Your Russia

Poor little neglected blog...

2009-03-05T15:07:00.003-06:00

Man, I haven't even managed to keep up my film journal, which was pretty much the only thing left here at Your Russia. Life has taken some interesting turns lately. The bad: major layoffs at work, resulting in the craziest pace at my office that I have ever experienced. The good: new relationship status with Jason (what a great friend-to-boyfriend transition!). It should be an interesting/exciting/busy year. But hopefully I can resurrect this blog soon—at least my film journal.

November Film Journal

2008-12-08T12:17:00.002-06:00

Fear, Anxiety & Depression (Todd Solondz, 1989)
Don't Look Now (Nicolas Roeg, 1973)
Billy the Kid (Jennifer Venditti, 2007)
The Terminator (James Cameron, 1984)
Funny Games (Michael Haneke, 2007)
Se7en (David Fincher, 1995)
The Sign of Leo (Eric Rohmer, 1959)
Welcome to the Dollhouse (Todd Solondz, 1995)
Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (John McNaughton, 1986)
The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (Dario Argento, 1970)
Le Corbeau (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1943)

October Film Journal

2008-11-05T15:57:00.002-06:00

Mulholland Dr. (David Lynch, 2001)
Lost Highway (David Lynch, 1997)
Pop Skull (Adam Wingard, 2007)
A Nightmare on Elm Street* (Wes Craven, 1984)
A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge (Jack Sholder, 1985)
Images (Robert Altman, 1972)
Halloween* (John Carpenter, 1978)
[Rec] (Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza, 2007)
The Tell-Tale Heart (Ted Parmelee, 1953)
The Evil Dead (Sam Raimi, 1981)
The Evil Dead II (Sam Raimi, 1987)
Wolf Creek (Greg Mclean, 2005)
Tales from the Crypt (Freddie Francis, 1972)
Creepshow (George A. Romero, 1982)

September Film Journal

2008-11-04T12:58:00.002-06:00

La Dolce Vita* (Federico Fellini, 1960)
Danielson: A Family Movie* (J.L. Aronson, 2006)
In the Company of Men (Neil LaBute, 1997)
The Collector* (William Wyler, 1965)
Hallelujah! Gorilla Revival (Jason LaRay Keener and Jeremiah Ledbetter, 2008)
Safe* (Todd Haynes, 1995)
I Think We're Alone Now+ (Sean Donnelly, 2008)
Wresting in Tijuana+ (Gustavo Vazquez, 2007)
Baghead+ (Jay Duplass and Mark Duplass, 2008)
Present Company+ (Frank V. Ross, 2008)
Nights and Weekends+ (Greta Gerwig and Joe Swanberg, 2008)

August Film Journal

2008-09-09T15:56:00.002-05:00

The Dark Knight*+ (Christopher Nolan, 2008) - IMAX
The Misfits (John Huston, 1961)
The Happening (M. Night Shyamalan, 2008) - best comedy I've seen in ages and worth every penny of my $1
The Thing (John Carpenter, 1982)
The Last Emperor* (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1987) - TV/director's cut

"Choose an instrument."

2008-08-12T18:09:00.008-05:00

And with those words, my participation in a can of zebras musical side-project with Jason LaRay Keener began. And then it grew into an ongoing music/video project. "Hilarious Mustard" is the first offering from the album They make pills for people like you.

Click here for project info.

Or go here and click to watch the video in high quality.

July Film Journal

2008-08-01T10:32:00.003-05:00

Written on the Wind (Douglas Sirk, 1956)
Peter Ibbetson (Henry Hathaway, 1935)
Batman (Leslie H. Martinson, 1966)
Ratatouille (Brad Bird and Jan Pinkava, 2007)
Batman Begins (Christopher Nolan, 2005)
Niagara (Henry Hathaway, 1953)
WALL-E*+ (Andrew Stanton, 2008)
Artificial Intelligence: AI (Steven Spielberg, 2001)
The Dark Knight+ (Christopher Nolan, 2008)
Raiders of the Lost Ark*+ (Steven Spielberg, 1981)
A Woman Under the Influence (John Cassavetes, 1974)

*rewatch
+theater

June Film Journal

2008-07-07T17:26:00.000-05:00

The Lovers (Louis Malle, 1958)
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (David Lynch, 1992)
Secrets & Lies* (Mike Leigh, 1996)
Gone with the Wind*+ (Victor Fleming, 1939)
Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (Paul Mazursky, 1969)
Jaws*+ (Steven Spielberg, 1975)
The Color of Lies (Claude Chabrol, 1999)
Control (Anton Corbijn, 2007)
WALL-E+ (Andrew Stanton, 2008)

*rewatch
+theater

May Film Journal

2008-06-03T09:05:00.004-05:00

The Seventh Continent (Michael Haneke, 1989)
Knuckleface Jones (Todd Rohal, 1999) (short)
The Guatemalan Handshake (Todd Rohal, 2006)
La Cérémonie* (Claude Chabrol, 1995)
Lola Montès (Max Ophüls, 1995)
Time of the Wolf (Michael Haneke, 2003)
The Ruins+ (Carter Smith, 2008)
Six Figures Getting Sick (David Lynch, 1966) (short)
The Alphabet (David Lynch, 1968) (short)
The Grandmother (David Lynch, 1970) (short)
A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick, 1971)
Le Feu follet (Louis Malle, 1963)
Aguirre, the Wrath of God*+ (Werner Herzog, 1972) (in Nashville!)
The Strangers+ (Bryan Bertino, 2008)

*rewatch
+theater

April Film Journal

2008-05-01T14:57:00.002-05:00

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Tobe Hooper, 1974)
Waking Life* (Richard Linklater, 2001)
Zodiac* (David Fincher, 2007)

*rewatch

Hmm. I sense a pattern. I'll predict two films for May and one for June. Ha.

March Film Journal

2008-04-01T12:18:00.004-05:00

Persepolis (Vincent Paronnau and Marjane Satrapi, 2007)
Sweetie (Jane Campion, 1989)
I'm Not There (Todd Haynes, 2007)
There Will Be Blood* (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)

* repeat viewing
theater

What a strange month—that's a record for lowest number of films watched. And wow, three of the four were seen in a theater. But a lot of things are to blame here, including the fact that I'm currently caught up in Twin Peaks.

I should also note that I did attend a night of short films, including Reining Nails' A Commotion of Dogs. As always, well done, guys.

February Film Journal

2008-02-29T15:50:00.000-06:00

Lola (Jacques Demy, 1961)
Charleston Parade (Jean Renoir, 1927)
All That Heaven Allows (Douglas Sirk, 1955)
My Brother's Wedding (Charles Burnett, 1983)
Casablanca* (Michael Curtiz, 1942)
The Forest for the Trees (Maren Ade, 2003)
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (Andrew Dominik, 2007)
Christmas in July (Preston Sturges, 1940)
Funny Ha Ha* (Andrew Bujalski, 2002)
Quiet City (Aaron Katz, 2007)

*rewatch
theater

January Film Journal

2008-02-01T08:45:00.000-06:00

Psycho* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)
Five Easy Pieces (Bob Rafelson, 1970)
My Night at Maud's* (Eric Rohmer, 1969)
We Don't Live Here Anymore (John Curran, 2004)
Sherrybaby (Laurie Collyer, 2006)
The Green Ray* (Eric Rohmer, 1986)
Crazy Love (Dan Klores and Fisher Stevens, 2007)
Cat People* (Jacques Tourneur, 1942)
Isle of the Dead* (Mark Robson, 1945)
The Member of the Wedding (Fred Zinnemann, 1952)
Curse of the Cat People* (Gunther von Fritsch and Robert Wise, 1944)
I Walked with a Zombie* (Jacques Tourneur, 1943)
There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)
Mystic River (Clint Eastwood, 2003)
Imitation of Life (Douglas Sirk, 1959)

*rewatch
theater

"Excuse me, but I think you're in my car."

2008-01-14T15:44:00.000-06:00

I had to knock on my own car's window and say just that to two older ladies who decided my car was their car after we all left a wonderful Shostakovich concert a little over a week ago. Silver cars are a dime a dozen, and I walked to one a couple of cars down from mine and hit the unlock button on my remote. I didn't see the headlights flash, so I thought, "Oh, that's not my car." Meanwhile, I had managed to unlock my own car's doors. These two ladies were close behind me, and they saw my car's lights flash and thought they had unlocked their car. What do you know? A comedy of errors! I turned back to my actual car and saw them getting in, so I thought once again, "Oh, that's not my car." Then I wandered around a bit wondering where the heck I had parked and knowing that I had left my car in the general vicinity. Finally, after briefly considering the terrible prospect that maybe my car had been stolen, I pressed the remote again and saw my lights flash. I also saw the two women sitting inside. So I proceeded to tell them they were in the wrong car. I love how they just ignored all of my stuff—umbrella, gloves, empty gum package. The lady in the driver's seat simply said, "Well, honey, this IS your car." I mean, what else could she say, really? The passenger said, "Well, this is the first time anything like this has ever happened!" The driver replied, "Well, no, there was that one time Judy drove off in someone's Cadillac." Hmm. Anyway, they were parked right next to me. Call me crazy, but if you arrive at the symphony wearing a fur coat and driving a Lexus, why on earth would you think you'd be driving home in a Corolla? Way to downgrade, ladies!

