a pure young woman
as if at the shore of a white ocean,
as if at the centre of a burning star
of slow space.

From her lengthily green gaze
the light fell like dry water,
in transparent and deep circles
of fresh force.

Her bosom like a two flamed fire
burned raised in two regions,
and in a double river reached
her large, clear feet.

A climate of gold scarcely ripened
the diurnal length of her body
filling it with extended fruit
sand hidden fire.

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13. If You Forget Me - Pablo Neruda / Read by Madonna
I want you to know one thing
you know how this is
if I look at the crystal moon
at the red branch of the slow autumn at my window,
If I touch near the fire the impalpable ash
or the wrinkled body of the log.
Everything carries me to you, as if everything that exists,
aromas, light, metals, or little boats
that sail towards those isles of yours that wait for me.

Well now, if little by little you stop loving me,
I shall stop loving you, little by little.
If suddenly you forget me, do not look for me
for I shall already have forgotten you.
If you think at long and mad the wind banners that passes through my life
and you decide to leave me at the shore of the heart where I have roots,
remember than on that day, at that hour I shall lift my arms
and my roots will set off to seek another land.

But if each day each hour
you feel that you are destined for me with implacable sweetness.
If each day a flower climbs up to your lips to seek me, ah my love,
ah my own, in me all that fire is repeated,
in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten,
my love feeds on your love beloved,
and as long as you live it will be in your arms without leaving mine.

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14. Integrations - Pablo Neruda / Read by Vincent Perez
After everything,
I will love you
As if it were always before
As if, after so much waiting,
Not seeing you
And you not coming,
You were breathing close to me forever.

Close to me with your habits,
With your colour and your guitar
Just as countries unite
In school room lectures,
And two regions become blurred
And there is a river near a river
And two volcanoes grow together.

Close to you is close to me
And your absence is far from everything
And the moon is the colour of clay
In the night of quaking earth
When, in terror of the earth,
All the roots join together
And silence is heard ringing
With the music of fright

Fear is also a street
And among its trembling stones
Tenderness somehow is able
To march with four feet
And four lips

Since without leaving the present
That is a fragile thing
We touch the sand of yesterday
And in the sea
Love reveals a repeated fury

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15. And Now You΄re Mine - Pablo Neruda / Read by Julia Roberts & Andy Garcia
Now, you are mine. Rest with your dream inside my dream.
Love, pain, and work, must sleep now.
Night revolves on invisible wheels
and joined to me you are pure as sleeping amber.

No one else will sleep with my dream, love.
You will go; we will go joined by the waters of time.
No other one will travel the shadows with me,
only you, ever green, ever sun, ever moon.

Already your hands have opened their delicate fists
and let fall, without direction, their gentle signs,
your eyes enclosing themselves like two grey wings,
while I follow the waters you bring that take me onwards:
night, Earth, winds weave their fate, and already,
not only am I not without you, I alone am your dream.

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Chico and Rita

2011-06-09T10:37:00.002-04:00

I don't know if you realize that it is not easy to find some good movie clips that have at least some sort of interesting things to talk about... So, if you don't see new things here, it may mean that I am still looking, and didn't give up. Here is a new thing for you to reflect upon. I like this movie a lot. Watching it, you may agree that the animation truly sets itself apart from others. Just watch the facial expressions, the body language and the movements of the characters. Some critics say that these animated characters "act" better than many real sub par movie stars. This is a short 6 minute 57 second clip from the beginning of the film. If you want to know more about this love story, get the movie, some popcorn, kick up your heels and enjoy it. The sound track is very good and the animation is one of a kind. Here is some information for you...

Chico and Rita is an animated feature-length film directed by Fernando Trueba and Javier Mariscal. The story of Chico and Rita is set against backdrops of Havana, New York City, Las Vegas, Hollywood and Paris in the late 1940s and early '50s.

A gifted songwriter and beautiful singer chase their dreams – and each other – from Havana to New York and Las Vegas. Chico is a young piano player with big dreams. Rita is a beautiful singer with an extraordinary voice. Music and romantic desire unite them, but their journey – in the tradition of the Latin ballad, the bolero – brings heartache and torment.

Director Fernando Trueba met designer and artist Javier Mariscal ten years ago. Together, they wanted to make an animated feature film set against the Havana music scene in the late-40s and 50s.

Before drawing the locations in Cuba, Mariscal completed an intense research trip. Although the economic stagnation of the Castro regime has spared Havana the ravages of rapid development in the past five decades, many of the buildings from that era have suffered from decay. But the film-makers came across a treasure trove when they discovered that the city government of the time had assembled an archive of photographs to help with street repairs. They found pictures of every street corner in Havana from 1949.

The team also found pictures taken inside the planes ferrying Americans to the party island. Mariscal explained that the planes arriving from New York, Washington and Miami during that period were filled with Cuban musicians entertaining the passengers. They provided lots of information about the Cubans of that era, the clothes, the faces, the streets, billboards, cars, bars, the way they lived, the incredible life of Havana.

The film appeared at the following film festivals:

Telluride Film Festival on September 4, 2010
Toronto International Film Festival in September 2010
London Spanish Film festival on 6 October 2010
London Latin American Film Festival in November 2010
Holland Animation Film Festival in November 2010

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures distributed the film in 100 Spanish theaters on February 25, 2010.

The film had a special screening at the Barbican Centre on 25 September. It opened across UK cinemas on 19 November 2010.

Cape Town Design/FilmFest at Design Indaba February 2011
Miami International Film Festival March 2011

Music

The film has an original soundtrack by Cuban pianist, bandleader and composer Bebo Valdés. It features music by Thelonious Monk, Cole Porter, Dizzy Gillespie and Freddy Cole.

According to Tono Errando, "it was the moment when new musicians came along like Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie with a new kind of music, that is not for dancing, full of notes, played really fast, a music that now we call jazz. Then the Cuban musicians arrived. Dizzy Gillespie has said many times in interviews, there was a moment for him that was very important, it was the moment he first played with Chano Pozo. Pozo was the first percussionist that played in a jazz band."

