“Is it the form of the clouds, or the tints of the sky, or the colours of the surrounding objects which are so changeable, which have troubled my thoughts as they passed before my eyes? Who can tell?” Le Horla [The Horla] (Jean-Daniel Pollet, 1966)
Aug
19
violet
The narrator enters a violet-blue room via a lavender-purple corridor (via). DP: Jean-Jacques Rochut.
Violet: a building or structure *
– Guy de Maupassant, Le Horla, 1887 (via)
Objects and rooms have distinct colours ranging from the deepest blues and violets to a pale lavender, a muted silver and shocks of yellow. The usage of colour in Le Horla is striking throughout and reminds me of how Van Gogh's paintings became increasingly colourful as his madness enveloped him.
* the Bales 2025 Film Challenge for August is not date-related but lists, for the most part, the colours of the rainbow.
“He moved over to the window: a smallish, frail figure, the meagreness of his body merely emphasized by the blue overalls which were the uniform of the party. His hair was very fair, his face naturally sanguine, his skin roughened by coarse soap and blunt razor blades and the cold of the winter that had just ended. “Nineteen Eighty-Four (Rudolph Cartier, 1954)
Aug
18
indigo
Winston Smith (Peter Cushing). We only see his frail looking back with the identifier KZ-6090, and his name SMITH W.
Indigo, in food or fashion*
– George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) (via)
* the Bales 2025 Film Challenge for August is not date-related but lists, for the most part, the colours of the rainbow.
“Travel in the country, long-range plans, and upsetting persons around you, could make this a disturbing and unpredictable day. The events in the world are not doing much either to cheer one up.”The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (Tobe Hooper, 1974)
Aug
18
1973
Cast and crew in the back of their motorhome. From LtR: Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, Allen Danziger, Teri McMinn, Tobe Hooper, Dottie Pearl, and William Vail (via). DP: Daniel Pearl.
your August 18 horoscope
“Pray for me. I forgive the evil done me.”
Procès de Jeanne d'Arc [The Trial of Joan of Arc] (Robert Bresson, 1962)
Aug
17
forgiveness
Jeanne (Florence Delay) bound to the stake. DP: Léonce-Henri Burel.
Holi: someone is forgiven (forgiveness being an important aspect of Holi)*
– Jeanne d'Arc
Jeanne trusts her delusions to forgive the people who brought her to justice.
* the Bales 2025 Film Challenge for August is not date-related but lists, for the most part, the colours of the rainbow.
Him: It’s a film?
Her: It would have been a film.
Le camion [The Lorry] (Marguerite Duras, 1977)
Aug
16
indigo
Indigo: a building or structure*
A truck, both the narrative structure and his (Depardieu's character) material representation. She – the director – and he – the lead actor – do a read-though while discussing her script. A communist truck driver picks up a female hitchhiker. They discuss the landscape, the cosmos, pointlessness, communism of course. All the while, the indigo truck plods on.
* the Bales 2025 Film Challenge for August is not date-related but lists, for the most part, the colours of the rainbow.
Al filo del hacha [Edge of the Axe] (José Ramón Larraz, 1988)
Aug
16
1978
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A computer screen with the admission date of Lillian Nebbs (Christina Marie Lane) in the psychiatric ward on August 16, 1978. Diagnosis: Psycho Amnesia [sic]. There are small pop magazine stickers on the display's bezel. DP: Tote Trenas.
Top of the Heap (Christopher St. John, 1972)
Aug
16
10 A.M.
An invitation via telegram dated August 10 for astronaut George Lattimer to Waltersville Alabama on August 16 at 10 A.M.. DP: Richard A. Kelley.
“I'm just fine. I have everything here. I have the TV. You can see the whole world” Trois couleurs: Bleu [Three Colors: Blue] (Krzysztof Kieślowski, 1993)
Aug
15
cerulean
Julie (Juliette Binoche) in a blue wallpapered room, observes blue beads suspended in front of a window with a cerulean sky and ocean behind it. Throughout the story, her clothing changes from white, to black, to the darkest charcoal blue, to Prussian blue. DP: Slawomir Idziak.
Cerulean, or blue: in food or fashion*
– the mother
How could I not pick at least one instalment of Kieślowski's Trois couleurs trilogy. Here's blue, the liberté of the tricolor. Blue occurs as the sky to fall through, the room without life, and the cloth that binds.
* the Bales 2025 Film Challenge for August is not date-related but lists, for the most part, the colours of the rainbow.
Fuoco! [Fire!] (Gian Vittorio Baldi, 1968)
Aug
15
Ferragosto
The statue of the Virgin with a bullet hole right through her eye. DP: Ugo Piccone.
Someone opens fire on August 15, the day of Ferragosto and the Virgin's Assumption
Le 15/8 (Chantal Akerman + Samy Szlingerbaum, 1975)
Aug
15
Chris Myllykoski. DPs: Chantal Akerman & Samy Szlingerbaum.