Another Snowy Night

Another Snowy Night
Walhalla Driveway - January 7, 2010

Saturday, December 26, 2009

News From Walhalla, News From the World - December 26, 2009

Selections from The New York Times & The Wall Street Journal

A New Eden, Both Cosmic and Cinematic
By MANHOLA DARGIS
Published December 18, 2009
http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/12/18/movies/18avatar.html
A New York Times Film Critic's Thoughtful Commentary on "Avatar"

What My Daughter Taught Me About Compassion

By DAVID HOROWITZ
Published December 25, 2009
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703939404574568361975770866.html
A Conservative Wall Street Journal Columnist Rethinks 'Compassion'

He Just Does What He Thinks Is Right

By PEGGY NOONAN
December 26, 2009
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748704254604574614400275474962.html
A Conservative Wall Street Journal Columnist Rethinks 'Obama'

Media stories of personal interest today: December 26, 2009 - ckl

Friday, November 27, 2009

WASHINGTON POST: "JOURNALISM'S SLOW, SAD DEATH"

"Journalism's Slow, Sad Death"
Washington Post, Friday, November 27, 2009


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/25/AR2009112503534.html?hpid=opinionsbox1=


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"NEWS FROM WALHALLA"
: UPCOMING POSTS

  • My favorite class syllabus from The Department of Photography & Cinema, The Ohio State University: 606 Photographic Communication & Expression (with highlighted click-ons to images & films) - ckl
  • Sample Listings From: The Ohio State University Course Catalog Listing of Courses Taught in The Department of Photography and Cinema in one of its heyday years.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

CONTEMPORARY CANADIAN CINEMA: A SAMPLER (11/19/09)

Submitted by: Clay Lowe, Emeritus faculty, The Ohio State University

Canadian Background Info:

Canadian Prime Minister: Stephen Harper, Conservative Party of Canada

Drive Time: Columbus to Windsor, Ontario: 3 hrs 44 mins, 196 miles

CBC. Canadian Broadcasting Radio & TV: http://www.cbc.ca/

Toronto International Film Festival: http://tiff.net/

Montreal World Film Festival: http://www.ffm-montreal.org/

Vancouver International Film Festival: http://www.viff.org/home.html

Stratford Shakespeare Festival: http://www.stratfordfestival.ca/

Shaw Theatre Festival: http://shawfest.com/Home/Playbill

Currency Exchange: $.95 US = $1.00 Canadian

Canadian Film Buzz Event 2009-2010:

James Cameron's "Avatar" (post-production) 2009

Trailer: http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi531039513/

See: New Yorker http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/10/26/091026fa_fact_goodyear

SELECT CANADIAN FILM DIRECTORS/WRITERS:

DENYS ARCAND (Montreal):
The Decline of the American Empire, 1986; Jesus of Montreal, 1989; Love and Human Remains, 1993; The Barbarian Invasions, 2003.

JAMES CAMERON (Kapuskasing, Ontario) The Terminator, 1984; Rambo: First Blood Part II, 1985 (screenplay); Aliens, 1986; True Lies, 1994; Titanic, 1997; Dark Angel, 2002 (TV: Fox).

DAVID CRONENBERG (Toronto) Videodrome, 1983; The Fly, 1986; Naked Lunch, 1991; Crash, 1996 (Not award winning "Crash" - see Haggis); Spider, 2002; A History of Violence, 2005 (Based on graphic novel, stars Viggo Mortensen); Eastern Promises, 2007 (Russian mafia, also with Viggo Mortensen).

ATOM EGOYAN (Canadian-Armenian) (Wife/actress: Arsinee Khanjian) Family Viewing, 1987; Speaking Parts, 1989; The Adjuster, 1991; Exotica, 1994; The Sweet Hereafter, 1997 (With novelist Russell Banks); Felicia's Journey, 1999; Adoration, 2008.

PAUL HAGGIS (London, Ontario) 
Crash, 2004
; Million Dollar Baby, 2004; 
The Last Kiss, 2006; 
Flags of Our Fathers, 2006; 
Casino Royale, 2006; 
Letters from Iwo Jima, 2005; 
In the Valley of Elah, 2007.