December Film Journal

2008-01-02T10:20:00.000-06:00

Boyfriends and Girlfriends* (Eric Rohmer, 1987)
No Country for Old Men (Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, 2007)
Grey Gardens* (Ellen Hovde, Albert Maysles, David Maysles, and Muffie Meyer, 1975)
Juliet of the Spirits (Federico Fellini, 1965)
Day for Night (François Truffaut, 1973)
Killer of Sheep (Charles Burnett, 1977)
White Christmas* (Michael Curtiz, 1954)
Salaam Bombay!* (Mira Nair, 1988)
Meet Me in St. Louis* (Vincente Minnelli, 1944)
It's a Wonderful Life* (Frank Capra, 1946)
Away from Her (Sarah Polley, 2006)
Streetwise (Martin Bell, 1884)
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (José Quintero, 1961)
Love in the Afternoon* (Eric Rohmer, 1972)
The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (Nicolas Gessner, 1976)
All the King's Men (Steven Zaillian, 2006)
3 Women* (Robert Altman, 1977)
Rebecca* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1940)
Anastasia (Anatole Litvak, 1956)
Lolita (Stanley Kubrick, 1962)
Heaven Can Wait (Ernst Lubitsch, 1943)
Harvey (Henry Koster, 1950)

*rewatch
theater

Merry Christmas to All!

2007-12-14T12:49:00.000-06:00

Today's my last day at work for the year, so I'll be scarce for a while. I leave you with a link to the Sounds Familyre blog, where the good folks are posting a different song by a different artist every day for 13 days, and you can download them all for free. Thanks, Daniel Smith!

So I actually went on a vacation...

2007-12-03T16:01:00.000-06:00

...to Asheville, North Carolina—really lovely city and area.

November Film Journal

2007-12-03T14:00:00.000-06:00

Shadows (John Cassavetes, 1959)
Woman in the Dunes (Hiroshi Teshigahara, 1964)
Marie Antoinette* (Sofia Coppola, 2006)
Il Grido (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1957)
The Bicycle Thief* (Vittorio De Sica, 1948)
8 1/2* (Federico Fellini, 1963)
Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (Jan Harlan, 2001)
Lacombe Lucien (Louis Malle, 1974)
The Aviator's Wife* (Eric Rohmer, 1981)
Sybil (Daniel Petrie, 1976)

*rewatch
theater

October Film Journal

2007-11-01T09:02:00.000-05:00

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (Richard Lester, 1966)
The Departed (Martin Scorsese, 2006)
Eyes Without a Face (Georges Franju, 1960)
Vernon, Florida (Errol Morris, 1982)
A Letter to Three Wives (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1949)
If.... (Lindsay Anderson, 1968)
Jules and Jim* (François Truffaut, 1962)
Throne of Blood (Akira Kurosawa, 1957)
Donnie Brasco (Mike Newell, 1997)
The Phantom of the Opera (Rupert Julian, 1925)
Splendor in the Grass* (Elia Kazan, 1961)
Punch-Drunk Love* (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2002)

*repeat viewing
theater

Changes

2007-10-09T16:43:00.001-05:00

Lots of things have been going on lately, including changes at work. The company is implementing a new workflow process because production is increasing so much. I now have a new manager, and I have a new position on some projects (while still filling the copy editor role for many others). For the first time, I'll be working as a project editor on some titles, so I sort of feel like I'm learning the ropes again. I'm trying to get used to the idea of setting schedules, leading meetings, working more directly with designers and the production team, etc. It should be interesting.

September Film Journal

2007-10-03T17:02:00.000-05:00

The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980)
Junebug (Phil Morrison, 2005)
Volver* (Pedro Almodóvar, 2006)
Claire's Knee* (Eric Rohmer, 1970)
The Mayor of Casterbridge (David Thacker, 2003)
The Innocents* (Jack Clayton, 1961)
Pickup on South Street (Samuel Fuller, 1953)
Old Joy (Kelly Reichardt, 2006)
Lifeboat* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1944)
Petulia (Richard Lester, 1968)
Contempt (Lean-Luc Godard, 1963)
Kingdom of Crooked Mirrors (Aleksandr Rou, 1964)
Roman Holiday* (William Wyler, 1953)
The New World* (Terrence Malick, 2005)
The Knack...and How to Get It (Richard Lester, 1965)
Insomnia (Erik Skjoldbjærg, 1997)
Fast, Cheap & Out of Control (Errol Morris, 1997)
Ballad of a Soldier (Grigori Chukhrai, 1959)
The Marrying Kind (George Cukor, 1952)
Gimme Shelter (Albert Maysles, David Maysles, and Charlotte Zwerin, 1970)
Notes on a Scandal (Richard Eyre, 2006)

Sidewalk Motion Picture Festival:
Deconfliction (Edward Tyndall, 2007) (short)
I Always Do My Collars First: A Film about Ironing (Allison Bohl and Conni Castille, 2007) (short)
Fish Kill Flea (Brian Cassidy, Aaron Hillis, and Jennifer Loeber, 2007)
All Day Long (Andrew Semans, 2007) (short)
Hannah Takes the Stairs (Joe Swanberg, 2007)
From the Files of a Very Concerned Psychologist (Sam Frazier, Jr., 2007) (short)
Lunch (James Brown, 2007) (short)
Shrinks (Carey Rayburn, 2007) (short)
Cutting Teeth* (Jonathan Barnette, 2007) (short)
Reunion Days (Christopher Haber, 2007) (short)
All Angels Have Rat Tails* (Jason LaRay Keener and Jeremiah Ledbetter, 2006) (short)
Cup of Joe (Christopher Hilleke, 2007) (short)
Asclepius Fandango (Sam McDavid, 2007) (short)
Mr. Extion (Griffin Hood and Barry Battles, 2007) (short)
The Jesus Guy (Sean Tracey, 2007)

*repeat viewing
theater

August Film Journal

2007-08-31T14:27:00.000-05:00

Nights of Cabiria* (Federico Fellini, 1957)
North by Northwest* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1959)
The Ten Commandments* (Cecil B. DeMille, 1956)
Hiroshima mon amour* (Alain Resnais, 1959)
Dial M for Murder* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954)
Zodiac (David Fincher, 2007)
The Beales of Grey Gardens (Albert Maysles and David Maysles, 2006)
Vertigo* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958)
Sweet Charity (Bob Fosse, 1969)
Gone with the Wind* (Victor Fleming, 1939)
Notorious* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1946)
I, Claudius (Herbert Wise, 1976)
The Puffy Chair (Jay Duplass, 2005)
Rear Window* (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954)
L'Enfant* (Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, 2005)

*repeat viewing
theater viewing

Contacts: A Rant

2007-08-15T12:24:00.001-05:00

That's my right eye. The bubble, which I'm surprised shows up in photos, would be a contact lens, of course. And it's a mighty expensive one—$144 just for that one alone.

I've been going through an ordeal during the last several months:

Trips to my optometrist: seven and counting

Pairs of lenses tried so far: four

Number that gave me clear vision: zero. And that's even after the adjustment period. Nothing has worked, and my vision with the lenses has been about the same as if I just took off my glasses and used nothing. I mean, some lenses have been slightly better than others, and I've been able to see enough to get around, but it's been frustrating and has given me headaches and very sore eyes. I just got my fourth pair this week, and they are about the same. I'm somehow supposed to wear the lenses to work, but I can't, especially when I'm paid to read all day. So that leaves me nights and weekends, and forget that if I actually want to do something like watch a movie, drive without worrying too much, etc.—you know, stuff where it would be particularly nice to be able to see. While wearing my third pair, though, I did manage to go to the store, cook dinner, have a friend over, and generally entertain. No clear vision, but at least they were comfortable enough to wear all day, and on that particular day, I wore them about 11 hours—a record for me.

Condition of my eyes: Weird. At least, that's what they tell me. They're extremely flat, need a plus power, and are astigmatic—a perfect storm of conditions that my doctor warned me about on my first visit; he told me it would be quite the challenge to fit me properly, but we were both willing to go for it. At this point, every pair of disposable soft lenses has been ruled out because they don't come in the proper size or power that I need. Wait, there was one that might have worked—my doctor showed it to me in the big book o' contact lens info so I could see it's been discontinued. Sigh. So I'm now trying the conventional lenses that have to be worn a year or more.

Times I've fainted during all of this: zero (shocking). I've always been particularly squeamish about my eyes and have dreaded the thought of putting anything in them, much less attempting to take something out. The photo above is proof that I actually did it—yay!

Times I've felt faint: Several when I first started, but the worst case was when they were inserted for the very first time. Because, really, there's nothing quite like learning how to do that in the office's lobby in front of the receptionist and other patients. Seriously, they couldn't have given me my own room for that?! I've had my own room ever since, but the first time was very public and ended with them having to bring me water and direct a large fan at my face. Quite embarrassing. Other highlights: A patient came in and actually asked what on earth they were doing to me. Another patient showed sympathy by saying she used to be as bad as me. And the woman who trained me declared loudly, "Bless your heart, you're shaking like a leaf!" (I was.) She also told the doctor, "Well, she's been at it for 20 minutes and has only managed to get one in." Guess what, though? As soon as she left me alone and quit watching me, I could put the things in and take them out.

How hard are they to put in and take out?: I've found that it depends on the thickness of the lenses. In general, I think they are easier to insert than remove. Once, I wondered if it would be possible to cry the things out.

The pluses of all this?: I've not paid for a single visit after my first one. My doctor charges the same base fee no matter if you require one fitting or 20. And the lenses haven't cost me anything so far. Also, I bought some new sunglasses and got to wear them. And yes, I am really proud of myself for getting over the squeamishness. I've also been surprised that some lenses have been very comfortable. I've had some that I couldn't really feel. Here's hoping comfort and clarity will converge someday for me.

