Examining the life and times of fashion designer Yves Saint-Laurent, Pierre Thoretton's L'amour fou lucidly injects a sober biographical sketch with an informative alluring amorous solution.
Within we discover a prolific artist prone to depression and substance abuse whose innovative vision redefined and enabled various voices. An avid art collector, he acquired a vast array of works over the years whose particular features were loosely situated within the specific temporal coordinates of a constantly transforming personalized aesthetic.
Much like Charles Swann.
Primarily framed by the accounts of lifelong partner Pierre Bergé, St. Laurent's trajectory is characterized by brilliance, success, and mental illness. Their relationship endures as Yves creates and Bergé manages, a stable juxtaposition of art and commerce which survives their passion's deterioration.
What Saint-Laurent achieved throughout his lifetime is remarkable, resulting from the ways in which he consistently reinvented himself while continuing to cultivate his insight. The film could have elaborated to a greater degree on the latter part of his engagement, his personal life and idiosyncrasies enjoying more screen time throughout. He's often portrayed as an undeniable genius whose only destabilizing lesions were self-inflicted. There must have been more controversy associated with his pursuits, controversy that could have been focused on more acutely than Bergé's role in his life story.
But the film's about crazy love, and Bergé's role in Saint-Laurent's success was paramount. L'amour fou only presents a brief introduction to their union, and although this introduction provides a significant amount of anecdotal refreshment, it principally serves to encourage further investigations.
Which isn't so bad.
Saturday, July 30, 2011
Midnight in Paris
Working within a light-hearted quaint sharply crystallized kitschy tradition, presenting thoughtful witty self-aware observations concerning creativity, Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris frankly endures its own self-destructive mechanizations as it simultaneously satirizes and elevates various philosophical/sociological/historical/. . . ical points.
Plus it has time travel.
Gil (Owen Wilson) wants to make the transition from writing screen plays to novels while daydreaming about moving to Paris. He trusts no one with his work, however, as he isn't yet prepared to subsume negative criticisms. He encounters a self-assured erudite slightly pompous handsome individual (Michael Sheen as Paul) to whose clarifications his fiancée (Rachel McAdams as Inez) takes a shine. Gil's able to interject the occasional colourful contradiction after travelling back in time to the Paris of the 1920s (which he proceeds to do every evening at midnight) and learning various facts about Hemingway (Corey Stoll), F. Scott Fitzgerald (Tom Hiddleston), Picasso (Marcial Di Fonzo Bo), and . . . first hand, facts which Inez is quick to dismiss because he occupies a less prestigious position.
In the order of things.
Travelling through time raises some interesting points, most of which have likely been mentioned before. Would the novelty of a 21st century kitschy work make it seem literary in the early 20th? Would the novelty of taking a writer and placing him within a 21st century manifestation of the 1920s seem literary from a 21st century filmic perspective? Would the novelty of a literary comedic 21st century filmic perspective seem incisive from an atemporal disengaged discursive non-committal self-reflexive perspective? Would an atemporal disengaged discursive non-committal self-reflexive perspective seem comedic from the point of view of a dedicated modernist cultivating a particular artistic market, working within broad guidelines, an aspect, in reaction to Victorian counterpoints?
Bears.
Hemingway's lines become increasingly trite as Gil's gain critical momentum. As Gil comes closer to situating himself within a burgeoning movement's jouissance, his confidence increases. As his confidence increases within the imaginary, his stability pleasantly deteriorates in the symbolic.
And he succeeds.
Is Gil the greatest kitschy-filmic-literary-atemporal-discursive-disengaged-perpetually-productive sprout ever?
Perhaps, although, with the passing of time, these answers seem harder and harder to ephemerally tether to a shape shifting transformative meteorology, within which moments coyly whisper, "by the light of the sickle moon."
lol
Plus it has time travel.
Gil (Owen Wilson) wants to make the transition from writing screen plays to novels while daydreaming about moving to Paris. He trusts no one with his work, however, as he isn't yet prepared to subsume negative criticisms. He encounters a self-assured erudite slightly pompous handsome individual (Michael Sheen as Paul) to whose clarifications his fiancée (Rachel McAdams as Inez) takes a shine. Gil's able to interject the occasional colourful contradiction after travelling back in time to the Paris of the 1920s (which he proceeds to do every evening at midnight) and learning various facts about Hemingway (Corey Stoll), F. Scott Fitzgerald (Tom Hiddleston), Picasso (Marcial Di Fonzo Bo), and . . . first hand, facts which Inez is quick to dismiss because he occupies a less prestigious position.
