Bardot and some other DVDs I forgot to mention...

I must have somehow overlooked a box-set Image is releasing of 3 Brigitte Bardot flicks, under the name The Brigitte Bardot Classic Collection. The set includes three previously released Home Vision titles (are more to come? I sure hope so since HVE stopped putting out DVDs around the time Criterion introduced their Eclipse series): Roger Vadim's The Night Heaven Fell [Les bijoutiers du clair de lune], Marc Allégret's Plucking the Daisy [En effeuillant la marguerite] and Vadim's Don Juan; or If Don Juan Were a Woman [Don Juan ou Si Don Juan était une femme...], Bardot's final film.

A few other DVD announcements that rolled by since my last post: the complete series of The Shield from Fox on 3 November; Michael Mann's Public Enemies on 10 November from Universal; and Blu-rays of Cujo and My Bloody Valentine, the original film in its director's cut, from Lionsgate on 24 November.

IFC and Criterion, cont'd; Plus The General on Blu-ray

As you may have already seen, ScreenDaily announced all the titles that will come from the pairing of IFC and Criterion, after Gomorrah and A Christmas Tale, of course:

Jan Troell's Everlasting Moments [Maria Larssons eviga ögonblick]
Christopher Nolan's Following
Steve McQueen's Hunger
Abdel Kechiche's The Secret of the Grain [La graine et le mulet]
Hirokazu Kore-eda's Still Walking
Olivier Assayas' Summer Hours [L'heure d'été]
Alfonso Cuarón's Y tu mamá también

That unfortunately means, likely, no Last Mistress, but at least none of the titles above are worth complaining about. In other news, Kino has announced a Blu-ray of Buster Keaton's The General for 10 November. Universal will release the fourth season of Alfred Hitchcock Presents... on 24 November, and Zeitgeist will have Jennifer Baichwal's Act of God on 26 January 2010.

Absurd Popularity Of A Cat

CATcerto. ENTIRE PERFORMANCE. Nora The Piano Cat

For Youtube video CLICK HERE

or for the entire news/facts CLICK HERE

I really don't know what's wrong with the internet but I just can't seem to paste the entire embedded code of the video here. But I really wish to share with you its performance and really, people nowadays have nothing else better to do than writing scores/concertos for an animal.

A keen Hamodia reader in New York

Maybe if the AJN also had such dedicated and ardent readers, it's circulation figures would improve and not require lame excuses.

see http://tinyurl.com/nn9mlp

The Decade List: Reprise (2006)

Reprise - dir. Joachim Trier

[Again, this is a slightly modified version of an older post. I will be contributing more new pieces on films this month. I've been busying myself with doing work for the local film festival, which has taken up a big portion of my time (satisfyingly). So forgive me, those of you who've already read this.]

Phillip (Anders Danielsen Lie) and Erik (Espen Klouman-Høiner) have been best friends since childhood, bonded together by their love of literature. Both aspired to become writers, and Reprise opens as the two friends, now in their early 20s, drop their novels into the mail, anxiously awaiting word from the prospective publisher. Writer/director Joachim Trier, a distant relative of Lars Von Trier, then takes us into the troubling effects the publication of Phillip’s novel takes on the two men, treading on territory that’s deceptively familiar. Phillip’s publication, in addition to his intensely passionate relationship with Kari (Viktoria Winge), causes a spiral of mental illness, attempted suicide and disillusionment, which lands him in a mental hospital for the better part of a year. Reprise isn’t just a chronicle of ambitious youth in modern day Norway (though it really could have been set anywhere; Trier stated that several critics called his film very un-Norwegian), but an alarming fantasy that cleverly disrupts stylistic and narrative clichés in ways deeply poignant and unsettling.

The opening moments of Reprise are rather off-putting. A narrator quickly summarizes the events leading up to Phillip and Erik’s completion of their novels and brazenly suggests scenarios which would likely follow, from casual affairs, critical response and a Parisian locale for the completion of their further works. However, each time the film adheres to these annoying motifs, Trier deflects the artifice abruptly. These fantasies become juxtaposed (I hate that word) with a harsh reality. Both instant success and an inability to deal with his first serious relationship render Phillip unable to deal with the world around him; the suggestion that Erik is talentless moves him into a state of monotony, both in his personal and romantic lives. In a way, Trier is criticizing these “hip” cinematic bells-and-whistles, bringing a grounded truth in to offset the gloss.

However, the motifs serve as the tragic fantasy of Reprise. The film, both in its fantastical elements and otherwise, exists in a world of ideals. Phillip and Erik make up two members of a no-girls-allowed brotherhood of rouge intellectuals, who spend their days reading and dissecting art and literature. The group is so exclusive that Erik is scared to bring his girlfriend Johanne around; for most of the film, Trier doesn’t even show us her face. One member of the group, Lars (Christian Rubeck), goes on a misogynistic rant about the defeating nature of men falling into a relationship, relinquishing their intellectual spirit for the mundane. “How many girls have actually introduced you to a worthwhile music group?” he poses. “If they have, it’s likely that it was someone their father, brother or ex-boyfriend listened to. And how many girls have introduced you to books that you didn’t already read in high school?” It’s an alarming statement, but Lars' assessment isn't one that's supported by the film. All of the women in Reprise are far richer than Lars’ cynical statements would suggest, but Trier never makes a point to align the film with any of the characters' singular beliefs or claims.