Recent weather: This is our tenth straight day of temps at 100 degrees or more (105 yesterday). And we're having a draught. Contact wearers know this can dry out lenses, but I really just had to throw this in here because, dang, it's been HOT, and I just wanted to say that.

Apologies I owe my readers (if you're still reading): At least one—for this rambling complaint.

July Film Journal

2007-08-01T09:09:00.000-05:00

Sans Soleil (Chris Marker, 1983)
Time Indefinite (Ross McElwee, 1993)
The Godfather* (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972)
A Star Is Born (George Cukor, 1954)
Climates (Nuri Bilge Ceylan, 2006)
Lawrence of Arabia (David Lean, 1962)
Brief Encounter* (David Lean, 1945)
Forbidden Games (René Clément, 1952)
Picnic at Hanging Rock* (Peter Weir, 1975)
The Godfather: Part II* (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974)
Little Children (Todd Field, 2006)
The Devil and Daniel Johnston (Jeff Feuerzeig, 2005)
Ballerina Furnace (Jason LaRay Keener and Jeremiah Ledbetter, 2007) [short]
Paths of Glory (Stanley Kubrick, 1957)
Dans l'Obscurité (Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, 2007) [short]
Barry Lyndon* (Stanley Kubrick, 1975)
Ivan's Childhood (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1962)
Ballerina Furnace* (Jason LaRay Keener and Jeremiah Ledbetter, 2007) [Saw this with 20-something other shorts; don't have the info for those, but all were part of a 48-hour film contest.]
Mary Poppins* (Robert Stevenson, 1964)
The 39 Steps (Alfred Hitchcock, 1935)

*repeat viewing
theater viewing

Gateway Films/Directors

2007-07-20T14:31:00.000-05:00

Every once in a while, someone will ask me what got me into films. It's a conversation that's always interesting because I enjoy hearing how others got started, too. As for me, I'm relatively new to all this. I enjoyed watching movies when I was growing up, but they were never a priority in my family—we never had cable and were still using an old hand-me-down Betamax machine after everyone else had moved on to the VCR. I do remember one notable title that I still think of as my own gateway film, though the gate really didn't swing wide open until years later. That film is Citizen Kane. I can't remember when or how Kane came to my attention; I just remember really wanting to see it. When I was around 15 or so, I found out that it was going to air on PBS, so I recorded it. I was especially interested in seeing if it would live up to all of the hype. To my absolute delight, it did. This was cinema that somehow felt different.

Then several years passed, and I know I watched films from time to time and even loved some of them, but I didn't actively seek them out or think about them critically. My college offered no film classes (though students there can now minor in film), and since I was an English major/history minor, most of my time went to reading, anyway (not that I regret that).

I've kept a film journal for each year since mid-2003, which was when I started participating in an online film community. When I look back at that year's viewings, I see many mediocre titles on the list. Those were my pre-Netflix days, and I was just getting my feet wet. I relied on my library a lot, and then I finally joined Netflix late in the year and began receiving titles I’d waited a long time to see. I won’t even attempt a top 10 for that year, but I will mention a few films that really intrigued me: Punch-Drunk Love, with its strange and dizzying world of colors and sounds and seesawing emotions; Picnic at Hanging Rock, which provides a mystery it absolutely refuses to solve; A.I. Artificial Intelligence, which is a mess in some ways, but I’ll own up to finding it quite interesting; and Charles Laughton’s curious and brilliant expressionistic gem, The Night of the Hunter.

So I guess I would consider those more early gateway films. I've definitely encountered several gateway directors over the years; they're the ones that stopped me and really shook me up. Bergman, Tarkovsky, and Dreyer are just a few.

Anyway, thinking about this made me look over all of my film journals and try to come up with "best of" lists. More accurately, though, I was looking for the films that had an impact on me. My rules for choosing were loose. I was aiming for 10 titles per year, but I cheated and went with 11. I’m not even sure about the criteria these titles had to meet. Some I've named below are films that deeply disturbed me, maybe even films I have no immediate desire to see again, yet they helped shaped my viewing habits and woke me up to the idea of cinema as an art form. Some of these I started, gave up on, then returned to later. Some may not have struck me at the time, but looking back now, they definitely belong on the list. I limited myself to one title from a director per year, meaning I had to throw out Stalker in favor of Solaris, and Persona for Cries and Whispers. This whole process was tough—now I see why I usually avoid making lists.

2004:
Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979)
Cries and Whispers (Ingmar Bergman, 1972)
La Dolce Vita (Federico Fellini, 1960)
Le Fils (Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, 2002)
The Ice Storm (Ang Lee, 1997)
Russian Ark (Aleksandr Sokurov, 2002)
Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (F.W. Murnau, 1927)
Three Colors: Red (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1994)
Touch of Evil (Orson Welles, 1958)
Under the Skin of the City (Rakhshan Bani Etemad, 2001)
Wit (Mike Nichols, 2001)

2005:
L’Argent (Robert Bresson, 1983)
Barry Lyndon (Stanley Kubrick, 1975)
Funny Ha Ha (Andrew Bujalski, 2002)
Hiroshima mon amour (Alain Resnais, 1959)
The Lady from Shanghai (Orson Welles, 1947)
The Marquise of O (Eric Rohmer, 1976)
Ordet (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1955)
Pather Panchali (Satyajit Ray, 1955)
Solaris (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1972)
Vivre sa vie (Jean-Luc Godard, 1962)
Winter Light (Ingmar Bergman, 1962)

2006:
Badlands (Terrence Malick, 1973)
The Best of Youth (Marco Tullio Giordana, 2003)
Brief Encounter (David Lean, 1945)
Cat People (Jacques Tourneur, 1942)
Grave of the Fireflies (Isao Takahata, 1988)
Onibaba (Kaneto Shindô, 1964)
Red Beard (Akira Kurosawa, 1965)
3 Women (Robert Altman, 1977)
Umberto D. (Vittorio De Sica, 1952)
The Up Series (Paul Almond/Michael Apted, ongoing)
The Virgin Spring (Ingmar Bergman, 1960)

Now I'll turn the question over to you. If anyone would like to share how you got into films or if you have any gateway films or directors, please do.

Nice Ink

2007-07-18T13:02:00.000-05:00

Here's a neat follow-up to my previous post about the symphony: The New Yorker's article about three regional symphonies. The Alabama Symphony Orchestra gets a write-up on the second page, and it's a good read. The author saw the first performance of the program I attended; I was there on the second night.

June Film Journal

2007-06-29T08:45:00.001-05:00

Shansho the Bailiff (Kenji Mizoguchi, 1954)
Mrs. Miniver (William Wyler, 1942)
The Young Girls of Rochefort (Jacques Demy and Agnès Varda, 1967)
The Cranes Are Flying* (Mikheil Kalatozishvili, 1957)
Vanilla Sky (Cameron Crowe, 2001)
Can't You Hear the Wind Howl?: The Life & Music of Robert Johnson (Peter Meyer, 1998)
The Spirit of the Beehive* (Víctor Erice, 1973)
Shopgirl (Anand Tucker, 2005)
Bedazzled (Stanley Donen, 1967)
Sherman's March: A Mediation to the Possibility of Romantic Love in the South During an Era of Nuclear Weapons Proliferation (Ross McElwee, 1986)
Vagabond (Agnès Varda, 1985)
La Jetée* (Chris Marker, 1962)
Goodfellas* (Martin Scorsese, 1990)

*repeat viewing

In lieu of an actual post...

2007-06-12T17:46:00.000-05:00

...I give you...nail polish bottles. Just having fun with my macro button on my camera lately.

Excuses

2007-06-11T12:51:00.000-05:00

My apologies to anyone who expected the L'Eclisse discussion last week. Work is totally overwhelming at the moment. (Is there such a thing as a free weekend or evening anymore?) The next two weeks are going to be especially rough (wrapping up a huge project). If anybody wants to post about the film, please do. I'll join in if/when I can.

May Film Journal

2007-06-01T11:07:00.000-05:00

Baby Doll (Elia Kazan, 1956)
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (John Ford, 1962)
Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht (Werner Herzog, 1979)
Through Fire, Water and...Brass Pipes (Aleksandr Rou, 1968)
The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir, 1939)
Talk to Her (Pedro Almodóvar, 2002)
Stroszek (Werner Herzog, 1977)
Some Like It Hot (Billy Wilder, 1959)
They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (Sydney Pollack, 1969)
The Devil Wears Prada (David Frankel, 2006)
L'Eclisse (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1962)
La Belle et La Bête* (Jean Cocteau, 1946)
The Europeans (James Ivory, 1979)

Not a film, but also watched: Sister Wendy's Story of Painting (1997)

*rewatch

L'Eclisse Discussion

2007-05-29T12:45:00.000-05:00

**EDIT**: In spite of my rather wishy-washy intro here, it looks like the discussion has kicked off in the comments below.

OK, folks, how do we want to do this? I've seen the film. Has anyone else? This one's no different from most of my other encounters with Antonioni. Somehow, I fail to really connect with his films, but I'm eager to hear your thoughts and am sure that what you say will help me out. This week's looking pretty busy for me, so we can either give everyone some time to watch/rewatch this and then start the discussion next week, or we can....well, feel free to make suggestions below.