DON MCKELLAR 
(Toronto) Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould, 1992
 (Writer for director Francois Girard).

DEEPA MEHTA (Indian-Canadian) 
Fire, 1996; 
Earth, 1998
; Bollywood Hollywood, 2002; 
Republic of Love, 2003; 
Water, 2005.

SARAH POLLEY (Toronto)
 Actress - stage/screen (The Sweet Hereafter & The Adventures of Baron Munchausen). Director: Away From Her, 2006 (Featuring brilliant performance by Julie Christie; based on Alice Munro, Canadian short story: The Bear Came Over the Mountain).

PATRICIA ROZEMA (Sarnia, Ontario)

Mansfield Park, 1999; I've Heard the Mermaids Singing, 1987.

MICHAEL SNOW - experimental artist/filmmaker (Toronto)

Wavelength, 1966; Rameau's Nephew by Diderot, 1974; WYLNT (Wavelength for those who Don't have the time) 2003.

GUY MADDIN: Wexner Center Artist Residency: 2008-2009 http://www.wexarts.org/about/residencies

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CCAD Class Screening: November 19, 2009

"The Saddest Music in the World (2004)"

Directed by Guy Maddin, 100 minutes

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Guy Maddin (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Born February 28, 1956, is a Canadian screenwriter and director of both features and short films from Winnipeg, Manitoba. His most distinctive quality is his fondness for recreating the look and style of silent or early sound era films.

While Maddin strives to recreate the styles and moods of early film melodramas, Weimar Republic German silent films, and 1920s Soviet agit-prop, his own distinct personal style lies in his use of clichés, psychosexual situations, bizarre stories and humor. It is this self-conscious and surreal merging of early film-making techniques with a post-modern sensibility that give Maddin's films their distinct style.

His film education came not with any formal training at a trade school, but with endless weekends of watching films with close friends John Paizs and Steve Snyder. Soon realizing that Paizs was making films and Snyder was teaching production at the University of Manitoba, Maddin eventually decided that he needed to put his own knowledge to work and step behind the camera.

Maddin's first film was the 1986 short The Dead Father. His first feature film was Tales from the Gimli Hospital. His latest work Brand Upon the Brain was made in collaboration with The Film Company.

In 2007, Maddin became the first artist-curator of the UCLA Film Archives. In this position, he performs the programming for their new "Curated by..." series.[1]

As of fall 2007, Maddin is teaching film at the University of Manitoba. Also in 2007, Maddin's documentary My Winnipeg won the Best Canadian Feature award at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Guy Maddin feature films: Tales from the Gimli Hospital, 1988; Archangel, 1990; Careful, 1992; Twilight of the Ice Nymphs, 1997; Dracula, Pages From a Virgin's Diary Silent, 2002; Cowards Bend the Knee Silent, 2003; The Saddest Music in the World, 2003; Brand Upon the Brain! Silent, 2006; My Winnipeg, 2007; Death of the Reel (post-production) 2008; Invisiveis Os (post-production), 2008.

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Further Internet Resources

CANADIAN FILM TITLES:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category%3ACanadian_fil

DIRECTORS:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category%3AFilms_by_Canadian_directors

GUY MADDIN:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category%3AFilms_directed_by_Guy_Maddin

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Clay Lowe (former co-host "It's Movie Time" WCBE 90.5 FM)

New film reviews appear at various times at:

http://twitter.com/claytonklowe

http://claytonklowe.blogspot.com/

http://www.facebook.com/claytonklowe

See also Facebook group: OSU PhotoCinema Alumni and Friends

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Strangers In A Strange Land: Alex McDonell Memorial Service, November 16, 2009

Reflective Notes
Clay Lowe: A drawing together of the life as a journey metaphor.

