Cinema of the World

Composer and pianist Thelonious Monk has been known until today as the eccentric genius of jazz. Charlotte Zwerin’s film about the “high priest of bebop and modern jazz” had its beginnings in 1967 when documentary film-maker Michael Blackwood was commissioned by West German Television to make a one hour film about Monk. He accompanied the mercurial music master over a six-month period capturing Monk on and offstage, Monk in the studio and Monk on the road, Monk at work and Monk at rest in New York, Atlanta and several European cities. With this footage, which until 1981 was "just sitting there like the Dead Sea Scrolls of jazz" (Bruce Ricker), supplemented by newly-filmed interviews, new interpretations of Monk's music by Barry Harris and Tommy Flanagan and rare archival photographs, Zwerin has realised a vibrant portrait revealing Monk's complex character, his dramatic mood swings, his idiosyncratic irreverence and his legendary sense of humour which also fleshes out the nature of his musical contributions. Come and listen to ''Rhythm-A-Ning”, ''Ugly Beauty'', “Crepuscule with Nellie,” “Evidence”, "Blue Monk", "Epistrophy". It's Monk Time!

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"A classic of Franco Filth, 9 March 2001
10/10
Author: sirarthurstreebgreebling II from Streeb Greebling Acres

Jess Franco does it again with this classic tale of abduction, preversion, rape and murder. The two strippers are taken out of prison and promised freedom if they investigate the dissapearence of an international swimmer. Their previous experience in espionage will give them the edge they need in this case. Soon they learn that the swimmers abduction is just the tip of the iceberg and that this mission is not as straight forward as it seemed. With some outrageous dialogue that i cant repeat here and a plot that will leave you reeling this is Franco at his best. Filthy, Unrepentant and Entertaining.

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In Sept./Oct. 1992 a mini festival took place in the Temple Bar Area of Dublin. Called 'The Here To Go Show', it celebrated William Burroughs and Brion Gysin and was located at The Gallery of Photography, The Project Arts Centre, and a number of Private locations. Organised by English writer Terry Wilson, Irish rock singer Frank Rynne, and writer Joe Ambrose. The show was documented in guerilla fashion by the organisers the results of which have been distilled into 'Destroy all Rational Thought'.

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"Somewhere over the rainbow Timothy Leary is laughing his head off, if he still has a head, that is."
Anyone who takes all the scenes in this movie literally ought to have his head examined, since the movie makes obvious leaps into psychedelic madness everywhere, including a scene filmed like a silent movie in which a frantic mother cautions her son not to eat Timothy Leary's brain, and another scene in which Leary's opinions about alien abduction are dramatized by an alien hopping into bed with a little ol' lady from Iowa.

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A fascinatingly detailed snapshot of the flamboyant outer reaches of countercultural San Francisco in the hippie years and an emotional celebration of diversity, liberation, sexual anarchy and fabulousness, "The Cockettes" joyously re-creates the brief but resplendent reign of the legendary freakadelic drag troupe… . The climate of all-embracing acceptance, blurred sexual lines, joyful transgression, rebellion and freedom comes through with warmth, humor and nostalgia.

-- David Rooney, Daily Variety

More reviews available here.

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This is a fascinating documentary about the Chilean writer, director, artist Alexandro Jodorowsky. The interviewer Louis Mouchet asks Jodorowsky a potpourri of questions about his films, philosophy, art, and his opinion and feelings on a host of subjects. Mouchet begins the interview with the simple, but spellbinding, inquisition: "who are you?", to which Jodorowsky replies with a tale of the Emperor of China. He states that when we can define ourselves we cease to be. He shares with us his thoughts and definitions of his lifelong quest for knowledge and the unknown, and his exploits into the Panic Movement in France, and his drawings and art and how he avoided the lynching by the audience at the premiere of Fando and Lis. There are also interviews with his associates Marcel Marceau, Jean Giraud and the musician Peter Gabriel. We also learn of his plans of the project of Dune, which fell through and was later made by David Lynch. There is also an interesting and amusing look at Jodorowsky as an orator in a class of students, in which Mouchet is invited to join in. It is a fascinating and enlightening look at the life and works of this creative and artistic guru.

