"I would love to play Simon Cowell in a movie. It would be my dream role. Simon’s become a legend in five years ... It wouldn’t be that hard for me to play him because I see a lot of Ron Burgundy in Simon Cowell. Like Simon, Ron was the biggest thing on TV, loved himself and had that whole irresistible middle-aged man thing going on. I could play Simon, but to be honest Simon could...
Editors who worked with renowned film directors such as Orson Welles, Ingmar Bergman and Rainer Werner Fassbinder are giving a series of lectures on that speciality in the International Film and Television School of San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba, reported sources from this teaching centre, which this year has an enrolment of 117 students from 28 countries.
I've been sampling the Pacific Film Archive series "A Woman's Face: Ingrid Bergman In Europe" , curated by Susan Oxtoby focusing on the work of the actress before her Hollywood heyday. Though nearly complete, the series extends with two more entries: Roberto Rossellini's Voyage in Italy (1953) —which has been enfolded into Pedro Almodóvar's most recent film Los Abrazos Rotos...
Dark Waters (1944, USA) - A traumatized shipwreck survivor moves in with her relatives, whose insensitive behavior, bordering on the sadistic, drives her towards a nervous breakdown. Probably the scariest movie in the marathon so far, (admittedly with little competition). Everyday events are made to seem evil , without apparent reason. Watched it all. The Keys of the Kingdom (1944, USA) - Gregory Peck...
Not only does the end of each year bring me to want to relive my favorite Christmas movie (sorry Arnaud Desplechin, Bruce Willis), but it also marks the time when John Waters provides his Top 10 films of the year for Artforum. Last year his #1 was a tie between Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona and Christophe Honoré's Love Songs [ Les chansons d'amour ], both of which made my list too although...
W. Magazine's article on the auctioning off of the late Ingmar Bergman's home and belongings confirmed what I'd long suspected: Animal was, in fact, his favorite Muppet. Bergman was also known to relish the odd blockbuster during his two daily film viewings at a screening room ten minutes' drive from his house. Watching "Jurassic Park," he exclaimed enthusiastically: "Those Americans...
I hope they don't take this down, but while it's up there... here's one of my favorite Mystery Science Theater segments, a priceless parody of Ingmar Bergman, ya shore you betcha.
As mentioned in an earlier post, Swedish National Radio commissioned the group Sparks to produce a radio musical some time ago. Their only proviso was that it should touch on some Swedish theme. As Ron Mael wryly observed, they didn’t think they could get much material out of a musical about Volvos, so they settled instead on Ingmar Bergman as a subject. The result, entitled The Seduction of...
SHOPPING: The (Makers) Market at the (Old) American Can Factory on Sundays 11 AM until 6 PM. From Yelp: "The Market at The Old American Can Factory, Brooklyn's first ongoing Maker's Market, goes far beyond DIY. Here, the fruits of cultural and intellectual productivity go directly from the hands of creative Makers into the hands of shoppers. But it's not only about shopping--it's about reinvestigating...
10 - Turn, turn, turn You know it's the 60s when you hear the screaming at the start of this clip from the US music show Shindig that sets the theme for this month's top ten. It's a setting of Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 by Pete Seeger, the man of peace who had to be restrained from taking an axe to Bob Dylan when he went electric at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965, illustrating peaceniks' curious propensity...
Cage in Season of the Witch is even worse, apparently , than Cage in a remake of the Wicker Man . When two knights (Nicolas Cage, Ron Perlman) return from the Crusades, they find their homeland ravaged by the Black Plague. The church blames the plague on sorcery, and orders the knights to escort an accused witch (Claire Foy) to a remote abbey , where monks will perform a ritual that they hope will...
Portrait lithograph of Swedish playwright, writer and painter August Strindberg made by Edvard Munch in 1896, from the estate of Ingmar Bergman . Image found here (very large) but inspired by this post. ---
The 22nd album by Sparks – never ones to do things the easy way – is a biopic in opera form of a legendary Swedish art-house director, with a cast of actor-singers augmenting Russell Mael’s vocals, and a complete orchestra backing Ron’s luxurious pianos. It’s a genre and format to which the brothers, whose work is so often described as “operatic”, are immaculately...
Céline and Julie Go Boating (1974) .. Jacques Rivette Gertrud (1964) .. Carl Theodor Dreyer The Green Ray (1986) .. Eric Rohmer Chimes at Midnight (1965) .. Orson Welles Early Summer (1951) .. Yasujiro Ozu Late Spring (1949) .. Yasujiro Ozu Sans Soleil (1983) .. Chris Marker L'Atalante (1934) .. Jean Vigo The Spirit of the Beehive (1973) .. Victor Erice Au Hasard Balthazar (1966) .. Robert Bresson...
STOCKHOLM – A writing desk, film cameras and Golden Globe awards belonging to Swedish film legend Ingmar Bergman are attracting a huge interest from collectors as they go up for auction in Stockholm. Auction house Bukowskis says the 337 Bergman items for sale include the chess pieces most probably used in the director's 1957 film "The Seventh Seal" and a 1960s portrait of Bergman by Irving Penn. Bukowskis...
STOCKHOLM – A writing desk, film cameras and Golden Globe awards belonging to Swedish film legend Ingmar Bergman are attracting a huge interest from collectors as they go up for auction in Stockholm. Auction house Bukowskis says the 337 Bergman items for sale include the chess pieces most probably used in the director's 1957 film "The Seventh Seal" and a 1960s portrait of Bergman by Irving Penn. Bukowskis...
The Synth Show with Mark O'Leary on guitar/sound, Jamie Saft on Synths and Kenny Wollesen on drums has just been released on Leo Records. Recorded in Brooklyn New York, it features synth based improv/synthscapes/synthpop. Harking back to the 70's Synth glory days of Zawinul, Jarre, Wakeman, Tangerine Dream, early Kraftwerk and Hamer. It has all of that and a little vaudeville meets BBC radiophonic...
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