Cuban pianist, bandleader, composer and arranger of the film Bebo Valdés was living in obscurity in Stockholm, when Trueba reintroduced his playing to an international audience with his film Calle 54, and went on to produce the Grammy-winning Lagrimas Negras album, teaming Valdes with flamenco singer Diego “El Cigala”.

Trueba was also able to persuade the real-life flamenco star Estrella Morente, who has been performing since the age of seven, to participate in the film.

Musicians featured in the film include Chucho Valdes, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Chano Pozo, Tito Puente, Ben Webster, and Thelonious Monk.

Lascia ch'io pianga

2011-03-27T00:37:00.003-04:00

What to do to follow Madonna? I got something that I hesitated to use, but what the heck... It's only a blog among the billions out there... And no one may ever care... so here we go...

The term or title antichrist, in Christian theology, is a leader who fulfills Biblical prophecies concerning an adversary of Christ, while resembling him in a deceptive manner. The antichrist will seemingly provide for the needs of the people but deny the ultimate salvation. Don't wow me... I just learned that today!

The term "antichrist" appears five times in John and John of the New Testament — once in plural form and four times in the singular. Now that's out of the way, let's move on...

Antichrist is a 2009 film written and directed by Lars von Trier, starring Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg. It follows horror film conventions and tells the story of a couple who, after the death of their child, retreat to a cabin in the woods where the man experiences strange visions and the woman manifests increasingly violent sexual behavior. The narrative is divided into a prologue, four chapters and an epilogue. The film was primarily a Danish production but co-produced by companies from six different European countries. It was filmed in Germany.

After premiering at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, where Gainsbourg won the festival's award for Best Actress, the film immediately caused controversy, with critics generally praising the film's artistic execution but strongly divided regarding its substantive merit. Other awards won by the film include the Robert Award for best Danish film, The Nordic Council Film Prize for best Nordic film and the European Film Award for best cinematography. The film was dedicated to the Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky, a Soviet and Russian filmmaker, writer, film editor, film theorist and opera director, widely regarded as one of the finest filmmakers of the 20th century with films such as Ivan's Childhood, Andrei Rublev...

Prologue: A couple passionately makes love, while their young son Nick climbs out of his crib, and climbs onto a desk by an open window. The son falls to his death on the snowy ground below.

Chapter One: Grief: During Nick's funeral, She collapses.

This clip shows the Prologue and the first scene of Chapter One.

The version released by Criterion Collection on BluRay and DVD is in fact the uncut, so-called "Protestant Version" which has a run time of 108 minutes. The cut, so-called "Catholic Version" has a run time of between 100 and 104 minutes (approximately). This clip is from my collection of Criterion movies. I am sure one brief scene shown in this clip has been removed from the "Protestant version." This movie is rated NC-17 which is a notch higher than R so you have been warned. Please do not watch this clip if you have a sensitive soul, although this is a very short clip and you won't see anything at all that has earned this movie an X rating at the Cannes film festival in 2009. If you are interested to know, I have not watched this movie and not sure if I will. I do not like horror movies, but this clip is fascinating to me, and the music is great... I stopped watching after she collapsed. That's it for me.

According to some critics, Antichrist delivers enough beauty, terror and wonder to qualify as the strangest and most original horror movie of the year. Its Best Cinematographer at the 2009 European Film Awards was shared with Slumdog Millionaire as both films were shot by Anthony Dod Mantle. It was nominated for Best Director and Best Actress but lost to Michael Haneke for The White Ribbon and Kate Winslet for The Reader respectively.

Now, about the music... the Prologue uses an aria from Rinaldo, an opera by George Frideric Handel, composed in 1711 with its spectacular vocal and orchestral passages. Rinaldo has been cited as one of Handel's greatest operas. Of its individual numbers the soprano aria "Lascia ch'io pianga" has become a particular favorite and it is a popular concert piece, sung by the who's who of opera. That's what you hear in this clip. If you really are into film soundtracks like I am, you may want to know this...

LASCIA CH'IO PIANGA

From the Soundtrack of the movie Antichrist

Run time............: 5 mins
Language...........: Italian

From the opera RINALDO
Georg Friedrich Handel

MEZZO SOPRANO: Tuva Semmingsen
DIRECTED BY: Bjarte Eike

VIOLIN 1:
Bjarte Eike
Fredrik From
Hanna Yomark

VIOLIN 2:
Peter Spissky
Jens Solgard

VIOLA:
Torbjarn Kahl
Vappu Helasvuo

CELLO:
Thomas Pitt
Judith-Maria Olofsson

VIOLONE: Mattias Frosternson

THEORBO: Fredrik Bock

HARPSICHORD: Allan Rasmussen

Recorded in Kastelskirken in Copenhagen.

Note: Sorry about the incorrect aspect ratio. This clip is shown as 1.85:1. It should have been 2.39:1, rather than waiting to fix that, I want to get it out now and may come back to fix it later.

Lyrics:

Lascia ch'io pianga mia cruda sorte
E che sospiri la liberta

E che sospiri
E che sospiri la liberta

Lascia ch'io pianga mia cruda sorte
E che sospiri la liberta

Il duolo infranga queste ritorte
De miei martiri sol per pieta
De miei martiri sol per pieta

Lascia ch'io pianga mia cruda sorte
E che sospiri la liberta

???

Lascia ch'io pianga mia cruda sorte
E che sospiri la liberta

[English translation:]

Let me weep over my cruel fate,
And sigh for my lost freedom!

May the pain shatter the chains
of my torments just out of mercy.

Let me weep over my cruel fate
And sigh for my lost freedom

Madonna Madonna

2011-03-14T09:43:00.000-04:00

Some (or all) of you who stumble into my blog might think that I am a bore who only shows old stuff such as old movies, classical concerts and OMG operas. That may be true most of the time... but... I do have other stuffs that I do not show you. To prove that point, here is a rock concert. To be fair, I only show the part that is less "turbulent" so if you are not too happy, my advice for you is to get a copy of Madonna's Sticky and Sweet Tour and you can watch it all. Get a high definition (BluRay) version because it's much better than watching my clip here.