The motifs then project the further installment of the fantasy, in which young artists get backing, move to Paris and go down in history. Reprise is rather astute in dispelling these fantasies, though it does bring suggestion that literary publication in a less common language would prove to be easier than trying in English or French, languages spoken outside of their native country. It’s perfectly bittersweet and utterly assured from its first-time director. It’s not often that one gets to say, “every time you think the director is making the wrong move in his film, he quickly dismisses this and gives you more than what you bargained for.”

With: Anders Danielsen Lie, Espen Klouman-Høiner, Viktoria Winge, Odd Magnus Williamson, Pål Stokka, Christian Rubeck, Henrik Elvestad, Henrik Mestad, Rebekka Karijord, Sigmund Sæverud
Screenplay: Joachim Trier, Eskil Vogt
Cinematography: Jakob Ihre
Music: Ola Fløttum, Knut Schreiner
Country of Origin: Norway
US Distributor: Miramax Films

Premiere: 3 July 2006 (Karlovy Vary Film Festival)
US Premiere: January 2007 (Sundance Film Festival)

Awards: Best Film, Best Direction, Best Screenplay (Amanda Awards, Norway); Best Director, Don Quijote Award (Karlovy Vary Film Festival); Discovery Award (Toronto International Film Festival)

Rojak(Shrimp Paste With Fruits), The Belfast Mimic

Add some water, chilli sauce and sugar to enhance the stinky flavour. Oh yeah, we Malaysians love our food smelly, Durians, Belacan (dried shrimp block), Petai (a kinda veg)......

Its a very funny feeling to make your own's rojak. You hope it to turn out exactly like what you had tasted like those on the streets but in the end, the result turns disastrous, but yet, you lick your lips like its the best tasting rojak in the world (ok, that you = Cin Khor).

DVD Release Update: 1 September - Headless Woman, My Effortless Brilliance, etc.

Of the DVD releases below, you'll find that Sony has finally decided to throw the Uma Thurman romantic comedy The Accidental Husband, which is reportedly another awful career move for the actress and has been in release limbo for two years; you'll find another sure-to-be-irritating entry into the Eating Out series, directed by, um, Glenn Gaylord; and also release dates for Lynn Shelton's My Effortless Brilliance, Lucrecia Martel's The Headless Woman and Pablo Trapero's Lion's Den.

- It's Gary Shandling's Show, The Complete Series, 1986-1990, Shout! Factory, 20 October
- Messiah of Evil: The Second Coming, 1973, d. Willard Huyck, Code Red, 35th Anniversary Special Edition, 27 October
- Unmistaken Child, 2008, d. Nati Baratz, Oscilloscope, 3 November
- The Accidental Husband, 2008, d. Griffin Dunne, Sony Pictures, 10 November, w. Uma Thurman, Colin Firth, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Sam Shepard, Justina Machado
- The Divine Weapon, 2008, d. Kim Yu-jin, Virgil Films, 10 November
- Eating Out: All You Can Eat, 2009, d. Glenn Gaylord, Ariztical, 10 November
- Spectacle: Elvis Costello with..., Season 1, 2008-2009, Video Service Corp., also on Blu-ray, 10 November
- American Venus, 2007, d. Bruce Sweeney, MPI, 17 November, w. Rebecca De Mornay
- It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia: A Very Sunny Christmas, 2009, 20th Century Fox, also on Blu-ray, 17 November
- My Effortless Brilliance, 2008, d. Lynn Shelton, IFC Films, 17 November
- Prisoner, 2007, d. David Alford, Robert Archer Lynn, IFC Films, 17 November, w. Julian McMahon, Elias Koteas
- Vampire Party [Les dents de la nuit], 2008, d. Stephan Cafiero, Vincent Lobelle, Dark Sky Films, 17 November, w. Tchéky Karyo, Julien Boisselier, Hélène de Fougerolles, Stéphane Freiss
- Meat Weed America, 2007, d. Aiden Dillard, Troma, 24 November, w. Lloyd Kaufman, Debbie Rochon, Peter Stickles
- Lion's Den [Leonera], 2008, d. Pablo Trapero, Strand Releasing, 8 December
- We Want a Child, 1949, d. Lau Lauritzen, Televista, 8 December
- Antony and Cleopatra [Marcantonio e Cleopatra], 1913, d. Enrico Guazzoni, Televista, 15 December
- The Headless Woman [La mujer sin cabeza], 2008, d. Lucrecia Martel, Strand Releasing, 15 December
- Spartacus [Spartaco], 1913, d. Giovanni Enrico Vidali, Televista, 15 December
- Big Love, The Complete 3rd Season, 2009, HBO, 22 December
- Crude, 2009, d. Joe Berlinger, First Run Features, 16 March 2010