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A prismatic portrait of enigmatic film director Lynch, whose wholly distinctive, challenging, and visually arresting cinematic flights of fancy include "Dune," "Blue Velvet," "The Elephant Man," "Twin Peaks," "Lost Highway," and "Eraserhead." Contains on-set footage of the conception and production of "Lost Highway," supplemented with extensive biographical information, interviews with colleagues and friends (including Lynchian staple Jack Nance in his last appearance before his death in 1996), and clips from his films, television productions, and commercials.

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Wonderful; NOT the definitive documentary
The definitive video documentary of M.C. Escher does not exist. Trust me, I've looked. Such a video would portray the graphic artist's life, personality, and psyche convincingly. It would map his creative process, charting change and growth across his lifespan. It would feature friends, family, artists, perceptual scientists, mathematicians and philosophers. It would explain the mathematical gymnastics and perceptual principles underlying fantastic images and illusions. It would show antecedents such as Arabian mosaics or Hogarth's classic frontispiece. It would introduce Escher's contemporaries like Oscar Reutersvard and Roger Penrose, and consider Escher's legacy, as reflected in the art and science of Roger Shepard, Scott Kim, Vladimir Kush, Octavio Ocampo, David MacDonald, Irvine Peacock, Rob Gonsalves, Akiyoshi Kitayoka, and others. And of course, the video would provide original, mind-bending animations that move and act in ways implied by Escher's still images. Without fantastic visuals that go beyond anything that you can find in a book, why would you even need a video presentation? It is important to get this part right because Escher's art ripens with prolonged, deep inspection. Brief video clips deprive Escher's intricate universe of its essence.

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The life story of Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, a German Jew, who as a physician established the field of sexology, and fought militantly against German anti-sodomy laws in the late 19th century. The script reveals main characters in Hirschfeld's life including impossible love interest Baron von Teschenberg, and Hirschfeld's aids- young Karl Giese and guardian angel, the transvestite Dorchen, as they establish the First Institute of Sexual Sciences in Berlin in 1920, and follows their struggles to keep it open, up to the rise of the Third Reich in the mid 1930s.

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------- AllMovie review and plot synopsis ------------
The Asphalt Jungle is a brilliantly conceived and executed anatomy of a crime — or, as director John Huston and scripter Ben Maddow put it, "a left-handed form of human endeavor." Recently paroled master criminal Erwin "Doc" Riedenschneider (Sam Jaffe), with funding from crooked attorney Emmerich (Louis Calhern), gathers several crooks together in Cincinnati for a Big Caper. Among those involved are Dix (Sterling Hayden), an impoverished hood who sees the upcoming jewel heist as a means to finance his dream of owning a horse farm. Hunch-backed cafe owner (James Whitmore) is hired on to be the driver for the heist; professional safecracker Louis Ciavelli (Anthony Caruso) assembles the tools of his trade; and a bookie (Marc Lawrence) acts as Emmerich's go-between. The robbery is pulled off successfully, but an alert night watchman shoots Ciavelli. Corrupt cop (Barry Kelley), angry that his "patsy" (Lawrence) didn't let him in on the caper, beats the bookie into confessing and fingering the other criminals involved. From this point on, the meticulously planned crime falls apart with the inevitability of a Greek tragedy. Way down on the cast list is Marilyn Monroe in her star-making bit as Emmerich's sexy "niece"; whenever The Asphalt Jungle would be reissued, Monroe would figure prominently in the print ads as one of the stars. The Asphalt Jungle was based on a novel by the prolific W.R. Burnett, who also wrote Little Caesar and Saint Johnson (the fictionalized life story of Wyatt Earp). — Hal Erickson

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Summary:
A novelist (Udo Kier) hires a quiet British country house so that he can work on finishing his latest novel. His agent arranges for a secretary to stay with him, in order to speed up its completion (played by Linda Hayden). However, this turns out to be a big mistake when she reveals that she has actually come to kill him for stealing the manuscript for his last novel from her husband, which drove him to suicide. The housekeeper, Kier's girlfriend (played by 70's sex superstar Fiona Richmond) and 2 local thugs all meet horrific ends as Hayden goes on her killing spree - imdb-

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Brydie White is a 17-year-old retarded girl living in a rural English village whom finds solace in burying pet animals in the church cemetery and strikes up a few friendships with a few village children while her disapproving mother and a loathsome drunkard get in the way of her newfound hobby.