The Sticky & Sweet Tour was the eighth worldwide concert tour by American singer Madonna to promote her eleventh studio album, Hard Candy. It began in August 2008 and was Madonna's first tour from her new recording and business deal with Live Nation.

This clip is 33 minute long, and it starts with the song "Devil Wouldn't Recognize You" featured Madonna atop a piano, cloaked in a black shroud. She was surrounded by a circular video screen which showed imagery of waves splashing and rainfall. Madonna then performed "Spanish Lesson," featuring a flamenco style dance solo by Alexander Kolpakov. She played the guitar once again for "Miles Away." "La Isla Bonita" featured the Ukrainian gypsy group, Kolpakov Trio, incorporating the gypsy wedding song, "Lela Pala Tute." At the end of the song, Madonna marched ahead with a band of violin players to the front of the stage and then sat aside with her dancers for a solo performance from Kolpakov Trio, who performed the traditional song "Doli Doli." She returned to the stage for "You Must Love Me," the Academy Award winning song from Evita. What is not included is what follows that has political messages, and I try to remain neutral here.

The Sticky & Sweet Tour broke many records in terms of its ticket sales. Madonna performed to over 3.5 million fans in 32 countries, grossing a total of US $408 million, making it the fourth highest grossing tour of all time, only behind U2's U2 360° Tour, AC/DC's Black Ice World Tour and The Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang Tour. Madonna's still remains the highest grossing tour by a solo artist.

Wanna Laugh Till You Drop?

2011-03-11T00:14:00.001-05:00

Enough sad stuff and grief and all that depressing mood dragging you down... Do you believe that laughter is contagious? I dare you to watch this clip and keep a straight face. Being a high quality freak... I am not too happy about the quality of this video clip that I swiped from the net somewhere. It's dark, it's not wide screen etc... but it is delightful. Watch it... You may want to have seconds.

Of course, credit has to go to where it's due. This is the work of Christine Rabette in 2003 entitled "Merci!"

Norwegian Grief

2011-03-09T22:49:00.002-05:00

Haruki Murakami is a well known Japanese writer who has fantastic support from fans in Japan and also internationally. Norwegian Wood is one of his most successful novel written in 1987 that made him famous. Now, a very talented Vietnamese-French movie director, Tran Anh Hung, after 4 years of begging, was able to convince Murakami to allow his book to be made into a movie. Tran Anh Hung debuted his career with "The Scent of Green Papaya," went on to make "The Vertical Ray of the Sun" and he was the winner of a Golden Lion award at the Venice Film Festival in 1995 for Cyclo. I beg to differ here because I really do not like Cyclo too much. Nonetheless, I blogged a clip of that movie here. Beginning the project in July 2008, Tran Anh Hung finished Norwegian Wood very recently.

The film, shot in Tokyo and at some stunning Japanese countryside, was first screened at the Venice Film Festival in September of 2010, but did not go for general release in Japan until December 11, 2010. This year, the much-anticipated film has been shown in the Netherlands, Vietnam and the Czech Republic. It was screened at the Deauville Asian Film Festival in France on March 9 (which is today) before general release in the UK on Friday, March 11, in Sweden on March 18 and in Singapore in April. Germany will have to wait until July to see this title.

The fanfare at Deauville tickled my curiosity so I took a peek at the movie to see what the scoop is all about. One of the conditions Murakami demanded for his OK was that the movie must follow the book closely. Now, I know that's easier said than done... So I watched the movie... to see whether the movie director was able to remain faithful to the book. I was impressed with a scene in Norwegian Wood and want to share it with Murakami and Tran Anh Hung's fans worldwide.

I think that the motion picture version wins big in terms of imparting to the viewers the immense grief of the young man mourning the loss of the girl he loves deeply. The words in the book appear lame and can ill compete with the powerful image and sound of the motion picture. By watching this clip, you may be able to imagine in some way the extent of human grief upon the finality of the loss of a loved one. If I were Murakami, after watching this scene, I would rewrite that portion of my book.

If you have the time, read the book and go see the movie.

How to make and eat giant noodles

2011-03-08T03:16:00.000-05:00

Director Yimou Zhang, famous for his movies such as Raise the Red Lantern (1991,) Hero (2002,) House of Flying Daggers (2004,) Curse of the Golden Flower (2006,) all beautifully filmed movies, ventured into comedy in this quite strange "A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop" in 2009. It also was filmed with his keen artistic eyes but this movie bombed big time in the US. I guess comedy taste does change with geographical locations.
That movie was reported as follows::

Opening Weekend: $35,033 (USA) (5 September 2010) (5 Screens)
Gross: $190,666 (USA) (19 December 2010)

But I do like this clip taken from that movie, what do you think?

He is making "The 13 Women of Nanjing" now, and I need to get a peek at it when it becomes available in 2012. Did you know that he dated Gong Li? She had a very interesting role as Miss Hua in "The Hand," a short feature in the movie Eros... But I don't think I would blog that.

Trong Mắt Em Là Biển Nhớ

2011-03-07T04:02:00.000-05:00

Thơ: Trường Đinh
Nhạc: Ngô Thụy Miên
Ca Sĩ: Tuyết Dung

Từng đêm em về như môi sương
Từng lời em ru như gió buồn
Anh đan giấc mơ trên mây trời xa
Trên sóng tay em, anh là nhẫn cỏ
Em trong anh là màu hoa
Em trong anh là cơn sóng
Người ơi, như cánh diều bay trên đồng vắng
Giấc mơ anh cho em long lanh
Mình gọi tên nhau trong nắng hồng
Mình gọi quê hương trong mong manh
Tình ơi, dĩ vãng miền thật trắng
Kỷ niệm chiều xin mãi còn xanh...

