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Ο Δράκος [O Drakos / The Ogre of Athens / The Ogre / The Vampire] (Nikos Koundouros, 1956)
Jan
2
Martini
The boss, Hondros (Giannis Argyris), pours out a stiff drink on the floor of his cabaret with Mr Tomas (Dinos Iliopoulos) in the background. DP: Kostas Theodoridis.
The first film dinner of 2024.
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Ο Δράκος [O Drakos / The Ogre of Athens / The Ogre / The Vampire] (Nikos Koundouros, 1956)
Dec
31
New Year's Eve
Men in identical white shirts and dark slacks dancing in the club during after hours. Their upper bodies seem top-heavy, tending to lunge towards the ground. DP: Kostas Theodoridis.
New Year's Eve celebrations.
A mousy bank clerk (Dinos Iliopoulos), who bears an uncanny resemblance to a criminal on the run, finds himself hiding in a shady cabaret on New Year's Eve instead of spending a quiet evening alone. During his forced stay at the nightclub, he comes to enjoy and identify more and more with his newfound persona and assumes the role of the notorious “Drago”.
An initial box office dud, it is now considered one of the top ten all-time best Greek films.
Happy new year, everyone! On to many more cinematic discoveries!
viewРождество обитателей леса (ca 1912)
Various beetles and a grasshopper rejoice around the Christmas tree materialised by Old Man Frost.

December 25: a Santa for #Christmas
Pождество обитателей леса [Rozhdestvo obitateley lesa / The Insects' Christmas] (Wladyslaw Starewicz, ca 1912)
Father Christmas makes a Christmas tree for the people of the forest.
Дед Мороз (Ded Moroz, or Old Man Frost) is the Slavic version of Saint Nicholas or Santa Claus. An ornament depicting the old grey climbs down a child's (or doll's) Christmas tree and sets off to the forest where he plants his magic staff to create a Christmas feast for the woodland animals.
The word “animation” means “a bestowing of life“. Like his ancestor in the arts Bernard Palissy and the ancient winter solstice celebration of the return of light that long ago spawned Christmas, Wladyslaw Starewicz's Insects' Christmas breathes life into real but inanimate beetles, dragonflies, and frogs. The illusion is complete as you effortlessly forget they are painstakingly animated.
From me to you, a little Christmas treat
Director Wladyslaw Starewicz and his daughter Irina (Irene), surrounded by several of his tiny actors. Irina, writer and director in her own right, starred in her father's WW1 short “Liliya Belgii” [“The Lily of Belgium”] (1915).

#Bales2023FilmChallenge #WladyslawStarewicz #Russia #fantasy #animation #ShortFilm #Christmas #holidays #StopMotion #insects #animals #1910s ★★★★☆
#todo
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3615 code Père Noël [Deadly Games / Dial Code Santa Claus] (René Manzor, 1989)
Dec
4
Santa's List Day
A letter to Santa on Santa's List Day (USA). A man in a grey overcoat and yellow scarf at a public Minitel terminal. On the display the code 3615 and an 8-bit illustration of Santa Claus carrying his bag with presents. The sack holds a smaller Minitel device with the text PERE NOEL. DP: Michel Gaffier.
Aah France… Land of old wine, old cheese, old art, and Internet access in the early 80s. Prestige project of Président Giscard, France was determined to take a technological leap. Any French man, woman and child could borrow a Minitel – a PC-like videotex device – from the national telecommunications services. For those who didn't have landline there were numerous public terminals throughout the land. The machine gave the people access to a phonebook (convenient!), the news (smart!), same-day delivery shopping(!) and sexting (ooh la la!). All these services were accessible via a code starting with 3615 followed by a string of letters. Dial 3615 ULLA to text with a sexy lady – some telecom employee pretending to be one – and 3615 PERE NOEL for Santa Claus. The real one, of course.
9 year old whizkid Thomas (Alain Lalanne aka Alain Musy) is dead set on proving that Santa is real and not some weirdo looking for a gullible kid to play with. A trap is set, and the boy waits.
“You know Mum, I don't have to write to Santa anymore. There's an easier way, through Minitel.”
– Thomas
3615 code Père Noël is definitely not your cutesy little Christmas romp. The violence is not cartoonish, the bandit is more Manson than moist. The boy's disillusionment in the adults around him is a perfect mirror of “Santa's” lonely attempts to communicate and be accepted. However, Thomas' mom didn't lie about one thing; that seeing Santa on Christmas Eve turns you into an ogre. Or an adult, as the grownups call it.
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Lights (Marie Menken, 1966)
Dec
1
National Christmas Lights Day
It took experimental filmmaker Marie Menken three years to shoot Lights. From midnight until 1 AM, she filmed New York's window displays during the holiday season, using her camera, motion, colour, and available light sources as her paintbrush.
“There is no why for my making films. I just liked the twitters of the machine, and since it was an extension of painting for me, I tried it and loved it. In painting I never liked the staid and static, always looked for what would change the source of light and stance, using glitters, glass beads, luminous paint, so the camera was a natural for me to try—but how expensive!”
– Marie Menken, c. 1966
Filming at night helped to avoid unwanted interruptions of people and cars, but turned out to be problematic for her hand-cranked #Bolex, which kept stalling in NYC's icy winter nights.
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Weihnacht (Roland Klick, 1963)
Nov
24
Black Friday
The miracle of Christmas, as seen in a fancy shop window. A dress shirt is on display among Sputnik-style decorations and an entranced toddler is reflected in a gilded mirror. From across the street, “Woolworth's” in neon text bounces off the window pane. DPs: Jochen Cerhak & Roland Klick.
A little boy takes in the magic of pre-Christmas, while the adults rush and worry about all that must to be bought.
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Oss Oss Wee Oss (Alan Lomax, 1953)
Aug
22
Folklore Day
The childrens' 'Obby 'Oss May Day procession that precedes the adults' one on a Padstow hillside. DP: George Pickow.
“Unite and unite and let us all unite,
For summer is a-come unto day,
And whither we are going we will all unite,
In the merry morning of May.”
– Padstow May Night Song (traditional)
Then the “Morning Song”. Two 'Osses appear, dancing their dance, who then eventually on the evening of May Day meet at the maypole where they die, to be risen again next year.
“Now fare you well and bid you all good cheer,
For summer is acome unto day,
We call no more unto your house before another year,
In the merry morning of May.”
Alan Lomax's Oss Oss Wee Oss is probably the best known visual documentation of the Padstow 'Obby 'Oss festival. That it was filmed in 1953 doesn't matter; the ritual is circular, like the horses themselves and the eternal coming and going of the seasons.
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Körkarlen [The Phantom Carriage] (Victor Sjöström, 1921)
Jun
13
International Axe Throwing Day
David Holm (Victor Sjöström) attempts to break through a wooden door with the butt of an axe. This scene was the inspiration for the infamous door scene in Kubrick's The Shining (1980). DP: Julius Jaenzon.
“I want to be good, but no one believes me. Is it any wonder I cry?”
– David Holm
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Иконостасът [Ikonostasat / The Icon Stand] (Todor Dinov & Christo Christov, 1969)
Jan
15
World Religion Day
Icon maker Raphe (Dimitar Tashev) and Katerina (Violeta Gindeva) surrounded by the icon stand. The Holy Virgin can be seen in the background. DP: Atanas Tasev.
The cyclical story of the Christ envisioned as an icon maker, the creator of sacred images of the saints and the Holy.
When you know what to look for – the significance of bread, the judgement of the Pantocrator, the wheel that begets martyrs – Иконостасът speaks the language of the people, not of the ecclesiastic.