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This cynical Serbian comedy features a battle between Good and Evil. The tale centers around a teenage fashion student, Marina and a freewheeling swinger, Nikola. After their one night stand, which he does not remember, the spaced out girl finds herself pregnant. Marina will do anything to con Nikola into marrying her. She enlists her friends to devise a series of crazy plots. Included are scenes of a devil with a nose for coke and rock'n'roll, and an effete angel dancing to '60s tunes. -- Sandra Brennan

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SYNOPSIS
A blind, but deadly, gunman, is hired to escort fifty mail order brides to their miner husbands. His business partners double cross him, selling the women to bandit Domingo. Blindman heads into Mexico in pursuit. (Tom Seldon on IMDb)

NOTES
This is an excellent action-packed comic strip like spaghetti western. The obvious inspiration comes from Zatoichi. This time a blindman, portrayed by Tony Anthony, is not looking for revenge, but to deliver 50 mail brides to the miners in Texas like he promised. At the start of the movie he has been double-crossed by his partners who sold the brides to Mexico. Blindman has no choice but to go to Mexico to find the brides and bring them back.

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"The full title of this 1976 Swiss curio is MOSQUITO DER SCHAENDER (MOSQUITO THE RAPIST), meaning it is NOT to be confused 1995's big bug bummer MOSQUITO. MOSQUITO THE RAPIST is a gross, creepy, disturbing yet disconcertingly (if not always intentionally) comedic look at the crimes of a real-life German serial killer. What distinguishes it from the serial killer movie glut of the eighties and nineties (HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER, THE VANISHING, ANGST, CONFESSIONS OF A SERIAL KILLER, DR. LAMB, THE UNTOLD STORY, SOMBER, etc.) is its grim, obsessive tone and an unforgettable performance by Werner Pochath.

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The film was based on a subject by Mario Gariazzo, a director who in the seventies, gravitated into the orbit of Daunia and to whom Fernando di Leo “lent a hand” by offering advice for his script - for his detective film, The Bloody Hands of the Law - and for the production of his western, Holy Water Joe and the tear-jerker, The Balloon Vendor, a story vaguely inspired by William Wyler's famous film, The Desperate Hours. At the start it was Gariazzo who was to direct it but at the producers' insistence he was finally replaced by di Leo.

The budget was very low (the film was shot in a remote house in the Abruzzo mountains) and the means and number of actors (only four in all) were scarce, but di Leo managed to exploit those limitations in a creative way. He focused on the desolate setting to make the plot oppressive and claustrophobic and developed the psychology of the characters in a negative and neurotic sense in order to produce a constant tension, both in the dialogue and in the action. Although the director considered the film a minor entry in his filmography, Vacation for a Massacre (the original title belonged to an old script for a western which di Leo had written in the late Seventies: it must be said that in the reprints and the home-video market, the film also circulated under the title, Madness - Vacation for a Massacre), over time earned a certain admiration from the audience, especially abroad and particularly due to the violent and morbid pulsations which characterized it.

A word must be said about the leading actor, Joe Dallesandro, who came from Andy Warhol's famous Factory and who on the set, maybe because of an intake of mysterious drugs, was capable of amazing physical feats.

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Description: Constructed as series of interviews of people on the street discussing their personal fantasies when prompted by the filmmakers to use passers-by as the objects.

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This is a very rare film so I decided to upload it without the subtitles. I've also included a short Angelepolous film, Ekpomb (1968)i, along with it. Since I don't speak or read Greek, I can't tell you much about either film. Ekpombi has no description on allmovie nor on imdb. It's documentary style, focused on the swinging sixties.

