movies

0429 – The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey (1988)

spacetime coordinates: remote Cumbrian mountain village 1348 >> 1980s New Zealand

navigator_xlg

The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey is a 1988 feature film, an official Australian-New Zealand co-production, directed by Vincent Ward.

Ward and his production team based the look of the film on extensive research into the Middle Ages, particularly the mining industry, although this was then rendered imaginatively.  The colours of the film are based on medieval art and, in particular, medieval and renaissance artists’ ideas about heaven and hell. The blues in many of the modern-day sequences are based on the inks in the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, while the reds and oranges of the motorway lights and furnace fires evoke images of hell in the works of Hieronymous BoschPieter Bruegel and Matthias Grünewald.  Ward later said he had not achieved what he wanted to with the colour of the modern-day scenes due to the film’s short shooting schedule. Ironically, the colour in the medieval scenes, which were turned into black and white, was far better than that in the 20th century scenes. Some of the mining scenes were inspired by engravings from the German mining manual De re metallica, although it dates from two centuries after the time of those scenes. The angel of death seen flying across the moon at one point is based on a medieval engraving in Paris’ Père Lachaise Cemetery.

See also: Middle Ages in film

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095709/

movies

422 – Midnight Special (2016)

spacetime coordinates: 2010’s  San Antonio Texas > Louisiana Florida midnight-special

Midnight Special is a 2016 American science fiction film written and directed by Jeff Nichols, and produced by Sarah Green and Brian Kavanaugh-Jones. The film stars Michael ShannonJoel EdgertonKirsten DunstAdam DriverJaeden Lieberher, and Sam Shepard.midnight_special_one_sheetThe story revolves around Roy Tomlin and his biological son, Alton Meyer, escaping from both the government and a cult, after discovering that Alton has special powers.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2649554/

series

415 – True Detective (TV Series 2014– )

true detectiveTrue Detective is an American anthology crime drama television series created and written by Nic Pizzolatto. The series, broadcast by the premium cable network HBO in the United States, premiered on January 12, 2014. Each season of the series is structured as a disparate, self-contained narrative, employing new cast ensembles and following various sets of characters and settings.

The first season, starring Matthew McConaugheyWoody HarrelsonMichelle MonaghanMichael Potts, and Tory Kittles, takes place in Louisiana and follows a pair of Louisiana State Police homicide detectives, and their pursuit of a serial killer over a 17-year period. True Detective‘s first season explores themes of philosophical pessimism, masculinity, and Christianity; critics have analyzed the show’s portrayal of women, its auteurist sensibility, and the influence of comics and weird horror fiction on its narrative. (read more here)

True_Detective#Opening_sequence

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2356777/

movies

0414 – Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)

three_billboards_outside_ebbing_missouri

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri is a 2017 black comedy crime film written, produced, and directed by Martin McDonagh. It stars Frances McDormandWoody HarrelsonSam RockwellJohn Hawkes and Peter Dinklage. The film follows a mother who, when the police in her town fail to find a suspect in her daughter’s murder, purchases three billboards to call public attention to the unsolved crime, polarizing the community. (soundtrack by Carter Burwell)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5027774/

movies

0406 – Travellers and Magicians (2003)

spacetime coordinates: 2000’s Bhutan

travellers

Travellers and Magicians (Dzongkha: ཆང་ཧུབ་ཐེངས་གཅིག་གི་འཁྲུལ་སྣང) is a 2003 Bhutanese Dzongkha language film written and directed by Khyentse Norbu, a reincarnate lama of Tibetan Buddhism, who is also known as Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche. The movie is the first feature film shot entirely in the Kingdom of Bhutan. The majority of the cast are not professional actors; Dendup, a well-known Bhutanese radio actor and producer, is the exception. This movie is among the first to take a Himalayan Buddhist perspective. (New aspects)

travellers4
bus station

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0378906/

movies, music, Uncategorized

0402 – Drowning by Numbers (1988)

Drowning by Numbers is a 1988 British-Dutch film directed by Peter Greenaway.

The film’s plot centres on three married women — a grandmother, her daughter, and her niece — each named Cissie Colpitts. As the story progresses, each woman successively drowns her husband. The three Cissie Colpittses are played by Joan PlowrightJuliet Stevenson and Joely Richardson, while Bernard Hill plays the coroner, Madgett, who is cajoled into covering up the three crimes.

The structure, with similar stories repeated three times, is reminiscent of a fairy tale, most specifically ‘The Billy Goats Gruff‘, because Madgett is constantly promised greater rewards as he tries his luck with each of the Cissies in turn. The link to folklore is further established by Madgett’s son Smut, who recites the rules of various unusual games played by the characters as if they were ancient traditions. Many of these games are invented for the film, including:

  • Bees in the Trees
  • Dawn Card Castles
  • Deadman’s Catch
  • Flights of Fancy (or Reverse Strip Jump)
  • The Great Death Game
  • Hangman’s Cricket
  • The Hare and Hounds
  • Sheep and Tides

In Drowning by Numbers, number-counting, the rules of games and the repetitions of the plot are all devices which emphasise structure and symmetry. Through the course of the film each of the numbers 1 to 100 appear, the large majority in sequence, often seen in the background, sometimes spoken by the characters. 

The film is set and was shot in and around SouthwoldSuffolkEngland, with key landmarks such as the Victorian water towerSouthwold Lighthouse, and the estuary of the River Blyth clearly identifiable.

Music

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092929/