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AQUARELA takes audiences on a deeply cinematic journey through the transformative beauty and raw power of water. (…) From the precarious frozen waters of Russia‘s Lake Baikal to Miami in the throes of Hurricane Irma to Venezuela‘s mighty Angels Falls, water is AQUARELA’s main character, with director Victor Kossakovsky capturing her many personalities in startling visual detail. (rottentomatoes)
timespace coordinates: 1980’s New Jersey
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, often shortened to Buckaroo Banzai, is a 1984 American science fiction action/adventure film produced and directed by W. D. Richter and written by Earl Mac Rauch. The premise centers upon the efforts of the polymath Dr. Buckaroo Banzai, a physicist, neurosurgeon, test pilot, and musician, to save the world by defeating a band of inter-dimensional aliens called Red Lectroids from Planet 10. The film is a cross between the action/adventure and science fiction film genres and also includes elements of comedy and romance.
Buckaroo Banzai has been adapted for books, comics, and a video game and has attracted a loyal cult following. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: AMC describes the series as a “modern fable set in Long Beach, California about a disarmingly optimistic local ex-surfer, Dud (Wyatt Russell), who’s drifting after the death of his father and collapse of the family business.” In the first season, Dud joins a fraternal order known as the Order of the Lynx, hoping the Lodge can put him “on the path to recover the idyllic life he’s lost.”
Lodge 49 is an American comedy-drama television series created by Jim Gavin. It aired on the television network AMC in the United States from August 6, 2018, to October 14, 2019, spanning two seasons and 20 episodes.
The title alludes to the novella The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon, which Gavin references as an inspiration. (wiki)
Greener Grass is an 2019 American comedy film, written and directed by Jocelyn DeBoer and Dawn Luebbe in their feature directorial debuts, based on the 2015 short film of the same name (YOUTUBE). It stars DeBoer, Luebbe, Beck Bennett, Neil Casey, Mary Holland and D’Arcy Carden. (wiki)
DeBoer and Luebbe explained that the films of David Lynch, John Waters and 1960s and 1970s landscape photography was an influence. Visually the film is reminiscent of 80’s-music-video aesthetic / fashion aesthetics / 90’s infomercials.
«The Romans stole the alphabeta system from the Greeks through war», explains Rammellzee. «Then, in medieval times, monks ornamented letters to hide their meaning from the people. Now, the letter is armored against further manipulation.»
New York graffiti artist and B-boy theoretician Rammellzee (the artist encases himself during gallery performances in Gasholeer, a 148-pound, gadgetry-encrusted exoskeleton inspired by an android he painted on a subway train in 1981. Four years in the making, Rammellzee’s exuberantly low-tech costume bristles with rocket launchers, nozzles that gush gouts of flame, and an all-important sound system.)
«From both wrists, I can shoot seven flames, nine flames from each sneaker’s heel, and colored flames from the throat. Two girl doll heads hanging from my waist and in front of my balls spit fire and vomit smoke… The sound system consists of a Computator, which is a system of screws with wires. These screws can be depressed when the keyboard gun is locked into it. The sound travels through the keyboard and screws, then through the Computator, then the belt, and on up to the four mid-range speakers (with tweeters). This is all balanced by a forward wheel from a jet fighter plane. I also use an echo chamber, Vocoder, and system of strobe lights. A coolant device keeps my head and chest at normal temperature. A 100-watt amp and batteries give me power.»
«slanguage» – a heavily encrypted hip-hop argot – is the linguistic equivalent of graffiti «tags» all over the mother tongue. In an essay on English as the imperial language of the Internet, the cultural critic McKenzie Wark argues for the willful, viral corruption of the lingua franca of global corporate monoculture as a political act.
timespace coordinates: 2000’s Redmond, Washington – Laconia, New Hampshire – Hollywood, Florida
The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters is a 2007 American documentary film about competitive gaming directed by Seth Gordon. It follows Steve Wiebe in his attempts to take the high score record for the 1981 arcade game Donkey Kong from the previous holder, Billy Mitchell. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: 1969 Los Angeles
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is a 2019 comedy-drama film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It features a large ensemble cast led by Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie, Emile Hirsch, Margaret Qualley, Timothy Olyphant, Austin Butler, Dakota Fanning, Bruce Dern, and Al Pacino. The film follows an actor and his stunt double, as they navigate the changing film industry, and features “multiple storylines in a modern fairy tale tribute to the final moments of Hollywood’s golden age” (wiki)
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