You need to know, you're your personal alchemist

[sovay]

Short things:

1. I'd never even heard of Cyber Monday until this year. What is it? I for one welcome our new robot overlords.

2. R.I.P., Ken Russell. I should find somewhere to start with him that isn't The Lair of the White Worm (1988). The Devils (1971) is only coming out on Region 2.

3. I wonder why Roddy McDowall was not also cast in the film version of No Time for Sergeants. (Those are some of the dorkiest glasses in stage history.) The other two principals were: it made Andy Griffith a star. It's not exactly as though he was an unknown property.

4. I'm not sure I see the point of having a book on Derek Jarman reviewed by someone who clearly didn't like his films very much. I'm glad Bray finds his paintings important, because I know very little about Jarman's non-cinematic art, and I hope someday to visit his garden at Dungeness, ideally with rushthatspeaks, but seriously: difficult? Hard to sit through? Sententious gesture politics? Well-intentioned? I have to wonder if we saw the same movies—I am never sure what to do with criticism when that happens. (Did he miss how much of Wittgenstein (1993) is funny?) Personally, I'm looking forward to Sebastiane (1976); I have been since I knew it existed. Brian Eno did the music and it's in Latin.

5. Aphorisms by Kafka, which I hadn't even known existed. Commentary by Michael Cisco, who probably does.

I must catch a bus.

Comments

[ashlyme.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Martin has Sebastiane. Jarman and Eno? I'll check it out.

Oh, Lair of The White Worm is utter pants, isn't it? Still, it could be worse; I heard part of an interview earlier where he was (I hope) mock-pitching a film called Bravetart and the Loch Ness Monster (feisty Scots prostitute meets Aleister Crowley, apparently)... Erm.

[sovay]

Hmm. Martin has Sebastiane. Jarman and Eno? I'll check it out.

My favorites right now seem to be The Tempest (1979), War Requiem (1989), and Wittgenstein (1993), but I have never disliked anything I've seen by Derek Jarman and I am almost certainly undervaluing Caravaggio (1986) and Edward II (1991), which were the first two films of his that rushthatspeaks and I watched—right around this time last year, actually—and we were absolutely blown away. Jubilee (1977) is like one of its own cut-up fliers, all jagged edges and then Elizabethan grace. I think we're only going to watch Blue (1993) if we have something much less upsetting to chase it with, which probably isn't The Last of England (1987).

Oh, Lair of The White Worm is utter pants, isn't it?

I was shown it by some friends earlier this year, who thought my life was incomplete without it. It is true that I am very fond of Peter Capaldi, but I am also rather fond of my brain.

[matthew cheney (from livejournal.com)]

I would love to know what you make of Sebastiane -- an American classicist studying at Oxford, Jack Welch, did the translation for Jarman, and my high school Latin isn't strong enough to know how well the actors handled it. It could sound very strange to somebody who knows the language! They obviously had no money on the film, and the production was among Jarman's most difficult, but I think it's wondrous.

And yes, don't follow Blue with The Last of England! Blue is gorgeous and a unique experience, but oh so sad. The Angelic Conversation or Glitterbug would be a good one to put on after. (Glitterbug, which was assembled posthumously from Jarman's super-8 shorts, has a phenomenal soundtrack by Brian Eno as well.)

I'll soon be posting a video essay about Caravaggio that I just finished, so hopefully will help you value it a bit more. Just need to solve some annoying problems of compressing the video file without causing havoc to the imagery.

[sovay]

I would love to know what you make of Sebastiane -- an American classicist studying at Oxford, Jack Welch, did the translation for Jarman, and my high school Latin isn't strong enough to know how well the actors handled it.

Totally. I think it's the next one on our queue, once rushthatspeaks is no longer in Italy and we're actually close enough to watch a film together rather than just talk wistfully about it. I've read about its making in Dancing Ledge.

The Angelic Conversation or Glitterbug would be a good one to put on after.

The Angelic Conversation is the one I turned out to have owned on Italian-subtitled DVD since 2009, under the impression it was just the soundtrack by Coil. We have no idea how that happened.

(Glitterbug, which was assembled posthumously from Jarman's super-8 shorts, has a phenomenal soundtrack by Brian Eno as well.)

I will definitely want to see that. I love the short "Art of Mirrors."

I'll soon be posting a video essay about Caravaggio that I just finished, so hopefully will help you value it a bit more.

It was my first Jarman: I loved it when I saw it. I never wrote it up properly, but Nigel Terry. Sean Bean. Sean Bean making love to Tilda Swinton with gold coins. Tilda Swinton, my God. It just happened that I love Benjamin Britten, so War Requiem, and, who knew, apparently I love Wittgenstein. I look forward to your essay!

Just need to solve some annoying problems of compressing the video file without causing havoc to the imagery.

(Got nothing. I write all mine.)