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

Thursday, March 28, 2019

The Florida Project (Sean Baker, 2017)

The Florida Project (Sean Baker, 2017)

Cast: Brooklynn Prince, Bria Vinaite, Willem Dafoe, Christopher Rivera, Valeria Cotto, Aidan Malik, Patti Wiley. Screenplay: Sean Baker, Chris Bergoch. Cinematography: Alexis Zabe. Production design: Stephonik Youth. Film editing: Sean Baker. Music: Lorne Balfe.

Wednesday, March 27, 2019

Twentieth Century (Howard Hawks, 1934)

Twentieth Century (Howard Hawks, 1934)

Cast: John Barrymore, Carole Lombard, Walter Connolly, Roscoe Karns, Ralph Forbes, Charles Lane, Etienne Girardot, Dale Fuller, Edgar Kennedy. Screenplay: Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur, based on a play by Charles Bruce Millholland. Cinematography: Joseph H. August. Film editing: Gene Havlick.

Tuesday, March 26, 2019

The Awful Truth (Leo McCarey, 1937)

The Awful Truth (Leo McCarey, 1937)

Cast: Cary Grant, Irene Dunne, Ralph Bellamy, Alexander D'Arcy, Cecil Cunningham, Barbara Vance, Esther Dale, Joyce Compton. Screenplay: Viña Delmar, based on a play by Arthur Richman. Cinematography: Joseph Walker. Art direction: Lionel Banks, Stephen Goosson. Film editing: Al Clark.

Monday, March 25, 2019

Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman, 2008)

Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman, 2008)

Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Tom Noonan, Michelle Williams, Samantha Morton, Hope Davis, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Emily Watson, Dianne Wiest. Screenplay: Charlie Kaufman. Cinematography: Frederick Elmes. Production design: Mark Friedberg. Film editing: Robert Frazen. Music: Jon Brion.

Sunday, March 24, 2019

Cold War (Pawel Pawlikowski, 2018)

Cold War (Pawel Pawlikowski, 2018)

Cast: Joanna Kulig, Tomasz Kot, Borys Szyc, Agata Kulesza, Cédric Kahn, Jeanne Balibar. Screenplay: Pawel Pawlikowski, Janusz Glowacki, Piotr Borkowski. Cinematography: Lukasz Zal. Production design: Benoît Barouh, Marcel Slawinski, Katarzyna Sobanska-Strzalkowska. Film editing: Jaroslaw Kaminski.