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The Romanian town Sulina lies right in the no-man's-land of the Danube-delta, cut off from the rest of the world. Ten years after the fall of the communist regime the people here are worse off than ever. Sulina used to be a wealthy trade town. But with the decline of communism the economic connections petered out. The film portrays four of the region's inhabitants from three generations who just manage to get by. 25 year old Nicu tries to make a living as a fisherman. Together with a friend, he drags his boat across the pack ice even in the winter to get to his nets - always in danger of breaking through the ice. Ionut, 15, doesn't have a proper job. His father cannot take care of him, so he sets out to steal whatever he can find on the deserted ships from the Danube-fleet to sell it afterwards. The old married couple Varvara and Toni live from hand to mouth as peasants. There are regular arguments because Toni drinks too much and curses the new government while Varvara is left with all the work. Varvara tries to change her husband, using superstitious rituals.

The Romanian - German co-production, realized with CNC Romania support, was screeened in many international festivals, among them Berlinale, Rotterdam International Festival, and also at MoMA - New York.

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Description: Set towards the end of World War I, The Peach Thief tells the story of a whirlwind love affair between a Serbian Prisoner Of War, Ivo Obrenovich and a Colonel's wife, Lisa (played by the beautiful Nevena Kokanova). Lisa catches Ivo Obrenovich stealing peaches from a tree in the Colonel's private garden. They soon fall in love with each other and start secretly meeting in the garden...

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Description: This playful film is at once a documentary of a day in the life of the Soviet Union, a documentary of the filming of said documentary, and a depiction of an audience watching the film. Even the editing of the film is documented. We often see the cameraman who is purportedly making the film, but we rarely, if ever, see any of the footage he seems to be in the act of shooting!

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Vertov and his Kino group produced this lyrical documentary on the lives of Coal miners in the Donbas who are struggling to meet their production quotas under the five year plan. Enthusiasm is most noteworthy for it's creative use of the new sound medium. Vertov liberated the recording equipment from the studio and shot sound on location. He also used common everyday sounds and wove them into what can only be described as a symphony. In fact, after seeing the film Charlie Chaplin wrote: "Never had I known that these mechanical sounds could be arranged to sound so beautiful. I regard it as one of the most exhilarating symphonies I have heard. Mr. Dziga Vertov is a musician.”

“Enthusiasm for both his subject and his style permeates Vertov's first sound film, contrasting the old order and the new through didactic, dynamic montage. As in The Man With The Movie Camera, one's attention is drawn to the making of the film itself as a contribution to the modernization program, epitomizing Lenin's statement, 'Of all the arts, for us cinema is the most important'”
—Holt’s Foreign Film Guide

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Sir Paul, a distinguished author, blinded in a horrific accident, advertises for an amanuensis, an assistant to help him with his writing. He employs the amiable Jane Ryder to be his eyes as he revisits scenes from his past and works on what he intends to be his final opus. Jane appears to be ideal: attractive, intelligent, unruffled by her employer's abrupt eccentricities. But, gradually, we come aware that Jane has another agenda. Incrementally, Sir Paul's familiar surroundings are altered. Strange things happen around the house and he becomes increasingly dependent on his new assistant. Jane plays increasingly sadistic games until their relationship breaks down.


Review from here

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nur, who has been deaf since birth, works as a librarian. His father had left him and his mother when he was seven, and Onur has always blamed himself for this. Although being able to speak, he has chosen to stay silent because of the pitying looks of the people around him. At his friend Vedat’s engagement party, he meets Zeynep, who later finds out about Onur’s hearing disability, but is not bothered by it. She is forced by her overbearing father to leave home and gets a job at a call-center. Having to speak on the phone all day to people she doesn’t know, Zeynep finds peace with Onur, who she communicates with perfectly without speaking...

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Story
It’s the 1930s. The Republic Day Ball is in progress in Zonguldak, a coal mining town in Turkey. Among the invited guests are the newcomers to this small and boring town: Halit, a mine engineer; his gorgeous wife, Mükerrem; and Halit’s sister and unwanted household member, Seniha. When Nüshet, whose father is the richest man in town, asks Mükerrem for a dance, Seniha, who has been watching them from a dark corner, immediately realizes that Mükerrem will not be able to resist the incredible (and feminine) beauty of this young man. At the same moment, she also knows that God would lift her up from the place where she has long surrendered to a fate of ugliness, to a place where she would be the one who determines the destiny of beauty.

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