“Ich sollte eigentlich ganz allein auf der Welt sein, ich, Steiner, und sonst kein anderes lebendes Wesen. Keine Sonne, keine Kultur, ich nackt auf einem hohen Fels, kein Sturm, kein Schnee, keine Straßen, keine Banken, kein Geld, keine Zeit und kein Atem. Ich würde dann jedenfalls keine Angst mehr haben.”

– Walter Steiner

A wasteful act: Crispus Attucks, (arguably) the first American victim in the American Revolution, dies on March 5^th, 1770.

“She's always happy. She desires nothing, envies no one, is curious about nothing. You can't surprise her. She doesn't notice the humiliations, though they happen to her every day. It all rolls off her back like some waterproof material. Zero ambition. No moral code. Not even a whore's love of money.”

– The Writer

An ambitious but aimless girl – she wants to be loved, and to be a model, a proto-Edie – mills about her day.

 

Sublimely shot, we see Adriana through glass panes, in reflections, in an off-focal plane, in other people's words.

A film about outer space for Nicolaus Copernicus' birthday (1473).

 

In a galaxy far far away, the opening scroll informs us, a civil war rages between governments, greedy conglomerates, and rebels. Only a few scrap-dealing space pirates can save the day!

January 21 redux: a film from 1984 on the date Orwell died (1950).

“The film is about observing, about glances that see without being seen, a dubious art of light and visibility.”

– Michael Klier, via

According to Harun Farocki, Der Riese was the first narrative film completely compiled out of surveillance footage.

A freebie for someone's birthday, with bonus points for high fashion. Petra von Kant is a fashion designer who, during a particularly icy birthday party, tells the world that her new lover is a woman. Then, one day, said lover returns home to her husband.

– You have a good figure. You could use it to your advantage. Get in touch with me some time. – I'd love to.

With its exuberant costumes and set design, a Greek chorus of mannequins, and Sirk-ish larger- than-life melodrama, Fassbinder's Die bitteren Tränen der Petra von Kant delves deep into the absurdities of love and fancy.

Winter sports in celebration of the Chamonix 1924 Winter Olympics.

“Ich sollte eigentlich ganz allein auf der Welt sein, ich, Steiner, und sonst kein anderes lebendes Wesen. Keine Sonne, keine Kultur, ich nackt auf einem hohen Fels, kein Sturm, kein Schnee, keine Straßen, keine Banken, kein Geld, keine Zeit und kein Atem. Ich würde dann jedenfalls keine Angst mehr haben.”

– Walter Steiner

In a film that is as much about Herzog as it is about Steiner, we follow the soft-spoken woodcarver in preparation of his definitive ski flight in Planica, Yugoslavia.

Moons for Galileo Galilei's observation of Jupiter's four largest moons in 1610: Ganymede and Callisto on January 7, and Europa and Io on January 8.

“I therefore concluded and decided unhesitatingly, that there are three stars in the heavens moving about Jupiter, as Venus and Mercury round the Sun; which at length was established as clear as daylight by numerous subsequent observations. These observations also established that there are not only three, but four, erratic sidereal bodies performing their revolutions round Jupiter… the revolutions are so swift that an observer may generally get differences of position every hour.”

– Galileo Galilei, Sidereus Nuncius (”Starry Messenger”), 1610

A spacecraft named Ganymede II returns back to Earth after its expedition to Jupiter's moons followed by 1500 days stuck in space. The Earth they find, is deserted.

A short main character for National Short Person Day (USA).

“When we behave nobody cares. But when we are bad nobody forgets.”

– Hombré