The 31ª Mostra Internacional de Cinema (31st São Paulo International Film Festival) started yesterday, and as it has been happening in the last eight years, I will spend the next two week watching films everyday as if there was no tomorrow. However, before it started, I was already busy writing about it and watching films all the days of the week, since the beginning of October on Cinematógrafo, my Portuguese language blog about cinema.
In other words: I won’t blog here until the beginning of November, because in between the 5 or 6 films per day I sleep. Yes, it stupid way to spend time, sleeping, but I do that sometimes. And impressively, I will stay away from my (and any other) computer. That’s the effect of this time of year on me: I discover there is life beyond the Internet. Until then explore the archives, visit the links, go read a book or go to the cinema.
I hope that all of you have a great time with Halloween or any other parties, events and, of course, films. If you want to find me, go to Cinematógrafo and maybe try the translator on the top, if you don’t speak Portuguese.
See you in November!
Posted by Bibi | Posted in cinema, vintage | Posted on 01-10-2007
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The list of Batman films I watched doesn’t include the 1966 Batman. The film directed by Leslie H. Martinson was filmed at the end of the first season of 1960’s Batman TV series. The LiveJournal page film_stills: Batman: The Movie has several high resolution images from the film, that apparently had the same “quality” of the TV series. Even if you was a fan you have to agree with me that the costumes aren’t the high point of the series. Julie Newmar was, but she wasn’t in the film. (via Bedazzled) Related posts: Detective Comics Comic Book Bondage Cover The History of the Batmobile
Posted by Bibi | Posted in cinema, posters | Posted on 20-09-2007
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Things to Come: A celebration of the 1936 film written by H.G. Wells, directed by William Cameron Menzies, and produced by Alexander Korda.Nice site with a great number of publicity materials of the film and pictures. (via IWR Art) Things to Come is based on H. G. Wells’ novel The Shape of Things to Come, published in 1933. A “web edition” of the book is available at The University of Adelaide Library, the film, in the public domain, is available to download at Internet Archive, and you can watch the film at Videos with Bibi.
Once more it’s time to celebrate the International Talk Like a Pirate Day. And I will do it on my way, sharing links, since I don’t have any pirate costume. Catster and Dogster users are also participating of this special day, submitting the pictures of their furry fellows dressed as pirates, with the tag “pirate”, on Dogster and Catster. Getting to Know … International Talk Like A Pirate Day: an interview with Mark “Cap’n Slappy” Summer and John “Ol’ Chumbucket” Baur, the founders of Talk Like a Pirate Day. Many Books has a nice collection of Pirate Stories of digitalized books in the public domain to read on-line or download, available in many formats. Photos from International Talk Like A Pirate Day on Flickr. Explore all the previous images or go directly to the 2007 photoset. Pinup Pirate illustration created by the deviantART artist agrivaine (ChrissieA). Pirate Pinup: the picture above is a self portrait by the Flickr user Danielle. Pirates Of The Caribbean 1 and 2 in 30 seconds and re-enacted by bunnies, presented by Starz Bunny Club Exclusive, created by Angry Alien Productions. Polite Dissent made a great list of comic-book pirates (and pirate comic books) to celebrate the day. (via Pen-Elayne on the Web) Post Like a Pirate is a pirate translator which also posts directly on Twitter, Myspace or send by email the translated text. Réunion de piratesses: a collection of illustrations created by several artists to a contest created by the French illustrator Delfine, on her blog, which theme was “fille de pirate” (daughter of pirate). Take a look at the illustrations and on the Hors concours illustration of the contest if you speak French. The Pirate Pin UpArrr Mates, the Sexiest Pirate Pinups ‘n the Seven Seas. Sexy picturs of pin-up dressed as pirates, or something like that. The picture on the top is from one of those girls, Molly Roger.
Watch the classic silent film The Black Pirate with Douglas Fairbanks at Videos with Bibi, and the special “Talk like a Pirate Day” films Dancing Pirate and Captain Kidd. WordPress users can Piratify Your Blogs using the Text Filter Suite Plugin. It turns yer blog into pirate-speak on Talk Like a Pirate Day! (via The Mystery of the Haunted Vampire)
The YouTube profile Offcial Wench hosts 23 videos of Cap’n Slappy and Ol’ Chumbucket. The last video added, Pirates of the Burning Sea, introduces the video game, “Pirates of the Burning Sea” for the release party in Seattle, Washington on September 19th. You can watch their video Pirates And Ninjas bellow.
Pictures of The Pirate zombie pin-up model. As a good pirate she has a parrot.
And the original Talk Like A Pirate Day site. It has some cool stuff, games and many other links.
The Flickr user Gerry D. is a film enthusiast and it seems he has special interest in the Italian cinema. What makes me think about are his Flickr sets. On his set Italian movies he shares 556 vintage images posters, publicity and ads for Italian films (until now). Even more impressive is his set Cinemas, theatres, auditoriums, concert halls with 716 images. He also has a set with 97 stills of Italian films and film people, among others. (via Hugo Strikes Back)
The poster above from one of the greatest Italian fims, Paisà, directed by the master Roberto Rossellini. Enjoy to watch Italian film on Videos with Bibi.