In the order of things.
Travelling through time raises some interesting points, most of which have likely been mentioned before. Would the novelty of a 21st century kitschy work make it seem literary in the early 20th? Would the novelty of taking a writer and placing him within a 21st century manifestation of the 1920s seem literary from a 21st century filmic perspective? Would the novelty of a literary comedic 21st century filmic perspective seem incisive from an atemporal disengaged discursive non-committal self-reflexive perspective? Would an atemporal disengaged discursive non-committal self-reflexive perspective seem comedic from the point of view of a dedicated modernist cultivating a particular artistic market, working within broad guidelines, an aspect, in reaction to Victorian counterpoints?
Bears.
Hemingway's lines become increasingly trite as Gil's gain critical momentum. As Gil comes closer to situating himself within a burgeoning movement's jouissance, his confidence increases. As his confidence increases within the imaginary, his stability pleasantly deteriorates in the symbolic.
And he succeeds.
Is Gil the greatest kitschy-filmic-literary-atemporal-discursive-disengaged-perpetually-productive sprout ever?
Perhaps, although, with the passing of time, these answers seem harder and harder to ephemerally tether to a shape shifting transformative meteorology, within which moments coyly whisper, "by the light of the sickle moon."
lol
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2
The final battle between Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) and Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) has been materialized in David Yates's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2.
Lacking the need to establish purpose and point, this is a film that gets right down to it.
And right down to it it does get.
On the hunt for Voldemort's remaining horcruxes, Harry, Ron (Rupert Grint), and Hermione (Emma Watson), with the help of the conniving Griphook (Warwick Davis), sneak into Gringotts in search of Helga Hufflepuff's besieged golden cup. Having discovered it, they then break out, riding the back of a dragon, only to eventually find themselves back at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Ready for the final showdown.
The film focuses on Harry's pursuits as he searches for Rowena Ravenclaw's lost diadem and investigates Snape's (Alan Rickman) memories, and neither he nor Voldemort take an active role in the initial confrontation. Although, since Harry misses the majority of the action in order to hunt horcruxes, he arguably takes the most active and direct role possible.
Even more active and direct than Neville Longbottom's (Matthew Lewis), who steals every scene he's in and delivers an appropriately timed inspirational speech when victory for Voldemort's forces seems inevitable.
And shortly thereafter Harry springs back to life to face Voldemort head-on, autocratic versus democratic duelling to the end, the insatiable aggressor challenging the counterstrike of the momentum his voraciousness engendered. Harry's democratic counterstrike lacks the influence, resources, and bloodlust of their opponents but charges onwards nonetheless, the product of coerced ingenuity. As he faces Voldemort, it's as if two competing conceptions of Nietzsche's übermensch contend, one using cruelty and pain to solidify its response to its culture's perceived moral vacuum (the fascist response wherein creativity must fit within a one-dimensional frame approved by whomever occupies a corresponding position of power), the other enabling individuals to create their own place within that vacuum based upon the wisdom of the free choices they make in response to its sundry enlivening manifestations. It's as if Harry is the ideal superperson since he doesn't seek to rule or govern on his own, or have an invincible advantage, even though he could easily take advantage of his fame to occupy a prestigious position, preferring instead to work within a malleable system with a minimized degree of hierarchical structure which encourages creativity and innovation.
Many of the characters from the previous films make an appearance, even Professor Sprout (Miriam Margoyles), with Remus Lupin (David Thewlis) delivering some memorable lines. Love has been represented/depicted/rationalized/conceptualized/. . . billions of times, and one of its illustrations that I find the most endearing is that found within Deathly Hallows 2, in regards to Severus Snape, whose love for Lilly Potter (Ellie Darcey-Alden, Geraldine Somerville) is exceptionally motivating.
It still almost brings tears to my eyes whenever I revisit the related scenes and encounter their undeniably intense and patient beauty.
Lacking the need to establish purpose and point, this is a film that gets right down to it.
And right down to it it does get.
On the hunt for Voldemort's remaining horcruxes, Harry, Ron (Rupert Grint), and Hermione (Emma Watson), with the help of the conniving Griphook (Warwick Davis), sneak into Gringotts in search of Helga Hufflepuff's besieged golden cup. Having discovered it, they then break out, riding the back of a dragon, only to eventually find themselves back at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Ready for the final showdown.