Personality Tests

2007-05-24T13:29:00.001-05:00

I love personality quizzes and the like. I took a break earlier to take this intelligence test (explained here). My results:

Your Personal Evaluation

The Seven Intelligence Areas

Musical: 10
Intrapersonal: 9
Linguistic: 8
Spatial: 6
Interpersonal: 5
Bodily-Kinesthetic: 4
Logical-Mathematical: 2

A Short Definition of your Highest Score

Musical - the ability to understand and develop musical technique, to respond emotionally to music and to work together to use music to meet the needs of others, to interpret musical forms and ideas, and to create imaginative and expressive performances and compositions. Possible vocations that use the musical intelligence include technician, music teacher, instrument maker, choral, band, and orchestral performer or conductor, music critic, aficionado, music collector, composer, conductor, and individual or small group performer.

That both surprises me (since I don't even play an instrument) and doesn't surprise me (since I love music so much and find it moves me in a way that nothing else really can). It makes me sad, though, because I feel like I missed my calling in life. Oh well, at least the linguistic category is near the top—pretty important because that does have something to do with my career. It's also comforting to know that collecting music or knowing a lot about music can be considered a vocation. Ha, I wonder if I can fit that into my résumé somehow....

By far, my favorite of these sorts of tests are the Myers-Briggs ones. Myers-Briggs is a source of endless fascination for me. I recently took this test and found I still register as an INFJ (my closest pairing is S/N). Here are two write-ups explaining my type (with links to all the other type descriptions). A lot of that sounds like me (barring the psychic phenomena, which sounds like it would be considered extreme, anyway). And I ended up in a job that is all about "dealing with minutia or very detailed tasks," and I think I'm pretty good at it.

Anyway, this isn't just so you can read all about me. I'm curious about all of you. If you wish to kill some time, have fun with these tests and please feel free to share your results. I know a few of your types already, but don't let that stop you from sharing.

Symphonic Ramblings

2007-05-17T12:16:00.000-05:00

My life has been increasingly harried lately, but this weekend, I'll take what amounts to a mini vacation, even if it only lasts a couple of hours or so. I'll be going downtown to hear the Alabama Symphony Orchestra perform Beethoven's Symphony no. 3 (the Eroica), a true watershed moment in the history of the composer as well as in the history of music itself. (You can listen to it and read about it here. Check out the fun anecdote in the first paragraph under "A Closer Look.")

I've had a soft spot for Beethoven for years. I spent many, many hours in the music aisles of my college library researching his life and music for a paper and speech. Accounts of his life break my heart more than a little—the pain goes beyond the obvious tragedy of his deafness. All of this can be heard in his works, which ushered music from the refined Classical Period to the stormy and dramatic age of Romanticism.

I should go to more events like this, and from now on, I plan to. About a month ago, I decided to check the orchestra's Web site, and I found that the season was almost over. I had missed Dvorak's wonderful Symphony no. 9 (From the New World, and anybody who's a fan of classic Westerns and the music in those films should check this out—very influential), along with the magnificent Symphony no. 1 from Brahms. But things started to look up when I discovered a letter from the new conductor. Apparently, his goal is to perform all nine of Beethoven's symphonies over the course of three years, starting with the current season. That meant I'd already missed his first two (which I have never heard). Ah well. I may have missed the appetizers, but I found out just in time to enjoy the main course—this one, my friends, is where Beethoven came into his own. And to think that he had been considering suicide around this same time period.

So next season will bring us Symphony no. 5. The season after that will include no. 7 (the second movement is my favorite; some here have heard it used very effectively in Karloff and Lugosi's The Black Cat). And then, a bit later, oh my word, we shall hear no. 9. That might be too much for me. (Can you tell I especially go for the stormier odd-numbered ones?)

Anyway, I’ve not been around an orchestra for years (other than a small one at church). I guess the last time I heard a "real" orchestra full of professional musicians was many years ago when I attended a performance of Verdi’s Rigoletto. Before that, I went to the symphony sometime in my early teens, but that was actually a night of show tunes. All I remember are many variations of "Hello Dolly" and a man a couple of rows in front of me who kept waving his arms and pretending he was playing the trombone. Then there was my art survey class in college, which doesn’t really count, but I like the story anyway. This class met in the music building, and an orchestra down the hall rehearsed the same piece of music during every class for weeks. The art wasn’t dull, but the professor was, so I found myself concentrating on that beautiful, stirring music. When they finally stopped playing it and moved on to something else, I was crushed. I’ve never heard that piece of music again, and I still have no idea what it was.

All of this scattered post is really just my way of saying I’m excited about this weekend. And now I must ask a question out of curiosity: Does anyone here dabble in any kind of music, play an instrument, etc.? Heck, feel free to list your favorite symphonic works if you’d like.

Summer Film Series

2007-05-04T14:30:00.000-05:00

After vote-tampering, the lack of a runoff vote, and a delay in announcing the final list, the Alabama Theater finally gave us the titles that will be shown during the film series. There are some surprises here. Guess the theater couldn't get rights to some of the other titles. And they dropped the film count from 12 to 10. Anyway, the films:

The Godfather
Breakfast at Tiffany's
Lawrence of Arabia
Apollo 13
Dr. Zhivago
Mary Poppins
The Ten Commandments
Vertigo
Gone with the Wind
Rear Window

April Film Journal

2007-04-30T09:05:00.000-05:00

The Fallen Idol (Carol Reed, 1948)
Carrie (William Wyler, 1952)
The Letter (William Wyler, 1940)
Marty (Delbert Mann, 1955)
Counsellor at Law (William Wyler, 1933)
A Moment of Innocence (Mohsen Makhmalbaf, 1996)
Marie Antoinette (W.S. Van Dyke, 1938)
Volver (Pedro Almodóvar, 2006)
Seconds (John Frankenheimer, 1966)
All About My Mother (Pedro Almodóvar, 1999)
Nashville (Robert Altman, 1975)

A Quick Post from the Other Side

2007-04-27T08:44:00.000-05:00

Well, folks, I hope to return to regular blogging before too long. Things at work have taken a turn towards insanity lately, but I'm aiming to get back to the land of the living one of these days. For now, it's deadlines, deadlines, deadlines.

Hope everyone is doing well. Many thanks to those of you who have e-mailed me. You amuse me, keep me sane, and brighten my days, and it is always great to hear from you, no matter how busy I am.

Athens Stories, Part 2

2007-04-18T12:30:00.000-05:00

My grandmother was an extraordinary cook. Moreover, cooking was an absolute joy to her (I've been told I take after her a bit in both temperment and looks, but I didn't inherit her total adoration of cooking, nor her great culinary skills). She was old-school, where everything was made from scratch, and she somehow knew how to walk into a kitchen and throw a meal together out of just anything—a testament to Depression-era cooking, no doubt.

Breakfast was a big deal, and I remember waking up to gigantic spreads of food whenever my family visited. Surely she didn’t cook like this all the time, but she went all out when we were there (this was before the era of health concerns, obviously). Homemade biscuits were the staple. The light and fluffy creations were shaped by hand, and she served them with butter (of course) and a choice of syrup, honey, or jelly. Bacon was served on the side, and because one type of meat was obviously not enough, she would cook up some sausage, too. Naturally, if she was frying sausage, she was pretty much obligated to add some flour to the pan drippings and whip up some sausage gravy. If this gravy wouldn’t do, she could offer alternatives: tomato gravy or, if she'd cooked country ham, red-eye gravy (for the coffee lovers). And she couldn’t forget the grits—this was a Southern meal, after all.

All of this brings me to my favorite biscuit-related story (and everyone should have one). As my grandmother told it, she had made a fresh batch of biscuits many years back and had set the skillet on top of the stove so the biscuits could cool a bit. My cousin Kermit (yes, I know—other than the frog, who else has that name?) was back in Athens for a visit with his parents, the aunt and uncle discussed in the previous story. My grandmother hadn’t seen him that morning, but she knew he was next door at my great aunt's. Since no one was with her to partake of the hot biscuits, my grandmother went about her household chores. Kermit could help himself when he stopped by.

A little while later, she heard someone in the kitchen. From the dining room, she peeked around the corner to see Kermit, with his sandy blond hair, his boots, and his jeans, standing over the stove with his back to her, looking as if he had a knife in his hand and was buttering a biscuit for himself. He must have smelled them through the kitchen’s screen door and made a beeline for the treats. Who could blame him for diving on in? She turned to finish up her work, leaving him to enjoy her cooking.

When she was done, she went back into the kitchen to find that every single biscuit was gone. For that matter, Kermit was, too. Well! Not that my grandmother would have begrudged a biscuit to anyone, but this was puzzling, to say the least. Had the boy been starving or something?

A bit later in the day, Kermit returned, and, naturally, she just had to ask him why he ate all of the biscuits. He looked completely blank and asked, "What biscuits?" She told him she’d seen him in the kitchen eating them, but he seemed clueless and denied it. Then it began to sink in as she finally took a good look at him. Sandy blond hair? Yes. Boots? Um...no. Jeans? Nope.

?!?!

She never did discover who her guest was that morning. Obviously, this story is a testament to an era when nobody bothered to lock their doors. Can you imagine a total stranger in your house nowadays? Yikes. To a passerby in need of a free meal, I guess this whole scenario was the perfect invitation to just come on in, and I'm thankful he was only after the biscuits. What I really love is how he took the time to seek out the butter and also, apparently, the jelly while he was there. Hey, if you're going to do something, might as well do it right, huh?

