byneddiedingo

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 tygerland

Henri Matisse The Piano Lesson. 1916. 

#henri matisse

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Nocturama (Bertrand Bonello, 2016)

Cast: Finnegan Oldfield, Vincent Rottiers, Hamza Meziani, Manai Issa, Martin Petit-Guyot, Jamil McCraven, Raban Nait Oufella, Laure Valentinelli, Ilias le Dore, Robin Goldbronn, Luis Rego, Hermine Karagheuz, Adèle Haenel. Screenplay: Bertrand Bonello. Cinematography: Léo Hinstin. Production design: Katia Wyszkop. Film editing: Fabrice Rouaud. Music: Bertrand Bonello.

Nocturama is a kind of existential thriller in which a group of young people bomb and burn various Parisian landmarks. I use the word "existential" because their terrorism appears to be unmotivated; it's an acte gratuit thatseems to stem from no political or social dissatisfaction. The narrative is elliptical: We watch the members of the group as they cross Paris to assemble at their various assigned targets before we even know where they're going and why. Eventually, there's a flashback that shows their preparatory meeting, but even that supplies only the most rudimentary information: that the explosive is semtex, which has been procured for them an older man named Greg (Vincent Rottiers). Their several missions accomplished, they regroup in a department store that's closed for the night, where they raid the food and wine department, try on the clothes, listen to music, and watch the news, which eventually reveals that their hideout has been discovered. Two of them are missing: One is killed in a showdown with a security guard, while Greg suffers a fate that we learn about in a curious way. The outcome is presented with a cold-blooded detachment. Bertrand Bonello breaks no new ground for the thriller genre, but skillfully plays with the viewer's reactions to the young protagonists, an alternation of censure and sympathy.   

#Nocturama #Bertrand Bonello

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Austin Stoker, Laurie Zimmer, and Darwin Joston in Assault on Precinct 13 (John Carpenter, 1976)

Cast: Austin Stoker, Darwin Joston, Laurie Zimmer, Martin West, Tony Burton, Charles Cyphers, Nancy Kyes, Peter Bruni, John J. Fox, Marc Ross, Alan Koss, Henry Brandon, Kim Richards. Screenplay: John Carpenter. Cinematography: Douglas Knapp. Art direction: Tommy Lee Wallace. Film editing: John Carpenter. Music: John Carpenter. 

Jean-François Richet's 2005 remake of Assault on Precinct 13 makes a lot more narrative sense and has a much better cast (Ethan Hawke, Laurence Fishburne, etc.), but it feels routine in comparison with the laconic, low budget original, which John Carpenter admitted was a kind of mashup of Howard Hawks's Rio Bravo (1959) and George Romero's Night of the Living Dead (1968). Which only goes to show that when it comes to thrillers, coherence and slick production values are not the top priorities. Setting the hook is what matters, and Carpenter's movie does that early with a shocker of a scene that almost earned the film an X rating -- one of the rare instances when the ratings board was upset by violence rather than sex. In this case, the film's rough edges and unknown actors somehow add a neo-realist touch to a movie in which the bad guys might as well be zombies or space aliens for all we get to know about them. 

#Assault on Precinct 13 #John Carpenter #Austin Stoker #Laurie Zimmer #Darwin Joston

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beyond-the-pale

Paul Cadmus - Standing Nude, c. 1930

#Paul Cadmus

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 granstromjulius

Henri Matisse

#Henri Matisse

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 granstromjulius

Henri Matisse

#Henri Matisse

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 granstromjulius

Henri Matisse

#Henri Matisse

[byneddiedingo]

 pagansphinx

Thomas Hart Benton (American, 1889 - 1975) • Persephone • 1938-39 

#Thomas Hart Benton

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mochi-and-company

Michael Leonard, 1982

#Michael Leonard

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Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung Ka-fai in Farewell China (Clara Law, 1990)

Cast: Maggie Cheung, Tony Leung Ka-fai, Hayley Man, Lester Chit-Man Chan, Hung Chun, Jun Liao. Screenplay: Eddie Ling-Ching Fong. Cinematography: Jingle Ma. Art direction: Lee Lok-Si. Film editing: Ma Kam. Music: Jim Shum.

Despite a narrative clotted with flashbacks, some scenes that don't seem to fit, and an unsteadiness of tone, Clara Law's Farewell China remains a vivid, sometimes harrowing look at Chinese immigrants in New York City. Maggie Cheung gives a dazzling performance as Li Hung, who leaves her husband, Zhao Nansan (Tony Leung Ka-fai) and their infant son in China to seek work in New York. When Nansan stops hearing from Hung, he finds his way to the city to search for her. Hayley Man gives a lively performance as a 15-year-old Chinese-American runaway from her family in Detroit, who steals and turns tricks as she aids Nansan in his search through the city's lower depths.  

#Farewell China #Clara Law #Maggie Cheung #Tony Leung Ka-fai

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eternal–return: Paul Klee ·Limits of Reason (1927)

#Paul Klee

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5 Centimeters per Second (Makoto Shinkai, 2007)

Cast: Voices of Kenji Mizuhashi, Yoshimi Kondou, Satomi Hanamura, Ayaka Onoue. Screenplay: Makoto Shinkai. Cinematography: Makoto Shinkai. Art direction: Makoto Shinkai, Film editing: Makoto Shinkai. Music: Tenmon. 

Makoto Shinkai's eye-dazzling, tearjerking anime has many admirers, but I tend to side with the detractors that think the spectacular images overwhelm an insubstantial story of young love frustrated by time and space. Shinkai crafts magnificent settings, creating vivid skies while also paying meticulous attention to mundane details like railway cars and shop interiors, but his human characters are sketchy, even at times kitschy: his little girls have huge eyes like the children in Margaret Keane's paintings. 

#5 Centimeters per Second #Makoto Shinkai

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 paintingispoetry

William Holman Hunt and Edward Robert Hughes, The Lady of Shalott, 1905

#William Holman Hunt #Edward Robert Hughes

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 passareltemps

Paul Klee, Blue Coat (1940).

#paul klee

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 arinewman7

Sunset, Paul Klee. 1930

#paul klee

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chainsawpunk

Paul Klee, May Picture, 1925

#paul klee

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Martin Loeb in My Little Loves (Jean Eustache, 1974)

Cast: Martin Loeb, Jacqueline Dufranne, Ingrid Caven, Henri Martinez, Dionys Mascolo, Maurice Pialat, Pierre Edelman, Marie-Paule Fernandez. Screenplay: Jean Eustache. Cinematography: Nestor Almendros. Film editing: Françoise Belleville, Vincent Cottrell, Alberto Yaccelini. 

A deadpan film about coming of age, which as usual means learning about sex, set first in a French village where such learning is discouraged and then in a French city, where such learning is haphazard. Regarded by many as a masterpiece, though I have my reservations about its lack of narrative drive. Beautifully filmed by Nestor Almendros. 

#My Little Loves #Jean Eustache #Martin Loeb