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

Friday, January 10, 2025

The Consequences of Love (Paolo Sorrentino, 2004)

Cast: Toni Servillo, Olivia Magnani, Adriano Giannini, Antono Ballerio, Gianna Paola Scaffidi, Nino D'Agata, Vincenzo Vitagliano, Diego Ribon, Gilberto Idonea, Giselda Voloni. Screenplay: Paolo Sorrentino. Cinematography: Luca Bigazzi. Production design: Lino Fiorito. Film editing: Giogiò Franchini. Music: Pasquale Catalano.

Thursday, January 9, 2025

Thirty Day Princess (Marion Gering, 1934)

Cast: Sylvia Sidney, Cary Grant, Edward Arnold, Henry Stephenson, Vince Barnett, Edgar Norton, Ray Walker, Lucien Littlefield, Robert McWade, George Baxter, Marguerite Namara. Screenplay: Preston Sturges, Frank Partos, Sam Hellman, Edwin Justus Mayer, based on a story by Clarence Budington Kelland. Cinematography: Leon Shamroy. Art direction: Hans Dreier, Wiard Ihnen. Film editing: Jane Loring. Music: Howard Jackson, John Leipold.

The Paperboy (Lee Daniels, 2012)

Cast: Zac Efron, Matthew McConaughey, Nicole Kidman, John Cusack, David Oyelowo, Scott Glenn, Ned Bellamy, Nealla Gordon, Macy Gray. Screenplay: Pete Dexter, Lee Daniels, based on a novel by Dexter. Cinematography: Roberto Schaefer. Production design: Daniel T. Dorrance. Film editing: Joe Klotz. Music: Mario Grigorov.

Tuesday, January 7, 2025

One Man Up (Paolo Sorrentino, 2001)

Cast: Toni Servillo, Andrea Renzi, Antonino Bruschetta, Angela Goodwin, Nello Mascia, Peppe Lanzetta, Stefania Barca, Italo Celoro, Clotilde Sabatina, Marzio Honorato, Rosaria De Cicco, Roberto De Francesco. Screenplay: Paolo Sorrentino. Cinematography: Pasquale Mari. Production design: Lino Fiorito. Film editing: Giorgiò Franchini. Music: Pasquale Catalano.

Monday, January 6, 2025

Basquiat (Julian Schnabel, 1996)

Cast: Jeffrey Wright, David Bowie, Michael Wincott, Benicio Del Toro, Claire Forlani, Dennis Hopper, Gary Oldman, Christopher Walken, Willem Dafoe, Parker Posey, Elina Löwensohn, Paul Bartel, Courtney Love, Tatum O'Neal. Screenplay: Julian Schnabel, Lech Majewski, John F. Bowe. Cinematography: Ron Fortunato. Production design: Dan Leigh. Film editing: Michael Berenbaum. Music: John Cale, Julian Schnabel.

Sunday, January 5, 2025

Monte Carlo (Ernst Lubitsch, 1930)

Cast: Jack Buchanan, Jeanette MacDonald, Claud Allister, Zasu Pitts, Tyler Brooke, John Roache, Lionel Belmore, Albert Conti, Helen Garden, Donald Novis, Erik Bey, David Percy. Screenplay: Ernest Vajda, based on a novel by Booth Tarkington and a play by Hans Müller and Evelyn Greenleaf Sutherland. Cinematography: Victor Milner. Costumes: Travis Banton. Film editing: Merrill G. White. Music: Karl Hajos, Herman Hand, W. Franke Harling, Sigmund Krumgold, John Leipold.