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, June 13, 2024

Hit Man (Richard Linklater, 2024)

Cast: Glen Powell, Adria Arjona, Austin Amelio, Retta, Sanjay Rao, Molly Bernard, Evan Holtzman, Galen Bryant Banks, Mike Markoff, Bryant Carroll. Screenplay: Richard Linklater, Glen Powell, based on an article by Skip Hollandsworth. Cinematography: Shane F. Kellly. Production design: Bruce Curtis. Film editing: Sandra Adair. Music: Graham Reynolds.

Tuesday, June 11, 2024

Another Round (Thomas Vinterberg, 2020)

Cast: Mads Mikkelsen, Thomas Bo Larsen, Magnus Millang, Lars Ranthe, Maria Bonnevie, Helene Reingaard Neumann, Susse Wold, Magnus Sjørup, Silas Cornelius Van, Albert Rudbeck Lindhardt. Screenplay: Thomas Vinterberg, Tobias Lindholm. Cinematography: Sturla Brandt Grøvlen. Production design: Sabine Viid. Film editing: Janus Billeskov Jansen, Anne Østerud.

Monday, June 10, 2024

Blue Collar (Paul Schrader, 1978)

Cast: Richard Pryor, Harvey Keitel, Yaphet Kotto, Ed Begley Jr., Harry Bellaver, George Memmoli, Lucy Saroyan, Lane Smith, Cliff De Young, Borah Silver, Chip Fields, Harry Northrup, Leonard Gaines. Screenplay: Paul Schrader, Leonard Schrader. Cinematography: Bobby Byrne. Production design: Lawrence G. Paull. Film editing: Tom Rolf. Music: Jack Nitzsche.

Thursday, June 6, 2024

Beijing Watermelon (Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1989)

Cast: Bengal, Masako Motai, Yasufumi Hayashi, Haruhiko Saito, Takashi Sasano, Hana Kino, Akira Emoto, Yugi Ogata, Ryo Okubo, Ryo Iwamatsu, Kazunori Hagiwara, Hiromi Oshima. Screenplay: Yoshihiro Ishimatsu. Cinematography: Shigekazu Nagano. Production design: Kazuo Satsuya. Music: Tetsuo Kondo.

Monday, June 3, 2024

School Daze (Spike Lee, 1988)

Cast: Laurence Fishburne, Giancarlo Esposito, Spike Lee, Tisha Campbell, Kyme, Joe Seneca, Ellen Holly, Ossie Davis, Bill Nunn, James Bond III, Branford Marsalis, Kadeem Hardison, Samuel L. Jackson. Screenplay: Spike Lee. Cinematography: Ernest R. Dickerson. Production design: Wynn Thomas. Film editing: Barry Alexander Brown. Music: Bill Lee.

Sunday, June 2, 2024

Affliction (Paul Schrader, 1997)

Cast: Nick Nolte, James Coburn, Sissy Spacek, Willem Dafoe, Brigid Tierney, Jim True-Frost, Holmes Osborne, Mary Beth Hurt, Marian Seldes. Screenplay: Paul Schrader, based on a novel by Russell Banks. Cinematography: Paul Sarossy. Production design: Anne Pritchard. Film editing: Jay Rabinowitz. Music: Michael Brook.

Saturday, June 1, 2024

Pretty Poison (Noel Black, 1968)

Cast: Anthony Perkins, Tuesday Weld, Beverly Garland, John Randolph, Dick O'Neill, Clarice Blackburn, Joseph Bova, Ken Kercheval, Don Fellows. Screenplay: Lorenzo Semple Jr., based on a novel by Stephen Geller. Cinematography: David L. Quaid. Art direction: Harold Michelson, Jack Martin Smith. Film editing: William H. Ziegler. Music: Johnny Mandel.