狂つた一頁 [Kurutta ippēji / A Page of Madness] (Teinosuke Kinugasa, 1926)
Sep
12
The servant's wife (Yoshie Nakagawa) eating. She looks up at someone offscreen, and smiles. DP: Kōhei Sugiyama.
狂つた一頁 [Kurutta ippēji / A Page of Madness] (Teinosuke Kinugasa, 1926)
Sep
12
The servant's wife (Yoshie Nakagawa) eating. She looks up at someone offscreen, and smiles. DP: Kōhei Sugiyama.
ねこぢる草 [Nekojiru-sō / Cat Soup] (Tatsuo Satō, 2001)
Aug
30
National Grief Awareness Day
Nyāko taken away by Jizō with little brother Nyatta telling Nyāko to come back home. DP: Masaru Takase.
Nyatta is not ready to have Jizō take away his big sister Nyāko to Ne-no-kuni, the land of the dead. The kitten grabs his sister's paw, resulting in her soul being ripped in two and leaving Nyāko in a state of limbo. The cats' mother then sends the two off on a mission to buy fried #tofu. Maybe now Nyatta can find a way to put Nyāko's divided soul back together. But first, there's a circus to visit!
ねこぢる草 is based on works by mangaka Nekojiru / ねこぢる (1967—1998) whose trademark crudely drawn #cats caused a ripple in Japan's underground #manga circuit. Nyatta and Nyāko continued their surreal adventures by way of widower Yamano Hajime after Nekojiru's tragic suicide in 1998.
“This is called the comeback of reality.”R… ne répond plus [R… no longer responds] (Jean-Pierre + Luc Dardenne, 1981)
Aug
28
Radio Commercials Day
In the nice room for special occasions a small boy is eating next to a large greying woman wearing an apron who in her turn eyes a younger woman who looks exactly like her tuning the radio. It's prominently placed next to an oversized, sensual cornucopian glass bowl, overflowing with oranges. DPs: Jean-Pierre Dardenne & Stéphane Gatti.
R… ne répond plus is Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne's exploring the airwaves. Some is clearly political. Radio Schwarzi Chatz (“Radio Black Cat”) and the feminist witches from Wellenhexe (”[radio] wave witch”) have important messages, unheard of in the mainstream media. Others broadcast in languages on the verge of extinction, so may that tongue survive in a world that – already forty years ago – was rapidly homogenising.
And then there are those, they're unnamed, who travel the land and across the borders with walkie-talkies – those too are radios, two-way – using their meandering frequencies to hold on to reality. It's all very elusive, but it's there. Maybe #radio is not dead. We just need to learn how to tune into that Enochian frequency again. It's real after all.
Zupa [Soup] (Zbigniew Rybczyński, 1975)
Aug
27
Crab Soup Day
The husband eating soup. The colours are extremely bright and placed on top of animated black-and-white still photographs created with an optical printer. DP: Zbigniew Rybczyński..
Zbigniew Rybczyński's autobiographical Zupa follows an unnamed couple's faltering monotonous relationship.
Produced by the groundbreaking Se-ma-for Studios in Łódź – you may be familiar with their 1981 Oscar-winning Tango by, again, Rybczyński – the story is told through colourised analogue still #photography and electronic music and sound effects created by PRES's Eugeniusz Rudnik.
L'homme qui ment [The Man Who Lies] (Alain Robbe-Grillet, 1968)
Jul
25
soup
The titular man (Jean-Louis Trintignant) at a dinner table, observed by Sylvia (Sylvia Turbová) and Maria (Sylvie Bréal). The room is white and sparsely furnished. DP: Igor Luther.
“cut”Cuadecuc, vampir (Pere Portabella, 1971)
May
26
World Dracula Day
Lucy (Soledad Miranda) in bloody embrace with Dracula (Christopher Lee). DP: Manel Esteban.
A black forest. A man walks through, holding a smoke machine. Then a carriage with a familiar coachman. Dracula! Where are we? No, not 19th century #Transylvania. The film stock reveals bullet holes in ancient walls, and beyond these walls a ladder, maybe scaffolding. A pneumatic drill, more crew members, lights, a clapperboard. Are the characters aware of that? Them seem to interact with the disturbance yet oblige to the interruptions of the movie set. In a state of hypnopompia, guided by kuroko, maybe?
Pere Portabella created a hyper-reality with his Cuadecuc, vampir. A director dismantles the man-behind-the-curtain, Franco, the other #Franco while setting up scaffolding for the next Spain. Everything's a reality, or an illusion, then nothing is.
American Dreams: Lost and Found (James Benning, 1984)
Feb
24
National Trading Card Day
A Hank Aaron trading card from director James Benning's personal collection. Below it a scrolling text quoting from Arthur Bremer's diary.
“What the hell are you doing?”書を捨てよ町へ出よう [Sho o suteyo machi e deyō / Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets] (Shūji Terayama, 1971)
Jan
9
成人の日
Young adults rally in the streets. DP: Masayoshi Sukita.
Coming of Age Day in Japan.