thirteen for fourteen

first tier

/disguised as a goodbye, a new beginning makes more sense
a new visual language in multiple dimensions
two ancients combined and transformed
new ones built from earth/

goodbye to language 3D

thou wast mild & lovely

the sleepwalker

second tier

/the static frame relaxes
the primal state of eroticism blinds
the rise of technology warps emotions/

/mundane communications evolve,
a star is humbled,
a master relaxed
&another perfects the image/

norte, the end of history

stranger by the lake

the heart machine

person to person

happy christmas
inherent vice

jealousy

third tier

/a true hollywood classic
&the politics it battles/

citizenfour

pompeii

(via chained and perfumed)

Lighting Over Water (Nicholas Ray and Wim Wenders, 1980)

Quick observation: countless documentaries, especially about artists, end-up being talking head documentaries which can provide intriguing insights into the artist but have no cinematic value. If these were turned into written interviews the effect would be exactly the same.

"There was theatre (Griffith), poetry (Murnau), painting (Rossellini), dance (Eisenstein), music (Renoir). Henceforth there is cinema. And the cinema is Nicholas Ray."
- Jean Luc Godard

If Nick Ray is cinema, a documentary about him certainly should have cinematic value (the opposite of talking head docs). This documentary manages to maintain purely cinematic; and perhaps one of the greatest films of all-time. A blend of reality and fiction (or simplystaged reality) that would be possible in no other medium.



Brilliant cutting between (raw, documentary) video [pictured above] and (highly aestheticized) 35mm film [pictured below] in a shot/reaction-shot.



An incredible look into the artistic process and the mind of a mad genius.

"Would you kill somebody for a great shot?" One of the last distinguishable quotes said in the epilogue by one of the students right before the end credits.