Athens Stories, Part 1

2007-04-05T11:06:00.002-05:00

My late grandmother Rosanna lived in Athens, Tennessee, and she told some terrific stories about my family, the house she lived in, and various people in the town. My sister and I have always said we needed to get these stories down before we forget them. We'll see how this goes. I'll start with a little story from my family's history.

My aunt (one of my grandmother's three children) and uncle had an unhappy marriage. She was a lovely young woman who was a teacher, and he was an ex-serviceman who must have been quite the charmer. Family lore says he spent a mere matter of days in the military before getting discharged with a heart condition—something everybody always says he faked. I'm not really sure how you fake a heart condition, but I've heard he was a master malingerer.

Anyway, they met on a street corner—a day my saintly grandmother described as being one of the darkest days of her life. They married, and he proceeded to lie around the house while my aunt went to work to support him and, eventually, their two kids. This ne'er-do-well was, reportedly, a great cook—he held down a job as a chef for a few months at a swanky club in Athens. But that didn't last, so he turned to other endeavors, including spending my aunt's paycheck on western wear; as the story goes, he blew $500 on cowboy boots and other accoutrements.

One day, he was lying in bed as usual, and my aunt had gone off to work. My elderly great-grandfather, a former Baptist preacher, decided he agreed with the book of Proverbs—that if you spared the rod, you would spoil the child. Apparently, this line of thought extended to in-laws who were all grown up. So he broke off a branch from a tree, went into my uncle's house and then into the bedroom, where he proceeded to dole out some punishment to the Slumbering One.

The end.

March Film Journal

2007-04-02T08:46:00.000-05:00

The Marquise of O* (Eric Rohmer, 1976)
The Collector (William Wyler, 1965)
Naked (Mike Leigh, 1993)
These Three (William Wyler, 1936)
The Children's Hour (William Wyler, 1961)
Holiday (George Cukor, 1938)
Cape Fear (J. Lee Thompson, 1962)
Marie Antoinette (Sofia Coppola, 2006)
Monsieur Verdoux (Charles Chaplin, 1947)
The Killers (Marika Beiku, Aleksandr Gordon, and Andrei Tarkovsky, 1958)
The Killers (Robert Siodmak, 1946)
Young Mr. Lincoln (John Ford, 1939)
A History of Violence (David Cronenberg, 2005)
Requiem (Hans-Christian Schmid, 2006)
When a Woman Ascends the Stairs (Mikio Naruse, 1960)
Cléo from 5 to 7 (Agnès Varda, 1961)
Muriel (Alain Resnais, 1963)
A Face in the Crowd (Elia Kazan, 1957)
Aguirre, the Wrath of God (Werner Herzog, 1972)
Badlands* (Terrence Malick, 1973)
The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson, 2001)
Fitzcarraldo (Werner Herzog, 1982)

* repeat viewing
italics - theater viewing

First Day of Spring

2007-03-20T12:22:00.000-05:00

I shot several springtime photos last weekend. Here's one of them in honor of today:

Edit: A few more shots are up at Flickr if you're so inclined.

Rainy Day

2007-03-15T14:21:00.000-05:00

It's a gray and rainy day here, and my mood pretty much matches the weather. Regarding my comment under the previous blog post, is it really any wonder that I now can't stop thinking of Solaris?

Summer Film Series

2007-03-14T10:55:00.000-05:00

Every year, the Alabama Theater hosts a summer film series, and this year, the folks behind it decided to let people vote on what films they want to see. The process was handled a little strangely—the ballot initially contained a certain number of titles, but later, everyone was given the option of suggesting additional films, and the proposed movies were added to the ballot after many people had already voted. Naturally, this produced a skewed vote, but some of the later entries managed to fare pretty well. Of course, voting like this usually leads to frustration and fears that the final roster will be loaded with cringe-inducing titles (yes, I am wearing my film-snob hat right now). Of course, I'm usually somewhat frustrated with the film list every year, but nobody asked me. Wait, this year, they actually did.

Initial voting is nearing an end, and the next step will be a runoff vote so we can choose 12 titles from the top 20 contenders. Here are the titles that make up the current top 20, along with the number of votes and the percentage of votes they've received (sorry to go all statistical on you):

Star Wars (439) - 4%
The Godfather (407) - 4%
The Ten Commandments (398) - 4%
Lawrence of Arabia (389) - 4%
Ben Hur (384) - 4%
Breakfast at Tiffany's (379) - 4%
Vertigo (374) - 4%
The Man who Shot Liberty Valance (354) - 4%
Gone with the Wind (351) - 3%
Marry Poppins (278) - 3%
Jaws (275) - 3%
Dr. Zhivago (274) - 3%
Forrest Gump (232) - 2%
The Sound of Music (219) - 2%
American Graffiti (197) - 2%
Schindler's List (197) - 2%
Jurassic Park (197) - 2%
North by Northwest (195) - 2%
Potter Movies (177) - 2%
The Maltese Falcon (170) - 2%

I'll just keep quiet about some of these titles. And the ambiguous "Potter Movies" entry is pretty scary. Aren't there, like, 59 of those flicks? Anyway, I especially want to see:

Lawrence of Arabia: I've never seen this at all, but I've been told that it should definitely be seen on the big screen.

Vertigo: I've seen it twice before but never in a theater. My respect for it grows with each viewing, and I've been meaning to watch it again. Also, Bernard Herrmann's score is one of my absolute favorites. (Jeremiah, you get a gold star and my gratitude for nominating this one.)

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance: This one's currently in my Netflix queue, and I've been meaning to see it for a while.

The Godfather: Yeah, I could go for this. Actually, I may be one of the few who prefers Part I to Part II.

I will leave you with this sad fact. I nominated The Night of the Hunter, which was, admittedly, a very late addition to the ballot. It currenly has 3 votes, while The Parent Trap (either the Lindsay Lohan or the Haley Mills version) has 160.

Flannery O'Connor on Fiction

2007-03-08T12:23:00.000-06:00

I recently read several of the essays included in the O'Connor collection Mystery and Manners, where I ran across this relatively simple quote that I especially liked. O'Connor was describing her views on writing, but this can easily translate to films.

A story that is any good can't be reduced; it can only be expanded. A story is good when you continue to see more and more in it, and when it continues to escape you. In fiction, two and two is always more than four.

Amen, sister.

February Film Journal

2007-02-26T09:06:00.000-06:00

The Naked Spur (Anthony Mann, 1953)
Tape (Richard Linklater, 2001)
Jezebel (William Wyler, 1938)
The Best Years of Our Lives* (William Wyler, 1946)
Black Narcissus (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1947)
Small Change (François Truffaut, 1976)
Aliens (James Cameron, 1986)
The Lady and the Duke* (Eric Rohmer, 2001)
Targets (Peter Bogdanovich, 1968)
La Cérémonie (Claude Chabrol, 1995)
The Heiress (William Wyler, 1949)
Four Adventures of Reinette and Mirabelle (Eric Rohmer, 1987)
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1943)
Stella Dallas (King Vidor, 1937)
Secrets & Lies (Mike Leigh, 1996)
Story of a Love Affair (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1950)
Rendezvous in Paris (Eric Rohmer, 1995)
The Unfaithful Wife (Claude Chabrol, 1969)
All or Nothing (Mike Leigh, 2002)
My Man Godfrey (Gregory La Cava, 1936)

*repeat viewing

Blue Skies

2007-02-13T10:43:00.000-06:00

It's a dark, rainy day here today (which I don't really mind—don't get me wrong). My neighbors up north are getting snow, but here, it's just wet. Anyway, a few days ago, we had a very cold, gray day, and there had been rumors of sleet (didn't happen). After work, I pulled into a parking lot and noticed the skies beginning to clear. Of course, I grabbed my camera.

Dusk at the Lake

2007-02-05T16:29:00.000-06:00

I just seem to be in the mood to take shots of the sky lately.

For whoever's interested, Flickr has been updated a bit (though a few of the shots have already been seen here). If I ever have another weekend where I don't have to work, I hope to get out and actually vary my subjects.

Happy birthday, James!

2007-02-01T12:44:00.001-06:00

James
Originally uploaded by DianeR.

Wow, James, you are seven years old today. Unbelievable. How can you possibly be growing up so fast? Have a very happy birthday, dear nephew!

January Film Journal

2007-01-30T17:16:00.000-06:00

One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevitch (Chris Marker, 2000)
La Jetée (Chris Marker, 1962)
I Vitelloni (Federico Fellini, 1953)
Repulsion (Roman Polanski, 1965)
The Machinist (Brad Anderson, 2004)
A Scanner Darkly (Richard Linklater, 2006)
Now, Voyager (Irving Rapper, 1942)
Pride and Prejudice (Joe Wright, 2005)
The Razor's Edge (Edmund Goulding, 1946)
Beloved (Jonathan Demme, 1998)
Sullivan's Travels (Preston Sturges, 1941)
The Devil's Backbone (Guillermo del Toro, 2001)
The Thin Man (W.S. Van Dyke, 1934)
The Tenant (Roman Polanski, 1976)
Dark Days (Marc Singer, 2000)
Mouchette (Robert Bresson, 1967)
The Old Maid (Edmund Goulding, 1939)
An Autumn Tale (Eric Rohmer, 1998)
The Butcher (Claude Chabrol, 1970)
The Story of Adèle H. (François Truffaut, 1975)
The Marriage of Maria Braun (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1979)
Winchester '73 (Anthony Mann, 1950)

Work: Inside and Out

2007-01-24T16:54:00.000-06:00

It has finally decided to become cold here and actually stay cold. A few daffodils at my workplace got a jump on spring, no doubt fooled by the 70-degree weather we had a little over a week ago. They are currently holding their own during the freezing nights and cloudy, chilly days.

