Author Archive: Peter Jakobsen
The Coldest Winter
(David Halberstam) (2007) Through the noise of Vietnam and Iraq, we fail to hear and heed the still reverberating conflict in Korea, under armistice since 1953 but technically open. David Halberstam, in his last book, brilliantly recounts the manoeuvres and ideologies at play, and beyond the recounting of the bloody and appalling battles, informed by a decade’s worth of interviews of the high and the low, and supplemented by excellent maps, shows the political shadows cast by the conflict on American policy, such as the stance vis-á-vis China, only corrected after a generation of isolationism, and the consignment to irrelevance, for almost a…
Continue Reading →American Visions
Copley could paint a nice lady; couldn't paint a shark
(Robert Hughes) (1997) Hughes was one of those big, bold, Jesuitical, learned men of the arts whom we sorely need and miss. This book, and the series on which it is based, is crammed with Hughes’ invariably wise, precise and yet loving take on American Art. He took up a role as Time’s art critic in 1970 and those who are old enough to have actually read Time recall his brilliant and generally fair opinions on the world of contemporary art. This wonderful review is as good as his seminal The Shock of the New but wiser and less hurried. If you…
Continue Reading →The Adventures of Robin Hood
(Dir. Michael Curtiz, William Keighley) (1938) It might be a wall of corn, but as they say in showbiz, “the colour of corn is Gold”. This is the lushest, most colourful, most joyous blood-and-thunder adventure ever to burst out of Hollywood in the Golden Age, a filmed comic book that puts modern actioners in the shade. It has been written that Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland were very much in unrequited love, and this shines forth in the film. Olivia is pretty as a picture and she glows here, without the treacle-and-vanessa-redgrave emoting she sheds in, say,…
Continue Reading →The Curse of ”The Sound of Music”
(Dir. Robert Wise) (1965) We’re sorry, but we can only watch The Sound of Music in 15 minute increments. Any more attracts a risk of type-two diabetes. This cloying, sacchariferous, candied, 174-minute dollop of goo would have received one or less review stars from us, but for the superb cinematography, sweeping over and around the chocolate-box town of Salzburg and its surrounding mountains, and the overall production values, which are first-rate. The (bizarre and stupefying) success of both the stage musical and the film have led to endless revivals around the globe, the mawkish meld of Nuns, Nazis and warbling infants a seemingly irresistible combo. We are…
Continue Reading →Great Hall
Ceiling of the Great Hall of the People (Photo by Forezt)
Late editions The Great Hall The Varnished Culture‘s nourishing mother has sent news it will build a Great Hall by 2017. This Maoist-sounding edifice is to have courts for various ball games, a swimming pool, a yoga area and gym – all the things a world-class university needs. “The Great Hall has been designed to artfully blend into the streetscape.” Alumni, staff and supporters are invited to “embed themselves in the DNA of the Great Hall” and have your name woven, etched and displayed in 3 dedicated spaces and sculptural forms, together with three personally chosen inspirational words. It seems appropriate…
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