0225 – Kuky se vrací (2010)

Kooky (Czech: Kuky se vrací, literally “Kuky returns”, a pun on Lassie se vrací) is a 2010 Czech action comedy film directed by Jan Svěrák. The film combines techniques of puppet animation, stop motion and live action. It tells the story of a six-year-old asthmatic boy whose parents throw him away his favorite toy, an old teddy bear named Kooky. The boy, however, secretly sneaks out of the house at night to retrieve Kooky from the garbage can and bring him back home. Due to that, the boy gets ill. In his feverish dreams, Kooky comes to life in the landfill, escapes into a mysterious forest and begins its journey amongst the rough-and-ready creatures of the forest.

The film was inspired by the works of the Czech sculptor and painter František Skála, who refused to participate in the production. Svěrák offered collaboration on the technical development of puppets and visual effects to Jakub Dvorský from the video game company Amanita Design. The puppets in the film were manipulated by the members of the ensemble Buchty a loutky.  During the post-production process, Svěrák and his team concentrated on removing the strings and wires with the help of computer animation. Kooky is technically the most complicated film by Svěrák; it contains three times more visual effects than Dark Blue World, the most expensive Czech film up to that point.  In addition to fictional puppet figures, the film makes use of real animals (fox, butterfly, snail, frog etc.)

imdb   wiki

224 – Small Soldiers (1998)

spacetime coordinates: 1998 Ohio 

Small Soldiers is a 1998 American science fiction action film directed by Joe Dante. The film revolves around two adolescents who get caught in the middle of a war between two factions of sentient action figures, the Gorgonites and the Commando Elite.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Soldiers

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0122718/

219 – Legend (2015)

spacetime coordinates: 1960s London

Legend is a 2015 French-British crime thriller film written and directed by Brian Helgeland. It is adapted from John Pearson‘s book The Profession of Violence: The Rise and Fall of the Kray Twins,  which deals with the rise and fall of the Kray twins; the relationship that bound them together, and charts their gruesome career to their downfall and imprisonment for life in 1969.

Rotten Tomatoes’ consensus reads, “As a gangster biopic, Legend is deeply flawed, but as a showcase for Tom Hardy – in a dual role, no less – it just about lives up to its title.”

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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3569230/

195 – Hugo (2011)

spacetime coordinates: Paris in the 1930s

Hugo is a 2011 historical adventure drama film directed and co-produced by Martin Scorsese and adapted for the screen by John Logan. Based on Brian Selznick‘s book The Invention of Hugo Cabret, it is about a boy who lives alone in the Gare Montparnasse railway station in Paris in the 1930s.

The backstory and primary features of Georges Méliès‘ life as depicted in the film are largely accurate: He became interested in film after seeing a demonstration of the Lumière brothers‘ camera; he was a magician and toymaker; he experimented with automata; he owned a theatre (Theatre Robert-Houdin); he was forced into bankruptcy; his film stock was reportedly melted down for its celluloid; he became a toy salesman at the Montparnasse station, and he was eventually awarded the Légion d’honneur medal after a period of terrible neglect. Many of the early silent films shown in the movie are Méliès’s actual works, such as Le voyage dans la lune (1902). However, the film does not mention Méliès’ two children, his brother Gaston (who worked with Méliès during his film-making career), or his first wife Eugénie, who was married to Méliès during the time he made films (and who died in 1913). The film shows Méliès married to Jeanne d’Alcy during their filmmaking period, when in reality they did not marry until 1925. (read more here: Historical references)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0970179/

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188 – Kynodontas (2009)

Dogtooth (Greek: Κυνόδοντας, translit. Kynodontas) is a 2009 Greek film directed by Yorgos Lanthimos about a husband and wife who keep their children ignorant of the world outside their property well into adulthood. The film stars Christos Stergioglou, Michelle Valley, Angeliki Papoulia, Mary Tsoni, and Christos Passalis.

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IMDB

0177 – Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)

spacetime coordinates: 2001-2002  New York City

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close is a 2011 American drama film adaptation of the novel of the same name by Jonathan Safran Foer, directed by Stephen Daldry and written by Eric Roth.

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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0477302/

0159 – The Blue Notebooks

The Blue Notebooks is the second album by British producer/composer Max Richter, released on 26 February 2004 on 130701, an imprint of FatCat Records.

Richter composed The Blue Notebooks in the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He has described it as ‘a protest album about Iraq, a mediation on violence – both the violence that I had personally experienced around me as a child and the violence of war, at the utter futility of so much armed conflict.’ The album was recorded about a week after mass protests against the war.

The album features readings from Franz Kafka‘s The Blue Octavo Notebooks and Czesław Miłosz‘s Hymn of the Pearl and Unattainable Earth. Both readings are by the British actress Tilda Swinton.

wiki