Meanwhile, I am stuck inside in the middle of this horrible mess. This is what it looks like when I'm trying to ship two books. Pretty ugly, no? But there's no point in cleaning up until these books go. Anyhow, a slice of life:

So this is what it means to own a digital camera.

2007-01-18T16:00:00.000-06:00

I recently got a digital camera, and I was driving home from work the other night and was stunned by how beautiful the sky was. Then I realized that I had my camera with me. It's just a shame I was, you know, driving. By the time I got out my camera and reached a red light so I could actually get the shot, I'd lost a lot of the sky because of the trees, and I had that darned light post smack in the middle of my view. But still, there's something really great about being able to take a shot just whenever. And I'm still amazed that my new camera is about half the size of my hand; I'm so used to my old-school Pentax (old-school, yes, but still pretty awesome). The more technologically advanced folks have, of course, appreciated this sort of thing for years. I'm late catching up, so I'm still in that phase of childlike wonder. Anway, this is not a great photo, but I'm quite glad I was able to capture at least part of that sky.

Daily Dose of Imagery

2007-01-09T15:35:00.000-06:00

For some time, I've been meaning to highlight Sam Javanrouh's photo blog, Daily Dose of Imagery. I've become quite the fan, and I make it a point to visit every day to check out each new photo. If I'm away from my computer, I make sure to check the entries for the days I've missed. Javanrouh seems to do quite a bit of traveling, so you'll see shots from many different cities around the world included on his site. (Yesterday's photo from Rome, for example, is a stunner.) But he makes his home in Toronto, so that city is represented particularly well. For example, check out this fun composition (be sure to wait for the second box on the page to load and then move your mouse across it). And since something like this is pretty foreign to me, living down here in the deep South, I'm fond of these two shots of Nathan Phillips Square. I'm also drawn to his various photos of cafés, including these two of the Balzac. But I'm only scratching the surface. The archives page is a treasure trove. Enjoy!

Thoughts on the New Year (and the Old)

2007-01-02T15:01:00.000-06:00

Here are the two words that best sum up my thoughts on 2006: Good riddance. I pray that 2007 will be much better all-around.

Julie, Mark, Ron, Melinda, Deb, Mom: Thanks so much for what you did for me (where did you get such patience?). You are each a blessing. Cue the song "Five Stars and Two Thumbs Up."

So, did anyone make any New Year's resolutions? I never make them, but I'm toying with some ideas this year, though they will probably be rather hard to pull off. But they would most likely be beneficial. Anyway, I do have some things to think about.

As far as this blog goes, I've learned to stop saying I have plans or even intentions to post on any specific thing. Any statement proclaiming that I will write about something seems to always work as a death knell, leaving you with film journal entries and personal anecdotes instead of, well, any of the film or music reviews I had hoped to write about. But so it goes. Thanks, dear readers, for hanging around these parts anyway. I am grateful for each and every comment.

Happy New Year, y'all!

December Film Journal

2007-01-02T09:19:00.000-06:00

Andrei Rublev (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1969)
The Bad Seed (Mervyn LeRoy, 1956)
Knife in the Water (Roman Polanski, 1962)
Village of the Damned (Wolf Rilla, 1960)
His Girl Friday (Howard Hawks, 1940)
The Leopard (Luchino Viscont, 1963)
The Double Life of Veronique (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1991)
Plan 9 from Outer Space (Edward D. Wood Jr., 1959)
Dawn of the Dead (George A. Romero, 1978)
Unfaithfully Yours (Preston Sturges, 1948)
3 Women (Robert Altman, 1977)
The Hours (Stephen Daldry, 2002)
Bringing Up Baby (Howard Hawks, 1938)
The Sea Is Watching* (Kei Kumai, 2002)
The Shop Around the Corner* (Ernst Lubitsch, 1940)
The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges, 1941)
The Best of Youth (Marco Tullio Giordana, 2003)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Mike Nichols, 1966)
Alien (Ridley Scott, 1979)
49 Up (Michael Apted, 2005)

*rewatch

Good morning!

2006-12-30T15:12:00.000-06:00

Wow, nothing really gets my day off to a great start like waking up to someone pounding on my front door at 5:40 a.m. (especially when I went to bed around 2:00). Yeah, it's also awesome to stumble in the pitch dark to the peephole and realize that it would have been a good idea to replace the burnt-out lightbulb above my door; I'd been meaning to do that for days. I absolutely love being able to see only a man's shadowy profile through the peephole--as he keeps pounding and pounding. And I've been watching too many horror movies lately and receiving too many phone calls where the person on the other end never says anything, including one call the other night around 3:30 in the morning. So, you can imagine. I think that incident took some days off of my life.

Actually, my hot water heater had broken and flooded the apartment downstairs, so I was spared and have no real reason to complain. But this continues the trend of having something in my apartment break while I'm on vacation. Seriously, it always happens. The maintenance man and I should be BFF by now. Hey, we were hanging out yesterday morning while I was still in my robe, so you know we're close.

I'm back!

2006-12-17T13:55:00.000-06:00

Yay--I can access my own blog again! I've upgraded to beta, and everything seems to be working at the moment (after being completely unable to post or access comments last week). Dear readers, please e-mail me and let me know if you experience any problems leaving comments, etc.

November Film Journal

2006-11-30T12:51:00.000-06:00

Husbands and Wives (Woody Allen, 1992)
The Queen (Stephen Frears, 2006)
All About Eve (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1950)
Hamlet (Grigori Kozintsev and Iosif Shapiro, 1963)
Onibaba (Kaneto Shindô, 1964)
Badlands (Terrence Malick, 1973)
Le Notti Bianche (Luchino Visconti, 1957)
San Francisco (W.S. Van Dyke, 1936)
Le Divorce (James Ivory, 2003)
Divorce, Italian-Style (Pietro Germi, 1961)
Forbidden Planet (Fred M. Wilcox, 1956)
Track of the Cat (William A. Wellman, 1954)
The Black Room (Roy William Neill, 1935)
The Man They Could Not Hang (Nick Grinde, 1939)
Bad Day at Black Rock (John Sturges, 1955)
Walk the Line (James Mangold, 2005)
The Big Sleep (Howard Hawks, 1946)
Open Water (Chris Kentis, 2003)

Italics denote a theater viewing.

Books!

2006-11-08T13:04:00.000-06:00

So, I just found out that Elizabeth Enright, the author of some of my absolute favorite children's books, was the neice of architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Never had any idea, but that's very cool.

Anyway, I'm thinking about Enright today because I decided I wanted bookshelves for my birthday this year, and I'm ridiculously excited about them. Yay! This means that books that have been boxed up for ages will finally see the light of day again. Plus, my second bedroom will start to look more like a bedroom and less like a storage unit.

I'm not sure why my thoughts have settled on the childhood books. But man, I have such a soft spot for Enright's works, especially the four titles involving the Melendy family: The Saturdays, The Four-Story Mistake, Then There Were Five, and Spiderweb for Two. My sister was a fan of these, and she got me hooked. Both of us tore through a large volume from the library that contained the first three of the books. The titles were out of print for a while, so the library copy was a treasure. Thankfully, all of the books have been reissued. I'll be glad to see my copies again; even thumbing through Enright's illustrations (not what's on the current covers!) will be a pleasure. The protagonists, children and young teens who take an interest in art, music, dance, and acting, do things like spend allowance money on trips to the opera and art museums. Heh. (I should point out that these books were written in the 40s and early 50s.) In the course of the stories, the family moves from New York City to the country—many wonderful adventures are had in both locations. These characters and their experiences just felt magical to me when I was growing up. Now, as trite as this sounds, these books are like old friends.

As I peruse my book collection, I'll no doubt weed out some of the lesser-loved titles (or, let's face it, those books that I bought on the cheap at the library bookstore and now wonder why I even bothered). This will create room for the parts of my collection that I'd love to grow. One such part would be film commentary. My friend Doug has previously recommended the Time Out Film Guide and 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die as quick references. I still need to pick up those. Other film-book recommendations would be most welcome.

And then, someday, I need to get to the great Russian writers, who have somehow managed to elude me, on the whole. Dostoevsky. Tolstoy. Chekhov. Got a favorite here? I'm all ears.

October Film Journal

2006-11-01T14:50:00.000-06:00

The Spirit of the Beehive (Víctor Erice, 1973)
The Adventures of Prince Achmed (Lotte Reiniger, 1926)
Vera Drake (Mike Leigh, 2004)
Full Moon in Paris (Eric Rohmer, 1984)
The Little Foxes (William Wyler, 1941)
Bunny Lake Is Missing (Otto Preminger, 1965)
Reds (Warren Beatty, 1981)
The Lady with the Little Dog (Iosif Kheifits, 1960)
Being Juila (István Szabó, 2004)
La Notte (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1961)
Les Bonnes Femmes (Claude Chabrol, 1960)
Elizabeth I (Tom Hooper, 2005)

This and That

2006-10-23T13:10:00.000-05:00

A "what the heck" moment: Walked into Parisian (a nice department store) over the weekend. Saw a LONG line of people, some sporting KISS t-shirts and makeup. I made my way past the line and saw Gene Simmons on a platform touting his new line of fragrances for men and women. Someone who was with me confirmed that it was him, since Simmons wasn't sporting the makeup. Um, the heck?! KISS perfume and cologne?! Now, I'm hard-pressed to name a single KISS song (someone did tell me they did the one about rocking and rolling every night and partying every day, which I've heard). When I think of KISS, I think of something like, say, "Back in Black," which is not even a KISS song. If I hadn't been afraid of, I dunno, getting attacked and having my head ripped off or something, I should have yelled out, "Hey, Gene—back in black, baby!" Heh.