Posted by Bibi | Posted in cinema | Posted on 31-07-2007
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Bergman yesterday and now Michelangelo Antonioni. What the hell is going on? If I believe in god, heaven and all those things I would say that God created a cinema studio in the sky and is hiring the best directors to do it. And off course they are European. Sigh. At least they had a good run. Aged 94, the director died The director died peacefully at home on Monday night, his wife, actress Enrica Fico, told La Repubblica newspaper.
My first Antonioni film was Blowup and I hated it. Wait, don’t be made at me, I was ten. I watched again many years after and recognize his genius. But it isn’t an easy film. I loved the way he played with the camera all over the film. I watched very few of his films after Blow Up and Story of a Love Affair is my favourite Antonioni, until now. Probably because I have a hidden passion for Italian neo-realistic films.
I know more about him and his films through books and films excerpts than for the films themselves. What shame! The best I can do in his homage is trying to find Red Desert to watch. For now, take a look at this collection of Antonioni’s films posters and watch the L’avventura’s trailer.
Posted by Bibi | Posted in cinema | Posted on 30-07-2007
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Oh well, the inevitable happened, Ingmar Bergman lost the chess match. The Master has passed away this morning at his home in Fårö. My first Bergman film was Fanny and Alexander, but my passion for his works didn’t start then. At nine years old, I didn’t know much about cinema and I preferred comedies, than dramas. Thankfully my taste changed and in my second contact with his work with The Seventh Seal, the film caused a great impact on me.
Before starting watching his films I already knew something about them, I knew about his passion for silent films and that was the one thing that made grow my respect for him. But it were the films themselves that showed me a whole new wonderful universe of cinema language. Part of his genius mind can be discovered through a great book called Bergman on Bergman: Interviews With Ingmar Bergman. I read it years ago and I think it’s time to do it again. But even being a huge fan of books about cinema, I know that to learn about something, you have to watch the films. That’s what I’m planing to do: watch the Bergman’s films I haven’t watched yet.
It’s sad to imagine that one more of my idols passed away. It’s even sadder to imagine that a man has to die to have his work rediscovered. However, I’m waiting for a happy ending. Maybe the new generation will start to watch his films and see the beauty inside them. I do hope so.
P-E Fronning, from Martin Klasch blog, gave me the bad news today. He says that in Sweden today there were all kind of homages to him, and they were showing Wild Strawberries on TV. It sounds perfect to me. I will follow one of his suggestion and watch Smiles of a Summer Night.
For now, to know more about Bergman, visit his excellent official site, with videos, interviews, pictures, biographies, writings and interesting information, and read more about his work at BBC’s article Why Bergman was an artistic giant. There are news about him everywhere, so you don’t need to search too much to conclude how important his work was.
If you have the chance, watch a great documentary about the director made in 2004: Ingmar Bergman – 3 dokumentärer om film, teater, Fårö och livet av Marie Nyreröd (Bergman Island). It’s talks about Bergman’s personal life, cinema and theater, his greatest passion and something that is unknown to most of us.
Read also De Düva, Religious Affiliation of Film Directors, Swedish Cinema, Ingmar Bergman Face to Face, Medieval Macabre and Ingmar Bergman (in Portuguese).
Posted by Bibi | Posted in cinema, fun, video | Posted on 28-07-2007
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There are directors that like to say that remakes are homages. My experience shows that those “homages” are a way to spoil the memory of a good film, in general. A few cases are exceptions. Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht and Shadow of the Vampire are good examples of what a remake or a homage film should be – both for the same film, Nosferatu. Another example of homages is parodies. I think parodies are usually better than usual remakes, presumably because they don’t take themselves too seriously.
I also enjoy when the director pay a “small” homage to a classic in a scene, specially when the reference is subtle. This isn’t the case of The Battleship Potemkin. The Odessa Steps sequence is one of the most reverenced sequences in the film history. That wonderful scene was re-enacted several times, in almost every gender of film, and that made it so well known to us. Unfortunately, that’s also the reason why it loses its effect when quoted.
All this talk of scenes, homages and parodies is but a way to introduce a hilarious film: De Düva, also known as The Dove. Don’t be fooled by the title: it sounds Swedish, and “duva” really does mean “dove / pigeon” in Swedish. However, it’s an American film. The film, directed by George Coe and Anthony Lover in 1968, was all made to look like a Bergman’s film. It’s a brilliant parody with strong references to The Seventh Seal (Det Sjunde Insegletand) and Wild Strawberries (Smultronstället).
The film is silly and fantastic. It has the tabus, which Bergman masterfully worked; it has a joke with the chess match scene from The Seventh Seal; it starts like the Wild Strawberries; the mise en scène looks like a film directed by Bergman; and it sounds Swedish. I bet the screenwriter had a lot of fun making up words.
The dialogue, seemingly in Swedish, is actually a Swedish-accented fictional language based on English, German, Latin, and Swedish, with most nouns ending in “ska”.
That’s probably what makes it so funny and why I highly recommend it. The quality of the video on-line isn’t the best, but since the video is rare and isn’t available in DVD, it is worth it. Madeline Kahn, better known for her films with Mel Brooks, made her debut in the cinema with this film. Watch it below, or at Videos with Bibi (bigger video image), or directly at Google Video. (14 min)
. I read it years ago and I think it’s time to do it again. But even being a huge fan of books about cinema, I know that to learn about something, you have to watch the films. That’s what I’m planing to do: watch the Bergman’s films I haven’t watched yet.
