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This has been a particularly brutal few weeks for passages. Leachman, King, Plummer, Holbrook. Dustin Diamond!?

I came across this interview with Larry King, on Blank on Blank, and laughed pretty hard. Cheered me up a bit.

Take care, everyone.

Giuseppe Rotunno at 97. For me, one of the greatest cinematographers who ever lived.

FrauBlucher wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:27 am Leon Spinks 67

There's something quintessential late 70's about Leon Spinks.
There's a terrific documentary Facing Ali (2009) in which Leon is one of 10 Ali opponents who look back at their lives and careers. Leon is pretty humorous and at the time was working at a soup kitchen in Texas (iirc) and seemed happy, a few years before his move to Las Vegas.

Dylan wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 7:30 pm Giuseppe Rotunno at 97. For me, one of the greatest cinematographers who ever lived.

I didn't realize he had done so much notable work beyond the films he shot for Italian filmmakers like Fellini and Visconti. The Leopard and Amarcord alone would put him in the pantheon, and of course you have Rocco and His Brothers, Fellini's Roma, etc., but then you have Mike Nichols (granted, not favorites, but Rotunno did his job pretty damn well on Carnal Knowledge and Wolf), All About Jazz, even The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, the poster child for great films that few involved can really enjoy because the experience of making it was so f-ing horrible.

Found this on The Leopard from an article in the American Society of Cinematographers by Ron Magid:

"Visconti's desire to use three cameras in the cramped laundry location where Rocco worked was particularly challenging, but Rotunno had the opposite problem while shooting the lush palazzo of landowner Prince Salina (Burt Lancaster) in The Leopard (1963). The climactic hour-long banquet scene, in which the Prince faces his decreasing power and influence in 19th-century Sicily, is considered one of cinema history's great setpieces, and was shot under strenuous circumstances.

"The sequence was filmed with three cameras in widescreen Super Technirama, within a real palazzo illuminated by thousands of candles. ‘To create the atmosphere, we studied all the painters of the 19th century and earlier,’ Rotunno said. ‘Although it wasn't very realistic, Visconti felt that the quality, density and direction of the candlelight represented the richness of the place.‘"

hearthesilence wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 11:32 pm

Dylan wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 7:30 pm Giuseppe Rotunno at 97. For me, one of the greatest cinematographers who ever lived.

... even The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, the poster child for great films that few involved can really enjoy because the experience of making it was so f-ing horrible.

Speaking of which, also Popeye! He seemed to be well suited to situations involving lavishly heightened artificiality. "The sunset almost looks painted on!", as one character says of the backdrop in And The Ship Sails On!

And Argento's Stendhal Syndrome from 1996 was one of his last credits, which is certainly quite different from the blocks of primary colour, gel-drenched heightened look of Luciano Tovoli's work on Suspiria, but perfect for a film that is about the grimy and viciously cruel outside world contrasting and clashing against the almost-as-dangerous ecstatically mind-scarring excesses of art, and maybe needing the real-world horror and abuse to occur in order to provide (provoke?) the creative impetus. That Pietà image in the final shot as the main character literally embodies her torment, if only for a suspended moment, is really what the entire film has been building to.

Director Moufida Tlatli https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moufida_Tlatli

Probably best know for The Silences of the Palace (1994)

Voiceover artist Robb Webb, the voice of 60 Minutes... and Fishing with John

Jean-Claude Carriere, 'Belle de Jour,' 'Tin Drum' Screenwriter, Dies at 89

Birth and That Obscure Object of Desire were two of my favorite watches of last year, certainly one of the greatest screenwriters to ever do it.

HinkyDinkyTruesmith wrote: Mon Feb 08, 2021 11:29 pm Jean-Claude Carriere, 'Belle de Jour,' 'Tin Drum' Screenwriter, Dies at 89

Birth and That Obscure Object of Desire were two of my favorite watches of last year, certainly one of the greatest screenwriters to ever do it.

Oh, god. Him and Tonino Guerra probably worked with more great directors than any other screenwriters during the sound era.

Oshima Nagisa. Bunuel. Philip Kaufmann. Schlondorff. Milos Forman. Louis Malle. Wayne Wang. It's absolutely incredible. His fiction books and
film studies are terrific as well.

You could quite seriously watch nothing but Jean-Claude Carrière and Tonino Guerra-scripted films and you’d still come away with the most incredible cross-section of great European cinema over the last six decades. And both men always came across as so disarmingly modest about their achievements, but neither had needed to prove anything for decades.

2021 has been pretty brutal and it's only February.

Mary Wilson of the Supremes

Carrière's passing was quite a shock. Such a talented creator who leaves us with so much material in various fields.