A mess of a movie: Watched Bunny Lake Is Missing. Wondered if The Zombies produced this film, as the movie managed to randomly insert performances by them here and there throughout. Scenario: Two main characters walk into a pub to talk about a missing girl. Cut to a TV set in the pub. Show a couple of minutes of The Zombies performing. Later, have the heroine escape from the hospital by finding her way through a back exit. A man near the exit is listening to the radio, which is conveniently playing the same song by The Zombies. Dumb. And then there was Noel Coward's very bizarre cameo. And a silly ending that just went on and on and on....

Greek to me: I ordered a used copy of the Tri-Danielson Alpha CD from a vendor at Amazon. It arrived today, and as I looked through the track listing, I noticed that something was amiss. Where was "Rubbernecker"? Where was "Pottymouth"? Where was "Lord Did You Hear Harrison"? Hmm. Then I realized I'd been sent Omega instead. That's what happens when you don't know your Greek alphabet, I guess, since the title's not spelled out anywhere. (Of course, you could go by the fact that the background for the cover art is black on one disc and white on another.) But now I know the symbol for omega, anyway. No crisis, since I don't have this CD yet, but this is the old original version, and some things were changed, I think, for the rerelease. Hmm.

And speaking of Danielson...

Thank the good Lord above for: Daniel Smith (plus the family/famile) and all of the various incarnations of Danielson (Famile, Br., Ship, Tri-). This music makes me feel happy in unhappy times. "Give it up and crawl on through!"

Sidewalk Overview

2006-10-13T16:41:00.000-05:00

So, it's been almost three weeks since the Sidewalk festival. It already feels like it's been much longer. During the event, downtown Birmingham seemed to be throwing parties right and left. Besides Sidewalk, the area hosted a jazz festival and a Greek food festival, along with an upstart film festival called Cakewalk (the founder says his purpose is to screen films that don't make it into Sidewalk, but some locals say this is a case of sour grapes). And if any theatergoer felt the need to rest his or her eyes, Sidewalk also featured a music café with live bands. There really was something to do around every corner.

I hate to admit it, but this was my very first film festival, so there was a learning curve, of course. Actually, things got started with a bit of ticket confusion. (Lesson learned: Don't listen when they tell you that you can pick up tickets at ANY venue—it's not true!) But all my friend and I suffered was a hasty and hot eight-block walk; we picked up the tickets and made it back to our venue warm and flustered but with time to spare before our first viewing. Aside from that, everything else ran pretty smoothly. What followed were two hectic, exhausting, and delightful days.

Another thing: It didn't pay to be too attached to the idea of eating regular meals. Films usually started a bit late, and then Q&As followed, resulting in 30-40 minute breaks between screenings, usually just enough time to get from one venue to the other, stand in line, find a seat, etc. Eventually we had to skip a screening because, you know, people have a way of getting hungry.

One last thing: Wow, I had no idea sitting and watching movies could be so exhausting. I was totally wiped out at the end of both days. And I never noticed how painful it can be to sit for so long.

Lest you think I'm complaining too much, let me just say that the fest was a blast. What really struck me about Sidewalk was its egalitarian nature. Sidewalk is an independent film festival, after all—there are no red carpets, and if you want to speak to a director, you go up to him or her and do so. Actually, the director of my favorite screening of the weekend (Danielson: A Family Movie) kept popping up at other screenings I attended. We must have similar tastes.

It's amazing that three of the films I saw (all documentaries) looked at the role faith plays in the various subjects' lives. In all of the films, people discussed the ways they felt God was working through them. This really became the message of the weekend, as I heard remarkably similar speeches from three very different people in three very different films. Two of the films were enjoyable (Danielson and Awake, My Soul). One was not (Jesus Camp). But more on those later, hopefully.

Well, well, well...

2006-10-11T16:52:00.000-05:00

Didn't I say I'd post about my Sidewalk experience? I guess I need to keep my mouth shut. Anyway, sorry for the delay. These days, writing anything is a bit like pulling teeth (it seems like I say that all the time). I don't know why I have such a hard time getting myself to write; it's very frustrating. And then, of course, there are time limitations, too. But I haven't given up the idea of posting something. An overview is almost done and should be up before too long, hopefully.

In other news, I'm excited about some new music I'm just getting into. Any time I "discover" a new artist, I always throw myself into the deep end. I'm usually years late to the game, but I make up for being tardy by being ridiculously enthusiastic. I'm thinking about an upcoming music post, too. Wait, did I just open my mouth again?!

September Film Journal

2006-10-03T14:06:00.000-05:00

Ossessione (Luchino Visconti, 1943)
Adam Had Four Sons (Gregory Ratoff, 1941)
Kurosawa (Adam Low, 2001)
Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997)
The Bad Sleep Well (Akira Kurosawa, 1960)
Little Dieter Needs to Fly (Werner Herzog, 1997)
Enduring Love (Roger Michell, 2004)
Capturing the Friedmans (Andrew Jarecki, 2003)
Distant (Nuri Bilge Ceylan, 2002)
The White Sheik (Federico Fellini, 1952)
The Nutty Professor (Jerry Lewis, 1963)
Pollock (Ed Harris, 2000)
The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (Cristi Puiu, 2005)
A Tale of Springtime (Eric Rohmer, 1990)
When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (Spike Lee, 2006) (special screening at work)
Force of Evil (Abraham Polonsky, 1948)

* * *

Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival Films:

Geocaching: From the Web to the World (Jeff Orlowski and Tessa Banks, 2006) (short)
10 MPH (Hunter Weeks, 2006)
Danielson: A Family Movie (or, Make a Joyful Noise HERE) (J.L. Aronson, 2006)
Paralegal (Eric Lane, 2006) (short)
LOL (Joseph Swanberg, 2006) (I'm cheating here because I had to leave early, but I saw most of it.)
Stickmen (David Possien and Clint Martin, 2006) (short)
The Man with Apple-Shaped Boxing Gloves (Jason LaRay Keener and Jeremiah Ledbetter, 2006) (short)
Goodbye Beautiful Day (David Possein, 2006) (short)
Monday Monday Monday Monday (Daniel Scheinert, Stuart Webb, and Zach Rucker, 2006) (short)
The Dogwood Trees (Lee Fanning, 2006) (short)
'Til Death (Nadia Perry, 2006) (short)
Time and Tide (Julie Bayer and Josh Salzman, 2006)
Awake, My Soul (Matt and Erica Hinton, 2006)
Jesus Camp (Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady, 2006)

* * *

Italics denote a theater viewing.

More Pictures

2006-09-28T15:10:00.000-05:00

I've posted a couple more Alabama Theater photos at Flickr, plus a few personal shots.

Alabama Theater Photos

2006-09-20T12:02:00.000-05:00

Several weeks ago, I had the opportunity to visit one of my favorite places in the city, The Alabama Theater, for a free screening of Sparrows, starring Mary Pickford. While a free screening is nice, I'm willing to admit that my main reason for going was to take another opportunity to stroll around the beautiful venue, camera in hand. Considering its history, it's a surprise the theater is still standing. The Alabama was built in 1927 by Paramount Studios and was promptly nicknamed "The Showplace of the South." It had a good run, but somewhere around the late '80s, the owners declared bankruptcy, and the theater sat empty and abandoned for years. Many feared it would face a cruel date with a wrecking ball. Thankfully, restoration began in '98, and now, it hosts concerts, films, opera, ballet, and other special events. There is still work to be done, but the place is alive again, and most of it looks gorgeous—it just begs to be photographed.

My old point-and-shoot camera bit the dust a few months back, and my father had a spare Pentax SLR that he gave me. I've not taken any photography classes since high school, and it was a bit overwhelming to try to reacquaint myself with f-stops, shutter speeds, and the like. But it was also fun to try, so I headed down to The Alabama hoping for the best, even though I knew that I would not be shooting under ideal circumstances. The theater is very dark inside, and I would need a large depth of field—two opposing factors that might be tricky to reconcile, especially without a tripod. (And take all of that with a grain of salt, as I might just be spouting nonsense. Photography buffs, feel free to correct me.) My father advised that I use my wide-angle lens, which would allow a lot of light in through the shutter without sacrificing too much clarity. I'm pretty happy with most of my photos, which I've started uploading to my flickr page. The shots of the stage are the worst of the lot—very washed-out and lacking in sharpness. Oh well—I think it was simply too dark in there. The others are quick snapshots that give a good idea of the place's beauty. I'll be adding more in the future, once I get some computer problems fixed. I'll post again when they're up.

Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival

2006-09-05T12:26:00.000-05:00

Well, for many practical and personal reasons, I won't be able to pull off a trip to the Toronto International Film Festival this year, so I'll have to console myself with my city's upcoming independent film festival. The festival's titles have been announced, and I'm trying to work out a schedule. The problem is, with so many films showing in a two-day span (I'm not counting Friday night, when only one film is screening), many films will overlap, so I've got to choose carefully. One big conflict that's already arisen: Danielson: A Family Movie (pictured) plays at the same time as We Go Way Back, which sounds pretty intriguing. At the moment, though, my loyalty lies with Danielson because, well, I buy CDs from his label, and he seems like an interesting fellow (now I just need to hear some of his music). And there's a chance I might catch WGWB during an encore run as the festival closes. It's terrific to see so many shorts being featured, and I'm sure I'll catch a set or two (or more) of those—I'll also have to choose between the Alabama shorts and shorts from around the world. I plan to blog about what I see and the experience in general.

