Still image from Citizen Kane Great films can teach us more than what their makers plan while filming. The story quoted below can be found in Paul Arden’s book, and it amply demonstrates how far...
I know I’ve not written anything about Roman Polanski’s arrest on this blog – but I have written an article. As always, I allow myself to do what the legal system of some countries e...
(written 5 Sept 2008) I am currently giving much thought to the importance of screen adaptations. I have to think simultaneously of the stage adaptations, too, because very often we are speaking about...
Some of you will instantly recognise a paraphrase of the title of Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter by Mario Vargas Llosa in the post’s title. I remember reading it in about 1998 in Moscow. I was ...
Despite the title of the post, I am not going to write either about The Age of Innocence by Martin Scorsese, or about Inglorious Basterds by Quentin Tarantino. To me, these titles, taken figuratively,...
I have just read a very good article by Slavoj Žižek in the London Review of Books: Berlusconi in Tehran. By “very good” I mean that he, as usual, displays an astounding amount knowledge t...
When coincidences like this occur, you’ve got make a point of them. So here goes… I was reading Mayakovski’s My Discovery of America, and in the very beginning he narrates his journe...
I‘m sitting in the living room with a laptop on my knees, listening to Rachmaninov’s Adagio Sostenuto from the Piano Concerto no. 2. There is a bookcase in front of me (which I assembled m...
It may be strange or not, but the road to my discovery of Rocky Horror Picture Show was paved by Mina Mazzini. Or rather, by her spectacular cover of Sweet Transvestite. For those of us who are Mina&#...
Had I been blogging several years ago, I’d be in the same state of shock upon hearing of Falco’s death. But sadly, I knew very little about him then and didn’t even react to the news...