Từng làn thu êm như hương hoa
Từng mùa thơ trao nắng quê nhà
Em thêu nhánh hồng bên giòng sông xưa
Trong mắt môi nồng, em là biển nhớ
Anh trong em là cơn mưa
Anh trong em là gió mùa
Người ơi, những lá me rơi bên sân trường
Đóa hoa gầy bay ngàn tha phương
Mình gọi tên nhau trong dỗi hờn
Mình gọi xuân về trên quê hương
Bao giờ, nắng nở trên nhụy trắng
Cho vơi nỗi nhớ một trời thênh thang

Confutatis

2010-09-14T23:53:00.009-04:00

The Requiem Mass in D minor (K. 626) by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was composed in Vienna in 1791 and left unfinished at his death on December 5th, 1791. A completion by Franz Xaver Süssmayr was delivered to Count Franz von Walsegg, who had anonymously commissioned the piece for a requiem mass to commemorate the February 14 anniversary of his wife's death.

The Requiem was scored for 2 basset horns in F, 2 bassoons, 2 trumpets in D, 3 trombones (alto, tenor & bass), timpani (2 drums), violins, viola and basso continuo (cello, double bass, and organ or harpsichord). The vocals include soprano, contralto, tenor, and bass soloists and a mixed choir. It was never known how much of this work was finished by Mozart before his death.

Here is a dramatization of this story by Peter Shaffer's 1979 play Amadeus that later was made into the 1984 movie of the same name, directed by Milos Forman. This movie won 8 Oscar awards.

This clip is at the very end of the movie and it is quite sad but it contains some seemingly educated dramatization of how composers compose their orchestral music... How much is real and how much is fiction? Only a real professional musician may be able to tell. But this is great movie and music making and editing. When you are down and tearful, this Requiem may cheer you up. It does me. Go get a CD for yourself.

Of the ten parts, Confutatis and Lacrimosa are featured and they are listed here for you to enjoy...

Confutatis:

Confutatis maledictis,
When the damned are cast away

flammis acribus addictis,
and consigned to flames of woe,

voca me cum benedictis.
call me among the blessed.

Oro supplex et acclinis,
Bowed down in supplication I beseech Thee,

cor contritum quasi cinis,
my heart as though ground to ashes

gere curam mei finis.
help me in my final hour.

Lacrimosa:

Lacrimosa dies illa,
O this day full of tears,

qua resurget ex favilla
when from the ashes arises

judicandus homo reus.
guilty man to be judged:

Huic ergo parce Deus,
O Lord, have mercy upon him,

pie Jesu Domine,
gentle Lord Jesus,

dona eis requiem! Amen!
grant them eternal rest! Amen!

Watch until the very end of the clip... you may learn a few things by reading the end credits. The music you hear at the end is the second movement, Romance, of Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, KV 446, by the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, conducted by Neville Marriner. Unless you are French, you may think you hear a strange language during the second part of this clip. I noticed it too late and too lazy to redo this clip... but the dialogue is not very important in this movie anyway, right?

Queen of the Night

2010-09-11T18:45:00.003-04:00

It's hard to leave Bergman's Magic Flute without talking about the Queen of the Night aria, so here it is... while I still can get to it easily...

In act 2 of Mozart's Magic Flute, a particularly demanding aria, the Queen of the Night's "Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen" ("The vengeance of Hell boils in my heart") reaches a high F6 note which is rarely found in opera. Mozart wrote this with his sister-in-law Josepha Hofer in mind, who premiered the role of the Queen of the Night and apparently she had no problem to reach the high notes. Guinness lists the highest demanding note in the classical repertoire as G6 (and Mozart does get there in his 'Popoli di Tessaglia'.) The Queen of the Night aria only gets to F6 at 1,397 Hz (about 88 Hz lower than G6.)

This movie is in Swedish and I did not bother with the subtitle. But if you must, here is what the Queen of the Night said in her aria, addressing her daughter princess Pamina, ordering her to kill her Dad Sarastro (Wow! This is so melodramatic:)

"Revenge and hate are raging in my bosom, with desperation, I am torn apart. You now must kill Sarastro to avenge me. Yes, kill him to avenge me or be disowned forever in my heart. Disowned by me forever you shall be....

You shall be disowned by me. Forever you shall be disowned by me.

Second verse...

You shall be plagued forever, cursed and renounced forever. I ruthlessly shall sever every bond between us both. I'll curse you forever. I shall sever every bond between us both. If by your hand Sarastro does not perish. God of vengeance, hear a mother's oath."

Magic Flute

2010-09-11T14:23:00.004-04:00

I wanted to blog this Mozart overture for a long time. The original DVD of this movie is from the Criterion collection and it is stupidly protected by some strange encryption. It gave me a lot of grief to extract this clip. I bought this DVD a long time ago and finally can share it here so you can see a piece of work by a world renown movie director, a great cinema photographer and hear music by the one of a kind Mozart.

The Magic Flute (German: Die Zauberflöte, K. 620) is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue. The opera was premiered in Vienna on 30 September 1791, at the suburban Freihaus-Theater auf der Wieden. Mozart conducted the orchestra himself so if you have seen the movie Amadeus, you know that it is quite faithful with this fact.

This clip is the overture of The Magic Flute (Swedish: Trollflöjten.) This is Ingmar Bergman's 1975 film version of Mozart's opera Die Zauberflöte. It was intended as a television production and was first shown on Swedish television but was followed by a cinema release later that year. The film was shown at the 1975 Cannes Film Festival, but was not entered into the main competition. The film is notable as the first made-for-television film with a stereo soundtrack.

Photography was by Sven Vilhem Nykvist (3 December 1922 – 20 September 2006) who was a Swedish cinematographer well known for his work in Bergman's films. He won Academy Awards for his work on two Bergman films, Cries and Whispers (Viskningar och rop) in 1973 and Fanny and Alexander (Fanny och Alexander) in 1983, and the Independent Spirit Award for Best Cinematography for The Unbearable Lightness of Being.

As the overture begins, a close-up shot of the face of a young girl who was Ingmar Bergman's daughter fills the screen. Her face reminds me of La Joconde (Mona Lisa in case you do not know the alternate name of this famous painting) by Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci during the Renaissance. During the overture, Nykvist showed close-ups of a multitude of faces in the audience. Bergman's daughter reappears frequently. At the end, a portrait of Mozart himself is shown then the curtain rises and the opera begins. Unfortunately, I don't know which of Bergmans' daughter is seen here as he has several from different wives. He also fathered a secret daughter from an affair with a Swedish countess in the 1950s. If you know, leave a comment here.