The film focuses on Harry's pursuits as he searches for Rowena Ravenclaw's lost diadem and investigates Snape's (Alan Rickman) memories, and neither he nor Voldemort take an active role in the initial confrontation. Although, since Harry misses the majority of the action in order to hunt horcruxes, he arguably takes the most active and direct role possible.
Even more active and direct than Neville Longbottom's (Matthew Lewis), who steals every scene he's in and delivers an appropriately timed inspirational speech when victory for Voldemort's forces seems inevitable.
And shortly thereafter Harry springs back to life to face Voldemort head-on, autocratic versus democratic duelling to the end, the insatiable aggressor challenging the counterstrike of the momentum his voraciousness engendered. Harry's democratic counterstrike lacks the influence, resources, and bloodlust of their opponents but charges onwards nonetheless, the product of coerced ingenuity. As he faces Voldemort, it's as if two competing conceptions of Nietzsche's übermensch contend, one using cruelty and pain to solidify its response to its culture's perceived moral vacuum (the fascist response wherein creativity must fit within a one-dimensional frame approved by whomever occupies a corresponding position of power), the other enabling individuals to create their own place within that vacuum based upon the wisdom of the free choices they make in response to its sundry enlivening manifestations. It's as if Harry is the ideal superperson since he doesn't seek to rule or govern on his own, or have an invincible advantage, even though he could easily take advantage of his fame to occupy a prestigious position, preferring instead to work within a malleable system with a minimized degree of hierarchical structure which encourages creativity and innovation.
Many of the characters from the previous films make an appearance, even Professor Sprout (Miriam Margoyles), with Remus Lupin (David Thewlis) delivering some memorable lines. Love has been represented/depicted/rationalized/conceptualized/. . . billions of times, and one of its illustrations that I find the most endearing is that found within Deathly Hallows 2, in regards to Severus Snape, whose love for Lilly Potter (Ellie Darcey-Alden, Geraldine Somerville) is exceptionally motivating.
It still almost brings tears to my eyes whenever I revisit the related scenes and encounter their undeniably intense and patient beauty.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
CBQM
Circulating Fort McPherson's warm and friendly pulse, Moccasin Telegraph radio (CBQM) quaintly coordinates the life and times of this Northwest Territorial town.
Bustling with vitality.
Fiddlers, recipes, philosophical advice, casual greetings, and informal announcements grace the gregarious airwaves as the mighty Peel River patrols the landscape.
Director Dennis Allen uses his lens to affectively edify CBQM's nocturnal hearth, focusing on the dynamics of Winter's tight-knit internal gatherings, while expanding his focus in Summer to capture vast fertile surrounding expanses.
Traditional activities are showcased within as salmon are dried and smoked, and a resounding sense of history permeates the present as contemporary events pay homage to the past.
Nice to see the ways in which a radio station's personalities can package and distribute value added information, from the darkened days of Winter to the setting of the midnight sun.
Bustling with vitality.
Fiddlers, recipes, philosophical advice, casual greetings, and informal announcements grace the gregarious airwaves as the mighty Peel River patrols the landscape.
Director Dennis Allen uses his lens to affectively edify CBQM's nocturnal hearth, focusing on the dynamics of Winter's tight-knit internal gatherings, while expanding his focus in Summer to capture vast fertile surrounding expanses.
Traditional activities are showcased within as salmon are dried and smoked, and a resounding sense of history permeates the present as contemporary events pay homage to the past.
Nice to see the ways in which a radio station's personalities can package and distribute value added information, from the darkened days of Winter to the setting of the midnight sun.
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Transformers: Dark of the Moon
The Autobots and Decepticons battle once again in Transformers: Dark of the Moon, one group caring for the future of humanity, the other, not so much.
Enjoyed the first act of the film as Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) struggles to find a job, competently dealing with the shocks of the working world while reservedly accepting that successfully defeating the forces of evil twice does not necessarily guarantee that one will find full-time rewarding employment. Nevertheless, he still finds a position in the mail room of an innovative company and proceeds to prove himself while impressing partner Carly Spencer (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley) and mollifying his ill-tempered father (Kevin Dunn).
Until fellow employee Jerry Wang (Ken Jeong) suddenly provides him with top secret intelligence regarding the Ark, a spacecraft which escaped Cybertron during its transformational Armageddon and proceeded to crash land on Earth's moon.
