Misfortunes of Imaginary Beings

A blog formerly known as Bookishness / By Charles Matthews

"Dazzled by so many and such marvelous inventions, the people of Macondo ... became indignant over the living images that the prosperous merchant Bruno Crespi projected in the theater with the lion-head ticket windows, for a character who had died and was buried in one film and for whose misfortune tears had been shed would reappear alive and transformed into an Arab in the next one. The audience, who had paid two cents apiece to share the difficulties of the actors, would not tolerate that outlandish fraud and they broke up the seats. The mayor, at the urging of Bruno Crespi, explained in a proclamation that the cinema was a machine of illusions that did not merit the emotional outbursts of the audience. With that discouraging explanation many ... decided not to return to the movies, considering that they already had too many troubles of their own to weep over the acted-out misfortunes of imaginary beings."
--Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

Wednesday, March 13, 2019

Inception (Christopher Nolan, 2010)

Inception (Christopher Nolan, 2010)

Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, Ken Watanabe, Dileep Rao, Cillian Murphy, Tom Berenger, Marion Cotillard, Michael Caine. Cinematography: Wally Pfister. Production design: Guy Hendrix Dyas. Film editing: Lee Smith. Music: Hans Zimmer.

Tuesday, March 12, 2019

While the City Sleeps (Fritz Lang, 1956)

While the City Sleeps (Fritz Lang, 1956)

Cast: Dana Andrews, Rhonda Fleming, George Sanders, Howard Duff, Thomas Mitchell, Vincent Price, Sally Forrest, John Drew Barrymore, James Craig, Ida Lupino. Cinematography: Ernest Laszlo. Art direction: Carroll Clark. Film editing: Gene Fowler Jr. Music: Herschel Burke Gilbert.

Monday, March 11, 2019

The Bad and the Beautiful (Vincente Minnelli, 1952)

The Bad and the Beautiful (Vincente Minnelli, 1952)

Cast: Kirk Douglas, Lana Turner, Dick Powell, Walter Pidgeon, Gloria Grahame, Barry Sullivan, Gilbert Roland. Screenplay: Charles Schnee, George Bradshaw. Cinematography: Robert Surtees. Art direction: Edward C. Carfagno, Cedric Gibbons. Film editing: Conrad A. Nervig. Music: David Raksin.

Sunday, March 10, 2019

Gold Diggers of 1935 (Busby Berkeley, 1935)

Cast: Dick Powell, Gloria Stuart, Alice Brady, Adolphe Menjou, Hugh Herbert, Glenda Farrell, Dorothy Dare, Wini Shaw. Screenplay: Manuel Seff, Peter Milne, Robert Lord. Cinematography: George Barnes. Art direction: Anton Grot. Film editing: George Amy.

Friday, March 8, 2019

The Magician (Rex Ingram, 1926)

Cast: Alice Terry, Paul Wegener, Iván Petrovich, Firmin Gémier, Gladys Hamer, Henry Wilson, Hubert J. Stowitts. Screenplay: Rex Ingram, based on a novel by W. Somerset Maugham. Cinematography: John F. Seitz. Art direction: Henri Ménessier. Film editing: Grant Whytock.

Tuesday, January 1, 2019

Out With the Old

New Year's Day seems like a good time to call a halt, even if it turns out to be only a temporary one, to this blog. More and more it has seemed like an obstacle to be overcome: I have books I haven't read, rooms I haven't dusted, floors I haven't mopped, and, yes, movies I haven't watched partly because I didn't want to force myself to write about them. So, Happy New Year to all, and to all a see you later.