movies

505 – Downsizing (2017)

spacetime coordinates: near future Norway / Nebraska2017-12-29-downsizingDownsizing is a 2017 american science fiction  / high-concept social satire / comedy-drama film directed by Alexander Payne, written by Payne and Jim Taylor and starring Matt DamonChristoph WaltzHong Chau, and Kristen Wiig. It tells the story of a couple who decide to undertake a newly-invented procedure to shrink their bodies so they can start a new life in an experimental community.

Starting with Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift, there exists a rich literature as well as many films dealing with mini-humans usually called dwarfs. The idea of shrinking human bodies in order to reduce the consumption of raw materials available on earth necessary for the life of mankind was presented for the first time in the novel Das Miniatom-Projekt (2006) by Richard M. Weiner. In the novel the miniaturization takes place at CERN by decreasing the sizes of atoms with the help of the world’s biggest particle accelerator, while in the Downsizing film the shrinkage is performed by bio-medical methods, by decreasing the sizes of cells.

Absolut-Vodka-Bottle-in-Downsizing-2

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1389072/

documentary, quotes

0479 – Human Flow (2017)

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Human Flow is a 2017 German documentary film co-produced and directed by Ai Weiwei about the current global refugee crisis. Ai Weiwei also comes from a past of displacement; his entire family was exiled to an isolate village of Xinjiang in the Gobi desert due to his parents being writers in the midst of the Cultural Revolution in China.

Like Human Flow, Ai has created similar art installations such as the “Law of the Journey” that features a 200 foot inflatable boat carrying 258 refugee figures, “Laundromat” where he filled a New York City gallery with discarded clothing and personal notes left by refugees in a camp in Idomeni Greece, and the recreation of the captured image of Aylan Kurdi, the young Syrian who drowned off the coast of Turkey.

Human Flow (7)Human Flow (8)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt6573444/

https://www.humanflow.com/

movies

0465 – The Handmaiden / Ah-ga-ssi (2016)

spacetime coordinates:  1930s South Korea / Japan

The Handmaiden (Hangul아가씨RRAgassilit. ”Lady”) is a 2016 South Korean erotic psychological thriller film directed by Park Chan-wook and starring Kim Min-heeKim Tae-riHa Jung-woo and Cho Jin-woong.  It is inspired from the novel Fingersmith by Welsh writer Sarah Waters, with the setting changed from Victorian era Britain to Korea under Japanese colonial rule.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4016934/

movies

0460 – Gok-seong / The Wailing (2016)

spacetime coordinates:  village in the mountains of South Korea  August 31, 2014 – February 28, 2015

The_Wailing-p1

The Wailing (Hangul: 곡성; Hanja: 哭聲; RR: Gokseong) is a 2016 South Korean supernatural horror film directed by Na Hong-jin about a policeman who investigates a series of mysterious killings and illnesses.

According to director Hong-jin Na, the movie was made on the base of folk religions in Korea, Shamanism in Nepal  and Catholic faiths.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5215952/

movies, Uncategorized

438 – garbage planet Sakaar

movies

0435 – The Eagle (2011)

spacetime coordinates: AD 140  Roman Britain > estate near Calleva (modern Silchester) in southern Britain territory of the Picts north of Hadrian’s Wall

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The Eagle is a 2011 epic historical drama film set in Roman Britain directed by Kevin Macdonald, and starring Channing TatumJamie Bell and Donald Sutherland. Adapted by Jeremy Brock from Rosemary Sutcliff‘s historical adventure novel The Eagle of the Ninth(1954), the film tells the story of a young Roman officer attempting to recover the lost Roman eagle standard of his father’s legion in Scotland. The story is based on the Ninth Spanish Legion‘s supposed disappearance in Britain.

hadrians wall the eagle

The film was an Anglo-American co-production. It may be considered a sequel to the film Centurion, written and directed by Neil Marshall, because Channing Tatum’s character in The Eagle is Marcus Flavius Aquila, the son of Titus Flavius Virilus who led the Ninth Legion that was lost in the far north of Britannia, and who was therefore the same person as Dominic West‘s character Titus Flavius Virilus in Centurion. Historically, the purported disappearance of the Ninth Legion in Northern Britain is a subject of debate and dispute

Macdonald intended the film to be historically authentic, but as little is certain about the tribes that the Romans encountered—they were generally Celtic peoples, though some may have been Picts—he made concessions. For example, the tribespeople spoke Gaelic, even though the language probably did not enter widespread use in the region until the 5th century AD;  Pictish is the more likely language to have been spoken at the time. “It’s the best we can do,” Macdonald said. “All you can do is build on a few clues and trust your own instincts. That way, no one can tell you you were wrong.”

Seal People chieftain

Macdonald described his view of the Seal people: “They were a more indigenous folk than the Celts, who were from farther south … They were probably small and dark, like the Inouit [sic], living off seals and dressed in sealskins. We are going to create a culture about which no one knows much, but which we will make as convincing as possible. We are basing it on clues gained from places like Skara Brae and the Tomb of the Eagles in Orkney, so that we will have them worshipping pagan symbols, like the seal and the eagle. The reason they have seized the emblem of the Roman eagle from the legion is because to them it [was] a sacred symbol.” (wiki)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1034389/

movies

0434 – The Legend of Tarzan (2016)

spacetime coordinates:  1889 Belgian Congo // London

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The Legend of Tarzan is a 2016 American adventure film based on the fictional character created by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Directed by David Yates, with a screenplay by Adam Cozad and Craig Brewer, the film stars Alexander Skarsgård as the title character, with Samuel L. JacksonMargot RobbieDjimon HounsouJim Broadbent and Christoph Waltz in supporting roles.

Making Africa seem authentic was especially important to the filmmakers, since the film was shot in England, except for six weeks in Gabon, filming background by helicopter without the cast. A working waterfall and a 100-foot-long collapsible pier were assembled at Warner Bros.’ Leavesden studios. Seven versions of the African jungle were constructed to show different scenery throughout the filming. Plants from Holland were mixed with trees sculpted by the art department. Kedleston Hall stood in for the Greystoke Manor, and a cedar tree on the grounds of Highclere Castle served as the setting for an early pivotal scene between Tarzan and Jane. (wiki)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0918940/