Sometimes there are links between them, oftentimes there are not.
• The new new museum: Jerry Saltz for New York magazine riffs on the recent history of art museums and makes you long to see the new Whitney in Manhattan.
• A night at the museum: for Reverse Shot at the Museum of the Moving Image, Fernando F. Croce writes about Tsai Ming-liang’s extraordinary film Face (Visage, 2009, above), for which this is the trailer:
Sometimes there are links between them, oftentimes there are not.
• The A-Z of Carl Dreyer: terrific anthology from Matthew Thrift at BFI about the demanding work of the great Danish director, including his little-known study of the sculptor Thorvaldsen (1949, above).
• Seeing Istanbul again: Orhan Panuk’s translator Maureen Feely writes for The New York Review of Books about the Turkish writer’s vision of the city where he lives.
• Sophia Loren and the Italo-American songbook: apart from being hugely enjoyable, this essay is an object lesson in how to assemble – without commentary – comparatively obscure film extracts to explore an idea, in this case the creation of trans-national identity in ’50s’ cinema; from Bristol PhD candidate Sarah Culhane.
Sometimes there are connections between the three things, oftentimes there are not.
• The wonderfully elusive Chinese novel: a fascinating discussion from The New York Review of Books in which Perry Link takes off from a review of The Plum in the Golden Vase or, Chin P’ing Mei, Vol. 5: The Dissolution to consider wider questions about Chinese literature and translation.
• Alec Soth on photographing “the cloud” in Silicon Valley: it’s more than a year old, but this is a solid SFMOMA video about the wonderful photographer making images of something entirely insubstantial.
Sometimes there are connections between the three things, oftentimes there are not.
• The River – a new authenticity: a very fine essay by Ian Christie for Criterion on Jean Renoir’s 1951 feature shot in India (above).
• The catastrophe: a rather extraordinary piece by Oliver Sacks in The New Yorker on the late Spalding Gray, who I knew slightly and admired immensely.
• Bruce Springsteen – ‘The River’: from when this song was new – just because…
• Innerspace: Eric Hynes at the Museum of the Moving Image Reverse Shot blog writes very well about Miami Vice (1984-89, above) and Miami Vice (2006); for those nostalgic about the original series, take a look at the Top 10 Miami Vice music moments compiled by schnuffel661:
Sometimes there are connections between them, oftentimes there not.
• A new Whitney: Michael Kimmelman reviews Manhattan’s latest museum, with great use of embedded video and graphics (above) in a spectacular online essay from The New York Times.
• The Louvre scene from Bande à part (1964, director Jean-Luc Godard): this has recently been appropriated by an ad for a mobile phone, but the original says more about heritage, museums, cinema and being young than pretty much any other 40 seconds of film.
• The Smithsons on Housing: writer and filmmaker B. S. Johnson’s eccentric and compelling BBC documentary made in 1970 about architects Alison and Peter Smithson; I came to this via John Grindrod’s terrific blog Dirty Rotten Scoundrel, which has an informative entry here (and lots more links to fascinating films).
• Los Angeles Plays Itself: Thom Andersen’s great 2003 essay film (above) about Hollywood’s representation of the city of angeles is finally available on DVD (albeit as a Region 1 impost); here’s the trailer…
• Survival tactics: German filmmakers in Hollywood, 1940-1960: a long, detailed and dense essay by Joe McElhaney for Lola about Michael Curtiz, Ernst Lubitsch, Billy Wilder and others – fascinating if you’re prepared to devote the time it needs.
• How I feel for the films of Robert Siodmak: Geoff Andrew for the BFI on the noir director who has a retrospective at BFI Southbank this month and next; here’s the trailer for the re-release of Siodmak’s Cry of the City (1948):
• The Angelic Cinema of Manoel de Oliveira: a beautiful video essay by Kevin B. Lee for Fandor about the cinema of the director who died very recently, taking its inspiration from the film de Oliveira made at the age of 102, The Strange Case of Angelica (2010, above); go here for an excellent tribute to the filmmaker compiled by David Hudson.