Update: I was told by a savant secret admirer from afar that the young "La Joconde" in question here is by Liv Ullmann. I should have guessed... because Ullmann was clearly Bergman's favorite leading lady.

Woody

2010-09-10T20:23:00.002-04:00

Wild Man Blues is a 1998 documentary film directed by Barbara Kopple, about the musical avocation of actor/director/stand up comedian Woody Allen. The film takes its name from a jazz composition sometimes attributed to Jelly Roll Morton and sometimes to Louis Armstrong and recorded by both (among others). Allen's love of early 20th century New Orleans music is depicted through his 1996 tour of Europe with his New Orleans Jazz Band. Allen has played clarinet with this band for over 25 years.

In this clip when his European tour was in Paris, on the way back to New York, Allen showed off his musical talent that I did not know he had, although I knew he had a jazz band. No wonder the music tracks of his movies all sound wonderful.

Although Allen's European tour is the film's primary focus, it was also notable as the first major public showcase for Allen's relationship with Soon-Yi Previn. For this story, you need to learn more about Mia... or may be I will blog about it in the future here.

Prague

2010-09-05T23:56:00.005-04:00

This blog is selfishly made for myself. To avoid fumbling around looking for my DVD and play a very fine symphony orchestra, I blog this so I can get to it much easier and faster on line.

The Symphony No. 38 in D major, K. 504, was composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in late 1786. It was premiered in Prague on January 19, 1787, a few weeks after Le nozze di Figaro opened there. It is popularly known as the Prague Symphony.

The Prague Symphony was scored for two flutes, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, timpani and strings.

The work has three movements:

1. Adagio—Allegro, 4/4 (Sonata form)
2. Andante in G major, 6/8 (Sonata form)
3. Finale (Presto), 2/4

This performance was recorded from the Stefaniensaal, a concert hall famous for its perfect acoustics, in Graz, Austria. In the DVD, this symphony followed a performance by Cecilia Bartoli, the orchestra of Concentus Musicus Wien was conducted by Nikolas Harnoncourt.

Do you ever imagine how the individual musician belonging to a large symphony orchestra works? This video may give you a way to appreciate the seriousness and their importance to the beautiful music that you hear. As with all Mozart's Andante movements with usually immense sadness but wonderfully melodic undertone, I love this one and I do hope you do too. So, drop your hair, kick back, leave your worries outside and enjoy. After this symphony, Mozart composed his famous trilogy of symphonies 39, 40 and 41.

Barbarella

2010-09-01T21:31:00.003-04:00

OK, here's the deal. I do not want to put off this any longer so here it goes... a classic "space strip tease" by none other than Hanoi Jane.

This is a very old 1968 Dino de Laurentis movie. If you don't know who that is, you are too young and need to look him up. This film is by Roger Vadim. The same remark above applies. Roger Vadim was an interesting French movie director. He loved to show his usually beautiful wives naked in his movies. Jane Fonda was his third "beautiful" wife and she stars here as Barbarella, Queen of the Galaxy. This quite cheesy and at times funny movie received very high rating marks.

After watching this clip, you have to take a test: Who is the producer? Who is the director? Who wrote the music? Who are the co-stars? You missed all that? What were you watching? You were supposed to focus on the stylized text on the screen and nothing else! You failed the test! Watch it again and pay attention the next time, please!

The Wolf

2010-06-05T17:09:00.003-04:00

I like Quentin Tarantino's work. Pulp Fiction is perhaps his most well known movie. In any case, I'll let you be the judge about his work. Be warned, the language in this clip may be offensive for some of you. There are many good reasons why it was rated "R." I think the writing is so ... talented. You really need to watch this movie to truly enjoy this clip.

Guido's Muse

2010-05-27T17:34:00.002-04:00

Fellini's classic Eight and a Half begins unconventionally but breathtakingly hypnotic. It may take several viewings to begin appreciating the work of this master. This clip is at the very beginning of the movie when the movie director is getting treatment in a health spa where he gets the first vision of his muse Claudia. In Nine, the muse is Nicole Kidman. As can be seen in this clip and throughout this movie and many others of Fellini, religious undertone is quite prevalent.

Asa Nisi Masa

2010-05-27T09:17:00.002-04:00

To give Eight and a Half equal time, this clip is one key scene of Fellini's famous movie. The title is the "magic spell" cited by the little girl. According to some account, the children of Italy play a game of word, adding "sa," and "si" alternately to fragments of a word to form secret messages. Here, the word is Anima, for "soul," thus the secret spell "Asa NIsi MAsa" that Guido was projecting to the mind reader. Sort of Felliniesque telepathy. This is my favorite scene. There is another one that introduces Guido's muse... coming soon...

Musical Italiano

2010-05-24T13:40:00.002-04:00

OK, this is my last clip for Nine, then I'll move onto something else... may be Chicago? Hmmm...? I'm not sure what this scene is about as it does not seem to have any relationship with Eight and a Half. But the novel black and white intermixed with color shooting, and the energetic dancing are mesmerizing. Where do the dancers get all the energy? My final verdict: Nine is no Eight and a Half.

A Call from the Vatican

2010-05-24T13:36:00.002-04:00

The earlier clip about Saraghina in Nine was "Ti Voglio Bene/Be Italian." While I have this video at hand, I might as well finish what I wanted to do: comparing Nine and Eight and a Half. This one is "A Call from the Vatican" where Carla/Penelope Cruz who is Guido's mistress shows the hot for him. Nine is Eight and a Half plus a Half which is the music. Got it?

Rob Marshall directed the movie Chicago in 2002, and that was a great musical. Nine, his next musical gets less enthusiastic reviews, but I think the song and dance choreography are quite good. I can't really say the same thing about Cruz' singing talent, but you've got to admit that she's quite hot. She's got the nomination for best supporting actress in this role. You be the judge.

Sheryl Crow

2010-05-23T21:27:00.003-04:00

I'm on a rare roll, so I am forging ahead with some of the clips I wanted to put here but could not get to them... until now. It is not so simple to extract clips from a long video and make them stream on the internet. I don't know how the others post their clips on Youtube, but it is quite a bit of work for me, and this clip is worth it.

