Director: Olivier Assayas

Irma Vep is a 1996 film directed by the French director Olivier Assayas, starring Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung (playing herself) in a story about the disasters that result as a middle-aged French film director (played by Jean-Pierre Léaud) attempts to remake Louis Feuillade‘s classic silent film serial Les vampires. Taking place as it does largely through the eyes of a foreigner (Cheung), it is also a meditation on the state of the French film industry.

The idea for the film was born out of an attempted collaboration among Assayas, Claire Denis, and Atom Egoyan, who wanted to experiment with the situation of a foreigner in Paris. In the 1915 original serial, written and directed by Louis Feuillade, Irma Vep was played by French silent film actress Musidora (1889–1957). Much of the film depicts set-related incidents that echo scenes in Truffaut‘s La nuit americaine (English title: Day for night), to which Irma Vep owes a large thematic debt.

However, Assayas publicly stated that although he considers La nuit americaine a great film, it is more about the fantasy of filmmaking than the reality. Assayas credits Rainer Werner Fassbinder‘s Beware of a Holy Whore as a greater inspiration.

Assayas married Cheung in 1998. They divorced in 2001. They again collaborated in 2004 on the film Clean. (wiki)

Dauði Baldrs (1997)

Dauði Baldrs (youtube) (Old Norse for “Baldr’s Death” or “The Death of Baldr”) is the fifth album by the Norwegian solo act Burzum. Unlike Burzum’s previous work, which was mostly black metal, this is a dark ambient album. It was recorded using a synthesizer and a normal tape recorder by Varg Vikernes while he was in prison, as he was not allowed to have any other instruments or recording equipment. The album has been described by many as “dungeon synth“.

The album is about the legacy of Baldr, the second son of Odin in Norse mythology. Most likely a concept album, as the whole album leads up to Ragnarök, the battle at the end of the world in Norse mythology.

“Illa tiðandi” is easily the most minimalist track, with only two sections being repeated over the 10:29 duration, which are both simple piano melodies, eventually accompanied by a choral chant. It is an alternative version of the song “Decrepitude I” (wiki)

Thulêan Mysteries (2020)

Thulêan Mysteries (youtube) is the twelfth and final studio album by Norwegian musical project Burzum.

Recorded as a soundtrack to Vikernes’ role-playing game MYFAROG, the album follows the post-prison era medieval/dark ambient musical style. Vikernes said of the album:

“Since my true passion has never been music, but actually tabletop role-playing games, I figured I should make this an album intended for that use; as background music for my own MYFAROG (Mythic Fantasy Role-playing Game).”