Reunited with Seymour Simmons (John Turturro), they then unravel a plot involving the stockpiling of pillars on the moon and the murder of many of the people involved with American and Russian moon missions.
It turns out an Autobot named Sentinel Prime (Leonard Nimoy) piloted the Ark away from Cybertron in order to ensure the Autobots's survival, but had really struck a deal with Megatron (Hugo Weaving) to betray them, believing that the future of the Transformers would pay more dividends in Decepticon hands.
With the help of Spencer's boss and Witwicky's rival Dylan Gould (Patrick Dempsey), the Decepticons conquer the earth and prepare to use Sentinel's technology to transport Cybertron to its solar system.
There are many quirky scenes that make the first act stand out, including the struggles of Alan Tudyk's character Dutch, awkward elevator encounters, and Sam and Jerry's discussion in the stall of a men's washroom. These scenes infuse the film with a catchy comedic sensibility that lightens the tension and disrupts the action, briefly, the sharp introduction of a distinct staccato which doesn't ruin the overall affect as it did in Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (the comedy in a Transformers film finally worked for me).
The film also features the significant transitions most of the characters have entertainingly negotiated since Revenge of the Fallen, which, I suppose, is one of the principle points.
As if we're all Transformers.
Transformers 3's second act is primarily concerned with the Autobot/human counterattack and the momentum fluidly built up beforehand stalls significantly. I suppose if you have a constructed bountiful world that is then devastated it makes sense to ensure that its dynamic isn't present in the Decepticon aftermath. But it also makes sense to then build towards a salient climax wherein that world's productivity is brilliantly revitalized, and Dark of the Moon does contain a climax and its origins are revitalized, but the content used to fill this traditional form didn't exactly motivate me, apart from the quasi-rapprochement entre Simmons and Mearing (Frances McDormand).
Nonetheless, its saving grace is represented by how it presents the ways in which the right perverts "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" maxim, by placing it in Decepiticon hands, who, basically want to bring their world to ours, or supplant Earth's culture with another, the imperialist few using their resources to destroy the longevity of the many, in the interests of the one, the dark of the moon (note the necessity of maintaining a prominent place for the study of First Nations culture within educational systems).
Enjoyed the first act of the film as Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) struggles to find a job, competently dealing with the shocks of the working world while reservedly accepting that successfully defeating the forces of evil twice does not necessarily guarantee that one will find full-time rewarding employment. Nevertheless, he still finds a position in the mail room of an innovative company and proceeds to prove himself while impressing partner Carly Spencer (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley) and mollifying his ill-tempered father (Kevin Dunn).
Until fellow employee Jerry Wang (Ken Jeong) suddenly provides him with top secret intelligence regarding the Ark, a spacecraft which escaped Cybertron during its transformational Armageddon and proceeded to crash land on Earth's moon.
Reunited with Seymour Simmons (John Turturro), they then unravel a plot involving the stockpiling of pillars on the moon and the murder of many of the people involved with American and Russian moon missions.
It turns out an Autobot named Sentinel Prime (Leonard Nimoy) piloted the Ark away from Cybertron in order to ensure the Autobots's survival, but had really struck a deal with Megatron (Hugo Weaving) to betray them, believing that the future of the Transformers would pay more dividends in Decepticon hands.
With the help of Spencer's boss and Witwicky's rival Dylan Gould (Patrick Dempsey), the Decepticons conquer the earth and prepare to use Sentinel's technology to transport Cybertron to its solar system.
There are many quirky scenes that make the first act stand out, including the struggles of Alan Tudyk's character Dutch, awkward elevator encounters, and Sam and Jerry's discussion in the stall of a men's washroom. These scenes infuse the film with a catchy comedic sensibility that lightens the tension and disrupts the action, briefly, the sharp introduction of a distinct staccato which doesn't ruin the overall affect as it did in Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (the comedy in a Transformers film finally worked for me).
The film also features the significant transitions most of the characters have entertainingly negotiated since Revenge of the Fallen, which, I suppose, is one of the principle points.
As if we're all Transformers.
Transformers 3's second act is primarily concerned with the Autobot/human counterattack and the momentum fluidly built up beforehand stalls significantly. I suppose if you have a constructed bountiful world that is then devastated it makes sense to ensure that its dynamic isn't present in the Decepticon aftermath. But it also makes sense to then build towards a salient climax wherein that world's productivity is brilliantly revitalized, and Dark of the Moon does contain a climax and its origins are revitalized, but the content used to fill this traditional form didn't exactly motivate me, apart from the quasi-rapprochement entre Simmons and Mearing (Frances McDormand).
