I'll just leave this here, though for few days I was gathering my thoughts after seeing the "One more time with feeling" and drafting few smart notes on this. After a pause I came to conclusion, that we are not invited to Cave's personal grief (no matter how personal the album is), but probably we have to live with new Cave from now on, as we have to live with new ourselves from time to time.
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P.S. Though I didn't like few compositional moves from the directors point, I have to say, the scale of the documentary is something I look for in every film festival I go (the scale of content, rather than form). I never get to see or hear anything like this though. Because there is only one Nick Cave and only one Warren Ellis.
Last night at 4:30 AM I've finished reading The Roosevelts: An Intimate History by Geoffrey C. Ward, Ken Burns. It was one of those books that one tries to not read too fast because it's SO good.
Bought the book because of FDR, but fell in love with TR. Got to know ER for the first time really.
All three characters - all being fearless leaders and imperfect human beings in their own ways - may make one feel like one is living the most unproductive, aimless & passion-free life. Out of priviledged background or out of boredom but it seems people just had more time to come up with ways to fill their lives with daily self education and meaningful action those days. In addition to that, I can't believe how well they've documented their own lives by writing diaries and so many letters. One may only wonder where did they find so much time for writing and clearing out their own thoughts in between wars, travels, and daily social & political action.
P.S. Beautifully published book with tons of visual references presented in opposite to most (auto-) biographies I've read before. Perfect for a history nerd with no brain power to remeber names and dates like me.
John Berger's ('one of the most influential intellectuals of our time' according to the Observer) "Ways of Seeing" is one of those books that I wish someone had told me about when I was a student. Someone could have saved me hours wasted in galleries and museums trying to keep a straight face pretending I understood what I was looking at.
Well, I knew few dates and few names of the painters, knew something about their place in art history and could appreciate their craftsmanship, but I had almost no deeper understanding, or at least a clear method of reading art beyond that. So I'm deeply thankful to John Berger for pointing my attention to:
A different meaning that words and our own emotions bring to the art piece.
Status and power that content of classical European oil paintings ensured to the owner;
Gender issues and portrayal of the female body (I love how Berger draws a clear line between terms 'nude' and 'naked');
An analysis of glamour as an invention of industrial society in modern times during which 'The pursuit of individual happiness has been acknowledged as a universal right. Yet the existing social conditions make the individual feel powerless' (p.148). And I'm pretty sure, no one ever forgot to show this book to people in advertising business.
I guess Berger summed up a lot of things that intuitively were floating in my head, but could not be described in my own words. And though 'seeing comes before words' according to Berger himself, now, after reading his book, I have a clear starting point and few keywords in my head every time I start to analyse any visual in front of me.
The book contains and extends ideas firstly presented in "A BAFTA award-winning series with John Berger, which rapidly became regarded as one of the most influential art programmes ever made." (BBC2)
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In the first programme Berger examines the impact of photography on our appreciation of art from the past.
This second programme deals with the portrayal of the female nude, an important part of the tradition of European art. Berger examines these paintings and asks whether they celebrate women as they really are or only as men would like them to be.
With the invention of oil paint around 1400, painters were able to portray people and objects with an unprecedented degree of realism, and painting became the ideal way to celebrate private possessions. In this programme, John Berger questions the value we place on that tradition.
In this programme, Berger analyses the images of advertising and publicity and shows how they relate to the tradition of oil painting - in moods, relationships and poses.
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'A snap in the face of the art establishment ... Ways of Seeing revolutionized the way that Fine Art is read and understood' - Guardian.
this post is about a film I've seen in Vilnius International Film Festival in February. It was really cold outside at the time, and my Moscow memories were thrown at me from the screen one by one. The documentary film by Petter Ringbom "The Russian Winter" tells a story about musician, ex-member of the Fugees, John Forté trying to chace his second chance after 5 years in prison and doing it by traveling across Russia with his band and other musicians. I've never seen Moscow and St.Petersburgh filmed so honestly, as it is, at least as I've seen and felt it when living and traveling there in recent years. The documentary is full of great music (including Forté's collaborations with Alina Orlova, Sunsay, Billy's Band and others) and cultural misunderstandings, as well as beautiful street-views and some inspirational talks by Forté himself. Here is a trailer, and official description of the movie:
Taken from the iTunes page:
The Russian Winter
Brooklyn-born John Forté was a Grammy-nominated musician in The Fugees at 21 and a federal prison inmate at 26. When his prison sentence was remarkably commuted in 2008, Forte was given a second chance to share his talents with the world. Chronicling his concert tour across Russia, this inspirational documentary takes us on Forté's personal journey—one that's as much about having his music heard as it is about hearing and learning from the music of others.
Official Selection Tribeca Film Festival 2012
Official Selection Moscow International Film Festival 2012
IDFA Play Competition for Music Documentary 2012
Featuring: John Forté, Alina Orlova, Sunsay, Billy's Band, Zero People, Artemy Troitsky and more.
Directed By: Petter Ringbom
Produced By: Le Castle Film Works
few days ago finally got to watch Waiting for Superman - a documentary on public school system in United States directed by Davis Guggenheim. As for someone who loves listening to sir Ken Robinson and other speakers on topic of education, it was heartbreaking for me to listen to those naive and such basic dreams of those children and their parents, who participate in a lottery to get to a proper school..
God, I now understand how lucky I was to go to a school I went in my local neighborhood.
and what about ten-years created by unions of teachers in USA?? wtf? who else gets a ten-year job contract impossible to break no matter how bad at work one is?? good luck, America.
