1146 – Baraka (1992)

Baraka is a 1992 non-narrative documentary film directed by Ron Fricke. The film is often compared to Koyaanisqatsi, the first of the Qatsi films by Godfrey Reggio for which Fricke served as the cinematographer. It is also the most recent film to be photographed in the 70mm Todd-AO format, and the first film ever to be restored and scanned at 8K resolution. (wiki)

Named after a Sufi word that translates roughly as “breath of life” or “blessing,” Baraka is Ron Fricke‘s impressive follow-up to Godfrey Reggio‘s non-verbal documentary film Koyaanisqatsi. Fricke was cinematographer and collaborator on Reggio’s film, and for Baraka he struck out on his own to polish and expand the photographic techniques used on Koyaanisqatsi. The result is a tour-de-force in 70mm: a cinematic “guided meditation” (Fricke’s own description) shot in 24 countries on six continents over a 14-month period that unites religious ritual, the phenomena of nature, and man’s own destructive powers into a web of moving images. Fricke’s camera ranges, in meditative slow motion or bewildering time-lapse, over the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, the Ryoan-Ji temple in Kyoto, Lake Natron in Tanzania, burning oil fields in Kuwait, the smoldering precipice of an active volcano, a busy subway terminal, tribal celebrations of the Maasai in Kenya, chanting monks in the Dip Tse Chok Ling monastery…and on and on, through locales across the globe. To execute the film’s time-lapse sequences, Fricke had a special camera built that combined time-lapse photography with perfectly controlled movements of the camera. In one evening sequence a desert sky turns black, and the stars roll by, as the camera moves slowly forward under the trees. The feeling is like that of viewing the universe through a powerful telescope: that we are indeed on a tiny orb hurtling through a star-filled void. The film is complemented by the hybrid world-music of Michael Stearns. ~ Anthony Reed, Rovi (rottentomatoes)

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1105

Manuscrit – Horae ad usum Romanum , dites Grandes Heures d’Anne de Bretagne Bourdichon, Jean (1457 ?-1521). Enlumineur

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Erbario: a 15th-century Herbal from Northern Italy

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1098 – Ladyhawke (1985)

timespace coordinates: 13th century  Southern Italy

“Are you flesh, or are you spirit? / I am sorrow.”

Ladyhawke is a 1985 American adventure | comedy | medieval fantasy film directed and produced by Richard Donner and starring Matthew Broderick, Rutger Hauer, and Michelle Pfeiffer.

The story is about a young thief who unwillingly gets involved with a warrior and his lady that are hunted by the Bishop of Aquila. As he comes to know about the couple’s past and secret, he finds himself determined to help them overcome the Bishop’s oppressions, both in arms and in the form of a demonic curse. (wiki)

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1083 – The Wind (2018)

timespace coordinates: the Western frontier of the late 1800’s

The Wind is a 2018 American supernatural western horror film directed by Emma Tammi in her directorial debut. The film was written by Teresa Sutherland. It stars Caitlin Gerard, Ashley Zukerman, Julia Goldani Telles and Miles Anderson. (wiki)

The character Emma seems to enjoy Gothic literature. Among the books from her collection that read aloud at various points in the film are Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Ann Radcliffe‘s The Mysteries of Udolpho.

imdb   /   rt

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“Towards evening, they wound down precipices, black with forest of cypress, pine and cedar, into a glen so savage and secluded, that, if Solicitude ever had local habitation, this might have been “her place of dearest residence”  (Ann Radcliffe)

1053 – True Detective (season 3 – 2019)

timespace coordinates: 1980 – 1990 – 2015, the Ozarks –  Arkansas

The third season of True Detective, an American anthology crime drama television series created by Nic Pizzolatto, was confirmed by HBO on August 31, 2017, and premiered on January 13, 2019. The story takes place in the Ozarks over three separate time periods, as partner detectives investigate a macabre crime involving two missing children. 

Mahershala Ali plays the lead role of detective Wayne Hays, while Stephen Dorff plays his partner detective Roland West. The season marks Pizzolatto’s directorial debut, with the series creator dividing up directing assignments with Jeremy Saulnier and Daniel Sackheim. Pizzolatto also serves as the showrunner and sole writer of the season, with the exception of the fourth and sixth episode, which he co-wrote with David Milch and Graham Gordy respectively. (wiki)

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1044 – The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)

timespace coordinates: ~ 1950’s Wigan,  Greater Manchester, England

Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit is a 2005 British-American stop-motion clay animation vegetarian horror film produced by Aardman Animations in partnership with DreamWorks Animation.  It was directed by Nick Park and Steve Box.

The Curse of the Were-Rabbit is part of the Wallace and Gromit series, created by Park. The film follows good-natured eccentric cheese-loving inventor Wallace and Gromit, his intelligent mute dog in their latest venture as pest control agents, as they come to the rescue of a village plagued by rabbits before an annual vegetable competition.

The film features an expanded cast of characters relative to the previous Wallace and Gromit shorts, with a voice cast including Helena Bonham Carter and Ralph Fiennes. It won a number of film awards including the Oscar for Best Animated Feature. (wiki)

imdb   /   rottentomatoes

1043 – The Wild Pear Tree / Ahlat Ağacı (2018)

timespace coordinates: 2010’s coastal Turkish town of ÇanakkaleThe Wild Pear Tree (Turkish: Ahlat Ağacı) is a 2018 Turkish drama film directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan. Rotten Tomatoes critical consensus reads, “The Wild Pear Tree uses a young man’s post-graduation experience to pose thoughtful, engaging questions about life in modern Turkey — and the rest of the world.”

According to Nuri Bilge Ceylan, The Wild Pear Tree is about a son’s unavoidable slide towards a fate resembling that of his father.

imdb   /  rottentomatoes