It is from the movie DeLovely, telling the life of American music composer Cole Porter (1891–1964.)

"Begin the Beguine" is one of his work that is so famous and well-liked that any notable singer must include it in his or her repertoire. Porter composed the song at the piano in the bar of the Ritz Hotel in Paris. In October 1935, it was introduced by June Knight in the Broadway musical Jubilee produced at the Imperial Theatre in New York City.

So, because it is so famous, you can find this tune played and sung by every band, and every singer, but I think Sheryl Crow by far gave the best performance in this movie. The song in this clip is edited to be shorter than its longer version that is more than 4 minutes. The last refrain, whose lyric sounds a bit cheesy to me, is left out, so this is just perfect. Enjoy!

Saraghina - 8½

2010-05-22T15:32:00.002-04:00

Because I already was committed and showed you the 2009 version of Saraghina, I feel obligated to also show you, for comparison, its genesis: Federico Fellini's 8½.. For those of you who are not old enough to know and appreciate, 8½ (pronounced Otto e mezzo in Italian) is a 1963 film directed by Italian director Federico Fellini. Co-scripted by Fellini, Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, and Brunello Rondi, it stars Marcello Mastroianni as Guido Anselmi, a famous Italian film director. Shot in black-and-white by cinematographer Gianni di Venanzo, the film features a soundtrack by Nino Rota with costume and set designs by Piero Gherardi.

The film's title refers to 8½ being Fellini's eighth and a half film as a director. His previous directorial work consisted of six features, two short segments, and a collaboration with another director, Alberto Lattuada, the latter three productions accounting for a "half" film each.

This clip is about 1 hour into the movie, introducing Saraghina. If you pay attention, Marcello Mastroianni's glimpse of a large woman descending a slope precipitated him back into his childhood and a memorable encounter with Saraghina.

8½ won two Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film and Best Costume Design (black-and-white). Acknowledged as a highly influential classic, it was ranked 3rd best film of all time in a 2002 poll of film directors conducted by the British Film Institute.

What do you think? You like better Nine, or 8½? I think it's a slam dunk for the older master of the 60s. I love Nino Rota's music in films, such as in this clip. Haunting and it stays with you.

Saraghina - Nine

2010-05-21T22:20:00.002-04:00

Nine is a musical based on a book by Arthur Kopit, music and lyrics by Maury Yeston. The story is based on Federico Fellini's semi-autobiographical film 8½. It focuses on film director Guido Contini, savoring his most recent (and greatest) success but dreading his imminent 40th birthday and a midlife crisis blocking his creative impulses and entangling him in a web of romantic difficulties in early 1960s Venice.

The original Broadway production opened in 1982 and ran for 729 performances, starring Raul Julia. The musical won five Tony Awards, including best musical, and has enjoyed a number of revivals. One of which is Nine, a 2009 American/Italian musical film directed and produced by Rob Marshall. The screenplay of this film is by Michael Tolkin and Anthony Minghella. Maury Yeston composed the music and wrote the lyrics for the songs.

The 2009 Nine premiered in London and was released in the United States on December 18, 2009, in New York City and Los Angeles, with a wide release on December 25, 2009.

Despite mixed to negative reviews, Nine was nominated for four Academy Awards: Best Supporting Actress (Penélope Cruz who gave a really hot show stopper in the movie... you wanna see it?), Best Art Direction (John Myhre (AD), Gordon Sim (SD)), Best Costume Design (Colleen Atwood) and Best Original Song ("Take It All" Music and Lyrics by Maury Yeston.)

To fully appreciate this movie, you must know Fellini's Eight and a Half well. Many of Fellini's movies cast women of dubious appearance and characters. They are usually large and voluminous. In Eight and a Half, one such character is Saraghina, who fascinated the kids living nearby her beachfront adobe. Nine did not follow that tradition in that the 2009 Saraghina is as sexy as sexy can be... but you can see the sand from the original Fellini's beach scene. Watch how young Guido is punished after being caught red handed in his fascination with the forbidden Italian fruit.

Should I show you next the original Saraghina of Eight and a Half? Come back here... give me a little bit of time...

A Brand New Angel

2010-05-20T07:55:00.002-04:00

Hello blog.... I can't believe one year has gone by... and this blog has been completely neglected. I have too many excuses, but ... who cares. I am now ready to go again anew. Here is a short clip from a recently released Oscar winner. In general, I do not like country music, but this clip changed my mind a bit. Jeff Bridges sings and acts all the way to earn his 2010 best actor Oscar award. You be the judge after you go see the movie Crazy Heart. Many complain that he mumbled the words he sings, and I agree. I had to look up the lyrics of this song to know exactly what he is singing about. I think it's about someone who died and went to heaven, if there is such a place, a rather sad song. The lyric? Here they are:

Well it rained last night
and the stars shone bright
and way off yonder
we heard the whippoorwill.

At the first light of dawn
we heard that he was gone.
Our hearts were empty
and our eyes were filled.

Open the gates;
welcome him in.
There's a brand new angel,
a brand new angel
with an old violin.

In music we heard
all the songs of the birds.
And he said that some songs
are like clear fall days.

But he played his last refrain
oh but the song will remain.
Though he's put his bow down
and closed his case.

Open the gates;
welcome him in.
'Cause there's a brand new angel,
there's a brand new angel
with an old violin.

In this clip, only half of the song made it to the movie. If you are interested in listening to the entire song, click on the "Play" button below:

And here's the clip. Click on it to see the video that is about 3 minutes long for half of the song.

Flea Trainer

2009-05-16T08:15:00.001-04:00

Limelight is a type of stage lighting once used in theaters and music halls. An intense illumination is created when an oxy-hydrogen flame is directed at a cylinder of lime (calcium oxide,) which can be raised to 2572°C before melting. The light is produced by a combination of incandescence and cando-luminescence.

This vaudeville act is from a 1952 Charlie Chaplin movie named "Limelight" that has the famous music score by Chaplin himself.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

2009-04-24T00:26:00.000-04:00

Enough opera already! How about a no nonsense, to the point, not beating around the bush proposal of love that worked?

