Prometheus
I reviewed Prometheus at Tiny Mix Tapes. Basically, the gist is: don’t believe the haterz. The film, and Noomi Rapace, kicks some ass.
I wrote about American composer John Luther Adams’s seminal experimental percussion piece, Inuksuit, which was recently performed in Ojai. It’s a pretty amazing piece of music, with both its percussionists and audience members moving all over natural landscapes as it explores the relationship between our physical and sonic environments. Here’s the article:
I blurbed the underdog masterpiece of French New Wave, Jacques Rivette’s Celine and Julie Go Boating. 1 week run in LA, starting June 8th. There’s so much to say about the film: it’s a surreptitiously feminist, impossibly stylish, 3 hours long, conceptually ambitious, yet super easy to watch. And those actresses.
Like a Borges story swathed in a silk kimono, the maze-like turns of the epic-length Céline and Julie Go Boating are so welcomingly sensual, you’ll be just as likely to laze in the film’s warm beauty as you will be to decipher its Byzantine puzzles. Librarian Julie (Dominique Labourier) and cabaret magician Céline (Godard regular Juliet Berto) are the mysteriously linked protagonists who spontaneously form a friendship, one that rivals Daisies for playful absurdity and Mulholland Dr. for alternate dimensions. The other realm in question here is the psychodrama of a Parisian household from a bygone era, revealed to the duo in fragmented film-within-a-film memories brought on by magical candies. Director Jacques Rivette’s 1974 exploration of the nature of narrative is the most mischievously immersive of the French New Wave, casually bending our perceptions of both time and space even as it keeps us fully aware of its richly-rendered world. Céline and Julie Go Boating was Rivette’s biggest commercial hit in France, yet remains sadly unreleased on DVD in this country, so seize the chance to catch this master stroke of whimsy and wonderment on the big screen! Brand-new 35mm print!
http://www.cinefamily.org/films/celine-and-julie-go-boating/
6/5 at Cinefamily. One of my favorite films of the 00s, with director Andrew Bujalski in person. Here is my blurb.
A decade ago, a young director named Andrew Bujalski made one of cinema’s politest call-to-arms with Funny Ha Ha, his generation-defining D.I.Y. debut about post-college indirection. Like Linklater’s Slacker did for the ’90s, Funny Ha Ha definitively captures aimlessness in the Aughts with humor, compassion, and incisiveness as it follows recent grad Marnie (the luminous Kate Dollenmayer) as she meanders through temp jobs, crushes, and to-do lists. A graduate of Harvard’s hands-on and documentary-heavy film program, with a faculty advisor none other than Chantal Akerman(!), Bujalski’s indisputable film buff cred shines through every warmly rough-hewn frame and naturalistic line of dialogue. A true crowd-pleaser that began as a word-of-mouth phenomena and went on to single-handedly inspire not only countless imitators — from current in-theater dramedies to HBO series - but an entire filmmaking movement (so-called “mumblecore”), few debuts have had such an impact on the landscape of current American filmmaking. With a gorgeous 35mm restoration of its original 16mm print, there’s never been a better time to see what sets Funny Ha Ha apart. Andrew Bujalski will be here in person for a Q&A & reception after the film!
http://www.cinefamily.org/films/special-events-june-2012/#funny-ha-ha-10th-anniv-screening-filmmaker-andrew-bujalski-in-person
(Source: delisandwich, via lilkneesocks)
So, I threw a 30th birthday party and to make it special, I hired Arthur Nakane, the LA-area’s 1-Man-Band of (my) choice. This dude is pure magic, especially to be playing in a living room. Here’s his website: http://www.arthurnakane.com/
