“Just close your eyes and call him… It's me, Ana… It's me Ana…” El espíritu de la colmena [The Spirit of the Beehive] (Víctor Erice, 1973)
Sep
3
National Cinema Day
Ana (Ana Torrent) watching James Whale's Frankenstein (1931). DP: Luis Cuadrado.
One day, in a quiet village, a traveling movie theatre appears. The proprietor has no words for the miracle he brings in on the reels. When it's finally time, and the whole town is crammed into the crumbling impromptu playhouse, and the lights are dimmed, a word of warning. This is the story of Dr. #Frankenstein, it starts.
– Teresa
The old folk in the audience remember their first brush with cinema, and life, and death. For sisters Ana (Ana Torrent) and Isabel (Isabel Tellería) it may be their first, and it may as well be real. The creature, Isabel assures her younger sister, is not dead. He's a spirit and you can call for him.
When you're little, everything is a miracle. Milagros is the name the maid answers too. And so does the landscape, the mushrooms, the heart, and the magic of cinema.
frankenstein
“If you're not sure a mushroom's good, don't pick it. Because if it's bad, and you eat it, it's your last mushroom and your last everything too.”El espíritu de la colmena [The Spirit of the Beehive] (Víctor Erice, 1973)
Aug
30
mushrooms
Little Ana (Ana Torrent) all but disappearing behind a for her almost too large ceramic bowl. DP: Luis Cuadrado.
It's August 30, #Frankensteinday.
Peace, little girl (1964)
March 21: #countdown to #NationalCountdownDay
Peace, little girl [Daisy aka Daisy Girl] (Sidney Myers, 1964)
One… two… three… four… five… seven… six… six… eight… nine… nine…
It was the #PoliticalAd campaign to end all political ad campaigns. Peace, little girl opens innocently enough with a little blonde girl, picking the petals of an ox-eye #daisy while counting. When the final petal's gone, the tone changes completely.
This deceptively simple propaganda film was made in support of Lyndon B. Johnson's 1964 presidential campaign by ad agency #DBB and media consultant Tony Schwartz. It was so effective and bleak in is insinuations that the Johnson campaign was forced to pull it after only one screening.
What fascinates me is the similarity with one particular scene from James Whale's #Frankenstein (1931). The Monster (#Karloff) meets a little girl who sits on the shore of a lake, picking daisies. He approaches her, and the girl, knowing the creature is a good man at heart, invites him to play a game with her involving them tossing the daisies into the lake.
The Monster (Boris Karloff) and little Maria (Marilyn Harris) playing with daisies on a beautiful day at the lake. DPs: Arthur Edeson & Paul Ivano.
Spoiler warning
When they run out of daisies, the Monster picks up the girl who to him is as pretty and innocent as a flower, and tosses her into the water.This scene was cut and considered lost until the 1980s. Could Tony Schwartz have been aware of that scene? He was at the right age to have seen the pre-code, pre-cut version.
#Bales2023FilmChallenge #SidneyMyers #LyndonBJohnson #ChrisSchenkel #MoniqueCorzilius #MoniqueCozy #RobertDryden #DrummondDrury #ShortFilm #war #peace #scaresploitation #flowers #propaganda #ColdWar #election #politics #USA #1960s ★★★★☆