Viens Malika

2009-02-15T10:26:00.002-05:00

Lakmé is an opera in three acts by Léo Delibes to a French libretto by Edmond Gondinet and Philippe Gille, based on the 1880 novel Rarahu ou Le Mariage de Loti by Pierre Loti. The story is set in India in the mid nineteenth century when the British were suppressing many religious sects. This clip is from the Sydney Opera House, performance of the Australian Opera conducted by Richard Bonynge with Joan Sutherland as priestesse Lakme and Huguette Tourangeau as Malika, her servant.

Its complex melodies are Delibes' signature. Viens, Mallika, Dome epais... (The Flower Duet) in Act 1 is the most familiar music from this opera because of its use in advertisements, as well as in films (one of which is The Hunger, with vampire Catherine DeNeuve and victim Susan Sarandon where this melody is beautifully introduced in piano.) British Airways TV Commercial theme is widely known as they used this famous duet in an ad, but I think United airlines used it first way back in the 70's.

If you hear some annoying clicks, it's not your system. They come from the software I use and one of these days, I will fix this problem. The video is a bit dark, from the original recording.

Diva

2009-02-11T22:00:00.001-05:00

I hope you do like Opera. Well, if you don't, you must like movies like the Fifth Element. What do they have in common? The scene you may be watching if you click on the photo below. This is one very famous scene in Gaetano Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, sung by Dame Joan Sutherland, no less. It is the well known "Mad Scene" that inspired the also famous "Diva" scene in the Fifth Element movie with Bruce Willis. But this is the real thing... So, enjoy. It's 13:48 minutes long and I think well worth your time. You may learn to like opera after all. It's different!

Lip My Stocking

2008-12-21T07:53:00.000-05:00

It's about time I add a new entry to this poor long neglected blog. I was trying to decide if this should be a very sad, or a very funny clip. To brighten your holiday, I am refraining from making a gloomy clip that may make you cry... So enjoy this one. There are two separate clips from "Lost in Translation (2003.)" The title of this blog refers to another scene that is not included so you need to watch this excellent movie if you want to know what it is about.

I Confess

2008-08-09T22:14:00.001-04:00

I wanted to show this segment of a gem of a movie (Night On Earth-1991) for a long time, and finally got to it. The original language is Italian so I went through the trouble to include the subtitle track. I find this hilarious, irreverent to some, but so funny... Italy at its best. This segment should be rated "R" (for those of you who are not familiar, the American rating system uses letters to "tell" viewers what kind of contents is to be expected in a given movie, "R" is not for kids) so watch it but please do not be offended. Set aside the time for its entire length of 26 minutes and 23 seconds. You may like it, I think.

GOTJ

2008-06-26T00:36:00.000-04:00

If you feel depressed or blue, my advice to you is take some time off to watch this movie "George of the Jungle." It is so silly, but it was a BIG hit in the US.

Bolero Trocadero

2008-04-16T15:41:00.003-04:00

This is an unusual performance of Ravel's Bolero. The outdoor location is Paris' Place du Trocadero between the Eiffel tower and the Musee de l'Homme. If you want to know where this comes from, wait until the end of the clip. To guess the time period, spot to see a young Sharon Stone in a couple of scenes. The vocalist is easily recognizable Geraldine Chaplin. It's a bit long (12 minutes 50 seconds) and I hope you like it. I do.

How To Catch A Train

2008-03-06T09:20:00.002-05:00

Let It Be

2008-02-07T21:31:00.000-05:00

A sad rendition of The Beatles' "Let It Be!"

Teach Physics to a Dog

2008-01-10T10:55:00.001-05:00

Charlot

2007-10-22T00:33:00.000-04:00

The director is Louis Malle, the music is Rondo Capriocioso from Camille Saint Saens' Violin Concerto #3.

Anita

2007-09-10T23:08:00.000-04:00

There is a bittersweet moment in this movie clip that I think is very Proustian a la "Recherche du Temps Perdu." The movie is Intervista, meaning "Interview" which is a pseudo autobiography of movie director Federico Fellini. Intervista is in Italian with English subtitle. I cannot easily extract the clip with the English subtitle so you have to see it without. The key feature really needs no words as it is pure magic. It is when Marcello Mastroianni in a Mandrake costume performed magic to bring back the lost time when young Marcello had a magic moment with then young and beautiful Anita Ekberg in the famous Trevi Fountain of Rome. The clip starts out with Fellini paying a surprise un-announced visit to an aging but still beautiful Anita Ekberg at her estate on the beach. Where did the time go? It is magic.

Toreador

2007-08-12T23:06:00.000-04:00

Gypsy

2007-08-11T23:39:00.001-04:00

I hope you enjoy this Gypsy song... music by Bizet.

Forget Me Not

2007-08-10T01:24:00.000-04:00

I need to get off my rocker chair and dust off my video tools to refurnish my blog here. It has been a long, long time... OK. Promised! Very soon! How about a musical? You like musical?

You Never Can Tell

2007-05-21T01:11:00.000-04:00

Nessun Dorma

2007-05-01T00:37:00.000-04:00

Warning... Rated R, containing some nudity and images may be disturbing to some sensitive souls. This is from an old favorite movie of mine that I finally got around to revive. The clip contrasts gruesome scenes with beautiful and sensual allegorical images, all accompanied by a world class musical score with a happy ending.

Schubert Andantino

2007-04-08T17:12:00.000-04:00

The music is Franz Schubert's Piano Sonata No.20 in A major D959 : Andantino (second mouvement,) for an Easter Sunday.

Papaya salad

2007-04-07T16:36:00.000-04:00

Here is a better illustration (than in an earlier similar blog) of one way Vietnamese papaya (Carica Papaya) salad is prepared. The garnish is beef jerky with sesame seeds. The sauce is flavored fish sauce spiced with fresh red pepper. At the end of the clip is a glimpse of another famous ingredient for a Vietnamese soup: the young flower buds of the "Thien-Ly" vine (Telosma Cordata or Odoratissima.) The "Thien-Ly" vine and its flowers are featured prominently in Vietnamese songs and poems romancing young love mainly because of its beautiful heart shaped leaves.

