Carmen – PC? 22/11/14

November 24, 2014 | Posted by Peter Jakobsen | LIFE, MUSIC, Opera, Ulalume |

The WA Opera has achieved fame – no, sorry, infamy – by censoring smoking from its production of Carmen.  This due to pressure from their new sponsor, Healthway, an independent statutory body reporting to the WA Minister for Health, which according to its website “provides sponsorship to Sports, Arts and Community organisations to promote healthy messages, facilitate healthy environments, reduce the promotion of unhealthy messages, and increase participation in healthy activities … key priorities for Healthway are reducing harm from tobacco, reducing harm from alcohol, reducing obesity and promoting good mental health.” In view of this, we assume WA Opera…

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Nazi Philistines – Arthur Boyd – The Brians

November 24, 2014 | Posted by Peter Jakobsen | ART, HISTORY, Modern Music, MUSIC, POLITICS, Ulalume, WW2 |

Pyjamas

The Wall Street Journal reports that the art collection of Cornelius Gurlitt, who died on 6/5/14, has been bequeathed to a museum in Bern.  The collection included works looted by the Nazis and ‘assayed’ under the stewardship of Gurlitt’s father, Hildebrand: Matisse, Franz Marc, Monet and Renoir (which last perhaps suggests the basic philistine nature of the national socialists). German authorities famously carried out a home invasion of Gurlitt’s Augsburg home in 2012 and confiscated the art as, according to the WSJ, “Gurlitt sat shocked in a corner wearing his pyjamas.” This property was never returned to him but the…

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Sunset Boulevard

November 24, 2014 | Posted by Peter Jakobsen | Classic Film, Drama Film, FILM, THUMBNAIL REVIEWS |

(dir. Billy Wilder) (1950) Creepiest of black comedies as wisecracking opportunist from Ohio (William Holden) encounters Old Hollywood (Norma Desmond, aka Gloria Swanson) with her major-domo, Erich von Stroheim, with fatal results. This Paramount classic with a sensational script is still the very best film ever made about Hollywood. After this classic, the pictures got smaller. From Schwabs to the golf course at Bel Air, to Norma Desmond’s crumbling palazzo, this faded Sunset grandeur is vindication alone for olden golden Hollywood…

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The Insider

November 24, 2014 | Posted by Peter Jakobsen | Drama Film, FILM, THUMBNAIL REVIEWS |

(dir. Michael Mann) (1999) Cancer man and chemist Jeffrey Wigand (Russell Crowe) is shown the door but his erstwhile Big Tobacco employer strikes again when he breaches the confidentiality agreement. 60 Minutes producer and crypto-saint Lowell Bergman (Al Pacino) is busy inducing that in aid of the effort to expose what everyone already knows: smoking is bad for you. Compelling and clever; rich performances, particularly by Crowe and Christopher Plummer as the 60 Minutes host, Mike Wallace (both characters the most compelling throughout by far, because they face genuine, human, crises of conscience).  

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It’s A Wonderful Life

(dir. Frank Capra) (1946) Utopian dreamer George Bailey (James Stewart) receives a Dickensian gift as he prepares to jump off a bridge; a glimpse at local conditions if he’d never been born. Full of sentiment but not sentimental, TVC challenges you not to be reaching for your hankie by the conclusion.    

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