I recently finished reading one of his rare misfires, Le Réveil de Buñuel; he goes to LB's tomb, his old friend wakes up and they start talking. An intriguing premise except that he mostly rehashes old anecdotes and information, with few new insights. As an antidote to my disappointment, I was thinking of going back to some of his better efforts like his essay Le Film qu'on ne voit pas or Conversations sur l'invisible in wich he dialogues with two French astrophysicists.

And there are also all those movies he wrote, as well as video recordings of the theater productions he worked on, which will continue to challenge and delight viewers.

hearthesilence wrote: Tue Feb 09, 2021 8:07 am 2021 has been pretty brutal and it's only February.

Mary Wilson of the Supremes

I've always loved the Supremes ever since hearing them on oldies radio when I was a little kid; growing up and picking up one of their greatest-hits compilations I was just blown away by how consistent they were when Holland-Dozier-Holland was writing their singles. I read Wilson's book Dreamgirl a few years ago and found it quite compelling.

Elliot Mazer, the longtime producer and engineer who helped craft albums for Neil Young, Linda Ronstadt, and the Band. He is best known for producing multiple albums by Young, beginning with 1972’s Harvest, by far his most popular LP and the one that catapulted Young into superstardom. Mazer would later produce better, more harrowing works like the 1973 live LP Time Fades Away and the famous "lost" 1973 LP Homegrown which Young finally released last year. (IMHO, it's another masterpiece from his peak '70s run of albums.)

HinkyDinkyTruesmith wrote: Mon Feb 08, 2021 11:29 pm Jean-Claude Carriere, 'Belle de Jour,' 'Tin Drum' Screenwriter, Dies at 89

Birth and That Obscure Object of Desire were two of my favorite watches of last year, certainly one of the greatest screenwriters to ever do it.

He wrote Jess Franco's best film, THE DIABOLICAL DR Z.

dustybooks wrote: Tue Feb 09, 2021 1:55 pm

hearthesilence wrote: Tue Feb 09, 2021 8:07 am 2021 has been pretty brutal and it's only February.

Mary Wilson of the Supremes

I've always loved the Supremes ever since hearing them on oldies radio when I was a little kid; growing up and picking up one of their greatest-hits compilations I was just blown away by how consistent they were when Holland-Dozier-Holland was writing their singles. I read Wilson's book Dreamgirl a few years ago and found it quite compelling.

Same here. Icon(s). R.I.P.

dwk wrote: Wed Feb 10, 2021 11:01 pm Larry Flynt

Oh, shit. I know how polarizing he was, but I genuinely think he did a lot of good in his life. The First Amendment battles he fought have benefited all artists in
America. I love how he used his gubernatorial/presidential runs and money to smoke out Republican hypocrisy, too. He never took advertising money from cigarette companies, which still makes him alone in that regard among adult magazine publishers. The guy didn't just publish pornography, either. Flynt Publications had a lot of influential skateboarding and other lifestyle magazines.

As an aside, I had a professor in school who was a judge in one of Flynt's myriad of legal quandaries during the 80's AND the Robert Evans/Cotton Club fracas.
Just like in The People Vs. Larry Flynt, he did have some models dump cash on the courtroom floor for bail.

Didn't he offer some big money for someone to come forward with the Trump Russia pee tape?

beamish14 wrote: Wed Feb 10, 2021 11:29 pmThe First Amendment battles he fought have benefited all artists in America.

A titan of First Amendment rights, frankly, despite his frequent theatrics and general tastelessness. Gotta love how some of the obits refer to him condescendingly as a "self-styled" First Amendment advocate, etc. As if only the corporate mainstream media gets to anoint the true free speech heroes (that is, those who toe the line).

Whoah, jeez. His work with Miles Davis and the first few Return to Forever albums are unimpeachable. Did we know he was even sick?

soundchaser wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 10:28 pm Whoah, jeez. His work with Miles Davis and the first few Return to Forever albums are unimpeachable. Did we know he was even sick?

Just saw his FB page's announcement - it was a rare form of cancer that was only discovered very recently.

Just stunned and very sad.

I saw Chick Corea perform ten years ago with the Return to Forever band and he seemed beyond healthy and sharp. An absolute shock! I was literally listening to that first Return to Forever record in the morning. A lot of Corea can be incredibly corny like the Electrik Band stuff or Leprechaun, but actually love the earliest fusion stuff and the album he did with Gary Burton. There's also that brief period where he went free jazz (as did so many who went smooth later on like Bob James and Gato Barbieri) resulting in the incredible group Circle with Anthony Braxton, Barry Altschul and Dave Holland. The last two also collaborated with Corea on A.R.C., another wild album for its time. It also goes without saying his work with Miles Davis was so important to his electric period. Listen to any of his performances on the Miles at the Fillmore bootleg series released a few years ago. It's incredible!