Nonetheless, its saving grace is represented by how it presents the ways in which the right perverts "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" maxim, by placing it in Decepiticon hands, who, basically want to bring their world to ours, or supplant Earth's culture with another, the imperialist few using their resources to destroy the longevity of the many, in the interests of the one, the dark of the moon (note the necessity of maintaining a prominent place for the study of First Nations culture within educational systems).
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Shock Corridor
Just how far will one person go to win the Pulitzer Prize?
Journalist Johnny Barrett (Peter Breck) discovers an unsolved murder case and decides to engage in some psychological detective work of his own in order to bring the deceptive culprit to justice. After convincing a psychiatrist that he lacks sanity, his information hunt begins in a state mental hospital where three perennial residents witnessed the crime in question. Challenging his reason as he acclimatizes himself to life in the Shock Corridor, he discovers that when his clandestine lucidity is synthesized with a particular brand of patient curiosity, he can bring his troubled co-denizens back from the brink for long enough to unravel their valuable references. But his search is tempered by a mischievous and seductive mental quid pro quo that subtly reveals its malevolent intensity as he comes closer and closer to delineating the subject of his desire.
Through the passage of time.
Two of the three witnesses find themselves locked up because they have been unable to face the predominant homogenized semantic denominators that structure the social lives of their democratic communities, and have in turn embraced said denominators in a ridiculous fashion, thereby taking control of the means of production, subjectively situating themselves within positions of power.
One, while a prisoner of war, flirted with communism as a reaction against the bigotry that conditioned his family life growing up, and was given a dishonourable discharge after being exchanged. He was shunned afterwards and adopted the persona of an heroic confederate general to compensate.
The other, an African-American student attending a recently desegregated Southern University, was broken by the toxic racist sewer of white supremacy and reinvented himself as a grand wizard in the ku klux klan.
The third, being unable to handle the fact that he had helped to create weapons of mass destruction, reverted to an infantile state in order to forget the past.
Thus, in order for Johnny to solve the case and win his Pulitzer, he must function as an inclusive understanding open minded trustworthy citizen, thereby normalizing the activities his co-denizens engaged in prior to being committed in order to provide them with rational voices.
Unfortunately, Mr. Barrett was concerned primarily with winning the Pulitzer and not with capturing a criminal, and doesn't possess the fortitude required to individually combat madness's cloak and dagger, losing his voice in the process.
I think that's what Fuller's saying.
Journalist Johnny Barrett (Peter Breck) discovers an unsolved murder case and decides to engage in some psychological detective work of his own in order to bring the deceptive culprit to justice. After convincing a psychiatrist that he lacks sanity, his information hunt begins in a state mental hospital where three perennial residents witnessed the crime in question. Challenging his reason as he acclimatizes himself to life in the Shock Corridor, he discovers that when his clandestine lucidity is synthesized with a particular brand of patient curiosity, he can bring his troubled co-denizens back from the brink for long enough to unravel their valuable references. But his search is tempered by a mischievous and seductive mental quid pro quo that subtly reveals its malevolent intensity as he comes closer and closer to delineating the subject of his desire.
Through the passage of time.
Two of the three witnesses find themselves locked up because they have been unable to face the predominant homogenized semantic denominators that structure the social lives of their democratic communities, and have in turn embraced said denominators in a ridiculous fashion, thereby taking control of the means of production, subjectively situating themselves within positions of power.
One, while a prisoner of war, flirted with communism as a reaction against the bigotry that conditioned his family life growing up, and was given a dishonourable discharge after being exchanged. He was shunned afterwards and adopted the persona of an heroic confederate general to compensate.
The other, an African-American student attending a recently desegregated Southern University, was broken by the toxic racist sewer of white supremacy and reinvented himself as a grand wizard in the ku klux klan.
The third, being unable to handle the fact that he had helped to create weapons of mass destruction, reverted to an infantile state in order to forget the past.
Thus, in order for Johnny to solve the case and win his Pulitzer, he must function as an inclusive understanding open minded trustworthy citizen, thereby normalizing the activities his co-denizens engaged in prior to being committed in order to provide them with rational voices.
Unfortunately, Mr. Barrett was concerned primarily with winning the Pulitzer and not with capturing a criminal, and doesn't possess the fortitude required to individually combat madness's cloak and dagger, losing his voice in the process.
I think that's what Fuller's saying.
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