If anyone has heard anything about any of these directors or films, I'd appreciate the info. Or just toss out your opinions if you'd like.

Please, Mr. Postman...

2006-08-31T10:47:00.000-05:00

Please stop destroying my Netflix discs. Pretty please. I realize I have a miniscule mailbox, but don't blame me—take it up with my apartment manager. All I'm asking is that I come home, unlock the mailbox, and *not* find a Netflix envelope that's crumpled and, well, curved. That's surely not a good sign when a flat disc can somehow be shaped into a curve. First it was I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang. The latest victim, Dark Days, suffered a cruel fate yesterday. That's two discs in less than two weeks—both snapped completely in half. Netflix is going to blacklist me or something, and nobody wants that. Feel free to cram, wrinkle, crumple, and crush the junk mail, but please spare the bright red envelopes. Thank you.

August Film Journal

2006-08-30T13:17:00.000-05:00

Camera Buff (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1979)
Visions of Light (Arnold Glassman, Todd McCarthy, and Stuart Samuels, 1992)
The Lower Depths (Akira Kurosawa, 1957)
4 Little Girls (Spike Lee, 1997)
A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies (Martin Scorsese and Michael Henry Wilson, 1995)
Grey Gardens (Albert and David Maysles et al., 1975)
Late Spring (Yasujiro Ozu, 1949)
Good Night, and Good Luck (George Clooney, 2005)
Do the Right Thing (Spike Lee, 1989)
The Bad and the Beautiful (Vincente Minnelli, 1952)
Sparrows (William Beaudine, 1926)
I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (Mervyn LeRoy, 1932)

Italics denote a trip to the theater.

July Film Journal

2006-07-31T14:39:00.000-05:00

The Age of Innocence (Martin Scorsese, 1993)
Madame Bovary (Rodney Bennett, 1975)
Downfall (Oliver Hirschbiegel, 2004)
Capote (Bennett Miller, 2005)
My Voyage to Italy (Martin Scorsese, 1999)
Grave of the Fireflies (Isao Takahata, 1988)
Match Point (Woody Allen, 2005)
Tabu: A Story of the South Seas (F.W. Murnau, 1931)
L'Avventura (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1960)
Germany, Year Zero (Roberto Rossellini, 1948)
Crimes and Misdemeanors (Woody Allen, 1989)
High and Low (Akira Kurosawa, 1963)
Hawaii, Oslo (Erik Poppe, 2004)
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1947)
Red Beard (Akira Kurosawa, 1965)

Office Space

2006-07-23T16:12:00.000-05:00

Whew! I'm emerging for a breather after some especially stressful and busy days at work so I can share part of a corporate e-mail about my workplace (etpetra, you'll appreciate this). You see, whenever a new building opens on the grounds, somebody in Administration gets a bee in her bonnet about the office environment. So everyone here gets a message like this:

While we all appreciate working in such a creative environment, we ask that you follow a few guidelines so that we may maintain a professional office atmosphere that is complementary to the facility and sensitive to all.

If you are in an office, we ask that you not hang any personal artwork. We will soon be providing a selection of art from which you may choose for your office. If you have a personal piece that you feel strongly about, please ask Faith to stop by to discuss it.

Glass panels in offices and work stations are designed to allow light to permeate the entire floor, and they are not designed to be covered or to peer into.

If you are in a work station, please do not cover the glass panels.

Please do not hang anything from the ceiling, doorway, windows, or glass panels, e.g. curtains, mobiles, blinds.

Please don't add rugs or doormats to your personal area.

OK, I was holding my breath to see what they'd say about cubicle walls, since I am not high enough on the totem pole to have my own office. And thank God I'm not in the new building, where cube walls are partially made of glass panels, which now, apparently, cannot be covered (because, you know, it really would be a shame to block the overhead fluorescent lighting). I mean, it's like prison: You and your cube neighbor could turn toward each other, put your hands on the glass, and have a telephone conversation. No wait—I guess you couldn't do that because it would violate the no-peering rule. Huh. They are killing all the fun.

So...nothing was said about cube walls. Mine are decorated quite nicely, and I don't plan on taking anything down unless they make me. If it comes to it, I guess I could call Faith and talk to her about why I feel strongly about all of my Alabama Theater postcards; my various Orson Welles pictures; my vintage travel poster calendar (so very ironic, considering my previous blog post); the lovely Robert Doisneau photo Kiss by the Hôtel De Ville; my printout of Matt Goening's awesome ”How to Be a Clever Film Critic” comic, which always makes me laugh; my nephew's glittery work of abstract art; various photos; or my much-loved 16 Horsepower sticker.

But I'm appalled that I can't hang a mobile from the ceiling. What is this world coming to?

Vacation Facts and Stats

2006-07-07T09:09:00.000-05:00

This is the time of year when I start wanting to go on vacation, though that never seems to happen. Let's break this down.

Number of years I've worked where I do now: 5 1/2

Number of vacation days I get this year, since I've reached my five-year anniversary: 22

Number of vacation days I've used so far this year: 1

Number of years it's been since I've been on a vacation (i.e. taking a trip, as opposed to just taking time off): More than I'd care to admit

Overall traveling experience: Quite low

Regret over that fact: Somewhat high

Farthest away from home I've ever been (/Sam Gamgee voice): The Bahamas

What I would love to do on a vacation: Pick a city and thoroughly explore it, hitting all of the spots the locals know and love and taking in as many museums as I can.

What I actually end up doing when I take vacation time now: Not much. What usually happens is that I take two or three weeks off before Christmas. Use it or lose it, you know, and there's no way I'd lose it.

What I did on my last (kinda-sorta) vacation: Took a one-day birthday trip to New Orleans so a friend and I could go to a concert. Became very ill and almost fainted in front of the bar. Had a bartender offer to get roadies to carry me out to my car. Impressed bystanders by emerging from the concert hall carrying a HUGE chunk of ice on my head. (Actually, that probably impressed no one. This was New Orleans, after all. And no, I had not been doing anything even remotely untoward.)

What I did on my last vacation (that didn't involve visiting family members and that lasted more than one day): Woke up with a sore throat. Experienced my first flight. Witnessed the most gorgeous sunrise ever while high up in the clouds. Developed a fever by the time I boarded the ship. Went to some rather uninteresting islands where the only activities were shopping and gambling. Took cold medicine. Ate some food that was terrific, in spite of the fact that I probably couldn't taste much. Discovered cruising really isn't my thing.

What I did on my last family-related vacation: Stayed with my sister and brother-in-law for a month. Had an absolute blast. Slept on a cot the whole time but would do it again in a minute. Happily, there's no need to now, since we live in the same city.

The vacation plan I find myself dreaming about more and more lately, even though I'd previously put the idea to bed: Attending the Toronto International Film Festival

The film festival I'm much more likely to actually attend: The Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival. I have no excuse because it's in my city. I'm very much looking forward to the annoucement of this year's lineup. Last year's was pretty good and included Mutual Appreciation (with Bujalski attending) and Cavite, to name just a couple.

June Film Journal

2006-06-27T13:09:00.000-05:00

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Rouben Mamoulian, 1931)
L'Enfant (Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, 2005)
Delicatessen (Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 1991)
The Cranes Are Flying (Mikheil Kalatozishvili, 1957)
Finding Neverland (Marc Forster, 2004)
Woman of the Year (George Stevens, 1942)
The Public Enemy (William A. Wellman, 1931)
Elevator to the Gallows (Louis Malle, 1958)
Dodsworth (William Wyler, 1936)
Mr. Arkadin - The Corinth Version (Orson Welles, 1955)
Belle de jour (Luis Buñuel, 1967)
42 Up (Michael Apted, 1998)
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Jacques Demy, 1964)
Lancelot du Lac (Robert Bresson, 1974)
Before Sunrise (Richard Linklater, 1995)
Le Fils* (Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, 2002)
Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans* (F.W. Murnau, 1927)
It's All True (Bill Krohn, Orson Welles, et al., 1993)
The Steamroller and the Violin (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1960)
Before Sunset (Richard Linklater, 2004)

An asterisk indicates a repeat viewing.
Italics denote a trip to the theater.

Fun with Flickr

2006-05-25T14:39:00.000-05:00

covered walkway
Originally uploaded by DianeR.

I recently created a Flickr account and have posted some pictures from a trip to the local botanical gardens, as well as some shots taken at the gorgeous place where I work.

Welcome

2006-05-22T17:25:00.000-05:00

Hello and welcome to Your Russia. Perhaps I should explain my blog's title. First of all, I am not Russian. Nor have I ever been to Russia. Nor do I have any idea what your idea of Russia might be like. "Your Russia" is the title of a song by David Eugene Edwards (my blog description also refers to this song). If you haven't heard of Edwards, see if you can track down some of his music, either his work with the band 16 Horsepower, or his work with his current band, Woven Hand (or both). By naming my blog "Your Russia," I'm paying tribute to him and his music, as well as to another artist I greatly admire—Andrei Tarkovsky, the famous Russian director. The title just seems fitting, since music and film are two things I adore, and I appreciate the approach Edwards and Tarkovsky take to their respective arts.

So again, welcome to Your Russia. Enjoy your stay.