Alex McDonell Memorial Service
12 noon, Monday, November 16,2009
Coleman & Daniels Funeral Home
Endicott, New York


1. The Book of Ruth
Read copy online: http://www.readbookonline.net/title/16634/

Ruth 1:16 And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God:

Ruth 1:17 Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the LORD do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me.

(Self-evident re-iteration of what it takes to survive in a world where we have all wandered away from home.)


2. The Biography of a Grizzly

Ernest Thompson Seton

By A Customer (Amazon.com)
I acquired this book at age 9-10. Now, at age 75, I really miss it (it was "borrowed" 20-30 yrs ago). My nostalgic memory is of a haunting,memorable, and very literate tale of an excellent bear-person, who resolutely faces what life offers; infancy & vulnerability; growth & education, maturity & strength, suffering fools and agressors, and finally, decline and mortality. Seton's magic is to dissolve completely the artificial barrier between nature's creatures and ourselves.

(A paradigm novel that deeply influenced my own ideas about the struggle to survive and at the same time find yourself in the process . . . Clay Lowe)


The Biography of a Grizzly



3. Stranger in a Strange Land

Robert A. Heinlen, 1961 (Hugo Award-winning science fiction novel)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stranger_in_a_Strange_Land

(The novel that became the hippie's guide to coming to an understanding about how we are all strangers in search of a new land . . . Clay Lowe)


Stranger in a Strange Land cover






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Friday, September 25, 2009

Isabella Rossellini: Tough Guy's Moll

Landmarks Gateway Theatre
6:30 pm, Tuesday evenings
October 13, 2009 - November 10, 2009
Featuring films by:
Norman Mailer, Guy Maddin, David Lynch & Isabella Rossellini

October 13
BLUE VELVET (R. 120 minutes 1986)
Director: David Lynch
Starring: Kyle MacLachlan, Dennis Hopper, Laura Dern, Isabella Rossellini
Music: Angelo Badalamenti
Guest co-host: Vicki Anne Bennett, photographer-artist

October 20
TOUGH GUYS DON'T DANCE (R. 110 minutes 1987)
Director: Norman Mailer
Starring: Ryan O'Neal, Isabella Rossellini, Debra Sandlund, Wings Hauser, Lawrence Tierney
Music: Angelo Badalamenti
Guest co-host: Jennifer Ntiri, actress, arts psychology

October 27
WILD AT HEART (R. 127 minutes 1990)
Director: David Lynch
Starring: Nicholas Cage, Laura Dern, Diane Ladd, Willem Dafoe, Isabella Rossellini, Harry Dean Stanton
Music: Angelo Badalamente
Guest co-host: Wariaz Tyler, writer, UCLA Fellowship Candidate

November 3
THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD (R. Canadian 99 minutes 2004)
Director: Guy Maddin
Starring: Isabella Rossellini, Mark McKinney, Maria de Madeiros, David Fox, Darcy Fehr
Original Music: Christoher Dedrick
Guest co-host: Frank Gabrenya, Emeritus film critic, Columbus Dispatch

November 10
BRAND UPON THE BRAIN! (NR. 95 minutes 2006)
Director: Guy Maddin
Narrator: Isabella Rossellini
Starring: Todd Moore, Erik Steffan Maahs, Cathleen O'Malley, Clayton Corzatte, Susan Corzatter
Original Music: Jason Staczek
Guest co-host: Jennifer Ntiri, actress, arts psychology

GREEN PORNO: Season 2
Short Subjects (Throughout the Series - May show clips from Season 1 & 3 also)
http://SundanceChannel.com/Greenporno
Director, writer, producer, host: Isabella Rossellini
Mantis
Snail
Worm
Fly
Firefly
Spider
Dragonfly
Bee
Guest co-host: Wariaz Tyler, writer, UCLA Fellowship Candidate

Isabella Rossellini: Tough Guy's Moll
Series Programmer/Host:
Clayton K. Lowe
Emeritus faculty, The Ohio State University; formerly moderator, World Film Classics, Educable TV-25; programmer/co-host, Columbus Museum of Art Film Series; Producer/co-host "It's Movie Time" WCBE 90.5 FM