Bunraku

2007-03-31T02:28:00.000-04:00

The works of Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653-1724) that skillfully describe the nature of humankind are performed as bunraku (a theater form originated in the sixteenth century uniting narration, music and puppets) and kabuki (a type of traditional Japanese theater in which men play female characters,) both of which are still familiar in today's Japan.

Bunraku, the traditional Japanese puppet theater (ningyo joruri) has a 400 year history. Bunraku was originally just the name of a theater troop that performed puppetry, but over time, the word evolved to indicate ningyo joruri itself, and it is now the official name of this form of puppetry. It is a style peculiar to Japan, in which the recitations of a male narrator, shamisen music performance and puppetry are united.

Bunraku features the superior literariness of gidayu, a style of reciting dramatic narratives, the highly qualified musicality, artistry, and dynamic sound of the thick-necked shamisen and the technique required for 3 puppeteers to handle 1 puppet (in Chikamatsu's time, puppets were smaller than they currently are, so each puppet was handled by one puppeteer). Its high quality and sensitive expressiveness and interpretation describe feelings of affection in a realistic manner.

Additionally, the precision of the heads, wigs and clothing of the puppets, together with the set decorations, lighting and sound effects blend to create a peculiar beauty in the theater space. Those who have seen this form of puppetry say it's unparalleled anywhere in the world, and it often overwhelms the audience.

This is a bunraku puppet theater scene from "Meido no Hikyaku " (Messenger from Hell) that opens a movie by legendary director and actor Takeshi Kitano. The puppet show does have very poetic narration. Since overlaying the subtitle takes too much time that I do not currently have, below you can read the words that accompany the puppets' actions...

The scene depicts a messenger distressed because his beloved is being sold to another man, while the courtesan laments the fact that the other man wanted to buy her with money. Bunraku uses several operators in luxurious kimonos: A story teller, the "tayu." The singer "joruri" sits behind the scene and interprets all the characters in the play. The music is by a sole musician playing a "shamisen" which is a kind of three string guitar. The musician not only plays the music score but he also creates sound effects such as rain, wind etc... Each puppet which can be as large as 4' or 5' is handled by three male operators. The Master Operator "omozukai" appears full face and he takes care of the facial expressions of the puppet (movements of the eyes, eye brows and mouth which can all move;) and the right arm. His first assistant handles the left arm and his second assistant is in charge of the legs, or the clothing of the female characters who do not have legs. The assistants wear black and black hoods.

Here are the words of "Messenger from Hell:"

I beg you
Calm your heart
Do not be a slave
To such miserable feelings
Who has put you in this state?
No one else...
No other than I...
I, Umekawa...
I am to blame for all
Should I be grateful?
Or should I lament?
I don't know

Cries...

Read my heart
Bowed in touching distress
She cried anguish tears
Onto the pieces of gold
The coins soon resembled
Beautiful and bright kerria flowers
All covered with dew
Bathed in her tears
The coins sparkled brilliantly

Second act...
....
Honor, glory and fortune
Are only fleeting grains of sand
Their traces become dust
Scattered on the roads to Yamato
To be forever trampled on.

Papaya & Gac

2007-03-16T17:05:00.000-04:00

In this clip, if you do not blink and pay attention, you may be able to witness a modern day rendering of the traditional way Vietnamese women prepare meals in their homes. On the far right, you may be able to make out the preparation of a famous and delicious green papaya salad. The woman first peels the green papaya and then uses a hand shredder to shred it into long threads for the salad. In the middle is a rare close up viewing of a fruit named "Gac (Momordica Cochinchinensis Spreng)" whose highly pigmented seeds are used to provide the briliantly decorative color red in various dishes. There are no tables and they prepare their food, outdoors, at ground level, sitting on tiny stools.

Easy To Love

2007-03-15T00:18:00.000-04:00

I felt so guilty to have given you such a sad blog in "Every Time We Say Goodbye," so this is to make it up to you... The tower on the left in the background is the Eiffel.

Every Time We Say Goodbye

2007-03-14T21:21:00.000-04:00

Lan Nghiem-Phu

Hedgehogs and Foxes

The Worst Movie Ever

Toshiba English Intelligence

Sophia

TinTin

Queen of the Night... Not

Womanizer

Agnus Dei

Pina in HTML5

Cremation

Pina

Dull Boy Jack

Automaton

Indians and Cowboys

Love At First Sight

Frida Kahlo

Me Love You Long Time

Willie

Miminashi Hoichi

Easy To Love

Shooting Fish in a Barrel

At Sea Funeral

Operatic Impromptu

Glass Symphony

E La Nave Va

Carmen

Cinema Paradiso

Toto and Alfredo

The Wizard of Oz

Recuerdos de la Alhambra

Orfeu Negro

I Want a Woman

Amarcord

Mr. Bojangles

Ya Ya

Metafora

Time Travel

Midnight in Paris

A Gift To You and To Me

Hable Con Ella

Valtzer Triste

Taboo

Henry & June Soundtrack

Je M'Ennuie

June and Anais

Louveciennes

Tropic of Cancer

June Mansfield

Parlez-moi D'Amour

Sous Les Toits de Paris

Nin

The Real ITMFL

I'm In The Mood For Love

Neruda

Chico and Rita

Lascia ch'io pianga

Madonna Madonna

Wanna Laugh Till You Drop?

Norwegian Grief

How to make and eat giant noodles

Opening Weekend: $35,033 (USA) (5 September 2010) (5 Screens) Gross: $190,666 (USA) (19 December 2010)

Trong Mắt Em Là Biển Nhớ

Confutatis

Queen of the Night

Magic Flute

Woody

Prague

Barbarella

The Wolf

Guido's Muse

Asa Nisi Masa

Musical Italiano

A Call from the Vatican

Sheryl Crow

Saraghina - 8½

Saraghina - Nine

A Brand New Angel

Flea Trainer

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Opening Weekend: $35,033 (USA) (5 September 2010) (5 Screens)
Gross: $190,666 (USA) (19 December 2010)